To me, it seems that there is a question to be asked about what stories we want to tell in Glorantha. Do we want to have confusing and uncertain secession conflicts when the Red Emperor dies, with all the political broohaha that follows from several factions of loyal Lunars manoeuvreing and fighting, each convinced they're on the right side because they're _all_ on _a_ right side? Or do we want the mantle of emperorhood to pass from one Mask to another without a hitch?[*] If we want the former, the RMM position is clearly better; if the latter, Martin's is better.
Personally, I like my Glorantha to be complex and interesting. Plus, as has been pointed out, the Lunar philosophy is based on obscuring, twisting, and hiding the truth, and knowing that mutually contradictory facts are all true. So I vote for the the RMM view! Hurrah!
[*] Both positions allow conflict with various parts of the Empire not wanting to be parts of the Empire any more and using the flux of secession as a chance to move while no-one's looking, so that can't differentiate the positions.
And James Frusetta wrote:
> And the other question: can the RE use a *non*-human to comprise his
> mortal body? I'm assuming it hasn't been done and probably isn't
> possible, but can you actually *have* a Troll RE, Elf RE, Broo RE, etc?
> (The mind boggles at a Broo emperor and his proxies: "Okay, you're for
> sheep, and you're for cows, and you're for goats, and you're for the
> *front* of sheep, and...").
This had me in stitches. I've got this wonderful mental image of the new broo RE, sitting in a large, elegant audience chamber in Glamour dishing out the Proxy tasks while the cream of the Lunar nobility look on, horrified. And looking even more horrified when _they_ get chosen as the Front of Sheep Proxy.
Neil.
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