Re: Sacred Days in an Army

From: Julian Lord <julian.lord_at_wanadoo.fr>
Date: Sat, 20 Jul 2002 12:48:26 +0200

Wesley :

Actually, I think this is the wrong list for this kind of question, and you should take it to the HeroWars yahoogroup ... ;-)

> I was just reviewing the various holy days that the Orlanthi attend
> and came up with a question that I couldn't quite answer.
>
> This question would apply to any army in Glorantha.
>
> The 28 major days are attended by all heortlings. What happens if the
> Free Army of Sartar is besieging Furthest when Reaping Day comes
> along. Obviously the entire army can't abandon the siege lines to
> attend ceremonies.

IMO this is mainly an issue of sensible vs non-sensible gameplay, not a Glorantha-Digest-type existential one.

To start with, the "all" in the statement, "The 28 major days are attended by all heortlings", is an Orlanthi all.

Most importantly though, is that the cycle of holy days is the _normal_ procedure of ordinary life : that the Hero Wars will disrupt. If the entire army can't abandon the siege lines to attend ceremonies, well then, they just _can't_. So they don't.

> Would it be acceptable for the initiates to rotate
> through during the day? Devotees and priests have to spend all day
> doing their thing and so would be out of action for the duration.

Possibly, your mistake here is to look at these holy days like a straightjacket. Wrong. They have several purposes (but not that one : the Orlanthi are NOT Yelmites ... ) :

1. Background info to illustrate day-to-day life, provide scenario hooks, and a base for HeroQuesting
2. Info for the Narrator, so that if a HD is missed (such as the above case), then he can maybe ask for a community test of some sort, to see if disaster befalls
3. Sources of internal conflict to make the game more interesting : what's more important : this siege, or our crops and our winter bread ?

So you see, wrong list : take it to HeroWars !!

> This could prove problematical for the initiates if all of the priests
> are tied up unless they could fudge their time and start in batches to
> serve the initiates.
>
> Thoughts?

d) Creative solutions are of course possible :"Darn ! All our guys are tied up in the siege, but Valind predicts a loooooooong hard winter ... :-( Hmmm, maybe you guys an gals could do the HD ceremonies as a HeroQuest ? Our clan _really_ needs to do these two things at the same time right now ... Good luck !! ;-) "

Or even :

e) Just ignore it, and it'll go away ...

Julian Lord

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