Bell Digest v930604p3

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Date: Fri, 4 Jun 93 17:15:55 +0200
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From: RuneQuest-Request@Glorantha.Holland.Sun.COM (RQ Digest Maintainer)
To: RuneQuest@Glorantha.Holland.Sun.COM (Daily automated RQ-Digest)
Reply-To: RuneQuest@Glorantha.Holland.Sun.COM (RuneQuest Daily)
Subject: RuneQuest Daily, Fri, 04 Jun 1993, part 3
Precedence: junk
Status: O

The RuneQuest Daily and RuneQuest Digest deal with the subjects of
Avalon Hill's RPG and Greg Stafford's world of Glorantha.

Send submissions and followup to "RuneQuest@Glorantha.Holland.Sun.COM",
they will automatically be included in a next issue.  Try to change the
Subject: line from the default Re: RuneQuest Daily...  on replying.

Selected articles may also appear in a regular Digest.  If you 
want to submit articles to the Digest only,  contact the editor at
RuneQuest-Digest-Editor@Glorantha.Holland.Sun.COM.

Send enquiries and Subscription Requests to the editor:

RuneQuest-Request@Glorantha.Holland.Sun.COM (Henk Langeveld)

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From: grendel@sfsuvax1.sfsu.edu (John Castellucci)
Subject: New Fanzine!
Message-ID: <9306031722.AA14852@sfsuvax1.sfsu.edu>
Date: 3 Jun 93 03:22:43 GMT
X-RQ-ID: 953

------------------------------------------------------------------------
Announcing a new RuneQuest fanzine!

RQ Adventures  (published 3 times a year)

Dedicated to exploring the world of Glorantha through original material.

   The 1st issue is now available and contains a full length scenario,
Escape From Duckland.  The adventure is 32 pages of excitement including
10 full encounter descriptions, 8 fully described characters for use as
PCs or NPCs, encounter stats, player handouts, maps and more! Set in Sartar,
the adventure describes a journey from Apple Lane south to Holy Country.

"I love it!" - Ken Rolston

RQ Adventures is professionally typeset and printed -- issue 1 is 32
pages saddle stapled + cardstock cover (same format as TOTRM).

Issue 1 is $5.00US for United States residents (postage included)
           $6.00US for foreign (no foreign currency accepted)

Make checks payable to:  John Castellucci

and send to:             RQ Adventures Fanzine
                         2006 22nd Ave.
                         San Francisco, CA
                         94116  USA
------------------------------------------------------------------------

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From: joe@sartar.toppoint.de (Joerg Baumgartner)
Subject: Runic Concordances revisited
Message-ID: 
Date: 4 Jun 93 08:28:37 GMT
X-RQ-ID: 954

-- 
--  Joerg Baumgartner   joe@sartar.toppoint.de

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From: STEVEG%55661@uunet.UU.NET (Steve Gilham)
Subject: A quiet boggle or two
Message-ID: <01GYYLS7UDKI004RMS@UG.EDS.COM>
Date: 3 Jun 93 17:25:38 GMT
X-RQ-ID: 955

Greg Fried asks:-
>Graeme slams my idea of a 'combat sense' too!  OK, OK!  But to get back to
>the more pressing question: how DO we encourage more interesting combats and
>the use, by PCs, of more skills in combat beside that one weapon they've
>trained up so assiduously?!                           ^^^

And this for RQ, the notorious game of "I've hit with my broadsword, now pass 
me my mace." !?  The answer is one of those elusive things - it could be 
applied to any RPG, but I think the desire and incentives needed will vary 
from player group to player group.


Joerg Baumgartner (re sorcery & divine magic)
>Exactly this is what gave sorcery a bad name among RQ2-players! (I've got  
>a discussion running on that in Free INT) The easiest way around this is:  
>Forbid it when GMing. (BTW, game balance and feel is destroyed by Rune  
>Levels with Shield 10 and Truesword plus Bladesharp 6, too...)

Sorcery was indeed blatant; I think many people still mapped the 4 point 
stacking maximum from RQ2 onto the RQ3 system.  I can't say I was entirely 
happy with the change.  It was bad enough having characters w/iron plate + 
shield 4 + protection 4 (=22-23 points) under RQ2; but RQ3 took that limit 
away from us too.


Generally on sorcery - I fear that we are going to be stuck with the 
one-size-fits-all generic mythic-Europe system of RQ3 for reasons only of 
backward compatibility with a system that no-one really likes & has no 
Gloranthan feel to it.  Heck, even the Magic-world sorcery system was better 
than the RQ3 one, within its limitations.

Given the almost total revision of RQ2 characters under RQ3 (take away all 
that Divine Intervention you put your body & spirit on the like to earn POW 
for & replace it with Ceremony which you could havestayed safe at home to 
learn), and the fact that sorcerers in published material languish primarily 
in the non-Gloranthan material, I'd be quite happy to see a system which 
required reshuffling existing sorcerers into something more runic.


>I don't quite undestand what you mean with "A POW spirit with 10 points of 
>power effectively doubles one's spirit magic ability". The chance for a 
>success stays the same, only benefit is that you keep your own magic 
>points for defense and overcoming purposes.

I think the point being made is that you can cast far more spells effectively 
(I'd say a 10 POW spirit would more like treble the spell casting 
effectiveness of a POW12-14 character - think of it - 10 disrupts or befuddles 
 w/o losing ability to overcome targets resistance)





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From: dustin@ocf.Berkeley.EDU (Dustin Tranberg)
Subject: Duration and sorcery
Message-ID: <199306040930.AA17340@earthquake.berkeley.edu>
Date: 3 Jun 93 19:30:37 GMT
X-RQ-ID: 956


First of all, I _like_ RQIII Sorcery, AND the fatigue rules, hah!  Anyway...

joe@sartar.toppoint.de (Joerg Baumgartner) writes:

>>Dustin Tranberg writes:

>> How about if long-duration 
>> sorcery holds the MPs used until the spell wears off? 

>I'm afraid this won't quite work since it would not allow the use of magic 
>point matrices/dead crystals. Things would be different for a warded 
>spell, as suggested earlier. In this case I can imagine a POW-spirit or a 
>magic point storage device being blocked by the ongoing ward. It's similar 
>to a Ghoul spirit's POW being blocked while incorporated - no magic points 
>regainable. So you might view such a ward as an undead?

Actually, I'm not clear on what is meant by a "warded" spell, perhaps
because my RQ experience begins and ends with RQIII.  Explain, please?

Anyway, Graeme Lindsell muses on the same idea (I _think_ it's Graeme):

>This may actually be too limiting, since storage crystals (that can't 
>regenerate MP) would only be of use casting instant spells: a sorcerer 
>would need a LOT of power spirits.

I don't see how MP storage devices are useless for this long-term
expenditure of points (as long as the spell stays on).  The way I'm
thinking of this, the sorceror could use his 11-point battery to throw
a long-duration spell, and only lose the use of the *battery* for the
duration of the spell, rather than losing use of his own personal
MPs or incapacitating a POW spirit for the same amount of time.

It strikes me that MP storage would actually be pretty useful for this
method.

Dustin