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, Sat, 26 Mar 1994, part 1
Sender: Henk.Langeveld@Holland.Sun.COM
Content-Return: Prohibited
Precedence: junk
X-RQ-ID: Intro
This is the RuneQuest Daily Bulletin, a mailing list on
the subjects of Avalon Hill's RPG and Greg Stafford's
world of Glorantha. It is sent out once per day in digest
format.
More details on the RuneQuest Daily and Digest can be found
after the last message in this digest.
---------------------
From: 100270.337@CompuServe.COM (Nick Brooke)
Subject: Glorious ReAscent
Message-ID: <940325102906_100270.337_BHL23-1@CompuServe.COM>
Date: 25 Mar 94 10:29:07 GMT
X-RQ-ID: 3412
Some Glorious ReAscent queries came up:
CF> Was Arraz mentioned in any previous source? I don't recall him.
Carl Fink is a God Learner: I'll give him a God Learner's answer.
Try finding "Lux" in GRoY. He's prominent enough in Gods of Fire and Light
and the Prosopaedia. In a limited way, "Arraz" is probably the Dara Happan
name for the God Learners' "Lux". Note that one of his titles is "King of
the Luxites"...
Also note that the Gods Wall identifications are those made by Plentonius:
only an arch-conservative Dara Happan would both know them and assume them
always to be correct. Me, I doubt the published identification of some of
the most prominent figures on the Gods Wall. If you have a problem with
anything in the Glorious ReAscent, try thinking your way through it: why
does Plentonius want to say it that way?
JB> The Dara Happans had a time reckoning even before Time. So did most
JB> (if not all) of the other peoples. This means that Godtime before the
JB> Compromise cannot have differed too much from Time.
Balls, Joerg. Plentonic Dating was invented in the third century ST, and
applied retrospectively. Your inference is not necessarily correct. Maybe
"regnal years" of some kind were recorded for, say, the Anaxial Emperors,
but it does not follow that these are in any way identical to the modern
"post-Compromise" years of Time. The sources for Plentonic dating are two
suspiciously round numbers found in fragments of poetry. If I tried basing
Israelite history on the nursery-rhyme "Solomon Grundy, born on a Monday"
(etc.), they'd put me away...
Of course, our only source for the assumed date of the inner transformation
(aka. "fall") of the Red Moon (1725 ST) is a children's nursery rhyme. But
I don't necessarily believe that one, either: look at the implausible life
spans it would require!
The "parallels" you see with Kralori emperors are an unconvincing work of
God Learning. Better to deal with each of these self-contained systems in
isolation: you'll confuse yourself less that way. If the two cultures had
any plausible prehistoric connection, maybe there'd be something in this.
But I can't think of any.
JB> In my reading, the monster which swallowed Heler can have been the
JB> dome over Dara Happa which covered the Blue Dragon aka Oslir River.
I like this interpretation a lot. Although it's God Learner nonsense...
JB> The goat (GW3-20) seems to be one animal out of many, no bad (brooic)
JB> associations in Dara Happa.
Why does this come as such a surprise to you? We don't all share Orlanthi
taboos on ritually unclean foodstuffs, any more than we share Dara Happan
notions of what constitutes decent clothing, or the Praxian concept of
socially acceptable behaviour...
====
Nick
====
---------------------
From: watson@computing-science.aberdeen.ac.uk (Colin Watson)
Subject: Counting of years before Time
Message-ID: <9403251555.AA02262@condor>
Date: 25 Mar 94 15:55:52 GMT
X-RQ-ID: 3413
_____
Joerg speculated about tGRoY:
> 1. Interesting fact: counting of years before Time
> The Dara Happans had a time reckoning even before Time. So did most (if
> not all) of the other peoples. This means that Godtime before the
> Compromise cannot have differed too much from Time.
That's interesting. From which perspective is the information presented?
(Sad to say I don't have a copy of the Glorious Reascent to judge for myself.)
Is it presented as a definitive statement of the Way Things Really Are/Were?
Or is it saying that this is just the way that third-age Darra Happans view
their history? In the latter case I think it may deliberately be misleading.
I wouldn't be surprised if the Darra Happans projected their ideas of time
onto their mythic "past" so they can make more sense of it: it isn't necessarily
how things in Godtime are at all; it's just the only way they can rationalise
Godtime - considering it simply as part of their pre-history.
The events in Godtime are Myths by definition, hence they are subject
to change depending upon what people believe at the time. The Myths which are
"true" in one century do not necessarily stay true in following centuries.
Hence Godtime is subjective in Time: it changes from day to day.
For me, portraying Godtime simply as pre-history robs it of so much of its
appeal.
___
CW.
---------------------
From: sandyp@idcube.idsoftware.com (Sandy Petersen)
Subject: re: RQ Daily
Message-ID: <9403251704.AA14820@idcube.idsoftware.com>
Date: 25 Mar 94 05:04:12 GMT
X-RQ-ID: 3414
Greg Fried asks:
>Can't tigers and lions interbreed?
Yes, but the offspring is not fertile, and can't produce
further offspring on its own. Like a mules and hinnies which, except
for rare exceptions, cannot breed.
In any case, the laws of nature in Glorantha are certainly
different. But we know that creatures don't go around mating
indiscriminately in Glorantha (unlike, say, Xanth), so some version
of interspecies incompatibility persists. Of course, the
incompatibility is probably mythological rather than physiological.
Everyone knows that Telmori can mate with wolves and have fertile
offspring. I doubt that any other humans can. Plus no doubt if
someone else performed a ritual to be able to mate with a wolf, the
child would probably be a weird mutant instead of a "normal"
werewolf. Of course, Telmori can mate with other humans and produce
normal offspring, too.
Guy Robinson sez:
>I have a view which people might find disturbing with gaming
>material when I find holes ... I make it up.
My hero. I wish more people felt free to do this with
Glorantha. I suppose this general reluctance is the fault of Greg and
myself.
>Footnote: I have bought the RQ3 Troll Pack and even with River of
>Cradles I feel that I need more info on Northern Prax and Adari,
>taking into account the invasion of Sartar and the extablishment of
>the Grantlands. Can anyone provide me with some brief suggestions?
Alas. I can't help feeling a bit betrayed, given your earlier
comment. What, exactly, does Northern Prax consist of, in your
opinion? The land from Tada's Tumulus north to Shadow's Dance?
Pam Carlson sez: tons of stuff that back up my own points about
species crossbreeding. She looked at it from a genetics viewpoint,
while I looked at it from a taxonomic and behavioral viewpoint.
Thanks.
Jesper Wahrner
> I feel that roleplaying an orthodox mostali would be very much like
> roleplaying an intelligent robot
To each his own. I prefer playing them with personalities and
emotions, but very different ones.
Joerg Baumgartner writes an interesting comparison of Solar gods and
Kralori Emperors.
Seems to me that the comparison holds pretty good up to
Shargash/Daruda. Maybe that's where the split took place between the
two cultures (Daruda was not a god of war and destruction). As you
state, maybe this was the start of the Lesser Darkness -- a good time
for the split to occur.
For what it's worth, you mention "Shang-Hsa the God Learner". When I
originally wrote about him, my intent was that he NOT be a God
Learner. I think the False Dragon Ring's names are not honored as
emperors, even evil ones. I believe Shang-Hsa May-His-Name-Be-Cursed
to be a First Age emperor who ruled during the Sunstop.
---------------------
From: ANDERSJC@howdy.Princeton.EDU
Subject: "Racism"
Message-ID: <9C6EC6856@howdy.princeton.edu>
Date: 25 Mar 94 21:06:48 GMT
X-RQ-ID: 3415
This is being posted for Paul Anderson, on Janet Anderson's account:
On 'Racism' and the inherently racist subtext of RuneQuest
Remember, many _Gloranthans_ are racist. This should not be a surprise.
Cultural groups provide their members with an armoury of justifications for the
superiority of the group and the inferiority of all other known groups. This
is a survival mechanism for the group, as well as a corollary from the obvious
fact that the group does things Right (and other ways are therefore Wrong).
Some members of civilized cultures (not all) are sufficiently self-conscious to
doubt, or urbane enough not to employ, some of these justifications; but this
leaves out the vast majority of Gloranthans. 'Racism' is the use of inheritable
characteristics to hold other groups inferior, and most Gloranthans who can
distinguish themselves by such characteristics probably do. For example. the
Praxian Agimori view everyone else as too weak/pale/short to be Real Humans;
and almost all humans view trolls as dirty and savage _by_nature_.
While I'm on the subject, of course trolls don't eat their young. (Trollkin
are Other, and therefore inferior.) In fact, humans are inferior to trolls, not
only because they spoil good hunting, but because humans take thoughtless risks
with their young ones - like making them play outside.
P.S. I do not believe that Professor Tolkien was racist; rather the contrary.
He was lower-upper=middle class, like Orwell and Kipling, and there may well be
projections of *class* prejudice, but that's different.
---------------------
From: joe@sartar.toppoint.de (Joerg Baumgartner)
Subject: Arraz
Message-ID:
Date: 26 Mar 94 07:03:32 GMT
X-RQ-ID: 3416
Carl Fink in X-RQ-ID: 3406
> I've just received my copy of the _Glorious Reascent_. Was Arraz
> mentioned in any previous source? I don't recall him. To me,
> introducing a new brother for Yelm at this point is like having the
> murderer first appear ten pages before the end of a mystery story.
In my reading, he was there in the Prosopaedia under the name of Lux.
His title is King of the Luxites.
Like Kolat, Arraz is counted among the orginal sons of the element, but
not worshipped as a leader. At least we needn't blame the God Learners
for his existence, since Peloria had been shielded from them by the
EWF, Carmania and Dorastor.
Generally, the Dara Happans use strange names. We are told that Vadrus
is an old enemy of the Yelm pantheon, but this name doesn't show up
once in GRoY.
What is interesting is that, with Arraz, the number of Aether's sons
amounts five, with Umath the last and greatest (a member of the
Celestial Court, everywhere outside of Dara Happa). Likewise Orlanth is
the last and greatest of the Air gods.
--
-- Joerg Baumgartner joe@sartar.toppoint.de
---------------------