Bell Digest v940523p2

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, Mon, 23 May 1994, part 2
Sender: Henk.Langeveld@Holland.Sun.COM
Content-Return: Prohibited
Precedence: junk


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From: Argrath@aol.com
Subject: Replies; jewel-bird
Message-ID: <9405211521.tn350757@aol.com>
Date: 21 May 94 19:21:29 GMT
X-RQ-ID: 4097

Nick writes:
>A while back, Martin wrote: 
>> I guess if you can't defend your position from within
published material, 
>> you'll have to invent it.   

>And I still can't work out if this was a celebration of
creativity and  >imagination, or a sneering put-down. 

Gee, Nick, how do you mean that? .  I hope those aren't my only two choices.  How
about interpreting it as a simple statement of fact?  Or how
about the following translation: "Gee whillickers, why didn't you
say at the *outset* that you were making it up out of whole
cloth, instead of claiming that it was derived from published
works, thus causing us to spill needless electrons on the screen
arguing over whether it was or not?"

David Dunham:
Would it be fair to say that your East Ralios Orlanthi are much
like Dark Age Irish, at least to the extent that we can fill in
some of the details with Pagan Shore?

I agree that some more useful stuff would be nice to see on the
Daily, as opposed to 'Tis/'Tisn't/'Tis.  Although I think I've
been doing my part, I'll keep on keeping on with the following,
which I wrote when Mike Dawson thought he could get AH to do
something along the lines of the old Plunder:

The Jewel-Bird
DESCRIPTION
     A hummingbird made of gems.  It is ruby-throated, the green
of its wings and head is emerald, the black markings and beak are
obsidian, and the white of its body is white jade with green
tint, all carved to resemble feathers.  Its eyes are clear
diamonds.  It is seven centimeters long, with a twelve centimeter
wingspan.  It weighs about 60 grams.

ORIGIN
     This was the work of a Second Age Arkati craftsman named
Wilchia.  He lived and worked most of his life in the court of
the king of Handra.  He made several of these birds for his
patron, who gave them away as gifts to foreign potentates.  As a
result, a jewel-bird could turn up almost anywhere.

KNOWLEDGE
     Stories of the Marvelous Jewel-Bird, and the sorrow it has
caused, are popular in some parts of Maniria.  In the most common
version of the story, the bird caused kinstrife which ended with
a king and his six sons dead, and the kingdom in ruins.  A blind
troll then makes off with the bird, but does not know its command
word.
     A few people know that there is more than one.
     Yelm, Yelmalio, and other solar cultists see the bird as
blasphemous.  They may try to free the spirit in the bird,
believing that it must be a bird spirit.

POWERS
     The bird is primarily a toy.  It is said to banish grief and
despair, but that is not always true.  It delights those who can
appreciate it.  It annoys people who can only think about the
waste of magical resources going into something trivial.
     The bird has a brass frame inside, enchanted to hold a bird
spirit.  A command word activates the bird, and causes it to fly. 
Due to the restrictions in the enchantment, this is the only
magical effect that can occur.  One cannot target spells against
the spirit without putting a hole in the bird first.  
     When someone says the command word, the spirit in the bird
casts its spells.  Animate Brass makes the bird flap its wings as
fast as a real hummingbird would, but the bird flies through use
of the sorcerous Fly spell.  The spirit sees the world through a
Sight Projection.  The spirit has INT 13, POW 18.  It knows its
three spells at 95%, and knows none of the sorcerous manipulation
skills.  It acts just like a real hummingbird, and has a tendency
to wander away if it can.  In the stories about it, this is how
the trouble starts.
     There is another spirit in the object, in a POW spirit
binding enchantment.  It has POW 18.

PROCEDURE
     Make a brass frame and put a magic spirit and a power spirit
binding enchantment on it.  The magic spirit should know Animate
Brass, Fly, and Sight Projection.  Then craft a king's ransom
worth of gems to look like feathers and attach them to the frame. 
Then make a user restriction on the binding enchantment so that
no one but the enchanter can use it, and "attack" and "target"
conditions that cause the spirit to cast its spells when someone
speaks the command word.  Link the magic spirit enchantment to
the POW spirit enchantment.


--Martin


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From: ddunham@radiomail.net (David Dunham)
Subject: RQ questions
Message-ID: <199405220130.AA01918@radiomail.net>
Date: 22 May 94 01:30:10 GMT
X-RQ-ID: 4098

>From: habowman@magnus.acs.ohio-state.edu (Hal Bowman)
>I am a humble neophyte who is now totally lost about what has
>happened with RQ.  Instead of bothering the experts on this list with my
>naive questions, could someone tell me where I can write for answers to
>really basic rule and culture questions?

So you'd rather bother experts not on the list? No seriously, ask them
here, we all might be illuminated.

I'm not sure what you mean by "happened with RQ." It's a game by Chaosium,
published by Avalon Hill (who just put out a cheaper, one-volume printing
of the rules). Most of the discussion on this list is not actually about
RuneQuest, but about Glorantha, the world associated with RQ. (Nothing
forces you to play RQ in Glorantha, and there are several supplements set
in Fantasy Earth or generic settings.)

>From: JAJ@roadnet.ups.com (JAJ)
>My question is: How do your campaigns build up your PC's skills, magic, 
>personality, history, etc. while PLAYING (adventuring and living) and not 
>mainly by bookkeeping (training, apprenticeships, and the like)?

We always spent a lot of time training. You can bring some element of play
into this unplayed time by using the catchup tables in RQ Cities (those are
my tables, even if Midkemia forgot to give me credit).

I see nothing wrong with abstracting large amounts of time and just playing
out the interesting bits.


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From: WALLMAN@VAX2.Winona.MSUS.EDU (Close friend of Little Elvis)
Subject: scholar/gamer debate fodder
Message-ID: <01HCM7O3QHEQ00B5FO@VAX2.Winona.MSUS.EDU>
Date: 21 May 94 17:13:56 GMT
X-RQ-ID: 4099

> From: fletcher@u.washington.edu (Brent Krupp)
> I will end this ramble, but also let me encourage people who agree with 
> Devin to *not* use email, but share your feelings with the list. If there 
> are a bunch of 'lurkers' out there who have been intimidated into 
> ssilence by the impenetrable Gloranthan scholar discussions, please let 
> your voice be heard.

Okay, I also agree with Devin.  RQ has become a slippery slope.  I
also will also stick my neck out and say that the daily is sometimes
unrecognizable as a discussion group about a game and its world.  

I have exchanged email with people who also wish the daily was simply
more useful.  Anyone get the Chaosium digest?  It does not have long
discussions of "How do people really become initiates of Cthulhu?" or
"Is the Shub-Niggarath worshipped in India the same Shub-Niggarath
worshipped in England?"  And yet, people play the game (in great numbers).

In the end we are PLAYING the game.  Do scholarly discussions help
PLAY the game?  For a minority only I think.  

Do not brush off a request for useful discussion as a request for
game mechanics discussion.  I like theories.  If they help me PLAY
the game.  I like sociology/mythology talk.  If it helps me PLAY the
game.  I do not think I could persuade anyone to PLAY the game by
having them look only at scholarly discussions on Glorantha.

Ed							It seemed like a
Wallman@vax2.winona.msus.edu				good idea at the time.

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From: isaac@twics.com
Subject: A Proposal for Ralios...
Message-ID: <0097ECFD.28E534E0.34@tanuki.twics.com>
Date: 22 May 94 04:15:54 GMT
X-RQ-ID: 4100

Hi everyone, me again.

Thanks for all your replies on Ralios and High and Low Sorcery ... it was a
great help to get a few pointers. Something occurred to me about the nature
of Ralios in particular, and the West in general -

I don't know whether anyone will agree with me, but there seems to be a 
tendency to attempt to force Ralios - and Safelster in particular - into a
kind of "Renaissance / Italian" mold. To me this seems rather a shame,
especially as it seems to entail a large amount of rationalization of the
essentially Gloranthan nature of the land to make it "fit" into a setting
which doesn't really seem to spring all that naturally from the social
and geographical background. Maybe this is a general tendency in RuneQuest
of late, equating Glorantha with the real world, but it does seem rather to
water everything down...

With that in mind, I wonder if the following might not prove food for thought
for a re-appraisal of the Safelstran (and possibly even Ralian / Seshnelan)
"reality". It's just a proposition, so please feel free to lay into it with
gusto. I just thought a fresh approach might be liberating...

A Modest Proposition for Safelster -

        In the centre of every Safelstran town and village stand two things :
a church, and a fort. Essentially they serve the same purpose : to make the
people do as they are told.

        Everyone who has ever tried to exercise control over any part of the 
Safelster region has come up against the same problem : geography. Throughout
the entire area of the vast tracts of land which are subsumed under the name
"Ralios", from the mountains in the farthest east to the ocean in the farthest
west, there are no major geographical barriers, no obstacles to transportation
and travel. Any society that tries to oppress its workers (read : peasants)
has found that those same workers have a tendency to simply up and leave, to
abscond. If they don't like the way they are being treated, they can just as 
easily find somewhere else to leave.

        From the earliest times, Safelstran societies have had to cope with
this problem. As a result, two major tendencies can be observed. The first of
these is the tendency to decentralization; in areas of greatest freedom of 
movement - noticeably the eastern reaches of Ralios - societies tend to be 
clan-based, and extremely individualistic. The second tendency is one of 
control of the population by fear and force - physical as well as spiritual -
which is most noticeable in the "western" societies of the Safelster region.
Thus the fort, and its spiritual equivalent, the church, form the most 
typical features of the Safelstran community.

        The presence of a powerful, authoritarian body of soldiers in a 
community has a profound influence on its society. Authoritarian structures
breed an authoritarian mindset, with individual initiative being quelled, and
a tendency to react to direct commands and orders being strengthened. A major
proportion of the Safelstran "lower classes" consists of typical "oppressed 
peasants": they do as they are told by their overlords, and their priests
tell them that to do so is God's will.

        The ideal Safelstran society (by which I mean the one proposed by the 
"western", Rokari-based world view) is, however, far from the reality. The
four castes of Noble, Wizard, Warrior and Farmer are all well and good in
theory, but the past few centuries since the fall of the oppressive and 
militaristic Kingdom of Jorstland have seen the rise of a growing 
entrepreneurial class bringing wares and luxury goods from the fashionable
west and generally encouraging the trade which has become the lifeblood of the
Safelstran city-states since the old kingdom's collapse. Many of the upper 
classes are in debt, and the number is growing. In response to this, many 
states have taken drastic steps such as arbitrarily declaring nobles' debts
null and void without compensation, as a result of which leading merchant
families have begun to group together for mutual protection against such 
excesses. The Free City of Wexten may be an example of one such community
which has been established in reaction to such authoritarian rule. The 
balance of power in the early 17th century is a delicate one.

*****

Just a thought. Any comments, anyone? 

Thanks for reading!
Cheers from distant Nippon,

Gary

(Gary Newton / Isaac@twics.com)

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From: alex@dcs.gla.ac.uk (Alex Ferguson)
Subject: Cults, metals.
Message-ID: <9405222152.AA07766@keppel.dcs.gla.ac.uk>
Date: 22 May 94 21:52:04 GMT
X-RQ-ID: 4101


Martin Crim:
> Gee, maybe I missed it because I've only been following the
> Joerg/Alex clash of titans since early March, but no one has
> mentioned the best counter-example yet to Alex's insistance on
> one god to a cult: the Tusk Riders.  Their cult explicitly
> worships three different spirits.  

Gah, what such insistance?  Have I called for the Seven Mothers to be
abolished?  In any case, note that the Tusk Riders claim to worship
one entity, it's merely them nasty GLers who did the cult writeup who
say differently.

What I claim is that people don't worship (in a committed way, as opposed
to in a "lay membership" fashion), all of a pantheon, or anything much
like all.  Rather, I think most people worship one god, or in some cases,
a "tight group" of local significance.  This is why I think the existing
model of initiation is preferable to Joerg's.

> Alex "Quotation Marks Anonymous Founder" Ferguson objects to the
> use of the word selenium for the lunar rune metal.  Might I ask
> that you please suggest a better term?

I merely pointed out that it connoted the wrong moon.  What do you
want, one that "sounds like" an earthly metal, one that suggests the
Red Moon, or what?  I use "Silver", myself, for "the lunar rune metal",
though I found the idea of an "extra", specifically lunar metal being
discovered/invented by crazed Pelorian metalurgists amusing.  After
all, who says the association between elements and metals is an absolutely
fixed thing, rather than a product of habit and tradition?

> Alex also notes my cleverly-disguised element-rune connections,
> and says this should "only [be] the case for those cults which
> are 'advanced' enough to have a need for it, and magically
> significant enough to provide the capability."  Yeah, that was
> kinda the idea.  It seems clear to me that you don't have to be
> as advanced to use lead, since it has a lower melting point.

You did much the same with _every_ element, though, and Xiola Umbar
isn't really high up the "need for" list, is she?

> Re: exarchs in steel plate
>      I don't have any trouble with this, myself, given China's
> historical advantage in technology over the West.

Not in iron armour, they didn't.  Anyway, I was quibbling with the cult,
not the culture, as I said.  Why would an exarch do his own enchanting,
even if he really _did_ want iron armour?

Alex.