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, Thu, 22 Sep 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.
X-RQ-ID: index
6306: =
- Re: RuneQuest Daily Headers, HL in reply to Mike Dawson
6308: =
- Yelorna and SUn County
6309: =
- Alchemy rules & Chalana Arroy
6310: =
- Re: from Sandy
6311: =
- Truestone Summary, Dungeoncrawl Now.
6312: =
- Yelorna
6313: =
- Re: Disease spirits, marks, etc...
6314: =
- RQ4 Rules & Husbands as Gamemasters
6315: =
- Re: RuneQuest Daily, Tue, 20 Sep 1994, part 1
6316: =
- Re: RuneQuest Daily, Wed, 21 Sep 1994, part 2
6317: =
- Re: RuneQuest Daily, Tue, 20 Sep 1994, part 1
6318: =
- alchemy
6321: =
- Warhamster and tactics
6322: =
- Some of us aren't too stuck up for silly
6323: =
- Re: RuneQuest Daily, Wed, 21 Sep 1994, part 4
---------------------
From: henkl@aft-ms (Henk Langeveld - Sun Nederland)
Subject: Re: RuneQuest Daily Headers, HL in reply to Mike Dawson
Message-ID: <9409210801.AA29228@yelm.Holland.Sun.COM>
Date: 21 Sep 94 09:01:29 GMT
X-RQ-ID: 6306
Henk here,
Mike says
"I suggest that people posting to the daily use their subject line
wisely by including a (brief) useful description, and adding their
name to the end of the subject. Note that Henk's headers do not
currently capture the ID of the person posting."
It was my intention that they did... Time, time...
Of course, if you are afraid no one wants to read YOUR stuff, then
leave your name off. (OR consider rewriting.)"
---------------------
From: jonsg@hyphen.com (Jon Green)
Subject: Yelorna and SUn County
Message-ID: <9409210952.AA00697@ren.hyphen.com>
Date: 21 Sep 94 11:52:49 GMT
X-RQ-ID: 6308
Michelle_Ringo in X-RQ-ID: 6292:
>
> Question for those familiar with Sun County. Do you think
> that Yelorans can join the Sun County militia and work
> themselves into a position to become Templars?
>
Pretty unlikely in Sun County - very *very* orthodox there. It'd be almost
heresy. She'd have better luck in Balazar, where there's a more liberal
(= primitive, in Yelmalion terms) culture, tolerated but not approved from
Sun County, and women can achieve positions of military authority. (E.g.
Starnia from Dykene, a Light Daughter ["A *what*?" cried the High Priest] and
a Hawk Rider.)
Anyone got perspectives from other Yelmamlion outposts?
Jon
jonsg@diss.hyphen.com
---------------------
From: loren@hops.wharton.upenn.edu (Loren Miller)
Subject: Alchemy rules & Chalana Arroy
Message-ID: <9409211530.AA11026@Sun.COM>
Date: 21 Sep 94 07:30:43 GMT
X-RQ-ID: 6309
There's a player in my carmania campaign who has chosen a Chalana
Arroy initiate as his character and wants her to be an alchemist to
have some means of self-defense. She wants to throw pepper and noxious
fuming things at enemies to protect herself. I realize this is pretty
*weird* from an Arroyan point of view and I'd rather explore that in
the game than just say no up front. So I have two requests.
1. Has anybody written up usable guidelines for iron-age chymistry
and/or alchemy in a FRP? I don't want to use the typically
renaissance-based rules for alchemy that I have seen around, because
those are secrets that I think the Mostali would hold on to pretty
tightly. I don't think that it would be widespread enough for an
Arroyan healer from the Brolian hills to pick up. I enjoyed the plants
of prax article in TotRM, by the way, and think that it's closer to
what I want than *The Compleat Alchemist* frinstance.
2. What are some of the typical reactions that more senior Chalana
Arroy healers might have to such bizarre and borderline-violent
actions from an initiate?
--
Loren Miller
I can tell by your shoes that you are a lover of liberty
---------------------
From: jonas.schiott@vinga.hum.gu.se (Jonas Schiott)
Subject: Truestone Summary, Dungeoncrawl Now.
Message-ID: <9409211102.AA00851@vinga.hum.gu.se>
Date: 21 Sep 94 15:02:44 GMT
X-RQ-ID: 6311
OK, let's look at the suggestions for truestone:
1. Joerg basically says that they're divine spell matrixes you can make
without a ritual. Sorry, Joerg but that's what all your carefully
thought-out ideas amount to... And BTW, you do _not_ have support for this
in Elder Secrets - it is irritatingly silent on the subject of what happens
to the person filling the stone or exactly how the spells are recharged,
that's what got people confused in the first place. And SiP? Where in this
book are there any _rules_ about truestone?
2. Sandy runs them as Universal Matrixes, that you can store _anything_ in.
He doesn't say, but I assume that if you store a skill in it, you lose that
too.
3. Then there's the idea that Henk, Paul Reilly and myself have pushed -
that they store spells much the same way a crystal stores magic points:
keeping them in 'suspended animation' until you want to release them.
Now, I think Sandy's version also has great merit, and I'm wracking my
brain for some way to combine it with mine...
Another thing that struck me is that I can't recall any statement of what
it is you have to do to resist the blank stone's 'pull'. If Paul is right
and they have a POW-potential, maybe a simple resistance roll would do? But
I'm not sure about limiting them this way.
______________
Mike Dawson with an interesting question:
>Where is the place of the "bug hunt" or dungeon crawl in the RQ line?
Miles below ground...
>Keep in mind that many people have fond memories of their time spent
>in Snakepipe Hollow, and I happen to love the idea of an adventure
>set inside a dead dinosaur ala Trollpak.
I also have fond memories of an old D&D/AD&D campaign that was powergaming
to the max. That doesn't mean I'd want to do it all over again _today_.
>Granted, in a perfect world all the publication energy available
>would be aimed at classics like Borderlands or large scale peices
>like Sun County.
Of the scenarios in Sun County, one is a blatant dungeon crawl, and another
is a thinly disguised one. Shadows on the Borderlands contains two
mega-dungeons.
So the answer to your first question is really: at the forefront of the 'RQ
Renaissance'. :->
>But what if AH got a submission that was just a gloranthofied
>dungeon?
Yeah, so what? They'd just publish that too.
All the sarcasm aside, there is of course a place for _any_ sort of
supplement in the RQ line, simply in the interests of diversity. To attract
new, younger, gamers, you probably need scenarios they can understand. (I'm
not being _too_ condescending, am I?) And even for old hands, a change of
pace is often needed ("what the heck, we've tried talking our way through
this for hours, let's chalk up some experience checks"). But on the other
hand, I can easily whip up a hack&slash-fest myself if I need one, so I
have no reason to pay good money for one.
( Jonas Schiott )
( Institutionen for Ide- och lardomshistoria )
( Goteborgs Universitet )
---------------------
From: JARDINE@RMCS.CRANFIELD.AC.UK
Subject: Yelorna
Message-ID: <9409211135.AA10771@Sun.COM>
Date: 21 Sep 94 11:38:00 GMT
X-RQ-ID: 6312
Michelle Asks about Yelornans joining the Sun County militia and progressing
to the Templars.
They might be allowed to join the Militia. They would either have to use the
same weapons as the militia (Longspear and Hoplite shield) and prove themselves to be better than the men (Bigger, stronger, more skilled etc.) or they might
be taken on as a scout or peltast (less prestigious than a file member).
There is a LOT of sexist predudice in SC and any woman who wanted to do man's
work would have to be better than the men. Thus if there is any aspect that
she could be criticized as being less good at she would not get in). Thus
she must be more skillful than most of the men, at least as strong and big as
the smallest and weakest man (probably stronger and bigger) and generally able
to show that if she isn't good enough then neither are THEY! Of course being
a Yelornan is better than being some furriner with a wacky cult and strange
obscene immodest dress sense. No scarlet women in SC please, we're Solars!
All the above predudice would be magnified tenfold when it came to joining the
Templars. The woman would have to use the correct kit. She would have to
prove that she was good enough (probably by defeating a file-leader) and she
would have to be able to hold her own in Shield Push. That's tough for a
woman who will generally be smaller, lighter and weaker than men. Imagine
a woman playing in the NFL!!! Also remember that Yelorna specializes in
the bow and mounted combat, although she still supports the long spear.
Yelorna is smart, she does not try to beat the boys at their own game but
chooses areas where her smaller size and strength are not handicaps.
Let's face it a Unicorn rider with bw and lance is at least a valuable in
a battle as a Templar, although the Templar still has the advantage in a
head-to-head. If the rider gets him in the flank, she cheated...
Have fun and keep the faith
Lewis
---------------------
From: henkl@aft-ms (Henk Langeveld - Sun Nederland)
Subject: Re: Disease spirits, marks, etc...
Message-ID: <9409211855.AA01612@yelm.Holland.Sun.COM>
Date: 21 Sep 94 19:55:17 GMT
X-RQ-ID: 6313
Tim Leask, Mike Morrison about disease marks.
And this morning at 10am I started writing...
I've been thinking of a similar scheme, but instead
of introducing a new entity "mark", I'd modify an
existing one...
Enter, the detachable spirit...
Detachable spirits are manifestations of natural
phenomena. They have no real INT, just POW.
They can split and reassemble at will.
[restrictions needed to limit the assembly of
high POW spirits... Expense of mp, resistance
roll versus combined POW...]
And now it's 20:45, and I'm going home, after
a day's full of network outages...
I may warm up this half-baked idea later.
---------------------
From: faber@apollo.umuc.edu (Chris Faber)
Subject: RQ4 Rules & Husbands as Gamemasters
Message-ID: <199409211918.PAA09817@apollo.umuc.edu>
Date: 21 Sep 94 11:18:16 GMT
X-RQ-ID: 6314
Greeting Martin,
I was wondering if you could e-mail me the RQ4 Playtest Rules?
Husbands & Wives Gaming Together:
Have just caught up on my reading, I wanted to respond to the
issue of favoritism towards one's partner in the RP environment.
It's true that as a GM I provide my wife will clues to upcoming
adventures, but just the other night I had no problem killing one
of my wife's favorite character. A certain Yelorian with real attitude
towards the male dominated society of Sun County. To my wife's credit,
I had warned her of the danger in the upcoming adventure and when her
character's patrol partner enter that o'so dangerous room in Balastor's
Barrack with the basilisk, she followed, she died. A day and half later
her character was resurrected minus 8 characteristic points. Fortunately,
she was the proud owner of an 8pt power storage crystal, which allowed
her to cut a deal with Sun Dome Temple CA's for 8pts of Restore
Characteristic spells. You decide if favoritism was shown.
Chris (killer of Michelle Ringo's Characters) Faber
---------------------
From: DevinC@aol.com
Subject: Re: RuneQuest Daily, Tue, 20 Sep 1994, part 1
Message-ID: <9409211530.tn03942@aol.com>
Date: 21 Sep 94 19:30:06 GMT
X-RQ-ID: 6315
Devin here:
D Cowling asks:
"Does anyone have any material on the amount of fatigue lost to encumbered
and
unencumbered individuals when travelling? By foot, horseback, everything?
If
not, what are your rulings on this(I might compose a chart based on your
experiences with this)."
I don't know if you are aware of this, but in RQ3 it states that for each
hour of marching on foot, 1 fatigue is lost. For each hour on horseback, 1/2
fatigue is lost. That's all it says. I don't know if you were aware of this
but are asking for more realistic rules or if you hadn't caught this rule.
Devin
---------------------
From: DevinC@aol.com
Subject: Re: RuneQuest Daily, Wed, 21 Sep 1994, part 2
Message-ID: <9409211531.tn04008@aol.com>
Date: 21 Sep 94 19:31:16 GMT
X-RQ-ID: 6316
Devin here:
With such a rare occasion as Alex and I agreeing on something, I sold off my
life insurance, thinking the apocolypse is surely upon us..........
He writes:
"I find a Strange Ally in Devin:
> Not Chaos, although I suppose any Stormbull who noted strange skin
colouring
> and texture on someone might equate it with Chaos, but the Mother of
Lizards
> is certainly not Chaos connected.
Absolutely. Let's not forget that when discussing when something is Really
Is chaos-tainted, that we generally only have some passing Storm Bull's
word for it, whose algorith may often resemble:
if funny_looking(thing) then
kill(thing)
else
if has_lunar_written_across_forehead(thing) then
kill_with_extreme_prejudice(thing)
else
merely_peer_suspiciously_at(thing);"
Agreed. A certain Lhankor Mhy from Ralios who really liked to poke her beard
into the most curious places eventually got mixed up with an ancient item
connected to Ratslaff. After folling with it for some time, she was turned
orange...orange eyes, orange hair, orange skin.
She didn't radiate Chaos...wasn't Chaos tainted, but it didn't matter. In
fact, whenever she met Stormbulls, they would sense Chaos, fail, and then
attack her anyways. Why?
1) Because they know their sense Chaos is not always reliable (Chaos
sometimes is sneaky), and
2) Better safe than sorry, and what's the loss of one Lhankor Mhy beard
stroking nit picker anyways?
I imagine Stormbulls often have problems with anyone even remotely odd. They
are giving a Yelmalian who grew to size 20 and got glowing silver eyes from a
heroquest the same problems (although they treat him more warily).
Mike asks:
"Where is the place of the "bug hunt" or dungeon crawl in the RQ line?
Keep in mind that many people have fond memories of their time spent
in Snakepipe Hollow, and I happen to love the idea of an adventure
set inside a dead dinosaur ala Trollpak."
I happen to like a very occassional dungeon crawl or bug hunt in my campaign.
When I say occasional, I mean like twice every year of weekly gaming. Such
things are fun and bring a sort of nostalgia to the session that I like.
In any case, of course, they need to be thoughtful and well-designed.
Examples of good bug hunts and bad bug hunts IMO:
The Good:
Rabbit Hat Farm (Sun Dome)
Devil's Playground (Rubble)
Snake Pipe Hollow (SPH)
Black Broos of Dyskund (SotB)
Rainbow Caverns (Apple Lane)
Muriah's Revenge (Borderlands)
Hellpits of Nightfang (Judges Guild)
The Bad:
Balastor's Barracks (Rubble)
Duck Tower (Judges Guild...but with fond nostalgic memories)
Duck Pond (Judges Guild)
The Ugly:
Lair of the White Wyrm (White Dwarf)
Devin
---------------------
From: DevinC@aol.com
Subject: Re: RuneQuest Daily, Tue, 20 Sep 1994, part 1
Message-ID: <9409211531.tn04029@aol.com>
Date: 21 Sep 94 19:31:44 GMT
X-RQ-ID: 6317
Devin here:
Nick writes:
"I think the colour Purple associated with them is meant as a giveaway that
these Marshes are on the shores of Luathela. But if your campaign is better
served by locating them near Slon, or Winterwood, or any point in between,
put'em there. The point is, they're very, very far away. JQ said he wrote
them in because he liked the Voyage of the Dawn Treader so much, if I'm
remembering his comments straight."
Yeah, I figured out the Purple = Luathela connection. What confused me was
the reference to Marsh Elves though, who I thought pretty much lived only in
the swamps of Pamaltela. Also, Bloggom is described as being safe
(relatively) while I was always under the impression (from Gerg's writings, I
believe also from RQ2 rulebook) that the off map areas were very dangerous to
non-heroes.
"They are off the map."
OK. I was also just checking to see if these Bloggom marshes were a construct
of Jon's or official Gloranthan lore that I had not yet stumbled upon. I will
now assume the former.
"I'd hope for a ship of passing Wolf Pirates (in an amiable mood), or maybe
idealistic Loskalmi explorers (Boldly Going, etc.), myself. Or Barran the
Monster-Slayer, if you want a fully-fleshed-out crew and a tie-in to
"Strangers in Prax"...
This ship's very next stop is wherever you want your players to end up.
(Perhaps by way of a couple of God Learner islands inhabited by Silly Old
Men, etc: I can name you a good source for these).|"
Too late, already ran Barran and both of the God Learner scenarios from
TOTRM... and Harrek was killed permanently in my campaign.....so, I think a
lift from a certain Weartagi captain who was lost in Prax might be called
for........
Martin comments on Warhamster:
"The same tactical
realities apply, IMHO, to Gloranthans. The Sun Domers of Prax
survived the solitude of testing not because their co-
religionists in the tribes declined to attack them (don't Waha
cultists raid other Waha cultists?), but because they beat the
nomads every time through their hoplite tactics, use of terrain
features, and excellent earth works.
The upshot is that Cf should be based on either the factors
listed OR a tactical fudge factor, whichever is higher.
Obviously, the same tactics that work well in open battle don't
work well in guerrilla warfare, so the fudge factor depends on
the size of the engagement, as well. "
Well, first, shouldn't those tactics you are talking about be representied by
the miniatures themsleves and not in the CF? In other words, if the Hoplite
tactics are so great, then the Sun Domers should use them by keeping their
minis in formation et al. In other words, won't the benefits of a shield and
Pike wall show through by the way the minis are setup and run?
Second, morale is a big factor in most battles, and well organized troops
generally have better morale. Simply give hoplites and their ilk morale
bonuses while in formation.
Devin
---------------------
From: sandyp@idcube.idsoftware.com (Sandy Petersen)
Subject: Warhamster and tactics
Message-ID: <9409212240.AA02016@idcube.idsoftware.com>
Date: 21 Sep 94 10:41:33 GMT
X-RQ-ID: 6321
Martin Crim:
Martin is kind enough to praise the Warhamster rules, then he
reveals his sordid wargaming past and wonders why tactics aren't a
part of it, since the Cf and Df are solely based on skill and hit
points, rather than particular combat tactics.
First I'll nit-pick:
> The Celts in were superior warriors to the Roman legionaries.
>They fought, raided, and practiced with weapons more than the
>Romans did.
I don't think the Celts actually practiced more with weapons
than the Legionaries, who practiced plenty. In addition, the
Legionaries were trained systematically (unlike the Celts), and were
often older and more experienced than the Celts (remember that a
Legionary's term of service was 20 years -- an auxiliary's was 25
years). I admit, though, that the Celts were bigger and stronger, and
they were absolutely no slouch with their weapons. Probably
individually braver than the Romans, too, as Caesar's account of the
Nervii (for instance) appears to demonstrate.
>legions rarely lost, and never lost to equal numbers of Celts or
>Germans except the afore-mentioned ambush in the woods.
The "ambush" being the battle of the Teutoburgerwald. My nit
worth picking here is that in that battle, it's generally agreed that
the Germans in the ambush _did_ outnumber the 3 Roman legions
slaughtered. Even so, their victory is rather remarkable, and
doubtless due to the fact that the Romans, spread out along the road,
could not properly form up to receive the German charge.
ANYWAY, my hope when I originally did Warhamster was that the rules
themselves could be used to simulate tactics without any sort of
fudge factor. For instance, the Romans believed that the reason they
beat their enemies (in addition to their skill) was that they were
bunched up tighter, as the Celts swung their long swords around their
heads, and the Romans used their short little swords in serried
ranks. To simulate this in Warhamster, simply place the Roman
legionaries on smaller bases than the Celts. Hey presto!, the battle
becomes a mismatch, as the greater number of Romans (and their
greater armor) take their toll on the hapless barbarians.
To simulate hoplite tactics against cavalry, just remember
that the guys in the rear ranks get to fight, too. Plus there should
probably be a morale check for horses charging spears. The narrow
ranks of hoplites combined with the multiple spearmen should give
them the edge over loosely-grouped disorganized nomads without any
fudge factors.
In general, I dislike fudge factors in gaming, and prefer to
see the actual problem which the fudge factor tries to smooth over.
---------------------
From: jacobus@sonata.cc.purdue.edu (Bryan J. Maloney)
Subject: Some of us aren't too stuck up for silly
Message-ID: <9409212232.AA27552@sonata.cc.purdue.edu>
Date: 21 Sep 94 12:32:19 GMT
X-RQ-ID: 6322
I loved the cult writeup of Rubba Duck.
I hope that hundreds more things like it are posted.
The day RuneQuest is too grown up for Rubba Duck is the day that I burn every
RQ thing I have and urge a 100% boycott of all RQ products.
However, I doubt that RQ and RQ people as a group would ever turn into such
dour, shrivelled up old prunes.
---------------------
From: hasni@hogbbs.scol.pa.us (Richard Ohlson)
Subject: Re: RuneQuest Daily, Wed, 21 Sep 1994, part 4
Message-ID:
Date: 21 Sep 94 16:52:49 GMT
X-RQ-ID: 6323
Subject: Runequest 4th edition playtest rules
I am sending this assuming that it is going to Henk Langeveld, the editor
of the RuneQuest Daily. I'll make it short, incase it doesn't go where I
am exptecting it to go.
Is there a mailing list or something still set up for the 4th edition
play test rules? If there is, I would like some more information
regarding it.
--Hasni Mubarak