Bell Digest v941009p1

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, Sun, 09 Oct 1994, part 1
Sender: Henk.Langeveld@Holland.Sun.COM
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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

6528: alex = (Alex Ferguson)
 - Kitori
6529: joe = (Joerg Baumgartner)
 - Aeolians
6530: winterg = (George Winter)
 - UNSUB LIST
6531: joe = (Joerg Baumgartner)
 - Henotheism in Maniria
6532: T.J.Minas = (T.J.Minas)
 - RE: Orlanth, Resurrection, Humakti Geases
6533: niwe = (Nils Weinander)
 - Armouring geases again
6534: KFC01067 = (Takehiro OHYA)
 - re: TradeTalk = Free INT in English
6535: erisie = (Sven *Erik Sievrin)
 - Re: RuneQuest Daily, Sat, 08 Oct 1994, part 2
6536: CHEN190 = (Peter Metcalfe, CAPE Canty)
 - Re:Clarification of Swamps.
6537: Mike.Dickison = Mike.Dickison@vuw.ac.nz
 - Carse to Karse Konversion
6538: henkl = (Henk Langeveld - Sun Nederland)
 - Re: RuneQuest Daily, Fri, 07 Oct 1994
6539: FKiesche3 = FKiesche3@aol.com
 - Copy of "Dragon Pass" for Sale...
6540: nh0g+ = (Nils Hammer)
 - unsubscribe

---------------------

From: alex@dcs.gla.ac.uk (Alex Ferguson)
Subject: Kitori
Message-ID: <9410080916.AA25911@hawaii.dcs.gla.ac.uk>
Date: 8 Oct 94 09:16:22 GMT
X-RQ-ID: 6528


David Cake takes issue with me suspecting:
> >that the Kitori started
> >off as an all troll grouping, perhaps a single clan, and has grown into a
> >tribe by "adopting" human clans.

> The Sacred marriage implies that the leaders of the clan are both human and
> troll, which is unlikely to happen if one central clan adopts other smaller
> clans.

I didn't say the other clans would be smaller, or that the troll clan would
be "central" in any authority-weilding sense.  But I think that if their
the two have a genuinely unified tribal culture, co-evolution is a much more
plausible origin than post hoc merger.

> >>         I definately disagree that humans are allowed to join KL, except in
> >> the normal (excruciating) way.

> >I'm not sure either way, but I feel that having all the trolls in a troll-
> >only cult would defeat the purpose of (attempted) tribal unity.  

>         There are inumerable societies that have male only or female only
> cults, and nobody claims that that is going to defeat tribal unity. 

Well, for example, Yelm and Dendara have a defined mythological relationship
mirroring the pragmatic one, don't contain _all_ persons of either sex,
and don't act to play up rivalries between distinct clans.

> > Or maybe we should just (cop out by)
> >say(ing) that they all worship Kitor, a ancestral/founder deity with lots
> >of AA-like surface darkness magic.

>         Much too dull. There are enough founder deities around (though a
> married pair if founder deities is bearable).

That's an non-objection; I could equally well say there are enough Argan
Argar and Kyger Litor worshippers around already.  Orlanthi tribes do not,
I believe, have well-developed founder cults as such, though granted they
do have founders.  I'm thinking of something which has KL-style "ancestor"
worship shades to it, as well as being a founder cult per se.  This is
a cop out in the sense of effectively "relabelling" religious strands to
be more acceptable to all.

> >> I think that blurring the species
> >> distinction like that would be heresy to the KL cult, and that is not a
> >> pleasant thing to contemplate.

> >Of course it is.  Whatever else the Kitori are, I'm sure they're heretics.

> As long as you don't mess with the
> fundamentals of the cult - and I think that racial purity is one thing that
> is not going to be skipped over lightly. If they won't let most trollkin
> in, they are hardly going to accept humans.

Since to the vast majority of trolls, being in the same tribe as a human
would be unthinkable (most trolls don't even have tribes, mind you), citing
the attitudes of standard-issue KL cultists is not convincing reasoning.
Note that "creatures of darkness" can be non-excrutiatingly initiated into
KL, into which category the Kitori uz may place their fellow "darkmen".

>         And note that the clans do not intermix that much - a clan is
> either human or troll - so as long as AA is calling the shots as far as
> tribal decisions, not a problem.

Yes, a clan can have essentially "private" worship, and/or have a specialised
worship that fits into the larger pattern of the tribe (a la Elmal clans).
However, if you had tribal level worship of KL by all the trolls, and none
of the humans, presumably all worshipping a common ancestor not recognised
by or accessible to the humans, you no longer have one tribe, but two.

Alex.

---------------------

From: joe@sartar.toppoint.de (Joerg Baumgartner)
Subject: Aeolians
Message-ID: 
Date: 8 Oct 94 11:42:17 GMT
X-RQ-ID: 6529

Nick Eden in X-RQ-ID: 6506

> Having spent some time as an Aeolian heretic I would dispute the idea 
> that we have a western mindset. Now it could just be that Nick Brooke's 
> version for How the West Was One (I'll try not to give anything important 
> away) diverges from the standard, but the standard doesn't seem to exist 
> in Greg's published writings anyway.

IMO the HtWW1 Aeolians were formed a bit too close to the KoS article 
on Heortlings, but what the heck - with the recent Rokari insurge, all 
kind of back to the roots movements could happen.

> The Aeolians are not Westerners. They have an Orlanthi view of the caste 
> systems,

Yes, although not that close to KoS p.246f as you presented it in the 
caste committee, IMO.

> they regard the Orlanthi pantheon as saints of their church, 
> while giving St Rokar, St Dromar and St Geralnt Flamesword pretty short 
> short shrift.

And correctly so - they are locally unimportant. The Church of Jonatela, 
while quite different from the Aeolians in most respects, wouldn't care 
much for these purely Seshnegi Saints either. I doubt any sects worship 
St Rokar or St Mardron except the Rokari sect. And they try to reduce 
iconodules and overly personalized saint worship in their own ranks...

> Basicly they are culturally Theylan's, who have altered the 
> worship of the Invisible God to fit their culture.

This is somewhat correct. Their culture has been altered as well - they 
have had a hereditary nobility for the last 1370 years, their warriors 
call themselves knights, prefer combat from horseback and in decent armour 
over charging their foes in Woad and on foot, they practice a feudal 
system, though based on the Theyalan clan system, they build castles 
for their lords rather than walled villages (although primitive by 
Western standards), they are even more urbanized than the (in this regard 
already extremely untypical (for Orlanthi)) Sartarites, and their exposure 
to Western ideas has been quite high - God Forgot and the Machine City, 
the Trader Princes (of Maniria, not necessarily from southern Seshnela) 
have left their traces.

> Just because we heretics regard St CA, the white lady, who the Invisible 
> God gave the miraculous powers of healing and ressurection to shouldn't 
> be interpreted as meaning that any 'normal' Malkioni would give them the 
> time of day, let alone give their beleifs any serious consideration.

This is true. While some Henotheism is quite common among the Malkioni 
outside of Loskalm and Tanisor, the Aeolian approach was designed to be 
radically different from the Return to Rightness creed.

> To 
> be frank I've never encounted a much as heretical as the Aeolians and I 
> was VERY surprised not to be burnt at the stake during HtWwO.

David Hall wouldn't have allowed you to reenact the test of Ehilm's Flame...

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

---------------------

From: winterg@iia.org (George Winter)
Subject: UNSUB LIST
Message-ID: 
Date: 8 Oct 94 03:47:44 GMT
X-RQ-ID: 6530

UNSUB LIST WINTERG@IIA.ORG George Winter



---------------------

From: T.J.Minas@soton.ac.uk (T.J.Minas)
Subject: RE: Orlanth, Resurrection, Humakti Geases
Message-ID: <199410081530.QAA00895@willow.soton.ac.uk>
Date: 8 Oct 94 17:30:12 GMT
X-RQ-ID: 6532


Further thoughts from Southampton:

Orlath subcults/Women initiates

Orlanth Lux (or Orlanth Lightbringer) is another aspect that should
probably have the 4 Magic Weapon Subcults. It is a bit specialised,
and probably is never very large, but it is more widespread than
Orlanth Victorious, Argrath's Hero-subcult.

     As for women in Orlanth, see the Biturian's travels in CoP
for an (unnamed) Orlanthi woman as one of the three examiners at
the Orlanthi Wind Lord making ceremony.


Resurrection

     CA resurrection isn't easy to get, either, to all those of
you who feel "its too powerful" as a reusable spell. She gets it
because she is the Primary Healing deity in all Glorantha. But,
even so, her worshippers have hods of restrictions, small temples,
and many calls upon their time and energy.
     any priestess with CA resurrect is gonna have so many people
wanting it, it will be a real pain to her, only tolerated (the
hassle that is) because of her oath and dedication to CA.



A last thought: The Truestone/Styx combo isn't meant to be tried
on your own. Your pals make sure you do the ceremonies to get back
all your knowledge etc

---------------------

From: niwe@ppvku.ericsson.se (Nils Weinander)
Subject: Armouring geases again
Message-ID: <9410081642.AA12724@ppvku.ericsson.se>
Date: 8 Oct 94 18:42:18 GMT
X-RQ-ID: 6533

Nils Weinander writing

I expressed consternation at Humakt's armouring geases

> OK that's
>fair enough, but then why do Humakti have the same stuff? Humakt
>didn't loose his armour in any myth I've heard of.

and got some replies:

Ian:
>Guess that means we'll have to write some!! 

hmmm

Sven Erik Sievrin:
>It has to do with the Humakti concept of honour and fair play, I think. 
>Many of the geases gives the Humakti extra power in some area while 
>making himself weaker in arelated area.

That's more like it. I agree that gift and geas should be matched.

Sandy:
>	To show off their courage, or to show that for every benefit,  
>there must be a penalty. It's a completely different reason from the  
>Yelmalion system. 

OK, I give up. There is a valid reason and I don't want to be the
cause of a new moose debate, so I'll rest my case.
_____

Swamp pros and cons:

I tend to agree with Sandy that swamps can be  a pretty good place to
stay. Apart from the abundance of things to eat you are rather safe from
your enemies in a swamp: it is notoriously easy to get lost in a big
swamp if you don't know it intimately. It is also difficult to say the
least to move an army, or just about any sizable body of fighhing men,
through marshland.

On the other hand, when it comes to Pamaltelan swamps, don't the slarges
live in them? I thought they weren't your preferrable neighbours.
_____


/Nils W

---------------------

From: KFC01067@niftyserve.or.jp (Takehiro OHYA)
Subject: re: TradeTalk = Free INT in English
Message-ID: <199410081705.CAA10649@inetnif.niftyserve.or.jp>
Date: 9 Oct 94 11:05:00 GMT
X-RQ-ID: 6534

Hello to all. I'm a Japanese and reading this ML.

Joerg Baumgartner in X-RQ-ID: 6490

>Ok, this much editorial rambling. I hope that we will get Tradetalk 1
>out this year. If you want to read our stuff before, you will have to
>do it the hard way. BTW, I don't understand all this fuzz - I read and/or
>translate French RQ stuff, too, and my Read French is a meagre 25%.

>And a lot of other continental people have to put up with English material,
>too, if they want to stay up to date - serves you right to share this
>problem once... 

Aha, please don't forget us, the inhabitants of the farthest east ^^).
In this country, most translators of Japanese RQ have less than 30%
skill in Read/Write English, the rate of publishing supplements is
slow, so those who wish to stay up to date must toil over reading
English supplements, zines, or Mailing Lists... like me. B-P
To tell the truth, I am one of the translators, so my Read/Write English
is only 25%, too ^^). It is very hard for me to read even this daily,
but in all probability it's worth my labor (I wish so).
In fact, I am very interested in the articles around non-CA resurrection.

>If anybody feels he or she can translate German into fluent English, and
>will be satisfied with a free issue of the magazine as payment, contact
>me, please. I can check for misunderstandings etc, but I can't really do
>a fluent translation.

Assuming that his English is still not fluent, I must give up all my hope
to write fluent English. B-P

-----
Takehiro Ohya   KFC01067@niftyserve.or.jp
College of Arts and Sciences, The University of Tokyo.
Languages: Japanese 95/92, English 15/25 , German 03/10.

---------------------

From: erisie@utu.fi (Sven *Erik Sievrin)
Subject: Re: RuneQuest Daily, Sat, 08 Oct 1994, part 2
Message-ID: 
Date: 8 Oct 94 22:26:12 GMT
X-RQ-ID: 6535

Joerg's short guide to Heortland was welcome. In our campaign we are not 
at the building wall battle yet and I plan to let my player take part in 
it, so any information about Maniria south of Sartar is extremely 
welcome. Belonging to that generation who has never read a single Wyrms 
Footnote I do not have the ability to check so much background as you 
oldtimers have.

Richard Ohlson and his Tricksters: When checking some old printouts of the 
Digest that I have, I found rather many Trickster shrines and just what I
wanted - no myths, alas, but the "quest" to get the spell and the location, 
at least. I think it is was numbered 07.02.

---------------------

From: CHEN190@csc.canterbury.ac.nz (Peter Metcalfe, CAPE Canty)
Subject: Re:Clarification of Swamps.
Message-ID: <01HI1T07DT089YE1SB@csc.canterbury.ac.nz>
Date: 9 Oct 94 11:26:46 GMT
X-RQ-ID: 6536

>Peter Metcalfe is STILL not convinced that swamps are A-OK.
>>>There are plenty of people who live in swamps and love it.  
>>I'm not too sure about these examples exemplfying Swamps are good.  

>Eat me. Are there ANY "real" swamps or marshes in all of England?

I woulnd't know as I've never been there.  I live in Christchurch, 
New Zealand which is on the other side of the earth.  
 
>As an inhabitant of a nation possessing same, and a frequent  
>visitor to 'em, I hereby state that whatever weird view you have of  
>swamps by watching movies or reading old Conan stories are false. 

Actually Christchurch does have the distinction of being founded on 
a swamp.  But do not fear, Sandy, you do not have foot in mouth disease 
(it was a false alarm).  You see, I was looking at David Dunhamms post the
other day and was about to correct in about the Chinampa's of Tenochtilan 
being a floating garden (they're actually reclaimed land from shallow 
lakebeds), when I realized that what we're arguing about was the type of
terrain.

You see Christchurch is actually founded on/near marshlands which is 
land that composes a high degree of moisture.  The type of plants that 
actually grow here, are grasses and shrubs and in the wetter areas 
semiaquantic flora.  Because of this, when I hear the word 'swamp' 
it conjures to me the images of the florida keys and the hot dense 
mangrove swamps of Hornilio rather amongst other things.  Hence the 
persistance of my argument that swamps are bad.

Now it appears that the flora of the marshes near the Doraddi (such as the
Sozganjio, Churlwe and the Tondu) actually have a different flora then that 
in the Hornilio of the Porlaso, and are somewhat along the likes of the Nile 
river delta (say), ie somewhat more hospitable to than _I_ imagined.

hopefully this clears a few things up.

--Peter Metcalfe


---------------------

From: Mike.Dickison@vuw.ac.nz
Subject: Carse to Karse Konversion
Message-ID: <199410081404.AA17769@rata.vuw.ac.nz>
Date: 9 Oct 94 15:03:55 GMT
X-RQ-ID: 6537

**** Info on Karse ****

Thanks to Peter Metcalfe, Nick Brooke, and particularly Joerg for some info
on Karse. Peter pointed out that it had been beseiged once before by
Fazzur, in 1605. Nick pointed me to Midkemia's Carse supplement, and
convinced me it had some respectability. And Joerg gave a plausible
Gloranthan history for the generic background in the supplement.

Well, I found a copy in a second-hand shop today, in mint condition, for
$NZ10 (that's $US6 or about 4 quid). They also had Tulan, the RQ Companion,
and some back issues of Heroes. A good haul... I've just spent a few hours
Gloranthifying Carse, and thought that some notes might be useful for
anyone else who might find a copy. All my own opinion, of course. Let me
know if you disagree or have better ideas.

**** From Carse to Karse ****

Conversion done for 1620-1625, under Lunar occupation. I thought the Lunars
might have learned from the problems in Pavis, and taken over with some
grace and with the support of the inhabitants. Bear in mind this is a very
important seaport to them, and they don't want to mess it up.

1)  Languages: Heortlander, though inhabitants often speak Sartarite or
Esrolian. The Sharwen, pro-Esrolian matriarchal supremacists, use
Earthspeech as a secret tongue.
2)  Half the city guard has been disbanded and replaced by 100 provincial
veterans, working in partnership with Karsians. The unpopular guard
commanders have been replaced by Lunar sergeants. A Lunar centurion
oversees it all.
3)  The Baron's garrison (those that didn't desert or die) has been
scrapped and replaced by 200 lunar troops, on rotation from the regiment's
encampment a few miles upriver. 100 are barracked in the city, 100 in the
castle proper. The shipyards are busy building Lunar galleys.
4)  Sagrath the Wizard was killed in the siege: his tower is now the HQ of
Commander Graptolus Redsandal, the military governor who oversees the
Baron's actions and enforces Lunar laws.
5)  Lunar scribes have moved into B-2, the docks admin, and are stamping
out smuggling and imposing extra import duties on Esrolian ships and tax
breaks on Etyries merchants.
6)  The Sea Goddess is now a Sea Temple, to Choralinthor, Diros, Dormal and
Magasta.
7)  D-9 Sadu the Grocer is a Teshnan refugee, a prince in his homeland.
8)  There are rather too many alchemists: I've replaced some with a Duck
flophouse, a slave trader, another wine seller, and a few shrines.
9)  K-4 the Magician's Guild I've turned into a church and library for
local Aeolians and Western visitors, with a few local scholars and wizards.
10)  The bath houses, instead of being seedy brothels are instead places
where Esrolian visitors can talk business.
11)  The Warrior's Guildmaster has been replaced by a woman Scimitar of
Yanafal Tarnils, former senior triarch for the occupying regiment now
trying to recover CON after a brush with disease.
12)  Q-1 Hugi Olafson should of course be an Uroxi, suspicious of all these
Lunars.
13)  Q-4 And Stoneman Took, the halfling tobacconist, should be (of
course!) Stonefeather the Duck, who deals in Porthomekan cigars, supplying
the tobacco of choice for most of Duckpoint.
14)  Q-5 I like Albright and Albright better as Scholars of Law, itinerant
Lhankor Mhy lawspeakers exiled from Sartar.
15)  T-4 The Royal Guest tavern has of course quickly become the Imperial Guest.
16)  Undertakers? Orlanthi would burn their dead, Esrolians have a woman Ty
Kora Tek cultist. I chose the latter, making Digger Troon into Diggeress,
matriarch of the Troon clan.
17)  U-18 Sam should be a trollkin.
18)  The Caravanserai family of Hazara Khan has become the Heartland
merchants of the Har-Azial family, including Etyries priestess Empsonia
(replacing Abdur). Worthy Outfitters is now an Etyries trade hall.
19)  Temple of the Sky God. I scrapped this completely. The Lightbringer
Temple has been cunningly converted into a Seven Mothers temple with an
Orlanth Betrothed shrine in the corner, and most of the locals switched
without a fight. Some still choose to worship Orlanth elsewhere, and a few
have turned the Iron Fist into an Orlanthi resistance group, which have a
real Orlanth shrine in the secret basement of the temple. They get there
through the passageway in Shigga's Tavern and plot at nights.
20)  The horrid D&D Thieves' Guild is now the Green Circle Band, a bunch of
clever brigands organised into a criminal gang by the Upright Man, actually
a Krarshti.
21)  The Crimson (formerly Emerald) Serpent is actually the Lunar secret
police, made up of spies that were planted in Karse several years ago, and
who helped swing the locals pro-lunar. They have infiltrated the Iron Fist
(in fact, they started it, to keep an eye on troublemakers) and have an
informant in the Sharwen. The Sharwen are not anti-Lunar, but hope they can
use the invaders to get a woman in power.

That's all so far. Despite a rather dated D&D feel to it, Carse seems a
good product, and only required an evening's conversion to make it run.
Hope these notes weren't too boring for those of you who could care less.
I'll post some of my Esrolian notes rel soon.

_________________________________________________________________
Mike Dickison, science writer  #   Learning is the dictionary,  #
Wellington, New Zealand        #    but sense is the grammar    #
adzebill@matai.vuw.ac.nz       #      of science. - Sterne      #




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From: henkl@aft-ms (Henk Langeveld - Sun Nederland)
Subject: Re: RuneQuest Daily, Fri, 07 Oct 1994
Message-ID: <9410082327.AA22471@yelm.Holland.Sun.COM>
Date: 8 Oct 94 23:27:07 GMT
X-RQ-ID: 6538

sandyp (Sandy Petersen):
>	The fishing is great. The hunting is great -- lots of fine  
>edible birds -- ducks, geese, and swans. If you can stand eating  
>muskrats and other aquatic rodents, that's fine, too.

Well, I've eaten muskrat -or "water rabbit", "shore beaver"- as
they tend to call it when it's sold as meat, and can tell you
it's fine...  A bit small though...

-- 
Henk	|	Henk.Langeveld@Sun.COM - Disclaimer: I don't speak for Sun.
oK[]	|	RuneQuest-Request@Glorantha.Holland.Sun.COM
	|	In every shell script there's a small one trying to escape.

---------------------

From: FKiesche3@aol.com
Subject: Copy of "Dragon Pass" for Sale...
Message-ID: <9410082117.tn166061@aol.com>
Date: 9 Oct 94 01:17:41 GMT
X-RQ-ID: 6539

DRAGON PASS for sale...

Please do not reply to me (FKiesche3@aol.com), I am just posting this from
another list that I belong to...

--start inserted message--

Date:   Thu, Sep 29, 1994 14:05 EST
From:  CONSIM-L@vm.ucs.ualberta.ca
Subj:        Auction Notice: AH dragon Pass and Chaosium's Arkham Horror
To:       FKiesche3

Hi all,

Just a quick notice to let you know I am auctioning off mint copies
of Dragon Pass and Arkham Horror.

If you're interested in these two fine games, please check out
rec.games.board.marketplace or rec.games.frp.marketplace.

If your site does not get these newsgroups, you can contact me
directly at epass@nyx.cs.du.edu

  Eric (epass@nyx.cs.du.edu)

--end inserted message--


---------------------

From: nh0g+@andrew.cmu.edu (Nils Hammer)
Subject: unsubscribe
Message-ID: <8iZsgEu00WB=ICl4lT@andrew.cmu.edu>
Date: 8 Oct 94 22:17:52 GMT
X-RQ-ID: 6540

unsubscribe

nh0g@andrew.cmu.edu