Re: Cowed by an Illusion

From: Peter Larsen <peterl_at_...>
Date: Mon, 24 Jun 2002 08:58:46 -0500


At 11:56 AM +0000 6/24/02, simon_hibbs2 wrote:
>
>> >> Even if he has no Uralda-connected magic at all?
>> >
>> >I think it is possible for him to do so.
>>
>> The trick, in this case, would be fooling Uralda -- she's the
>one
>> that makes calves after all. Everyone would see the mating, but
>unless the
>> goddess noticed (a Complete Success? A high resistance?), no calf.
>
>Uralda isn't a person, and as a heortling goddess is bound by the
>Compromise anyway, so I don't think this is realy relevent. A
>Uralda worshiper might take offence of course, and decide to
>punish the trickster.

        Surely being bound by the Compromise does not prevent gods from doing/being whatever it is they do/are. Uralda is/makes cows, presumably you need to have her involved in the making of cows (at least in the normal cow way). So, while Illusion magic could create a bull that could fool Heortling observers, the ability of that bull to procreate might reasonably be limited by the Illusion's ability to fool the Mother of Cows into sending a calf to the "serviced" cow. This is Glorantha, after all, calves don't just pop out because of cow-sex, after all. I assume that an Illusion that could fool all human senses might fail to fool the Progenitor of All Cattle, resulting in a "real" but sterile bull. Heck, maybe sterility is, in some cases, the god in questions inability or refusal to notice the infertile person.

>Mythicaly, trickster was present whenever the world changed, and
>had a hand in almost every major mythic event even if his
>contribution is often forgotten (at least, people try to forget
>as hard as possible sometimes), hence the wide range of his
>mischievous abilities. In order to get the ability to create
>fake cows, he must have been involved in some mythical adventure
>where he learned to make cows.

        Fair enough. My point, though, was not about Trickster's ability to create cows, which he can do, of course, until the cows come home, but the ability of those cows to breed without more illusions.

>On a different point, in RQ a Create Cow spell would do exactly
>that, and you'd need a different spell to make cow smells, etc.
>In HW I imagine you'd have a Create Cow feat, which would allow
>you to create a full cow at a high difficulty, or cow smells, etc
>at lower resistances.

        Did anyone ever use Illusion magic in RQ? It always scared my players away for the immense costs to do anything very impressive with it. I agree, more or less, with your take on feats; it seems the simplest way to handle it.

Peter Larsen

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