Are you saying that Charms shouldn't be common magic? Not sure the point you're trying to make above.
>The contentious bit comes from the old RQ thing that everybody had Pow
>(power) and used it to cast spells. So they were actually *doing* the
>magic. This is intrinsic in Glorantha in my understanding, which, although
>I cannot quote exact references is inferred in the rules.
Well, there are a several takes on this. First, the BRP system was created (by Sandy, right?) as an offshoot of the CoC system. That is, the system was invented to support Cthulhu, not Glorantha. So saying that Gloranthan metaphysics match the old system is of dubious merit it seems to me.
But for argument's sake, let's say that we want it to match the POW system. Well, what do you mean by "doing" the magic. I think that in all cases, the character is "doing" the magic. That is, what HQ implies to me is that magic is, in fact, doing the right little ritual or whatever to open the door to the source of power of the magic. Which then creates the effect.
In the POW system, using POW simply means exhausting your ability to open up the otherworld, or where ever the magic is coming from.
Note, however, that it's a simple matter to use the HQ rules to create a "magical exhaustion" effect - I've come up with such a system myself. I think it's telling that they decided not to include such a system. I think that the existence of most such systems was and is for game balance with regards to power. Once your magic system is balanced as it is in HQ, you no longer need the extra limiter, and it's dropped. Because it doesn't represent anything from the actual metaphysics of any literature or anything (sometimes people get exhausted, but HQ still supports that), and I'm guessing doesn't match Greg's actual view of Glorantha. It was just needed at the time to make things playable.
>FWIW I think that it would be sad loss to Glorantha if magic always had to
>come from otherwordly beings/nodes/spirits and that people had no *mana* of
>their own.
Well, what about Natural Magic (see the article on this if you haven't already: http://www.glorantha.com/support/natural_magic.html)? These are, in fact, said to come from the people themselves. I think that what they "Do" here is precisely the same sort of thing - they do a ritual that opens up the door to the power coming out - but that the source in this case is, in fact, the character. So I don't think that the current model loses anything by having only some common magic come from otherworld beings. That is, there are five sources of common magic, and only three of them are "otherworld" sources.
So, if you see a power as coming from an innate source, use talents or Natural Magic to represent it.
>FREX - in RQ 1&2 I thought you learned battlemagic from a priest and he
>*showed* you the secret of how to do the magic. A bit like learning magic
>in Harry Potter I suppose if one was looking for an analogue of sorts.
I don't understand how this is not precisely what happens in all cases. Harry "casts a spell" using an enchantment. Meaning he's doing a little ritual to open the door to wherever the magic comes from. Be it himself, or some deity or whatever I can't say (Ms. Rowlings seems silent on the matter), but the process seems the same in all cases.
A Devotee doing a feat - even specialized non-common magic here - is doing the same thing. Somewhere in the book this is made explicit. Magic *is* rituals that open the door to power that causes certain effects. Your priest teaches you how to do this ritual. Just like in RQ.
>In RQ3 you learnt spirit magic from spirits?
Well, I think that's a result, again, of older game systems. Greg has to make RQ2. So what does he do? He looks at animism, and how RPGs do spells. Spells are character powers. So he says that the spirits give the characters spells. Does this match animism? Not really at all. But it's the best approximation he's got.
Along comes Mr. Laws with a better system, and suddenly Greg can make animism do what it's supposed to do.
I'm no great student of animism, but from what little I know, the HQ model is much more like RW animism, and what I'd guess Greg wanted all along. So is the current system like RQ2? No, but that's precisely because they have better tools now to indicate what it should have been like all along. Else why make the changes?
Mr. Stafford will, no doubt, correct me where I'm incorrect here. :-)
>When you learn common magic, who do you learn it from? When I designed the
>Anzarni clan for my game (using BA) I didn't insert a shaman at all as I
>chose to ignore common magic to start with. I reason that perhaps common
>magic is learnt from family members, teaching you the *nack* of how to do
>stuff.
Well, I think to get a common magic charms you might have to have a practitioner or shaman to do it (but not totally sure about that, you might be able to do it yourself). But, generally you always have to learn from somebody. The only question is whether you learn from an intermediary or not. With a shaman or something, they act as an intermediary for your character, getting the charm made for him. A priest might be an intermediary and teach you a spell. Your father might be the intermediary who teaches you a talent, sure. Or, you might just be born with natural magic, and nobody has to teach it to you. For instance Puma people and shapeshifting.
For CM Spells, CM Charms, and CM Feats, some otherworld being that lives in the mundane world was involved at some point, somewhere along the way. That is, it's some landscape Spirit or such that has to exist to get captured in the charm. Or some landscape daimone to teach the first priest the CM feat. Or some landscape essence from which the spell gets its power. Or, possibly in these cases to deal with the character directly.
Does that help at all?
Mike
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