Regardless of whether a particular Humakti takes prisoners/ambushes/creates illusory cows (and I gather that depends on what myths he likes best),
I get the impression that to your typical Heortling thegn, a Humakti is a pretty weird customer. Probably when the Orlanthi get drunk in the Adventurors' Pubbe, they have the same arguments we do. "Ambush? Never. Humakti are too big on 'honor' to ambush." "No! s'truth! I saw Doug HiltHugger build the best damned duckblind you ever saw and wait till the broo walked by..." "Oh, they ambush *broos*. Stands to reason they ambush *broos*. That doesn't count." "What about trolls?" "I dunno... aren't trolls a kind of broo?"
This would make Humakti seem very erratic and unpredictable to non-Humakti (and probably to Humakti from the next clan over, who grew up on different myths). I'd bet that when people need to team up with a Humakti, they take whatever measures they can to minimize it--in particular, they probably try to hedge the Humakti with oaths, such as "Obey the warband leader for the duration of the mission". The hope is that the Humakti's truth-rune will keep him under control until you're back on safe ground.
The trouble, of course, is that the Humakti are probably as weird about oaths as they are about everything else. First of all, you're likely to find out that the oath doesn't apply, at the worst time... "Well, yes, I swore to obey you. But of course, earlier oaths take precedence over later oaths, and six years ago, we all swore never to take a BarkClansman prisoner until they returned that statue they stole. So I could hardly let us waltz back home with their chief's daughter, could I? I *had* to kill her!" Mind you, he wouldn't be trying to weasel his way out of anything. He'd honestly be weighing all his obligations fairly and coming up with the right course of action--and he wouldn't give a damn what anyone else thought.
And even if he keeps his oath, he's likely to do it in a way you don't understand or like. Tell him to take plunder, and he'll do it--and if he sees his chief about to get run through, he won't drop the plunder to save him. He'd want to, of course, but he's bound by that oath, you see!
Or am I misunderstanding them entirely? (And if I am... doesn't that prove my point?)
--Andrew Solovay, who has fond memories of Gronk, his Humakti baboon from those 8th-grade Runequest campaigns
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