Re: The Thing With Many Bodies

From: Stephen Tempest <e-g_at_wUb-FKDMwAGGbjEY8xUaol0L88PRadr1I2tAFRMfwOhALDcaNb9cLKJDytWKnwIHKsj4UAQ_>
Date: Sat, 18 Sep 2010 19:01:53 +0100


"In_a_flat_field" <beautychokes_at_iw3NPPvcYQY18n0v79XQ1FI0Y_Q1UJrqNo8N2sgBKQUJ7GcOdFygNYMl1hvyidlkwM65BYkfWZQ5usftEvFLCS9oZA.yahoo.invalid> writes:

> That's absolutley great. Could the thing only be defeated via a Hero
> Quest? How do you kill something which won't die?

You probably can't, not permanently. What you can do is kill it here and now, for you, and for this generation of your clan.

Yes, it would probably involve a heroquest. You'd need to find out how your heroic ancestor or clan founder dealt with the monster, and then magically re-create the same circumstances and re-enact his deeds.

Think of it this way: the monster can kill individual members of your clan, but that doesn't kill The Clan itself. That goes on from generation to generation. Killing the monster works the same way in reverse: you can kill the thing with many bodies, but not The Thing With Many Bodies. It's supernaturally tied to your clan, part of its self-definition, drawing its strength from you and vice-versa. Killing it permanently, if that were even possible, might have drastic and unpleasant effects on your clan...

Which is not to say the players can't try anyway, if they and you can come up with an interesting idea. :-) One common way of dealing with Gloranthan entities which can't be killed permanently is instead to dismember them and bury the pieces far apart - though that might not help against a thing which has Many Bodies to start with. Or maybe it can be imprisoned in a Hell dimension somewhere: the Lunars specialise in that kind of thing. Or distracted and sent against some other group instead (NOT a good action...)

Or maybe they can find another myth of another culture which also has a Thing With Many Bodies, but this one was killed permanently in their legends. So, they re-enact that myth instead and hope to fool the universe into thinking that their TWMB is the same as the one in the other myth. Sometimes that sort of experimental heroquesting works in Glorantha; at other times it lays waste to entire countries. :-)

Stephen            

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