On Wed, Nov 10, 2010 at 12:15 AM, Peter Metcalfe < metcalph_at_0glhVdNSsZMadzTvzNYbeQA_Xeh-d9jmf8tXJm-EPYt-l7gQN96H3Lzb0HMX5dio3JWVhfH7K0yhQ91vNwq0y6F_TQ0.yahoo.invalid> wrote:
> On 11/10/2010 8:17 AM, Kevin McDonald wrote:
> > On Tue, Nov 9, 2010 at 4:25 AM, Peter Metcalfe
> > <metcalph_at_0glhVdNSsZMadzTvzNYbeQA_Xeh-d9jmf8tXJm-EPYt-l7gQN96H3Lzb0HMX5dio3JWVhfH7K0yhQ91vNwq0y6F_TQ0.yahoo.invalid <metcalph%40quicksilver.net.nz>>wrote:
> >> On 11/9/2010 9:23 PM, hcarteau_at_1Xy9Ts2dtciuAmf-FPOED834NSKeT3VG0_L7vQKEeuCtqqpLst5MWOb2XrV_t3AazAslQcmhGjn5.yahoo.invalid <hcarteau%40free.fr><hcarteau%
> 40free.fr> wrote:
> >>
> >> /// So what would be the malkioni Spike ?
> >> Danmalastan would be my guess.
> > The question itself is a bit misleading. Asking about a "Malkioni" Spike
> is
> > a bit like asking for a "theist" spike or an "animist" spike.
> Not really. The Malkioni are a culture rather than a magic system,
>
<snip>
You are correct about the culture vs magic system point. My bad. What I was getting at is that there are a nice variety of Northern/theist cultures with different origin stories. It would be nice if there were multiple Western/sorcerous ones too. Gloranthan cultures all seem to have founding stories that explain all of the other cultures that they interact with. I would be surprised if the peoples of the West were different in that regard. I expect that the fact that there there wasn't/aren't is more due to a lack of attention given to Western Glorantha by the writers (mainly Greg) than an intentional feature. Or maybe he deliberately made them that way to express his disapproval of that mindset. <shrug>
Back to the main point. I think calling the peoples of Western Glorantha a single culture may be taking it too far. In our world there are many cultures with Indo-European roots. After millennia of separation their similarities are only apparent to scholars. Most people don't think the classic Norse, Persian, and Indian cultures were similar, but they have common roots and share elements of religion and language if you know where to look.
For Glorantha, our (out of game) sources on the peoples of the west are few and (in game) generally come from one admittedly authoritative source - Zabbur. That said, I think there is room for a lot of variance to have developed as events forced people to move around and react to external forces.
The Vadeli are an extreme example. They were Malkioni once upon a time but have drifted pretty far from where they started. I don't see why there can't have been many Malkioni sub-cultures that have developed in their own direction. I actually think there was enough time for multiple branches of the Vadeli culture to arise, although I have seen no evidence of it. There where also probably remnants of the other original Malkioni peoples like the Kachasti and Tadiniti who moved, mixed with other people, learned new truths, etc. Most of these peoples probably died out as their lands were absorbed by the Mostali, conquered by Vadeli, sunk beneath the ocean, etc.
All of the above might make interesting story seeds for games or in the development of surprise Hero Wars events. I like the idea of hitherto unknown peoples exploding out of nowhere and upsetting all the carefully made plans of the major players. If there is one thing that the Hero Wars narrative should NOT be is predictable.
-Kevin McD
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