>
> I can certainly see the case for people believing in a decline from a
> Golden Age of Perfection. However I would venture to suggest that it was
> also part of Glorantha back in RQ II (in the late 1970s) that there is a
> strand of thinking in many human cultures when they look at non-human races
> that is a bit more Darwinian.This is the idea that the other Elder Races
> (Uz, Aldryami, Mostali, Dragonewts and even Broo (though I doubt if
> they Broo are afforded the dignity of being an Elder Race)) are not as
> well-adapted to the here and now as humans are.
>
Certainly if "adaptation" was the term used way back then, I can understand this idea. Surely someone with better memory or product access than this old man has will be able to pluck the words used then, if we need it. But, offhand, I don't think I used those terms.
The (apparent) fact you state is true--Elder Races doing more poorly than
humans--but it need not be Darwinian in origin. It looks that way to us,
raised to see through that "scientific filter," but Glorantha has many other
methods to explain this supposed fact.
For instance, many humans over the Ages have claimed that the Elder Races
are NOT falling behind. They only look that way to us short-lived humans. In
fact, say those terrorists of the peaceful mind, the Elder Races are
building up their forces and powers to unleash all at once upon us hapless,
food-like human beings.
Has this idea dropped out of canonical thinking?
>
As the ammunition maker for canon,I will assure you that the situation on the ground has not changed. In fact, except for growing and changing in many details, canon has largely remained consistent since I began writing in 1966. However, ways of presenting it and talking about it have matured. Have, in fact, aged.
> (The decline of the Trolls and the Dragonewts has not dropped out of canon,
> though in contrast to the passage from old RQ II cited above, Hero Wars
> suggested that the Aldryami were readying themselves for reforestation by
> the end of the Third Age)
>
The early RQ years, of the published world I mean, are the start of the Hero Wars, the end of the Third Age. Everything we know and love is in danger of being changed, and it is up to your player characters to be the decisive point of what it will be like afterward, in the yet-to-be 4th Age.
In fact, all of the Elder Races DO have a Master Plan of their own to unleash. They do not know of each others plots, however. Except for the Uz and Triolini, I mean, who are working together to break off the ice shelf. Gamemasters can decide when to unleash them.
> Glorantha certainly has had extinctions since Time began -- e.g.
>
Although extinctions hardly prove darwinism!
Are there still Dinosaurs in the Third Age-- if so, what are their numbers
> like compared to the Second age? (FWIW in my Glorantha there are, but there
> are less of them)
>
There are fewer in the end of 3rd Age than earlier.
Oh, except for the hidden cavern where they are bred by the earth. If the
doorway to the cave is every cleared of the avalanche that closed it, they
will all be free. Centuries worth of breeding, all free at once, and
including things never seen before.
Because, in Glorantha, even extinct things can come back.
The MRQ book about Duck suggested that there were Geese too (bigger,
> more primitive and aggressive Durulz).
The problem with the ducks and geese comparison is that the ducks and durulz is essentially a false equality. Durulz are not really ducks, nor ever were. OK, they might even have once been a duck-like race. But now, they are not really ducks at all, any more than humans are lemurs. (Oh no, Darwinistic comparison!! language alert!) :D
> If these creatures ever existed in canon, have they survived into the Third
> Age?
>
GM choice
but in fact, there is an area of the East Isles where many species of birdy
humanoids live. Humans inevitably compare them to bird species that they
know. I know humans do that because I did it when I explored these places
for the first time. But such appearances are not always based on biological
fact. They are based on mythical ones.
> Are the Centaurs of Beast Valley still an extinct race recreated by EWF
> magic (as in King of Sartar), or is it now canon that they never went away?
> (Maybe the Centaurs in the Castle Coast never went away, but Beast Valley is
> different?)
>
There is more than one origin for centaurs.
> Finally where did the Gold Wheel Dancers go?
>
Extinct.
The last one was on the World Council of Friends until removed by Loko
Moko.
Even it comes back though.
I expect some Hsunchen tribes have become extinct too-- how many of the
> smaller tribes referred to in the MRQ II guide to Fronela (Mammoth Hsunchen,
> Wolverine Hsunchen, etc.) are still alive by 1600 ST? However some Hsunchen
> may have been assimilated into other human cultures rather than annihilated.
> Didn't this happen to the Galanini in Ralios? Also aren't at least some of
> the inhabitants of Wenelia people that once were Hsunchen but who adopted
> other ways?
>
All those are true.
> Does no Gloranthan see anything analogous to natural selection in these
> extinctions?
No. Not in the scientific way.
Beside which, Darwinian natural selection is inappropriate to apply to
cultures anyway.
> If they do, I would expect it to be a very Gloranthan form of natural
> selection-- races and species which fail and become extinct are poorly
> adapted to the world of Myth as well as to the Material Plane.
>
Such a person is possible. But I've seen no proof of it. Do you have some Gloranthan documents from him or her?
All very keen thinking!
However, I think this is a very good example of how our mental
preconceptions shape what we see.
There is no gravity in Glorantha--it is the natural attraction of all things
to each other which is the state of Uleria.
There are no germs, although there ARE living things that are too small to
be seen with the naked human eye.
YGWV
--
Greg Stafford
Game Designer
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