Mechanics of heortling blended/hybrid/joint magic?

From: bryan_thx <bethexton_at_IE1JxECHrgIvFrKmKJTto9403qippda0T1Lzs7yO4II9R0xJgbOMTt4IuhUTu381pz>
Date: Sun, 29 Jul 2012 19:21:34 -0000


It is suggested in the source material that, in the period following the dragon rise, the rebels/Sartarites/whateveryoucallthem start using magic in new, blended, ways.

In Masters of Luck and Death, it is said of the Eaglebrowns:
- "...the band has increasinly turned to magic and animist powers in particular, setting the members on a path that will in due course transform them into the Eaglebrown Warlocks,on of Argraths most powerful magical units."

In "King of Sartar" under The Composite History of Dragon Pass" it says on page 155 "[Argrath] taught them how to make a new kind of military unit, which was something like a clan and something like a ritual. He took many very diverse individuals and, with them, created a temporary spirit which acted in a way greater than their sum could have ordinarily achieved. Argrath showed them that they could, in this way, do what the great lunar magical schools achieved when they devastated a whole fyrd with their power."

I'm pretty sure that there have been some other references to this trend as well, but those were the ones I could put my fingers on at the moment.

What I'm wondering is how to do this mechanically in Heroquest?

The situation with the Eaglbrowns could just be done as augments--the novelty purely being theists and animists working together. What Argrath does almost sounds like temporary hero bands. So I could handle this with existing rules.

However, as my game enters this post dragon-rise phase, I'd like to play up this aspect a bit. So I'm not so much looking for 'something that would handle it on the rare occasion it comes up" and more "Something that could be made a central part of the magic in the game"

So finally, my questions:
- any descriptive ideas on how this new approach to magic might work?

I look forward to any thoughts!

PS: In case anyone is interested, to handle the dragon rise I had a support ritual being performed, such that the participants saw what was happening from the point of view of the hero they were supporting, but at the same time were seeing their own physical ritual...and one roll in that ritual was the faithful camp guards who do everything to guard the ritual. So as dragonnewts broke the cohesiveness of WhiteWalls walls, and then the scorpionmen opportunistically swarmed over toward the ritual, I'd cut back and forth between the battle in the remnants of Whitewall to what was happening at the temple ceremony (and what could be seen happening in the sky). When the dragon rose, the dragonnewts suddenly turned to defending the support ritual (although as it turned out due to rolling a crit to a fumble, that help ended up not being as key as I'd expected). Would love to hear how others have played out the dragon rise!            

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