Glorantha Thread

I learned a lot the last time, so thank you Veeky Forums. I've got a couple of questions and observations. I'[m learning more about Glorantha by taking it easy and starting it from the beginning. It's fascinating how Glorantha apparantly begins by showing the end first, with White Bear and Red Moon depicting the Hero Wars.

I'm just starting to read Griffin Mountain. According to this site, waynesbooks.com/runequest.html, it's the second major book after Cults of Prax. After reading some complaints on the net about how it's always about goddamn Dragon Pass, I find it really hilarious that the first major supplements for Glorantha just sidestep that region entirely and focus on Prax and Balazar. I can set entire campaigns in both of those places without touching Agrath and in the future, it seems like I won't read about Dragon Pass at all anytime soon since up until RQ3, most supplements focus on different things. Like trolls. Trolls get a shitload of books what the hell.

When will I get to read about Sartar?

Next questions, what the hell did it mean when it said that Waha got healed by Pavis? I thought Gods don't manifest in the world anymore after Time? There are other details like that too, is there some way to incarnate a God in Glorantha?

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Pavis and other citygods are more like large spirits then gods if I recall correctly. Info on that is in Pavis & Big Rubble.

Generally, any sufficiently powerful worshipper of a god is indistinguishable from their god.

When Renvald Meldekbane called Orlanth to manifest in the world to fight the monstrous chaos thing Zistor, it may also have been Renvald filling himself with Orlanth's power, something commonly called Heroforming.

Was the Waha that Pavis injured and healed the god, a man incarnating the god, or something in between?

Yes. Both. And neither.

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Interesting. Thanks Anons! Was there ever Heroquesting rules for Runequest or was that only ever a Heroquest thing?

>Androgeus
>CF of 20 means s/he's as strong as Harrek the Berserk and Jar-Eel the Razoress and about 2000 warriors give or take
Who is this mysterious person?

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I don't think there was anything official ruleswise, although I think the new version will.

As for Androgeus, they're a contradictory demigod stuck between opposites. They don't have a massive list of events they've taken part in IIRC.

Anyone has made they own little animal tribes for Prax?

Not myself but I recall in an old thread someone talked about making an Elephant tribe.

Would a member of some Arkat cult be a sorcerer with a grimoire or more of a theist? This is important.

Depends on their origin.
If they're from an area with a tradition of sorcery then the former, but if they've come to worshipping Arkat through his aspect as a Humakti hero, then the latter.

IMG prax has a whole bunch of tiny tribes one clan/family in size:
>Short Llama Tribe (because why else would they be high llamas?)
>Pig Tribe
>River Horse Tribe (live in rivers and marshes with their ugly beasts)
>Ibex Tribe (never call them the goat tribe)

Img = in my game?
That's cool, tell me more about them, I love tiny praxian tribes getting be between the big five.

>River horse tribe.
Hmmm.

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Is 13th Age Glorantha dead yet? It dropped and since then: crickets.

Yup. They themselves don't like the name, because of the bias against horses.

Or "In My Glorantha."

These tiny tribes mostly live in some small areas. The River Horse Tribe inhabits the Zola Fel valley, hunting the birds and beasts of the wetlands. They've been pushed further and further out by the settler of the valley, and now are mostly found in the swamps. They're associated with the water rune, and their guardian spirit is the same as their tribal beast.

The Ibex Tribe are often mistaken for the Impala Tribe, as they're both pygmy peoples. The Ibex Tribe are associated with the air rune, and have a large proportion of Storm Bull followers. A god learner once described them as the last of Ragnaglar's followers untainted by Chaos. Unfortunately he described them to the tribe itself, and was slaughtered for the insult.

The Short Llamas are fire rune associated. Sure footed, they thrive where few other tribes would try to survive. They climb cliffs, fending off cliff toads and rock lizards, stealing condor eggs, and trying to avoid the taint of "walkers."

The pig tribe herds giant boars, similar to tuskers, and are connected to the darkness rune. For these reasons, they're often mistaken for Tusk Riders. They spend a lot of their time scavenging, as the pigs can eat things thrown away or forgotten by other tribes. The humans are similarly scavengers, so their garb is often piecemeal and they will often use the weapons of other tribes.

Bretty cool mate, I like some of them a lot, like the pig tribe or the Ibex tribe.

>13th Age Glorantha
Always wondering about this, isn't the most commonly talked about glorantha the 3rd age ?
What happened in the other 10 ages?

It's the system name, not reflecting the setting really.

Glorantha is very IMG friendly,

if you think that some idea had in mind would be cool, fun and/or interesting you should definitely add it to your game.

I for one whant to include a small "scarab tribe" in prax which is basically just some trollkin warriors who legged it, mostly do their thing during the nigth and live together with large scarab beetles.

Yeah I now, I really don't play in Glorantha but I use a lot of gloranthan stuff like Praxian tribes and other cultures or deities (Lodril, Vardruse or Hunakt for example).
The idea of a beetle tribe of Trollkins is pretty funny, but wheren't the trollkins unable to reproduce be themselves, being an offspring of Uz than where steriles or I'm mixing my Uz?

Trollkin breed true, which is why they're a problem.

Praxians herd but don't always ride their tribal animal, right? Or are they all large enough to ride?

So far as I know, the only ones that don't ride their herd-animals are the Morokanth, since sapient tapir-people would look a bit dumb getting piggyback rides from their herded humans!

Morokanth creep me the fuck out.

Other than the Dragon Pass, I knew little about the larger world until these threads and someone got me into Praxians, so I keep looking for more info. Some of their animals don't seem like good mounts though, like llamas and impalas.

Like all tribes of Prax, Morocanth most likely get EVERYTHING they need from their herds. Human leather for their clothes and bags, human bones for their weapons, human blood and milk for their drink. Tapir are vegetarians but Morocanth are only tapir-like so they probably eat human meat too. Glorantha is one weird and magical place. If it helps you feel better though, I'm pretty sure the other tribes can raid the fuck out of them since Morocanth can't ride.

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>When will I get to read about Sartar?

In the two books that are exclusively devoted to describing Sartar and his kingdom?

They're going through in publishing order. The early stuff first.

I'd honestly recommend it for anyone looking to get into Glorantha. It's nice and easy when a book doesn't hit you with the histories of major cultures and a detailed timeline of events thousands of years long all at once. It also avoids the question on if Glorantha is gameable. There's plenty of stuff to play with here if you like gritty bronze age adventures.

That said, reading it this way raises several questions. Like I wasn't expecting Griffin Mountain to hit me with bigass new lore. I was reading the summary of the three ages again, when I got to the second age, I was expecting another story on the EWF. Instead, I learned about the Middle Sea Empire and the EWF was barely mentioned.

Most people of the Covenant do. Only the Morokanth are outliers of the known tribes.

My guess is there will be the occasional walker in the least tribes (as opposed to great and lesser), but the four I came up with are riders (llamas are big enough to ride, as are hippos (well, as much as rhinos) the Ibex Tribe are pygmies, and the pig riders ride huge boars like mraloti pig hsunchen and tusk riders do.

Isn't there a mindbreak spell to turn normal humans into Morokanth herdmen too?

I think it was mentioned somewhere that the tapir dudes got a spell that turn their man beasts into normal humans.
But I'm pretty sure that that was written by Mongoose, so fuck that noise

There's legends of it (and it's been statted up)
But I view it more as a legend and outsider view of several Morokanth practices.

Morokanth enslave people, mainly to do things herdmen can't do. Like reading, weaponmaking, etc.

Morokanth also use slaves to produce a "higher quality" herdman via interbreeding with their herds. The offspring are smarter than herdmen, but compared to a human they're like a brain damaged mentally retarded person. Sometimes they can mimic human speech.

There are rituals that can summon a herdman spirit. By having the spirit and a human compete in spirit combat, the spirit can take over their body.

Of course, most herdmen will be children. After all there's little reason to raise them to adulthood. A few cows for milk and calves, a bull for studding. But otherwise most will be culled when they grow a beard.

So, anyone can identify all the gods using only the runes? Seems the six age game we would be a Solar clan, but then narrowing it down will be more difficult. I would bet it being in pavis or balazar.

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Sun, Truth, ???. Illusion, Issaries/Etyries maybe?, ???. Earth

Seems like the spread is similar to what's King of Dragon Pass's council, so the pantheon might be similar to an Orlanthi's

It's hard to tell. Most of those runes are common ones, and Haledi's is the rare wilderness rune, often associated with the Lady of the Wild.

I wonder if the other Prax tribes will defend the Morocanths if an invader decides to wipe them out because of their practice of herding men.

Probably, maybe.

After all, if the morokanth were wiped out, it would be a crime against Waha.

On the other hand, there'd be no one protecting their herds which would then be up for grabs.

The Truth dude seems to be armored, apart of Humakt, what other Truth warrior dudes exist? Yelmalio?
Lady of the wild? Wasn't her the one than married Balazar or I'm mixing myths?

Sometimes. She's also the mother of Odayla (the bear god) with Orlanth. The mate of Ironhoof in beast valley, and a daughter of Kero Fin.

Why are trolls fucked anyway?

They withdrew from the Council of Wyrms' Friends over the ritual that led to the creation of Nysalor/Gjabi. The other members cursed them, interfering with their fertility, but the spell was partially blocked by Kyger Litor (troll mother goddess).
Since that time, the majority of births have been trollkin rather than true trolls. Efforts to remove the curse continue, one such attempt resulted in the creation of the Great Trolls (UZDO).

They got cursed so that real trolls give birth to stunted things called trollkin so they're slowly dying out. They opposed the birth of Gbaji, so they got cursed by him I think. Haven't read too deeply about that bit of lore yet though. Like every other race Glorantha, they've also been involved in several wars so other races dislike them. Plus you know. They like eating those other races, so that puts a damper on diplomacy.

How important are secular leaders in Glorantha? I don't know if this is just Prax, but my impression from Cults of Prax is that religion is of paramount importance and anyone worth a damn leadership or power wise is probably a Rune Lord or Rune Priest. This makes Cults incredibly influential. Are all leaders in Glorantha Priests/Lords?

Not all, but a lot of the time secular and religious power is tied.
Clan chieftains are also god-talkers of Orlanth the chief, the Emperor of Dara Happa is also the high priest of Yelm (and Yelm himself), etc.

>the Emperor of Dara Happa is also the high priest of Yelm (and Yelm himself)

This reminds me, has Lord Death on a Horse been explained to be someone big, like some god of death, or is he just a really hardcore man who likes killing?

The Malkioni to the west separate temporal and spiritual leadership.
The sorcerers look after the spiritual well being of the people, and the nobility have the duty of looking after their material well-being.

(the women and gold the nobility are surrounded with are, according to their mythology, to make this onerous task (and that of dealing with outsiders) more pleasant.)

I don't think it's ever set out with concrete details. The possibilities could include:

>A really murderous Humakti
>A human Zorak Zorani berserker
>Humakt
>(an) Arkat
>Kargan Tor
>The (/a) Devil
>An embodied spirit comprised of all the sin of the Loskalmi
>A Yellow Vadeli
>A Tolati
>Any and all of these at once.

third from left is a beast rune, also known as dragons eye.

Nah they re-populate just fine as the other anons already said.

Still considering if they should consider golden scarab beetles as some form of corrupted beetle(gold is after all the fire metal), or value them as some sort of counter culture rebellion stuff.

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There is an Arkat cult in Adventures in Gloranth apparently that I think was theistic, but considering Arkat's history I'd imagine there are all kinds of Arkat cults with all kinds of magic.

You mean giant bombard beetles or plain giant golden beetles? The first are a lot more amussing, and dangerous. Perhaps a sub set of the argan argar cult than used lodril and mix the worship of Lodril/argan argan to both live in the surface and rebel to Uz social mores, with they fiery bombard lizard and using the rebel magic of lodril.

Nah the boring kind, was fluffing out the trollkin tribe a little more and determined that sheep sized scarabs would be pretty cool for them, mostly dung beetles, trading literally shit for stuff with some of the other clans or moving to their pastures when they move on.

Sounds fun user, tough I dunno who will buy shit (Vadeli?). I don't remember the praxians being specially hostiles to Troll, so I bet they will be have a better time than the Pol Joni integrating in the Praxian live.

Everybody needs manure.

Perhaps farmers,but the praxians nomads are pretty self suficients, and they animals produce enough bio-compost for all they needs, peddling literal shit doesn't seem a very stable way to get an income. But I could be wrong desu.

I was talking about trollkin collecting shit for their dung beetles, partially by following some large clan and partially by trading it for some goods or simple services.

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Ah I see, that makes more sense. The beetles put they larvae in the shit balls, don't they? Seems a better way to eat some broteing than consuming shit.
What kind of society do they have tough, Trollkin gypsy?

I don't have my books to hand, but did the Praxian tribes do any sedentary stuff like agriculture at all? IIRC they just went the traditional nomad route of herd animals and trading/raiding for the stuff they couldn't get.

If I Recall well, the praxian disdained anything to do with dirt-pickers, they raided the different people than had lived there since the God times for grains and vegetables and the villagers acepted it with a meek resignation.

>Trollkin gypsy
THat actually sound even better thatn the usual non-descript prax nomad i intended.
Do troll have the technological marvel known as the wheel ?
light carriages pulled by a group of scarabs controlled by non-retarded trollkins sounds pretty comfy
Living in the trails of the large clans and near chaos where non-trolls don't want to live.

>The beetles put they larvae in the shit balls, don't they?
Yeah, unless you got some fancy modern tech for breeding them it's required.
I don't think that larger beetles would make larger balls in relation to their new size but sometimes you need a situation where the players find a strangely round brown, football sized sphere in the middle of nowhere and start thinking about it.

I imagine them going from oasis to oasis, bartering stuff they have picked up along with nomads, selling the useless members, putting ridiculous acts or chanting and making weird music than amuse the nomads or whatever. Also trollkin aren't that big, they could go mahoud like in they big beetles, imagine them full of all kinds of refuse, garish pieces of clothes, bones and leather, brightly colored stones all merry arranged in they lovely golden dung beetles...

Sounds good to me, so golden beetles are prized ?
Selling of the stunted kin to others sounds like something even trollkin would do.

Imagine a 1,30 tall troll, dressed in garish clothes decoraded with pretty stones, telling you that he's a rich man for owning TWO golden beetles.

and he is going to bould a fence to keep those pesky impala riders out

I liked the idea of the other user about the golden beetles and they solar implications, they favour them because is a rebellions statement to other trolls (specially those no fun Pavis ones), than they attract an extra amount of customers is a welcomed adition.
What kind of gods apart of goritsi would they worship tough?

Well Argan Argar is a good candidate for surface feeling trolls who live by travel and trade.

Meant to write "surface dwelling".
Also spirit magic is big on parax so I could see them also rely on that.
The spirit of scarabs
The spirit of clear night
The spirit of Fortune, which is a golden stylized scarab for them.
Or do trolls have an issue with that?

I wouldn't go for a spirit for healthy offsprings tho since I would expect second and third generation trollkin to be more stable as they keep selling of their stunted members.

Orlanth did nothing wrong.

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The fuck is going on in that picture?

A thanatar cultist is attacking a sorcerer -- probably a Lhankor Mhy scholar or a Seshnelan priest.

He seems to be using the head of an Orlanthi Storm Lord for its knowledge of lightning magic. I'm not sure about the rest of his arsenal, but it seems to be both extensive and well-preserved.

Orlanth did plenty of things wrong, he just makes up for it. A relatable and good deity to follow imo

Loyal thane best god.

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Odd that, because the Praxians normally hate them, yeah? But they are still a "proper" Praxian tribe so defended from outsides?

I'm still learning and some fucker a few threads back got me a bit hooked on Praxians.

Prax was always the good part, Dragon Pass never got its boxed set and being the focus has since stripped it of interest. Balaazing was just distant and slightly boring.

I'm just a general fan of animism and more "primitive" tribal cultures both, so someone said "Look at Prax" and I've found it pretty to my liking, though I'm not sure how I feel about nomads.

Do you think of the tribes as native Americans or Eurasian steppe nomads?

They feel more like Eastern steppe nomads to me, especially due to their strong ties to their animals, which feels much more Asian than American.

I'd like to think that Elmal is Yelmalio so that Orlanth stole Yelm's son from him.

Next you'll be saying that Baaster Gor's father was Humakt.

Now "stolen" is kinda harsh considering that the myth goes that elmal was bild and not in the cool kids club at the sun tribe.
more Like "Get in buddy, we are going to have adventures, get the chicks and figth Chaos."

God of defensive warfare is best god.
Also remember that he got his body destroyed, by crazy powerfull chaos creatures, three times and just puts himself back together, with or without actually dying, while yelm is dead in the underworld for getting poked with a sword.

Yelm's a bitch.

It is IMG. Mostly because I want Humakt to have a proper family, even if it is the dourest of them all.

probably one of those details I'd change IMG, at least the amount it's fucking over Trolls

but then there's lots of little or major changes I'd make for the Elder Races and other non-human races of Glorantha, like Dwarves are mostly extinct, cause I find them to be unpleasant boring assholes, while Ducks would actually be a fair amount more prominent than normal, because I think they're pretty interesting

That's fine, but there are already alot of places where they don't live and people know them, at best, from myth.

Could we also point out that Yelm isn't the original head of the fire tribe as he pretends to be, may or may not be a dragon and is a major motivation for the "punch a solar in the dick" heroquest ?

This is actually what a lot of Orlanthi believe.

Is there a mother?
She must have been hell of a woman to counteract Yelm.
Or maybe Orlanth is just that much of a rolemodel.

I don't remember Yelmalio's mother being mentioned, but the Orlanth/Yelmalio relationship is rather funny. For one, an Orlanthi and a Yelmalio worshipper can be the best of mates, but they are still required by their religion to take the piss out of each other, and the Orlanthi has to eat eggs at least once a week as a show of contempt for Yelmalio.

>the "punch a solar in the dick" heroquest

How does this rate on the danger scale from 0 to The Fucking Uralda Heroquest?

Would probably be Dendara, the wife of Yelm and most perfect woman.

Who certainly isn't Entekos, the right air, celestial goddess, and mother of moons.

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I bet it was teh Vardrus daughter, she was the still air or some other lame power like that.

What's this about him maybe being a dragon?

Orlanthi propaganda.

the God Learners associated Yelm with the second Emperor of Kralorela, HeenMaroun. HeenMaroun was a true dragon, and has a lot more in common with Yelm's son, Murharzarm.

(Who is also depicted in the Gods War boardgame as a dragon.)

Note, this is just the Kralori point of view. The equivalent figure in the east isles, Govmeranen, was not a dragon.

Morokanth are "officialy" vegetarian now, which calls into question how they "live off their herd". Imagine a fat tapir lounging about with a bunch of herdmen actually doing things the human body is good for (e.g. toiling the plains to produce the crunchiest lettuce for their herder).

Why would he think he's even particularly hardcore? We have not seen him fight anyone or anything badass.
He's just some burly dude on a horse trampling through the pathetic militias of the area. Never facing any actual warriors.

Things that are Orlanthi propaganda:
>Everything, including Yelm's own version of events

That Pelorians are so high strung they refuse to admit even things their god learned to be chill about tells you all you need to know about them.

Too bad neither the Second Council nor the Lunars figured out it's maybe a bad idea to include them in their empires.

I figure they get the herdmen to gather up a bunch of tasty roots and leaves.

This is of course, one of the ways the Morokanth cheated. They lost the contest, and were meant to have to eat meat, but they worked out a deal with Waha where they'd still look after their herds, but the herds could eat meat, and the Morokanth could eat plants instead.

Fucking Morokanth.

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Depending how good the city watch is or how strong the solar in question, a 4 at best.

Let's not lump all Pelorians together when really we just mean Dara Happens.

>Hating on the Lodrilly.
Faggot.

We shouldn't forget that there was someone who was equally good at chariot racing AND pissing off Dara Happans that she made god.

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From which book is that text, is it a Heroquest supplement?

>is it a Heroquest supplement?

Aye, it's from the Imperial Lunar Handbook Vol. 2.