Dark Forest Umathelan Encounters

OK, today's post has been directly ripped off the fucking brilliant post on the Rotten Pulp blog...

This is Second Age Umathela, so there aren't any hostile Elves in the forests... which does not mean the forests are safe, though. Here's a nice D100 encounter table for those unwary parties who have adventured into Umathela's Dark Forest.

1-2: 3D6 Bush Babies (T&T: MR 15; RQ: use Trollkin, SIZ 4, CON 9; Original RPG: AC 10, HD ½). Paralyse on touch, then climb up adventurer to eat. Vulnerable to caring words.

3-4: 1D6 crows follow party, gain 1D4 crows per day. Dive-bomb when party is distracted. 5 or more crows can try abducting party member - roll under DEX (T&T: LVL1 DEX SR; RQ: Agility roll; Original RPG: roll under DEX×5%) or be carried off.

5-6: Vangono's horror with cub. Attacks if angered.

7-8: Skin Kin. Skin flaps hanging from branches. 2D6 detach and float after party discreetly; attack by stripping flesh off party members to replace it with themselves. If someone is killed in this manner, the stripped skin becomes another Skin Kin, and the dead man will be puppeteered by the skin kin. Will retreat if party cuts themselves.

9-10: Blood-Oak blocks path. Vine tendrils around it grapple, takes 3 rounds to drop grappled hero into concentric teeth that go through center of tree. If a vine is severed, three more grow in their place (prevent this by cauterising wound). Its wood is super valuable, screams when burned.

11-12: Snicket swarm — 4D6 rat-bird things tear through area, leaving everything exposed at head height stripped bare. Listen check to hear them coming, reflex save to avoid.

13-14: Snake-Armed Ruby Brain Beast. 5 snake arms; each can grapple or claw.  Placing palm on gem in back will instantly kill it.

15-16: Patch in middle of road is covered trapdoor, leads to underground webbed cavern with Trapdoor spider. Spider pops out to grab nearby enemies and bind them in its web below, injecting them with paralysing poison to eat later.

17-18: 1D6 Olodo robbers lay trap in road — front party members will be swept into rope trap, robbers will make demands of remaining members from trees.

19-20: 1D4 Black vines twined in shape of humans, white masks in place of faces. Touch transfers your face to them, stealing your mind. Vulnerable to mirrors. Mask can be transferred back by use of a mirror.

21-22: Find a wolf in a trap. Will struggle at first, but if released and healed will become loyal to party.

23-24: Broken-down cart with carcasses of draught hogs. 1D100 guilders worth of Gems, baby in basket under wreckage — seems to be from wealthy Malki family.

25-26: Tiny Umathing village. Distrustful of strangers, but have food. All old women in town currently out on hill putting old iron knives in the ground. Twin brothers are making a furrow around the village. They're preparing for an undead attack after a Nontrayan cultist died in childbirth.

27-28: Gigantic multi-layered cake in the middle of the forest. Unattended. Delicious.

29-30: Olodo camp. Friendly, lots of music. Will take party onboard in return for odd-jobs.

31-32: Lightning storm. Builds in intensity, starting a fire, until one bolt slams down near the PC's as a solid, bright crystal, surrounded by shrapnel of the same material. In light, the crystal becomes volatile and explosive; in darkness, becomes incredibly heavy.

33-34: Massive, recently-vacated cocoon hanging from tree, warm and protected. Will give all who sleep within it revelatory dreams.

35-36: Lake with bathing Rusalki - water-nymph ghosts. Beautiful, will lead travellers down to underwater village. Breathing is fine as long as you hold their hand.

37-38: Travelling explorer investigating rare animals, will accompany PC's or buy any corpses they have.

39-40: Old shack with saws, tools, etc. Woodsman owner will return soon.

41-42: Razorleaf wood. The leaves here draw blood when they touch. Trees begin shake, shedding more and more leaves.

43-44: Chasm with river at bottom. Rotting ropes show where bridge used to be. Might be just wide enough to jump.

45-46: Daggerslash. Resembles dead piece of wood, attracts party with distressed moaning sounds then latches onto them like beartrap with 40 rows of sharp claws.

47-48: Glade of massive, dark red mushrooms; when properly prepared, can be used as nerve poison, paralyses victim.

49-50: 1D4 Bear traps surrounding tied basket of food, money and goodies.

51-52: Path cuts out, rocky outcrop on one side, thick forest on other.

53-54: Skull butterflies flutter to party, play music. Land of the dead slowly opens up between tree trunks around them.

55-56: Deep fog falls. Party is likely to loose their way.

57-58: Bushfire.

59-60: Tree trunks fallen in way, must go around.

61-62: Smoking crater with shiny glimmer in center.

63-64: Flock of birds fly off at parties approach, screeching wildly. Everything nearby is aware of parties presence

65-66: Idyllic clearing with clear brook going through it.

67-68: Stream, must be forded or bridged.

69-70: Multiple skeletons stuck together into horrible beast - horseclaw, vulture, man and Vangono's horror.

71-72: A wooden puppet skeleton hands from a tree with offerings around it. It's a horrible idol, will offer advice if given food to eat.

73-74: Man entirely covered in tattoos hung from tree; if touched, tattoos will transfer to toucher, move slowly, whisper strange demands.

75-76: Trap in ground covered by leaf-litter. Falling in it leads to a banquet table, with chairs that will bind around PC's. Other guests in increasing stages of being transformed into plants. Log-man offers food and wine.

77-78: Witch trapped in Ice, six hands, holding a silver dagger in each. Seven gold-encrusted rubies frozen around her head. Lots of burnable tinder around.

79-80: Sleeping children in glade.

81-82: Statues cowering away from chasm - an invisible bridge leads over it.

83-84: Ghost Funeral procession.

85-86: PC's meet party of hungry ogres. Will pretend to be friendly travellers, and will try to kill and eat the PC's during the night.

87-88: Baba Yaga's hut. "Fou, fou, fou! I feel the Russian Spirit!" Hut on Chicken legs surrounded by skulls with glowing eyes. Baba yaga makes constant unreasonable demands or devours you, but her servants will help you stop her if you treat them kindly. May give guidance in rare cases.

89-90: Secret Timinit hive.

91-92: Thorn queen on throne, surrounded by dead children, can tell prophecies by pulling out eyes. Has power over all children, vulnerable to objects with five sides. Will ask riddles, attack with children and thorn vines from throne if angered.

93-94: Crystal guardian; as many heads as party members, each head copies one party members attributes and actions.

95-96: Forest is sentient, breathes.

97-100: A quiet, peaceful day. Birds chirp. The party feels at ease.

RuneQuest 6 available for pre-order now!

And here's the link!

RQ6 Stats for HeroQuest Publications

Someone on the Glorantha Yahoo list asked the following:

[We] wished that HeroQuest books, especially campaigns, had RQ stats added. Once RQ6 is out, wouldn't that be cool? I don't know how difficult it would be to achieve this, I'm sure there are many legal problems or other technicalities I'm not aware of, but if this could be done, even as just an appendix, I'm pretty sure it would be good for sales.

To which Loz answered:

We're way ahead of you.

We're intending (that is, Design Mechanism and Moon Design) to release PDF files with appropriate RQ6 stats and notes to accompany HQ books. Books won't be dual statted; that would inflate page count horribly. However RQ players will be able to use HQ books as fully as possible with these PDF stat packs. And, many GMs like their stats separate from the core text anyway, so it makes sense to adopt this approach.

It will take some time to put these together of course; time we don't have right now. But it's All Part of the Plan.

This is just über cool. And, as mentioned by Loz, it would keep the stat blocks [let's admit that stat blocks are a pain in the arse] separate from the juicy text of the HQ books.

The Look of Second Age Westerners

OK, today's post is straight out of the HeroQuest forums out there at Moon Design's web-site.

The original poster wrote:

I am really enjoying the Look of Glorantha blog Moon Design is doing for the lead up to the Big Glorantha guide.
While waiting for RQ6 I am reading the Abiding Book for MRQ2.
Does a Second Age Westerner look different from a Third Age Westerner?
Is it only a matter of worldview that was changed by the disasters between the Second and Third Age, or did it also set them on a new path of cultural development?

To which Jeff replied:

I fear the Mongoose artistic accuracy was almost always very bad (Dara Happa Stirs is a notable example) and Greg and I really have no idea how they depicted Second Age Westerners. However, this article does give correct information as to the look of the Second Age Jrusteli:

http://moondesignpublications.com/blog/jeff/quick-summary-gloranthan-cultures-part-two-westerners

Cool link. I especially like this picture by the immense Ivan Bilibin:

it fits in well with my own view of the Umathelan Malki people.

RuneQuest 6 available for pre-order soon

RuneQuest 6 will be available for pre-order soon for £32/€40 from the 'Products' page of the Design Mechanism web-site. Here's the relevant announcement by Loz:

Today I sent the production files to the printers.

I'm therefore hoping that pre-orders can start next week. Here are the details.

Moon Design will be handling all print and electronic orders via their website. There are several reasons for doing this.

First is synergy. Part of our business model was to integrate with Moon wherever we could. By partnering with Jeff and Rick we can offer package deals on both RQ6 and Glorantha titles (for those that want them).

Second is expedience. Moon already has an established e-commerce gateway and it makes sense to take advantage of that. Plus, Moon can host PDFs for immediate download once payment has been processed which benefits Design Mechanism because we get a far higher portion of the cover price than relying simply on Drivethru - although Drivethru will still be used for PDF sales and Print on Demand options.

Our Products page at The Design Mechanism will have a link to the RQ pages at Moon, so clicking on our 'Order Now' button will take you to their site. Moon still have a little work to do before all that goes live, but it shouldn't take too long.

The PDF edition of the book will also be fully bookmarked and hyperlinked. We have to finish that work, but once its done then you'll be able to order the PDF immediately. If you order the print copy you also get the PDF free of charge, so you'll at least have the electronic content while you wait for your book to ship.

RQ6 is being distributed by Alliance, the largest distributor of hobby books and games in the world. They are also handling direct fulfilment for us, so that's where your book will ship from once it reaches their warehouse from the printer. I'm anticipating that stock will be available from about the 20th July, but its possible this date will shift a little. I will keep you notified.

Pre-order cost of RQ6 is $50 (US) + $10 shipping in North America, or $15 shipping elsewhere in the world. And you get the PDF free, which on its own is $25.

We will be maintaining the pre-order price until 22nd August. Two reasons for this. First, it takes into account Gencon US, and second its my birthday. Seemed like the right date. After 22nd August the price is $62, but this still includes the PDF if you order direct.

Some people have asked me if RQ6 will be available for Continuum (20th - 23rd July). Unfortunately, we won't be able to ship stock to the UK in time. However Pete will be there with a couple of sample copies so Continuum attendees will be able to whet their appetites.

Other than that, its great to be able to say that RuneQuest is firmly on its way. Stay tuned for pre-orders going live and the final release date.

Snow White and the Huntsman

I've seen the film Snow White and the Huntsman yesterday and I've quite enjoyed it. Now, this being a role-playing blog, I'll gloss over its cinematographic qualities (or lack thereof), and concentrate on the inspirational parts of it, along with what 'improvements' I would imagine I would have brought to the film, had I been the director. Inspirational in terms of an Umathing campaign game, yes... Read on to see why.

By the way, the following may contain 'spoilers' but since everyone including little children already knows the story of Snow White, this shouldn't be an issue.

Characters
The stepmother is portrayed as a kind of [literally] life-sucking lamia or vampiress. Throughout the film, which spans several years in the life of Snow White, the Queen has most of the young females in the kingdom abducted so that she can remain young and beautiful by sucking their life force. Now this is shown by her "sucking" their breath through her open mouth. This actually reminded me of Oriental tales of qì-stealing vixen spirits. Pretty cool, but in my opinion it would have been more fitting with the faux European milieu of the film to depict the stepmother as a kind of Erzsébet Báthory, the notorious Hungarian countess who bathed in virgins' blood to keep her youthful looks, and thus to depict her bathing in blood. But then I guess the film would have lost its 12A rating...
The Queen got her cool qì-stealing power through her mother. This is shown in a flashback type of scene, although the mother looks like an unassuming peasant woman. How on earth could she possibly have been able to bestow this power on her daughter? In my version of Snow White and the Huntsman, the Queen's mother is a puissant God Learner who found the qì-stealing power in the Otherworld, and who passes it on to her daughter instants before she's taken care of by the Gift Carriers who are wiping out the God Learners.

The Huntsman, played by Thor, looks like a solid Umathing. Good.

Snow White is a wee skinny for an arse-kicking fighting princess, although she does look good in her armour at the end of the film. I wish she'd kept it on during the whole film.

The river folk are a nice addition. They don't look particularly faux European though. Too bad most of them get wiped out half-way through the film. I would make them a lost Umathing tribe who worships the river spirits rather than the Storm pantheon.

The Duke, his son, and their retinue look like nice faux European knights. That's OK with the old Gloranthan way of portraying the Westerners, but obviously they aren't aware that the canonical view on Westerners has changed. Bring on the new art!

Creatures
The dwarfs are OK. What kind of wilderness-dwelling creatures could have taken care of a Malki princess on the run in Umathela, though? Durulz? I don't think there are any in Pamaltela. Olodo? Yes, I think Olodo would do. They would keep Snow White in their inhospitable mountains and train her to become a kick-arse warrior. In which case she should fight half-naked rather than in a Malki armour.

The troll that the Huntsman and Snow White meet in the wilderness is obviously an Aldryami. How uninformed of them.

Overall Atmosphere
The meeting with the white deer is a rip-off from Princess Mononoke. Shame on them.

Again, what with Erzsébet Báthory, the 18th century settig of Snow White, etc.... I think the film should have looked more like it had been cast in the 17th century, with crude firearms. Imagine at the end of the film the Queen would have used bombards rather than trebuchets against the forces of the Duke. Also the son of the Duke would be a master musketeer rather than a bowman.

Hollywood: next time, drop me a line :)

Art for Umathela (5)

Today's artist, contrary to all the previous ones, is not a Russian but a German, albeit pretty much from the same period of time as Ivan Bilibin, and drawing in a similar fairy-tale style.

Actually Franz Jüttner (1865-1925) is particularly remembered for his illustrations of German fairy tales such as Snow White, even though he also draw political cartoons, and, supposedly, comics, even though the latter seem to have been lost.

Snow White fleeing in the dark forest -- you can see the huntsman in the distance

The Queen asks her magic mirror

The End of the Middle Sea Empire and its Consequences

I have been watching a lot of Rome lately and, although the TV series is set at the end of the Republic and at the beginning of the Empire, it has spurred me to read more about Roman history. By the way, if you want to play at the time of the TV series, I heartily recommend the Rome role-playing game.

Anyway, an interesting article I have stumbled upon is the Wikipedia article about the so-called Crisis of the Third Century: The Crisis resulted in such profound changes in the Empire's institutions, society, economic life and, eventually, religion, that it is increasingly seen by most historians as defining the transition between the historical periods of classical antiquity and late antiquity. I would add that it also prefigures  the key changes between antiquity and the Middle Ages.

Seeing how the end of an empire brings about social changes that deeply impact the areas formerly managed by the declining empire, I have excerpted and commented a few key sentences from the Wikipedia article.

a new Malki manour

In the years following the emperor's death, generals of the Roman army fought each other for control of the Empire and neglected their duties in preventing invasions from foreigners.

I believe the Middle Sea Empire likewise becomes the scene of many localised, small-scale wars to control the various now-independent (and isolated, because of the Closing) parts of the former Middle Sea Empire. This being a fantasy setting, though, these small-scale wars are as likely to involve powerful wizards as military commanders.

Dozens of formerly thriving cities, especially in the Western Empire, had been ruined, their populations dispersed and, with the breakdown of the economic system, could not be rebuilt. Major cities and towns, even Rome itself, had not needed fortifications for many centuries; many now surrounded themselves with thick walls.

This is in my opinion one of the most mediaeval-ish parts. The God Learner cities of the Umathelan coast, who used to be large, open, and without walls, are now partly destroyed, and their remnants of population have regrouped in the most easily defendable quarter of the city (possibly the one on a hill), and are busy building up defensive walls.

Internally, the empire faced hyperinflation caused by years of coinage devaluation. This had started earlier under the Severan emperors who enlarged the army by one quarter and doubled the legionaries' base pay. As each of the short-lived emperors took power they needed ways to raise money quickly to pay the military's "accession bonus" and the easiest way to do so was by simply cutting the silver in coins and adding less valuable metals like bronze or copper.

No-one trusts Umathelan coinage any longer... The metal therein is too debased. This is a further incentive for "dungeon delving" by the way: delvers hope to find caches of non-debased metal in the abandoned dungeons of the God Learners.

One of the most profound and lasting effects of the Crisis of the Third Century was the disruption of Rome's extensive internal trade network. Ever since the Pax Romana, starting with Augustus, the empire's economy depended in large part on trade between Mediterranean ports and across the extensive road systems to the Empire's interior. Merchants could travel from one end of the Empire to the other in relative safety within a few weeks, moving agricultural goods produced in the provinces to the cities, and manufactured goods produced by the great cities of the East to the more rural provinces.
[...]
With the onset of the Crisis of the Third Century, however, this vast internal trade network broke down. The widespread civil unrest made it no longer safe for merchants to travel as they once had, and the financial crisis that struck made exchange very difficult with the debased currency. This produced profound changes that, in many ways, would foreshadow the very decentralised economic character of the coming Middle Ages.

Roads aren't safe any longer — where they still exist, since no-one is able to maintain them any longer. Banditry is rife. Whatever trade caravans are left must hire various mercenaries and swords-for-hire to accompany them, and to protect them. This provides further adventure seeds in post-imperial Umathela.

Large landowners, no longer able to successfully export their crops over long distances, began producing food for subsistence and local barter. Rather than import manufactured goods from the empire's great urban areas, they began to manufacture many goods locally, often on their own estates, thus beginning the self-sufficient "house economy" that would become commonplace in later centuries, reaching its final form in the Middle Ages' manorialism. The common free people of the Roman cities, meanwhile, began to move out into the countryside in search of food and better protection.
Made desperate by economic necessity, many of these former city dwellers, as well as many small farmers, were forced to give up hard-earned basic civil rights in order to receive protection from large land-holders. In doing so, they became a half-free class of Roman citizen known as coloni. They were tied to the land, and in later Imperial law their status was made hereditary. This provided an early model for serfdom, the origins of mediaeval feudal society and of the mediaeval peasantry.

Oh yes, former proud citizens of the Middle Sea Empire. If you haven't been strong or scheming enough to live through the upheavals of your cities, you must have fled to the countryside and started up eking out a living toiling the earth. Glorantha being Glorantha, country-dwelling Malki labourers must somehow have included worship to Ernamola in their once-monotheistic cults. They also need a protector in case of war, strife, or invasions. Hence the Malki manours that are appearing in the Umathelan countryside (whereas the Malki used to be concentrated on the coast before the Closing).

The Tarmo Mountains

The Tarmo Mountains are the southernmost limit of Umathela. Here is how they look like:

(according to Greg himself!)

Height and Weight Table

There is a single table in the T&T rules to roll a delver's height and weight. Yet one may want to have a thin player character. Or a fat one. And even beyond delvers, the game master may want to have a diverse array of NPCs!

The following table will enable you to roll a delver's or NPC's height through a random 3D6 roll, and then to assign a corresponding weight depending on the overall body frame the delver/NPC is supposed to have.

Enjoy.

A: Severely Underweight (kg)
B: Underweight (kg)
C: Normal/Healthy (kg)
D: Overweight (kg)
E: Obese (kg)

3D6	Height (m)	A	B	C	D	E
3	1.22	23	26	32	41	52
4	1.30	26	29	37	46	59
5	1.35	28	31	40	50	64
6	1.42	31	35	44	55	71
7	1.47	33	37	47	59	76
8	1.55	37	41	52	66	84
9	1.60	40	44	56	70	90
10	1.68	44	49	61	78	99
11	1.73	46	52	65	82	105
12	1.80	50	56	70	89	113
13	1.85	53	59	74	94	120
14	1.93	58	64	81	102	130
15	1.98	61	68	85	108	137
16	2.06	66	73	92	117	149
17	2.11	69	77	97	122	156
18	2.18	74	82	103	131	166

Obviously the table above is for humans, and it uses real world body mass indices. Depending on how you envision non-human sentients in your campaign, it must be modified accordingly...

Also there is no reason why this table couldn't be used with other role-playing games.

Art for Umathela (4)

As already mentioned in previous entries, I am a big fan of both real and faux vintage fairy tale/mythological Russian illustrations as inspirational sources for my Umathelan campaign game.

Today I am presenting you some inspiring illustrations by Mikhail Fedorenko. I haven't been able to find any details about this artist, despite his works being widely available on the internet.

A Malki Noble

The Gates of Yoranday

The Closing

T&T: New French-Language Edition - Character Sheet

A nice, professional-looking player character sheet is available on-line for free at this location. I believe you must have a valid login to download it, but it's worth it because the sheet is really beautiful.

Given the simplicity of the T&T stat blocks, I believe you can safely use this player character sheet even if you're not familiar with the French-language terms.

If you're really, really linguistically challenged, here are a few tips:
FOR is STR; CH is LK; VIT is SPD; FLU is WIZ.
I believe that Attaque normale is where you'd inscribe your usual attack dice.
Défense totale is the total hits blocked by your character's armour (I usually call these Protection Points in English — not sure how canonical it is).
Arme is Weapon; Portée is Range.
Sorts is Spells.

Design Mechanism Seminar, 27 May

Your chronicler with the poster of the panel.

The Sunday panel of the Eternal Convention was dedicated to RuneQuest 6, the latest incarnation of the classic "D100" role-playing game (and sytem); the speakers were Loz and Pete of MRQII fame, who started their own company to write, publish, and sell RuneQuest 6. Loz and Pete were unable to make it to the con this year, so they participated through a G+ hangout. It worked out pretty well despite the unreliable connection; Nick Brooke acted as the local speaker, often 'translating' questions from the audience to Loz and Pete who couldn't always hear them well.

First of all, Pittel (Andreas Pittelkow, one of the organisers of the Eternal Con) had received extended preview printouts from Loz and had prepared a nice board with all the sheet laid out for us conventiongoers to read before the panel actually started. This enabled us to prepare our questions for Loz and Pete. Mysticism, the new magic system featured by RuneQuest 6 on top of the regular ones, obviously attracted special attention.

Now on with what I have been able to transcribe from the seminar.

First, the name. After all the abbreviations for the various editions of RuneQuest, RuneQuest 6 will simply be called 'RuneQuest'.
The Design Mechanism holds exclusive rights to the 'RuneQuest' name for 5 years.

The upcoming book— it will be as complete as possible in terms of rules, magic, creatures, and GM advice. Expect a softcover book with a total of 456 pages. A hardcover book is not in the works, except maybe as a future collector's item.

Amongst the novelties:

• In terms of magic systems, it will feature the usual RQ magic systems plus mysticism.
• Passions: each character starts with three passions (see the preview)

Expect a sword and sorcery feeling in the way the rules are presented, e.g., in the character examples in the side bars.

Of course, the new RQ is generic and not tied to Glorantha any longer — although the various magic systems can obviously be used to replicate Glorantha. Sorcery has been streamlined and should be more easily usable than in RQ3. Combat has an added level of complexity compared to RQ3; however, the way combat works, it should be over il less time than it used to mostly because you don't want to fight to death: you would either surrender or flee.

(The following stems from questions from the audience)
Opposed skill resolution: under your skill but as high as possible (so-called 'blackjack' mechanism).

Mysticism is Crouching Tiger, Hidden Dragon and jedi knights, but it will be magic point-hungry. Possibly similar to the super powers section in the BGB.

Compatibility with other D100 games: high, not only with former RQ versions, but also with D100-based games in general.

In the works/future plans:

• Monster Island, by Pete: trying to capture the feeling of King Kong and sword and sorcery, with oodles of monsters, much in the style of Griffin Island.
• Book of Quests, by Loz: loosely related sword and sorcery scenarios.
• Mythic Greece
• Mythic Britain
• Mythic Constantinople
• Mythic Mesopotamia
• Glorantha will be supported, even though it's not yet a priority. Possibly, the first book will be Adventures in Glorantha, with advice as to how to use the rules in Third Age Glorantha; the book might also contain RQ statistics for already-published HQ books, e.g., Pavis.
• There is also a licence in the pipe. Unfortunately nothing further can be revealed.
• Also expect a free online downloadable magazine à la Signs & Portents.

The price of RuneQuest 6 will be approximately 48 euros. It should be available in July. You will soon be able to pre-order a hard copy directly from the Design Mechanism web-site. Pre-ordering it from the Design Mechanism web-site should entail a discount and/or the free PDF, and it is a nice way to support Loz & Pete.

Foreword by Steve Perrin. Only fitting. Shame on Mongoose for not having mentioned Steve in the MRQ books!

Moon Design Seminar, 26 May

The panels are one of the highlights of every Eternal Con. During these seminars, we get a glimpse of what our favourite rpg publishers have in the pipe.

Jeff prophesying

On Saturday night, I attended the Moon Design seminar. Here is a summary of what Jeff et al revealed to us mere mortals.

The next available product should be issue 15 of Wyrms Footnotes: the text is finished, but the illos and the layout are incomplete. Issue 15 of Wyrms Footnotes will contain a scenario by Sandy Petersen.

The next big phat sourcebook will be the Guide to Glorantha. At the moment it's 500+ pages of text only. It has been proofread thrice, including by someone who is not into gaming. The book is actually so big that it will be simultaneously published as two books, divided as (a) overview of Gloranthan cultures and religions, and (b) a gazetteer. The books cover everything until 1630-ish Third Age Glorantha. All regions are covered, including Pamaltela and the islands. Jeff guarantees very detailed coverage, especially of the Lunar Empire, down to the smallest village. The only regions with less coverage are the Eastern areas, i.e., east of the Shan Shan mountains [note: not 100% true: I've had access to the draft, and Umathela isn't much more developed than in already-existing sources]. Regional maps are going to be beautiful and to the same level of focus as the ones in the Sartar book, plus there'll be 10 city maps by Gillian Pearce, plus mythical time maps by Éric Vanel. There won't be as much art as in the Pavis book. The Guides to Glorantha are written from a Third Age perspective. Material which refers to events that took place in the Second Age is purposely contradictory: Third Age people, including scholars, do not want to know much about the Second Age because it is thought of as a terrible age. God-Learners for instance are presented as much more evil than in the Chaosium or in the Mongoose books.

Sample map

Upcoming Moon Design projects (from most to least likely/complete):

• The Coming Storm, a Cinsina campaign book by Ian Cooper;
• The Harmast Saga, fiction by Greg Stafford;
• Gloranthan Bestiary, intended to be more like a field guide than a monster manual, by Pete Nash;
• Big Rubble book, companion to the Pavis book, possibly by a non-historically Gloranthan writer;
• a Gloranthan board game, possibly through Kickstarter;
• Harreksaga, by Loz.

Eternal Con 2012

I'm just back from the Eternal Convention. This is the one con I attend every year at Whitsun... simply unmissable. The Eternal Con is the successor to the Tentacles convention, also held every year at Whitsun, and also in beautiful Burg Stahleck, a former castle that saw action during the Thirty Years' War, and which is now a youth hostel.

The Eternal Con has kept much of the focus of Tentacles: role-playing games tracing their descent from RuneQuest, such as the Call of Cthulhu and other Basic Role-Playing System-based games, and HeroQuest; and freeforms. The main difference between Tentacles and the Eternal Con is less emphasis from the latter on inviting 'big names' from the rpg industry, even though Jeff Richard from Moon Design was present this year, and Loz and Pete from the Design Mechanism were available through a G+ hangout — more on Jeff's, and Loz and Pete's panels later.

Yet another characteristic of the Eternal Con is its family atmosphere, and its friendly ambience, possibly due to the fact that many attendees have attended for years and know each other well.

I'll also mention the food, of excellent quality for a mere youth hostel, the incredible view over the Hunsrück and the Rhine (just look at the picture above!), and the glorious weather.

T&T: New French-Language Edition - Abridged Rules

The French editor of the 8th edition of the T&T rules has just published an abridged version of the latter. Although my home rules (Timinits and Trolls) are substantially modified compared with the official, published rules, I have thought that providing this link could be useful, if only to give an idea of the T&T rules to those who may not know them (yet).

RuneQuest 6 Previews

Loz knows we're mad at him for being late on RQ6, and so he's trying to appease us through these previews... But no sir, it won't work! We want the real McCoy!
[just joking, Loz... keep honing the game to perfection...]

I especially like the Magic preview; it gives me the impression that Magic in RQ6 will be heavy in tone and cultural immersion rather than in game mechanics (the older I get, the more bare game mechanics bore me).

An Interview with the Trollgod

Grognardia features a lengthy interview with the Trollgod himself. Always an interesting reading.

Of particular interest is the fact that Ken has always been first and foremost a fan of the swords & sorcery genre — no wonder then that my system of choice for swords & sorcery role-playing has always been T&T: HeroQuest is great for Campbellian explorations in mythology; RuneQuest for gritty adventuring, the Basic Role-Playing System for historical immersion, but when it comes to one vs many the pleasure of having lots of 6s showing up on the gaming table is hard to match :)

The interview is also interesting for yet more insight about the early days of our hobby and its giants: Greg Stafford, Steve Perrin, and Rudy Kraft.

A Malki Monastery in the Wilderness

The Monastery of Lofty Exploration was founded in the early days of Malki Umathela by the Order of Otherworld Exploration. At its peak, it housed hundreds of Malki monks tasked with exploring the Otherside, especially with regards to Olodo and Umathing myth pillaging.

After the big purge of Malkioneran orders in the past century, the monastery fell in disuse. Paradoxically enough, it has been revived after the breakup of the Umathelan Coalition, more as a place for retiring God Learners than anything else. Although it only numbers tens rather than hundreds of monks nowadays, the monastery is quite rich because of the donations it receives from wealthy Malki families. Rather than exploring the Otherside, the monks today are involved in the very mundane task of brokering Byzantine alliances between the powerful Malki families who are constantly struggling to gain the upper hand in the feudal anarchy of western Umathela.

The monastery is perched high atop the cliffs of the Tarmo Mountains and is only accessible through a rudimentary lift. This enables the monks to control who is present within the monastery at all times, and explains why the monastery is so sought after a place for organising secret meetings, in spite of its location deep in hostile wilderness.

The Monastery as seen from the north

A Malki Fort in the Wilderness

Despite the demise of the Middle Sea Empire, the Malki cities of the Umathelan Coalition try to retain their grip on the land. Whilst this is quite true in eastern Umathela (Cerngoth is firmly under Malki rule), western Umathela is mostly in a state of feudal anarchy where each Malki city controls but a tiny stretch of arable land in its vicinity. Varanswal, as both the largest and the most landlocked Malki city in western Umathela, still retains delusions of grandeur and devotes much income and manpower to try and maintain control over what it perceives as its rightful fief.

Above: a Varanswal fort located in the upper course of the River Quarni.

(art stolen from A Wizard in a bottle)

RQ6 News

From Loz:

Thought I'd share with you a little of where RQ6 is at.

First, several chapters are now in layout. Some artwork is still to come in, but the design and structure of the book is taking shape. Others chapters are still being edited, and the final chapters are in the hands of the playtest crews, but we're nearing the home straight.

What this means, in terms of publication, is clearly not the 'Early 2012' we'd promised. Real Life intervened for both Pete and I which slowed some things down. What we're now looking at is 'Early Summer' - and the vague goal I've set is for RQ6 to be available, in print, for GenCon (which I'll be attending), if not a little before. So we're still shying away from specifying a particular release date, because a whole mountain of things could happen to cause it to slip: but I am hoping that June/July is reasonable. It should be. A great deal of work is being done and we want to make the best book possible, which will mean detailed proofing and final error-trapping before I send finals off to the printers.

We will open pre-ordering before publication. Once the book is fully laid-out we'll know its complete size, and can therefore price it accurately. How pre-ordering will work is dependent on a few background factors, one of which is how well the e-commerce facilities from our Site Provider work. They have new tools that I've yet to test, and it could be that we plug into Moon Design's e-commerce facilities instead. But rest assured you'll be able to order RQ6 from us, in advance, using a variety of payment methods.

So we're chugging along nicely. I know its frustrating waiting for is to say 'Guys, it'll be out on X of N, send us yer money...' but it will be worth the wait. We said from the start that we wanted to deliver the most complete and best edition of RQ that we can, and we're sticking to that goal.

But we do appreciate your patience and are looking forward to rewarding it. We will post some layout previews soon.

Loz is scheduled to attend the Eternal Con at the end of May. I'll try to get you more news!

Art for Umathela (3)

Ivan Bilibin (Иван Яковлевич Билибин) is yet another Russian artist whose works have fascinated me for a very long time, actually since high schol. Here are a few inspiring pictures:

Nontraya

A Malki Knight and a Brown Elf

A Fonritan Visitor

Art for Umathela (2)

I have already mentioned that I feel myself greatly inspired by (faux) Slavic mythological paintings for my Umathelan campaign.

Viktor Vasnetsov (Виктор Михайлович Васнецов) was a brilliant Russian painter who specialised in mythological subjects. Here are a few paintings, along with my own Gloranthised comments.

A Malki Knight at a Crossroads

Nontraya wooing Ernamola

Riding through the Elf Forest

Zistorite on Horseclaw

My Glorantha Varies — but then Greg said it was OK.

Races and Creatures of Umathela

Some of the many races and creatures of Umathela have already been mentioned on this blog:

• Iqari
• Lascerdans
• Plant-Men (Dryads, True Elves, Black Elves [Voralans], and Red Elves [Slorifings])

Other sentient races:

• Dwarfs. Umathelan Dwarfs are vegetarian.
• Grey Giants.
• Timinits (several sub-species); they are allied with the Westerners.
• Trolls (Dark Trolls and Trollkin) in the Tarmo Mountains. Hot Trolls do not live in Umathela but further south in the jungles.

Animals:

• Boars and hogs; both domestic and wild. And sheep. Swine and sheep are almost the only domesticated meat animals of Umathela. Fowl/poultry are uncommon; cattle non-existent.
• Horses are not native to Pamaltela and hence extremely rare. Only Westerners own horses, which are exclusively used as mounts, and never as beasts of burden.
• The Middle Sea Empire tried to introduce mules, but for some reason they all died out in Pamaltela.
• Draught animals: the standard Umathelan draught animal is the giant hog used to haul carts. In other parts of Pamaltela, wagons are simply dragged by teams of men.
• Although Theyalan in origin, Umathings do not keep alynxes as companions but dogs (that are similar to  the Catahoula cur).
• Wolves of various sizes and types. Large wolves may be used as mounts by some monsters.
• It is rumoured that the Zistorites have managed to domesticate large flightless birds called horseclaws, which they mount much in the same fashion as the Dragonewts mount the (larger) demi-birds.

Monsters:

• Giant arthropods.
• Giant insects. Trolls raise and breed all kinds of giant insects.
• Undead.

From the Gloranthan Bestiary:

• Charnjibber; a highly chaotic predator whose size and shape are constantly changing. Greatly feared throughout Pamaltela.
• Gargoyle; lives in the mountains.
• Grue (large chaotic monster; bipedal, huge deformed head; their blood is corrosive); lives in eastern Umathela near rivers
• Mountain Trolls (low intelligence)
• Sabre-toothed Cat
• Skybull
• Succubus
• Titanothere

Mottled Condies

From Trotsky's site:

Animals

• Vangono's Horror (a kind of larger hyaenodon created by Vangono, the Pamaltelan God of War)
• Uintal (the only pachyderm living in cool Umathela)
• Mottled Condy (the most common herd animal of Umathela)
• Manatee (in the Dashomo and Jorkar Seas)
• the Umathelan crocodile, small and swift
• Pteranodon
• Green Mamba, deadly venomous tree snake

Monsters

• Fright (a degenerate, trollish ape-like creature).
• Hoon (again, a degenerate, trollish bat-like large monster); lives in the mountains.
• Shadowstalker (darkness-related, wiry ape-like creature with a long neck); lives in forests.
• Watchwere (hulking ape-like chaotic horror); have the ability to see through any object as if it were transparent.

T&T: New French-Language Edition - More Impressions

(still reading T&T 8th ed)

There is a large section devoted to advice for the GM, and another large section that explains when to award experience points, and in what amount.

This latter section is really detailed and provides many many examples. I believe it should be really useful for anybody using the rules as written — which is not my case: I tend to award a set amount of experience points at the end of each session so that the players can improve their PCs by the time the next gaming session starts.

T&T: New French-Language Edition - First Impressions

OK, after having perused the new French-language edition of Tunnels & Trolls, I must agree that calling it "8th edition" is somewhat of an exaggeration. What Patrice Geille has done beyond translating the rules is mostly re-organising them in a more logical, structured way (7th ed was such a mess!).

Combat is the part that has received the most in-depth treatment, and indeed I can see a rule that I don't remember having seen in other editions (but then I'm not a big T&T expert): any damage inflicted through spells and/or missile weapons at the beginning of an encounter is added to the rolled damage total of the first round of combat, which is actually tantamount of keeping track of said damage twice. Now the rules say this is to reflect the 'shock' value of that damage; however, I don't think I'll apply that rule.

There is also quite an extensive part dedicated to poisons and their various effects, which I don't recall having already noticed in previous incarnations of the rules (possibly as an extra in the 30th anniversary CD).

More in future posts as I continue reading the rules and writing down small notes.

Voralans in Timinits & Trolls

The following is almost a direct rip-off of Scott's Mushroom People but hey, Scott said it was OK :)

Pamaltela is notorious for its dangerous forests and its death-filled jungles. Many delvers have tried to explore them, few have ever returned, and usually to die a horrible death as plants would burst out of their ears and eyes.
Unbeknownst to most adventurers, deciduous trees and evergreens are not the only perilous plants in Pamaltela — there are fungi of all sizes too! And just like True Elves are basically sentient trees, Voralans are sentient fungi.

Although smaller than True Elves and misshapen, and despite their being loth to combat, Voralans can be just as dangerous opponents as True Elves because of their mastery of noxious spore-based attacks. Whether these attacks are "biological", as claimed by the God Learners, or magical, as assumed by sane people, is beyond our knowledge. Whatever the truth, these spore attacks are destructive and unpredictable.

Voralans
STR×1, CON×0.75, INT×1, POW×3, DEX×1, CHR×1.5, KNW×0.75, PER×1.5, SPD×1, LK×1.5

Average SIZ: 1.35m

Special Rules:

• Voralans thrive in the night, so during the day (between dawn and dusk) any SR level is increased by 1.
• While Voralans are able to use any kind of spell, they are forbidden by their culture to use anything other than metabolic magic, which costs 1 fewer POW per spell level than in the spellbook. Other magic types cost an extra 2 POW per spell level.
• Voralans are able to take an hour of uninterrupted meditation to heal 1D6 CON on themselves or one other person.
• Voralans may not wear helmets. They simply won't fit over their mushroom head.

T&T: New French-Language Edition Available (cont'd)

T&T 8th ed. is at last in my grubby hands! I've only had time to quickly skim through the book. It has 137 pages, a very clear lay-out, numbered paragraphs, and a real character sheet. And of course new illustrations by Liz Danforth on top of the classic ones. What it is still lacking is an index.

T&T: New French-Language Edition Available

T&T 8th edition (in French!) is available on Lulu at last, apparently in dead tree only, for £17.21. More on this much-expected product as soon as I can lay my grubby hands on it.

Here's the blurb of the French edition of T&T:

Tunnels & Trolls 8e édition
La présente édition française du livre de règles pour le jeu de rôle Tunnels & Trolls est basée sur la 7e édition de langue anglaise. Toutefois, certaines lacunes et incohérences de la version originale ont été corrigées après consultation de l'auteur, Ken St André. De plus, nous avons ajouté certains passages de la 5e édition du jeu qui nous ont semblé utiles, voire indispensables. Cerise sur le gâteau : l'édition française comporte de nouvelles illustrations de la mythique Liz Danforth...

And here's the foreword, by Ken St André himself:

Plant-Men

As implied by their name, Plant-Men are sentient plant beings. While some may appear to be of very human-looking appearance, most feature completely vegetable traits. Some may have leaves or vines for hair, or a greenish hue to their skin, others are covered in bark or have non-animal twists to their limbs. Their eyes have neither white nor pupil. This latter trait renders their gaze particularly alien and unsettling to other humanoids. Cool sap circulates through the body of a Plant-Man, not warm blood. Plant-Man religion is likewise alien to other sentient races; Plant-Men hold animistic beliefs yet a number of named deities are known to outsiders. This is has proved extremely puzzling to the ever-cataloguing God Learners.

Plant-Men are called Wort-Men by the Umathings, and Elves by the Westerners with a further, finer distinction based on colour, as there are several types of Plant-Men. Three of these sub-species (brown, green, and yellow) are called True Elves by the Westerners. Plant-Men obviously do not use these exonyms but refer to themselves with a variety of different endonyms that depend on their plant association (see names in green below).
Plant-men have almost disappeared from Umathela proper, but are quite numerous in the forested lands around it.

Embyli by Dario Corallo

As mentioned above, Plant-Men come in an array of forms and sexes:

Dryads
Dryads are the female Nymphs of the woods, and are far more magical than other Plant-Men. Each Dryad is the protective spirit of a given grove of trees, which she may control under certain circumstances. The role of Dryads in the reproductive cycle of Plant-Men is often of paramount importance.

• Green Elves don't rely on them for reproduction, as they have their own females. When a Green Elf mates with a Dryad, no offspring results.
• Brown elves sometimes rely on them, sometimes not.
• Yellow Elves completely rely on them as they are all males.

Pregnant Dryads give birth to a large seed, not to a living being. The seed is planted, and it grows into a shrub. After two years, the shrub bears a fruit, which contains the child.

Brown Elves [Mreli]
They are associated with deciduous forests, and with trees such as aspen, birch, and oak.
They hibernate in the Dark Season, looking for a hollow tree or a comfortable hole in the ground in which to remain comatose until the Storm Season.
Brown Elves are both male and female, and also interbreed with Dryads, who hold important positions in brown elf society.

Yellow Elves [Embyli]
They are associated with rainforests, jungle evergreens, and palm groves.
They are wholly male and breed with Dryads for procreation.
They are quite aggressive vis-à-vis humans, especially Westerners. In Pamaltela, Embyli are organised in Dryad-ruled queendoms that resist the encroaching human civilisation. These bellicose Yellow Elves are particularly present in the lands to the east of Umathela, where they have fought many deadly wars against the Middle Sea Empire.

Green Elves [Vronkali]
Of the three races of true elves, the Green Elves are the most human-like, having for instance a similar sleeping pattern to the humans', and living in village-like communities with males and females. Vronkali are taller and stronger than any of the other Plant-Man species.
They are associated with coniferous forests, with trees such as fir, pine, and spruce.

Black Elves or Voralans
Hermaphrodite, diminutive squat humanoids with grey skin, and swollen limbs or heads, who inhabit the rare toadstool forests. They are shy, keep to themselves, and avoid combat. However, they can be formidable opponents because of their strange spore-based biological weapons to which they are immune.

Red Elves
Also called called Slorifings by the Umathings, and Goblins by the Westerners. They are small and stunted Plant-Men who inhabit the great swamps to the west and to the south-west of Umathela, thus far from human civilisation. They are associated with ferns and mosses rather than with trees.
Goblins are known to eat humans and to obey a cruel Sorceress Queen. All Slorifings are male, and need diminutive vile-looking Dryads called Olarians to mate.

The Lascerdans

The Lascerdans are a mysterious race of sentient reptiles from the ancient past of Glorantha. As with most little-known elder races, information about Lascerdans is scant.

What little information I have managed to scavenge is as follows. Lascerdans inhabited Umathela before and in the Dawn Age, when they were exterminated by the elves of Pamaltela. Lascerdans descended from the pel-mre of the distant, mythical past of Pamaltela, reptilian life created by Pamalt and Balumbasta. That would have made them distant relatives of the Slarges.

Physically, Lascerdans looked like muscular lizard-men with a gaping mouth. One description mentions their having the head of a basiliscus. Although Pamaltelan humans remember them as coming "from the mountains", Lascerdans were at least semi-aquatic, preferring river-bottoms and swamps.

The Lascerdans dammed the rivers to make shallow lakes and swamps, which destroyed forest land, though it did create some mangrove forests. However, the elves of the woods at the time were mostly green elves, and could not survive in mangroves.
The Lascerdans farmed and fed on pens of freshwater manatees (and probably other aquatic livestock), and their infamous slash-and-burn practices were not true slash-and-burn. Rather, the Lascerdans chopped out huge tracts of forest, burnt the wood, and hauled the greenage back to the rivers to use as cheap and fast manatee fodder. They recognised that they got more useful fodder from cleared areas than from the huge tree-covered portions, so they became tree-enemies. That might explain why the elves fought a genocidal war against them. The last Lascerdans were exterminated along the Palau River in 475

It is believed that the Lascerdans worshipped a fire god (a volcano god like the Olodo?), the Mother of Manatees (a herd goddess), and, more importantly, the River Gods of Umathela. They left some mysterious ruins in the forests of Umathela, called Lascerdan Stones.

Canonical sources mention the Lascerdans as being 'extinct' in Second Age Pamaltela but, hey!, my Gloratha varies...

The Iqari

The Iqari are mentioned, en passant, in The Abiding Book, a Mongoose supplement for MRQII. They are not really part of the Gloranthan canon, as they are a race originally developed for Gwenthia and added to Second Age Glorantha by Pete and Loz, who are involved as developers in both gaming worlds. The following has been communicated by Loz:

Back when Pete was working on the Mongoose Races books he asked Greg if there were any rules about creating new sapient races and Greg said, I believe, that Pete could invent new ones if he wanted to.

They were originally created for our Gwenthia book and are a particular favourite of ours, so we threw them into a few places.

They're part human, part raptor. Quite ferocious, but also with a developed civilisation.

According to The Abiding Book, Iqari are found in the upper peaks of Jrustela, and as an allied colony in the God Learner city of Arstranwal, which has been built in the high crags overlooking the Umathelan plain. There is little more information about the Iqari in the Mongoose supplements, so I shall copy the description found on the Gwenthia wiki:

With human bodies and the head and wings of an eagle, Iqari are formidable hunters, possessing the keen sight and instincts of raptors, and the strength and size of humans.

Iqari are social amongst their own kind, but are antagonistic towards most other species, and any who venture too close to their mountain colonies. Certainly they are intelligent, with tool-making and building skills. No one has yet been able to venture successfully into the mountainous reaches they inhabit to view first-hand what kind of settlements they occupy, but the common view is of great collections of nest-like structures that form crude versions of cities, high in the mountain peaks.

Iqari can fly far and wide, but seem to prefer the areas around their home mountains. Iqari hunting flocks regularly attack the settlements clustered in the fertile lower reaches of the hills and mountains, taking livestock and the occasional human victim - either as prey or simply for the joy of the kill.

Iqari communicate through a complex series of beak-clicks, sqwawks, feather-ruffles, head-tilts and hand signals. Some have noted that they can understand certain languages but lack the ability to speak them. As yet, negotiation with Iqari has been futile: they are unwilling to communicate openly or offer any respite from their attacks.

As well as their natural hunting abilities, Iqari employ long, barbed spears when hunting or attacking. These two-metre long weapons are dreadful in use, being either hurled from on-high or used as lances in the feared Iqari death-plunge.

Edit: The Iqari have both arms and wings, so the picture above does not correspond to how they actually look like.

RuneQuest 6 Latest News

The following was posted by Loz two days ago:

Here's the progress so far.

Playtesting
Our stalwart playtesting crews have worked they way through character creation, skills, equipment and combat chapters putting each to the test, suggesting revisions, identifying problem areas and highlighting what's worked very well for them. The input has been great and Pete and I spent time during the recent Petecon to address each point and challenge and integrate them, where necessary into the rules fabric.

The above chapters, along with Creatures, are nearing completion and will soon be sent for editing after we've completed some minor additional revisions.

Magic
RQ6 will have five very different magic systems: Folk Magic (Common Magic as was), Animism (spirit magic), Mysticism (brand new), Theism (Divine) and Sorcery. Initial writing is complete on three fifths of these and will form the next round of playtesting.

Folk Magic is a radical revision of old Common/Battle Magic. We've de-emphasised the combat aspects and vastly increased the more utilitarian spells. Old favourites are still there, but every spell has undergone a substantial degree of revision. Mysticism is completely new and aims to allow characters to replicate all manner of wuxia, martial arts, ki, and other powers that focus on self-realisation and potential. Its not a spell-based system, but it does have a very wide range of different effects/talents to offer considerable flexibility. Animism is a complete overhaul of the old spirit magic rules to clarify, expand and explain the system in detail. Theism and Sorcery are next up and these will, again, be overhauled with an eye on flexibility.

Creatures
A huge chapter, there's a wide range of beasties and mythical monsters along with playable races - each with character creation guidelines. Old favourites are in there (but no specifically Gloranthan critters) along with some new additions. We've tried to give each creature or race a unique spin making for more rounded creatures than simply things to butcher and steal from. Expect extensive rules for how creatures react and fight, along with guidelines for creating your own.

Art and Layout
Art is commissioned and we have a team of three very talented artists working on illustrating the book. Having seen some of the sample art, I'm very impressed and once we're in a position to share some of it I'll post samples on the DM website. But work is still underway, so patience please!

We have also commissioned a professional layout guru to work on the book's presentation. Clean, readable and easy on the eye is the overall theme. There'll be no intrusive borders, good use of white space, consistent and recognisable design elements, and a book that should look good in dead tree and PDF versions that remain printer-friendly.

So a lot has been happening and RQ6 has taken several bounds towards realisation. There has been some project slippage due to personal lives and Real Life intrusions, but nothing that has significantly delayed our progress.

Thanks for bearing with us.

Some more information from the Design Mechanism forum:

    So, with some of the sting taken out of Folk Magic will another magic system carry the weight of combat-focused spellcraft? Will we see Bladesharp, Speedart, Disruption, Multimissile shifted to another magic system? Or will they remain "Folk Magic" with a more limited effect?

Some of them remain in watered down version. The more potent effects will achieve apotheosis to a higher level of magic. A lot of the problems I saw in long running RQ2/3 campaigns was the out of control magic inflation which eventually rendered weapons and armour superfluous. So we're reining that in a bit.

For those that are worried about Glorantha backwards compatibility we will undoubtedly make a Battle Magic supplement/conversion available for free download.

Art for Umathela (1)

For some reason I am inspired by Russian fantasy for all things Umathelan. I have found many illustrations and paintings on line. I will give all the links on the blog.

This page is dedicated to Andrei Guselnikov's (Андрей Валерьевич Гусельников) art depicting ancient Slavic deities. The pictures are absolutely amazing.

Time-Line of the Campaign

Now leaning towards ca.950ST. The Umathelan Coalition has driven off the Middle Sea Empire but hasn't experienced the utter destruction it will undergo in the 11th century yet.
Rumours of the Closing are reaching Umathela. It's going to be several terrifying years of incoming doom for coastal people who rely on the sea, not helped by the dragonship attacks.

Eastern Umathela is more or less reunited under the leadership of the local God Learners, centred in Cerngorth. Is their leader in the 10th century already called the 'Lord of the World's Knowledge'?

Western Umathela is much more of a very loose coalition of city-states, which don't have any control whatsoever on the interior. And altough a noted Jrusteli scholar has written a book in 950 proving that the elves of Enkloso are extinct, the latter are in reality quietly plotting the Reconquista of Western Umathela.

The Olodo

The Olodo are another people that were brought to Umathela, before the Umathings. My understanding is that they were Old Wayers who lost some civil war on Jrustela. They were transported to Pamaltela by the Waertagi.
They retreated to the inhospitable areas of Umathela. In my opinion they somehow went "wild" and I hence intend to depict them as woodwoses.

There is little information on the religion of the Old Wayers. They are supposed to practise a mix of theism, shamanism, and even Invisible God worship. Yet some Olodo worshipped the volcano god Aurelion when on Jrustela. Even though it is unknown what happened to those particular Olodo when the Seshnegi settlers arrived, I find it cool to think that some of them where amongst the colonists transported by the Waertagi, and that they have hence had an influence on Pamaltelan Olodo religion, because I want to have at least one active volcano in the interior of Umathela, and I want to use the Olodo as antagonists to the PCs. And I'm sure antagonists with fire magic are going to kick arse.