From: owner-rq-rules-digest To: rq-rules-digest@hops.wharton.upenn.edu Subject: RQ Rules Digest: V2 #36 Reply-To: rq-rules Errors-To: owner-rq-rules-digest Precedence: bulk Content-Return: Prohibited Return-Path: owner-rq-rules-digest RQ Rules Digest: Saturday, 12 August 1995 Volume 02 : Number 036 TABLE OF CONTENTS David Cake HQ, Runic POW (Graydon) JEBrick@aol.com HQ, etc. Crom Runic POW owner-rq-rules@hops.wharton. [none] owner-rq-rules@hops.wharton. [none] owner-rq-rules@hops.wharton. [none] Bryan J. Maloney Monster Coliseum RULES OF THE ROAD 1. Do not include large sections of a message in your reply. Especially not to add "Yeah, I agree" or "No, I disagree." Or be excoriated. If someone writes something good and you want to say "good show" please do. But don't include the whole message you praise. 2. Use an appropriate Subject line. 3. Learn the art of paraphrasing: Don't just quote and comment on a point-by-point basis. When paraphrasing you demonstrate exactly how well you understand the point someone was trying to make. 4. There is no number 4. ---------------------------------------------------------------------- From: davidc@cs.uwa.edu.au (David Cake) Date: Sat, 12 Aug 1995 15:20:59 +0800 Subject: Re: HQ, Runic POW (re: Graydon) >> Why not just give them a few extra points of Craft(bladesmith)? - if >> they increase at all. > >'Cause I'm trying to represent a change in perception - by completing the >quest, they partake a bit in the peculiar perceptions of the Sword-sharpener. > Which only begs the question - what is the point of having such an obscure difference between being knowing something about sharpening swords, and partaking in the peculiar perceptions of the Sword-sharpener. I see lots of options here - they could just learn something about sharpening swords. They could learn some special uses of the specific item. Or they could even gain some supernatural sword sharpening ability, maybe expressed as something like a 'Ki' skill. But what I don't understand is why a quester there is all this aspect stuff. It, to me, actually works against the idea that the hero is changed in perception - rather than the hero themself having gained some insight, it is as if they have a new spell like ability to cast on themselves that expresses the insight for them. Its clumsy, and confusing. >> I have two questions here - the first is, if they are going to >> develop some ability with sword-sharpening, why bother with all this >> 'aspect' stuff - why can't they just gain some abilities to do with sword >> sharpening? The second is are they necessarily going to increase? > >Because they may do other heroquests. Take, for example, the Asrelia's >Hut example you mention - I agree with your basic point, that what you're >doing is bringing back something for your folk in the way of wealth and >fertility and suchlike, but consider who went on the thing. If the tribe >sends its best quester, who happens to be an Orlanth adventurous type, who >comes back with a really mighty field-blessing and a personal >understanding of how to propitate earth things, can that person use their >earth understanding at the same time as their various Storm-related >powers from previous heroquests? Sure. Its not like they're now an Earth priestess or anything - they have just met some Earth goddesses, and now they know something about propitiating them. A hero is not a jigsaw, a bundle of aspects and powers sewn together into a crazy quilt personality, they are a single person who has undergone some remarkable experiences, experiences that changed them. In the case of a hero who has returned from the Asrelias Hut quest, they have not gained some mythic aspect as a Earth propitiater that they can turn on and off - but their own relationship with the Earth may have changed, and this may show up on previous heroquests. They 'know' about Earth only in the familar sense - they've done the quest, they met some Earth powers, they are happy to tell the story, and they remember. If they meet an Earth power unrelated to their quest, well, they might be in a better position to guess what is going on, because they speak from experience rather than tradition, but they are not blessed with a mystic understanding of earth - unless that was a specific heroquest power that they gained, which would not be an incidental result of the quest, but a direct result of something that happened on the quest. > >I'd say, welll, it's _difficult_ - hence wanting the person to have to >raise specific aspects to use the powers. You could maybe get two at >once, but three or more? Your head would explode. > Nah. When an Orlanthi hero goes on an earth quest, he may be abstractly representing some line of Earth based heroes who have done the quest before - but he is the one that goes on the quest, and he is the one that comes back, hopefully with a few goodies. It seems you want to maintain a layer of abstraction at every point, heroes are a bundle of archetypes and abstracts, rather than simply people with unusual abilities. To me, it complicates the whole issue unnecessarily, and kind of misses the point. >> >In general, I'd say contesting heroquestors compare the points of >> >magnitude in their powers on the resistance table when they're trying to >> >affect each other; >> Agreed, though perhaps this should add to the POW of the questor in >> some cicumstances? >> Reasons- >> - it means small number of points still are useful. >> - compare powered crystals, which often work this way. > >It also means that shamans are immune to small heroquesters. I assume that you interpreted my comment to mean that the questers POW would always be compared to the targets POW, which was not what I intended. I feel that POW is almost always the appropriate attribute for actively trying to influence someone magically, but it is not always the most appropriate attribute for resisting - compare Disease spirits, for example. In general, I think POW vs POW is the most common, but not the only one. I do think that having aspected POW only resistable by aspected POW is a big mistake - it makes too big a jump between heroes and merely powerful magicians. >(Not sure >that's a bad idea; shamanic initiation is quite arguably the commonest HQ >going.) I definately consider shamanic powers to be similar in nature to some heroquest powers. Actually, a good way to fit the variations in shamanic powers that RQAIG attempted to introduce (OK, the RQAIG implementation was pretty bad, but the basic idea was OK, and seemed to be quite popular), is to consider them as 'aspected POW'. It also helps explain some of the current rules - it makes good sense to say that a Kygor Litor Priestesses fetch is Darkness aspected POW, and that is the reason why it can only capture Darkness spirits (a normal shamans fetch is Spirit aspected, I guess, which means it can capture almost any spirit, but may miss out on other abilities, especially in certain heroquest situations - a KL heroquester could use her fetch to power some Darkness abilities). > I'm dubious on the general grounds that HQ powers are of a >different order than plain magic; your defense should also be different. > >I can definately see resisting with a characteristic, or with accumulated >otherness of some description, but *not* directly with things like >'points of Rune spells' or 'size of fetch'; that's reducing HQ powers to >a kind of magic, with I don't see as appropriate. > I see it as absolutely appropriate! Not all the time, but probably most of the time - normal RQ magic has its origins in heroquesting, and in aspected POW (if used). I see heroquest powers as giving you more options, but as being essentially RQ magic but more flexible and mysterious. >> - it seems good to me - especially if it only acts this way >> sometimes (in some cases a personality trait roll might be needed, for >> example - some questers might only be able to use their fertility powers on >> something they love, or their death powers against something they hate) > >I don't use quantified personality traits in the game I run; can't see >the point. (I do feel free to tell players that their character is >proposing to do something implausible, at which I am balking, but >quantifying character is a lot like quantifying how good a problem solver >the character is - why bother with numbers, the _player_ is the control) > The reason why I see them as useful in a game, especially in a heroquest game, is that I think it is quite often appropriate for something to be dependent on some aspect of character - and not having personality traits leaves me with the options of deciding by GM fiat, deciding by player fiat, argueing, or using some overly abstracted version (like POW rolls are often used in RQ3). I realise that some people don't like them, but others find them very useful. I am certainly planning on working them into any heroquest rules I come up with. But YMMV - I am also interested in different mechanics. I think personality traits if used properly can be enhance roleplaying, as it forces players to think about the issue of their personality a lot. >I don't disagree with the _idea_ of restricting the generality of HQ >powers in that sort of way, though. > Do you have another suggestion on how to implement it in play? Cheers Dave >saundrsg@qlink.queensu.ca | Monete me si non anglice loquobar. > > > ------------------------------ From: JEBrick@aol.com Date: Sat, 12 Aug 1995 01:42:30 -0400 Subject: Re: HQ, etc. >>Actually, for the most part, I'm in complete agreement with you; however, I'm not sure that a heroquest done for personal power necessarily "looks" or "feels" any different from a heroquest done with "purer" motives at heart, nor am I certain that the results are wholly different. A lot of heroquests, it seems, wind up enhancing the abilities of the heroquester; a "properly motivated" heroquester (e.g., Argrath, Jar-Eel) uses his or her new powers to aid or defend their community, while a "selfish" one uses them purely for their own gain (e.g., our old friend Harrek).<< I would say that it comes down tothe gamesmaster of the Heroquest. Our gamemaster had played in heroquesting games in which they explored the maximum a character could go with really no goal. A Babeasta Gor(sp?) with a ax trance of 10+ was one that was mentioned to us. In his game we are at the heroquesting stage but we have a continual goal. In our game it is to collect some weapons of power and get them to the right people. So far we have collected the Windsword, Blaister's(sp?) Axe, and a peice of the Sun spear. All of these are not collected for the characters personal power. We have kept none of them. They are used to buy favors so that certain factions will fight with us in the Hero Wars. Therefore we have the " purer-motives" at heart but we are still gaining power by heroquesting. Jon ------------------------------ From: crom@erinet.com (Crom) Date: Sat, 12 Aug 1995 01:00:09 -0400 Subject: Runic POW Just thought I'd put my two cents (or lunars, as the case may be) in on the Runic POW argument. This commentary is based on RQ3: I have no familiarity with earlier works. The way I see it, POW is a measure of psychic (for lack of a better word) potential energy, much like the volt is a measure of electrical potential energy. It may take three volts to power a flashlight, nine volts to power a portable radio, or four-and-a-half volts to power the 100-or-so function, programmable, graphical scientific beast-of-a-calculator that my math professor won't let me use on my exam. (I wonder why?) These devices vary widely in function, but they all use batteries, devices very similar in design. POW I see as the batteries that power a spell. Temporal spells last until the POW used in their casting is expended. Instantaneous spells are like short-circuiting a battery, expending all of the juice at one time, often for a more dramatic effect. (Don't try it with your car's!) So, POW is just raw energy. It is the caster that chooses how he will use it. The concept of Runic POW sounds to me like the enchantment of divine magic into items, or reusable learned divine magic. If a character were to gain POW that was associated with a specific deity, it could be specified in game terms as the gain of a reusable spell(s) or objects enchanted with them. Perhaps the character could even be able to reuse a normally one-use spell, or runes could be associated with each of the spells (there's a job - -- if anyone's done it, please post), and the character could pick and choose among the spells that contained the specified rune whenever he used these points of "Rune POW" associated with the deity's rune (renewing them in the normal manner, of course -- prayer/communion/etc. in the temple). 'Twould seem much simpler in game mechanics, IMHO. I see the POW sacrifice involved in "learning" a divine spell as a plea to a deity. The deity grants this spell by creating a copy of the spell, and linking the spell to the spirit of the sacrificer, much like the link created when a person is intiated. These "spell links" are entwined with the person's membership link, so an excommunicant loses all divine spell knowledge with his membership link. Only priests can renew these links, for only they are near enough the deity to follow the metaphysical path to their finding. A recipient of Rune POW has walked these pathways, so he too can refresh the link. I see one-use divine magics as those which destroy the link during the casting, due to their subversion of the natural order. (Notice that all of the one-use spells listed in the MB deal with keeping souls from your favorite mythos' after-death-place (Create Ghost and Resurrect); or the reversal (not nullification or dispellation) of natural or magical effects (Restore Health).) Destruction of the link is a natural process; once used, it becomes anti-natural in nature, and the world rejects it. If a character were to be allowed to reuse a normally one-use spell, this would suggest that the character were outside and unaffected, in whole or in part, by the natural order (i.e. illuminated). Stayed with me this long? Now I'll tell you where to find The Meaning of Life -- your local video store. :) L8rz... P.S. I got a thought (imagine that!) while I was looking up one-use divine magics: If a character dies and loses characteristic points, should these characteristic points be subtracted from his _original_ characteristics? Or should the points lost be kept track of? Restore Health "restores characteristic points that have been lost to disease or to the effects of ... Tapping", but shouldn't Restore Health also restore points lost to death, since it seems death's degradation would be similar to that of disease? Or are ALL diseases caused by spirits, and the damage done by them is not merely physical? >> CRoM << crom@erinet.crom 'Then I said: "You all wished me to arouse the blade and use it. Now, I think, we begin to understand the consequences. The Black Sword must be fed. It will feed on friends if it cannot feed on enemies..."' --Michael Moorcock, Silver Warriors ------------------------------ From: owner-rq-rules@hops.wharton.upenn.edu Date: Sat, 12 Aug 1995 11:45:38 -0400 Subject: [none] ------------------------------ From: owner-rq-rules@hops.wharton.upenn.edu Date: Sat, 12 Aug 1995 12:22:37 -0400 Subject: [none] ------------------------------ From: owner-rq-rules@hops.wharton.upenn.edu Date: Sat, 12 Aug 1995 14:44:29 -0400 Subject: [none] ------------------------------ From: "Bryan J. Maloney" Date: Sat, 12 Aug 1995 21:23:12 -0400 (EDT) Subject: RE: Monster Coliseum In message Fri, 11 Aug 1995 23:19:31 -0400, crom@erinet.com (Crom) writes: > Is Monster Coliseum worth the buy? It says on the box that it contains Monster Coliseum is worthless unless you're running a chariot campaign. The only new stuff is rules for chariots. Everything else is worthless. Not worth the price. - -- Wiping up half a liter of baby diarrhea really gives you a sense of perspective. ------------------------------ End of RQ Rules Digest: V2 #36 ****************************** This is the bottom of the RuneQuest Rules Digest. RuneQuest is a trademark of Avalon Hill, and Glorantha is a trademark of Chaosium. With the exception of previously copyrighted material, unless specified otherwise all text in this digest is copyright by the author or authors, with rights granted to copy for personal use, to excerpt in reviews and replies, and to archive unchanged for electronic retrieval. Send electronic mail to Majordomo@hops.wharton.upenn.edu with "help" in the body of the message for subscription information on this and other mailing lists. WWW material at http://hops.wharton.upenn.edu/~loren/rolegame.html