Guest Post: Back Under the Glowline

A long time gaming buddy of mine Tom Zunder wrote such a great post on his Gaming Tavern forum that I asked his permission to reblog it also here. There is so much choice that we friends of Glorantha have now. So here is his post. 

So, time to return to Glorantha I feel. It’s been years, maybe a decade or more, since I’ve gamed under the Red Moon, faced the terrors of Thanatar and charged with my Enlo against Blue Moon Moth Riders. You know what, I kinda bloody miss it, and purged of all the accumulated cruft of the Glorantha nerds and the mismatch between myself and Hero Wars, it’s time to worship the Dark Mother, riddle with Nysalor and embrace the endless history of Darra Happa.

But, and this is lovely, there are so many choices.Firstly, and I don’t mind saying this, there is HeroQuest with the tailored match between the the recent setting books, all redolent in simple d20 keywords and meshed neatly between culture and game. There is some truly lovely stuff in the sources that meshes with HQ, and yet.. I’ve never really enjoyed a game of HQ, although a lot of that might be from the Hero Wars action point economy that bored me to tears. Also, and although I can enjoy the depth of Glorantha cultural minutia, it has been what turned me off the setting for so long. I am, and always have been, more of a greatsword swinging Zorak Zorani than a Lhankor Mhy, and so I don’t think it’s HQ for me.

Secondly there is RuneQuest. We approach a time of possibly the best moderately complex version of RuneQuest that we’ve ever had, one that fixes the old issues about divine magic, montheism in a polytheistic world, makes a bloody good stab at sorcery and delivers a folk magic that actually feels folksy and useful to a carpenter or potter. We don’t have Adventures in Glorantha yet, but Hannu Kokko and the Finns are making a very good stab at it with their proto-cult write ups and the joy that is the RuneQuest Encounter tool online.. a party of Chaos cultists heading out from SnakePipe Hollow, I don’t mind if I do. Only problem, I think RQ6, like earlier RQs, doesn’t scale to Heroic, which is, after all why HeroQuest was first conceived.

Thirdly, and this isn’t as mad as it sounds, is OpenQuest. Combined with the RuneQuest Classics RQ2 reprints from Rich Meints, or a selection of RQ3 adventures, one can run an OQ game in Glorantha with barely a flutter. The spells have the same names, the stat blocks are very similar, and OQ is lighter and involves less rethink that RQ6. I know Simon Bray runs all his Glorantha with OQ these days and if that isn’t a recommendation I don’t know what is. So, possible and do-able, but one also can’t help wondering if maybe a copy of RQ2 or RQ3 might also fit in this camp, they’re easily pickupable in the UK on ebay, if you haven’t already got them all on the shelf, which I have.

Fourthly, and here the ZZ beserker in me wails in joy, 13th Age Glorantha! This riot of a d20 game that won me over to D&D after 34 years just made me think of Orlanth, the Red Goddess, Kyger Litor, Yelmalio, etc. as I turned the pages. This is a game for the Heroic, and by setting it in the Hero Wars when Argrath wages devastation on the Lunar Empire, and the Red Moon wages it back in an apocalyptic frenzy that cracks Glorantha from Choralinthor Bay to Valind’s Glacier, is the time for the power and crazy that is a 13th Age player character. So, and this is a defininte, the d20 will come to my Glorantha table, but it will be rolling high and not low.

But that’s not all.

Oh no.

I have a steadily growing collection of skirmish minis and skirmish rulesets. I know Sandy Petersen is playtesting a Gloranthan Gods War game, and I suspect that like his earlier Cthulhu boardgame, this may lead to a big fat bunch of 28mm Gloranthan minis.

So how to skirmish in Glorantha?

Well the Glory Geeks, that brave band of Gloranthan wargamers, have valiantly field Hordes of the Things Gloranthan armies in the HOTT fields of war, and indeed Rich Crawley’s Goranthan HOTT bands are great to play. Just ask him, or Jane, for army lists and where to get the rules and you too can be playing Gloranthan battles in under an hour a time on your dining room table. I am odd though, I don’t like to base my figures in blocks, since I am a roleplayer first I like them singly based. So, not HOTT for me, although always up for a game.

Rich and I have been enjoying Song of Blades and Heroes from Ganesha Games in recent years. A fast 28mm/15mm/any scale skirmish game free of any tie in with any minis maker, SoBH or SBH is enjoyable, wonderfully generic, quick to learn and play, and leaves your minis free for any other use since it has no basing needs. I know Rich has done Glorantha with it and I was almost there until I saw..

Of Gods and Mortals, or OGAM. Published by Osprey this is in fact a superset of SBH, where gods (40mm+), avatars (28-40mm) and their forces (28mm) battle it out on the field of war. What could be more Gloranthan? Cacodemon and his warband facing down Storm Bull and his? It’s appealing isn’t it, and I think I shall have to lay down the ten quid to get OGAM and see how it’ll work if and when some good Gloranthan minis come out, so come on Sandy!

And that’s not all.. after all, if Sandy P does get the Glorantha boardgame going, is there any chance of resisting that?

Must go, Cragspider is calling..

The Troll

HQ: http://www.glorantha.com/product/heroquest-glorantha/
RQ6: http://www.thedesignmechanism.com/runequest.php
OQ: http://d101games.com/books/openquest/
13th G: http://www.13thageinglorantha.com/

SBH: http://boardgamegeek.com/boardgame/3080 … and-heroes
OGAM: http://www.northstarfigures.com/list.php?man=159&page=1

Tom Zunder: tom at zunder.org.uk
Encourage the Awesome!

Uz of Shadows Dance – Trollball and Other Troll Pursuits from Dagori Inkarth

It is time to return to Dagori Inkarth and visit the famed Skyfall Lake and see the Uz at their best – at a Trollball match. Based on “Into the Troll Realms” which contains the two famous Trollball teams here is a way to create your own Trollball teams with the rules tuned for RQ6. Full rules exist in the “Into the Troll Realms” but an abbreviated version will be found with the “Trollball Staff”
Should you anger your hosts they might set a pursuit pack on you or two.
Should you escape the hunters – you might encounter

Most of the trolls have now been updated with the “Hate the Sun”, “Vulnerable to Iron” and other abilities needed.

You will find more troll parties and enemies with filters Uz and Uz lands.

Back to the Roots – Returning to Snakepipe Hollow

Back in the very early days there was a wonderful scenario for Runequest called Snakepipe Hollow and then RQ Adventures did a return to the Snakepipe Hollow 20 years ago. For Runequest 6 one would surely need worthy opponents in Snakepipe Hollow.  For nostalgia’s (and education’s sake) added the missing enemies. Many of the ones were already existing and created just a tag for them. Here are few – updated for RQ6 – some of them are somewhat deadlier than in the original.

Both Hands of Chaos are it again.

There are a few obscure ones that have not been seen in publications since Snakepipe Follow like

Some existing parties have been updated and placed into Snakepipe Hollow. Use a filter with name “Nest of Chaos” in Party Encounters  and press the “Do you Feel Lucky” button – you’ll see a party appropriate for the Heart of Chaos in Snakepipe Hollow. It will include among other parties

  • Broo Raiders and Broos on the Road for Ragnaglar and Thed.
  • Dark Troll Hunting Party and a war party
  • Dragonewt Ambassador, Expedition, Revenge Mission and Dragonewts on Warpath
  • Ogre Trading Caravan and an Ogre Hunting Party
  • Some desperate Sartarites with Sartar Earthshakers
  • Scorpionmen Raiding parties
  • Unruly Giants
  • Thanatari Headhunting Mission from nearby Engoli tribe
  • Tusk Rider party and Urain Foul Wind Party

Opening the Doors of the Anaxial’s Ark – hundreds of beasts escape

Anaxial’s Ark has opened its doors and the multitudes of Gloranthan insects, land and sea animals and various chaos and darkness beings that escaped have taken the RQ Encounter tool beyond 1700 template mark to generate enemies from.  There should be now enough insects to feed the largest troll army and quite a variety of broos. Among the latest templates created are the following.

Uz lands

  • Dark Troll Sorceror
  • Kozoru, Shadow Vampire
  • Dehori – Grasping Hands plus tuning of most of the shades
  • Party: Flying Trollkin
Chaos
  • Bison – Chaos Herd
  • Bull Broo, Thed Initiate
  • Bullsitch
  • Chaos Wasp
  • Chaos Wolf
  • Chaotic Giant Constrictor Snake
  • Chicken Broo
  • Cloud of Chaotic Gas
  • Crocodile Broo
  • Hellwood Dryad gardener
  • Horse Broo
  • Hungry Eater
  • Krarshtkid Broo
  • Scorpion Broo
  • Stake Snake

Land Animals

  • Alligator
  • Bonacon
  • Diplodocus
  • Fell Wolf
  • Giant Vrok Hawk
  • Giant Worm
  • Glyptodon
  • Golden lion, Male & Female
  • Great Wolf
  • Horned Wolf
  • Nasobeme
  • Rhea
  • Storm Tiger
  • Woolly Serpent
Insects
  • Changa (Giant Cricket)
  • Giant Beetle
  • Giant Bloodgnat
  • Giant Dragonfly
  • Giant Elkhorn Beetle
  • Giant Fly
  • Giant Leech
  • Giant Peripatus
  • Giant solpugid
  • Giant Whipscorpion
  • Giant Woodlouse
  • Ham Beetle
Sea & Rivers
  • Flocks of Piranha (small to enormous)
  • Giant Shark
  • Ichtyosaur
  • Kronosaur
  • Sea Horse
  • Sea Lion
  • Seal
  • Walrus
  • Whale
Other
  • Dringi, Free Jolanti
  • Fachan
  • Gordayan
  • Hollri
  • Lycanthropy Spirit
  • Serpent Guardian
  • Spirit Wolf

It is easy to search for templates you need, just select either home, enemies or parties page and fill out the search criteria by typing a word or words and/or select an filter.

Return to Griffin Mountain and Balazar

We broke a milestone during the last few days. There are now more than 1600 templates to be generated in the RQ Encounter tool.

Here are a few enemies and encounters found in Griffin Mountain done via RQ Encounter tool. Quite a few of the Balazar encounters already existed but here are a few additions.

For Dorastor

For Uzlands (Dagori Inkarth, Halikiv etc)

For Prax

At the same time made an update to diseases table – all the diseases in Dorastor and in RQ6 and Monster Island can now be generated. Added also Jungle Diseases table for the Monster Island ones.
Updated all skeletons with skeletal suspectibility to damage.
RQ Encounter tool has a nifty new feature for selecting many of the professional skills. It also shows on the template page the number of times the template has been generated. The counting method has been changed so now all the different ways of generating the encounters count in the number of times starting today. Before today only the ones that were generated from the main search pages counted.

Obviously Unbalanced Chaos in Dorastor

Took a tour to Dorastor and created a few templates for missing creatures from the wonderfully unbalanced (in so many ways) from the original book on Dorastor. Some of the enemies can be used outside Dorastor as well though many are very specific to Dorastor. Some of these are quite deadly so take care.

Some other enemies as well are now described:

Day of the Undead in Delecti’s Upland Marsh and some additional enemies

Created a few Delecti related enemies for RQ Encounter Tool based on and inspired by the wonderful articles in an old Tales of the Reaching Moon. If you feel that your players have become upstarts – lead them to Upland Marsh.

Grimoires for sea and march sorcery have been created.

  • Sorcery Order Marsh and Mist
  • Sorcery Order of Waves and Depths

Few other enemies have been created as well.

Your True Friends – the Vadeli and other trustworthy news

Fonrit has long waited for the true saviours to come. Your true friends – the wise beyond ages, the beautiful, the charming, the compassionate, the witty conversationalists have arrived. The Vadeli are finally here – or at least their foreshadowing. Come trade, come dance, come talk with them, come to see and buy the loot from the far northern shores and beyond the seas, bring your gold with you – delivery will be cash only. You will not forget this occasion.

The word has come that there is a new kind of Undead around

From the jungles and savannah’s the hunters report that there have been sightings of Savanna Buffalo and Hippopotami

RQ Encounter has a tooling revamp and there now exists weapons categories for Monster Island and Mythic Britain with a full set of weapons installed as well as Mythic Britain names.

Most of the two legged denizens of Monster Island have now been retrofitted with the weapons from Monster Island weapon category and tuned a bit as well.

Bring Out Your Dead

In the honor of All Hallow’s Eve (long gone now) here are a few new and tuned Undead mostly for Glorantha.  Here are some new or more strongly tuned enemies.

The usual suspects are there – Skeletons, Mummies, Vampires, Zombies, Ghouls but there are also parties for Vivamort and Gark the Calm and a Hag or two but also some rare ones like the Skeleton of Than or even Firebrand the Flaming Skeleton. There are now Skeletons for Dream Dragons and Minotaurs but quite a few others. Careful with the Zombies as they mostly are of the variety that reproduces well.

On the party side there is also a Ghost ship, Ship of the Dead and Mummy and Zombie parties…

All of the undead can now be found with the keyword Undead on the Enemies or Parties filter.

In addition to the Undead there is also a Lamia looking for more company.

http://skoll.xyz/mythras_eg/

Rq6 Encounter tuning

Several of the enemies have been tuned to follow RQ6 guidelines (not having more than 4d6 in a characteristic) – at the same time minor tuning to the abilities have been done.

Following have been tuned.

  • Gray giant
  • Crimson Bat
  • Greater Slarge Individos
  • Maslo Elephant
  • All vampires
  • Rascullu
  • Titanothere
  • Charnjibber
  • Tyrannosaurus Broo
  • Gargoyles
  • Ouori Mermen
  • Cliff Toad
  • Plesiosaur
  • Mother of Monster and her brood
  • Hag
  • Gnydron Wanderer
  • Sky Bull
  • Hoon
  • Satyr
  • Succubus
  • Possessed large tree
  • Fright
  • Dwerulan Mermen
  • Brontosaur
  • Roc
  • Catoblepas
  • Nightstalker
  • Jolanti
  • Gorps
  • Erenxi
  • Zabdamar Mermen