From: Nick_Brooke@deloitte.touche.co.uk
Date: Wed 10 Jul 1996 - 11:25:04 EEST
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Dominic McNamara follows his early Economic Fantasy Role-Playing posts with
another piece, this time on how "lay people" can know nothing about ancient
cultures that isn't naive, romantic, racist and simplistic. I hate to stick
my oar in, but so are most role-playing settings, Glorantha most definitely
*included*. The "somewhat absolutist" manner in which arguments are carried
out on the Digest results in readable soundbites, rather than heaps of
scholarly, well-reseached, carefully nebulous and undigestable tosh (I
mean: why quote Rousseau, Childe, Marx, Renfrew, etc. in a post about
exploring a fantasy world setting? Those who've read them know, those who
haven't will hardly be impressed at the mere volume of names dropped).
I mean, in all fairness it's a competent essay and I was interested in what
he had to say (as a fellow ancient historian), but what has it added to our
understanding of Glorantha? Not a lot. For my part, I *prefer* using the
more prejudiced, racist, romantic historians (whether ancient or recent) as
key sources for the *attitudes* present in Gloranthan societies today ("WE
are indomitable; THEY are effete and decadent"). In Glorantha, historical
and archaeological MYTHS are more important than the "archaeological facts"
Dominic spends time deriding. Still, at least my weltanschauung was
illuminated.
The post on barbarian warfare was more immediately useful, perhaps. Best
observation was that Sartarites who can beat Lunars in battle aren't really
all that barbaric any more: players of Dragon Pass will note how, in order
to "beat 'em", Argrath pretty much "joined 'em" -- his new institutions of
the Free Army and Magical Union parallelling the Lunars' professional
fighting force and College of Magic.
I'm sorry if I'm picking on Dominic's articles, but they really do feel too
rooted in the modern historical discipline to be very useful in Glorantha:
more concerned with what we *don't* know about the past than with how we
can pick up sources (OK, maybe they're often incorrect, intellectually and
morally dubious sources) and use them in our games and world-building for
fun and profit.
_________________
Mark Adri-Soejoko asks about fiction collections. I have stored several of
my own pieces on my homepage, at:
<http://ourworld.compuserve.com/homepages/Nick_Brooke/>
The forthcoming Convulsion 3D programme book is a Gloranthan fiction
extravaganza, with previously unpublished stories by Greg Stafford, Sandy
Petersen, Ken Rolston, MOB, Chris Gidlow, Mike Hagen and myself. A few
spare copies will eventually be available for sale to people who can't make
it to the convention, which is taking place the weekend after next (19-21
July) in Leicester, England (Guests of Honour: Greg, Sandy, Ken, MOB). Any
last minute bookings, ring David Hall *NOW* on 01753 523 169 for details.
________
David B:
Comparing the eventual Lunar ban on roaming gangs of Storm Bullies - crude
antisocial thuggish murderers - to the Nazi genocidal policies towards the
Jews, Gypsies, homosexuals and other defenceless and inoffensive groups is
hardly fair.
Many Ducks rose up in armed rebellion against the Empire: OK, they were
Sure, you can be an Orlanthi. I am, most of the time I play RQ. But I don't
______
scapegoats, but they were also largely guilty. As Pam has pointed out, the
rebels would have got far shorter shrift from the Bull Shahs of Carmania,
who were of course barbarian in origin. Look at the Lunars' leniency
towards rebels after the uprising (source: Wyrms Footprints or King of
Sartar) if you want to see an enlightened policy towards the perpetrators
of civil unrest.
want to be an Orlanthi who has to lie about his opponents, dishonourably
ambush them, assist drug traffickers and murderers and terrorists, pretend
they're all chaotic "unpersons", and endanger the lives of my family and
friends with reckless abandon by doing so. I want to play a Real Person,
not a skirmish wargaming 25mm figure with numbers attached.
Loren:
Further to the Carmanian Houses, I intended the Dune parallels when I first
discovered them. Think of the Atreides vs. Harkonnen vendetta as a Dart
Competition, replace the technology/psychology with Lunar sorcery, and we
have a good model for what the graduates of the Lunar College of Magic get
up to: spending most of their time defending their own noble employers
against both predictable and exotic attacks, and some of their time trying
to devise ways through "impenetrable" defenses (subverting, sidestepping
and reflecting the defending sorceries in the best Lunar traditions).
The Genertela Book's Lunar Empire chapter has something on the size of
Pelorian rural clans: extending out to six generations or so, which is a
pretty hefty agglomeration (if I've remember it right).
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Nick
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