From: peter metcalfe (metcalph@voyager.co.nz)
Date: Mon 29 Dec 1997 - 01:14:28 EET
GAZZA:
>- -CRITICAL RESISTANT ARMOUR
>A couple of places on the 'net - notably Steve Mauhrer's
>HeroQuest rules - mention something called 'critical
>resistant armour' as being (presumably) good against
>even critical hits. What exactly IS this? Protection
>spells? Armouring Enchantments? Natural armour?
The Mostali know an enchantment called Ward Blow in Elder
Secrets which allows armor to protect against a critical
hit. But I would not allow this spell to fall into the
hands of non-mostali. I suppose the mostali at Bad Deal
can sell this sort of enchanted armor but the prices
would be prohibitively expensive.
Heikki Raappana:
>I was writing a seabased scenario and an interesting question arose: At
>the Closing of the seas, no man was able to sail out to open seas, before
>Dormal the Sailor came with his Open Seas -sorcery spell. Thus came the
>Opening of the Seas. Am I right?
Correct.
>As far as i know, no other cult teaches "Open Seas" ceremony, but do they
>anyway? There are Tsankst-worshipping pirates of Vormain and
>Kogag-worshipping sailor trolls of Jrustela for example. What about
>mostali-sailors (from Slon) with their ships made of stone.
>Is Dormal's "Open Seas" the only way to penetrate the Closing, how do the
>other cults and other-god-than-Dormal-worshipping sailors do it?
IMO they do. The 'Open Seas' spell was brought south from Pasos
to Jrustela by the Vadeli. I believe the Uz simply caught a
Vadeli-flagged ship (but not necessarily crewed by Vadeli) and
gained the secret from the crew (it's hard to keep a secret when
an Uz is chewing one's legs off).
The Masloi are stated to have have stolen the secret from the
Vadeli which precipitated a Naval War. The Eastern Isles do
not use Dormal's prayers but use instead Haragalan prayers
(according to the RQ Companion). The Haragalans had gained
the secrets of the Opening from Kralori Merchants but for some
reason decided to make their own prayers.
How the Slon mostali gained the secrets of the Opening is mysterious.
They can't have gotten it at Jrustela for the mostali there do not
make boats. I think a human ship sailed from Umathela to Slon and
was captured and/or shipwrecked which allowed the Decamony there
to gain the secrets of the Opening.
>I have understood that the Closing was some kind of powerful magic of
>sorcerers of Brithos Island, and was aimed against the Godlearners.
The spell was most probably by the Brithini but the purpose is unknown.
Nobody has managed to go to Brithos and find out what really happened.
An unpublished (but less than trustworthy BTW) source speaks of an
invasion by Fronelans (who were not God Learners at the time according
to Codex #1). _If_ true, that would put the mention of open ports in
Brithos in a new light (ie having declared themselves 'open' to the
invaders). So the spell could have simply been a panicked Doomsday
remedy to save Brithos from complete catastrophe and the destruction
of the God Learner Empire (who were their allies at one point and may
have still been) could have just been collateral damage. It would
also explain why Zzabur was plotting to sink Fronela in Snodal's Time.
But this is all IMO.
>Does
>the Closing affect the seaborn cultures such as Waertagi too, or was it
>just to keep the land-dwellers out from the open seas and was the Closing
>as powerful in Pamaltela and in Eastern Islands (they are pretty far from
>Brithos) as it was in Genertela?
It affected the Waertagi who had to sail down Magasta's Pool. The
returned Waertagi are said to be searching the Sea of Brithos for
the vanished Isle to extract their revenge.
Pamaltela was cursed by the Closing although at least two seas
were navigable - the Koraru bay between Fonrit and Laskal and
the Maslo Sea between Flanch (Onlaks) and Elamle. In addition,
the Edrenlin Isles (of the coast of Elamle) and the Tortugax
archipelago (of the coast of Dinal) were also navigable during
the Closing.
The Closing did not operate among the Eastern Isles but dissipated
instead. So one could sail between the Isles but not from the
Eastern Isles to Kralorela. The Isles of Vormain are not part of
the East Isles and so were isolated from it although I think they
could from one isle of Vormain to another. The People of the
Jewelled Isle of Mokato believe that the Closing was sent as
punishment against them. To thwart the Closing, they renounced
their Eastern Seas Empire (which had ruled all the Ten Thousand
Isles) and do not leave their Isle today for fear of reactivating
the Closing. The renunciation of the Empire was accompanied by a
sharp downturn in inter-Isle commerce and communication which wasn't
revitalized until Kralori traders arived with the secrets of the
Opening.
Some more details about the Closing and the Opening can be found
in the Genertela Book 1 and the Runequest companion.
- --Peter Metcalfe
------------------------------
This archive was generated by hypermail 2.1.7 : Fri 13 Jun 2003 - 22:38:00 EEST