From: Robert McArthur (rjm@arp.anu.oz.au)
Date: Fri 18 Jan 1991 - 09:56:33 EET
CONTENTS:
I started playing RQ2 in 1984. Since then, I have played only three characters that I can recall - an Erlin harper amongst the trolls at Skyfall Lake, a thief in Borderlands, and a StormBull initiate. The SB is my first, longest running and favourite character (6 years older in our time, only 2.5 years in the game!). As such, I have had a lot of time to look at my initial choice of SB as a cult, and to look at the cult through the eyes of a potential rune level (I'm almost there folks, this next High Holy day and I'm going to go for it!).
Most characters are striving towards rune level from the first moment. It may look a long way away and there may be intermediate goals but I would say that the goal, for most, is a strong runic association. Therefore, this is a very biased set of questions and comments about the SB cult. I realise that SB may have changed in RQ3 but, as the group I play with feels, for the most part, it is significantly inferior to RQ2, we have not adapted many of it's features to our play.
Knowing nothing about RQ initially, I opted for SB as a cult to be associated with because of comments in CoP (Cults of Prax). Since I still like them, I'll print them (without permission) here:
"Socially they are unacceptable. They characteristically act with total disregard for any tribal taboos or manners, even to the extent of occasional murders which will go unavenged. Normal people consider all worshippers of this cult to be mindless brutes, barely human, certainly deranged, and absolutely dangerous. These opinions are correct."
At the time, this sounded perfect "adventurer" material (this says a lot for my social/personal development at the time. I now would like a Chalana Arroy priestess.... how people change, sigh :-) ). I knew nothing about rune spells, rune levels specifically (only that you were supposed to strive to be one and you had to join a cult to get there) or anything about the system or Glorantha.
The first thing my SB did was look at a map, find the first thing that said chaos (chaos woods), and convince the rest of the party to head there and beat up everything which moved. Fortunately we never got there or my poor little initiate, just out of initial training, would have been swiftly plastered by nasties. However, I have never looked back going through Griffin Mountain and Lord Skippen's Mansion, and many local adventures (StarBrow's rebellion, the Lunar "invasion" of Corflu, a nasty *HUGE* god learner construct/spirit inhabiting the old city of Karse etc).
Let me also say that on the two times I have called on divine help, the first to help me single-handedly destroy the demon in Lord Sk's and the second to get out (alive) from Karse before it blew up. So the vibes are good from SB. (I was also born in the sacred time and have some minor thing for that - totally random I assure you and quite minor).
So,
The main query is why does the writeup of SB in CoP, when taken with
the other cults and in the Companion, make SB look like one of the
major Gods, when this seems to conflict with the actual mechanics
eg. Priests can only learn 1 and some 2pt spells. Although "The SB is one of the oldest manifestations of Umath the god [Primal Aer]"; SB beat up Lodril (not hard, I will admit :-)); SB beat up the Devil; "...finally there are the awesome powers of SB..."; SB is one of the (relatively) few cults with enchant iron; etc.
I haven't worked out anything about truestone yet.
The rest of the cult is pretty much OK. The lower levels know what to do and how to do it, the lords' writeup is fine (though sparse, there is never enough space). The priests is really where I had to take the CoP to task.
I think I could further argue for the use of small gnomes by SB because of the very strong ties to Ernalda and Eiritha. After all, Waha, with no ties to stasis, gets the use of small gnomes from Eiritha. Think about it...You can actually do almost anything to SB as a cult because a) they are too small to do anything influential politically or against big armies; b) they don't want to unless they are chaos based; and c) they never will get a huge number of members because so many die trying to kill chaos.
The number of SB cultists at the Block (necessary calculations for our current adventure and my future rise in the ranks). Based on "Glorantha", "Cults of Prax", "RQ"2 (soft cover) and "Griffin Mountain" the original.
tribe size No.of tribe as ----- ---- SB members bison 80000 5600 high llama 65000 3250 impala 120000 6000 sable 75000 0 pavis 20000 ?=0 baboons 10000 0 morokanth 80000 3200 other 20000 ?=2000 ------ 21000 members of SB in Prax
Assuming from initiation (13 years old) that they don't get to do
anything. Know that figures start from 17 year olds. Assume that
maximum age is 50 and that the pop. histogram is linear. So,
(50-17)/(50-13) are active members = 33/37 = 89%.
.89 * 21000 = 18690 members active throughtout the whole of prax.
Given the size of prax and that most nomads live outside the area
close to Sartar, rather than across Vulture's Country, assume
%60 live outside "inner prax" (near Sartar). This is much higher
than, for example, Waha since Waha stays with the herds. There is
generally more nasty chaos in "inner prax" than in the wastes. The
figure for Waha would probably be that 90-95% live outside "inner
prax". So,
.40 * 18690 =7476 members in "inner prax".
There are 5-8 main sites for SB worship but the block is the main one.
Assume 25% are at the block
.25 * 7476 = 1869 members at the block!
Assume, in a fighting cult, 3% of members are rune level. This is
low but represents the fact that once at rune level, you don't die as
easily but you do, in SB, have to always go on v.dangerous missions.
Normal cults I would assign about 5%.
.03 * 1869 = 56 rune levels
Assume, for SB that they have more initiates than some other cults due
to the relative ease in becoming one once you've made up you're mind
(one year membership in cult and have done nothing bad). 60% are init.
.60 * 1869 = 1121 initiates
therefore
.37 * 1869 = 692 lay members
Of the rune levels, although SB emphasises fighting most, priests are
needed for recruitment as only they can do it so I'll assume a 50-50
split.
.50 * 56 = 28 lord and 28 priests.
Of these, some will be retired and only there for teaching and sleeping.
Because of the nature of SB, I'll assume there are still 85% active
rune levels which is much higher than I would say for most other cults,
even Humakt.
.85 * 28 = 24 active lords, 24 active priests.
of the priests, 1 priest will be the high priest (taken to be active since
they have no time for teaching any more).
Assume 15% of priests are chief priests, given the nature of the cult and
the speed of acquiring 15 points of rune magic.
.15 * 24 = 4 chief priests.
The remaining priests are normal priests = 19.
Assume 60% of chief priests (in SB) are working to becoming lord-priests.
This, again, reflects the fighting nature of the cult.
.6 * 4 = 2 on sabbatical building up to lord priest.
Assume 10% of those on sabbatical have made it
.10 * 2 = 0.
The results are as follows:
The total number of SB at the block = 1869.
The number of SB lay members at the block = 692.
The number of SB initiates at the block = 1121.
The number of SB active normal lords at the block = 24.
The number of SB active normal priests at the block = 19.
The number of SB active chief priests at the block = 2.
The number of SB High priests at the block = 1.
The number of SB Lord-Priests at the block = 0.
The number of SB priests on sabbatical = 2.
The number of SB retired lords = 4.
The number of SB retired priests = 4.
Phew. Any comments will be __________ received.
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