From: Colin Watson (watson@computing-science.aberdeen.ac.uk)
Date: Tue 05 Oct 1993 - 18:47:21 EET
This Spirit/God plane thread is getting rather interesting. Is anyone bored with it yet? If so, shout, and I'll shut up about it :-) Meanwhile...
1-"What the Shaman Says" is not an objective view of the way things Really
Are. It's how the shaman thinks things are. He may think the big spirits he
meets are gods. Maybe they're not.
2-I don't doubt that powerful shamans may be able to reach the true (timeless)
God Plane via the spirit plane - but so can corporeal people reach the GP
from the Mundane Plane. It's just *very difficult* to achieve whichever way
you do it. Shamans may wish to heroquest into the GP via the SP so that
they appear in the GP as spirits (because, physically, they would have a
hard time standing up to the rigours of the God Plane in their fragile
corporeal bodies). Most Heroquesters would choose to enter from the Mundane
Plane so that they appear with Substance (and hence get to use their awesome
weapon skills etc.).
I don't think there's a fuzzy borderland where the SP meets the GP: either
you're in the God Plane or you ain't IMHO.
>I hold it that places and minerals have their spirits, too.
[...reasonable rational to back this up - deleted...]
Well, I've given my opinions about this already. If you want the SP to look
exactly like the MP then that's cool. I prefer it to look different.
[BTW Please don't take my ravings as gospel: I'm actually making them up as
I go along (believe it or not :-).]
>And a desert would have landmarks - beasts in their burrows, plants in
>hibernation (only faintly connected to the mundane plane), and last not
>least the life on the edge of the desert as faraway dawn.
Good point, but animal spirits don't make good landmarks 'cos they'll move around (in 3-D remember). And my model of the spirit plane only has "dead" spirits in it (not spirits attached to the Mundane Plane) so only deceased vegetation would show up. Granted, this might include a haze of ancient trees if the Desert had previously been a Jungle. You're right about the haze at the "horizon" too. In fact any shaman would have conclusive evidence of the shape of the earth - all he has to do is stick his head through the spiritual "ground" and see what shape it is from underneath. Maybe the can even see the other side of the world... Try convincing the Gray Sages of that one.
>So you say that plant spirits which can't attack will fade away or be eaten,
>unless they are lucky to be attacked by weak aggressive spirits? Don't let
>Aldrya or Flamal hear that!
Would Aldrya be annoyed? Isn't it the nature of plants to wither or be
consumed? I find it tough to think like a plant (though maybe I write like
one:). I think Aldrya & Co would be resigned to this state of affairs.
>Again my question: what if the combat result is a stand-off, with both
>participants having succeeded a few times in the combat. Do they both get a
>POW-gain roll?
Now, after having re-read the rules, I see why you're asking this. We always
played that you had to win an entire spirit combat to get your POW check.
However, now I see the rules indicate that you only have to win 1 round.
This ain't too bad IMO. It's easier to get a "lucky" POW check this way.
Spirit Combat tends to be very one-sided anyway in my experience.
Nevertheless, I'd say that its not possible to disengage from Spirit Combat
until one of the spirits has "won" completely. I wouldn't give exp checks
for sparring in Spirit combat any more than I'd give checks for sparring
with real swords. There has to be some risk.
>I think the RQ3 POW-gain roll is a bug, the seed for munchkinism.
Yup, munchkins are bad for ecology, spiritual or otherwise.
Unfortunately the game-system is geared toward characters advancing from
"Jethro the Farmer's son" to "Jethro the Rune Priest" in the space of a
campaign decade or two. The rules just about enable this sort of progression.
As a result, if you consider the larger scheme, it allows gross munchkinism,
given unlimited time and patience. The POW-gain syndrome is just one
symptom of this. David Dunham mentioned recently how most grandparents
become priests given lengthy campaign play in Pendragon Pass. It's rather
difficult (nay impossible) to write munchkin-proof rules which are still
fun. I think it can become futile. Better to educate GMs about how to avoid
Munchkinism through common sense.
Dealing with munchkins:
1/ Warn them subtley.
...if they persist
2/ Ridicule them mercilessly.
...if they still persist
3/ Stomp on them. Hard.
(I've only had to use this last option once, and that was in a game of AD&D.
It pained me.)
> >>I would rule only if the target spirit was completely destroyed.
>CW>MP completely destroyed, yes; but not POW. Destruction of POW should be
>CW>quite
>CW>difficult.
>First you let the spirits (at least the non-aggressive kind) fade away
>within short time (btw, what do people mean with "month" with regard to
>Glorantha? Half a season, i.e. 4 weeks? One cycle of the Red Moon, i.e. 7
>days? or one of the Blue Moon, i.e. 1 to 6 days?), then you leave thenm
>running around emptied of life force, to be conquered again as soon as they
>have regained one MP. This makes the aggressors gross, allowing them to
>build up their POW by the hour. (Munchkin spirits would look out for
>Spirits ten MP weaker than themselves, fight them down, and wait for POW to
>rise. Repeat until godhood.)
Whoah! Hang on, consider the following Rules:
A/ You only get a POW check if you had less than 95% chance of success.
If a spirit has 10 points less than you then you *don't* get a POW check.
(IMHO it'd be better to say: must have less than *50%* rather than 95%,
but them's the rules.)
I think these Rules apply to non-corporeal spirits as much as they do to
everyone else.
B/ Only one POW gain per week, maximum. Spirits *can't* build POW by the hour.
C/ The maximum POW attainable via POW checks is equal to the species maximum.
Likewise, if your favourite PC loses a spirit combat, his POW isn't destroyed
completely is it? So why should this happen to a spirit?
Given the rules, and the POW deterioration model, a creature's POW will tend to
level out: assuming successful hunting, a spirit gets a POW check each week;
he also loses 1 POW per month (which, we'll say arbitrarily, is 4 weeks); the
POW tends to level out when his chance of increase drops to around 25% (ie,
he gains 1 POW every 4 weeks from hunting, then loses it again from
deterioration). So creatures' POWs will tend to level out at about 5 points
below species MAX. (Without POW deterioration they would all, of course,
reach species MAX eventually).
Unlucky spirits who lose combats frequently, and are unable to avoid further
combat before they recover MP, will find that they fail to get enough POW
checks to keep up with the deterioration. Eventually they dissolve completely.
Statistically this will happen to any spirit *eventually*. (I'd work it
out, but I ain't no statistician. I guess it takes decades or centuries for
biggish spirits to get that unlucky: a spiritual "lifetime" if you will.)
I'd say that building POW above species max should only be possible via
mystical means such as Worship from mundane creatures, or possibly powerful
spells. Maintaining unusually high POW would require regular worship. If
worship ceased then the spirit's POW would drop.
eg.
The great spirit of Sheep Man has a POW of 200 due to worship from the
Sheep Riders and their herds (err... flocks). But, as we know, the Sheep
Riders turned there worship away from Sheep Man to worship Rhino. So
poor Sheep Man's POW starts plummeting. Assuming no further worship, after a
decade His POW has dropped by over 100 points. It keeps dropping until
he is worshipped anew, or until it reaches his species Max (when he can start
hunting for tasty grass spirits and such).
I thought perhaps the rate of deterioration should be proportional to
current POW: the bigger the POW, the faster it drops; hence godlike spirits
would need large numbers of worshippers to keep their huge power maintained.
>CW>I see POW as an attribute which "attracts" MP from the background pool in
>CW>the
>CW>spirit world. The bigger the POW, the faster it attracts MP, and the more it
>CW>can hold.
>But this background pool is fed by POW only. Still, I agree on the general
>picture.
Think about it. If the Magic pool is only fed by POW then for every MP you lost in spirit combat (or whatever) someone, somewhere has to lose a point of POW to replace it in the magic pool. I reckon it'd run dry pretty quick.
I think spirit combat knocks chunks of MP off spirits which land up in the pool and can be recovered later. Conservation of Magic and all that...
[...good stuff about ghouls + elementals...]
>To enter the spirit plane, they (elementals) would have to cross the border
>of the god plane into the spirit plane, and then wander about. This makes them
>comparatively scarce
Is this reflected in the Spirit Plane encounter tables? (I don't have them
handy.) Would shamans & sorcerers agree with this somewhat theistic view of
the origin of elementals?
>I'd like to see more types of elementals, not just will-less matter
>animated by magic.
Yes, the book suggests using intelligent elementals as demons. I've considered
writing up a few different types of demons. Basically, if demons want to
manifest on the mundane plane, I assume they have to take over a quantity of
mundane substance to form there bodies (like elementals except the substance
needn't be a pure element: eg. bronze demons, stone demons, wood demons etc.)
Hollri use ice to form their bodies. Anyone know of any sources for RQ demons?
(I've read an old White Dwarf article about demons for RQII, but it didn't
quite fit the bill.)
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