Evil Wizards, Valient Priests and Fantasy Names

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From: Guy_Robinson.sbd-e@rx.xerox.com
Date: Wed 13 Apr 1994 - 18:13:52 EEST

I have jiggled my environments about and I now can quote from messages. All examples of Receptionist magic :-) assumes the Orlanthi culture.

Sandy writes:
> I think this argument is erroneous. And here is why.
> Firstly, Guy, you apparently think that all Gloranthans live
>a life in fear and trepidation, needing handy attack magic available
>at all times. I think this is true only for adventurers and for
>citizens who dwell in lands that support adventurers. I don't think
>most priestesses of Ernalda ever enter hand-to-hand combat in their
>life. Neither do most western Wizards.

According to the Western Wizard's propoganda :-)

I am pitching my comments in a biased manner, claiming that the lifestyle of the Western Wizard is dangerous because of the "corrupt" nature of that society, because this is how I would run these Western Lands. Your comments are very constructive as they give another perspective.

The level of danger, is indeed exaggerated, but then Glorantha should be able to survive a GM's descision to increase the level of fear and loathing within its societies for his games.  

> Secondly, you must look at the magical ecology. If life is
>dangerous in the way you've described, to the point that priests and
>wizards must retain a goodly means of protection, then many priests
>are going to be worshipers of stuff like Humakt, Storm Bull, Golden
>Bow, etc. The peaceable cults of Barntar and Dendara will be
>less-around, because less-survivable. So the truly useful Rune spells
>like Bless Crops are going to be rare, because their priests are
>rare.

Due to the social and non-magical ecologicial forces at work I am not convinced that in a more violent world the war Cults would soak up most of the initiates. A society can only support so many warriors. Reducing the number of Bless Crops available could mean a disaster and famine, paving the way for a terrible famine after a military victory.

>But wizard's aren't restricted in this manner. One wizard can
>cast a protective spell as well as another, or a blessing. Hence,
>wizards are more flexible than priests. If the war's over, but
>everyone's already joined Zorak Zoran, you're stuck. None of your
>Rune levels are going to be able to quit and join Flamal now that
>crops and healing are the order of the day. But all a wizard has to
>do is learn a new spell to switch emphasis.

I think the there are softer options than trying to convert from Zorak Zoran to Flamal, although this is a very impressive extreme I must admit. I would suggest that people would more tend to subscribe to Orlanth in times of war with a mind to convert to member of his pantheon when the conflict is over.

After all if you join Humakt, for example, you embrace Death and this is something I feel a character would not do just because of the threat of War. Cult examinations should stop insincere initatiations.

Joining Orlanth on the other hand would be a sign of loyalty to the Orlanthi life-style, and conversion to other associated cults could almost be a common feature of peace-time celebrations.

> Thirdly, you speak of the priest's POW as if it were an
>infinite resource. There's only so much POW a priest is going to
>sacrifice in his entire life. If he's spending some of it on
>Absorption or Earthpower, then that POW is NOT available for Bless
>Crops. Every point spent on self-indulgent protection is one less
>Bless Crops that you don't get access to in need. But the sorcerer
>can cast his own blessing spells at any time at any place. He is not
>as limited.

The priests POW is not an infinite resource but neither is any human resource, like the effort people put into a field to ensure a good harvest. I propose the idea that each Bless Crops represents a recognised service to the community that the community, tribes and families honour.

Points of POW invested in self-protection do not yield this kind of tribute from society so they are discouraged, again by social means.  

> Fourth and lastly, I think most folks greatly underrate the
>utility of specialization, which I believe to be a major factor in
>Gloranthan magic ecology. I think that in a cooperative wizard-using
>society like the Hrestoli and Rokari, there is a strong tendency for
>some wizards to be healers, some wizards to be crop specialists, some
>wizards to be combat-oriented, etc. If this is the case, your local
>farm wizard isn't going to be reluctant to enhance the growth of your
>prize pig because it will hurt his MPs for later usage. Some other
>wizard, with combat spells, will protect him against the Bad Wizards.

The same applies to the Cults. I think the mix and relative importance of any cults would, over time, reflect the required degrees of specialization needed. More worship would go to the Gods whose services where needed and the power of that Cult would grow.

This assumes that Cult are also bound together by common religious bonds to varying degrees. If you feel that Cults are more discrete I can understand your concern. Orlanth and Issaries I would typify are close, between which initiates might transfer relatively easily, albeit on not too frequent a basis.

Individuals would be affected by social pressure. Even though the Orlanthi are Hill Barbarians it does not means that their culture is unsubtle. In fact I could argue that society bound together by social interactions can be far more flexible than one which allots people their role through a distant, or inflexible, authority.

Joerg writes:

>What is interesting: The Malkioni claim that Yelm, Orlanth and
>Humakt are scams set up by powerful sorcerers (bad guys, not
>wizards) who became trapped in their own preconceptions: Ehilm,
>Worlath, and Humct. They even added another, imaginary, one,
>Jogrampur, or so.

>(BTW: Their choice of these three seems to indicate they thought
>them to be the most powerful of theistic cults. Another point against
>later development of the Cult of Humakt. If one accepts the theistic
>"truth".)

Now in the voice I have been arguing in previously this is clearly a Malkioni smoke screen based on the genesis of their own God. After all where is Jogrampur now? (This is a rhetorical question :-)

In response to my mischevious reclassification of Divine Magic and Sorcery Joerg writes:

>So it's "receptionist" for divine magic?

Touche. :-)  

>And the God Learners demonstrated that it is possibe to build
>"visible deities", to the extent that the Umathelan False God
>Revolt had real priests of the previously unknown/non-existant
>god Jogrampur.

As a RuneQuest referee I know that as Cult can grow in power from an the inauspicious start of an alledged encounter with a powerfull spirit by a soltairy shaman (RQ2, Black Fang Brotherhood) therefore it also follows that a cult can also be fabricated. The point that the God Learners choose cults shows that this approach must have advantages over sorcery.

In discussing Sorcery Joerg also provides some meat to put on the bones of my Invisible God is Scam suggestion:

>There are those little gimmicks called crystals or MP matrices,
>or in Gloranthan terms maybe "life vessels", which contain all the
>MP a wizard or sorcerer could spare at any time. These are the ones
>used for communal obligations first.
 

>I have the strong suspicion that the churches of the Invisible god
>use the scattered magic emanation (not the main stream of energy)
>in their worship services to fuel or load their life vessels. Guy seems
>to suspect the same, by calling it a scam.

This the very thing I am trying to draw attention to. If the Cult strengthens the God it is focused on then I suspect that the Malikoni religion strengthens only the magical activities of the Sorcerer. This focusing of the magical power of a society into so felixible an individual is a bit unsettling.

As Pam Carlson writes:

>It strikes me that people mainly fear sorcerers because they represent
>frightening power with no discernable alliegence or control.

Exactly. The Cults specialise but their specialization is enforced by spirits of reprisal and other methods like excommunication. Priests are commonly invested only after a rigourous, magic-assisted grooming process while in some Western cultures you can be born a Wizard.

A specialised society of Wizards could be as defensive as the Maginot (sp?) line was for the French when the Germans came from another direction. After some retraining a rebel core of Wizards could attempt to destabilise a Sorcerous society, murdering the Combat specialists in an unexpected manner and replacing them as the main wielders of sorcerous combat spells.

David Dunham writes:

>Guy Robinson said
>>It is a real shame that Glorantha is ridden with far too many
>>fantasy names that are a curse to most fantasy writings.
 

>You'd prefer that Allan the Liberator and his friend Harry the Berserk
>defeat Jessica the Razor and liberate Seattle from the Roman Empire so
>that Oliver can be worshipped again?

As long as there is a Cragspider for every Xoila Umbar I have no great problems. When every fourth name in five is a fantasy name then I start to have problems. They are simply less memorable.

Real world names tend to be recognisable, as they work on linguist principles. In English there are actually some regular rules for determining whether a name is male or female for example. In a similiar manner I can recognise the differences between Latin and Scandinavian names without being a linguist.

Unless the inventor of the name is proficient with linguistic principles there is no way by which I can recognise whether a specific name is from the West of Genertalia or from Dragon Pass in Central Genertalia.
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