From: Sandy Petersen (sandyp@idcube.idsoftware.com)
Date: Wed 21 Sep 1994 - 07:56:10 EEST
Mike Dawson:
>Where is the place of the "bug hunt" or dungeon crawl in the RQ
>line?
Practically all of us switched to RQ from D&D or some other lesser system. We did this (probably) for three reasons: first, the neat world to play in, much better than the vanilla D&D universe; second, the fact that we could do stuff _other_ than combat (everyone remember the bad old days, when the GM had to figure out whether or not we could jump a crevice, so he asked us to make a Save vs. Petrifaction?); third, the fact that D&D combat was so bogus as to fail to reproduce _any_ fantasy books we'd ever read. RQ solved all three problems by putting us into an interesting non-milksop world, taking away our character classes, and giving us realistic and fun options in combat. Now, I realize that not everyone like RQ combat, even among RQ fans. But I have a sneaking suspicion that many of us have a guilty enjoyment of an hour or two of raw baddie-bashing.
When I first switched to RQ, my D&D-playing friends saw it as a flaw of RQ that the combats took so long. "You could have killed a dozen monsters by now if you were playing D&D." They, of course, missed the point. Killing a dozen D&D monsters isn't as fun as one RQ combat vs. another human being in which the wounds matter, the spells you cast matter, the tactics you choose matter, etc. RQ ends up with much less combat than D&D in numbers of bad guys slain, but there's probably at least as much time spent in _running_ combat in a RQ campaign as there is in a mature D&D campaign.
Anyway, I have no objection to an evening of combat in my own RQ campaign. On the other hand, the question Mike asked was whether or not Avalon Hill should publish same. Hmm.
Klaus O K
>Several posters have used the proverb "violence is always an option"
>as proof that Orlanthi society is a very violent one. Am I the only
>one to think that this proverb cuts both ways?
Alex is being noxious about Pamaltela being actually more fertile and
better than Genertela:
> Fertility does put an upper bound on the population density of a
>(sufficiently large) area though, and if the population if depressed
>below this for some other reason, it would similarly put the kibosh
>on the Pameltela Good, Genertela Bad.
Teeming millions of oppressed peasants is probably a bad defense of the "Genertela is as fertile as Pamaltela" argument. As Previously Stated, the Doraddi live in a large flat land area which, by all rights, should be a dire desert like unto the Sahara or Gobi. Yet it is as fertile as the American Great Plains or the African Savannah, and plenty of folk, dinosaurs, and plants thrive there. This I attribute directly to the benign influence of Pamalt. In addition, the most fertile land, biologically-speaking, is swampland and rain forest -- the productivity of these types of terrain is staggeringly higher than any other -- much _much_ higher than agricultural land, for instance. Pamaltela seethes with both jungle and swamp, the most fertile land. And Pamaltela's swamps _aren't_ chaos-infested nightmares. Another sign of Pamaltela's superiority.
>The basis of the Death of Genert myth is the whole Nasty Chaos
>Incident. However, only the Praxians believe that this seriously
>buggered things up, fertility-wise.
How can you say this? I know for a fact that the Westerners believe this as well -- they've published statements about it. Seeing as both the West and the Praxians believe this truth, it stands to reason that others do as well. As I recall, the Kralori reason that the outside world is completely hosed partially because of the death of Genert ("lucky us, with an emperor"). And no doubt other cases can be found. No doubt the God Learner spreading of the Monomyth has something to do with everyone now believing that Genert's death harmed Genertelan fertility, but this does _not_ mean that the connection is not real. They simply spread the facts around.
>Those of us wheeling out Genert and Pamalt as parallel equal
>brothers, and concluding that as a result, everything in Genertela
>is Broken, and everything in Pamaltela is Fixed seem to be viewing
>the continents through spectacles with oddly-coloured lenses.
As the person who's spent the very most time in Pamaltela, I submit that Pamaltela, while not heaven, contains generally happier inhabitants than Genertela, which is nonetheless not hell. Note that I do _not_ believe Genert and Pamalt to be "equal brothers". The correlation of Genert and Pamalt I believe to be a God Learner false comparison, probably made in order to further villainous Brooke-like plots against the peace of both continents.
The resemblances between Genert and Pamalt are purely superficial, like the similarities between a dolphin and a shark. Genert was an earth-god who ruled a peaceful empire and was slain trying to preserve his land. Pamalt was an underling who rose to prominence when the enemy came and as the result of his victory, became the ruler of the land. If there is a parallel here, it is an inverse one (hey, I like that!) -- you have Genert heading in a steady trajectory from the top to the bottom, with Pamalt coming out of nowhere rising to the top. Genert was among the first to fight, Pamalt was among the last. Genert stood alone. Pamalt used cooperation and leaned on his friends. Genert was a creature of the Earth. Pamalt was the friend of everyone, from fire to darkness to life to death.
HOWEVER, despite this disparities, Genertela suffers from the lack of its primeval Earth God. Pamaltela glories in the benefits of having a single ruling entity who governs the continent wisely. The truth is more complex than just saying that Pamaltela has what Genertela lacks. Genertela never had an entity like unto Pamalt. Pamaltela may not ever have had a Genert-equivalent (or if it did, it might have been Artmal).
BUT Pamaltela does have a ruler of the gods who governs benignly and Genertela does not. Pamaltela was not particularly hammered in the chaos wars whereas Genertela took it on the chin.
Alex F.
>Who thinks Sandy is about to be squished by a Gift Carrier? I'm
>glad to say I think he's cold enough to be pretty safe.
Now see here wiseacre. I happen to _know_ the damn secret of the God Learners. At least, when I explained my beliefs to Greg, he told me that them was the right ones, and not to tell anyone else ever. But I might tell _you_ Alex, in hopes of getting the Gift Carriers to nail you. ;)
>I wasn't counting humans, though, I was counting sentients. Of
>course, the non-humans infesting said areas don't worship Pamalt, so
>by rights I _should_ have excluded them, unless Pamalt goes out of
>his way to aid his enemies.
In the first place, there are heaps of sentients in Pamaltela. Uncounted millions of elves and elf-relatives in the jungle, and millions more goblins and mermen in the swamps. In the second place, I don't think Pamalt only values sentient life. The non-sentient life is at least as important to him -- plants, insects, etc. He is the god of it all, not just the humans.
>I just don't want to have to try to struggle to believe a handful of
>grain dropped in the middle of the veldt grows better than in an
>unblessed field in Esrolia.
These are not comparable situations. Ask rather whether a handful of grain dropped in the midst of the veldt grows better than a handful of grain dropped in the middle of the Balazar grasslands. I say yes.
>5) there's dragonewts [on Teleos]
>Is it Known if these 'newts have an Inhuman King, or are heterodox
>in some way?
I would say "yes" to both questions.
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