Gloranthan Genre conventions / tropes

[simon_hibbs]

Lost of good questions from Contracycle, I hope my answers are helpful:

Firstly, the above seems to suggest that there IS an underlying metaphysics of Glorantha, suggests that these things, like the gloranthan immune system, are objectively extant, and operate in particular ways.  Now, I feel I need to understand what this is and how it works so that I understand Gloranthan metaphysics and can understand what is going on in the divine.

You're quite right, there certainly is an underlying metaphysics to glorantha, and there are many objective facts about it's magic and mythology. For example everyone agrees that Orlanth exists, their differences are realy just matters of interpretation. The Orlanthi say that Orlanth is the source of their culture and worthy of their worship. The Lunars say Orlanth is a murderous rebell god that must be suppresed, while the Malkioni say he's either a demon or a powerfull but immoral sorcerer. The objective fact of Orlanth's existence aren't in dispute, but the moral interpretations vary enormously.

But, problem 2, information about the god-learners appears to be streng verboten, more or less  I've even been told that I should not ask about the god learners, and that they are essentially being written out of cannon; that the god learners are anathematic to glorantha both within the game world and within the metagame.

But, problem 3, the god learners ARE referenced in the texts in such a way, as above, to suggest that their knowledge is somehow quite significant to the world.

Gloranthans know that the nature of magic changed at the end of the second age, as it has at the end of every age. Many god learner magics failed, and nolonger work and this may include both their RuneQuest Sight power and their much-sought secret. As a result, there's a limit to how usefull studying them can be, except as a morality tale. (This isn't new, we've known this since Greg's first public writings about the God Learners.)

So I'm confused by the whole thing.  It feels to me like, say, we are playing mage: the ascension except without understanding Prime; as if the discussion of Prime has been ommitted ands we are just expected to like use our kewl powerz and not ask any penetrating questions.

The problem is that the metaphysics of Gloranthan magic are ultimately ineffable, in the same way that theologians and philosophers here on our earth would say they are. The true nature of the divine is as beyond mortal comprehension here on earth as it is in Glorantha and is tied up with moral issues that don't have objectively provable answers. Fortunately you don't have to actualy be an enlightened Bodhisattva (or equivalent) to run games there (or here).

Mundane Magic:
I feel that magic in Glorantha is essentially mundane. My earliest encounter with Glorantha was via the Dragon Pass boardgame; in this game, there were no bones about the fact that magic was artillery.  The Bat appears to me to be a "nuclear option".  Magic is clearly a functional, systematic propblem solving tool that the Lunar army uses carefully, deliberately, and with malice aforethought.

Gloranthan magic certainly has mundane effects, or perhaps rather it can  have effects in the mundane world. The meaning of that magic, the nature of it's source, the moral consequences of it's use and acquisition and what that magic tells us about the nature of the world are different matters.

For example, Humakti know the secret magic Sever Spirit which strikes a man dead in an instant. That's it's mundane effect. In order to get that magic, Humakti must obey a strict code of conduct that has profound moral consequences on them and their community. Their power derives from, or at least is intricately linked to the taboos and beliefs about the world that make up their religious practice. Therefore it's clear that the power of death itself has a very specific role in the cycle of life, in human society and our (Gloranthans') fundamental nature as mortals. There's not much mundane about that!


Simon Hibbs

"What is a magician, but a practicing theorist?" - Obi Wan Kenobi

[pete_darby]

There comes a time in a glorantha fan's life when he recognizes he's probably on the inside looking out, rather than the outside looking in... with the GL, I'm pretty much getting that feeling.

However, I'm without the references I need to adequately argue this, but in my experience, which I didn't think was particularly in depth, I've picked up enough about the God Learners to think I've got a better idea of what they were doing, why it was bad, etc. than Contra. So, I'll have to dig out references... probably from the Glorantha; cradle of the hero wars book and King of Sartar, which is my cue for realizing it really is more in depth than I thought, once KoS get cited.

But I'm still getting a little head-scratchy over which bits you've encountered that say, essentially; "These GL guys are really, really importatn... but we won't tell you why, because we're such teases!"

I'm not saying they're not there, I just can't think of them atm.

[simon_hibbs]

When I-the-player know the True Origin Of The World - even if my character does not - then I and the other players, and the GM, are all on the same page as to what the SIS is, how it is constituted, and what the paramaters of play are./quote]

I suppose I don't realy see how the parameters of play are dependent on the 'true' orrigin of the world, especialy if that is unknown or even unknowable to the characters.

And even more importantly, if I'm the GM, and the players pose a question like, "So, can we raise the dead?" then I cannot answer it from the game material... in which case the material is of dubious merit, having only got me into a hole I would not have been in otherwise (if I were using a less ambiguous game).

I'm hard pressed to see how you wouldn't know that, or wouldn't be able to get a workable answer from (say) the HeroQuest game rules as they are. After all a number of cults have 'Raise Dead' type magics available.

Now if your actual game story is about discoverign the ineffable nature of the cosmos then that's fine, but in that case havign that spelled out in a game source book might perhaps spoil the surprise for any players that might happen to read it, but then you cover that yourself in your post.

Well, my first response is, I don't know, because I by definition do not know what I do not know.  But even so, if they are now meant to be gone, and no remnants remain, why even talk about them at all?

I'm not sure if this is a rhetorical question, I mean they're obviously important to the history of several cultures in Glorantha, and in fact to it's physical geography in a number of places. The fact that most modern Malkioni sects use the God Learner text The Abiding Book as their fundamental sacred text makes them pretty important to any discussion of Malkionism, so clearly many remnants from their time do exist and are documented.

The answer "because they had such an impact on the worlds history" does not appear at all useful to me if I am not told what that impact is and was.  I don;t mean "whay talk about them" in in-character voices in Glorantha - I mean, why talk about them in Gloranthan products AT ALL if I am not supposed to use them in the game I actually play?  "If its in the game, its in the game" should be the operational principle, I would think.

Well, we do know a lot about their effect on history. We know about the Abiding Book, the destruction of Jrustela, some of the effects of the Monomyth on sevral major religions, their conflict with the Waertagi and their influence (in the form of the False Dragon Ring) in Kralorela. I'm not realy clear what it is you don't know about their role in history that you want to find out.


Simon Hibbs

[soru]

I mean, why talk about them in Gloranthan products AT ALL if I am not supposed to use them in the game I actually play?

I don't know of any particular reason you shouldn't use the God Learners.

What exactly is it that you want to do that you feel you can't? What do you see as stopping you from doing so?

soru

[Brand_Robins]

What exactly is it that you want to do that you feel you can't? What do you see as stopping you from doing so?

There is, sometimes, a tone in the voices of long term Gloranthaphiles (who've probably been through a thousand flamewars on the subject and just don't want to go through it again) that indicates that Godlearners are big nos. They may say, "sure you can use them in your game" but when it comes to actually giving you information about them to make them usable in the game, they get a bit snide and their help often becomes (or at least feels) off-handed.

I'll note that hasn't happened much in this thread, which is something I'm grateful for. Most people took my request for info about the Godlearners seriously, and made a good effort to give me details and specific references that might be helpful to the way I'd explained wanting to use them in game. Even so the evidence is a bit fragmentary and difficult to follow, but at this point I'm willing to believe that's because even long-term Gloranthaphiles find the knowledge base about Godlearners fragmented and uncertain on a lot of points.

Now, let me go back to genre crap and try and build an image of the Godlearners from it.

Two of the big 6 points were "Power has a Price" and "Values are in Conflict." I think these are two issues around which the Godlearner mythos orbits. We know that the Godlearners gained massive power – enough to make the sea burn and to so scare the gods that they set up a massive program to effectively re-write reality just to get rid of the bastards. That's all about power and its price – even Sedenya hasn't triggered that level of upset in the world and she's started a major empire and put a new moon into the sky. So we can probably guess that the Godlearners were more potent and dangerous than even the Red Moon and her Empire. That power came with the price of their destruction, fall, and erasure from reality by offended deities.

The next point is a bit more esoteric and a bit more tangential, tied in with parts of "Values are in Conflict" that I didn't really define before – and that's the subjectivist nature of Glorantha and mythology in general. In Glorantha it isn't that values are in conflict because one group is all (or even mostly) right and another is all (or even mostly) wrong – it's because multiple groups are right. There's also a lot of blurry lines around gods and pantheons, with one cultures demons often being another cultures angels. The people of Glorantha live in this world and have to deal with these things, figuring out what they believe as communities and building myths around them. The Godlearners, however, went against this. They decided that they were going to play sophistry with the very nature of the universe, using every Truth as a truth – even when they conflicted with each other. Basically they decided to resolve every conflict in the universe – but not through an honest method, but by "tricking" the universe into bending to their wills. They made the mistake of thinking (or making themselves think) that Glorantha was really and completely subjective. They could replace one god with another, water with fire, and anything else they wanted because there was no objective truth but their own (false) logic. Even the runes were bent and mangled to their will – perverting the very nature of reality.

In a real way the real sin of the Godlearners is that they destroyed (or attempted to destroy) mythology – the big number 1 of Glorantha. They tried to destroy meaning, community, and history to make the world over in their own image. They did this by exploiting the loophole in the universe that makes it at least partially subjective – and found out too late that it doesn't really work the way they were so very sure it did. When that happened they were crushed by the backlash, and now the gods (whom they screwed with at the primal level) are making damn sure that such crap can never be pulled again.

That, so far as I can tell, is the spine of the Godlearners. The details are added ontop of that to give history and depth to the general structural composite.

Did I get anything wrong?


(P.S. It occurs to me that analyzing Glorantha as a genre is something a Godlearner would do. I may be in trouble here.)

[soru]

Yes, that seems basically right.

soru

[simon_hibbs]

There is, sometimes, a tone in the voices of long term Gloranthaphiles (who've probably been through a thousand flamewars on the subject and just don't want to go through it again) that indicates that Godlearners are big nos. They may say, "sure you can use them in your game" but when it comes to actually giving you information about them to make them usable in the game, they get a bit snide and their help often becomes (or at least feels) off-handed.

I'm gald we're being more helpful this time:)

One think I'm not sure about is what you mean by "use them in your game". After all, the god learners and their secret knowlege was destroyed, and anyway stopped working to a large extent, so other than as background colour or a justification for introducing some arcane ruins/artifacts I'm not sure what use you might what to put them to.

The people of Glorantha live in this world and have to deal with these things, figuring out what they believe as communities and building myths around them. The Godlearners, however, went against this. They decided that they were going to play sophistry with the very nature of the universe, using every Truth as a truth – even when they conflicted with each other. Basically they decided to resolve every conflict in the universe – but not through an honest method, but by "tricking" the universe into bending to their wills. They made the mistake of thinking (or making themselves think) that Glorantha was really and completely subjective. They could replace one god with another, water with fire, and anything else they wanted because there was no objective truth but their own (false) logic. Even the runes were bent and mangled to their will – perverting the very nature of reality.

Cracking stuff, and it seems a shame to quibble with any of it, but I'm that kind of guy :}

The God Learners were materialists and did believe in an objective universe. I think they believed that the subjective symbolism in myth was an illusion and therefore could be bent to their materialistic purposes without adverse consequences. The god swap is an example of this - they took two land goddesses and transposed them. They were both deities, both with earth connections, both female, etc so objectively they should be the same and any 'personal' differences are just subjective tawaddle that doesn't relay matter. They were wrong, and after some limited initial success the whole thing blew up in their faces.

When that happened they were crushed by the backlash, and now the gods (whom they screwed with at the primal level) are making damn sure that such crap can never be pulled again.

From a theists perspective the gods fought back against them, from a Malkioni's perspective the backlash was lead by angelic beings serving the Invisible God. Minor point.

Did I get anything wrong?

Pretty good overview, I'd say. I hope my nit-picks aren't too much of a distraction and anyway they're only my opinion on the subject.


Simon Hibbs

[Brand_Robins]

The God Learners were materialists and did believe in an objective universe. I think they believed that the subjective symbolism in myth was an illusion and therefore could be bent to their materialistic purposes without adverse consequences. The god swap is an example of this - they took two land goddesses and transposed them. They were both deities, both with earth connections, both female, etc so objectively they should be the same and any 'personal' differences are just subjective tawaddle that doesn't relay matter. They were wrong, and after some limited initial success the whole thing blew up in their faces.

Okay, that actually makes more sense. It wasn't that they went overly subjectivist, it's that they went overly essentialist/absolutist.

In that case I think they fit even better than what I'd tried to do with them – their error was the error of positivist arrogance, thinking that the human mind can know the fundamental nature of the universe through its own will and rationality.

Good points, and very helpful!

Now, the other question is, Contracycle -- does this help you at all? Or am I going the wrong direction for your taste?

[Mike Holmes]

(P.S. It occurs to me that analyzing Glorantha as a genre is something a Godlearner would do. I may be in trouble here.)

I don't know much about the Godlearners, but from what I've heard of them, it seems to me that, effectively, they're PCs who learned that they were PCs. This wouldn't be the only game to have done this. Also, see Heinlien's novels Number of the Beast, and The Cat Who Walks Through Walls.

Seems that they learned that "Their Glorantha Could Vary". Just before the canon gods came down hard and said that they were going to reinstate the canon. ;-)

Mike

[Deacon Blues]

Well Chris, and I hate to say this, but the truth is if we can't even agree on some basic Gloranthan genre tropes we're pretty much fucked as far as getting newbies into the setting goes.

Ding ding ding.  My chair's parked in that Venn diagram where the circles of "Newbie" and "Fucked" overlap.

1. Myth Defines:

This helps a lot, actually.

2. Community is Central:

This helps, too.

3. Values are in Conflict:

Hmm ... not exactly unique to Glorantha, but good to know that it's important.  We're fighting Them not because they're dark-skinned ... er, I mean, orcs ... but because they want to make big cities and we want to live in small clans.  Okay.

4.  Power Has a Price:

Again, hardly unique.  The only campaign setting I can think of that ignores this is Forgotten Realms, where several people can claim the title "Most Powerful Wizard" and still unabashedly serve the forces of "Good" (what makes them good?  The fact that they're called Good, of course).  So this tells me nothing.

5. Ambiguous References:

I'm only gradually getting comfortable with this, but it's starting to sink in and feel nice - like a bath that started out too hot.

6. Greg can screw it, so can you:

See, this is just frustrating.

(A) I don't want Greg to screw it.  He's the game designer.  I paid him (or a company acting on his behalf) a considerable sum of money to get a set of tools with which to Tell Stories of Make Believe.  I don't want to open that toolkit and find, instead of all the tools I want, an index card with the words, "You're probably just as good at home repair as I am, so make your own tools."  I don't need vague ideas.  I have vague ideas.

(B) You say that, and then you and the rest of the Glorantha veterans get into a multi-page debate about what exactly the God Learners (by the way, who?) are.  So, apparently, there is some fruit in hashing out a common touchstone of What Glorantha Is, Who's In It, and What They Want.

This is starting to tangent a little from the original issue, so I'm going to start a new thread.

[Brand_Robins]

Again, hardly unique.  The only campaign setting I can think of that ignores this is Forgotten Realms...  So this tells me nothing.

Understandably so. The point of the list isn't that each point is unique to Glorantha, it is that the list as a whole defined what sets Glorantha apart from other genre/settings as a whole. I'd imagine that a vast number of fantasy settings are quite similar in many of the points, it's only in the gestalt that they're "Glorantha."

I'm only gradually getting comfortable with this, but it's starting to sink in and feel nice - like a bath that started out too hot.

You and me both. The issue that I should mention, to keep from being a total cheat, is that while I will make ambiguous references in material that I write I also generally have an idea of what is behind it. When I talk about the "sacred thread" in a Teshnite's background I have a fairly strong idea about the basics of it being related to coming of age ceremonies for boys of a certain status in society. Because it's my ambiguous reference it's comfortable. The ambiguous references of others aren't always.

(A) I don't want Greg to screw it.

An objection I can fully understand and agree with. However, it's also the nature of the world. I think this point may be one of the ones that really does what Chris suggested -- it helps people decide if they want to play in Glorantha or not. If you can say, "Someday I'll be Gregged, but that's okay because X, Y, or Z" then you can probably make the rest work. If you say, "I never, ever want to be Gregged, it would just screw up the game for me" then it's probably a setting you'll want to tread lightly with.

(BTW, nothing wrong with either position.)

(B) You say that, and then you and the rest of the Glorantha veterans get into a multi-page debate about what exactly the God Learners (by the way, who?) are.

Kinda, sorta, but I'd like to make a couple clarifications here.

1. I'm not a Glorantha vet. I've been into the setting for a whole 6 months now. I don't even (currently) own the Glorantha setting book. My only knowledge of God Learners before this thread was the half-dozen vague references to them in the HeroQuest book and two references that I'd stumbled across on the Lhankor Mhy site.

2. My part of the "debate" was really just trying to get these vague and difficult references from others and make them over into something I could understand by applying the genre rules I'd tried setting out.  

3. There is still a lot of "specific setting" for people like us (newbs) to learn. I can't deny that. The genre tropes aren't inherently supposed to make it so that you don't need any setting detail, or to reduce everything to the same simplistic formula. They are supposed to make a basic spine of ideas and themes that can be used to build a bridge between newbs and grognards, and to make it possible for newbs to feel comfortable with the setting in a very general sense while they try to sort out the details they want to use and not use.

So my God Learner discussion was supposed to be an example of a newb (me) talking with old-guard about a touchy and difficult subject, using the genre ideas to make it work for both of us. There was a lot of back and forth about the issue, but then Simon, Soru, and I (at least) came to an understanding. I still don't know all the detail nitty-gritty about God Learners, but I do now feel comfortable with their general place and meaning in terms of Glorantha as genre.

[RaconteurX]

The above seems to suggest that there IS an underlying metaphysics of Glorantha, suggests that these things, like the gloranthan immune system, are objectively extant, and operate in particular ways.

Why would you believe otherwise? While the metaphysics of Glorantha are a trifle convoluted due to the existence of multiple otherworlds, the underlying principles are fairly consistent. Events like the Sunstop in the First Age (when Nysalor was born) and the Battle of Castle Blue in the Third (when the Red Goddess was born) are indicators of Glorantha's immune system at work as much as the Fall of the God Learners.

I've even been told that I should not ask about the God Learners, and that they are essentially being written out of canon.

You can ask all you want about them, just do not expect long, definitive answers from Greg. I have no idea where you heard the notion that the God Learners are being written out of the setting, as the three-part article about the Seshnelan kings contains some information about them. The God Learners may be anathema within the setting, but they are a well-established part of it.

[simon_hibbs]

In that case I think they fit even better than what I'd tried to do with them – their error was the error of positivist arrogance, thinking that the human mind can know the fundamental nature of the universe through its own will and rationality.

I think that's a good summary.

As a footnote, I'd point out that the Malkioni believe that they are the heirs of the Kingdom of Logic which was destroyed by an ice age long ago. The Brithini do date back to that era and still believe that the universe is ultimately Knowable (they're hard-line atheists), whereas the Malkioni believe that the perfect word of the creation was essentialy broken but that they can still be Saved through the Grace of God (Joy of the Heart).

The God Learners were Malkioni and so their grand unified theories of magic and myth could be seen as a Brithini-like heresy by modern Malkioni - only God can comprehend the ineffable nature of His Creation. I think this helps explain the anti-intellectual tendency in many Malkioni sects, principaly the Rokari.

Straying way off-topic, I'm afraid.


Simon Hibbs

[Mike Holmes]

Saved through the Grace of God (Joy of the Heart).

Something just struck me about this. Part of the communication problems is that Glorantha has a Dialect and Dialectic unique to it. I'm not talking terms, here, but how one learns to use the terms, and the context that they all imply. In that one little parenthetic, I can see a whole thought process that generated it.

Mike

[Nick Brooke]

Saved through the Grace of God (Joy of the Heart).

Something just struck me about this. Part of the communication problems is that Glorantha has a Dialect and Dialectic unique to it. I'm not talking terms, here, but how one learns to use the terms, and the context that they all imply. In that one little parenthetic, I can see a whole thought process that generated it.

I have an old article on Joy of the Heart here, if you want it. And I completely agree with your observation. Getting to grok Gloranthan buzzwords -- learning to make consistent use of the building blocks of the world and its mythologies -- is one of the black arts of the Gloranthaphile.

Cheers, Nick