Elsewhere (http://www.indie-rpgs.com/viewtopic.php?t=14714&start=15), Mike H. said, in reference to syncretism:

I think that what the rules are intended to support - and I've put some substantial effort into trying to figure this out - is that syncretism is found in terms of specific religions. That is, you don't take B magic keyword from X religion, and B keyword from Religion Y. At least not often (experimental Hero Quests might allow this). Instead, the religion is already extant, the syncretism has already happened, and it offers you the magic keywords from what were previously different religions.

So, for the classic (though somewhat OT) example of religion in England at the time of Robin Hood, the Christianity of the time was apparently forced to accept certain of the pagan Celtic beliefs as part of the religion. The two had melded into one at the time, and the pagan beliefs were slowly on their way out.

Now, what about a country truely in the throws of two competing religions? Well, what I'd suggest is that the "reality" of the gods and such is that they are mutually exclusive, and you can't get magic from both. You can pretend to be in another religion, but you can only "really" be in one. Again, in this case if you want the religion to be truely syncretic, then you'll have to be the one to do the Hero Quests to meld the myths to make it one religion.

...and I said that indeed where magic does tangibly come from the gods (or whatever), it is harder to imagine syncretism occuring.

So, if we syncretism and the related stuff does throw up interesting conflicts, what are they? Overlaying religious ceremonies to smother others, building temples on top of one another, naming saints after the local gods to keep people on board (bottom-up or top-down), political machinations with a spectrum of positions. What else?

lightcastle wrote:

...and I said that indeed where magic does tangibly come from the gods (or whatever), it is harder to imagine syncretism occuring.

Except that it seems to have occured all the time in Glorantha. Yelm and Orlanth, for example, were melded into each other's myths. HonEel converted Tarsh in part by proving that "She Who Waits" in the Goddess myth is Ernalda. (And went into the Ernalda rites to do it.)

So, if we syncretism and the related stuff does throw up interesting conflicts, what are they? Overlaying religious ceremonies to smother others, building temples on top of one another, naming saints after the local gods to keep people on board (bottom-up or top-down), political machinations with a spectrum of positions. What else?

All of this is possible. But in Glorantha it seems a lot of this is done in Heroquesting mode. In other words, you go into the otherworld to prove thise things. Yes, you do all the mundane aspects, but then you have to prove it by having your magic work. And that is normally big heroquest mojo.

Is what you are talking about playing the part of a culture hero who founds a new Brazil? Weaving the strands of national identity into a rope (or binding the rods of the fasces together, on the dark side)?

Some interesting sources for that kind of thing:

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Culture_hero
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/American_mythology
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/National_myth

I'd say the most interesting way to run that is to have the main characters be from different backgrounds, and form a hero band (or constitutional convention) together. Will all backgrounds be present? Who gets left out? And will they be represented by 'token' figures that nobody knows anything about, by an 'Uncle Tom' figure who is commonly seen as betraying their people, or by true heros (or villians)?

In HQ/Gloranthan terms, the new nation's magic comes from worship of the hero band, with some ability to pick and mix different aspects from different members (say, science from Franklin, winning wars from Washington, etc).

soru

soru wrote: Is what you are talking about playing the part of a culture hero who founds a new Brazil? Weaving the strands of national identity into a rope (or binding the rods of the fasces together, on the dark side)?

soru wrote: I'd say the most interesting way to run that is to have the main characters be from different backgrounds, and form a hero band (or constitutional convention) together....

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Fasces
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Force_%28Star_Wars%29

And yes, there are a lot of obvious downsides to playing in actual real-world history. Maybe one route would be to come up with a lightly fantasized version, something like G G Kay's use of Sarantium as a stand-in for the real Byzantium.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Nika_riots

soru

Hi Sam,

Well, my view has been that Glorantha always has syncretism going on all the time, just in differing amounts.

Remember that a HeroQuest brings benefits to the community that supports it, so if someone is doing misapplied worship, and eventually starts doing HeroQuests to try to make it official, even if they succeed, most of the time its going to be the small areas that support their new ideas. In order to make something "official" metaphysically, it is important to not only do the HeroQuest, but also get enough people to back you up on the HQ and buy into the new religious idea.

So in certain border areas where people mix peaceably, I'm sure you find minor cases of the myths mixing and religions growing towards each other. Places where people are mixing intensely(such as two different tribes banded together against Chaos), will result in faster and more solid syncretism as they end up living together, having kids, and going on HQ's as well. Then you have places where people are mixing through force or violence, in which case the myths mix, but the deities and spirits of one religion become the enemy deities of the other. Orlanth and Yelm are a perfect example of this.

But a neat thing is as the Hero Wars progress, and the stakes keep getting higher, people can and will start taking more risks, doing more HeroQuests, back and forth, and through it, all the religions will get mixed around, evaporated, or new ones will rise in their place.

It's an interesting circular logic to Glorantha- metaphysical reality is "proved" by what you see and witness on a Heroquest, but at the same time, what you see and witness is also created by the actions of Heroquesters, yourself and anyone else whose ever done(or will do) a Heroquest. If you do something different, and see different things, perhaps you "did it wrong", or perhaps you "discovered the older, forgotten way" and are doing it better.

A fun and worthwhile mystery to ponder regarding all this, is, did the Red Goddess really exist all along and was actually a part of all these other religions from way, way back? Or was it simply a mortal woman who ascended to godhood and managed to incorporate all these other religions and become part of their mythology through heroquesting and hardcore missionary work? (No, don't get into arguing the "truth" or canon of this, I'm not interested and it'll just derail the thread, this is here as an example of canon which suggests syncretism on a large scale).

Chris

I agree with Chris in that I think it is happening a lot.

The fact is that heroquests are gone on by oridinary people in Glorantha, let alone Player Characters. And I don't think you need to initiate to rival gods to syncretise. You can do it by identifying the other god with the person you want them to be.

But as far as playing in a situation where the religions are all mixed up like you say, I'm not sure what the problem is. From a rules point of view, what's stopping you?

Mandacaru wrote: This is the sort of thing I at least am interested in (the above example is the universe I'd love to create). I don't have a clear 'question' or anything, just wondering how it would go, how you'd make this happen in terms of game play and of rules.

Mike Holmes wrote:

Mandacaru wrote: So how does syncretization occur? Well, it seems to me that you have to heroquest, to prove that the myths of the adopted being as seen by the other religion are, in fact, incorrect, or that there's another equally valid interpretation. Basically change it so that the being now has a mythic relationship to all of the other gods of your religion.

It may be that what Sam is asking is: how could we model this without the overt Heroquesting of Glorantha?

If we're talking about a universe in which magic is subjective, subtle or nonexistent, the sort of things Gloranthans get up to on a regular basis aren't going to feel quite right.

Another real world example that doesn't follow the HQ rules is Japan, in which people are both Shintoists (animism) and Mahayana Buddhists (arguably theistic); and sometimes Christians as well. Maybe it's all just common magic?

droog wrote: It may be that what Sam is asking is: how could we model this without the overt Heroquesting of Glorantha?

I'm curious about your common magic house rules, can you post the link again for me?

Now that I see what you want from the syncretisation, I think something like what you say is the way to go. Note that even in the HQ rulebook, it specifically states you can do this.

(p. 118 - "Initiating to two deities from different pantheons generates many obstacles from both. Such interpantheon worship is rare, and the hero will porobably be forced by the religious hierarchies involved to choose one or the other. Still, gods exist who are basically unattached to any pantheon and so can bypass this problem.")

This is similar to the Lunar Empire situation, where you can presumably a member of the local religion and a lunar, without abandoning either.

Since there is precedent for allowing more than one magical keyword anyway (Common and specialized) I see no reason not to do what you think, a multiple keyword option. I would say that devotees are probably off limits somewhat though, since rule wise they give up magic from all other gods, even in their own pantheon. But you can always house rule that.

Mandacaru wrote:
Allowing more than one magical keyword (especially if running a 17 15 13 sort of chargen system rather than 17 17 17) would I think be a neat way to do it (also more in line with our history). To follow droog's example, a Japanese Brazilian nowadays could easily be a member of a Christian congregation, have some Buddhist philosophical leanings and have Shintoist (I'm probably cocking this up here) shrines to the ancestors at home.

Mandacaru wrote: Yes, you could use CM for those to some degree, but not with the concentration or 3 world rules in Glorantha, plus it too low key - it doesn't have the subtlety and drama of participating in a religious ceremony but having a black cockerel stuffed down your jacket - if the godtalker or priest doesn't detect it, the otherworld entities sure will, and you can't mask it by your superficial piety.

Good comments. Welcome to the Forge. Got a name we can use so that I don't have to call you Pumpkin or something? :-)

The question of "multiple religious affilliations" is really the crux of it. The problem is that Greg told me point blank that the idea was that the gods and spirits of Glorantha do not allow their magic to be used by people who also worship enties outside of the religion in question.

Or, put another way, the definition of a religion, for practical purposes, could be worship of a group of entities who allow the use of their magic to people who also worship any of the other entities.

Now, practically speaking, you could have a "syncretic religion" that was three pantheons, or traditions, or churches, etc, all smashed into one "religion" for this purpose. The question is one of in-game enumeration. Do you get a "Syncretic Religion X" keyword to go with your homeland, or do you get three separate Religion keywords? It would seem that the prefered method is the former model, with only one keyword, though I'm making some assumptions there.

Now, all this said, a simple way out of the problem is to just allow multiple religion keywords, and to say that sometimes the gods do consider other "religions" to be inoffensive enough to allow their magic to be used by people who worship dieties in the other religion. Or somesuch. Basically ignore my extrapolation of Greg's opinion, and go with something else. This is what I was playing originally, actually.

Hey, Mark! If you're reading, do you want to comment? I think you might have some interesting input to give here.

Mike

Mike Holmes wrote: Good comments. Welcome to the Forge. Got a name we can use so that I don't have to call you Pumpkin or something?

Mike Holmes wrote:
The problem is that Greg told me point blank that the idea was that the gods and spirits of Glorantha do not allow their magic to be used by people who also worship entities outside of the religion in question.

Addendum:

I just read something interesting in the Aeolian Church write-up in HQ:

The Aeolian Church is unusual in that it is a common religion even though its members use only wizardry. This is because the Aeolian Church practices misapplied worship.

Paul? The guy from Sam's HQ Trolls game? Good to see you here. :-)

Some of this provides quite the conundrum. That is, specialized religions often do, apparently, have elements that are not from one specific otherworld. The Lunar Way aside, apparently even the Orlanthi have some spirits that fall under the purview of their otherwise Theistic religion. Kolat at least.

In fact, in the vein of what you quoted from Greg, people have also said that "mixed" religions are actually the norm, and one that only pertained to one otherworld would be rare.

This doesn't conflict with the religion definition at all - it could be that spirits and saints and gods can all get along in one religion.

Mike

Mike Holmes wrote: Paul? The guy from Sam's HQ Trolls game? Good to see you here.

Mike Holmes wrote:
This doesn't conflict with the religion definition at all - it could be that spirits and saints and gods can all get along in one religion.

bigpumpkin wrote: My point, I guess, was that it's not religions per se that these entities are hung up on when it comes to deciding who can get their magic. The complex web of allegiances that bind or separate the Otherworlds will surely determine whether an entity allows an individual to use their magic alongside that of another entity, but there isn't necessarily a one-to-one correspondence between this and religion.

Religions are a human/mortal construct; they almost always reflect the allegiances in the Otherworld realm, certainly, but they frequently reflect their cultural and historical context just as strongly.

Essentially, it seems that a given religion (e.g. the Heortling Storm Pantheon) can borrow entities from neutral rivals (e.g. Ernalda) or even steal them from enemies (e.g. Elmal, Yavor). Does this assimilation always mean that the rival religion loses the entity in question? Look at Ernalda: she's worshipped in the Earth Pantheon and the Storm Pantheon. Do the myths that describe these additions reflect the human/mortal cultural assimilation of these entities? Or is it the other way around? Or both? :-) Hey! We're back to Heroquesting as a syncretic tool again...

It's also worth re-iterating my earlier (and woolier) point about promiscuity: certain entities (e.g. Donandar) seem to be almost completely unfettered by these divisions, and may be present (albeit in the background in some cases) even in mutually exclusive religions (e.g. Solar and Storm pantheons for Donandar). Does this transcendence reflect the unique nature of these entities, or does it instead reveal the arbitrary nature of the divisions that are generally perceived to be 'normal'?

if a pantheon can assimilate an enemy deity, provided there's a mythical pre- and/or post-hoc justification for it, then what are the limits?

Mike Holmes wrote:
I don't think it's like people sit around and plan to steal each other's gods, and then create the myths that allow them to do it. They have to come to believe that the being in question belongs to their mythic truth.

I've been sorta dreading this moment, but there's only one way to elucidate the principle, and that's by example. (Apollogies to the Gloranthaphiles, I'm going to make up a bunch of BS to make this point).

Ragnar and Varia, two Orlanthi, are sitting by a tree thinking about the gods.

Ragnar: Lankhor Mhy is a most wise god, is he not?

Varia: I heard the Lunar soldiers talking about their god Buserian and how wise he is the other day.

Ragnar: Bah, what puny Lunar god can compare to the lawspeaker of Orlanth!

Varia: The Lunars tell of a myth where Buserian first recites the laws down for their god Yelm standing in a ring of fire.

Ragnar: Standing in a ring of fire? That's the myth of "He who assists Lhankor Mhy"!

Varia: You don't suppose that Buserian doesn't really exist, and that those stupid Lunars have been worshipping one of Lankhor Mhy's assistants, do you?

Ragnar: I'm sure of it, now that you say it. And what's more, we can prove it. Next time we're in the hall of Orlanth and the priest opens up his hall, we'll ask to venture forth from it, and find the ring where the recitation was made. When we help "He Who Speaks" recite the Orlanthi law, then we will know that Buserian is but an aide of Lankhor Mhy, and the Lunar sages will be forced to admit that they have been worshipping wisdom that descends from Orlanth all this time!



Now, this is a stilted, condensed example. What would more likely happen, is that over time, people would start discovering that the myths overlap (in a world without magic, whats' really going on here is that memory is simply conflating the myths over time), and eventually the quest gets made to "prove" the change. Even the small adjustments in the myths in heroquests previous to this lead up to it.

For example, in the example, the Orlanthi discover that Lhankor Mhy has a sacred ring of fire, previously only attributed to Buserian's myth. And in another they discover a station about the recitation of the law. The myth mutates over time till the "true" version of the myth is discovered (the truth is always being discovered, of course), and Buserian becomes a minor Orlanthi god.


Consider that illustration from the book which has the caption, "A Lhankor Mhy lawspeaker discusses philosophy with a Buserian Sage." The Sage tells the Lawspeaker that Buserian has a great library of books. This impresses the Lawspeaker, who thinks, "My gods are greater than his, Lankhor Mhy must have a library, too!" Sure enough, when he examines the mythic reality, he finds that library there. He just wasn't looking for it before.

As their gods come closer and closer together by processes like this, they become more and more susceptible to being co-opted. Suddenly one day, they go into the otherworld, their god does not answer to the name that they call him by, but by that which has been discovered to be "more true" by the previous questers, that these gods are one and the same. Or related to each other in a mythic way that makes the god a servant of the other pantheon. When they ask the god, he says, "Do you not see? You have been deluded all along seeing my library as a Lunar one. It was never so, it was always an Orlanthi one."

The faithful will, of course reject this as some deception on the part of the Orlanthi, and attempt to "edit" the myth back into order as they remember it. Rather, they attempt to find the truth as they remember it to be, and thus wash away the Orlanthi illusion. Or, they will lose faith due to what they see, and fall into despair, convert, or whathaveyou.

Does that help at all? It's not a game that they're playing, they're simply exploring their mythic reality, and discovering new things about it constantly. The fact that these things tend to match their desires to see their "way" be ascendant, simply to them coincides with their belief that their way is, in fact, superior. To the extent that they can't make these positive discoveries, they realize that their belief is the frailer. Eventually such beliefs dissapear entirely replaced by the newfound truth.

Mike

No - thats not the question.

Ragnar and Varia have discovered - which is to say, asserted - that Buserian is in fact an assistant of Lhankor Mhy. How do the rest of the Orlanthi find this out?

If they don't find it out, then the "truth" they have "discovered" - which is to say, a lie they have invented as an apologetic - goes no further. No OTHER Orlanthi will "know" this "truth". What happens if a different group of Orlanthi come up with a different rationalisation, and quest to "prove" it?

Worse, how does the Lunar god Buserian get demoted within Lunar culture to the point of being a minor Orlanthi god? Because of course to the Lunars, the Orlanthi assertion is a) wholly untrue and b) unkown to them. And if the god is not so demoted in the Lunar pantheon, then what does the statement "Buserian becomes a minor orlanthi god" actually mean?

And with all of this apparent self-deception and ad hoc reasoning, why are we using the misleading terms "prove" and "discover" at all? These are actually the conceits of the CHARACTERS in Glorantha - why are they relevant to a discussion between real human players?

contracycle wrote: No - thats not the question.

Ragnar and Varia have discovered - which is to say, asserted - that Buserian is in fact an assistant of Lhankor Mhy. How do the rest of the Orlanthi find this out?

If they don't find it out, then the "truth" they have "discovered" - which is to say, a lie they have invented as an apologetic - goes no further. No OTHER Orlanthi will "know" this "truth". What happens if a different group of Orlanthi come up with a different rationalisation, and quest to "prove" it?

And with all of this apparent self-deception and ad hoc reasoning, why are we using the misleading terms "prove" and "discover" at all? These are actually the conceits of the CHARACTERS in Glorantha - why are they relevant to a discussion between real human players?

Worse, how does the Lunar god Buserian get demoted within Lunar culture to the point of being a minor Orlanthi god? Because of course to the Lunars, the Orlanthi assertion is a) wholly untrue and b) unkown to them. And if the god is not so demoted in the Lunar pantheon, then what does the statement "Buserian becomes a minor orlanthi god" actually mean?

Mike Holmes wrote:

contracycle wrote: No - thats not the question.

Ragnar and Varia have discovered - which is to say, asserted - that Buserian is in fact an assistant of Lhankor Mhy. How do the rest of the Orlanthi find this out?

If they don't find it out, then the "truth" they have "discovered" - which is to say, a lie they have invented as an apologetic - goes no further. No OTHER Orlanthi will "know" this "truth". What happens if a different group of Orlanthi come up with a different rationalisation, and quest to "prove" it?

...

Human understanding of the gods is, due to the fact of their being far beyond humans in terms of power and the nature of their existences, quite imperfect. Even the most devoted disciple claims only to know a small fraction of the truth that is the mighty reality of their diety. And they admit that what they know may not be precisely correct. The truth exists, but knowledge of it is not perfect. As such, one of the things that the religious do is to seek deeper understanding.

When somebody quests to find out something that they suspect is true, it's largely a matter of intuition. That is, if you drop something in the forest on a trip, you might think, "Hey, it's probably where I sat down." So you go to look there, hoping to find that this is, in fact, the truth. It may or may not be so. When Ragnar goes to the otherworld looking for the truth of Buserian, he's not causing the otherworld being to change, he's causing the truth to become more visible to all. The mythic landscape clears up so that the truth, there all along, is now known to all who may come by.

Worse, how does the Lunar god Buserian get demoted within Lunar culture to the point of being a minor Orlanthi god? Because of course to the Lunars, the Orlanthi assertion is a) wholly untrue and b) unkown to them. And if the god is not so demoted in the Lunar pantheon, then what does the statement "Buserian becomes a minor orlanthi god" actually mean?

When the Lunar comes along in the otherworld, and sees Buserian, now, sitting at Lankhor Mhy's knee scribing for him, he has four choices (Ragnar having cleared the veil to that understanding)

Greg once commented (on Misapplied Worship): "I almost wish that we'd called it Mixed Worship and made it the standard type of religion everywhere in the world".

contracycle wrote:
Worse, how does the Lunar god Buserian get demoted within Lunar culture to the point of being a minor Orlanthi god? Because of course to the Lunars, the Orlanthi assertion is a) wholly untrue and b) unkown to them. And if the god is not so demoted in the Lunar pantheon, then what does the statement "Buserian becomes a minor orlanthi god" actually mean?

Mike Holmes wrote: It seems that, perhaps, it could be that the Orlanthi Ernalda is simply incorrect.

Mike Holmes wrote:
The trouble here is trying to explain to the modern rational mindset how this all works. In some cases, I'm putting things from a rationalist player POV, and in other cases trying to explain the mindset of the character in Glorantha. You have to understand the Glorantha characters mindset to understand how this all works, and for some readers here, I was hoping that it would make sense to explain it in rationalist terms. But I'm sure that I'm just being more confusing.

The first thing to understand here is that in both Glorantha and the real world, there is no way to prove that the either the rationalist or religious POV is correct. There is no evidence in either world that can automatically make one POV right or wrong.

When the Lunar comes along in the otherworld, and sees Buserian, now, sitting at Lankhor Mhy's knee scribing for him, he has four choices (Ragnar having cleared the veil to that understanding):

Now, the Lunar vision is a little different, but it's also closer to being put into practice. Right now, Orlanthi under Lunar control are in some cases beginning to worship Doburdun or other storm gods. But that doesn't mean Orlanth really *is* Doburdun. Making that true is going to require real huge-scale efforts, not one or two mimsy-pimsy heroquests. It's going to take, oh, I don't know, a massive military campaign lasting more than one person's lifetime, coupled with a huge program of temple building and tactical heroquesting.

When the character rolls in a heroquest to see if he succeeds at something, thus "creating" the reality of the myth, what the Gloranthan sees as actually happening is that they're simply finding what their intuition and faith perhaps told them would be there to find.

It would probably only mean that Buserian can now appear in certain LM quests -- it wouldn't make a big difference to the Lunars.

contracycle wrote: But if that were true, how was conversion accomplished in Tarsh? Because surely Orlanth worshippers would have been as unmoved by Lunar claims about Orlanth as Lunars are said to be about Buserian.

--

So, I'm afraid I still don't understand how syncretism or conversion happen in Glorantha.

OK. So there's conversion for you -- let's talk about syncretism.

I think that the example Mike picked, integrating Buserian into Lankor Mhy, is actually kind of a dodgy one, because it's talking about an area where there are two gods with similar briefs -- god of scholars -- but very different ideas about what it means to be god of scholars (or maybe not; I don't really know enough about Buserian).

Let's look at the Storm Tribe in a bit more detail, specifically the Making of the Storm Tribe heroquest. In this quest, Orlanth does two things -- he exemplifies the clan/tribe structure of Heortling society and he explains what deities from other pantheons (clans) are doing in his religion (tribe). There is a basic formula for bringing a clan into a tribe, a tribe into a confederation, etc., and Orlanth says "I can do this with gods too, which is why Ernalda can be in my tribe even though she's not from my pantheon."

Elmal is the other obvious option -- a deity clearly from the Solar Pantheon, his name even shows the vestige of the word "Yelm." He's married to a local girl, though, Redalda, and he demonstrates, in the myth "Elmal Guards the Stead," that he shares important Heortling virtues, but in kind of a Solar way, ie he's kind of a stiffnecked, self-righteous so-and-so.

What has all this got to do with syncretism? Well, lessee.

OK, let's say that some Helering sailors got blown off course a long time ago and wound up on an uncharted desert isle. The locals are theists, and of course they have their own pantheon of gods. The Helerings stick to their old religion, but their priests really have to ransack their brains to come up with the right myths -- they didn't pay too much attention about Orlanth's journeys and whether he might ever have come here. They tell some stories that are right and some others that are wrong (ie some where the Heroquests work and some where they don't).

Now, the natives worship, I don't know, Jim-Bob, the god of taro root cultivation. The Storm Pantheon has no god of taro root cultivation, for obvious reasons. How can we learn to worship Jim-Bob so that we can grow delicious taro roots for ourselves and stop having to trade our shoes to the islanders for them?

So the top Helering god-talker and the top Islander god-talker get their heads together and have a long, rambling theological discussion, trying to establish a common ground, and the Helerings get the islanders drunk and get them into a storytelling contest.

Now things happen on two levels:

1) the Orlanthi are trying to learn how to worship Jim-Bob correctly. To make this easier, they need to fit him into their cultural framework, which means learning his myths and seeing how they can express them within the cultural framework of the Storm Tribe. They know that the Storm Tribe is the biggest and the best pantheon, and they know it's multicultural, so they're pretty sure that this Jim-Bob must be related to Heler or Quivin or Vestkarthen or somebody. They're looking for how Jim-Bob fits into their pantheon, which already has it as an important principle that it's possible to fit other gods in.

2) on the God Plane, there are possible connections between the gods here -- Orlanth is a weather god, Heler is a weather god, Heler comes from the Water Tribe, presumably this taro guy does the same -- or maybe he's an Earth Deity, like Asrelia. Whatever. The possible connection exists -- has always existed because of the spread-out nature of the Storm Tibe -- but has just never been put into play before.

They learn the myths, they try an islander heroquest, and either

a) they fuck it up. Sorry, guys, Orlanth never passed this way. See if you can use your existing magic to grow taro roots or something. You're not worshipping Jim-Bob.

or

b) they pull it off. Turns out Jim-Bob is the son of so-and-so, which makes him Heler's first cousin and therefore willing to grant them his blessings if they make the appropriate sacrifices, etc., etc.

Note that some religions are better at this than others. The Lunar religion is awesomely good at it: "We Are All Us" is made for syncretism. Both Storm Tribe and Earth Tribe have ways of doing it too. More isolated religions, maybe not so much.

The other thing is that it's very hard to incorporate deities who don't fit your general theme into your pantheon. This is why Donandar and Desemborth/Lanbril/etc. are so widespread -- everyone likes to steal things and everyone likes to dance. But not everyone likes to submit to authority. So the Lunars can incorporate most deities "god of bears? Sure, Bears Are Us. We Are All Us!" But they have a hell of a time incorporating Orlanth, because he's not us. He's "Me, and Fuck Your Us."

So instead they kill him and replace him with Doburdun. Doburdun is Us all right.

First, when you travel to the god plane or the Hero Plane, you are traveling to where the gods are. So the question of how the lunars know about the Buserian change is that they go to see him in the otherworld, and he's different.

Also, he might stop letting them use his magic. When they go to the otherworld to ask what's the matter, he says, "Well, see, I was only pretending to be a lunar god, I'm really an Orlanthi god." Or something less pedestrian to that effect.

Note, I haven't read James' posts, so apollogies if we cover some of the same things.

- I know my god does X
- which really means I have chosen my god to do X

- and I can go exploring on the hero plane
- which really means I am defining and changing the hero plane

- and I can go to change and define the hero plane
- which I then report as "discovery"

But again, I'm afraid that is not true. We have developed a method to resolve such disputes - independant verifiability. This argument is not legitimate; the alleged subjectivity of Glorantha is different from, not the same as, the real world, even in ancient epochs. The Greeks figured out the world was round using a ruler and a bit of string.

When the Lunar comes along in the otherworld, and sees Buserian, now, sitting at Lankhor Mhy's knee scribing for him, he has four choices (Ragnar having cleared the veil to that understanding):

So this presents two problems:
1) manifestly, the Lunar quests that "proved" that Orlanth was Doburden in Tarsh had no effect whatsoever on Orlanthi belief in Orlanth, and

2) The Lunar quests that "proved" that Sedenya was the Lord of the Middle Air also had no effect whatsoever on Orlanthi faith, or on Orlanths power in the Middle Air.

This strongly implies that Culture A does not "see" the same Otherworld as culture B. Because if that were true, then in either case, "whoever got there first" would determine what was "seen" by any new 'quester.

And it seems to me to get worse from there, because as I see it, Jame's proposed massive military campaign, occurring as it does on the material, not the hero, plane, should have absolutely no relevance whatsoever to the existance of Orlanth or his dominance of the Middle Air. What principle would govern changes in the physical plane imposing changes in the hero plane?

Yes - confirmation bias. Thats not the problem - the problem is how two people look at the hero plane and they both have their expectations verified, despite them being mutually contradictory, such as who is dominant in the middle air.

But the question is, why not? Buserian has now been Proven to be a subordinate of Lhankor Mhy. Does this not cause some consternation and religious uncertainty among the Lunars? Hitherto, they have been believing a falsehood - don't any of them find them find that worrying?

Mike Holmes wrote: That is, the Lunars don't conquer in the mundane world to alter myths.

James Holloway wrote:

Mike Holmes wrote: That is, the Lunars don't conquer in the mundane world to alter myths.

They do a little bit -- they need to build Reaching Moon Temples in order to really get their magical funk on in a particular location. The whole thing in Sartar centers on just that.

Mike Holmes wrote: I don't see how that alters the mythic world at all. It just allows magic to be used better in the mundane world. Like any ritual does.

Mike

James Holloway wrote:
Here's the thing: as far as I know, no one has suggested that Orlanth is Doburdun. I could be wrong about this. But my understanding is that they have replaced Orlanth with Doburdun because it does minimal damage to the mythology -- Doburdun is also married to Ernalda, Doburdun is the god of the storm, etc. In some highly technical metaphysical sense, Doburdun may "be" Orlanth, like they both embody the Storm Rune or something, but for practical purposes they are different cults AFAIK.

James Holloway wrote:
They learn the myths, they try an islander heroquest, and either

a) they fuck it up. Sorry, guys, Orlanth never passed this way. See if you can use your existing magic to grow taro roots or something. You're not worshipping Jim-Bob.

or

b) they pull it off. Turns out Jim-Bob is the son of so-and-so, which makes him Heler's first cousin and therefore willing to grant them his blessings if they make the appropriate sacrifices, etc., etc.

James Holloway wrote:
Well, I'm not sure about this, but I suspect that in order to destroy Orlanth in the mythic world, you have to take or destroy things in the physical world that support him, like the Old Wind Temple or the Hill of Orlanth Victorious. You could heroquest all you like to kill Orlanth from a base in Raibanth, but Orlanth would smash you flat every time.

No, they don't believe that hey change it, only that they discover new myths.

Mike Holmes wrote: Again, this is your belief in rationality as the only source of truth. As long as you maintain that, and don't realize that many people, including allmost all of them in Glorantha, don't feel that way, then you'll never understand their mindset.

It's like you're saying that before people knew that the world was round, that they were crazy for thinking that it was flat. Worse, you haven't proven in the analogy that the world isn't flat.

Quite incorrect. Again, you assume that faith is based on "seeing" which it simply is not.

I didn't think that it did. At least they don't think that it does. That is, the Lunars don't conquer in the mundane world to alter myths. They conquer because their gods say that they should.

They don't. They see the same things. Whether or not they choose to accept what they're seeing is a different matter.

Any change to a myth is, in fact, just a change in your understanding of it.

To actually find a deeper truth about a god, you'd have to go to the god plane to do it. Making it way tougher to do. I mean you practically have to be a god yourself to do it. Only superhumans like JarEel or huge organizations working together can have any chance of learning deeper truths on the god plane.

contracycle wrote:
While its possible to make that argument about the persons of specific gods, its not possible to make that argument over the lordship of the middle air.

It also appears that religious devotion, such as it appears in Glorantha, is essentially unimportant. Faith is not something deep and significant about me as a person - its more like popular fashion. Despite bronze being the very bones of the gods in the earth, the gods themselves are so wuss and useless that what really matters is who controls the biggest human army. THAT is the decisive element in conversion.

contracycle wrote:
But this is directly contradicted by the model of conversion we have just discussed, in which purely political-economic factors determined the presence of worship, and the truth of the myths, in the eyes of the individual.

contracycle wrote:
These questions come from me, the real human player, about the really existing game - not from a character about a nebulous world. I just want the straight dope so I can make judgements.

contracycle wrote:
But the question is how it occurs in a magical world where the gods really exist and are free willed; where the practitioners routinely enter the god plane and commune with their deities. And these gods are conspicuous by their absence in your account.

soru wrote:
The guys with that level of relationship are the ones rounded up and killed, exiled, or, in the Lunar case, seduced by the personal attentions of a missionary.

contracycle wrote:

No, they don't believe that hey change it, only that they discover new myths.

No, they DO change it. That is quite clear in the taro-root god example.

It is NOT good enough to make spurious allegations about my thinking, or allege there is something I "just don't get". This product does not come with a warning sticker that indicates it can only be played by those with academic training in anthropology.

No its not like that at all. Concluding the world is flat is fairly reasonable from casual observation. But Glorantha goes further and says that NOBODY in the entirety of Glorarantha ever uses rational thought for anything - they act exculsively through the denial of their own motivations and its transposition into religious mumbo-jumbo.

No, thats the central QUESTION: Do gloranthans act on faith, or do they act on knowledge?

The books say the gods really exist; the worshippers can do magic; can quest on the hero plane. It just turns out, none of it MATTERS.

No, the glowline and Yanafil Tarnils temples are clearly "magical engineering" that is geographically specific.

If that were true, questing to "discover" new myths or stations would not work, becuase the True versions would be objectively fixed to all observers, and we know this is not the case.

Any change to a myth is, in fact, just a change in your understanding of it.

No thats not true as you altready concdeded; its not that Goranthans are not changing the hero plane, its merely that they THINK they are not. So this "understanding" stuff is just a rationalisation of an imposed change that I desired.

To actually find a deeper truth about a god, you'd have to go to the god plane to do it. Making it way tougher to do. I mean you practically have to be a god yourself to do it. Only superhumans like JarEel or huge organizations working together can have any chance of learning deeper truths on the god plane.

I'm the GM. I twist JarEel around my little finger and eat Orlanth for lunch.
These questions come from me, the real human player, about the really existing game - not from a character about a nebulous world. I just want the straight dope so I can make judgements.

Mike Holmes wrote:
Yes, this is how the player has some control over the truth of Glorantha. They become a mini-GM using their character as a tool with which to alter things. The in-game desription of which is that these things existed all the time, and that the characters are just finding them. It's like the game Donjon - the player rolls his "find secret door" and, if successful, the player creates one. The character doesn't think that he's created a secret door out of thin air, he thinks it was there all along. In his reality, it was there all along.

Mike

James Holloway wrote: In practice, I bet this and my approach ("there is some actual wiggle room about questing in the game world") would come out to very much the same thing in terms of the session.

Mike Holmes wrote:
Quite. Basically nobody I've ever seen play the game gives a damn about any of this.

contracycle wrote:

Mike Holmes wrote: Again, this is your belief in rationality as the only source of truth. As long as you maintain that, and don't realize that many people, including allmost all of them in Glorantha, don't feel that way, then you'll never understand their mindset.

This is a totally unacceptable response.

First of all, I have said nothing about sources of truth in the real world. All I want is a clear understand of THIS GAMING PRODUCT. I do feel it is incumbent for a producer of a product sold for commercial sale to explain it, its ointernal logic, and how I the end-user am to actually use the product I have purchased.

It is NOT good enough to make spurious allegations about my thinking, or allege there is something I "just don't get". This product does not come with a warning sticker that indicates it can only be played by those with academic training in anthropology.

It's like you're saying that before people knew that the world was round, that they were crazy for thinking that it was flat. Worse, you haven't proven in the analogy that the world isn't flat.

No its not like that at all. Concluding the world is flat is fairly reasonable from casual observation. But Glorantha goes further and says that NOBODY in the entirety of Glorarantha ever uses rational thought for anything - they act exculsively through the denial of their own motivations and its transposition into religious mumbo-jumbo.

Mike Holmes wrote:
I disagree. I think that's just an incorrect POV. This is where the problems begin and end. If you take your POV, then you're correct, the Gloranthan's are all silly fools. If you take my POV then it's all internally consistent.

That's silly. I'm don't have such academic training, and I don't find it hard at all. It's only your insistence on certain axioms that start this argument that make these things problematic.

Which is fine. I don't see why the product needs to cater to you specifically. Let's say that there was a game about sewing quilts, and you found it boring, but others liked it. Would that make the game flawed? Then every game is flawed this way.

You'd have to argue that every player will have problems in understanding these issues. Odd thing is that you seem to be one of the only people I know who have this issue. So if HQ has a flaw of not appealing to everyone because of these issues, then it's not a very large one. In fact, I'd say that most games have much worse issues of this sort.

Except for those that do use rational thought. I've given you the example of the people that do.

Again, putting it all off as religious mumbo-jumbo indicates to me that this is simply not the game for you. It's about faith and religion, and will probably appeal most to people who think it's interesting to look at issues from that side of the fence.

No, thats the central QUESTION: Do gloranthans act on faith, or do they act on knowledge?

This is a non-sequitur. Why don't they matter? I think that they certainly matter to the characters.

Can you substantiate that with some evidence? Why clearly? Just because that's how you see it, doesn't mean that everyone does, nor that this is how it's intended to be seen.

I think that this might be the source of the trouble.

The rules are for the players, not for the characters. It's all metagame. We as players don't actually know the myths of Glorantha most times. Oh, we might know a few that somebody has written down, but when it comes to play, we have to make them up. Yes, the HQ rules allow the players to alter the myths. The players. Not the characters. The character only discovers the "deeper truth" that was always there.

Ironically, Fang Langford's name for this sort of play is "No Myth." That is, nothing is real in the game world at all, until we discover it as players. That doesn't mean that the characters feel that way. When you say, "we go left at the fork" and you find a temple, the characters assume it's been there forever. The players know that the GM just put it there, or may as well have. It was a fiction created by somebody at some point, and entered into the SIS when somebody thought to do it.

Where did I concede this?

Yes, the hero plane itself is simply local to the individual. But they understand this, and don't expect the personal understanding of the truth to match others much. On the God Plane (or Spirit Plane, etc) it's different.

The player knows that they can "edit" the reality of Glorantha. That they can have thier character search out certain truths.

Yes, this is how the player has some control over the truth of Glorantha. They become a mini-GM using their character as a tool with which to alter things. The in-game desription of which is that these things existed all the time, and that the characters are just finding them.

It's like the game Donjon - the player rolls his "find secret door" and, if successful, the player creates one. The character doesn't think that he's created a secret door out of thin air, he thinks it was there all along. In his reality, it was there all along.

Donald wrote:
You are demanding that the author subscribes to your view of the world or at least explains it in the terms you understand - those of the rational modern real world.

Greg is a shaman and as far as I can tell doesn't even consider they are a complete truth about to the real world.

It is hardly surprising that his creation doesn't follow those rules of logic.

There are two ways of handling this, either immerse yourself in and explore the concept that myth creates reality and reality creates myth, or treat Glorantha as a fantasy world which doesn't have an internal logic. Either will work as a gaming product.

Not true, few people in Glorantha think in modern rational terms because they aren't part of modern RW cultures.

Belief and personal experience weigh far more heavily than scientific proof, which is a concept alien to most of Glorantha (and much of the real world).

I suggest reading medieval theology sometime, you will find perfectly logical arguments which prove things I expect you will find absurd. The error occurs not in the logic but in the assumptions made, assumptions which went unchallenged because they were obviously true in the belief system of the time.

James Holloway wrote:
The truth of the myth doesn't change when you convert. Orlanthi who know the myth of Yelmalio and the Hill of Gold don't doubt that it happened. They just don't venerate Yelmalio. Orlanthi who decide to worship Yelmalio, like Monrogh, don't think that Elmal never Guarded the Stead. They just consider Yelmalio to be the greater god, the more worthy of veneration.

The thing is that the hero plane and the god plane are mutable, a bit. So there's certainly a sense in which the heroquester alters them when he quests. There's an amount of "play" in the myths.

When you reenacted the myth, therefore, you didn't get it quite right, but it works anyway, because it's close enough. You got the gist of it.

So there we see some flexibility in the system. As long as you respect the point of the myth, which is really about something rather different, you can futz around with the details a bit and nobody will mind.

That's fine, but what about totally new heroquests? Well, there also there is a little bit of play in the system. The Helerings in the Jim-Bob example can't just make up a totally new myth from scratch. That stuff doesn't fly.

What they have to do is find a myth they can use: "How Jim Bob Taught People to Grow Taro" or whatever. Now, Jim Bob really did teach these people to grow taro. That's not at issue. The play in the system is, are these guys eligible to learn the secret? They're using the argument "well, Jim Bob, we think you're related to our pantheon and therefore we can worship you" to try and argue that they are.

To do this they're using the Storm Pantheon's powers of weather and fertility and its connection with the deep in the person of Heler, the Blue God, who is (as Helerings) their personal patron. The connection is real, Jim Bob is real, and though no Helering has ever acted out the myth before, it is close enough to what Helerings do to work in principle.

Now, here's the thing. A sufficiently superhumanly powerful badass can use heroquesting on the God Plane to, you betcha, change the fabric of reality. With powerful magic and lots of community support (lots, like God Project lots) you can, in fact, go into the God Plane and say "hey Urox! Yeah, you, you pussy! I'm here to tame you and stop you being so wild!" And in the absurdly unlikely event that you calm Urox (because you have eight million masteries in Make People Think Tranquil Thoughts or whatever) you will change the nature of the deity, change the nature of his heroquests, change the nature of his affinities and feats. There will be a lot of styrmen with big axes and helpful new Look at the Pretty Flowers feats.

This is because, once you're in the god plane, all bets are off. Remember, Urox isn't all - powerful, he's just really, really powerful. You can change his nature if you're tough enough, not because his nature is inherently subjective or mutable or anything like that, but because you went in there and whupped on him until it changed. It was definitely like this and now it is definitely like that. Obviously, most people don't even bother thinking about this because it happens so rarely, but it can and does happen.

James Holloway wrote:
On the other hand, the power of the Lunar army comes at least partially from the Red Goddess.

Something that I keep stressing is that the existence of the gods, their verifiable existence, is not the decisive, magic-bullet argument here. The relationship with Orlanth can be anything from "he's like a very good friend" for an initiate to "he's like my father and mother, but so much more" for a disciple. But Sedenya is real too, and she's tempting.

The breadth of the Orlanth cult's spread is extensive, and it is understandable that such diversity would spawn some differences of worship depending upon the local customs. In general, three forms of the god are recognized. Orlanth Adventurous is the most widespread, for his god-form appeals to those who wander and adventure. Orlanth Thunderous is the weather god aspect and is worshipped where people commune with the violent storms of nature. Orlanth Rex is the King of the Gods, and is worshipped by chieftains and nobles and poets

contracycle wrote:
But, is Jim-Bob real? Becuase the precdent of military conversion suggests the gods do not have objective existance, but are created as cultural expressions.

In which case, sufficiently powerful tarot-root questors would not be obliged to consider the "essence" of Jim-Bob at all, if it is in their power to change what Jim-Bobs essential nature is.

contracycle wrote:
This does not appear possible to me, for as I understand it, the claims to soveriegnty advanced by both Yelm and Orlanth depend on whose view you think is correct, of their shared myth. I am admittedly shaky on the details, but once again this apepars to be a matter that thousands of people are willing to fight over.

OK. Why - that is, whats the explanation for that? Is it something metaphysical, or merely in the class of "plot device"? Is it something known to the players, or the characters?

Who and/or what decides that it was, or was not, "close enough"? Becuase there are dire warnings about the dangers of heroquesting without knowing exactly what you are doing.

This is contrary to the idea of myths being valuable secrets, or grudgingly shared, or in any sense an historical account of the past, magical or mundane. Again, what is the metaphysical basis for the myths being malleable?

Why not? According to whom? Where do myths come from initially, then?

I follow this, but is this an explanation of the players mindset, or the characters?

That is, I have proposed that Gloranthans do themselves concsiously engage in "constructive heroquesting", but this has been resisted on the grounds that while that may be what actually happens, they THINK they are discovering. So, which do you think this is an example of?

But, is Jim-Bob real? Becuase the precdent of military conversion suggests the gods do not have objective existance, but are created as cultural expressions.

But again we return to the central question - does that happen? Does a change on the magical plan actually cause this effect in the mundane plane, so that Uroxi stop getting magic?

There are statements that imply this effect should happen - such as the claims that the Lunar ways dominion over the Middle Air has improved the weather where its writ runs. On the other hand, it is also explicit that this writ does not run as far as dragon pass, where there are strong rival arir gods. So the Lunar dominance of the middle air appears to be only local, and to not impinge on the wind-related powers of Orlanthi.

If it were changes to the magical planes that had this effect, why are they not universal in regards the mundane plane?

Umm, but previous discussion of the tarot-root example implied that the detail of gods and their myths were not fixed, but that their "core essence" was. Hence the statements about getting the right 'sense' in the tarot-root quest. But here you say that the nature of gods is indeed changeable, subject to sufficient force.

In which case, sufficiently powerful tarot-root questors would not be obliged to consider the "essence" of Jim-Bob at all, if it is in their power to change what Jim-Bobs essential nature is.

contracycle wrote:
Now, how do we reconcile the "local cultural differences" element with the objectively existing Orlanth in the magical planes with whom worshippers have a personal experience?

If they are having a personal relationship, a face to face meeting perhaps during the sacred time rituals, then why do they get different ideas about who Orlanth is and what he wants? What relevance does local culture have to an objectively extant god?

soru wrote:
A sufficient level of power would allow reshaping the world from flat to spherical, that does not make it ambiguous whether it is flat or spherical.

soru

contracycle wrote:
GLorantyhan myths are so iobjective and authoritative that the King of DragonPass game used a multiple choice system to test the players knowledge of myths in order to achieve progress in the game.

soru wrote:
You seem to be confusing Glorantha with a world where belief defines reality. Sociological factors affect belief, belief affects worship, worship affects magic, magic affects who wins in a fight, who wins in a fight affects sociological factors. Nowhere does a change in belief ever effect reality, except in the same sense that, say, the loss of belief in communism affected the Soviet union post-1989.

The laws of economics did not change when the berlin wall fell.

Yes, for a defintion of 'sufficiently powerful' that allows you to say 'hey Jim-bob, get thee to God school and go learn that new stuff, or I will smite thee'.

A sufficient level of power would allow reshaping the world from flat to spherical, that does not make it ambiguous whether it is flat or spherical.

contracycle wrote:
OK. So cutting to the chase, the gods can be controlled by humans, right?

Are the gods artifacts of human creation?

Where does magic come from?

contracycle wrote:
Where does magic come from? The gods, or from Gloranthans?

contracycle wrote: So cutting to the chase, the gods can be controlled by humans, right?

contracycle wrote: Are the gods artifacts of human creation?

GB Steve wrote:
There always some ambiguity over whether it was a failure in an annual heroquest against the icespirits or just bad weather that caused the harvest to fail, much as there is with prayer and religious observance in the real world.

contracycle wrote:

Mike Holmes wrote:
I disagree. I think that's just an incorrect POV. This is where the problems begin and end. If you take your POV, then you're correct, the Gloranthan's are all silly fools. If you take my POV then it's all internally consistent.

No, it is a correct point of view, at least according to multiple statements made on the topic. If you WANT to add another gofds powers to your Pantheon, you heroquest to achieve this.

again, a straw man set up to be knocked down. In point of fact, as I often remark, I am *very* interested indeed in tyhe topics that Glorantha allegedly tackles, and my frustration arises from the fact the Glorantha tackels them poorly, inconsistently, and illogically.

Ad populum fallacy - the popularity of a position is not an indicator of its truth. Please argue your case, not fallacies such as this.

Furthermore, it seems abundantly clear to me that nobody does understand this issue - becuase nobody is ever able to give a cogent explanation. What we get instead is handwaving.

Like James Randi, I think it would be entirely reasonable to offer a reward - say £50 - for anyone who can construct a cogent and non-contradictory model of Gloranthan metaphysics in the full confidence it would never be claimed.

Except for those that do use rational thought. I've given you the example of the people that do.

Do you mean the god-learners? Otherwise, I am not aware of any such proposition. the god learners should really not be broght into this discussion IMO.

But its NOT about Faith and religion, because Gloranthans easily give up their gods for other gods.

You are avoiding the question. Do Gloranthans have faith in their gods, or knowledge of their gods? You cannot siply say "both".

This is a non-sequitur. Why don't they matter? I think that they certainly matter to the characters.

Becuase everything is decided by who has the biggest army. (although this itself is not much of an explanation, see later).

Yes - the whole map of the lunar empire is covered by the glowline, a magical forcefield which is emanated by the reaching moon temples. Building such temples ius said to be a basic mechanism of the expansion of the empire, and the effect of the glowline is to induce a "permanent full moon" effect for Lunar magic. Attacking such temples is a serious blow to Lunar power.

But I cannot see how the myths are metagame. It is repeatedly stated that the nyths of the embiment of Gloranthan culture - without the myths there is virtually nothing in Glorantha but bad chaos monsters. The myths are presented as important data; knowing myths is a key skill in understanding Glorantha, I have been repeatedly told. I mean there are whole volumes of myths in prints. Why, if they are merely irrelevant to my play? Characters go on missions to find the truths opf particular myths.

GLorantyhan myths are so iobjective and authoritative that the King of DragonPass game used a multiple choice system to test the players knowledge of myths in order to achieve progress in the game.

Ironically, Fang Langford's name for this sort of play is "No Myth." That is, nothing is real in the game world at all, until we discover it as players. That doesn't mean that the characters feel that way. When you say, "we go left at the fork" and you find a temple, the characters assume it's been there forever. The players know that the GM just put it there, or may as well have. It was a fiction created by somebody at some point, and entered into the SIS when somebody thought to do it.

Can you point me to a discussion of this in the text?

Where did I concede this?

when you pointed out that Gloranthans don't think they are changing myths, when in fact they are doing so. That was your proposed solution.

Yes, the hero plane itself is simply local to the individual. But they understand this, and don't expect the personal understanding of the truth to match others much. On the God Plane (or Spirit Plane, etc) it's different.

But is it? So can you then tell me who is the lord of the middle air - is it Sedenya or Orlanth, in the God Plane?

The player knows that they can "edit" the reality of Glorantha. That they can have thier character search out certain truths.

This is a non sequitur. Exploration is not creation. Searching out is not editing.

No that simply cannot be true - becuase the in-game descriptions contradict one another. That is why it cannot be assumed that these things always existed, and the characters just find them, unless I the player am simply expected to ignore the contradictions.

It's like the game Donjon - the player rolls his "find secret door" and, if successful, the player creates one. The character doesn't think that he's created a secret door out of thin air, he thinks it was there all along. In his reality, it was there all along.

Can you point me to a discussion of this argument in the text? At the moment I feel it is wholly unsupported.

Mike Holmes wrote: Here you have the apparent creation of a god where there was none before. But, in fact, as we'll learn with ILH2 when it comes out, this is just the revelation of another entire otherworld. The god plane does not, in fact change at all in this case. Instead what you have is the revelation of an entire otherworld that was not known to exist previously, in which Sedenya has always reigned eternal over all.

GB Steve wrote: When did that happen? I mean, that didn't seem to be the understanding of the event in Gloranthan circles last time I was involved. And to be fair, quoting unpublished material that seems to change from what was previously accepted seems a bit of a sneaky argument. ;-)

I don't really see what faith has to do with the argument. Gareth seems to be asking how the game works, not for some kind of proof of divinity in the real world. I'm sure one should be possible without the other.

Given that I'm not religious in the real world either, a model of Gloranthan religion would be very useful to me so that I can get this core part of the game right.

Sorry, I wasn't very clear. The apotheosis I have no qualms about, it's this "whole otherworld" business that is new to me. Does he mean the Red Moon or something else?

Mike really does talk about Glorantha as if it were the real world so that's what can be confusing, "The trouble here is trying to explain to the modern rational mindset how this all works." Given that the game was written and is played by such people, I'm not sure who else needs it explained.

GB Steve wrote: Sorry, I wasn't very clear. The apotheosis I have no qualms about, it's this "whole otherworld" business that is new to me. Does he mean the Red Moon or something else?

What Mike's referring to is Greg Stafford's comments on the HeroQuest Yahoo lists that the Red Moon is a separate Otherworld--different from the Gods Plane, Spirit World or Essence Plane. This will be elaborated upon in the forthcoming ILH2.

James Holloway wrote:
Of course Jim-Bob is real. I don't understand how you get from military conversion to "the gods aren't real." Let's return briefly to that topic.

Orlanth is real. When I initiated into manhood, I flew above the clouds to Kalurinoran, and there I saw the heroes and Thunder Brothers drinking in his great hall, Kalurinoran. We all saw it, although we all saw slightly different parts of it, maybe. That day I initiated into Orstan, and ever since I've used a little bit of the god's power to guide my hand as I carve, to make the best work I can.

contracycle wrote:

Thunder Rebels wrote: What Does This Look Like?

"At any ceremony outsiders see the mundane events, but they do not see what truly occurs. [...] They cannot see that the worshippers have actually left their bodies and flown into the God World.

It is not clear that you ever did see Orlanth, or the hall, or the thunder brothers. Clearly, to a non-Orlanthi observer, nothing of the sort happened, because they do not "know the secrets" or "have the right perceptions".

contracycle wrote:
It is not clear that you ever did see Orlanth, or the hall, or the thunder brothers. Clearly, to a non-Orlanthi observer, nothing of the sort happened, because they do not "know the secrets" or "have the right perceptions".

contracycle wrote:
It is not clear that you ever did see Orlanth, or the hall, or the thunder brothers. Clearly, to a non-Orlanthi observer, nothing of the sort happened, because they do not "know the secrets" or "have the right perceptions".

contracycle wrote: It is not clear that you ever did see Orlanth, or the hall, or the thunder brothers. Clearly, to a non-Orlanthi observer, nothing of the sort happened, because they do not "know the secrets" or "have the right perceptions".

contracycle wrote:
Greg is not a shaman; he merely claims to be one.

Then its hardly surprising it can be seen as a poor product, if you concede at the outset that it need not be logical.

Well that's extremely patronising and dismissive of pre-modern humans, in my opinion. Archeology has repeatedly shown that rationality is not the special province of modernoity, and that for example even making a stone axe requires a high intellect with the capacity to analyse cause and effect and construct goals out of opportunities.

I'm well aware of this, but it is the Gloranthan game texts that keep appealing to the provability of myths, not I.

Of course I as a real person do not accept the existance of these spheres, and we have been to the moon. Thats not the point. The game works, because the game does not contradict itself. I am quite willing and able to work within the limits of a belief system I do not personally share as long as that belief system is articulated to me. The problem with Glorantha is that the beliefe SYSTEM is not being artiiculated - only individual and contradictory beliefs.

cappadocius wrote:
Okay? So what?

James Holloway wrote: If you said to an Orlanthi "well, actually you just hung there in mid-air," he would say "yes, but my soul flew to the Storm Realm." And he'd be right.

GB Steve wrote: If your character made use of some kind of magical perception such as "Know Truth" or "See Magic" then the magical nature of the event would be apparent and your character would understand it.

Donald wrote:
I'm not sure what you're suggesting here. I generally accept people's claims about their religious beliefs unless I've seen strong evidence to the contrary.

If anything I'm insulting the modern humans who can't conceive of an alternative way of thinking and assume every sensible person shares their views. There is at least as much belief today in "what the scientist says" as there ever was in "what the high priest says" a 5000 years ago.

Proven by experience, not in the scientific sense of independently verified by controlled experiment. Of course the belief that scientists always have their results independently verified by controlled experiments is a modern myth.

This is your problem, Glorantha doesn't have one belief system but many. They contradict because each of them has found enough evidence to support their view. You have no more chance of reconciling all these different belief systems than you do of reconciling all the real world religions. To me this makes Glorantha more interesting and much closer to the real world than simplistic worlds where the creator has provided a canon explanation for how the world works.

As far as I can tell Greg isn't very interested in the metaphysics of Glorantha so doesn't write or explain much about it. Just about everything published is written from one cultural viewpoint or another.

contracycle wrote:
I don't think that can work. Becuase Truth depends on your culture, thus Know Truth would surely only show you your own truth. And if see magic is a magic power, but in fact nobody has magic powers, as is conceivable, then nothing would be achieved.

It gets a little thornier when we consider the Refute power of the Mystics. A mystic can Refute any attack directed against them, simply denying this possibility in the reality they inhabit. What would that actually look like? I have no idea how to resolve such an attack - or more accurately, I know precisely how to RESOLVE it, but I do not know how to NARRATE it. What actually happens? What does this look like? What does it say about the magic powers I "know" I have from my deity? Is my deity a wuss?

contracycle wrote:
Clearly, he would be wrong. I could say, no you and your buddies got drunk, fell down, and told a lot of wild stories the next day, I saw you.

And because I KNOW that the true Lord of the Middle Air is Sedenya, I kow that this is true.

contracycle wrote: What does it say about the magic powers I "know" I have from my deity? Is my deity a wuss?

contracycle wrote: I don't think that can work. Becuase Truth depends on your culture, thus Know Truth would surely only show you your own truth. And if see magic is a magic power, but in fact nobody has magic powers, as is conceivable, then nothing would be achieved.

contracycle wrote: I have no idea how to resolve such an attack - or more accurately, I know precisely how to RESOLVE it, but I do not know how to NARRATE it. What actually happens? What does this look like? What does it say about the magic powers I "know" I have from my deity? is my deity a wuss?

contracycle wrote:
This is important if for example I am called upon to judge a conflict of powers. Does Takanegi ACTUALLY possess the Eagle Heart, objectively? That is not clear, not to me anyway.

contracycle wrote:
And it is directly related to the issue of conversion and syncretism too. Because, how can I convert or persuade anyone when the truth of my argument depends on them already agreeing with my argument, such that they have the correct perceptions to see my proof?

contracycle wrote:
And it is directly related to the issue of conversion and syncretism too. Because, how can I convert or persuade anyone when the truth of my argument depends on them already agreeing with my argument, such that they have the correct perceptions to see my proof?

contracycle wrote:

Donald wrote:
I'm not sure what you're suggesting here. I generally accept people's claims about their religious beliefs unless I've seen strong evidence to the contrary.

Shamanism is not a belief; Shamanism is a magical practice. This is not a statement of belief, it is a claim of expertise.

Mike Holmes wrote: It's the lost item analogy again. If you lose something, you want it to be by the rock where you sat down, because that would be convenient. But you don't believe that if it's found there that it's your belief that placed it there, do you? It's there because that's where it dropped out.

This is the primary axiom which we disagree about. You feel that Gloranthan people think that they change the gods. When everyone else is telling you that from our reading they do not think that they do any such thing.

Here you have the apparent creation of a god where there was none before. But, in fact, as we'll learn with ILH2 when it comes out, this is just the revelation of another entire otherworld. The god plane does not, in fact change at all in this case. Instead what you have is the revelation of an entire otherworld that was not known to exist previously, in which Sedenya has always reigned eternal over all.

Yes, in the mundane world your faith can change things, and change things drastically. That's magic.

Obviously you're interested in the topic, Gareth, or you wouldn't be here arguing. What you seem not to be interested in is exploring these subjects from a religious POV. You want a rationalist explanation for how these things work, when they don't work that way at all. They work logically, but from axioms that you see as non-rational.

I could allow the fact that traveling faster than the speed of light brings up certain irreconcilable contradictions ruin my suspension of disbelief when I play sci-fi games that have it. But I don't, and few people do. In part because the subject is complex enough that, indeed, simply not looking closely at the problem can suffice to make things work out fine.

Actually, what I'd suggest is creating a RPG that looks at these faith matters from the POV that you find reasonable. I think that would make a much better counter-argument than any other you've made here. If people played it more claiming that it makes more sense to them, then you'd be pretty vindicated, I'd say.

Actually I think there have been other similar movements, but I'm not steeped enough in Glorantha lore to know for sure. Why should the Godlearners not be brought into the discussion. Your point seems to be, at least in part, that nobody in Glorantha ever took the rationalist POV. When, in fact, they have.

And what's more telling is that this worked! For a while. So here's an interesting thing. The "reality" of Glorantha is that we don't know what the reality is, or, rather, like our reality, it's an open question.

Yeah, I know you don't think that's functional. But it is. In fact, it allows the players to ask deep theological questions in play.

Is this functional in play? Quite. Does Sorcerer tell you if summoning demons is a good idea? No, it lets the players decide. In Glorantha, the reality is open to allow you to make your own statements about what these things are about.

Your reading is quite different than mine. They only do give up their gods when presented with some pretty compelling proof. Which is, in part that the faith of the other people has allowed them to prevail in battle, but also that their faith can now be shown to be true.

Well, now we have to get all epistemological. How can anyone really "know" anything? Pascal posits that you have to start with the assumption that you exist, and extrapolate from there. But outside of that, humans are quite capable of doubting or believing anything despite evidence to the contrary. There is no evidence that can be 100% convincing. As such, faith can always be a choice for people.

But that's so not true. The Orlanthi are going to stage a comeback and win after being defeated in battle. Know how? They're going to heroquest to fix things. The faith of a few is going to end up rectifying some of the trouble that the Lunars have caused.

This is the overall theme of the metaplot. Actually I dislike that the metaplot seems destined to create these themes despite what the players do. But it does speak to the nature of the universe. It's a heroic place, again, and armies cannot stand before the might of the strongest of faiths.

Who said the myths are metagame? They aren't. They are completely the beliefs of the people in the game, and what one encounters on the Hero Plane and elsewhere.

What's metagame is the player's ability to alter these things. Or, even better, it can be either way. That is, the reality of Glorantha doesn't say whether or not characters can change myths. What it does say is that the player can order their character to do things that will result in the myths changing. But, again, what we don't know as players is if the myth is actually changed, or if "it was that way all along."

This allows the player to make whatever statement he likes. "Ah, see, I changed the myth, myth must be alterable, so we should not worship the gods but instead make them bend to our will" OR "Ah, see, we've found the deeper truth, all hail Orlanth."

This does confound the community, BTW, who used to D&D style cosmology for Glorantha, are still adjusting to a much more complex and interesting one.

We as players aren't informed by the game as to whether or not the characters are actually changing anything.

The characters can't know the reality of the situation.

We can decide if we want, but that doesn't mean that the characters must act convinced.

You aren't expected to ignore the contradictions, but to have your character find the explanation for them. In fact, if you were playing a character in my game who you said believed the way that I think that most do, and then you had that character say, "Hey, look, we just changed Orlanth!" I'd ask you to correct that to something like, "Hey, look, we just discovered the true nature of Orlanth!"

It's like you're saying, "Look the characters are presented with a car, but then call it a plane!" and I'm saying, "No, when we play, they call it a car." Now we can argue all day about whether or not the text says to call it a plane or not...

StalkingBlue wrote:
A personal request from me. I'd be grateful if you would step away from discussions of what real-world shamanism is or isn't. There's a place for discussions of that sort I'm sure, but this thread isn't it.

contracycle wrote: Well, so what is this: it is not clear that the Orlanthi actually do magic and commune with their alleged gods. This is where the perception comes in that Glorantha makes perfect sense if you assume that nobody actually has magic powers.

Because, how can I convert or persuade anyone when the truth of my argument depends on them already agreeing with my argument, such that they have the correct perceptions to see my proof?

This is important if for example I am called upon to judge a conflict of powers. Does Takanegi ACTUALLY possess the Eagle Heart, objectively? That is not clear, not to me anyway.

James Holloway wrote:
Well, they got drunk and flew. That's telling.

contracycle wrote:
No no - I am saying, it is implausible to prpose that GLoranthans actually do go out and change their gods but don't notice their own behaviour. That implies that all Gloranthans are intellectual cripples, which is surely nonsense.

Right, but as you pointed out, that is not in fact True at all. What Happened is that a heroquest was carried out, and the god world was changed. The suggestion that it has "always been this way" is precisely the post hoc rationalisation I accused Glorantha of using.

Yes, in the mundane world your faith can change things, and change things drastically. That's magic.

Soryu said that GLorantha was not subjectivist, and here you claim it is. Which is true?

Thats becuase they ARE non-rational, just as irrational as Orwellian doublethink: we have always been at war with Eurasia = the red moon has always reigned over all.

I do not actually have a problem with this happening in a society in the game. I think that is entirely plausible. What I am unhappy about is the entirety of Glorantha as a consumer product being written in doublethink. Thats doubleplus bad.

But everyone tells me that any such proposal would be "not Glorantha" and would be "too rational" and "scientific".

Which only begs the question: why don't the Lunars solve their problems by heroquesting, instead of with armies?

....except that flies against the model of conversion in Tarsh proposed by James. Armies can and do crush faiths by sheer power and inertia.

No they are not and cannot be statements about what one encounters on the hero plane becuase they are only individual perspectives - not statements of gloranthan fact about the hero world or anything else.

Well WHY don't I know that as a player? Its my bloody game!

StalkingBlue wrote:
Now whether it is possible in Glorantha to start "seeing" the point of a new religion without ever having been formally initiated into it is another question.

Why don't you just make up your mind? There are two or three different but consistent ways to address this problem. Why don't you just pick one and run with it?

droog wrote:
I think the complaint is that Glorantha as a gaming product ought not to force the players to do this for themselves.

James Holloway wrote:

droog wrote:
I think the complaint is that Glorantha as a gaming product ought not to force the players to do this for themselves.

If you like. But clearly most people don't have this problem -- they just put whatever interpretation they want on the material and away they go. The books as written suggest a couple of obvious interpretations. Most people conclude that theirs is the "right" one rather than saying "there are a couple, but I picked this one." But in practice there's not much difference. People have been playing games set in Glorantha for, what, 25 years now? It clearly works at least a little bit.

droog wrote:
I know that. You know that. But one of the problems here is that several people are offering explanations that do not take account of contra's concerns. It seems to be the old problem of 'YGMV, but you're wrong.'

GB Steve wrote:
What do you mean, nobody has magic powers? Everyone has magic powers in Glorantha. I know for sure that in my games this would work.

StalkingBlue wrote:
Could you clarify this for me? Looking at the game mechanics I see magic powers that work - magical abilities have effects on the game world. So are you saying that IC these powers and there effects aren't "real" but merely exist in the minds of the users and targets?

And if the mystic or theist should fail, blame the messanger and not the message. He was obviously not up in his studies or failed in his devotion and must try harder. The road to enlightenment, or oneness with God or whatever one you're after is hard.

contracycle wrote:
So, I am not asserting confidently that there is no magic in Glorantha. But the non-magical Glorantha is, ironically, a hypothesis that explains all the available data. And, no citation from the canon can contradict this view, because all canonical statements are made in the voice of NPC's.

James Holloway wrote:
Not at all. Contra is asserting that the metaphysics of Glorantha "don't work," or "don't make sense." They do, but only if you're willing to accept some things he clearly isn't willing to.

His position in this thread has been moving from "it's impossible" to "the material is confusing," and he has only now started to say "well, I suppose I could do it this way," to which I and I suspect everyone else gladly say "indeed you could."

James Holloway wrote:
Sure, OK. That involves redefining "magic" in such a way as to make things like the giant floating eggs* "non-magical," but you could definitely run the game that way if you liked. Warlord Chronicles style.

*The existence of which is asserted not by characters but by the game text.

contracycle wrote:
But as was mentioned above, ALL the game text is subjective, every last bit of it. Or at least, there is no way to determine when the text is speaking authoritatively or subjectively. The problem is not only the prevalence of in character monologues by a long way - its endemic to all the text.

contracycle wrote:
For example, so far we have been discussing theism by default. In this situationa, it is prima facie reasonable to say, OK, the existance of your god does not challenge the existance of my god. We can just let 'em fight it out. But does that still make as much sense when we place a Malkioni next to an Orlanthi and ask the same question? Because the Malkioni is going to say "there is no god but Allah", roughly speaking. So the specific case for two theists does not necessarily, in my eyes, apply to this case, where one party does have an absolutist faith.

contracycle wrote:
No no no. The assertion that I am wilfully refusing to understand, or simply not suffiently intelligent to understand, is simply not fair. Not least of all becuase I have only ever asked to have the issues explained. The problem is that in the explaining, we all to often adopt the same dodgy technique that Gloranthan texts use, which is to switch between in-character and out-of-character statements without any clarity about which we are using at any given time.

GB Steve wrote: Mike really does talk about Glorantha as if it were the real world so that's what can be confusing, "The trouble here is trying to explain to the modern rational mindset how this all works." Given that the game was written and is played by such people, I'm not sure who else needs it explained.

Mike Holmes wrote: That is, you have to say, "if it were true that X, then what would a real person do" in order to evaluate whether or not something is rational, logical, believable, etc. My argument is simply that, since some people in the real world do base their actions on faith, that it's not absurd to expect people from faith-based Gloranthan societies to act in a similar fashion.

contracycle wrote:
But now lets look at Glorantha. The problem here is that Glorantha's history, in human terms, looks very much like our real world history - so much so that it is in fact quite easy to see Glorantha in a non-magical light. No magic is necessary to understand the human geography of glorantha.

I agree completely with you Gareth that the "non-magical" world POV works perfectly to describe Glorantha. You are quite correct about that.

But this is largely the point that I've been trying to make. What if magic is real in the real world? If so, then the Celt isn't rationalizing, his faith is correct. But that's not neccessary to prove. All I have to prove is that in Glorantha truth is ambiguous enough that a character in that world having faith is not non-sensical. Which I think is quite true.

Is the squinting Celt non-sensical? Or is he merely a product of his environment? I could play a character based on such a real world person, and do play characters like him in Glorantha all the time. Further, it doesn't matter if I personally believe that the magic does or does not exist in Glorantha, the character does, so we play him as though he does. Or he doesn't, and we play him as a godlearner or whatever.

But as was mentioned above, ALL the game text is subjective, every last bit of it. Or at least, there is no way to determine when the text is speaking authoritatively or subjectively. The problem is not only the prevalence of in character monologues by a long way - its endemic to all the text.

Mike Holmes wrote:
Basically there are no spells that really would alter the landscape of Glorantha to make it somthing that would not resemble to some extent our world.

And Mike wrote this:

"That is, farming magic doesn't make the farmer superior to a real world farmer, mostly it makes him just like a real world farmer. Sans magic, he'd probably starve to death."

I think that nails so much.

Everything is magic or religion dependent in Glorantha: the eco-system, the cultural life of all peoples, the history...

The supernatural in Glorantha isn't something extra added to our own world... It's a foundational element for a world alien to our world.

I know others will see it differently.... But thanks Mike, you just crystalized something for me in that statement.

Christopher

contracycle wrote:
Shamanism is not a belief; Shamanism is a magical practice. This is not a statement of belief, it is a claim of expertise.

We are talking about a game, a published product. Lets just talk about the damn game, not about our personal religious beleiefs. They are not germane.

Yes I agree. That in fact is precisely the charge that I have levelled, and why I expect my £50 will never be claimed. It is not just that there are conflicting views - it is that nobody knows. Arguably, not even Greg. And I have to say I find it exceedingly weird that a game product has survived all this time with a fundamental metaphysical hole and nobody ever addressed it.

James Holloway wrote:

contracycle wrote:
Which only begs the question: why don't the Lunars solve their problems by heroquesting, instead of with armies?

Because it's almost totally impossible. Heroquesting the overthrow of Orlanth requires overthrowing Orlanth, that guy with the double-digit masteries in "Smite Interfering Mortals With Deadly Thunderbolts." If you do it in the material world, the Cosmic Compromise prevents him from getting up close and personal with you. So you engage in operations in the material world to destroy Orlanth's support system, and then you heroquest to take him out.

Donald wrote:
In fact the two operate in parallel, alongside the military invasion of Sartar there is a major magical effort to kill or enslave Orlanth. The siege of Whitewall and building the Temple of the Reaching Moon are more to do that than to achieve a military victory over King Broyan and the rebels.

Mike Holmes wrote: If you assume that the only way for characters to make decisions is the way that the rationalist in our world makes decisions, then you'll have trouble understanding the Gloranthan mindset.

Donald wrote:
Unfortunatly you are making them so, you appear to believe in a scientific/materialist real world where everything fits together in a coherent form. You then want Glorantha to have a similar degree of certainty. Many people do not share your belief in the real world and see no reason to apply it to Glorantha.

Donald wrote:

contracycle wrote:
Shamanism is not a belief; Shamanism is a magical practice. This is not a statement of belief, it is a claim of expertise.

It's actually both, however if you're claiming that Greg does not have that expertise can you provide supporting evidence?

Christopher Kubasik wrote: And Mike wrote this:

"That is, farming magic doesn't make the farmer superior to a real world farmer, mostly it makes him just like a real world farmer. Sans magic, he'd probably starve to death."

I think that nails so much.

Everything is magic or religion dependent in Glorantha: the eco-system, the cultural life of all peoples, the history...

The supernatural in Glorantha isn't something extra added to our own world... It's a foundational element for a world alien to our world.

Mike Holmes wrote:
That is, farming magic doesn't make the farmer superior to a real world farmer, mostly it makes him just like a real world farmer. Sans magic, he'd probably starve to death.

StalkingBlue wrote:

Christopher Kubasik wrote: And Mike wrote this:

"That is, farming magic doesn't make the farmer superior to a real world farmer, mostly it makes him just like a real world farmer. Sans magic, he'd probably starve to death."

I think that nails so much.

Everything is magic or religion dependent in Glorantha: the eco-system, the cultural life of all peoples, the history...

The supernatural in Glorantha isn't something extra added to our own world... It's a foundational element for a world alien to our world.

I agree with all of that, except the word "alien"...

I'm not saying Glorantha mirrors our world, mind you, for people to engage with it emotionally, to care passionately about its meaning....

Mike Holmes wrote:
But this is largely the point that I've been trying to make. What if magic is real in the real world? If so, then the Celt isn't rationalizing, his faith is correct. But that's not neccessary to prove. All I have to prove is that in Glorantha truth is ambiguous enough that a character in that world having faith is not non-sensical. Which I think is quite true.

"That is, farming magic doesn't make the farmer superior to a real world farmer, mostly it makes him just like a real world farmer. Sans magic, he'd probably starve to death."

Gareth,

If you want to run Glorantha as "fake magic"--that is, what is called "magic" is actually trance states, hallucinations, and "magical" explanations for scientific events (like the Skyburn being a natural disaster explained through myth and magic), but you're worried about player expectations, shouldn't you declare, before characters are created and play has begun, how you want to run Glorantha? I mean, you'll be directly contradicting the text, which states that magic in Glorantha is obvious and flashy. A lot of players, I would think, would expect that the magic in the game, therefore, will be obvious, mythic, with lots of special effects.

You could obviously run your game differently, with the magic subtle for the most part, the flashy bits being hypnosis, hallucinations, and stage magic effects. I guess you'd just have to tone down the feats, spells, and spirits. And again, let the players know before hand how you want to run your game, to avoid the kind of disconnect you mentioned.

GB Steve wrote:

Mike Holmes wrote: If you assume that the only way for characters to make decisions is the way that the rationalist in our world makes decisions, then you'll have trouble understanding the Gloranthan mindset.

I get your point although I'd contend that there is no "Gloranthan mindset" as such. There's an implied mindset of fictional creations which I don't see as being the same thing.

I think part of the issue that Gareth has is that the rules of Glorantha imply a different mindset for him than they do for others. This is inextricably bound up in how everyone concerned in this debate views the real world and how it might be interpreted. Given that we're not about to change that, resolution is difficult.

Gareth's pov, as I see is that if what I call magical happens all the time in Glorantha, then there is no magic to it. It's just part of what one might do naturally, and without divine interference. Furthermore, given that much of this magic could be said only to appear to those who have faith in it, how is one to convince unbelievers of its existence. Much in the same way that you'd have trouble convincing an atheist such as myself that God exists in the real world because you know it does. All good points.

However, Glorantha is a fiction and not the real world. So if you want something to have objective existence in that world, you can just say that it's so. In my Glorantha there is no ambiguity about the existence of magic although there is ambiguity about what this magic might be.

contracycle wrote:
But where I become less sure again is when I resolve character actions with magic. If a character has something like "throw lightning" as an ability, or fly, when this ability is used I will be required to narrate causes and effects to that player.

OK sure, we can of course always discuss this. But my strong feeling is that if there was a section in the GM's books laying this out, and saying before you venture into Glorantha, you need to make a decision on this issue and discuss it with your players, then the product as a game would be much much less confusing to the buyer.

It would be quite interesting to play a game like this I think; please note I am not necessarily accusing the priests here of fraud, they may themselves believe this to be magic. But it would be interesting for a modern to see such "honest deceptive magic" in action as a possible model of historical society.

James Holloway wrote:

contracycle wrote:
But where I become less sure again is when I resolve character actions with magic. If a character has something like "throw lightning" as an ability, or fly, when this ability is used I will be required to narrate causes and effects to that player.

Well, in the game as written, the character throws lightning or flies. That's not really in doubt. You want to run it differently, that's cool.

joshua neff wrote:
If you want to run Glorantha as "fake magic"--that is, what is called "magic" is actually trance states, hallucinations, and "magical" explanations for scientific events (like the Skyburn being a natural disaster explained through myth and magic), but you're worried about player expectations, shouldn't you declare, before characters are created and play has begun, how you want to run Glorantha? I mean, you'll be directly contradicting the text, which states that magic in Glorantha is obvious and flashy. A lot of players, I would think, would expect that the magic in the game, therefore, will be obvious, mythic, with lots of special effects.

contracycle wrote:
Obviously I should declare it. But the problem is, I will NOT be contradicting the text. Because the text is relentlessly inconsistent with the voice it adopts for declarative statements about the nature of Glorantha.

As I have pointed out, there is literally nothing in Glorantha that can be firmly said to be magical. There are NO verifiable claims. The ONLY data is subjective, and discusses what Gloranthans BELIEVE, not the reality of Glorantha.

contracycle wrote:
Back on one of the HW lists, I pointed out that because of this almost nobody has any idea of what Glorantha is supposed to be like. Are Orlanthi like Celts, or like Germans? It entirely depends on the accident of which publication you read. And contradictory publications exist because none of them are authoritative. And none of them are authoritative because they only discuss beliefs, not facts.

contracycle wrote:
As I have pointed out, there is literally nothing in Glorantha that can be firmly said to be magical. There are NO verifiable claims. The ONLY data is subjective, and discusses what Gloranthans BELIEVE, not the reality of Glorantha.

contracycle wrote: As I have pointed out, there is literally nothing in Glorantha that can be firmly said to be magical. There are NO verifiable claims. The ONLY data is subjective, and discusses what Gloranthans BELIEVE, not the reality of Glorantha.

Gareth,

First of all, stop being so defensive. I'm not "charging" you with anything. You said, "Now, lets say I privately come to the view that Glorantha is not literally magical; what then do I say to a player who wants their character to fly to the top of a tower?" and I responded to that. I don't think my response was "bizarre" at all.

Now, you say, "There is literally nothing in Glorantha that can be firmly said to be magical. There are NO verifiable claims. The ONLY data is subjective, and discusses what Gloranthans BELIEVE, not the reality of Glorantha."

You're wrong. In the HeroQuest book, on page 97, it says, "Magic flows from the Other Side to the Mortal World, where beings use it to create, destroy, and transform. It has changed history, when mighty magicians crushed kingdoms. But not just the mighty have it! Everyone has a little. A humble farmer uses magic to improve his crops, a trader uses it to make herself more persuasive, and an artisan improves the quality of his handiwork."

That's not subjective, that's the rulebook talking objectively about magic in Glorantha.

On the next page, it says, "Magic is 'sensible'--it can be seen, heard, felt, or otherwise sensed when it is used. People glow, sparks shoot out of their hands, or a colored nimbus wavers around them. Attack magic is usually bright and makes a loud noise, detection magic makes the perceptive organs or the studied object glow, and healing magic sends gentle waves of energy flowing between healer and patient; the closing of the wound in a few seconds makes it even more obvious that magic is at work."

That's not in-game-voice flavor text, that's the objective voice of the rulebook.

And on page 222, the game text objectively states, "All peoples of Glorantha practice magic. All the various contradictory explanations for the origins of magic seem to work. No one doubts that magic exists; everyone can see its effects."

So, you're idea of Glorantha as a world in which magic doesn't objectively exists is your own interpretation, and it runs counter to every game text available. Similarly, the game texts objectively state that the gods and spirits exist. It's not just the view of the people of Glorantha, it's how the world works.

GB Steve wrote: So, what would count as evidence of magic in Glorantha? What is it that is missing that would allow you play the game in the way you want to?

Player: Which is the Greatest Mountain?
Me: That's the one the Orlanthi fly to in their great ceremony.
Player: But is it Kero Finn, or...
Me; Who's asking? You or Cormac Swensson?
Player: Me
Me: The Greatest Mountain is the one the Orlanthi fly to in their great ceremony.
Player: Fucker. WHICH ONE?
Me: What the fuck does it matter?
Player: Listen, if there isn't one answer it's a crock of shit.
Me: Okay then; whichever mountain they fly to in the great ceremony is the greatest mountain
Player: Oh. So they all fly to their own mountain, and go to different ones that they say is the Greatest Mountain..?
Me: No. They all fly to the Greatest Mountain. They fly to their nearest Greatest mountain, and all arrive at the Greatest Mountain.
Player: I don't get it.
Me: It's symbolic
Player: It's bullshit
Me: But it works
Player: But here it talks about "We go to the Greatest Mountain, but those other fuckers just go to great mountains."
Me: Yes
Player: A straight answer or I hurt you
Me; Okay. Maybe that's supposed to be what the Kerofini think, "We've got the great mountain, they're just fooling themselves." Maybe, and this may be hard to accept, Issaries have missed a very minor continuity point.
Player: Or maybe Glorantha's all a crock of shit by a stoned hippy and his acolytes who can't even keep their story straight.
Me: Why the fuck do you even play this game?
Player: ...You all say it's cool and interesting.
Me: But you think we're the acolytes of a stoned hippy. What do you care what we think is cool?
Player: I still think you're full of shit.
Me; And we love you. Do you need a hug?

That's pretty funny.

I enjoy a bit of existential doubt, myself. It allows me to explore my head.

contracycle wrote:
But I cannot really lay a trap if I can't even really predict if my target can really fly, or merely believes they can fly.

So, even as a GM, I could not answer the question "where is the greatest mountain" without knowing the religion of the CHARACTER asking the question. The question as asked by a PLAYER is unanswerable.

James Holloway wrote:
I mean, seriously -- unless for some bizarre reason what you really care about is being able to sling shit at Tentacles with the other guys from the Digest, who gives a hoot? Just pick one and play the game, or don't and pick one when you get to it. How hard is that?

contracycle wrote:
Sure James, I can pick one, but then you know, why I am paying money for this stuff in the first place if I'm just going to have to make it all up again?

contracycle wrote: And this is also annoying and pity because most of it is well written.

contracycle wrote:
Sure James, I can pick one, but then you know, why I am paying money for this stuff in the first place if I'm just going to have to make it all up again?

I agree with Josh and James unsurprisingly.

1. Such ambiguity comes about in Glorantha only because it has a cosmologically complex take on things. Other cosmologies ask you to do far greater handwaving it seems to me. Explain to me, for example, how Egyptian dieties end up in D&D worlds. At some point you just accept that no RPG is going to be perfect and accept some of the absurdity. Or you play some other game with absurdities that bug you less.

2. Real life is just as existential in nature. Or I at least, and others too, find it to be that way. To the extent that Glorantha is existential, it's more believable and interesting to players like myself. Not less.

3. When it all comes down to it, you aren't pointing out a logical flaw of any sort, but a preference for different axioms about your game world. Well, what would you have us do? We can't change those axioms. I've already agreed with you that, given your preferences, that the game has problems for you. Well that makes you unlucky. It doesn't make the game bad for everyone else, however (or even for a many it seems to me).


So to get back to syncretization, yes, if you assume your version of Glorantha where magic does not exist, then it's hard to reconcile syncretization the way that I have, for instance. But if you accept the axiom for a moment that magic does exist, and that this is how I, for one am trying to explain how it works, it's quite logical I think.

If you feel that the argument from my axioms is not logical, I'd like to know where the problem is specifically.

Mike

I'd like to quote another Holmes here:

a) Relativism is an Absolute: there can be no certainties. There are at least four and a half correct explanations for anything. Everything you believe is only a prelude to initiation into gnosis. Arkat made but half the journey. Only baboons know the truth, and only Lunars are aware of this. Godlearner documents are memic land mines. Epistemology and ontology consciously arise only when cultures clash (and twice on Godsdays). Choose your errors consciously and wisely. Mythos is logos. Praxis before doxis.

b) Cultivate Wonder: Mystery is a value in itself. Not knowing is a path to liberation. Enjoy the magical, the mythical, the mystical. Surprise yourself at least once per session.

c) Your created world is itself a myth; fluid, open to many interpretations, semiotically charged and awash with possibility. Get in there and start hacking your own memes. Never be afraid to kiss the trickster.
................................................

23. It's YOUR Glorantha.
There is no, there cannot be, a One-True Glorantha. No matter how much we recognise and strive to achieve the values of consistency and coherence, we have to recognise that myths just aren't like that!

Myths are by definition multivalent. They never have a single interpretation, or even a single authoritative version. And Glorantha is a myth. Its also your own personal shamanic journey, your own inner-world. The treasures and truths you discover and return with are yours, to be shared with your co-creative community.

So never be afraid to tinker. Official or prevalent ain't necessarily best. You can't keep a good idea down. (Just look what happened to the cult of Vinga...) Cast your threads upon the electronic waters, and in seven days four Digesters will have told you why you're wrong and six dozen will have silently adopted your idea into their own thinking.

Which leads me to the most important point of all...

24. Follow Your Bliss.
You're here to have fun. So have it. None of us are in this for the money. Glorantha is neither a work of art, nor an excuse for a personal jihad/crusade. It's a ramshackle, living, breathing group experiment, a bubbling cauldron of creativity and community. Love it.

http://home.iprimus.com.au/pipnjim/questlines/trickster.html

droog wrote: I'd like to quote another Holmes here:
.....
http://home.iprimus.com.au/pipnjim/questlines/trickster.html

You're very welcome, Christopher. Glad to be able to give something back.




EDIT: Even if I did screw up John Hughes' name.

soru wrote:
I can't promise to break down your door, but would it help if I told you your Glorantha is not allowed to vary?

James Holloway wrote:
I hardly think picking one of a couple of options is "having to make it all up again." I can't think of anything major you'd have to change by going with the "magic works objectively thus" approach.

I hardly ever run a game without some tweaking of the setting because I'm a cranky perfectionist and nothing ever fully satisfies me. Truth be told, I rather like doing this. Obviously, you don't so much.