From an older thread...

Ron Edwards wrote: However, it is definitely not, "Which side are you on?" The sides in the various political conflicts in Glorantha are deconstructed through playing the game. The Lunars are not and cannot be totally right; neither can the Heortlings (to pick the most famous and central of the many political and religious clashes across the world). It is embedded in every one of the sourcebooks, every one of the recently-published adventures, that relying on your temple, or your clan, or your culturally-constructed place in the world is not good enough.

Sooner or later, you will be part of, maybe even form your own, Hero Band. Sooner or later, you'll be HeroQuesting. Both of these are political and magical statements that cannot help but override, redefine, and retool-in-practice everything you thought you believed and represented. By entering deeper into the Otherworldly side of reality, you alter it - you create and become myth, and your ethical choices in doing so replace, eventually, the old-school assumptions about good and evil, chaos, political boundaries, and everything else.

My question is how (in the gameworld) do these quests re-define anything? How do the quests change? My understanding suggests that these Heroquests follow a set script and only make a god's story stronger the more often they are performed.

Hi there,

S. Ben, you're absolutely right. The good news is that there are several possible intermediate stages between the "follow the script" and "hacking" versions of heroquesting. They aren't necessarily graded along a spectrum, but rather represent a variety of different angles, takes, or outcomes.

1. Discovering stuff "in the myth" that you didn't know about. There you are, following the Stuff to Do that your mythological understanding has laid out, and wham - you're at a station that you know nothing about. H'm! What does this reveal about your god/cult that you didn't know? What does that mean for how you're going to change the practices of worship later?

This is especially useful if the "unknown station" is not a "kick-out" station (i.e. must be completed successfully to continue the quest). So you're going to get through it, and what you've really done (by your approach to it) is comment on your own religion in a way that might be significant later in the real world, in a wide variety of ways.

2. Cross-paths with other heroquesters, which is to say, your myth speaks of a (possibly mysterious) encounter or foe or whatever, and their myth does the same. So when you get to station 4 of your quest, they are there, performing station 6 or whatever of theirs.

This can be very interesting, because if it's cut-and-dried on both sides regarding what "should" happen, that's one thing ... but if you have other reasons to oppose or cooperate with the other heroquesters, then you have to make some choices about what's more important to you, the integrity of the myth or the chance to mess with or unite with the other group.

Anyway, those are just a couple of the interesting non-Crawl features of heroquesting that played a pretty big plot role in our game over the many moons of play.

Best,
Ron

This is my take on Heroquesting, bear in mind that I've only ever ran one Heroquest and it was a very spur of the moment kinda thing....I told the heroes that their god had overcome their enemy in Mythology and the next thing they are doing is waking up the whole city and getting the Heroquest ritual under way (which involved some very large AP bids).

To get my head round it, I strip it down to very basic mechanics. It also helps to present it this way to the players as well. Obviously the myth is the story on which the whole thing hangs on, but it is by no means certain. Heroes fail their rolls, or more likely start doing things off the cuff, which wasn't in the original myth. This is okay to do, in fact Greg Stafford says that its quite expected. It is the players game after all and the rules / heroquesting methods allow for this.

At this stage I seeing as I haven't run many Heroquests, I still take them at a very basic level--eg you do the Humakt gets the Sword of Death Heroquest to get a whooping great magic sword. Also from what I've read and heard the sort of big Cosmic changing HeroQuests lead to very big changes in the setting. For example the Empire of the Wyrms Friends in the Second Age aparently wiped themselves out by trying to perform this huge HQ which involved pretty much all the magical support in the Empire. They failed, and for some quests one of the consquences of failure is that you forget your magical abilities and cult associations. This is why when you start reading some of the really obscure Gloranthan material, it says that the Empire of the Wyrms friends may not have been called that. Its just that nobody remembers because they effectivly removed themselves from the Mythical/Magical landscape. As for Godlearners, well I'm just not going there.

Players also have the option of choosing what outcome they gain for sucessfully completing the quest. So for the Humakt gains the Sword of Death quest the Hero may decide to get a magical Sword for himself, or may chose to pass the benefit onto his community, so all the Clans warriors become very skilled. So as well as players being devious little powergamers, you can also use the "well your clan needs better warriors, and the Cheif comes knocking on your door one day as the most skilled warrior in the village" card.

Probably the most important thing to remember about Heroquesting, is that it is very powerful, the rewards are great as are the penenalties, so as a consquence is reasonably rare. Even though I've been playing RQ since the early 90s, where there where various homebrew Heroquesting rules available in the fan press, and HW since it came out, I still approach HQ very rarely, and with caution, since it is such a major magical event for both the Heros and their supporting community. Truth be told it is something that you can avoid, until you have the basics of Gloranthan adventureing under your wing.

Probably the best example of a heroquest I can think of outside of HW/HQ which everyone knows, is The Grailquest out of the Arthurian Cycle.

Also if you want to see how HQ works in Glorantha directly, get hold of a copy of King of Dragon Pass http://www.a-sharp.com/kodp/.

Hope this helps

Hi,

OK, this clears up a lot of stuff. It's very similiar to the Nettle Rite from Nobilis or some of the Godwalker stuff from Unknown Armies. So I think I've got a handle on it.

I wonder what's a good way to present this to players. There's a lot you can do with Heroquests and you want them to make good use of it and not, "Hey, that god pissed us off, let's mess with his metaphysical reality."

From the replies....

Ron Edwards wrote: This is especially useful if the "unknown station" is not a "kick-out" station (i.e. must be completed successfully to continue the quest). So you're going to get through it, and what you've really done (by your approach to it) is comment on your own religion in a way that might be significant later in the real world, in a wide variety of ways.

MrWong wrote: Players also have the option of choosing what outcome they gain for sucessfully completing the quest. So for the Humakt gains the Sword of Death quest the Hero may decide to get a magical Sword for himself, or may chose to pass the benefit onto his community, so all the Clans warriors become very skilled. So as well as players being devious little powergamers, you can also use the "well your clan needs better warriors, and the Cheif comes knocking on your door one day as the most skilled warrior in the village" card.

bluegargantua wrote: One idea I had was that a Heroqeust has a "Secret Station". There's a part of the myth that never gets told because it makes the god look bad. So you go through the station and get a stern warning at the other end that you can never talk about this to anyone else. So you come back home and all these people wanna know what happened. Fun stuff.

bluegargantua wrote: Benefits for the community are another interesting scenario. Particularly, when there are no benefits. I can envision a scenario in which a community needs to get a Heroquest done, they get together a group of local heroes, throw their complete support behind them...and they completely fail. Those that don't die on the Other Side are left gibbering wrecks. The community doesn't just fail to get the benefits, this community is going to break up completely due to this botched Heroquest. Enter your PCs who have some vested interest in seeing this community stay intact(ish). How to save the day? Another Heroquest.

Hi Tom,

Your "botched heroquest" scenario concept was the motor behind just about every Hero Wars story/sub-story during our fourteen months of play.

Regarding my "comment" concept, you may be underestimating players a bit. If you can see what I'm talking about, they probably will too, especially when some of the political/mystic passion of Glorantha has seeped into their thinking. It's really an amazing setting for getting people to care about the issues ... I'm thinking about a dinner-party scene in which the characters, all pretty unreconstructed Heortlanders, were wined and dined by, for lack of a better word, a Boldhome "Lunar-liberal" who thought they were getting a raw deal from Tatius' armies.

After the players (and characters) had processed a bit of this kind of ethical ambiguity in the setting, when they encounter the pretty black-and-white "Heortlings good, Lunars bad" context of a typical Heortling Heroquest, they don't feel any too ready simply to proceed through the myth obediently. They want to put a spin on it via their decisions during the quest.

Best,
Ron

The thing I really like about the ambiguity between Heortlings and Lunars is that it is SO historical. Substitute Celts and Romans and you see the exact same thing. Today we like to paint things very "Us" against "Them" with a fairly broad encompassing definition of "Us" and "Them".

For HeroWars to work, the "Us" and the "Them" have to be MUCH smaller, much more personal. Doing whats right for "Us" may make us enemies of this group of Lunars...but we don't particularly have a problem with THAT group of Lunars. In fact, we kind of like THAT group of Lunars and help them out when THIS group of Lunars tries to out maneuver them.

THIS group of Heortlings are our age old enemy who we hate more than we love our own children. Sure we hate THIS group of Lunars, but we hate THIS group of Heortlings even more. For many Celts who were oppressed by other Celts, the Romans were their saviors

Its all a very mixed up small scale where alliances shift like the wind and each new generation brings a new set of priorities.

Thinking about it at this scale should open all kinds of doors for Heroquesting. What happens when two Hero Bands are questing the same myth at the same time. Both want to succeed to benefit themselves and strengthen their god...but the two groups come from feuding clans and are sworn to kill each other on sight...in the middle of a quest?!

There are also enough versions of gods to make your head spin. What happens when you go hero questing in the myth you've always been told and discover now that its changed. Ra becomes Ammon-Ra becomes Aten-Ra to give an Egyptian equivelent. What the heck...someelses version of god is gaining ascendence...gotta stop that. What if the new version is something so horrible that you'd be willing to accept a Lunar version of your god before you accept this Heortling alternative version...what if there's no way to preserve your version of the god, and now you must try to promote a version thats the least offensive to you...

All kinds of possibilities when you bring "Us" and "Them" down to the scale of individual bands and villages.

Valamir wrote: Thinking about it at this scale should open all kinds of doors for Heroquesting. What happens when two Hero Bands are questing the same myth at the same time. Both want to succeed to benefit themselves and strengthen their god...but the two groups come from feuding clans and are sworn to kill each other on sight...in the middle of a quest?!

There are also enough versions of gods to make your head spin. What happens when you go hero questing in the myth you've always been told and discover now that its changed. Ra becomes Ammon-Ra becomes Aten-Ra to give an Egyptian equivelent. What the heck...someelses version of god is gaining ascendence...gotta stop that. What if the new version is something so horrible that you'd be willing to accept a Lunar version of your god before you accept this Heortling alternative version...what if there's no way to preserve your version of the god, and now you must try to promote a version thats the least offensive to you...

What Tod said. I presented a bit more of my thinking about the myth involved in the Goddess of Rape? thread.

Best,
Ron

bluegargantua wrote:
My question is how (in the gameworld) do these quests re-define anything? How do the quests change? My understanding suggests that these Heroquests follow a set script and only make a god's story stronger the more often they are performed. At worst, the character's fail or bail on the story at one of the stations and in some metaphysical way this degrades the god's power a bit. ...

Dude, you just gave me a great idea. Using an alternate setting, I had no real use for Hero Questing per se. I mean, I could have shoved that in but it's not even something I really like that much about the game, and doesn't seem to fit.

But HQs in terms of rituals to attain Feats and such, well, that's perfect. I mean, it's implicit in the fact that an Animist has to do a little battle with the spirit to get it to be a Fetish or something. But I hadn't thought of this in terms of other forms of ritual.

From now on in my game, if a player wants to get a new magic ability of any sort, I'm going to require that they design some ritual or task that they have to overcome to get the thing (they can't just spend Hero Points, even with a good explanation). For some it could be as small as a dangerous first casting of a Spell. For religious stuff there may be painful rituals involved. All sorts of nifty possibilities. These would be like tiny HQs with the reward at the end being the Ability in question.

This just happens to coincide with the fact that one of my characters is headed for a ritual next session. Perfect chance to test it out. Whee!

Thanks for he idea,
Mike

Mike Holmes wrote: From now on in my game, if a player wants to get a new magic ability of any sort, I'm going to require that they design some ritual or task that they have to overcome to get the thing (they can't just spend Hero Points, even with a good explanation). For some it could be as small as a dangerous first casting of a Spell. For religious stuff there may be painful rituals involved. All sorts of nifty possibilities. These would be like tiny HQs with the reward at the end being the Ability in question.

This just happens to coincide with the fact that one of my characters is headed for a ritual next session. Perfect chance to test it out. Whee!

Hey Tom,

Are you checking in on this thread still? I'm interested to know whether our input has helped your initial question.

Best,
Ron

Ron Edwards wrote: Are you checking in on this thread still? I'm interested to know whether our input has helped your initial question.

bluegargantua wrote: And my minor Heroquest question is:

My friends all worship Orlanth and are going on a Heroquest I am:

a. a worshiper of Ernalda (Orlanthi Pantheon)
b. a worshiper of Yelm (non-Orlanthi Pantheon)
c. a non-Theistic worshiper

Can any of these three people go on the Heroquest? My understandinging is that the first almost certainly can, the second might, and the third is outta luck. If this true, it would seem to make Heroquesting difficult or impossible for groups with mixed religous beliefs.

bluegargantua wrote:
And my minor Heroquest question is:

My friends all worship Orlanth and are going on a Heroquest I am:

a. a worshiper of Ernalda (Orlanthi Pantheon)
b. a worshiper of Yelm (non-Orlanthi Pantheon)
c. a non-Theistic worshiper

Can any of these three people go on the Heroquest? My understandinging is that the first almost certainly can, the second might, and the third is outta luck. If this true, it would seem to make Heroquesting difficult or impossible for groups with mixed religous beliefs.

There are many places on the other side where the places intersect. We had an Animist character enter the Spirit Plane and meet up with the rest of the group at one of these intersections, if it made sense wrt the myth. I think that character also wound up in the God plane a couple of times with the appropriate "wrong plane" modifers.

moonbroth wrote:
If I understand the latest thinking correctly, the "Hero Plane" (where almost all heroquesting happens) is being redefined for HeroQuest as "the place where all the other sides intersect." This was not the case in Hero Wars (or, if it was meant to be the case, it was hugely unclear), and caused immense brain-aches for this reason.

Usually, worshippers (theist, animist and/or sorcerous) go to their other side to begin a heroquest. They then proceed from the "safe haven" of Orlanth's Hall, Siglat's Node or whatever out onto the wild and wooly Hero Plane, where nobody is alien (or where everybody is equally alien, take your pick), and where all the myths interact on an equal footing.

(I'm sure you can take friends and allies along on such a journey, albeit they may be uncomfortable with your bizarre alien rituals; also, your safe haven may not be safe to them).

bluegargantua wrote: Hi,

Ron Edwards wrote: This is especially useful if the "unknown station" is not a "kick-out" station (i.e. must be completed successfully to continue the quest). So you're going to get through it, and what you've really done (by your approach to it) is comment on your own religion in a way that might be significant later in the real world, in a wide variety of ways.

Can you elaborate on that a bit? If this unknown station pops up and your group is suddenly in uncharted territory, are you really making a comment other than "crap, we need to get back to the myth"? I suppose it depends on the nature of the unknown station.

bluegargantua wrote:

MrWong wrote: Players also have the option of choosing what outcome they gain for sucessfully completing the quest. So for the Humakt gains the Sword of Death quest the Hero may decide to get a magical Sword for himself, or may chose to pass the benefit onto his community, so all the Clans warriors become very skilled...

Benefits for the community are another interesting scenario. Particularly, when there are no benefits.

Tim Ellis wrote: [. . .] then 2 or 3 sessions down the line you are now playing a new generation - those who chose to keep the power themselves are now at a disadvantage over those whose decendants are still benefiting from the "community" magic

Gordon C. Landis wrote:

Tim Ellis wrote: [. . .] then 2 or 3 sessions down the line you are now playing a new generation - those who chose to keep the power themselves are now at a disadvantage over those whose decendants are still benefiting from the "community" magic

Unless, of course, those who kept the power managed to use it in such a way as to secure benefits for their future generations far greater than a mere bonus to their warrior skills . . .

It's the ambiguous - or rather, the "only established when the play actually happens" - nature of all this that intrigues me so much.

simon_hibbs wrote:
The realy eye-opening thing was that as soon as Greg started the game, we had no idea which station we were at, and the stations were in different orders! It was just like playing a regular game in that respect - things changed, and the beings we encountered made unpredictable choices depending on our actions. Thisd meant it was very hard to know if we were doing the right thing or not, even though we knew the outline of the quest.

simon_hibbs wrote: Another point realted to your comment on how heroquests are only established when the play actualy happens. Greg ran a short excerpt of the Lightbringer's Quest at the Tentacles convention in germany last week. He used no rules, and just ran it as a short dry-run kind of game, by way of example. I played Issaries.

simon_hibbs wrote: We started after arriving at the Gates of Dusk, and first Greg explained what we know about the heroquest - the various stations of the quest and the roles the lightbringers play. The realy eye-opening thing was that as soon as Greg started the game, we had no idea which station we were at, and the stations were in different orders! It was just like playing a regular game in that respect - things changed, and the beings we encountered made unpredictable choices depending on our actions. This meant it was very hard to know if we were doing the right thing or not, even though we knew the outline of the quest.