And it was all going so well... ...Magic of Glorantha

[Gnarsh]

It's always tricky when dealing with source material though. On the one hand, I also tend to prefer that information that is "true" is clearly marked as such and information that is "belief" is also marked as such. However, sometimes the flavor of just presenting the beliefs of a culture as fact (think the original Trollpack) does wonders for product immersion.

I also think that it's not so much about new players following along and older players thinking it's a mistake. My bigger concern would be new players not realizing that it was just opinion and actually believing that the Troll gods (in this case) were chaos. Then when they read the Uz stuff, they then come to the conclusion that the Trolls just don't consider themselves to be chaos, but really are...

First impressions are critical. The "fact" is that the Troll pantheon is made up of lawful beings who fought against chaos. But for a new player, they wont know this unless you tell them. At some point it has to be made absolutely clear that Trolls aren't chaos. Older players already know this, so it doesn't matter that much, but newer players to Glorantha might form their entire campaign around the mistaken belief that Trolls are chaos, with somewhat disasterous results (at least from the perspective of the rest of us who know better).

I guess from a "play your campaign anyway you want" point of view, maybe that doesn't matter, but can you imagine the confusion such players might encounter if they ever play with a different group? Or heaven forbid they play at a tourney or convention...

 

[Dead Blue Clown]

My bigger concern would be new players not realizing that it was just opinion and actually believing that the Troll gods (in this case) were chaos. Then when they read the Uz stuff, they then come to the conclusion that the Trolls just don't consider themselves to be chaos, but really are...

Not possible. The Uz Guide categorically states, by trolls and God Learners alike, as well as in out-of-character text, that it's a tiny niche little idea. It's the troll guide, after all. It goes on about them hating, fighting and wailing on Chaos for quite a while.

I should've presented those snippets differently. I figured that too late, but I knew for next time (such as when I wrote the troll book).

It's a tiny thing, at best. Throwaway lines in the book's smallest chapters. I'd be mighty disappointed if this ended up being what people spent the most time talking about in the book that finally reveals how the God Learners and Dragonlords do their thing.

 

[Dead Blue Clown]

I can't remember. I'd tell you, honestly, but my brand new £1100 laptop chose this morning to die, setting me back 3 days of work I might never recover and is now in the care of my computer-literate friend Ray who is fixing it over the weekend.

Sigh.

DBC, I seem to remember from your Blog that this isn't the first time this has happened...didn't you lose a bunch of Nehwon stuff last time?

Dude, am I gonna have to drive up to Liverpool and stamp the word "BACKUP" on your forehead?

You remember correctly.

I'm really, really bad for remembering to back things up. And for whatever reason, I am cursed by glitchy computers. This last one (a laptop) cost £1100, was only a month old and died for no discernible reason this morning. It wasn't even online, so it can't be a virus.

Gah.

I blogged a hate-filled bunch of bile about it just now, actually.

Gah, I say again.

 

[simonh]

Personally, and speaking only for myself, I hate having errors/misunderstandings/ambiguities deliberately built in to histories/legends/myths/cosmologies.

I do get where you're coming from. If the source material is clear that the error or misunderstanding is in the myth or legend then that's fine. Many cultures in Glorantha do make errors and have misunderstandings, and it's one of the reasons the setting has so much richness and 'realness'. However when it's presented in the game author's voice you will get people who will quote this stuff to you and demand that it be taken as gospel truth for the setting as objective fact, on the basis that even if it was a mistake, it's now published canon (I know you're not one of them).

Personally I couldn't care less, except that dealing with whiners is annoying.

 

[RosenMcStern]

However when it's presented in the game author's voice you will get people who will quote this stuff to you and demand that it be taken as gospel truth for the setting as objective fact, on the basis that even if it was a mistake, it's now published canon (I know you're not one of them).

But now that the author himself has presented it as "misinterpreted God Learner belief", you can reply that it is just one interpretation of Truth (not even the most accurate one). So the fact that it is published [canon], yet it is just one of the many possible Points of View, will become clear to them. And so they will understand (if they make their INT roll) that not everything is fixed, and that their POV may be contradicted by someone else's POV. And this will be their real introduction to the most important Gloranthan principle:
YGMV.

 

[burdock]

a minor issue......which has a way cool reason for being there .............the book sounds wicked......but i realised tonight that the most important thing is to drink rotgut sometimes........however busy your life is you can always find special little moments in which to do this naughty deed.

drink rotgut and get thrown out of places


I tried it.............it works

 

[Kagan Altar]

Personally, and speaking only for myself, I hate having errors/misunderstandings/ambiguities deliberately built in to histories/legends/myths/cosmologies.

Real myths and legends can be just as confusing, mainly because the same belief or story of human experience may have known different developments when told within a different cultural context.

What matters really IMO to understand the subtlety is the context. If in the text you get something like "for the Aldryami this deity would be known as the Crusher of Worlds... blabla" there is a clear cultural context. If however statements are not put in clear relation to a cultural context, then the material can appear as contradictory with some other statement somewhere.

I like misunderstandings, ambiguities and errors deliberately built into myths, legends, cosmologies and histories. When it's done right, it makes them look all the more believable to me. I certainly don't want to see Glorantha have one single smooth monomyth where cultural "mythical blocks" would just fit nicely into each other like the pieces of a puzzle (that's IMO what's consistantly done wrong with D&D worlds, for instance, in that despite having cultures which are radically at odds with each other for centuries or more, they'd have two distinct pantheons which would not overlap on each other in any way nor present diametrically opposed point of views on some belief/story or another - which is a clear metagaming thought on the designer's part).

With the Second Age, we have the opportunity to see different takes on myths and beliefs before they are altered by the thought process if not the magical experiments of the God Learners. That makes it really cool compared to the Third Age material.

 

[soltakss]

It wasn't even online, so it can't be a virus.

That's like saying "I wasn't in bed when the rash started, so it can't be an STD".

Mallia's Minions can strike even when you are off-line.

 

[Dead Blue Clown]

It wasn't even online, so it can't be a virus.

That's like saying "I wasn't in bed when the rash started, so it can't be an STD".

That's so cool it's almost Zen. Me likey!