Cults of Glorantha Book 2 Poll

[Rurik]

Got Cults?

How is it?

Punishment/Reward will be meted out based on the following table:

Sucks Really Bad          Slow Death by Cutting and Stitching

Just Sucks                Gregg Renvald Meldakbane out of existence,
                          causing his Mug and T-shirt to also cease to exist.

Kinda Sucks               Make him eat his Renvald Meldakbane Mug.

Just OK                   Tell Him "Nice Job" make him write errata for core
                          Rulebook. 

Good                      Tim Hortons

Rocks                     Beer. Everyone Buys Him A Pint. 

Best Book Ever            Release Cults of Glorantha 3 with all the material
                          that didn't make 1&2. Include new Cult of Jeff.

I'm thinking the Cult of Jeff will have a mythology full of hardship and obstacles, with him triumphing against the odds after much suffering and adversity.

 

[CharlieMonster]

Having finally taken delivery of COG2 I am initially impressed and love the way Spirit Magic & Traditions work.

I was also pleasantly surprised by the Gark Tradition, nicely done even if it does remind me slightly of a Vampire "Pyramid Scheme" I saw in an epsiode of Angel one time.

The one bit I absolutely love is the way Hsunchen Transformations work in this incarnation of the game. Very slick very simple and if you are prepared to invest the POW & Hero Points, very nasty.


My only reservation so far is that ordinary Divine Cults are the "Poor Cousin" of the Magical practices in Glorantha. Spirit Cults can summon and bind spirits, cook up their runes and cast Rune Spells through spirits without runes. Granted I haven't had time to digest it all properly and will have to revisit COG1, but if sorcery is equally pokey, I can't see many players opting for Theism.

Although to be fair Spirit Users will potentially be burning a lot of POW, which given Spirit Magic ties power up like Divine Magic could be a limiting factor. Okay the more I think about it maybe it will balance out in the long run. What do other people think?

Off to read the Thanatar Write Up - Mwah-ha-ha-ha!

 

[Voriof]

Having finally taken delivery of COG2 I am initially impressed and love the way Spirit Magic & Traditions work.

I was also pleasantly surprised by the Gark Tradition, nicely done even if it does remind me slightly of a Vampire "Pyramid Scheme" I saw in an epsiode of Angel one time.

Heh. Well, I thought of it more as a magical Ponzi scheme, myself. But hey, you get victims to Tap and slave labour, all in one convenient package.

The one bit I absolutely love is the way Hsunchen Transformations work in this incarnation of the game. Very slick very simple and if you are prepared to invest the POW & Hero Points, very nasty.

Thanks! I thought that these would work. They devour/absorb/host spirits on a permanent basis. At least, those traditions which practice it. I believe I may have been inspired by similar processes in RuneQuest vikings.

My only reservation so far is that ordinary Divine Cults are the "Poor Cousin" of the Magical practices in Glorantha. Spirit Cults can summon and bind spirits, cook up their runes and cast Rune Spells through spirits without runes. Granted I haven't had time to digest it all properly and will have to revisit COG1, but if sorcery is equally pokey, I can't see many players opting for Theism.

Yes, I have to agree. The new divine rules considerably 'nerf' divine magic. And many of the more powerful spells were removed from the game (but we have disucssed that to death).

Unfortunately, there is little to be done about that barring some rethinking of divine magic.

Although to be fair Spirit Users will potentially be burning a lot of POW, which given Spirit Magic ties power up like Divine Magic could be a limiting factor. Okay the more I think about it maybe it will balance out in the long run. What do other people think?

Yes. And there's also a hard limit imposed by cult status and time. The more spirits you are friends with, the more you are nickled and dimed to death.

Off to read the Thanatar Write Up - Mwah-ha-ha-ha!

The spells for the Headhunter God ended up as Runespells. Not sur how they will work out. Many of the spells in the cults of CoGII were converted from Divine spells to Runespells which may inpact dramatically on their usefullness.

Jeff

 

[TRose]

I just got Cults 2 yesterday and so far I like the book. But I have a soft spot in my heart for Cutter and Stich. So its going to be hard for me to decided.

 

[ninthcouncil]

The one bit I absolutely love is the way Hsunchen Transformations work in this incarnation of the game. Very slick very simple and if you are prepared to invest the POW & Hero Points, very nasty.

One thing that didn't seem entirely clear: there is a hierarchy of 3 levels of transformations, and each totem has 3 transformations listed. Does this mean that the first is the Minor one, the second the Major and the third the Greater? If so, does the Major also include the Minor and so on? Otherwise, the shaman can do (say) Running Legs at will but Antlers only once per day.

Or, do you get to choose which is which when you gain the Transformation? Or, are they all available, and the Major/Minor/Greater distinction just affects the frequency and duration?

Off to read the Thanatar Write Up - Mwah-ha-ha-ha!

The spells for the Headhunter God ended up as Runespells. Not sur how they will work out. Many of the spells in the cults of CoGII were converted from Divine spells to Runespells which may inpact dramatically on their usefullness.

Jeff

I can't say that I like that very much, as converting such things to Runespells seems to imply that anyone could learn them, cult member or not. Even Cult speciality Rune spells will have a tendency to leak out into the wider world, which isn't the case with Divine Magic (other than by God Learner interference). In the case of Thanatar, this is worrying...

 

[Voriof]

One thing that didn't seem entirely clear: there is a hierarchy of 3 levels of transformations, and each totem has 3 transformations listed. Does this mean that the first is the Minor one, the second the Major and the third the Greater? If so, does the Major also include the Minor and so on? Otherwise, the shaman can do (say) Running Legs at will but Antlers only once per day.

Each of these spirits (and powers) ares indepenent of the others.

Or, do you get to choose which is which when you gain the Transformation? Or, are they all available, and the Major/Minor/Greater distinction just affects the frequency and duration?

Its up to the worshipper. You can have a fully integreated hunschen with very weak spirits or a guy with one uber powerful spirit or anything in between.

Will have to take a look at what got published though.

The spells for the Headhunter God ended up as Runespells. Not sur how they will work out. Many of the spells in the cults of CoGII were converted from Divine spells to Runespells which may inpact dramatically on their usefullness.

Jeff

I can't say that I like that very much, as converting such things to Runespells seems to imply that anyone could learn them, cult member or not. Even Cult speciality Rune spells will have a tendency to leak out into the wider world, which isn't the case with Divine Magic (other than by God Learner interference). In the case of Thanatar, this is worrying...

I admit I feel somewhat concerned but I assume that there was a decision that CoG2 would not draw on Divine spells and that there was not to be a mixing of divine, spirit, and sorcery magic in single cults (which, unfortunately, does not reflect the Gloranthan norms).

Will wait and see what the effects are though.

Jeff

 

[B_Steele]

The one bit I absolutely love is the way Hsunchen Transformations work in this incarnation of the game.

As a side note, this is the _magical_ version of the transformations, which allows you to shape specific parts of the character. There is a naturally-backed version to be found in the Player's Guide that is more like commonplace shapeshifting. Hope you like it, too.

Back to work for me, deadline week!

Bry

 

[Voriof]

The one bit I absolutely love is the way Hsunchen Transformations work in this incarnation of the game.

As a side note, this is the _magical_ version of the transformations, which allows you to shape specific parts of the character. There is a naturally-backed version to be found in the Player's Guide that is more like commonplace shapeshifting. Hope you like it, too.

Back to work for me, deadline week!

Bry

...eeeeysss.

But shapeshifting, in Glorantha, is almost always the purview of the hsunchen primitives who use a mixture of magic and natural ability. Very few others do it and most of those are either chaos-tainted (like the Telmori wolf people who are also hsunchen). To be honest, I am hard pressed to think of very many cases off the top of my head.

Just sayin'. I am looking forward to seeing it, if and when it gets to my area. Or, for that matter, CoG2.

Jeff

 

[Exubae]

Is there an overall plan with the development and feel of Glorantha the Second Age?
That last comment is starting to worry me, you're not all doing you're own thing, not talking, and hoping it all gels ...

 

[B_Steele]

We are given direction as to what we are doing in a general sense, but more than anything we have access to the work being done. Since much of the work being written is being written at the same time (as I believe the Player's Guide and Cults was), it is hard to know exactly what is being done at all times.

But yes, we have good communication between ourselves and even to Greg if need be. I know Aaron and I chat all the time about what is going on, and I have not worked on any Glorantha stuff for a few months now, so I haven't had a reason to chat it up with Jeff...yet.

Anyway, fear not, we are not all just running blind over here.

Cheers all,
Bry

 

[Rurik]

Well, my FLGS gets it's orders on Thursdays and no Cults II yesterday, so next week it is.

What I gather from this thread is that there is NO divine magic in Cults II and they have gone so far as to convert some divine spells to rune spells - is this correct?

 

[Voriof]

Well, my FLGS gets it's orders on Thursdays and no Cults II yesterday, so next week it is.

What I gather from this thread is that there is NO divine magic in Cults II and they have gone so far as to convert some divine spells to rune spells - is this correct?

Yes.

Jeff

 

[gamesmeister]

Well, my FLGS gets it's orders on Thursdays and no Cults II yesterday, so next week it is.

What I gather from this thread is that there is NO divine magic in Cults II and they have gone so far as to convert some divine spells to rune spells - is this correct?

I got mine yesterday - in fact, I had a field day and bought A&E, Legendary Heroes, Cults 2, MoG, and the ILH2 for HQ! The tricky bit was smuggling them all past the wife :wink:

Anyway, in answer to your question, a brief examination tells me you are correct. There are definitely no Divine spells, and in among the Rune spells I see such items as Create Ghost, Ritual of Devouring, Summon Ancestor, and a boatload of others.

The RQ2 side of my split personality screams "Outrage!" at this change. However, with the general movement of many of the smaller Gloranthan cults away from theism and into animism over recent years, I tend to think it's probably ok, especially with the new Spirit Magic introduced in this book which these spells fall under. A cursory glance over this chapter screams "cool" at me, so with the help of my daily medicine, I may be able to keep the RQ2 voices quiet.

 

[Rurik]

With all the talk of the awkwardness of adapting rune magic to the classic Gloranthan cults I have a question (still not having my Cults II ):

Could the spirit magic system in Cults II be easily applied to ALL cults, so that cult rune magic in Cults I becomes Spirit Magic instead? Similar to the RQ3 interpretation of cult spirit spells.

 

[CharlieMonster]

With all the talk of the awkwardness of adapting rune magic to the classic Gloranthan cults I have a question (still not having my Cults II ):

Could the spirit magic system in Cults II be easily applied to ALL cults, so that cult rune magic in Cults I becomes Spirit Magic instead? Similar to the RQ3 interpretation of cult spirit spells.

If I understand it correctly most Rune Magic is already available as Spirit Magic, although Cults are limited to which spells they have access to, so there is no reason why not. However spirit magics are dependant on Shamans to provide them. Also unless they are in Fetishes, they take up "effective POW" in the same way Divine Spells do. Turning Cult spirits into fetishes doesn't, but cost POW sacrifice. If you make all Cult Rune spells Spirit Magic, Theist are going to struggle even more for their meagre supply of Divine Spells.

 

[Exubae]

A take on spirit magic might work for divine cults.

Shaman don't need to have an integrated Charm/rune to cast spirit spells(Rune), they can cast any spirit (Rune spell) they can drag screaming from an appropriate spirit, but are limited by POW in the number of spells they can remember.
All spells ae cast using the summoning skill%

Which if translated to Divine cults, would allows you to cast the rune spells of your cult runes, special cult rune magic, and allow a Theology skill rolls to cast.
Not sure about using POW to store 'divine' rune magic though sticking with int is probably the best option.

 

[gamesmeister]

With all the talk of the awkwardness of adapting rune magic to the classic Gloranthan cults I have a question (still not having my Cults II ):

Could the spirit magic system in Cults II be easily applied to ALL cults, so that cult rune magic in Cults I becomes Spirit Magic instead? Similar to the RQ3 interpretation of cult spirit spells.

Having had a chance to read the Spirit Magic rules now, I'd say they are very similar to how I suspect lots of people thought the standard cults would work i.e.

1) Shamanic 'Practitioners' (the equivalent of Initiates) or above can create Charms, which to all intents and purposes are Runes, which they can integrate for the powers. They can create charms for the runes associated with their Practice (the equivalent of a cult), but these charms are attunable only to the person who created them. This definitely makes sense for cults to be able to do, and prevents killing characters for their charms/runes.

2) Only one skill is used to cast spirit magic, that of Summoning. The same could be applied to characters casting cult spells, using Theology instead.

You still have the same problem of certain spells applying to inapproprate runes e.g. Skybolt, but they can be fixed separately.

The above also got me thinking about some of the Divine spells, and how they've been applied to the wrong cult types. For example, applying Resurrect to Death cults is daft, as it is anathema to the purpose and role of a Death cult. But I think this belongs in another thread...