Glorantha 2nd age. What happens ?

[weasel_fierce]

Spoiler warnings I s'pose

Could anyone fill in some details on what actually happens to the godlearners and the wyrms friend empire ?


Does the Malkioni faith survive at all in the third age or ?

Are there any previous hero wars, or is that a third age thing alltogether ?

 

[Voriof]

Spoiler warnings I s'pose

Could anyone fill in some details on what actually happens to the godlearners and the wyrms friend empire ?

Bad things. Very. Bad. Things.

All of the expansive Empires, the EWF, Justreli, Dara Happan Empire, the Errinoiu Elves all come to bad ends. The only ones that survive, the Haralangans, abandon their empire willingly and Kralorela... goes back to being Kralorela.

Does the Malkioni faith survive at all in the third age or ?

Oh yes! Even in the campaign setting, numerous Malkioni sects are starting to purge themselves of the God Learner excesses - though many of them suffer from Imperial Hubris of their own.

Justrela is destroyed and the empire is wracked by a series of magical cataclysms that leave it devastated and helpless for its many enemies. The entities the God Learners have abused and enslaved turn upon the mages and they are hunted to extinction by Things That Should Not Be.

The sea is swept clean of ships by the Closing, a spell crafted by the great Zzabur - the First Wizard and master of the Brithini immortals.

The dragonewts turn on their human students, who have greatly abused their teachings, and the EWF leadership perishes. The surrounding human lands collectively invade Dragon Pass.

The Dragon Kill happens. No humans survive within 200 miles of the pass and all armies are consumed by the army(!) of true dragons that appear to defend their nesting places.

The age ends in silence and fear. All surviving cultures are gripped by conservativsm and most strive mightily to purge themselves of any God Learner, EWF, or foreign taint.

Are there any previous hero wars, or is that a third age thing alltogether ?

At the end of every age is a war of heroes. The God War in the Pre-Time past may be thought of as one. But the Gbaji Wars at the end of the First Age, the Imperial Age ends in warfare and bloodshed, and the Hero Wars end the Third Age.


Anway, that's the official continuity.

Voriof

 

[weasel_fierce]

All of the expansive Empires, the EWF, Justreli, Dara Happan Empire, the Errinoiu Elves all come to bad ends. The only ones that survive, the Haralangans, abandon their empire willingly and Kralorela... goes back to being Kralorela.

What specifically happens to the god learners and EWF ?

EDIT Nevermind, you answered that just now Others shouldnt feel that they cant hop in and chat or elaborate more though

 

[kintire]

Voriof is largely correct, although he omitted Carmania from his list of Empires that survive. Actually, Dara Happa survives for a while, although it gets conquered by Carmania. Spoilerificness follows.

Essentially, the God Learners push the boundaries of reality too far. Exactly what happens isn't entirely clear, partly because everyone and his dog try to grab the credit for it, but best guess is that they get to the point where they are meddling so much with the fabric of the universe that the compromise is suspended, and the gods get to get righteous on their collective backsides. Jrustela becomes Glorantha's contribution to the Atlantis myth, the imperial capital is sunk as well, and everyone who knows the God Learner secrets is visited by a Gift Carrier and Never Seen Again. Zzabur (or someone) weaves a spell that means that any ship that goes out of sight of land is never seen again either, which means that long distance commerce collapses almost completely.

This removes the chief rival of the EWF, but also shafts their trade something terrible. Still they expand their borders and begin a more enthusiastic drive towards their Great Project. General revolts begin, and the arising of the Cult of Orlanth Rex saps their support (the old Orlanth the Leader cult was subordinate to the Thunderous priests who are among the chief backers of the EWF: the Orlanth the King cult puts the priests at number two. Given the dissatisfaction with the EWF it proves very popular). The situation becomes so serious that the Diamond Storm Dragon himself heads out to destroy the founder of this new cult. It is an accepted fact that the great Dragons are invincible, but they dislike interventions, and it is a measure of how serious the revolt is that the dragon is intervening in person.

And it just gets worse. The leader of the new Orlanth Rex subcult, Alakoring turns out to be one of the five or six people with a credible claim to the title of "Deadliest killing machine ever". He kills the Diamond Storm Dragon, and invades the EWF. The revelation that dragons are NOT invincible sparks general revolt; Peloria frees itself and joins Alakoring Dragonbreaker, and EWF armies are repeatedly defeated. The excesses to which they are driven to stem the revolt causes a final split with the Dragonewts, and the rebel armies storm into Dragon Pass and destroy the EWF. Tragically, in their frenzy to destroy anything even remotely Draconic they begin smashing the Dragon eggs on which Dragonewt reincarnation depends, and the True Dragons awake, and obliterate the problem. By the end of the Dragonkill, which marks the close of the Age of Empires, about two thirds of humanity has perished.

In the West, the Malkioni religion survives, but fragments. The old Hrestoli beliefs are challenged by hardline Rokari and the westerners fight among themselves. Increasingly, all exceptions to the caste laws are tainted with the memory of the God Learners, and even the more moderate Malkioni become hardliners by second age standards. A few sorcerers try to recover God Learner powers, but it is soon observed that anyone who reaches a certain point vanishes forever. The Gift Carriers have not departed.

Kralorela reverts to its former state, although the Path of Immanent Mastery remains influential. Central Genertela is a post apocalypse wasteland with a few wandering tribes, except for Kethaela in the south which retains a degree of civilisation. Peloria reverts to its ancient ways for a while, but is soon placed under a worse tyranny than the EWF ever was by the new Empire of Carmania. These racial supremicists establish a caste based empire which places all foreigners at the bottom of the lowest caste, and they fiercely persecute all dissidents and religions other than their own. However, with the sea closed and the land routes through Dragon Pass devastated, trade is slight, travel is more difficult, vast tracts opf knowledge and magic have been lost, and even the largest empires are pale shadows of the glory of the Second Age.

 

[soltakss]

Just off the top of my head and from memory, so I'm probably wrong ...

EWF:
They decide to create the Great Dragon.
More and more of the high-ups retire to contemplate the Great Dragon.
[Possibly, they try and turn Orlanth into a Dragon (Compromise Violation) but I'm not sure about this]
The Provinces begin to rebel and throw off their EWF masters.
In particular, Carmanian and Dara Happan Dragonslayers have some success.
The pyramid scheme structure collapses as the number of worshippers goes down.
The Dragonewts take back their secrets and Blue Moon assassins kill many people with EWF powers.
Invaders come in from the North, South, East and West and start sacking the EWF cities.
Delecti creates the Upland Marsh and is killed.
The invaders start attacking Dragonewt Nests and destroying the eggs.
The Dragons get a bit upset and come together for Dragonkill.
Dragons eat all the invading armies and then have a lie down for a couple of centuries.
Only a very few survivors get out and Dragon Pass is closed (Death Line in the North, Cross Line in the South).
Dragon Pass becomes a haven for inhumans, trolls in the north and south, beastmen in the south, ducks and newtlings in the Upland Marsh, dragonewts in the centre.
Nobody likes dragons any more.

Middle Sea Empire:
They conquer almost everything around the Middle Sea.
They fight the Firebergs and force them away.
The Godlearners move away from just validating Malkioni Beliefs and start transforming non-Malkioni religions to Malkioni ones.
They make major changes to the mythic planes through HeroQuesting.
They make new deities and change old ones, Goddes Switch is the standard example but there are more.
The Machine City becomes a god, of sorts, and the other gods decide to act aganst it (Compromise Violation)
The Kralorelan Dragon Emperor gets tired of waiting and moves a star in order to get a favourable set of constellations, then he becomes a dragon and throws out the Godlearners from Kralorela.
An alliance destroys the Machine City.
Elves run amok in Pamaltela, planting jungles in everyone's gardens.
Violet-skinned demigods come to Slontos from the far West and start hammering a spike into the ground.
Slontos turns over in a series of huge earthquakes, shatterng the area.
The Seas invade the lands, flooding huge areas of Slontos, the southern coasts and the East Isles.
Zzabur casts a spell removing Brithos from the world, creating a sea of fog and Closing the Oceans.
The Waertagi are grounded at isolated ports, smashed in the sea or go down Magasta's Pool to Hell, following the Burning Ocean's path.
Jrustela is cleansed of all human life and only nonhumans are found there after Dormal opens the Oceans.
Everyone agrees the Godlearners were a bad idea and claims they never had any truck with them. But, the Malkioni keep a lot of the Jrusteli revelations and customs, many cults keep a lot of the Jrusteli influenced changes, everyone carries on speaking Tradetalk, many cults retain their connections with other cults that the Jrusteli forged, most people accept the Monomyth as the core description of other people's GodTime.

The Pamaltelan Empires fall apart for other reasons. Kralorela becomes inward-looking and takes no part in outside affairs. Brithos disappears. The EWF and Middle Sea Empire have been destroyed. Carmania takes over the Dara Happan Empire. The Western areas are broken into a series of squabbling states.

So, the only ones to come out of it well are the nonhumans and Carmanians. In fact, later on the Carmanian Shah splits up Dara Happa, Peloria and Carmania amongst his three sons, as he rules the whole lot.

After a hundred and fifty/two hundred years, the Red Goddess comes along and retakes Peloria.
The Pharoah kills the Only Old One, ending his reign, and forms the Holy Country.
Sartar unites new tribes in Dragon Pass and makes a country.

 

[Voriof]

Like I said, Bad Stuff Happens. But much of this death and destruction occurs over the course of a century or so.

How much of this happens in your game depends on you.

Jeff

 

[Rurik]

I'm pretty sure Kralorela gets flooded too at the end of the Second Age.

This is as I recall a change Robin Laws made as he was writing GtSA (after discussing it with Greg). If you look at the second age Kralorela map compared to third age maps you will see it was pretty much one big land mass in the second Age.

 

[Dr_Snugglebunny]

Don't forget the Gift Carriers of the Sending Gods! Whatever they are, beings (such as agents of Arachne Solara as some web/other pundits have speculated) or curses or spirits or many other things, they hunt down and destroy "all" of the surviving God Learners. Or at least that's the old story; not sure if that was Gregged.

Of course, not all GLs died, or that would violate the MGF (max game fun) principle. Plenty do survive in isolated areas, for the Third Age PCs to be freaked out by. They've been a big theme in my RQ3 Pavis campaign; only bad things come about when ancient God Learners pop up.

Some escaped via time/space travel as the Outer Atomic Explorers, about which even less is known...

 

[carandol]

Just off the top of my head and from memory, so I'm probably wrong ...

[lots of doom cut for brevity]

What sort of timescale are we talking here? If I start a campaign in 908, are my PCs likely to see much of this?

 

[ninthcouncil]

Just off the top of my head and from memory, so I'm probably wrong ...

[lots of doom cut for brevity]

What sort of timescale are we talking here? If I start a campaign in 908, are my PCs likely to see much of this?

Things start getting really heavy in the early 920s, if I remember correctly (that's the start of the Closing of the Seas, and I think Alakoring begins getting mediaeval on dragon ass around then too). So, yes, but the players have time to get powerful, and thus take an active part in the proceedings. I suspect that's the thinking behind the standard dateline.

 

[soltakss]

Just off the top of my head and from memory, so I'm probably wrong ...

[lots of doom cut for brevity]

What sort of timescale are we talking here? If I start a campaign in 908, are my PCs likely to see much of this?

Well, Dragonkill marks the end of the Second Age and happens in 1100 ST. So, you've got nearly 200 years for both empires to be crushed.

Most of the good stuff happens earlier rather than later, I think.

Check out Peter Metcalfe's Timelines at http://www2u.biglobe.ne.jp/~BLUEMAGI/TimelineMetcalph.htm for Timelines of most of the areas of the EWF/Middle Sea Empire.

 

[Exubae]

Has any one read Greg's Middle Sea Empire manuscript?
Noticed it on the issaries site wondered if was useful.

 

[soltakss]

Yes, it's very good. Light on specifics but has a lot of history, stuff on beliefs etc. Lots of lists of Emperors and brief descriptions of what they did.

There's a review at http://www.soltakss.com/review4.html towards the end.

If you are running a Middle Sea Empire campaign it's worth buying. Maybe Mongoose will use a lot of it in the source material, but I doubt if they'll use all of it.

I'm waiting for the EWF one to come out.

 

[Voriof]

Has any one read Greg's Middle Sea Empire manuscript?
Noticed it on the issaries site wondered if was useful.

Yes. Yes it was.

Jeff

 

[Alakoring]

Has any one read Greg's Middle Sea Empire manuscript?
Noticed it on the issaries site wondered if was useful.

I read an earlier edition (and plan on reading this edition). I think it's definitely worth it if you're running God Learners. And it does touch on some of the events after 908.

 

[TRose]

2 corrections to the above. One human does survive kind of in Dragon Pas.Delecti the Necromancer some how pulls a fast one and the dragons dont eat him. Also he a Godlearner and some how avoids fate of all other Godlearners. There also rumors that some Godlearners survived in Dorestor as slaves/under the protection of Ralzakark. Their fate might be worse then death but know one really knows. Also the Red Goddess,befor she Ascended, is said to have met some Godlearners that where out of town (Way out of town of memory serve me right) when disaster struck.
But one thing I always wondered is how did those hunting Godlearners differ the Godlearners from Orthodox Malkoni and non Godlearner Sorcerers.

 

[weasel_fierce]

But one thing I always wondered is how did those hunting Godlearners differ the Godlearners from Orthodox Malkoni and non Godlearner Sorcerers.

if they run, they're God learners. If they stand, they're disciplin...wait.. nevermind

 

[The King]

I hadn't read this thread until now. Interesting. This just confirms what I thought, i.e. whenever the true dragons wake up, this mean the end of an age.

Does anyone know how the continent of Pamaltela was affected by the end of the 2nd Age?

 

[Voriof]

I hadn't read this thread until now. Interesting. This just confirms what I thought, i.e. whenever the true dragons wake up, this mean the end of an age.

Does anyone know how the continent of Pamaltela was affected by the end of the 2nd Age?

Climate Change. Forests expand northward to devour the GL cities along the coast but are driven out of the plains. Massive die off of certain types of elves. Various places reclaim their independence (or resume their beloved enslavement).

Not as dramatic as, say, Kralorela, Justrela, Slontos, or Seshnela. Certainly not as dramatic as Dragon Pass.

Jeff

 

[simonh]

But one thing I always wondered is how did those hunting Godlearners differ the Godlearners from Orthodox Malkoni and non Godlearner Sorcerers.

In the same way that a Spirit of Reprisal targets an apostate.

That is to say, they've got a great big "Guilty" sign hanging over them, thats clearly visible in the otherworlds.