Ramalia

Just a note to say that Tradetalk magazine #10, including a lengthy article on the were-boars of Ramalia that I wrote back in 2002, has now been re-released in PDF format for the trifling price of $4. And, of course, its not just me, because every other issue of Tradetalk from #5 onwards has been re-released, too - so check them out, there's some really good Gloranthan material in there.

On a related note, there may be some good news about Heroes of Malkion on the horizon. With the emphasis on the "may" and the "horizon", of course, but at least there's something to hope for. And, no, I don't have any more information than that I can give out at the present time... just keep an eye out!

Runes in the West

I've mentioned the way that Malkioni interact with runes from a rules perspective in an earlier post. To illustrate further, here is the list of cults from Heroes of Malkion, with their runes. Note that some of these cults may have been moved to later books during the editing process, or had other minor changes - this is just the latest information I have. Furthermore, I won't be describing the cults themselves here; you'll have to buy the book if you want that! Instead, it just shows the range of cults in the book, and perhaps illustrates a little bit of how runes work for Malkioni.

Saints

Althens	Artifice
Anazieta	Harmony
Burning Arrow	Death
Drezedan	Death
Elleish	Man
Falerine	Fertility
Gerlant	Fire
Hasterax	Death
Iames	Harmony OR Light
Josselyne	Strength
Mistandar	Trade
Ongaring	Motion
Padelnik	Strength
Palenna	Fertility
Rendoir	Hunting
Xemela	Harmony
Zemuron	Law
Zmes	Artifice

Wizardry Schools

Areeshka	Luck, Fate
Avlor	Man, Victory, Stasis
Conwy	Trade, Truth
Defences of God	Law, Defence, Force
Hecretes	Illusion, Magic
Herigian	Law, Truth, Mastery
Inner Temple	Literacy, Light, Truth
Iron Blood	Law, Death, Harmony
Jenerin	Law, Trade
Kipperly	Harmony, Illusion
Kyria	Harmony, Motion, Protection
Lenderyn	Motion, Death, Magic
Nerivon	Motion, Destruction
Octahedral	Earth, Mineral
Ouxey	Perception, Stasis
Pure Waves	Water
Querto	Law, Motion, Mineral
Raceen	Law, Artifice
Rose Nuns	Law, Harmony
Siglat	Harmony, Perception, Mastery
Talara Ignia	Fire, Essence
Ulfrathgar	Chaos, Undeath
Urestes	Truth, Matter
Vonerin	Death, Spirit
Yarilia	Storm, Protection, Cold

Some additional things you might notice from this list:

• Not all wizardry schools necessarily have three runes; it depends on the range and scope of their magic.
• Saints grimoires, in particular, may focus on particular aspects of their rune; for example, Althens' Artifice rune/grimoire does not include metalwork, because he's a shipwright.
• Some grimoires, again especially amongst saints, mediate the power of their main rune through another rune; for example the Order of the Burning Arrow's rune is Death, but it's largely (though not entirely) through the medium of fire.
• Iames has two different runes, just to be awkward - but individual members only ever have access to one.
  
• Pastors of the main Malkioni prophets, such as Rokar and Hrestol, use the Law rune in almost all cases, and are therefore too repetitive to list here. Their grimoire is usually The Abiding Book, or some variant thereof.
• Talor simply used his own rune, in the last version I saw.
• There are additional cults, such as the Order of Shining Steel, in LotW2 and LotW3!
  

HarnMaster Barbarians

One of my earlier books (on which I worked with a number of other writers), HarnMaster Barbarians, has recently been released as a PDF on DriveThruRPG. The original was a loose-leaf product, not a bound book, so, with some decent quality paper, the PDF really isn't that different from the original hardcopy - and it's cheaper, too.

I have updated the Writing Credits page of my website with the direct link to the purchase site, and with similar details for any other books I've contributed to that remain available.

The End of Tentacles

I did say that when the official announcement about Tentacles came through, I'd post about that. So here we are.

Tentacles was a great gaming convention held in scenic Schloss Stahleck overlooking the Rhine in Germany. From my perspective, it was particularly significant as a convention specifically dedicated to Glorantha, Call of Cthulhu, and other related games. The location simply can't be beaten, to be able to game in such a beautiful place must have been the highlight of the year for many attendees. But the 2009 gathering will be the last.

I can understand their reasoning; it has become increasingly difficult in recent years to get sufficient Guests of Honour from America to attend (this was particularly noticeable last year, and reading between the lines, they anticipate similar problems in 2009). Of course, we can all have good fun without the Guests, but it's going to be increasingly difficult to keep the convention at a sufficient stature to fulfil the organiser's legal contract with the owners of the castle. As they've said on the website, they don't want this to turn into a Bachelor Beer and Karaoke Quest, and I can see how that might be the fate if they drag it on too long.

All good things must come to an end, and Tentacles will most certainly be missed by the Gloranthan community (and Cthulhu fans, etc., for that matter) . I only managed to attend twice myself, with the difficulties of getting to Germany, but I do hope to attend their one last hurrah. I wish I had been able to go more often, because the experience is truly wonderful, but such is life.

But Glorantha is bigger than this. We're not a dying community - yet.

(And, yeah, as I predicted, that 'by the end of 2008' schedule for publication of Heroes of Malkion is looking pretty shaky, isn't it?)

Heroes of Malkion Update

The latest update on progress on Heroes of Malkion indicates that artwork is still in progress. Moon Design hopes to have it out by the end of the year, which indicates that it will probably be out before the new edition of HeroQuest. (Nonetheless, it does duplicate a lot of information in the main HQ1 rulebook, in order that it can be used by those who only have access to HQ2).

Personally, I'd take the 'end of the year' estimate with a bucket-load of salt; these things are always statement of hope rather than any definite publication deadline. But... well, hopefully by Tentacles, eh?

In the meantime, here's a wordle from chapter 2 of the book (for the uninitiated, a wordle is an artistic representation of which words appear most frequently in a piece of text):

The Death of Pyramid Magazine

I've been reading Pyramid magazine ever since issue #1, which I believe was about 15 years ago. It's a gaming magazine, published by Steve Jackson Games, and focussing on GURPS, which was the basis for the homebrew system that I played in those days. (The rest of the homebrew system came largely from Pendragon, but the stats were easy to convert, and the ideas fitted what I wanted back then).

Around 10 years ago, it switched from dead-tree format to webzine format and, with a little reluctance, I continued my subscription. I'm glad I did; there has been a lot of good material published in Pyramid over the last decade. I've even contributed three articles to it myself, two on Glorantha, and one on, of all things, astrophysics. Subscription also got me access to playtests of SJ Games products, and, in particular, I helped out with the testing of the Vehicle Design software, and of GURPS Cops. Perhaps best of all, at least in the long term, were the NNTP discussion forums that the magazine ran for subscribers, where I have had all sorts of cool discussions with a wide range of people.

As of today, the Pyramid webzine ceases publication.

Oh, the magazine will continue as a monthly PDF release, with slightly less content for five times the price. But, oddly enough, that's not much of an issue for me. Because, over the last couple of years, since I no longer play GURPS, the NNTP forums were my main reason for paying the annual subscription anyway - everything else was an added bonus. Since those forums are being closed down, I will be cancelling my subscription forthwith, to claim the refund for the rest of the year. It's understandable why they're closing, of course, at least from SJ Games point of view. For myself, I don't really understand why NNTP is no longer popular as a format - it's so much more flexible than the message boards that seem to have replaced it. Sometimes, newer isn't better, and, while message boards are great for some things (hence the MBRPG I help to run), general discussion isn't one of them. A lot of functionality has been lost in the name of progress - but isn't that often the way?

So I'll miss those discussions... but change goes on, and one can't blame a company for closing down something that just isn't profitable for them. A fond farewell to Pyramid, then, and on to something else instead...

(Addendum: If you're wondering why I'm mentioning this, but not the more Glorantha-relevant news from Germany of a similar nature - I'm waiting for the official announcement before commenting on that).

If I were a cat...

One of the players on my MBRPG posted to say that if I were a cat, I would look like this:



(You probably have to know about LOLcats to know what this is actually a picture of... but still, I thought it was rather cool).