Quote from: Trond on July 01, 2024, 02:31:42 PM

Quote from: Lurker on June 30, 2024, 10:54:00 PMI have always wanted to play/run a Bronze Age game. It was a coin toss for my girls face to face group between it or a Sci Fi Traveller game. They eventually chose my home brew Traveller setting.

I've read Rune Quest before, but not sure I like the idea of EVERYONE has magic and is in a cult. I've read enough (history and bible) to see how important the spiritual realm was for the era, but I think RQ goes to far down that path with every player having magic etc. With that I think I'd lean to using Mythras

Oe question I know how important life events is for RQ character creation. If you aren't using the RQ setting, how did you modify that to fit your setting ? Before my girls chose Traveller, and we were considering RQ/Mythras, I was kicking around ideas on making modified events based on general Bronze Age events.

Much to my annoyance, I have yet to play the game as written here. I've played current RQ (as a player) and been GM with somewhat similar rules in a short swords & sorcery type game.

For this setting (that I really want to run soon) I'm all about just adventuring, seeing what happens, and take inspiration from 1) the historical Bronze Age 2) Bronze Age myth and 3) the old RQ2 rules. I actually think improvising is easier in RQ than many other games, since it gives you many options on how to resolve actions, how to gain experience etc.

RQ2 is actually pretty loose and adaptable in this sense. You're supposed to just explore the world and learn from it (join cults, guilds etc). Characters would often start very incompetent but RQ2 alternatively allows some learning to be done during character development (as options in the appendices) to make a bit older and more competent characters (5 years older normally).

Personally, I'm a fan of very quick character creation that leads to a bit more competent characters. So, after making a couple of characters using the background option appendices of RQ2, I came up with a very quick and dirty way of doing it was like this: "Option: Give each character 300 points to distribute on skills, to a max skill of 75% for starting characters (including bonuses). Characters of the nobility get 350 points. If the player chooses specialized skills, such as sage skills, assume that there is a mentor. Characters also have basic spells worth 1500 L (table p 32). " I also suggest that instead of rolling for status, you can just pick the character with the lowest characteristics to be the noble in your group (reflecting an easier life).

For life events, I'm not 100% sure which version of RQ you're referring to. Family is potentially important in my setting, because family feuds have historically been VERY prevalent on Mediterranean islands, and I thought I'd add this as an interesting feature. So: do start with some idea of family and clan membership, but I don't want to set too many things down into rules.

As for magic: I'd keep it rare except for magic that looks like e.g. simple blessings and curses (Bladesharp blesses your weapon to cut better). More powerful magic could be saved for powerful monsters (also pretty rare). And again, this suits RQ2 quite well. Even though magic is supposed to be everywhere, nobody starts with powerful magical spells as far as I can see in the rules.  You can look into the chance of becoming a cult initiate etc per year. The cults are the ones I listed earlier in this thread. They're not very fleshed out, but I might add to it or just improvise. They do allow very limited things like Divine Intervention, which is used in desperate situations by sacrificing a large amount of POW points (risking death).

I guess I should pay closer attention .... RQ2. I have and read through the new RQ (RQ7), and Mythras (I guess it is considered RQ6). I've never read the RQ2 rules/character creation, so my questions may have absolutely no bearing on your RQ2.

That said, in the RQ version I read, family history is important & character history is even more so. Like you point out, blood feuds etc are hugely important in that era.

That is one thing that drew me to RQ, well more my younger daughter. She has become obsessed with RPGs that have a life path character creation process. I don't know if she will ever willingly go back to a basic D&D class based RPG.

However, the new RQ system is focused on the background history specific to the setting. With that it is great at developing the history of the setting and linking the character to it. Unfortunately, that makes it impossible to morph it into a home brew none 'Glorantha' setting.

Quote from: Lurker on July 02, 2024, 11:21:16 AMI guess I should pay closer attention .... RQ2. I have and read through the new RQ (RQ7), and Mythras (I guess it is considered RQ6). I've never read the RQ2 rules/character creation, so my questions may have absolutely no bearing on your RQ2.

That said, in the RQ version I read, family history is important & character history is even more so. Like you point out, blood feuds etc are hugely important in that era.

That is one thing that drew me to RQ, well more my younger daughter. She has become obsessed with RPGs that have a life path character creation process. I don't know if she will ever willingly go back to a basic D&D class based RPG.

However, the new RQ system is focused on the background history specific to the setting. With that it is great at developing the history of the setting and linking the character to it. Unfortunately, that makes it impossible to morph it into a home brew none 'Glorantha' setting.

I agree, the newest RQ is very setting-specific. Glorantha has also grown very detailed over time, and I think I would find it a bit overwhelming if I were to run it as a GM (I'm fine with joining as a player).

I suppose I could have used RQ3, which is one of the most "generic" versions of RQ, but I was a bit enamored with the tone and relative simplicity of the RQ2 rules when I started this, and many people still love that edition.