There are 600,000 Solar Pentans. A crude breakdown of the cult numbers would suggest that they have about:
- 60k Yelm cultists (nobles and the Pure Horse Tribes)
- 100k Yelmalio cultists (most men and some women – includes worship of Hyalor)
- 60k Dendara cultists (includes worship of Hippoi)
- 80k Eiritha the Cattle Goddess cultists
- 20k Polestar cultists
- 20k Lokarnos cultists
- 20k other Celestial cults
- 40k Other (including Ancestor Worship)
The remaining 200k are children so they are not in a cult? Yes
Those are very crude numbers, but give an idea of comparative importance. We have a Yelm and Dendara (Yu-Kargzant and La-Ungariant in Pentan) among the nobility and the Pure Horse tribes. Yelmalio and Eiritha (Karbzant and Cow Goddess) among the rank and file. About a quarter of the tribes worship lesser deities such as Polestar, Lokarnos (wheeled wagons are important in Pent), Star Captains of various names, and their own ancestors.
Stuff like this is more common among the Pentans than we tend to imagine:
Do they have shamans as well? Many. Yelm has a shamanic tradition (Golden Bow), they have ancestor worship, and plenty of Horned Man shamans as well.
So imagine huge herds of horses and cattle (horses only among the Pure Horse People).
There are seven Solar Tribes among the Pentans, so let’s assume the average tribe has a little less than 60k adults. Let’s take the Pure Horse People aside for a moment (who follow Yelm, Dendara, and Polestar). That would suggest that the average Solar Tribe has something like the following:
- 6k Yelm
- 6k Dendara
- 17k Yelmalio
- 13k Eiritha
- 2.5 Polestar
- 3.5k Lokarnos
- 3k other Celestial
- 7k other
Now even one tribe is tough – we are looking at over 20k cavalry if mustered!
Now imagine how dangerous it could be if someone could unify all the Solar tribes – that’s a pool of over 150k+ cavalry! This is something that easily can overwhelm the Lunar Cavalry Corps, especially if it has even middling magical backing, and then simply go around the foot. Remember there are also three Storm Tribes, which provide even more force.
You can see that Dranz Goloi, whose Voor-ash Confederation include two or three Solar Tribes and two or three Storm Tribes is an existential threat to the Lunar Empire. He’s far far more dangerous than the loss of Dragon Pass, Prax, and the Holy Country. So much so, that even the Dragonrise seems small potatoes to the Red Emperor and his court in Glamour. Who cares what the Orlanthi are doing there, as the Red Emperor needs to be focused like a Sun Spear on the Voor-ash Confederation. If the Lunar Empire survives that, there is always time to reconquer Dragon Pass.
Dranz Goloi is one of the fascinating Gloranthan figures that I think gets a very short stick in the fan community. He built a coalition out of about half the Pentan tribes and very nearly took down the Lunar Empire. If I were a Lunar strategist, I’d be far more worried about him than some Orlanthi warlord in Dragon Pass.
There are three storm worshipping tribe. There are some 200,000 Storm Tribe nomads. Which is a lot.
They worship West King Wind, North War Wind, South Rage Wind, East Sting Wind! New gods that have been embraced by many Pentans since the genocide of the Nights of Horror. It’s all is there in the Guide!