Grimoires, grimoires, grimoires…

[David Scott]

A companion grimoire (point costs in brackets)…

Gnerdrod the speedy Grimoire of Wasteland Animals

Law rune (17+4pts =) 1W
(Beast) Grimoire of Wasteland Animals +1 (1pt)
Summon Lion (1pt)

Command High Llama (1pt)
Movement (13+8pts) = 1W
Extensible legs 13

[Robin Mitra]

You have lost me here. What do you mean by “right runes”? I thought all grimoires breakout the Law rune. And as I understand it, there is no cost, once a sorcerer has reached 11W and writes her own grimiores. It is possible to augment a spell with the Law rune, although it breaks out of the Law rune? I thought there is a general rule that you cannot augment a keyword with its own breakout ability.

As for Jorjar and the summon fruit spell, effectively yes. But the grimoire would have to have the right runes and would cost to buy. Don’t forget she would already be using her Law Rune to augment the spell, so it’s not like it would ever be at it’s base value.

Well, in my opinion it makes wizardry more powerful, because a sorcerer can use an unlimited number of spells, even from obscure and antagonistic sources, whereas a spirit talker has only spirits from her spirit society resp. tradition. But that is fine with me. Like the real world Glorantha, too, is not balanced. Life isn’t fair. 🙂

The same as with all spirit magic users – increase the spirit rune (or what ever your spirit magic is keyed off) and it will increase the effectiveness of all your charms.

[Matthias Hunger]

I think what David means with “right runes” (apologies if I put words in your mouth, David) is that each grimoire has its own rune/runes, even though they all hang form the Law rune (or Moon rune, in the case of Irripi Ontors). That limits the kinds of spells that can be written into/discoverd from the grimoire. For example, in Pavis: Gateway to Adventure, there is the example of the Debaldan Grimoire, associated with the water rune. No matter how great the sorcerers mastery, she could not created spells like “Throw Fireball” from this grimoire. Similary, Jorjar would presumably need a grimoire with the Life, or better the Plant rune, to create a Summon Single Fruit Spell from it. (Of course, the Abiding Book and its derrivatives is the exception that proves the rule).

Jorjar could augment her non-grimoire starting spell of “Summon Single Fruit” (with a rating of 13) with her Law rune, which is unconnected to that spell, but fits with spell casting in general.

[David Scott]

Okay, apologies if I’ve not been too clear on this. I’ve been tied up in HeroQuest Glorantha for a while now and am just assuming what I’m saying is clear – so just bear with me. Hopefully it will all become clearer when HQG comes out. But for the meantime –

Grimoires can now be broken out of any of your relevant runes. This was implied in the Pavis book, but is now in the rules. e.g.

A troll sorcerer with a darkness grimoire could break it out of the Darkness Rune and if they had the Law rune, augment it with that.

They could also do the reverse. The Law rune is much more flexible as you can break all grimoires out of it.

A Lhankor Mhy sorcerer can only break grimoires out of the Law rune due to the way LM approaches sorcery.

Robin, you are correct that you can’t augment an Law rune based grimoire with the Law rune. so it pays to break your grimoires out of your other runes!

You can still take grimoires without breaking them out of a Rune, but they start at 13 and are abilities.

The cost of a grimoire is the same as a breakout – 1HP, you then get 1 spell for free. Beyond that you need 1W in the associated keyword or grimoire if it’s standalone and then it’s 1HP per spell.

As for the comparison with spirit magic:

Spirit Magic has received an upgrade based on the work I’ve done for the upcoming Prax book. Spirit magic users get charms based on their spirit Tradition and sprit society membership. They cost 1hp per charm and are breakouts from the spirit rune or relevant rune:

The Lunar tradition is normally based on the Dying Phase.
Darkness tradition (trolls) on the Darkness rune.
Kolat (orlanthi tradition) on air or spirit.
Praxian tradition on the spirit rune.

The Praxian tradition is associated with the Man and Beast runes, so all members can get charms with those runes. Men tend to follow Waha (Death and Mastery), women Eiritha (Life and Beast, members can get charms with those respective runes as well. All clan have a patron – one that helped their ancestors survive in the Great Darkness, they can get charms from them as well. Finally they can get charms from the shaman and spirit-talkers of any of the societies they could join by doing a related task for the shaman and paying 1 HP.

Here’s a Hero from one of my games, she’s a member of the Praxian tradition, a Storm Bull spirit society member, Helpwoman is the clan patron. so she can get charms with the following runes:

Praxian tradition (Man and Beast)
Storm Bull (Air and Anti-chaos)
Helpwoman (Life and Harmony), who is associated with Brother Dog (Dog), and some of the low fires (fire)

None of those runes clash, so she could have any of them.

She could go to the Daka Fal shaman and ask to meet one of her ancestors. The shaman will want her to do a task (a basis for a group adventure, always played out), but could get a charm with any rune with a convincing story (credibility test) – who knows why your ancestor had that rune.

Ultimately Praxian heroes can have charms based on any rune.

[Niall]

Thanks for clarifying that David. I appreciate the time you spend answering my many questions.

I’m looking forward to the Prax book coming out.

[Niall]

Gnerdrod the speedy Grimoire of Wasteland Animals

Law rune (17+4pts =) 1W
(Beast) Grimoire of Wasteland Animals +1 (1pt)
Summon Lion (1pt)

Command High Llama (1pt)
Movement (13+8pts) = 1W
Extensible legs 13

Just looking at this. If I was a llankor mhy sage with this book, would I break this out of my existing Law rune? Say it’s at 1W.

Or does the Grimoire have to have it’s own Law rune, which is how I’m reading your example?

Lets say My Sage has Law rune 1W and he’s got his grubby hands on a grimoire that becomes his companion.

It’s a Grimoire that is in fact a sword that looks like a Scroll Tube. Can it have the Death Rune, or must that become a Law Rune?

Example: Initial 1HP, then 15 pts spent.
My character’s Law Rune 1W
*Companion Grimoire *Insert name* “It’s a sword!” 17 (+4)= 1w
**Death Rune 13 (+8)= 1W (If it can’t have a Death Rune this would become Deadly 1W)
**Look like a Scroll tube 13

Spells (Fight orientated, my character is a Sword Sage)
*Blah (1pt)
*Blah (1pt)
*Blah (1pt)

How would you stat it David?

[Niall]

I’m thinking alternatively it could look like

Example: Initial 1HP, then 15 pts spent.
My character’s Law Rune 1W
*Companion Grimoire *Insert name* “It’s a distracting sword!” Inhabited by a long dead sage.
**Death Rune 17 (+4)= 1W (If it can’t have a Death Rune this would become Deadly 1W)
**Look like a Scroll tube 13 (+8)= 1W
**Distracting Debate 13 ( Iread somewhere that some Sword sages had the ability to debate whilst fighting)

Spells (Fight orientated, my character is a Sword Sage)
*Blah (1pt)
*Blah (1pt)
*Blah (1pt)

[David Scott]

Companions are separate from the hero. They die easily. If you turned your grimoire into a companion, you loose the grimoire (that goes for charms as well). So in the example it has it’s own law rune.

Have a look at making a sidekick in HQ2, it’s the same rules in HQG. A descriptor (speedy), it’s species (grimoire), another ability or keyword (law rune), one at 17, two at 13, then 15.

[David Scott]

for your scroll tube companion, it needs to follow the standard rules too:

A descriptor, it’s species, another ability or keyword

Bert the debating Grimoire of (type of death magic)

Death rune
(Death) Grimoire of (type of death magic)
     spells
     spells
     spells
Debating

You don’t need to have the Death rune, but your companion could augment with it. Or you could have scroll tube that looks like. Or both, spending some of you 15 points on an ability.

This type of companion is actually a LM allied spirit, as it has the sorcerer spirit in it.

[Robin Mitra]

@David Scott: Thanks for clarifying the grimoire rules to me.

[Author]

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