HeroQuest Glorantha System and Other Settings

[Mark Jones]

Would it be possible to use HeroQuest Glorantha to run games in other settings? Primarily I am looking at TDM’s Mythic Britain.

I favour story based rpgs and HeroQuest sounds ideal. Only issue I can see is marrying the HQG rules to the setting’s magic systems. I don’t know for sure but I assume Mythic Britain will have theism, animism, folk magic and possibly some sorcery.

Anyway, how easy would it be to use HQG for other settings, be they published or homebrew, the rules themselves seem pretty malleable, but I guess it’s all down to what magic is used?

Thanks all

[boztakang]

HQ-G really IS HQ2 with just a few simplifications and tweaks, and setting-specific examples. (not to sell it short – the setting info is well worth the price of admittance, and the tweaks, though mostly minor, are good ones IMO)

I don’t imagine any difficulty at all using it in whatever setting you like… just skip the “pick your runes” part of character creation (or swap it out for some other setting-specific ability keywords, like “character class” or political factions or whatever seems to make sense) and away you go!

You don’t really need to use the “magic systems” at all, if they do not mesh in an obvious way with your desired setting. Magic can just as easily be handled as regular keywords or abilities, so long as the players and GM all understand the conventions of the setting and the tone of the game you want to run.

HeroQuest is an immensely forgiving and malleable system.
(i’m not familiar with the details of the Mythic Britain setting, or i’d offer more specific advice)

[Mark Jones]

Thanks for the info boztakang

I should have said, I’m also very interested in Glorantha and most definitely want to use HQG as my starting point to get into the setting. Over 30 years roleplaying, not quite 30 minutes reading about Glorantha 🙂

Mythic Britain is an awesome looking product by the designers of RuneQuest 6. It’s 5th century Britain, full of celts and druids and misty forests! I love the RQ6 rules but they are just too crunchy for me; I really prefer narrative systems that let me forego things like initiative and rounds when I want to, but also enable me to resolve entire combats with the roll of a dice or two if I want that. For example, one attack and one defend roll. This is another big reason I am looking forward to HQG

Do we have an ETA? Before Christmas?

[Mark Jones]

Also, are the following products fully compatible with HQG?

Borderlands and Beyond – by Moon Design
Glorantha Adventures 1 – by D101 Games
Griffin Mountain – by Moon Design
Pavis and Big Rubble – by Moon Design
Sartar Companion – by Issaries
Sartar: Kingdom of Heroes – by Issaries

[boztakang]

If you ignore the stat blocks, anything at all becomes “fully compatible with HQ:G” 🙂

The Sartar books, and “Pavis, Gateway to Adventure” are written from scratch for HQ (meaning, basically, almost no rules cruft at all) – check the “shop” link on this page. The older “pavis and big rubble” version has RQ(2/3) stats included, but that isn’t really a big impediment for using it with HQ – just ignore the stats and specific spells, and figure out what the real “challenge” is for each encounter, and improvise from there.

The ETA on HQ:G is as soon as layout can be completed, which I’m am confident Rick is working on as quick as he can, but it is a lot of work, and takes time. I’m sure there will be an update here when they have new info. Hopefully before christmas, but it’ll be a close thing at this point…

[Mark Jones]

Thanks again for the info, much appreciated

Hopefully Moon Design will be bringing out new Glorantha stuff specifically for HQG. But as you implied, it’s not difficult to convert what’s already out there because HQG is very user friendly when it comes to other system/settings

[David Cake]

To be honest, good as HeroQuest Glorantha will be, I think it would be easier to take the generic HeroQuest 2 rules if you want to run in a setting that doesn’t have runes. The one or two tweaks that HQ 2 adds outside the magic system and character creation are quite small (and can be adopted without using HQG character creation and magic) easily).

[Mark Jones]

Will there be a list detailing all the little changes?

[Mark Jones]

If I download the Guide to Glorantha pdf today, will I have unlimited continued access to download it at a later date if, for example, the product gets revised for errata updates or similar?

[Harald Smith]

As others have noted, HQ Glorantha is HQ2 with Glorantha specifics, a lot of nice examples, and a few very minor rule tweaks (change from low roll to high roll winning a resolution being the main one).

Fully possible to play HQ is non-Glorantha settings. For an example (and not that far off from what you’re thinking for Mythic Britain) see the Mythic Russia setting at: http://mythicrussia.wordpress.com/about/

I recently took an old RQ scenario and brought into my Sartar-based campaign. While you can use stat blocks to see what abilities to emphasize for a given character, you can largely ignore them. HQ really just draws on the scenario interactions.

HQ probably doesn’t suit those who are really into number crunching, gory, see where each blow lands type of games. It is excellent for those who like a more narrative, story-telling style.

[David Scott]

This thread over at RPG.net matbe of interest:
http://forum.rpg.net/showthread.php?740480-HeroQuest-Glorantha-Any-spoilers-for-the-soon-to-appear-version-2-1-of-HeroQuest

here’s my list of changes from the thread, you may also like to take a look at Newt’s excellent review:
http://heartsinglorantha.d101games.com/2014/11/09/heroquest-glorantha-preview/

—

As one of the writers for HeroQuest Glorantha, it’s more about expansion rather than change. The rules themselves have changed very little and you can continue using HQ2 with little or no work. From memory here are the basic changes:

• High roll wins is the default rule rather than an option.
• Minor change in difficulty levels – very high is +W not +9
• Minor change in Base value table session increments
• As you go is the default system for character creation

Terminology has has also changed, but that’s not so important (I can’t now remember most of them 🙂

• Narrator becomes Games Master
• Benefits of Victory
• Consequences of Defeat

The real meat is the that the magic systems are all in one place and complete:

• Rune Magic (theism) from Sartar KoH has been edited for clarity.
• Spirit Magic has overhauled completely based on the work I’ve done for the Prax book.
• Sorcery from Pavis: GtA has been tweaked and updated. It reflects the Xeotam Dialogues. A minor rules change is that Grimoires are the breakout and their spells have no value (taking of course the grimoires breakout value).eg

Law Rune 5W
(water) Debaldan Grimoire: this grimoire contains spells pertaining to the seas and water vessels. +1
(water, harmony) Calm Waters combines Water with Harmony to calm the waters within earshot of the caster, making its surface placid.

• Lunar Magic from Pavis has been edited for clarity. The mechanics have been completed and the New Gods added.
• There is no mysticism magic system obviously.

Background

• Cultures have been expanded. You can now play Sartarites, Esrolians, Praxians and Lunars.
• Cults have been broadened to reflect the wider area covered. Their rune descriptions edited to reflect this.
• Mixed magic systems are detailed (Waha).
• This not not replace previous HQ2 cult writeups as those are area specific.

Other stuff

• Examples are all Gloranthan.
• Has a bestiary
• Has heroquest examples
• Has a cool adventure that is adaptable to the cultures presents that contains a heroquest.

Here’s the basic ToC for the GenCon preview (unedited and just cut and pasted):

Introduction 4
The World of Glorantha 7
The Runes 10
Dragon Pass and Environs 14
Timeline for the Dragon Pass Region 22
Creating Your Hero 23
Create a Hero As-You-Go 24
Game Mechanics 41
Rules for Contests 45
Simple Contest 45
Consequences 47
Group Simple Contest 51
Extended Contests 54
Group Extended Contests 59
Samastina’s Saga: The Battle of Auroch Hills 63
Tactical Options 74
Hero Points 78
Recovery and Healing 79
Running Contests 80
Assigning Difficulty 85
The Pass/Fail Cycle 88
Gloranthan Communities 91
Gaming Tips 98
Magic and Cults 100
Basic Magic 102
Spirit Magic 102
The Praxian Tradition 105
Rune Magic 107
Ernalda 113
Orlanth 116
The Seven Lightbringers 120
Issaries 121
Humakt 124
Waha 128
Sorcery 132
Lhankor Mhy 135
Lunar Magic 139
The Seven Mothers 145
Heroquesting 149
Types of Heroquests 155
Gloranthan Creatures 157
Elder Races 157
Lesser Elder Races 159
Animals 161
Monsters 162
Spirits 163
Chaos Horrors 164
Gaming in Glorantha 167
Sample Adventure Theme 169
Appendixes 176
Appendix A: Calendar 176
Appendix B: Equipment 178
Appendix C: Languages in the Dragon Pass Region 182
Appendix D: Glossary 183
Appendix E: Bibliography 185
Appendix F: Other Gloranthan material 186
Appendix G: Quick Reference

[Mark Jones]

Very interesting

So if I download the Guide to Glorantha pdf today from Moon Design’s store, will I have unlimited continued access to download it at a later date if, for example, the product gets revised for errata updates or similar?

[Phil Nicholls]

Hi David,

Thank you for your extensive list of changes to HQ2. It is good to know how much, or how little, is actually changing.

The more I hear, the more I want a copy!

As for the wider issue of adapting other systems to HQ2, I have never found it difficult. Simply treat any descriptive text as as example of the 100 word character creation method, highlight the salient phrases and use those as abilities. This is so simple, yet effective.

Best of luck with Mythic Britain, Mark.
Phil

[Mark Jones]

Thanks for that David; looking forward to running some Mythic Britain

Sorry to keep banging this drum but, if I download the Guide to Glorantha pdf today from Moon Design’s store, will I have unlimited continued access to download it at a later date if, for example, the product gets revised for errata updates or similar?

[David Scott]

Mark (@spartan), if you bought your PDF as a registered user not a guest, you can always download it again via your account. This is pretty standard across most PDF stores (in my experience). As for updates and errata: The only real changes that have happened were for Sartar and it’s companion – the covers changed and there were minor text changes, where errors were found. PDF buyers could download the update, as I mentioned. This hasn’t really happened with any other product. As for errata, it’s our intention to put it on this site when we can under the relevant section. e.g:

http://www.glorantha.com/docs/products-2/
and for example
http://www.glorantha.com/docs/sartar-kingdom-of-heroes/

Most of the products don’t have errata as we haven’t found any (spelling and grammar aside).
The Guide is new and huge, so expect to see some at some point.

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