Chaosium has released three Cults of RuneQuest volumes out of a prospective ten. Last week (and the week before) we explored the latest volumes’ content. Now what? How might players, gamemasters, and creators utilize and engage with the bevy of new myths, cultures, and powers presented in these works? That’s what we’ll explore today.
As someone invested in RuneQuest as a gamemaster and a writer, I’ll be focusing here on those perspectives. I also believe that player use of the Cults books is pretty straightforward—check out a god you think sounds cool, and initiate your adventurer! (Or roll up a new one.) I advise gamemasters that if an excited player wants to initiate into a second cult, don’t sweat the compatibility too much. I’ve fooled around with enough gonzo cult stuff in my games that I’m confident feeding into player excitement about new options is a recipe for fun.
Note that my goal is to take off my critic or reviewer’s hat today. Further down I’ll be discussing my design approach to cults compared to Chaosium’s, but I do want to emphasize that this isn’t meant to imply that Chaosium somehow designed cults “wrong.” I think these differences in perspective are interesting and worth discussing, but not negative.
Oh, if you want to hear more of me babbling about cults and design, I was on the God Learners podcast recently! You can check it out here. Chatting about cults with Ludo and Joerg was loads of fun, so if you find this article interesting it’s worth giving a listen.
Gamemastering Cults
The amount of information in Cults of RuneQuest can feel overwhelming, even for experienced gamemasters. When I’m toying around with Glorantha material I try to keep at the front of my mind not what’s been written about a cult, but rather the core values of their Runes. I find the adventurer creation section of the core rules really helpful in this because it’s a bit more straightforward than the Runes summaries (such as those in the Starter Set handouts). This is especially true when improvising new cults at the table! For example, I may not have time to check the cult of Odayla’s section on likes and dislikes during a game, but I know they are Air and Beast—that makes the Odaylan hunter my players bumped into boisterous and crude, violent and antisocial, or some similar combination of traits. At the social level, Air helps explain (or justify) why most Orlanthi males have a violent streak, and Earth describes why the Esrolian Grandmothers are viciously pragmatic.
The campaign Six Seasons in Sartar is the paradigmatic example of “start small, grow big” for RuneQuest. I think this is great advice for introducing the setting, but when it comes to cults I actually prefer to start big, then grow small. Or perhaps grow specific. The Runes are our “big picture” traits and relationships, while the cult writeups are our enriching details.
If the Runes are our picture from 100,000 feet, then these cult writeups are from, say, 1,000 feet. Cults of RuneQuest isn’t saying that every single Sartarite clan worships these gods the exact same way. Rather, it’s like we’re looking at a masterpiece landscape oil painting. There’s loads of detail, but if we actually walked up to the depicted farmhouse we’d surely find something inside. That might be something we expected based on the painting, or it could be something new!
Glorantha’s cultural relativism doesn’t just give the gamemaster space to invent new magic, customs, cults, etc. It also gives the gamemasters space to forget and improvise. I think anxiety about forgetting details of the setting is one of the hurdles for RuneQuest gamemasters. Playing into this relativism, in my opinion, is more true for the setting, not less.
For inspiring ideas for adventure, I recommend skimming the “Nature of the Cult,” “Organization,” and “Miscellaneous Notes” sections. The five Lightbringer cults in particular are chock-full with details about how their worshipers participate in society. As a basic principle, any time I see a writeup say “worshipers do such-and-such,” I try imagining how I can turn not being able to do such-and-such into an exciting adventure. This same process can help set up difficult roleplaying decisions. If a player’s cult wants them to act one way, but their Passions, family members, metagame motives, etc. want them to act another, that’s fun!
I mean, it’s excruciating if you’re the player, but it’s great fun for the gamemaster and the rest of the table.
As an example, the cult of Orlanth says that his Storm Voices are required to eat an egg once per week as a “screw you” to Yelm, the Sun God. I love this exemplar of a small detail which connects player actions all the way up the ladder to relationships between the Runes.
Now, what if a local Storm Voice can’t find any eggs? Kind of unlikely; I tend to think finding an egg shouldn’t be difficult in an agricultural society with chickens. Maybe there’s a curse in the area preventing chickens from laying? Well, if that’s the case this is a larger problem than just the Storm Voice. Perhaps his need is just the first symptom noticed? Now, messing with agriculture is pretty severe, in how I imagine Glorantha. On Earth we tend to take food for granted. I have no clue how long it’s been since the industrialized world has experienced famine, but Gloranthans are much closer to their source of calories than us. My perspective is that baddies who tax, rob, stab, bully, vandalize, etc. provoke anger, but spreading pestilence or messing with agriculture is an existential threat. So depending on what exactly is going on with these eggs, the adventure could have some major consequences.
Well, that blew up beyond proportion. But I think this example still makes my point about how the gamemaster should try dredging up details to inspire adventures.
A last useful topic to note on, I think, is cult spirits. For gamemasters whose players want to summon and command the listed spirits with their common Rune magic, I recommend the following guidelines:
| Summon Cost | Spirit’s POW | Spirit’s CHA | Spirit Magic | Rune Magic |
| 1 | 2D6 | D6 | D3–1 points | None |
| 2 | 3D6 | 2D6 | D6+3 points | 1 point |
| 3 | 3D6+6 | 3D6 | Full CHA | D3 points |
In my Glorantha, the common spell Summon Cult Spirit is used to call on a spirit of the cult which happens to be in the area. There’s a sense of “right location” as a requirement for the spell to be useful. In some cases, nothing comes. In general, these spirits are weaker and more random than when an adventurer summons a specific spirit on purpose. Their magic is usually similar to the cult’s spells, but they might have a unique spirit ability like those described in the Glorantha Bestiary.
I see the difference between “Summon Cult Spirit” and “Summon Earth Elemental” to be that the adventurer sacrifices POW to learn a specific spell which summons a specific spirit, however far away the adventurer is from that spirit’s home. I allow adventurers to sacrifice for unlisted types of specific spirit, too, though it doesn’t come up a lot. For example, an Issaries merchant might sacrifice to learn Summon Road Spirit so that they can always call on that cult spirit. This spirit’s usefulness might be pretty situational, depending on its size. A 1-point spirit might just be able to teach the spell Mobility, but a 3-point spirit (with sufficient Extension) perhaps can speed adventurers cross-country as though upon a good road! The adventurer can’t use Summon Road Spirit to summon and negotiate with a local road spirit—rather, Issaries has provided them with a magical connection to this specific entity.
Overall, I really want to emphasize that gamemasters shouldn’t try to memorize the Cults books. That way lies madness. (Ignore that I’m bad at following that advice; my justification is that I write, but I am wrong.) Let your players memorize their own cults. Instead, start with skimming the books for practical use in actual games. Trust me, the more you play and utilize the material, the more you’ll internalize over time.
Looking for high-powered NPCs to compliment your new cults? Check out the Monster of the Month series on the Jonstown Compendium! Volume 2 includes six fully-detailed Rune Masters including retinues, cult spirits, and magic items. Get 10% off when you pick up the bundle!
Designing cults
Skimming over my cult of Hrunda the Monkey God in To Hunt a God and comparing it to the new releases, it’s clear to me that my design approach differs from Chaosium. I also noticed while reading Cults of RuneQuest some open spaces for myself or fellow creators to further explore and detail Glorantha. As I said earlier, this isn’t a “critic hat” day; I’m not trying to propose whether or not Chaosium should have dug into these spaces.
On design perspective, I noticed that Chaosium makes less use of subcults than I, and that I’m more inclined toward “cool character sheet” stuff. For example, Hrunda has three focal subcults (Fruitful, Protector, Sanguineous), and a few more which are less prominent (like Monkey-father, for ancestor worship of the Monkey God). Each subcult emphasizes an aspect of the god’s mythology, and usually connects this with a type of magic available to worshipers. In contrast, a minor god in Cults (like Valind) usually just has subcult entries for cult spirits and a spirit of reprisal. Most additional subcults include “character sheet” stuff, but not always (as in the case of many Hero subcults). I also found it interesting how infrequently Cults mentioned cult Heroes outside the main Lightbringers. Again by contrast, I’m inclined to think that such Heroes are moderately prominent in any Gloranthan religion.
By being less granular than I, Chaosium’s cults are more flexible for the gamemaster. It’s easier to add a subcult that provides additional detail or a new ability, because there’s open space. For example, I would probably have written Mastakos as two subcults: one as Charioteer, and another as Mutable, reflecting how Mastakos expresses different aspects of the Movement Rune whether he is worshiped by the Orlanthi or by merfolk. My point of comparison here is Orlanth Adventurous and Orlanth Thunderous, where different functions of the god are worshiped in different ways. Both methods of design work.
I tend to think about “cool character sheet stuff” when designing cults because that tends to get my players excited to adventure. Joining a new subcult or spirit cult, getting enough POW to sacrifice for an enchantment, etc. all have the positive behavioral reinforcement that “leveling up” does in games like Dungeons & Dragons. As a RuneQuest player, gamemaster, and writer, I find this cycle plays into the skill-based system’s strength of open potential for character options. I love RuneQuest-style games because over time, a character conceivably can learn to do anything. That freedom is awesome.
In contrast, Chaosium’s cult design focuses on player options which exist only partly on the “character sheet.” This is where the worldbuilding, setting detail, and social activity intersect with the game. They provide roleplay options for the player to explore their adventurer’s Passions and conflicts. It’s a type of game design which emphasizes that classic question, “What would my character do?”
Of course every game, supplement, and even each table is going to navigate to what extent it delves into these ways of playing the game. I wouldn’t even say that these are a spectrum—you absolutely can play games which dig deeply into both narrative roleplay and use of cool character abilities. Personally, I like to think I strive for a balance as a designer (though as a player, I am a horrible “give me magic” goblin).
As a designer, I find the mixture of detail and openness in Cults enabling. I’m optimistic that the Jonstown Compendium will continue diverging from Chaosium’s work in interesting ways. Just as the Compendium really is the place to go if you want RuneQuest adventures, I hope work emphasizing the local and the weird will make it the place to go for cool details. Not that it doesn’t already have cool divergent Gloranthan mythology (like The Voralans). I just want more!
There’s a variety of design spaces I can see myself exploring. My mental image here is “riffing” on Cults like improvising with a guitarist. Some areas include:
- Festivals: How do holy days play out, or go wrong? What might adventurers contribute, or seek out to ensure the ceremony’s success?
- Sacrifices: Making specific offerings at a specific place, for a specific boon (like a lay member offering rare flowers to Uleria to gain +20% to Charm their beloved)
- Myths: How can we add to these stories, discover rare subcults, localized forms of worship, and present those as Rune spells?
- Villainy: How can I create situations in which normal Orlanthi sacred behavior creates conflict? Can I do so without using the Trickster every time?
- Secrets: What secrets can be inferred or invented in the gaps between paragraph lines? How do these secrets impact the adventurers’ options and Passions?
I could probably waffle on for a while, here, iterating freeform on ideas and examples until we wound up with something resembling an outline. (Big chunk of the creative process for me.) This openness makes me excited to keep creating for RuneQuest. I hope it excites you, too.
Until next time, then.
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