Rediscovering Glorantha

The cover of the current edition of the book.

The first RPG that I ever read and played was the boxed edition of RuneQuest, upon which box was the image of a female warrior having her shield torn asunder by the teeth of a large lizard-like creature. This is an image that, for me, was formative in my learning to roleplay. It was also, of course, an image from Glorantha.

Glorantha is the mythic fantasy world of Greg Stafford which was largely associated with the RuneQuest brand. Of course, all these years on, Glorantha is now under license to Moon Design Publications and supported by both the new edition of RuneQuest (which I still need to finish reading) and HeroQuest.

It is in this latter form that I have re-discovered my love for place.

Inspirational

Glorantha is, to but it simply, inspiring. As fantasy settings go it is the only one besides Middle-earth that is as fully realised and completely believable. It is a raw and visceral world, a mythical world... a place of many wonders.

Glorantha is also so detailed that, for me at least, it always seemed too much work to understand it. Until now.

The mood and style of the world, with its weird Ducks and Apple Lane, has been (I now realise) a large part of the inspiration for my own dark world of Mykovnia.

So what?

Well... it's been a long time since I allowed myself the time and bother to read another fantasy setting. Yet, reading the excellent 'Sartar' sourcebook from Moon Design, I've felt myself drawn back into the wondrous world that is Glorantha.

There is something about the idea of creating a hero from scratch, including designing their clan, using narrative tools such as HeroQuest's excellent Sartar questionnaire, that really peaks my interest.

The sheer richness of the narrative, the inclusion of a ready-made campaign arc, and the overwhelming depth of a setting that has been around gaming circles since 1966 is just... intoxicating.

I'd dearly love to either run or (even better, perhaps) play in a Gloranthan saga. I'm just so glad that I've taken the shrink-wrap off those books I bought two or so years ago and finally read them. I'm also excited by the new Kickstarter for the Guide to Glorantha!

Game on!