The truth is that allergies and heat are still being very unkind to the rare Ballard Spotted Bruce, but I have something in hand I want to enthuse about anyway: The Book of Glorious Joy, written by Jamie Revell. I’ve had this in proof form for a while now, and am delighted that it’s finally for sale; 176 pages long, $15 US at Drive Thru.
This is a book about the Malkioni kingdoms at the west end of Genertela, in the world of Glorantha. It’s the same continent as Sartar: Kingdom of Heroes and many books and sundry rules before this, but a really different kind of culture. Nothing passes into Glorantha unchanged from its terrestrial inspirations, but you can think of the Malkioni lands as what would happen if European feudalism and chivalry were fused with Hellenistic philosophy instead of Christianity.
All the Western lands agree that that there is a single true God, invisible and utterly beyond human comprehension, who alone is worthy of worship. They believe things like this:
- Makan is the name for God when He performed the First Action and separated matter from energy, thus bringing the universe into being. Makan is the One Mind, omniscient and perfectly logical. The Abiding Book was the first to teach of the means to contact and venerate this primal form of God. Today, the Rokari are the largest sect to offer Makan direct veneration. Many other sects, while acknowledging this as the purest understanding of God, regard it as too remote and powerful to be truly understood by mortals, and that those who venerate it will therefore inevitably fall into Error, as the God Learners did.
- Ferbrith is the name for God when He performed the Second Action, when He separated shapes from principles, and thus gave form to the runes and created the Saint Plane. Hrestol was the first to teach of how to contact the Saint Plane and gain magic from this understanding of God. The Orthodox Hrestoli Church, of the Castle Coast in Seshnela, is the largest surviving sect to venerate this aspect of God above all others. It acknowledges a large number of saints, and teaches their magic.
- God was called Kiona when He performed the Third Action, multiplying the runes to create the elements and powers, to create the Adept Plane and initiate the Green Age. It is from this understanding that wizards gain most of their power, for it is the source of the grimoires and spells that they use. The largest Churches to focus primarily on this understanding of God are found beyond Genertela, such as the Sedalpist Church of Umathela.
- As Ordelvis, God performed the Fourth Action and completed the creation of the physical world, populating it with humans, animals, plants, geographical features, and everything else which we see around us today. This began the Golden Age during which everything was perfect and idyllic. Ordelvis is the source of at least some of the folk magic of the West, and thus is venerated through the various folk religions of the region.
- The Fifth Action is decay, disintegration and doom. Through this action, Hell was created and the Darkness began. At this time, many Churches claim that Malkion the Prophet was an emanation of the mind of the God made flesh. Others, such as the Rokari, claim that he was a mortal human divinely inspired to bring His message to the world.
More practically, they also believe that there are four social categories that encompass everything that’s right for people to do: commoner, knight, wizard, and noble. And this is where it gets fun.
The Rokari branch of the faith teaches this in the way you’d expect, as a rigorous caste system vigorously enforced. You are what your parents were, and that’s the end of it. (Well, almost the end of it. Wizards are celibate, so they go scour the countryside every so often for children of the other castes with magical aptitude.) It’s the society many gamers imagine all of medieval Europe to have been, with the higher castes having absolute power over the lower ones, tight restraints on what each caste can eat, wear, do for work, etc., harshly sexist restrictions on women in all castes, and so on.
But then there’s the Idealist Hrestoli Church. They place some special emphasis on the Second Action described above, for starters:
Joy of the Heart is a personal experience of the love of God. Whereas the regular religious services practiced since before the Dawn allow worshippers to experience the majesty and power of Kiona, the God of the Third Action, Joy reaches further, and connects with Ferbrith, the highest form of God of which humans can have direct experience. The experience is indescribable to those who have not felt it, a sense of rapturous bliss and of the all-encompassing love that God has for his creation. Once felt, it is never truly forgotten, and brings the worshipper into a new harmony with Creation.
Joy does not require the intercession of a clergyman, although clergy can ease the path towards Joy, helping to bridge the wide gap between the mortal world and the Second Action. In practice, therefore, most Idealists experience Joy during their religious services, or at the culmination of major heroquests. However, those who have closed their hearts to the possibility of personal communion with God are unable to experience Joy of the Heart, so that the Know Joy blessing has no effect upon them.
And they approach the social classes differently: everybody starts at the bottom and has to earn their way up. Yes, the Kingdom of Loskalm is a century into a visionary experiment that’s actually working pretty well.
Children of all classes grow up with their parents until age 12. Commoners are free to stay as they are, and have a lot of formal and actual protection:
In return for their loyalty, hard work, and payment of taxes, commoners share the same privileges as any other Loskalmi citizen, including the right to government representation, and a fair trial. Many commoners also spend a small proportion of their time training with the local militia, which is mobilized only in defense of the nation.
Most commoners never choose to leave their class. They can become powerful and surprisingly influential as merchants, liturgists, guildmasters, or any of a number of other roles. The knights protect them, and barring a national emergency, they will never have to fight – and possibly die – in battle. For those that wish to advance to knighthood themselves, however, there is only one route: they must serve in the military.
And from there on up it’s a matter of service in the class below:
All knights are promoted from the ranks on the basis of merit, although even eighty years of Siglat’s Dream have not quite destroyed the upper class ideals of the officer’s corps, so that a candidate whose own parents were knights, and who is knowledgeable about the proper forms of etiquette and behavior, may find promotion somewhat easier.
and
The majority of the wizards in Loskalm serve as religious functionaries, who sustain the spiritual needs of the nation by acting as religious guides and teachers. Most of these wizards work at cathedrals, universities, and smaller places of worship, but a number serve as administrators in the Loskalmi government, supporting the nobility in the day to day running of the nation. A number of wizards fulfill quite a different role, as the Wizard-knights of the Royal Loskalmi Army, highly trained in both magic and combat.
Only exemplary examples of Hrestoli knighthood are able to become wizards. Knights compete at tournaments of chivalry for the right to be ordained as wizards, and must demonstrate basic competency at the various academic skills that will be required in their new profession. The Church, Army, or government provides for wizards’ upkeep in a style appropriate to their high station.
and finally
Nobles form the highest class in Loskalmi society, and are more severely restricted in number than members of lower classes, for each has a specific function within the nation’s hierarchy. Nobles are of three types: the Lords Military act as the commanders and generals in the Royal Loskalmi Army, the Lords Spiritual as leaders within the Church, and the Lords Temporal hold the highest offices of the secular government. Each lord has a specific liege to whom he swears personal loyalty, although the good of the nation should outweigh all other considerations in his mind.
The investiture of a new noble is an event of considerable pomp and ceremony, and a cause for celebration throughout the newly assigned domain. Tax revenues pay for the homes, goods, and regalia of the nobility, which are always of the highest standard available. Promotion through the ranks of the nobility is in the hands of the Watchdog Council, and is usually a slow process.
Jamie’s done a really good job here balancing utopian and practical concerns. This is all pretty idealistic, but it comes back by good thought about what sorts of civil service you’d need to administer it, what the factions that inevitably form around major social issues do for and against the existing order, and on and on. A good example of this is in the way he handles the situation of Loskalmi women:
Traditionally, like other Malkioni, the Loskalmi believed that women were more refined and perfect creations than men, and so spared them the rigors of crude labor and the perils of combat. But, since the dawning of Siglat’s Dream, many have recognized that some women, at least, can best serve their country as warriors, or in similar roles. The current situation blends elements of both the old traditions and the newer egalitarian beliefs.
While women born to commoners live alongside their brothers, high class parents do not send their daughters to work in the fields, but raise them as honorary members of their own class. When a woman eventually marries, she takes the social class of her husband, but otherwise, she retains that of her parents. In either case, this is a titular rank carrying few responsibilities beyond acting in a manner appropriate to her station.
However, many Loskalmi women enlist in the army and start on the road to social advancement through their own merit. Ironically, this is often easier for the daughters of farmers, who have had plenty of opportunity to learn the requisite commoner class skills, than it is for more sheltered upper class women. In practice, most women who serve in the army do so as healers, or in similar non-combatant support roles, but this is by no means mandatory, and a number of female foot soldiers do exist. Such women can attain any rank or social class to which their ability entitles them. The husband of such a woman gains honorary rank as a member of her social class if it is higher than his own, but must still pass through all the requisite stages to gain promotion in his own right. For instance, if a commoner marries a female knight, he must still earn his way through the soldier and knight classes if he wishes to become a wizard.
It works—for me, at least—precisely because it’s not perfect, just pretty good. The artwork back it up, showing women as alert and prepared for whatever it is they’re doing as the men, confident and clearly not just hanging around being wank fodder. The gazetteer part of the book has women and men in about equal numbers, some of the women in relatively conventional roles, others up to the kind of individualistic weirdness that epic hero questers get into, some in between these poles.
What it boils down to is this: The Kingdom of Loskalm is a fun, appealing place, not perfect, full of things that heroes should and could improve, and full of opportunity for them to do so. I have a feeling this is going to become my new starting point for thinking about fantasy settings when I don’t have anything more specific/other in mind.
This book is also very much worth a look for readers interested in how HeroQuest can handle magic in styles closer to fantasy gaming norms than Orlanthi shamanism and all. It’s compact, but clear and useful, a mix of abilities covering individual spells and rituals and ones covering whole categories of working, and neat handling of grimoires as matters of both liturgy and scholarship, since priesthood and magic are inseparable for the followers of Malkion’s revelations. There are example cults for a bunch of saints and doctrinal divisions, and really good guidelines on making more to suit a particular campaign.
I will probably come back to this after I’ve had a chance to use it more. (I’m thinking about using it as character background for an experiment combining HeroQuest and the Mythic GM Emulator.) But as I hope this burbling conveys, I love this book and recommend it very highly.
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You like the Mythic Emulator then. Hm.