The Chaosium Con UK 2025 write-up (Part 2)

In the first part of my write-up I told everything I did at the Chaosium Con UK 2025 from the day I arrived until Saturday morning and the panel "What's new with RuneQuest?". Below you can read all I did from that point until the end of the con on Sunday night! With more Glorantha, more RuneQuest, more new games I had the opportunity to play, like Age of Vikings, QuestWorlds, and Lords of the Middle Sea, and more interesting people I met and talked to! Let the games continue! :-)

My badge with the two RuneQuest flags hanging below

Saturday 24th (continued)

10:00 - I played an Age of Vikings demo game run by Carol. The GM had the table set with lots of Viking runes, and even wooden figurines of Viking gods! Diana Probst (author of many JC publications such as The Dregs of Clearwine and Sacred Earth, Sacred Water) role-played her character for around 10 minutes before her head was brutally gored by a crazy ox (her character's, not Diana's!). She had previously told the GM she had to leave early, so they had both actually arranged that PC's horrible death in advance! Haha, at the time I thought it was for real, so I felt totally sorry for her! We kept playing with Mark and John, and learning more about this awesome game set in Iceland. I chose one of the pregens called Njáll Þórólfsson, because Njáls Saga is the only Icelandic saga I've read so far, and I enjoyed it. Although, of course, this was a different Njáll: a towering, honourable fisherman skilled in sword and shield.

The table where I played my first game of Age of Vikings, filled with runes, Viking gods, and cool characters.

The rules are pretty similar to the ones in RuneQuest, with passions and augments. I liked that characters have 3 favoured gods and goddesses they can automatically get inspiration from in order to increase their chances in a skill roll, if appropriate. For example, my character was devoted to Heimdallur, god of duty, protection, and vigilance, so in a situation in which these topics where relevant, such as in trying to perceive hidden enemies, I could get inspired by the god to get a +20 to my Spot hidden skill once. The rules for the Viking rune magic also looked interesting, as one of the other players played a character who could use it (Þrymur), and he did it by actually carving specific runes on an item. You can also sacrifice points of POW called Wyrd in order to turn failed rolls into successes, and the fact it is so costly will no doubt make this a last-resource mechanic. The demo game was a short, but interesting investigation, with magic, guilt, and some creatures of the Viking folklore involved. After the game, Carol told us how much she was into Viking history, reenactments, and culture, and also recommended the Contingency Con that takes place every year in January.

BTW, I could not attend the seminar on Sunday "Basic Roleplaying - Age of Vikings - What's new in BRP" that Jason Durall and others hosted, but on the BRP Central Forum Jason Durall posted that the first supplement for Age of Vikings will be the Companion, and after that the GM screen. As of June 11th the Age of Vikings Companion is "nearing the end of editing and art direction", and it will include the following:

• Cover also by Ossi Hiekkala (they showed it at the seminar, but alas, I wasn't there to take a picture)
• Creation rules for heroes from other places other than Iceland 
• Playing non-human heroes such as hidden folk, sealskins, jotunn, dwarfs, and ravens 
• Revised devotion abilities (the allegiance system from the previous edition has been revised and associated divine abilities will be compatible with the new Devotions and dedication point system) and rules for being godless or converting to Christianity
• Community creation rules 
• A greatly expanded bestiary with creatures from Iceland, elsewhere, and a large range of human NPCs
• Several standalone adventures and a four-part campaign 

12:00 - Time to buy things:

I went to the Artists' Atrium and bought some things from Daniel Barker's stand. He had prints of many of the art pieces he did for Tales of the Reaching Moon and other publications from the 90s, but he also had excellently crafted Gloranthan bank notes I could not help buy as a gift for a friend. I then went to the store Chaosium had set up, and bought some of the thinnest books I could find on the Jonstown Compendium, as my backpack only allowed those. But hey, fortunately one of these was a limited preview edition of Rhigos: Kulyanan's Tale by Martin Helsdon! I also bought some RuneQuest dice for a friend and me. I would have bought half the store if only I had had more space in my small backpack! For example, the print edition of QuestWorlds, the recently released Age of Vikings corebook, the book on Furthest...

Some of the beautiful books at the Chaosium store at Chaosium Con UK 2025, and the beautiful books I bought.

On my way to the restaurant, I chatted a while with the guys from QuestPortal. They happen to be from Iceland, so they are promoting the Age of Vikings game, among the rest of Chaosium's games you can play in their flexible VTT. Their website also supports Call of Cthulhu, Rivers of London, and soon also RuneQuest. I asked how easy it would be for users to translate the character sheets into other languages, and they showed me it was a piece of cake. They also generously gifted me with a cool set of purple dice! Thank you guys!!!

A picture of an Age of Vikings character as it appears on the QuestPortal virtual tabletop.

Once I reached the bar, I spotted Ludovic and we chatted for a while, then Jonathan Webb joined us, which was great, as he is the author of the campaign set in Sandheart (in the Praxian Sun County) I'm currently running at home. I showed them a picture I had taken of the cover of the new RuneQuest, and we chatted a while about the upcoming alternative edition. I told Jonathan I had devised a murder scenario set in the Sandheart district he had created and he was delighted to hear that.

14:00 - I was excited to play in a QuestWorlds Glorantha game GMed by Matthew Cole, author of the yet unpublished Vistas of New Pavis, and the full 3D-render of the city! The other players were Chris Went, Roy Duffy, Katherine from the Never Mind the Dice Rolls magazine, and Hervé Carteau, whom I also remembered from THE KRAKEN con, although I had never talked to him yet. We found out Matthew is a very meticulous GM, who had a really interesting heroquest scenario laboriously prepared for us. We started by creating our PCs from a template. We were all riverfolk fishermen, and had to help Zola Fel who was trapped in the Underworld. Apparently, a powerful Zola Fel heroquester had fucked up really bad in a previous heroquest, and now the river gods' magic was no longer working! Hervé played a loud-mouthed merchant duck excellently (and he hates ducks!), and was very funny ("Quack! That's what Issaries always says!"). Roy and Kat role-played the twins who were often bickering, which was also really funny, while Chris played a good-hearted, but absent-minded fisher. I played a hard-working fisherman, and assigned to him abilities like "Swim against the current", "Friend of the newtlings", and "Tavern pariah". It was great to be playing QuestWorlds and building most of our characters as we played.

Matthew used customised HeroQuest Glorantha character sheets with some predetermined skills on them. Can you spot the duck?

All through the game, I was amazed at how many little details Matthew had prepared for the game. We had tiny runes we could stick on our character sheets, stickers for the magic items that we would use on our quest, poems for their powers, cards with myths/customs we could introduce into the adventure... All of a sudden, poor Matthew accidentally turned his glass of water on the table, and someone exclaimed: "Of course, what better way to start a Zola Fel heroquest!" to try to cheer him up. Hahaha! I hope he gets to publish his scenario one day, because it is a crazy trip down and up the heroplane. It was a pity he had to rush us through the second half of the scenario in order to get to the end in time, but I had great fun nonetheless. We had to retrieve the "Tarn Bough" from the failed heroquest, which would then allow us to "Become the Rain at the Celestial Rainbow...", but remember: Hide it from the Sky People! And do not become prisoners...!

BTW, at the time I was playing this game, the seminar "What's new with Cthulhu?" was taking place, hosted by Mike Mason, Lynne Hardy, Paul Fricker, and Keris McDonald. They announced the scenario book The Sutra of Pale Leaves - Twin Suns Rising, which is already out and can be played as a campaign, and its following volume Carcosa Manifest, with 4 more scenarios and which will be out later this year. They also announced a new setting for Call of Cthulhu called "Campfire Tales", in which the PCs will be children who are in a summer boyscout camp and have adventures. It will include a rule by which the PCs gain badges that allow them to roll skills with a much better percentage. Finally, they announced they are working on the new edition of the supplement on Innsmouth, and they showed pictures of the 3D map of the coastal town! Have a look at this video for more.

18:00 - I had lunch with Nader, Vas and his friend, while chatting about various topics, such as the games and panels we had attended so far. The food was lovely all through the con, by the way. We even got vanilla ice cream for desserts.

19:00 - RuneQuest game with Andrew Moreton: Harvest Queen

This was the second half of a scenario the GM had run the previous day with a different group of players. I got to play again with Geoff (who played Kallyr, an Orlanthi rune lady, but not the Kallyr you may be thinking!), Dominic Swan (Ulvera, her Ernaldan fiancée), Steve (Griselda Black Axe, a bloodthirsty Babeester Gori), but also with new people like Diecke (who played an armoured bear!), and Rob Marcus (who played Harmast, a Humakti near rune lord status). We went into the Woods of the Dead and killed lots of ghouls, talked to trolls, explored a tower, and killed many Lunar hoplites. It was great to play powerful characters. For example, Yalana Goldhair (the Yelornan mounted warrior I played) had 7 rune points and rode a unicorn. At one point, I spent 4 rune points to cast a powerful Shooting Star spell, and shot 8 flaming arrows dealing 3D6 damage each against a unit of 14 Lunar hoplites. Pity I fumbled my 5th shot and immediately lost my bow, but anyway... The other characters were as powerful or more, particularly the Vingan runelady, and the Odaylan initiate who had transformed himself into a bear for two weeks (a clever character concept)! However, the opposition was obviously on par...

Andrew gave us the character backgrounds so we could choose the character we would like to play

Our mission was to catch a Lunar witch who had tried to kidnap the harvest queen of an Orlanthi clan in Sartar (that had happened in the previous scenario). Her tracks led us to the Woods of the Dead, so in we went! I liked a lot how the GM was really quick at managing combat with lots of enemies. For example, he threw a small horde of 14-16 ghouls against us, and we dealt with them in about two or three rounds of exciting combat. This happened again midway through the adventure as we faced a full unit of Lunar hoplites, and then also at the climax, where we fought the Lunar witch and Brangbane King of the Ghouls mounted on his zombie horse, protected by another horde of 20 ghouls, and 15 more hoplites! The duel between the witch and the Vingan runelady was truly epic, with almost unfathomable amounts of magical armour, and damage. I had to note down the details when the Stormlady dealt 29 damage to the witch's leg, and she immediately fell down, cast Heal Body, and got up again! She eventually was cut down only when she fumbled a parry, and Kallyr dealt 43 points of damage to her abdomen! At the same time, the Humakti faced Brangbane and managed to cut his leg, and then also his horse's back in one brutal blow thanks to his Humakti gifts and powerful sword magic (looots of rune points!). I almost felt bad for our archenemies in the end. xD Haha! I have just remembered another funny scene: when we charged the first unit of Lunar hoplites, one of them fumbled her attack against Steve's Babeester Gori, who then fumbled her parry, and they both got exactly the same result in the fumble table, so they rolled down the hill together for a couple rounds!

My character had 90% in her Lance, Bow, and Fire rune skills.

Afterwards, I spent some time in the bar chatting with Rob Marcus. Wait for it: he's not only the author of The Indagos Bull scenario, but he also created one of the scenarios in the Masks of Pavis original fanzine by Ian Thompson... and his current boss is Jonathan Quaife! (he created the Greydog clan campaign published in the last issues of the Tales of the Reaching Moon magazine). It was great to talk with Rob about the Pavis and Zola Fel valley campaign he's running, and about a hundred many other things with a Guinness in hand.

Sunday 25th

9:00 - After breakfast I headed excitedly to play a RuneQuest game run by Simon Bray (long-time illustrator of HeroQuest books and author of Furthest: Crown Jewel of Lunar Tarsh). That game ("Strange Aberrations") was also set in Furthest, and one of the first things our GM did was to unfold his beautiful full-colour map of Furthest on the table. One of the players was none other than Simon Phipp, whose incredible website dedicated to his high-level Gloranthan campaigns, cults, and material I have been a fan of for many years. He's also the author of many Jonstown Compendium publications about Dorastor, such as Dorastor: Seven Hills, or Secrets of Dorastor, and Secrets of HeroQuesting.

Simon Bray unfolded his detailed map of Furthest and Chaosium's map of Tarsh to introduce us to the setting of the game

Simon Bray's scenario focused on investigating the disappearance of a well-to-do scholar from a noble family. The party leader was Marius, a somewhat horny scribe and private investigator played by Dominic Swan, accompanied by a couple of his bored rich friends (Emilia and Lorilia) played by Neil Edmond and Ray Irving. The rest of the party was hired muscle: Jurus the exgladiator (played by Jon Reed), Nobil, a shady servant (played by Simon Phipp), and Talin the Yelmalian mercenary (played by me!). All characters had their own colour portrait by Simon Bray of course, which was great to better imagine them and their personalities. Each also had their quirks and nice details. For example, my light cavalryman was a veteran who had won many horse races in his youth, but had later been sent to the Risklands right next to Dorastor as punishment for some slight, and now had to take his medicine in secret so as not to cough constantly. His nickname was "Hoarse-Whisperer"! He also had a pet hawk in mindlink who kind of despised him. I loved my character!

Simon's portraits of each character helped enormously in imagining their look and personality

We started by exploring a noble mansion and soon found out that foul experiments had been attempted. We interrogated some philosophers, talked with shopkeepers, found out a bit about entropic alchemy, met the local mafia, and ended up forging a deal that benefitted us all. Well, some of us more than others, but it was good enough! xD I can't tell you more, because Simon Bray plans to publish this scenario and others in an upcoming supplement for his book on Furthest.

Afterwards, I sat down for lunch with Chris Went and Simon Phipp. They told me how they were going to attend the Games Expo UK down in London in just a week's time, although that one is more focused on publishing companies and not so much on playing games. And then in July Continuum Con would take place at the exact same venue as Chaosium Con UK!

14:00 - I hurried to the room where I was going to play one of the VIP games, meaning a game run by a Chaosium author, which cost 25$ extra, but what the heck. Even though I had already met Jason Durall at THE KRAKEN convention in 2018, it was a unique opportunity not only to play in a game run by the guy who put together the Big Golden Book and the new Basic Roleplaying book, but also to try out the new yet-unpublished RPG he is developing: Lords of the Middle Sea!

Jason laid out the map of the world from the old Lords of the Middle Sea wargame, together with a new colour map done specifically for the RPG, and a drawing of the different rooms in the dirigible.

In the scenario "Hard Cargo", we played the crew of the Bella Dama, a dirigible in an post-apocalyptic North-America that was now mostly underwater, and where new nations had been created. The tone was very much like a sci-fi Western. Actually pretty similar to the Firefly TV show, only not in space, but on an airship in a post-apocalyptic version of the Earth. It was pretty cool, and the rules, with passions, a short list of skills, and such, was easy to grasp if you have already any experience with any other BRP game like RuneQuest or Call of Cthulhu. It also has personality traits like in Pendragon, and a rule by which each of the members of the crew has one character they feel is their "best friend", and another one they hate, which produces interesting group dynamics. You can also create the details of your airship. For example, you have to choose a quirk your airship has, and ours had a "puffballs infestation". I sat between Martin Helsdon, who played the resourceful mechanic, and Ludovic Chabant, who played Diego the charismatic captain. The other players were Nader, who played a crazy armed-to-the-teeth nun, and Simon, who played Dr. Chan, who was secretly a deadly ninja with one subtle mutant power. As for me, I chose to play Esmeralda, the rogue pilot, who had secretly fled from a highly patriarchal island nation.

The main side of my character sheet, and the character sheet of our airship!

The crew's job that day involved taking a group of passengers to a rendezvous at a place two days away. We prepared for our trip, roleplayed our characters as if we had been playing them for ages, and had a lot of fun. Obviously, we soon found out our cargo was not precisely easy to carry, and in a short period of time blood was all over the place, and we had to deal with a storm outside and inside our airship. I loved how Jason roleplayed the NPCs, and how the players played their characters. For example, the mechanic manipulated the engine to cause the dirigible to make a sudden turn to catch the baddies unaware so we could get an advantage over them, while Sister Manita and Dr. Chan made a bloody short work of our main enemies! Another highlight for me was when the captain retorted the following line to an unpleasant NPC:

"See Boyd, the difference between you and me is you like to stay in the middle of the storm, while I'm more the type trying we don't go into the storm..."

And right then... Jason narrated how the airship faced the actual storm ahead of us... Brilliant! If they ever make a TV show out of this game, the scriptwriters should definitely include that line in the dialogues! After the game, Jason told us the text of Lords of the Middle Sea is 90% finished, and now he is giving the final touches to the air-land and air-water combat rules. Then it will go into layout and art procuring. After they release the rulebook, the plan is to publish a "companion" volume with additional rules and scenarios. The scenario we played will probably feature in the rulebook!

After the game, Ludovic introduced Pookie to me, the man behind the Reviews from R'lyeh blog. I used the opportunity to ask him how he manages to write so many reviews per month, and he gave me some tips. It was great to chat with him about writing reviews. He even told me he's already preparing something special for his 3000th review!!! We then talked to Neil Robinson, who kindly arranged a short demo of the upcoming Credo! board game by Chris Gidlow later on for us.

18:15 - At the central room in the venue, the Chaosium team gathered all the attendees and made a speech as a closing ceremony. They were delighted the con had managed to attract way more people than they had initially expected, 350 people in total!, so they announced they are going to organise another Chaosium Con UK at the same time next year! Hooray! As a token of appreciation, they told the audience we each could choose one publication that had been left over after the "Issaries Market" event to carry home. At that event, Chaosium's staff and many fans had brought old publications they wanted to sell or barter. But many had been left sitting there on a table. I quickly inspected them and chose a copy of Wyrms Footprints, the compilation of Wyrm's Footnotes articles from the 90s, profusely illustrated by Daniel Barker. Since there were some left over after everyone had made their pick, I also took a copy of the Convulsion 4 fundraiser: a compilation of Gloranthan short stories. There were also many issues of Tales of the Reaching Moon #17 which I already own, a copy of the German box set "Glorantha - Die Götter", and a copy of the German RQ3 scenario Schatten in den Hügeln, which I was very tempted to pick up, but did not.

The Chaosium team gave the closing speech on Sunday evening. Jeff Richard had had to leave on Saturday.

18:50 - After a nice dinner at the restaurant, we got to the room at the appointed time, and Susan O'Brien told us a bit about how to play a game of Credo. In fact, Chaosium had published this board game in 1993, but now they are doing a much nicer edition wonderfully illustrated by Kalin Kadiev. The game mimics the agreements about the core Christian doctrine the bishops convened during the First Council of Nicaea in 325 A.D. As a bishop in that council, your role is to try to get into the core Christian doctrine as many of your faction's beliefs as you can. But beware, random event cards and the rest of the players can foil your plans! Ludovic stayed to play a game, but I had another appointment...

The box and some components of the Credo board game: each player gets a sheet with their "doctrine", with spaces that will be filled by the articles of faith and core beliefs the bishops agree on during the First Council of Nicaea.

19:00 - The big game of Glorantha: The Gods War

Brian Duguid hosted an 8-player game of this board game by Sandy Petersen with huge miniatures. Hervé played the Malkioni faction, Ricardo played the Solar faction, Martin Smart played the Earth faction, Brian played the Storm faction, Thomas Zunder played the Darkness faction, Geoff played the Chaos faction, and Dominic played the Lunar faction, while I got to play the Sea faction. I started on the wrong foot when I made a risky move against the Earth faction, and never recovered. I figured if I had any chance of winning the game I had to take risks early on... but unfortunately it didn't pay off, and I was defeated. Next time, I need to be more conservative during the initial turns and group together many more of my huge monsters before committing to an attack! Anyway, it was great to participate in such a big game of Glorantha: The Gods War, because this game is a show in itself no matter who ends up winning in the end. In my last game at home, the Darkness faction had achieved a resounding victory, but this time it was funny to see how the Solar faction was one of the three best. In the end, it was a very close game between 3 of the factions: the Malkioni empire, the Yelmic celestial armies, and the Lunar forces. Dominic was declared the winner although in 4,5 hours we didn't even get to the middle of the game!!! I suspect the Lunar strategy was to look unmenacing and keep building shrines and temples in a corner of the board!

Yelm managed to get out from Hell quite quickly, and the biggest fights involved the Solar and the Earth factions

23:00 - After the game I spent my time chatting in the bar with Hervé, who told me great and many things about the cons at Castle Bacharach, Greg Stafford, Chimériades, and other stories. Dominic joined us later on, and then also a guy called Francis.

The next day I had breakfast with Ludovic and Hervé, and I again forgot to ask Hervé how the RuneQuest game he had run on Friday had gone...! Ahh, maybe next time! Stuart Morrison kindly gave me a lift to Milton Keynes coach station, and from there to the airport and back home.

What a weekend! In just 3 days I ran one game, played in seven, and one board game! I also played three games I had never played before. Moreover, it was amazing meeting so many people I had only known from Facebook or the BRP forums and blogs so far. And everyone was so friendly and kind!!! Next time, I now know I need to perhaps play a bit less, and spend more time chatting with all the fantastic people there! I honestly recommend everyone to go to one of these cons at some point. Chaosium Con Poland is taking place next October, so... who knows! ;-P

BTW, if you also were at the con, I hope you will share how the games and panels you participated in were, I'm very keen in knowing the details of all the events I missed!

The Chaosium Con UK 2025 write-up (Part 1)

I had an awesome experience at Chaosium Con UK 2025 in Cranfield between May 23rd to 26th. It was the first time the company publishing RuneQuest, Call of Cthulhu, and other games organised its own convention in the UK. Before that, they had only held them in Michigan. This year, however, was different, because 2025 marked Chaosium's 50th anniversary, and as part of the celebrations they decided to hold conventions in other countries around the world, such as Australia, Poland, and the UK. It was a great opportunity to meet some of the authors, get the latest news, and play some of their recently released games, as well as meet other fans like me, so I signed up for it! It also was, in fact, my first time at a convention in the UK! Here you can read all about my experience at the Chaosium Con UK. Read Part 2 here. You may also be interested in reading how hard it was to choose what panels and games to sign up for! :-D

My badge with Chaosium's 50th anniversary pin on top. The art is from the Rivers of London supplement: In Liberty's Shadow.

Thursday 22nd

I landed at Luton airport at midday, and despite a slight delay I had enough time to get on the coach that would take me to Milton Keynes coach station. Once there, I only had to wait 15 minutes before I could take a local bus to get to Cranfield University. This Chaosium Con was held at a convention centre at one end of the campus: the Cranfield Management Development Centre. It is a hotel and a convention centre all in one building, with restaurant, bar, garden, and even gym and indoor swimming-pool. The room was £64 per night (breakfast included), plus £15 for every dinner. Aside from that, the con badge was 60$ for 3 days, or 25$ for just one day. Through the window in my room I had a view of green meadows with grazing sheep and strange black birds. I spent the afternoon preparing some of the character sheets for the RuneQuest game I was running on the next day. At 8 o'clock I went down to the restaurant for dinner, and enjoyed my meal. I could see most of the Chaosium team sharing a table in the restaurant. Since I didn't know anyone, I sat alone, but that would change in the following days! :-)

This was my planning for Chaosium Con UK: a busy schedule!

Friday 23rd

7:50 - The restaurant offered a wide range of juicy dishes for breakfast, and I sat down at a table and immediately started chatting with a guy from Scotland. We were then joined by 3 other gamers and chatted about different topics. A guy named Adan had been to Gen Con in Minneapolis some years ago and said it was almost too huge, but also totally worth it, and had visited Chicago after that. Nader then said he had been to Gen Con almost every year (as he used to live close by), and also recommended going.

8:55 - I looked for the room where the 1st round of the RuneQuest Tournament was going to take place. On my way there I met Nick Brooke, introduced myself, and he kindly gave me a brief tour along the way and taught me to open doors by touching a button! He told me where the Chaosium store would be set and where the Artists' Atrium was, although at that time the artists were still readying their stands. Still, I saw some originals by Mark Smylie, who has done a number of covers for Chaosium books, and also for Martin Helsdon's awesome RQ supplements.

I then managed to find the table of the RuneQuest Tournament, my first event at the con! This tournament would have 3 rounds (one game played each day) and in order to decide who would go on to the next one the players at each table had to vote at the end of each game who they considered the best roleplayer. At my table there were 4 other players. Adan was already there, and also Vas, Martin, and Dave. Two of them had never played RuneQuest before, but after the game they said they loved it! Our GM was going to be Ricardo Shankland (author of the Skull Ruins: Tusk Riders Need Blood scenario!!!). We chose our player characters from a range of pregens. Three players had already chosen warrior types (a Humakti, a Babeester gori, and Vasana the Vingan), so I decided to go for something different. I was tempted to play a duck thief called Phinneas Pinfeather, armed with two daggers, but I picked up a Lhankor Mhy scribe with good sword and dodge skills, while Adan chose an Ernalda priestess. In the same room there were 3 other tables where other gamers were going to play the exact same scenario, and 4 more tables in a nearby room. I told the GM I wasn't interested in qualifying for the next round of the tournament, and there was no problem whatsoever. In fact, Dave wasn't interested either.

The pregenerated RuneQuest heroes ready to defend the giant cradle and its baby at all costs (the standees were not in scale).

Interestingly, we would be using the alternative RuneQuest ruleset Jeff Richard and Mike Mearls (designer of D&D5) are developing to attract a new audience to RuneQuest and Glorantha (more on this later!). The rules were pretty similar to the current edition, but somewhat simplified and faster. However, this game wasn't going to be a proper playtest, and so the GM wisely did not stop to check the rules when in doubt, and instead kept the game flowing nicely.

Once we had chosen our characters, the organisers gathered us in the other big room and Brian Duguid (author of The Voralans and The Children of Hykim books) told us all the premise of the scenario: a charismatic adventurer called Garrath Sharpsword had recruited each of us and many other allies to board a giant cradle that was flowing down the Zola Fel river (AKA the River of Cradles). Apparently, the Lunar occupying forces in Pavis were going to try and plunder it, so it was our sacred duty to defend it and the giant baby from any assailants. This was the beginning of the classic The Cradle scenario Greg Stafford published in the RQ2 supplement Pavis. After explaining this, Jeff Richard read aloud Garrath's rousing speech, and after a choral cheer we set off on our way north towards the approaching cradle!

Garrath Sharpsword (with Jeff Richard's voice) giving his speech: ¡¡¡hooray!!! Comic bubble by pngtree.com

The game experience was improved thanks to Roy Duffy and Dario Corallo. Roy provided big colour maps of the giant cradle (I bet Chaosium is going to hire him!), and Dario created dozens of colour standees for the PCs and NPCs, so the game had a great visual component for the battles on board the cradle.

11:00 - During the pause halfway through the session, I hurried to the Artist's Atrium and managed to buy a deck of Gloranthan cards from Lee O'Connor. He was only selling one deck per person, probably to avoid having people resell the extra ones. I later learnt he sold them all, but he's now got permission from Chaosium to sell more from DrivethruRPG. I also got to chat a bit with Katrin Dirim, who was selling prints of her art at her stall.

Going back to the giant cradle, I remember my PC (Sora Halthi) cast Detect enemies at a crucial moment and so managed to alert her companions fighting on the prow, that the stern was being overrun by other Lunar troops! She also managed to fight some dragonewts so that the Ernalda priestess (Orane Garhound) could reach a badly-wounded comrade in time. "You focus on fighting, and let me do the healing!!!" yelled the priestess to her companions. The fight was tough, but still some enemies' heads were cleanly lopped off to everyone's amusement. Later on, we had some time to explore the decks below, we had a strange vision that Sora managed to understand that it had something to do with the celestial realm. Intriguing!

The heroes defend the giant cradle from mercenary dragonewts!

Finally, the second wave of assailants included some elite warriors, and we were forced to retreat. We then voted for the best roleplayer, and were again summoned to the other room for the finishing speech and rounds of applause to the players who had qualified for the second round. Later I learnt that Claudia Loroff (Jeff Richard's wife who played Yanioth in the example campaign in the RQ rulebook) had been going around the tables and at some point she had acted like a Chalana Arroy divine intervention to resurrect some dead PC (!). She also visited our table and handed me a "My favourite age is the Bronze Age" badge.

15:00 - After the game, I stopped to gaze at the small display of the upcoming new plastic miniatures for RuneQuest. There, John Hunter (author of Back to Balazar) told me a bit about them. Some minutes later, Paul Johnson (IIRC) explained these miniatures are being made by Reaper, will come out by means of a Kickstarter campaign, and Chaosium had told them they wanted the miniatures to represent the pregens from the rulebook and the Starter Set first, and then for a couple more adventures they are developing, so fans can use them to play these adventures. I found the broos and trolls to be particularly awesome. I forgot to ask if they are planning to do any scorpion men. At the same time, Andrew Taylor, who has been making several crowdfunding campaigns these past years to make Gloranthan miniatures, is about to release some wargaming rules for playing skirmishes with 28mm minis. After that, I got my badge for the con, together with a second hanging flag I attached to it: "Glorantha Forever". I also attached the "My Favorite Age is Bronze" flag to it. On top of that, I also got a pin and a sticker of Chaosium's 50th anniversary. :-)

Some of the plastic Glorantha minis on display: trolls, trollkin, PCs, mounted PCs, broos... There will be a Kickstarter soon!

15:25 - I went to the bar to buy a sandwich and a drink for lunch. On my way back to my room, I spoke briefly again with Ricardo Shankland, who told me he is now working in a book for the Jonstown Compendium filled with scorpion men and devising new ways of making them even more dangerous (!!!).

16:00 - The Ruins of the God Learners!

I got a couple minutes late to the room, and my 5 players were already waiting there by the door. After this somewhat embarrassing start, I gave them 7 character sheets to choose from. I had prepared the pregens from the rulebook, plus Mago the Fierce from the RuneQuest Starter Set, as I figured someone would like to try one of the newer pregens. One of the players was Roy Duffy (author of Boldhome Blues and some lovely maps) who I had already played with at THE KRAKEN convention in 2018. He chose to play Yanioth, which was nice, because I wanted to see how the scenario played out with her in it. The other players were Dominic Swan (Vasana), Geoff Revill (Sorala), Andrew Sutton (Harmast), and Stephen Mooney (Mago).

The last time it had taken me 2 sessions to run this scenario online. This time I tried to get the PCs to the ruins faster, but the players prepared well for the trip downriver and decided to do some research about the place and two particular King Argrath's thanes first. This allowed me to test a part of the scenario I hadn't had the opportunity to test yet, although I wondered if those veteran players did not really know already what they found out from the published books (?). The preamble in New Pavis took a full hour, so in the 3 remaining hours they didn't have the time to explore the whole ruins and find out what they were used for. That was not a big problem though, because these ruins are kind of a sandbox, so you can choose to go wherever you please. I also fumbled a bit with all the props I had prepared for the game, and I failed to time a couple of events that would have made the scenario better. Nonetheless, the players seemed to have fun, and Roy and Geoff luckily engaged well with all the puzzles. After the game, Roy confessed he actually usually dislikes solving puzzles as a player, as he prefers to just roll some skill so that the character solves it! Although I wish we could have had more time for the players to explore more of the ruins, at least I managed to provide a fitting ending just in time. Another highlight was the heated discussion Yanioth and Sorala engaged in right at the end, when they had to make some tough decisions about the loot they had gotten.

The charming players I ran my scenario to, discussing what to do next!

I had a lot of fun seeing the decisions my players made. They played it really smart at different points in the adventure, and produced some funny scenes. For example, I was impressed when Sorala managed to augment her Sleight skill to do something shady, and she succeeded! The Storm Bull warrior managed to sacrifice a magic item to his god and be rewarded for it, and Yanioth was one of the bravest when she dived into the waters to explore the flooded basement! Moreover, Dominic gave me some interesting feedback after the game. By the way, there was no way to switch off the air conditioning in the room we were playing in, and it was chilly. 

18:20 - I got in the queue for the barbecue outside on the terrace, and managed to gobble up my dish in time for my next game. The weather was nice and sunny, and I got to chat a bit more with Dominic Swan, and shared the table with Katrin Dirim. Dominic told me how he had worked really long hours in his job years, and we also discussed a bit the alternative RuneQuest rules.

19:00 - I got to play an official Rivers of London scenario titled The Font of All Evil, masterfully GMed by Rob Silk. He introduced the game's setting extremely well. Maybe it was the tone of his voice, or his fine storytelling skills, but everyone at the table started listening to him immediately. Ludovic Chabant sat next to me for that game (author of A Short Detour, To Hunt a God, and The God Learners podcast), and all the other players were also lovely people, like Chris Went. The game started with a gruesome murder and the supernatural branch of the Metropolitan Police was called in to investigate due to the strange wounds on the corpse. That evening I learnt about a peculiar, very London thing called "mudlarking" (thanks to Chris Went!), which I had never heard about. The rules of the game were extremely easy to grasp, particularly for anyone who has played the current edition of Call of Cthulhu. Curiously, one of the players used to work for one of the pubs that feature in the scenario! The investigation went well, we followed the clues, role-played the interactions with witnesses, and other informants... and one of the player characters died horribly in the climax, but the rest managed to avenge her and achieved a resounding victory. And my character got to cast a fireball spell! It was great to try out this game with such a nice group of players, GM, and scenario.

The character sheet of my PC: Nafeesa Jones, a young police officer with Newtonian magic, and the table after the game.

Saturday 24th

8:00 - I had breakfast together with Andrew Sutton, Adan, Geoff, and others. Andrew told me he is currently running a game of RuneQuest using the awesome The Red Cow campaign for HeroQuest. Then Geoff told me about the awesome Prax/Pavis campaign he is currently running, in which all the PCs are Pol-Joni warriors who have established themselves in Pavis County after King Argrath left the city for Sartar. After that, I hurried to go find the seminar room where I would be attending a panel I had great expectations for...

9:00 - What's new with RuneQuest?

Brian Holland (in charge of marketing at Chaosium) was there in the big seminar room, as he joked, to make sure Jeff Richard did not spill the beans too much. First they talked about RuneQuest: Cults of Fire & Sky. Someone in the audience asked Jeff what his favourite part was, and he replied the Lokarnos cult, because they are like the truckers of Glorantha. He also recalled Greg Stafford was fascinated by birds, and owned many field guides to identify them. He even convinced Jeff's wife to get some chickens to raise!

Later he mentioned how the RPG market is undergoing a major transition, both because people are again slowly leaving online gaming to go back to playing face to face, but also because there is a big influx of new gamers for a variety of reasons that are fed up with D&D and want to try other games. I guess it is for this next generation of players that they (Jeff and Mike Mearls) are mainly creating the alternative ruleset titled RuneQuest Fantasy Roleplaying. However, he also mentioned how in 2015 the design goal for the current edition was to gather all the fans together again, but now for this upcoming alternative edition they aim to make it easier to play RuneQuest, streamline the rules (ditch Strike Ranks and substitute them by a phase system similar to the one used in the war-game White Bear and Red Moon), make it more intuitive, and apply all the feedback received in the last years to improve the game.

Then they showed everyone the logo and mock-up cover of the upcoming alternative ruleset, by Loïc Muzy. Jeff mentioned the setting is going to be the city of Pavis and the ruins of The Big Rubble because it is an easy entry point to the setting: the adventurers are basically exploring old ruins, and they can learn more about the setting little by little as they play. They want to release it together with 4 supplements including scenarios so that fans can start playing right away:

• GM book including a bestiary and some scenarios
• 4-part campaign with added material like extra backgrounds and cults
• Player Aid Pack with cardboard standees of PCs and NPCs to make it more visually appealing.
• After that, a cadence of scenario books!

Jeff Richard reveals the mock-up cover of the RuneQuest Fantasy Roleplaying core rulebook. Right: a close-up of the cover.

Jeff added that, since they are releasing a GM Book for this other line, it probably does not make much sense to publish the one that had been promised for the current edition! That was disappointing. They want these books to be between 64 and 256 pages (the new rulebook will be as thin as RQ2) and they will probably be released around May 2026! I asked whether all these new books would delay the planned releases for the current edition of the game, and they responded that won't happen because there are people working on both product lines ("to a degree"). However, they could not say what exactly the next releases for the current edition are going to be. I found that odd, but days later Chaosium revealed Michael O'Brien is going to manage the current edition line (RuneQuest Roleplaying in Glorantha) while Jeff Richard is 100% focused on RuneQuest Fantasy Roleplaying. So I guess when Michael could not attend the panel, they decided to leave that out until he could be present (hopefully at Chaosium Con Poland in October 2025?). By the way, you can watch a recording here.

OK, since this post is already long enough, I will stop here for now. Please check the second part of my write-up! In it you can read about my first game of Age of Vikings, a game of QuestWorlds set in Glorantha, and the Harvest Queen scenario for RuneQuest. And then all I did on Sunday: the RuneQuest game set in Furthest, by Simon Bray, the VIP game with Jason Durall, in which I got to play his upcoming game: Lords of the Middle Sea, and finally the big 8-player game of Glorantha: The Gods War I played! Please let me know what you think so far about all this in a comment below!

Keep reading what I did afterwards at Chaosium Con UK 2025

Sun County: aventuras de RuneQuest en el Condado Solar

Sun County: RuneQuest Adventures in the Land of the Sun es un suplemento de trasfondo y aventuras para RuneQuest 3.ª edición (la de JOC y Avalon Hill) que describe una región de Prax donde Yelmalio es el culto principal. El libro presenta una visión general del Condado Solar y 4 módulos, aparte de otros contenidos para ayudarte a empezar una campaña allí o hacer que los PJ vayan allí en busca de aventuras. Sus autores principales son Michael O'Brien y Trevor Ackerly, con la colaboración de varias personas más y algunos textos de Greg Stafford. A continuación puedes leer mi reseña del PDF de la reedición actual.

<<You can read this in English here>>

La espectacular portadaca obra de Roger Raupp no tenía el borde azul alrededor en la edición original.

Historia

Después de tener la licencia para publicar RuneQuest durante 7 años, Avalon Hill por fin publicó las primeras aventuras situadas en Glorantha que no eran reimpresiones de ediciones anteriores. El cambio se debió sobre todo a que Avalon Hill sustituyó al editor de la línea de RuneQuest por Ken Rolston (que también es conocido por ser el jefe de guionistas del videojuego Elder Scrolls). La publicación de Sun County en 1992 fue el inicio de una breve etapa en la que se publicó material nuevo y de alta calidad para RuneQuest. Por desgracia, estos libros nunca llegaron a publicarse en español porque JOC Internacional quebró antes, pero a esta etapa los fans anglosajones la han llamado «el Renacimiento de RuneQuest». Aun así, no duró mucho, porque tras 6 publicaciones la relación entre Avalon Hill y Chaosium se terminó. Y meros... 32 años después, Sun County vuelve a estar disponible, ya que Chaosium reeditó este suplemento en 2024 a través de DrivethruRPG.

Aspecto

El libro original de 132 páginas tenía la maquetación típica de doble columna de texto con algunas cajas de texto y... Espera, espera, ¿pero tú has visto qué portada tan espectacular? La tremenda portada, obra de Roger Raupp, no solo es una ilustración muy buena, sino que además es muy de RuneQuest gracias a su realismo y atención al detalle. Hace que Glorantha cobre vida ante tus ojos con ese estilo de la Edad de Bronce que venía faltando en los suplementos oficiales desde RQ2. Este estilo se observa sobre todo en las armaduras de los tres personajes situados en primer plano: unos yelmos corintios de bronce, corazas musculadas de bronce y linotórax. Se nota que aquí ya sí hubo una cuidada dirección artística. Por ejemplo, el brazalete con la runa del fuego demuestra que el personaje conoce el conjuro de Linterna (tal como se indica la descripción del culto de Yelmalio que incluye el libro) y algo parecido se indica con las plumas amarillas de los yelmos. Además, los tres personajes principales parecen estar practicando la cetrería, que en el libro se describe como uno de los pasatiempos principales de la nobleza. La otra mitad sensacional de la portada muestra el templo de la Cúpula Solar. Es una imagen potente en la que la arquitectura de aspecto realista refleja a la perfección las proporciones del mapa del templo que incluye el libro. Por último, la luz que refleja la cúpula dorada es otro detalle genial, ya que así se consigue incluir al «sol» en la portada de Sun County a la vez que se muestra esta parte tan importante de la capital del condado. Por todo esto, la portada resume de qué va el Condado Solar: guerreros hoplitas que adoran al sol en una región árida. Por si fuera poco, es una buena portada que mostrar a los jugadores, ya que te ahorra mil palabras: puedes decirles: «Llegáis ante el Templo de la Cúpula Solar en un día soleado y esto es exactamente lo que veis». ¡Toma ya!

Por otra parte, las ilustraciones interiores son en blanco y negro, obra de Merle Insinga y Roger Raupp, aunque se incluye algo de color en los adornos, títulos de de las secciones y cajas de texto. Las ilustraciones son correctas, pero escasas. Entre ellas se incluyen retratos de personajes importantes de la región como el propio conde Solanthos y el Señor Invictus, que también son útiles para mostrar a los jugadores. Por el lado negativo, son mucho más básicas que la portada y varios detalles no encajan con la ambientación con la misma fidelidad que la portada. Por ejemplo, varios personajes aparecen con cota de malla, que es un tipo de armadura que no existe en esta ambientación. Por suerte, los mapas también son buenos, sobre todo el del complejo del Templo de la Cúpula Solar que irradia verosimilitud por su disposición irregular, igual que el del pueblo de Garhound. Finalmente, el mapa de Sun County es bastante bueno, pero el color confunde porque yo asocio el verde con la tierra fértil y el amarillo para las zonas áridas, pero aquí parece que es al revés. Además, habría estado genial que incluyera las fronteras del condado y los límites de los distritos en los que se divide.

Un trozo de una de las ilusraciones interiores de Merle Insinga que muestra un deporte popular: el empujaescudos.

En cuanto a la reedición de Chaosium, tiene una maquetación nueva e incluye el color amarillo en algunas cajas de texto. Las ilustraciones interiores son en blanco y negro como en la edición original, menos una a color que antes estaba en la contraportada. Incluye un mapa remasterizado de Sun County que tiene mejor definición que el original (incluido originalmente en Corazón de Arena Vol. 1), aunque los colores siguen confundiendo un poco. En la edición impresa, este mapa está en la contraportada para que sea más accessible al jugar. Además, le han añadido la ubicación de la aldea de Corazón de Arena, lo que es un detalle útil. El libro está disponible en PDF, tapa blanda y tapa dura. Los datos de juego siguen siendo para la 3.ª edición de RuneQuest, así que no está actualizado a la edición actual y, aunque puede que sea una oportunidad perdida, es bastante fácil hacer la conversión. En realidad, el libro es una reedición, así que han decidido dejar exactamente el mismo contenido que en la edición original, salvo por el mapa remasterizado, un prefacio que han añadido y todas las erratas corregidas. De todas formas, habría sido buena idea añadir un PDF con los datos de juego actualizados para la edición actual. O bien... ¿puede que no lo hayan hecho porque en el futuro ya saldrá un suplemento sobre Prax y Pavis que incluirá esos datos de juego actualizados...?

Un trocito del mapa remasterizado del Condado Solar (disponible en español aquí)

Información de trasfondo

Fiel a su noble objetivo de ofrece material jugable para los fans de Glorantha, este libro de 125 páginas se divide entre información de trasfondo (54 páginas) y 4 escenarios junto con algunas ideas para aventuras (68 páginas). Primero voy a hablar del trasfondo y luego reseñaré las aventuras y el material de campaña (OJO: ¡con spoilers!). 💣💥⚠

La información de trasfondo sobre el Condado Solar comienza con una introducción donde se presentan los puntos básicos del lugar y sus habitantes. La gran mayoría de hombres adoran al dios de la luz Yelmalio y la mayoría de las mujeres adoran a la diosa de la tierra Ernalda, tienen un ejército de soldados que luchan en falanges de filas cerradas armados con sarissas (picas) y viven en una región árida llamada Prax, concretamente en un valle fluvial parecido al del Nilo o del Misisipí, rodeados de tribus nómadas hostiles.

La página del índice y la introducción - Puedes hacer clic para verlas más grandes

Al ser el primero de una serie de suplementos muy esperados por la afición, fue una buena idea centrarlo en una región cercana a la ciudad de Pavis: una de las regiones más comunes para jugar en Glorantha en su época. De este modo, ofrecía algo nuevo pero al mismo tiempo de una región ya conocida. En realidad, los primeros detalles sobre el Condado Solar aparecieron en el suplemento Pavis de RQ2 publicado en 1983. El libro Sun County incluye toda esa información, como la breve sección de historia, la lista de los 42 condes, el mapa del Templo de la Cúpula Solar y otros detalles, y la amplía. Por ejemplo, describe cómo es el gobierno del condado, la importancia del ejército y cómo el culto de Yelmalio lo decide todo. Está lleno de detalles culturales como el hecho de que la región es patriarcal y sexualmente represiva, un juego popular o el hecho de que solo los iniciados de Yelmalio pueden tener tierras, y que el culto controla toda la producción de bebidas alcohólicas. También describe brevemente 10 de las personas más importantes del condado, como los principales sacerdotes y señores de las runas, y presenta datos de juego para 4 de ellos. Me encanta leer datos de juego de PNJ poderosos porque suelen tener objetos mágicos y habilidades de combate potentes, y puedes compararlos con los PJ de los jugadores.

Por otra parte, es sorprendente que el retrato de esta cultura incluya tantas facetas negativas. Se describe a los yelmalianos como fríos y distantes con los forasteros, aislacionistas y muy puritanos, las mujeres del condado tienen un papel subordinado y hay leyes arbitrarias y crueles. Uno de sus rasgos positivos es que siempre se mantienen unidos, así que, al contrario que sus vecinos orlanthis, los yelmalianos no forman clanes ni tribus ni se atacan unos a otros sin parar. Por tanto, su sociedad es más estable, pero también mucho más aburrida por lo que respecta a la aventura. Me encanta porque refleja los aspectos buenos y malos de los poderes solares a los que adoran, igual que los orlanthis son tan turbulentos como sus dioses de las tormentas. Es decir, la religión influye en cómo es la sociedad de forma coherente con los mitos de sus dioses.

PNJ importantes del Condado Solar junto a los datos de juego de RQ3 para el comandante del ejército

Parte de la información se presenta en varios puntos dispersos del libro en forma de textos diegéticos (creados dentro del mundo). Por ejemplo, hay una crónica breve de un representante del gobernador lunar de Pavis que visita el Condado Solar. Es genial para ver esta región «desde dentro», ya que hace que la información cobre vida y de paso muestra cómo puede ser una audiencia con el conde, por si los PJ de tu campaña consiguen una. Aun así, incluso con la segunda parte en la que visita el pueblo de Arpón, es demasiado corta. Ojalá hubiera más historias gloranthanas como estas y The Widow's Tale o las historias cortas de Griselda. Además, en la sección sobre las campañas hay una visión general del Condado Solar escrita desde el punto de vista de un escriba lunar que el autor sugiere que puedes imprimir y dársela a los jugadores para que se hagan una idea de cómo es esta región. Sin duda, esto habría estado mejor ponerlo en la introducción del libro. Por último, también se incluye aquí el breve episodio en Cults of Prax en el que el mercader orlanthi Biturian Varosh narra su desafortunado encuentro con unos yelmalianos, y está guai porque te ofrece un atisbo del ritual «Los tres golpes de la ira» que las DJ pueden usar en una campaña.

Junto al mapa realista del Templo de la Cúpula Solar publicado originalmente en el suplemento de Pavis se incluye la costumbre del «acogerse a sagrado» que permite a cualquiera refugiarse en el recinto del templo (esto ya se describía en el culto de Yelmalio de Cults of Prax). Pero además, se describen los refugiados actuales acompañados de varias ideas para aventuras. Esto me recuerda a la costumbre de la Edad Media, pero resulta que también se usaba en los templos griegos y egipcios, así que encaja con el estilo Edad de Bronce de Glorantha. Aparte, el autor también se explaya en describir todas las defensas mágicas del templo, incluidos los objetos mágicos que guarda y los enormes espíritus que lo protegen de los intrusos. Esta fue la primera ocasión en la que se describieron al detalle las defensas de un templo de Glorantha en un libro oficial y ejemplifican las capacidades mágicas de las que dispone un gran templo. Son interesantes para crear defensas parecidas de otros templos y tiene todos los detalles necesarios para diseñar una aventura de en las que los PJ tengan que robar algo valioso del templo a lo «Ocean's Eleven».

Parte de la descripción del recinto del Templo de la Cúpula Solar: un gran templo de Yelmalio.

Como el culto de Yelmalio es tan importante en el Condado Solar, se incluye una descripción larga del culto básicamente copiada de Cults of Prax para RQ2, pero con algunos pequeños cambios. Algunos de ellos ya habían aparecido en la descripción breve del culto que apareció en el suplemento Dioses de Glorantha para RQ3. Por ejemplo, Aldrya proporciona el conjuro rúnico Curación del cuerpo en lugar de Maduración solar, y el subculto de Togtuvei proporciona el conjuro espiritual Encontrar Cúpula Solar en vez de limitarse a entrenar la habilidad de RQ2 de Dibujar mapas. Aun así, la versión más reciente del culto puede leerse en el suplemento Cults of RuneQuest: Gods of Fire & Sky.

De todas formas, Sun County incluye información nueva sobre el culto, como el Ritual del Río con el que los líderes del condado refuerzan el pacto centenario entre Yelmalio y el río Zola Fel que fertiliza su tierra. Se trata de una búsqueda heroica que se desarrolla en el mundo de los mortales y es muy versátil y fácil de usar en una campaña porque el dios del río pide al participante que haga frente a un enemigo concreto que está contaminando o molestando al río de alguna forma, y eso se convierte en la aventura. Como el enemigo o problema cambian cada año, puede ser cualquier cosa que te encaje. Por ejemplo, yo lo dirigí en una campaña en la que los PJ trabajaban para el duque Raus río abajo en las tierras de concesión lunares (como se describen en la campaña Borderlands). El duque quería forjar el mismo pacto con el río para fertilizar así también sus tierras, así que pidió a los PJ que lo acompañaran en el ritual. Previamente, los PJ habían enfurecido a una chamán poderosa de Malia (Muriah) al frustrar su primer ataque contra el Fuerte Raus. Durante el ritual, la ninfa del río dirigió al grupo hacia la fuente más cercana de peligro para el río. Eso resultó ser unas antiguas ruinas en el Gran Pantano donde Muriah estaba criando híbridos broo de tritónidos capaces de nadar y cruzar el río rápido para asaltar el fuerte por segunda vez. Para las ruinas y los monstruos del Caos que se encontraron aproveché la aventura «Dead Reckoning» de una antigua revista escocesa (Last Province #5). El Ritual del Río fue una buena forma de incluir varios mitos solares en la campaña y creo que a mis jugadores les encantó.

Pese a todo, ojalá el libro hubiera incluido más mitos de Yelmalio. Al final, solo describe el mito de la Colina de Oro en una sola frase breve dentro de la descripción de otro ritual, Los tres golpes de la ira, y el Ritual del Río. Como Yelmalio es tan importante en el Condado Solar, habría estado bien saber por ejemplo qué mito se recrea durante la gran fiesta sagrada de Yelmalio y qué ocurre exactamente durante las semanas del Tiempo Sagrado.

Datos de juego de un templario de la Cúpula Solar para RQ3, pero fácilmente convertibles a RQG.

Una de las secciones más interesantes es la dedicada a los templarios de la Cúpula Solar y la milicia de Sun County. Aunque la 3.ª edición de RuneQuest nunca contó con reglas de combate de masas, el libro describe las formaciones de batalla de los templarios e incluye reglas para falanges (las mismas que incluye la edición actual de RuneQuest). También incluye reglas para luchar con picas (sarissas) como las falanges macedonias, con el escudo colgando del cuello de forma que el soldado pueda sostener la pica con ambas manos. Las he visto en acción cuando los jugadores las usaron en la aventura de Corazón de Arena Volumen Uno (lee la crónica) con 4 PJ yelmalianos, y funcionaron muy bien. Aun así, me habría gustado que esta sección hubiera explicado cómo las tropas auxiliares como tropas de armas de proyectiles y la caballería logran proteger los flancos vulnerables de las falanges. Imagino que cuando se enfrentan a enemigos montados sin apoyo, adoptan una formación cuadrada o redonda para poder cubrir todos los flancos. En este sentido, es útil contar con los datos de juego de templarios y milicianos típicos, pero ojalá hubieran incluido también los de otros tipos de habitantes del condado como una sacerdotisa de Ernalda, un transportista de Lokarnos, etc. Por último, cabe decir que a la sección de trasfondo le falta un diccionario geográfico (gazetteer) que describa puntos de interés de toda la región, ya que es esencial para dirigir campañas. Solo hay una breve descripción de cuatro o cinco poblaciones en la narración del escriba lunar que he comentado antes.

Las aventuras y la información para campañas

Sun County incluye 4 módulos de distinta calidad y extensión. Melisande's Hand y Rabbit Hat Farm son perfectos para personajes iniciales de RQ3, mientras que Solinthor's Tower y Old Sun Dome es mejor dejarlos para personajes con más experiencia y recursos. El libro ofrece varias posibilidades respecto a los PJ adecuados para estas aventuras. Tres de los módulos pueden usarse con PJ existentes que provengan de fuera del condado y se incluyen ganchos para cada aventura. Por otro lado, se sugiere la idea de crear un grupo de PJ yelmalianos autóctonos para jugar una campaña en el Condado Solar, con varias notas sobre sus armas culturales y ocupaciones disponibles. Para terminar, se describen 8 personajes pregenerados con los que empezar a jugar de inmediato.

Información para crear yelmalianos autóctonos, ganchos para aventuras y consejos para directores de juego.

Estos personajes ya hechos están muy bien. Para empezar, ofrecen una variedad de ocupaciones y puntos de vista culturales de la ambientación: tenemos un templario de la Cúpula Solar con habilidades de combate altas y mucha magia, dos milicianos del condado, un comerciante de Lokarnos algo sospechoso y cuatro foráneos: dos nómadas jinetes de antílope (un guerrero del Toro Tempestuoso y una iniciada de Eiritha), y dos exiliados de Sartar (un mercenario humakti y un explorador de Lhankhor Mhy). En segundo lugar, están creados específicamente para el módulo Rabbit Hat Farm, ya que el libro incluye secretos para cada personaje, de forma que cada uno posee diferentes retazos de información antes de empezar. Por último, cada uno tiene notas sobre cómo rolearlos y 3 rasgos de personalidad clave, además de lo que cada uno piensa del resto de PJ. Es un enfoque genial para facilitar a los jugadores poder interpretar mejor los personajes. Y lo mejor de todo, la combinación de culturas distintas, personalidades distintas, objetivos diferentes y variados puntos de vista fomentan buenas escenas de roleo. A partir de aquí, las siguientes publicaciones de RQ3 siempre incluían los 3 rasgos de personalidad clave de los personajes importantes o PJ pregenerados y me parece una buena forma de dar vida a los personajes y que sean más que una lista de números.

Melisande's Hand: Este módulo lo publicó Michael O'Brien originalmente en la revista Tales of the Reaching Moon. Trata de una serie de pruebas que se celebran en el festival de la cosecha de una aldea orlanthi en el Condado de Pavis. El ganador obtiene mucho prestigio y el derecho a casarse con la iniciada de Ernalda elegida del lugar durante un año, pero también hay premios por ganar cada prueba en concreto. Puedes participar en las pruebas con tu propio PJ o jugar con uno de los PNJ incluidos. Aparte, el módulo incluye varias tramas secundarias en las que los PJ se pueden mezclar mientras se desarrolla todo lo demás, como un asesino en serie, o una cierta intriga entre los dignatarios invitados de las fuerzas de ocupación lunares y del Condado Solar. Yo me lo pasé bomba al jugarlo, incluso aunque jugamos con los PNJ como participantes en las pruebas en vez de con nuestros PJ habituales. Desde aquella ocasión, siempre me ha gustado dirigir este tipo de módulos de "festival", pero este caso es un ejemplo genial porque sus orígenes están en los mitos. Habría estado aún mejor si se hubiera situado en el propio Condado Solar. Porque, aunque hay formas de conseguir que tu PJ yelmaliano participe, necesitarán un patrocinador acaudalado para poder pagar los costes de participación.

Una de las escena del módulo Melisande's Hand

Rabbit Hat Farm: Este módulo empieza explorando una granja del condado que ha sido arrasada y pronto se transforma en mazmorreo peligroso. Aunque no es nada del otro mundo, los ganchos y las notas para el DJ están hechas con cariño y tiene varios puntos interesantes (y mortíferos). Que empiece como una investigación tiene su gracia y algunos de los enemigos tienen tácticas inteligentemente mortíferas. Casi parece una aventura de La llamada de Cthulhu, pero con mucho más combate y sin tiradas de Buscar libros, porque las criaturas del Caos son horrendas y peligrosas. Por ejemplo, hay un ser que parece invulnerable y otro estuvo a punto de aniquilar a todo el grupo de PJ cuando la jugué porque logró paralizar a todos menos uno gracias a su POD 18. Al contrario que «Melisande's Hand», este módulo queda mejor con personajes yelmalianos autóctonos, aunque, tal como puede verse en los pregenerados, también pueden incluirse praxianos y orlanthis. De todas formas, se podría haber explicado mejor su presencia en estas tierras, sobre todo porque en la sección de trasfondo se hace hincapié varias veces en que los yelmalianos desdeñan a los forasteros. Finalmente, esta aventura tiene vínculos con el material sobre Pavis, de modo que puedes conectarla con una campaña situada en Pavis y hay un elemento de tesoro que puede dar lugar a más aventuras, ya que hay varias facciones que andan tras él.

The Old Sun Dome Temple: Este módulo aprovecha el mapa del Templo de la Cúpula Solar para crear una mazmorra extraña y casi vacía. Sin embargo, no es lo que se espera el típico jugador. Los jugadores explorarán el lugar esperando el típico mazmorreo... pero no. Se trata de un lugar enorme, oscuro y abandonado, con casi nada con lo que interactuar salvo varios muertos vivientes, espíritus malignos y dos PNJ. Uno de ellos acechará al grupo para tratar de matarlos y el otro puede que los siga con curiosidad. Confieso que cuando lo jugué me pareció decepcionante, pero puede que el DJ no supiera cómo sacarle todo el provecho. Cuando lo dirija, intentaré que la atmósfera se parezca más a la de una aventura de La llamada de Cthulhu, con música ambiental inquietante y poca luz. De hecho, creo que funciona mejor si lo enmarcas en el género del «survival horror». Si los aventureros logran salir con vida, la cantidad de tesoro que pueden obtener es desorbitante, así que habría que rebajarlo un poco.

Como curiosidad, este módulo incluye un extraño portal que puede conducir a los personajes al plano heroico. Por desgracia, como en el momento en el que se publicó el libro y, de hecho, un poco también ahora, aún no hay reglas oficiales de búsquedas heroicas para RuneQuest, así que fue una jugada arriesgada del autor incluir este elemento. Al final se reduce a que el DJ tenga que improvisar o preparar a lo bestia o, lo más probable, que el PJ que lo atraviese vuelva de inmediato un poco confundido. Pero ofrece un atisbo de las aventuras tremendas que se podrían jugar si las búsquedas heroicas tuvieran un soporte sólido de reglas. Pero como aún no hay, puede resultar frustrante. Creo que la mayoría de DJ se limitarán a pasar por alto este detalle en sus partidas. Puede que el autor lo incluyera como una forma de queja, para dejar el mensaje de «RuneQuest podría llegar mucho más lejos, pero aún no sabemos bien cómo hacerlo». Aun así, si tienes el reglamento descatalogado de HeroWars o HeroQuest Glorantha, o le has echado un ojo a los artículos de Jeff Richards sobre heroquesting en el Well of Daliath, tal vez podrías crear una búsqueda heroica a partir de aquí donde los PJ exploren el reino celestial y se topen con varios de los dioses del cielo y otros seres. ¿Por qué no?

Hay muchos ganchos de aventuras centrados en explorar ruinas

Solinthor's Tower: Este módulo de solo 3 páginas parece una mazmorra de una sola sala, donde simplemente entras y luchas contra el «enemigo final de fase» en un espacio muy estrecho. De nuevo, si los PJ logran sobrevivir a las defensas mágicas, pueden obtener un montonazo de tesoro. También puede que accedan al reino celestial como en el módulo anterior, pero con los mismos problemas mencionados. Por lo menos aquí el autor propone una recompensa. Por otro lado, no entiendo por qué el PNJ principal puede usar elementales de fuego, ya que Yelmalio no tiene conjuros para invocarlos. Tal vez lo único guai es que se habla de las torres de retiro yelmalianas, y que el botín dará lugar a consecuencias para los PJ. A ver, también resulta que mi PJ murió en esta aventura, así que ese pequeño detalle puede haber hecho que le tenga una cierta tirria. :_) También recuerdo que me sentí un poco mal al entrar en la torre para darle una paliza a un pobre ermitaño. Sea como sea, este módulo funcionaría mejor como una escena de una aventura más larga. Por ejemplo, los aventureros tienen que encontrar un objeto concreto para cumplir un reto en otro lugar y primero deben encontrar en qué torre de retiro se encuentra, conseguirlo, y luego usarlo en la escena final. De lo contrario, es demasiado simplón tal y como está.

Resumiendo, Melisande's Hand es el mejor módulo de los cuatro, Rabbit Hat Farm está bien y los otros dos requieren un poco más de trabajo por parte de los DJ para que valgan la pena. Aparte de esto, el libro incluye varias tablas de encuentros muy a lo vieja escuela con una tabla de reacciones de PNJ, y algunas ideas para más aventuras. No me gusta mucho usar tablas de encuentros más que como sugerencias de lo que los PJ pueden encontrarse en zonas rurales o salvajes. Por ejemplo, puedes hacer una tirada en la tabla de encuentros en pueblos y que los PJ se topen con varios habitantes de un pueblo. ¿Increíble no? Ironías aparte, la lista de encuentros especiales sí es más interesante. Me recuerda a los encuentros de La isla de los grifos, ya que pueden desarrollarse para dar pie a aventuras cortas, aunque algunos son solo elementos decorativos o inspiración para DJ creativos a quienes se les dé bien improvisar. El mejor de todos es un personaje peculiar: Melo Yelo, un babuíno tragicómico que ansía ser aceptado en el culto de Yelmalio. Por último, las ideas de aventuras se dividen entre habituales, infrecuentes y extraordinarias, (como en el suplemento de Genertela), pero también como acontecimientos que pueden darse en un año malo, un año bueno o en festivales religiosos.

Los encuentros especiales incluyen a Melo Yelo, un extraño babuino que se afeita el pelaje y se tiñe la piel de amarillo.

Desde 1992, se han publicado varios otros libros que puedes usar para jugar campañas en el Condado Solar. La aventura «Gaumata's Vision» del suplemento Shadows on the Borderlands habría encajado a la perfección en el libro de Sun County, ya que se sitúa en el condado. Y lo mismo para Fortunate Sun, que estuvo años en la página web de Michael O'Brien (y que incluía información extra sobre el condado), y que actualmente está incluida en Sandheart Volume 2. Estas dos aventuras habrían hecho que Sun County se pudiera jugar más fácilmente con PJ autóctonos. Por suerte, ahora es muy fácil dirigir una campaña yelmaliana con las 6 aventuras en total que incluye la serie de suplementos sobre Corazón de Arena y el trasfondo de Life and Traditions under the Sun Dome y Black Spear, y eso es lo que muchos DJ están haciendo (¡como yo mismo!). Pero todo eso no habría sido posible sin la base que ofrece Sun County.

Resumiendo

Sun County brilla con luz propia debido a su buena presentación y a que describe una región cercana a una zona típica de aventuras (Pavis y la Gran Ruina), por lo que es fácil incorporarla a una campaña situada allí. Además, la mitad del libro es material jugable y aventuras, lo que es genial. También es genial contar con otra cultura humana descrita a fondo, porque hasta ese momento solo se habían descrito pueblos orlanthis como Pavis y Apple Lane (si exceptuamos la vista general que ofrece el suplemento Genertela), y la cultura praxiana en cierto modo incluida en Cults of Prax.

Sin embargo, hay dos problemillas que hacen que este suplemento no sea todo lo bueno que podría haber sido. Uno es el equilibrio entre trasfondo y aventuras. La combinación de material de trasfondo y aventuras es mi forma de suplemento favorita para cualquier juego de rol. Por eso, es genial que la mitad del libro se dedique a aventuras, pero a la vez eso hace que el Condado Solar se describa con menos detalles culturales de los que se merece. Por ejemplo, la sección de historia es bastante corta y no está ampliada respecto a la que ya aparecía en el suplemento de Pavis. Y peor aún es que el libro no incluye ningún diccionario geográfico de la zona con información sobre las poblaciones más importantes, sus templos y otros puntos de interés; además de que, como he dicho antes, el mapa debería haber incluido las fronteras y los distritos. Ya puestos, un mapa de la capital (Templo de la Cúpula Solar) también habría sido muy útil. Sí hay un mapa del recinto del templo, pero no de la población anexa. El otro problemita es el equilibrio del enfoque para PJs que estén de paso y de los PJ autóctonos. El libro se esfuerza en ser útil para ambos enfoques, pero se inclina claramente más por el primero porque presupone que muchos DJ lo usarán para complementar sus campañas alrededor de Pavis con PJs de Pavis. Por ejemplo, la premisa básica de dos de las aventuras es que alguien contrata a los aventureros para hacer algo ilegal en el condado, lo que está lógicamente enfocado a PJs que sean forasteros. 

Uno de los relatos «creados dentro del mundo» y la única ilustración interior a color que antes estaba en la contraportada

A pesar de eso, el libro sigue siendo un gran ejemplo de cómo ampliar Glorantha a base de fijarte en una región pequeña y detallarla a partir de los retazos de información que dejó Greg Stafford. Su contenido y varias de las aventuras son de lo mejor que hay, por lo que se merece un lugar en la estantería de cualquier fan. Y si lo combinas con otros libros sobre el Condado Solar, es perfecto para ir de aventuras y rolear en una cultura gloranthana peculiar.

Lo mejor:

• La sensacional portada. 😍
• Describe una región interesante de Prax en la que vivir aventuras.
• Muy fácil de usar en una campaña en Pavis y la Gran Ruina.
• Los personajes pregenerados se describen con rasgos de personalidad y objetivos detallados.
• Inició un breve periodo de esplendor para RuneQuest en los 90 (en inglés).
• Inspiró la serie de módulos de Corazón de Arena disponibles en el Jonstown Compendium.

Lo peor:

• Los módulos son mediocres excepto «Melisande's Hand» (¡que no se sitúa en el Condado Solar!).
• Le faltan algunos detalles útiles para campañas, como un diccionario geográfico de la zona.
• Al incluir tanto módulos para PJ autóctonos como para PJ de fuera, ambas opciones se quedan cortas.
• Que JOC Internacional no llegara a publicarlo en español. 😭

Sun County: RuneQuest Adventures in the Land of the Sun está disponible en PDF (12$) y en tapa blanda (24$) o tapa dura (36$) en DrivethruRPG. El libro impreso incluye el PDF. Y a ti, ¿qué te parece este libro? ¿Estás de acuerdo con mi reseña? ¿Has dirigido o jugado una campaña en el Condado Solar? ¿Cómo fue? Cuéntamelo en un comentario aquí abajo, por favor. Por cierto, ¿has visto la portada japonesa de Sun County?