Why RuneQuest Sucks
(as a system for Glorantha)
How To Fix Glorantha Series
Previous Article Retrospective
Well, I knew that would be an incendiary first article, and it certainly was! I haven’t had that much vitriol thrown at me since I expressed my love of pineapple on pizza.
What was interesting was that I got around three different classes of response.
By far the most common was telling me that I did not understand roleplaying, tabletop setting design, Glorantha or RuneQuest. I would like to think none of those are true. I have read nearly every Glorantha sourcebook, including the maligned 2nd Age books (which are actually not as bad as people think), and have run Glorantha multiple times across RQ2, Mythras and RQG.
But maybe there is some ineffable essence of these topics that I am missing and you are more than welcome to your opinions on that.
The second most common was people expressing that they used to loved Glorantha, and that I had hit on why they had fallen out of love with the setting. These are older people or people who were introduced to the setting through the brilliant King of Dragon Pass. The response was that the setting as it stands is too academic for them to enjoy.
The third group was mostly people who had not kept up to date with the setting or with the rules, who were telling me that there are plenty of adventuring groups in Glorantha, that I was wrong on Illumination and that nobody really believes that the Lunars are the good guys. This is simply not the case, as much as I wish it was.
For the first group, I may have been a too heavy handed in the Dungeons & Dragons comparisons (and I don’t even play Dungeons & Dragons!) but that is merely to appeal to as wide an audience as possible. The reality is that these requirements are universal, as they cause play issues otherwise.
For the second group, I am glad that I have given a voice to a lot of the discontent people have had with the setting, and I hope I matched that with the rules.
For the last group, please understand that a lot of the setting and the rules have changed since you last played, and if you tried to get back into the setting then you would likely be in the second group.
Introduction
RuneQuest is a system that has had eight iterations, most of which have been very closely linked to Glorantha. It was the first system that had an overt implied setting, conjoined to the world of the board game White Bear and Red Moon.
RuneQuest is a percentile based game, which means that you roll a d100 and aim to get underneath your skill rating. There are variations on this including contested rolls and roll difficulty, but this is the core mechanic.
The latest version of RuneQuest is “RuneQuest - Roleplaying in Glorantha” (commonly called and hereafter referred to as RQG), published in 2018 by Chaosium. This was a return to directly publishing the RuneQuest rules after many years.
There is a separate version of the RuneQuest rules called “Mythras”, published by The Design Mechanism. It was previously called RuneQuest 6e but no longer. That is a conversation for another article. This is a more generic version of the RuneQuest rules, not linked to any particular setting. They have Mythic Earth as one of their main ranges, which involves real world classical or medieval societies with fantasy elements.
There is also a narrative focused system called Hero Wars / HeroQuest / Questworlds, which is outside the bounds of this conversation. I think this system is very, very good for a narrative system and is solid for shorter campaigns. As with most narrative systems, it starts to struggle as the campaign continues.
Please note that this whole article is relating RuneQuest to Glorantha as a system for a setting. I do not think this is unfair criticism as the system and setting are linked by design by Chaosium.
In addition, I think RuneQuest was suitable both as a system for older Glorantha lore (which seemed to be at a lower power level) and as a system for real world Mythic settings because these will be more constrained by reality.
1. Combat
I am not going into whether the combat system is good or bad on its own merit. I am led to understand that it is a reasonably realistic representation of bronze age combat. However, it is bad for Glorantha.
Before you read this, it is important to note that character creation in RQG is an intensive process. Your character has a lot of factors (Homeland, Family History, Rune Affinities, Characteristics, Occupation, Cult, Personal Skill Bonuses, Other) to include as you create them and this can cause a power imbalance in the group if they’re not harmonious. On top of that, you have to ensure that they fit within the DM’s vision of the setting and campaign. All together, you are, at a minimum, likely to take an hour or two to create a character.
Combat in RQG takes up ~25 pages of the core rulebook for pure rules, not including tables for weapons and armour. The “Game System” portion of the rulebook has ~25 pages. The “Skills” portion of the rulebook also has ~25 pages. All four magic systems listed in the rules (not including their individual spells) have ~25 pages. None of these counts include art or fiction pages.
From this, you would believe that the combat system is as important and used as all other skills and as all the magic systems.
Combat is also much more complicated than any of those systems. There is a complex initiative system called strike rank where you can take multiple actions within a turn. There are attacks, parries, and dodges, which have two separate charts of attack versus parry or dodge and degrees of success depending on these. There are critical strike rules dependent on what type of weapon you are using, and a fumble system with charts.
In short, it is very, very complicated.
Even then it doesn’t cover the majority of potential interactions available in Glorantha from the use of magic. One example that is very likely to come up and need DM input is Flight magic. There is nothing on the Flight spell that says it cannot be used for combat purposes. This spell will likely break any combat that it is introduced into.
One of the refrains you will hear from RuneQuest and Glorantha players is that combat should not be the first, second or third option. Combat is a last resort because the stakes are high and the risk is high regardless of how well equipped your character is.
In reality, combat is a last resort because it is a relatively arduous slog that will compete with high level 5e for time taken to complete.
On top of that, if your character is to get maimed (very likely) or die (even more likely) and not get resurrected within a day or two (extremely likely) then you get to spend the next two hours desperately trying to create a new character while your friends continue the session without you.
So, to summarise:
Combat is highly risky, and negative results from combat are likely which can include stuff such as semi-permanent maiming of your character, or a single bad roll resulting in your character’s untimely demise.
The rules for combat are complex and take a lot more space and design room than they really should. Despite this, they do not cover off a lot of potential eventualities from the magic of the game world.
Character death is harsh, and combat can result in your character being out of play for at least a few months.
Character creation is also a long winded process.
Compare that with a standard OSR BX derivative, which often have point 1 & 3 but reduces the harshness through having simpler combat rules (that are more flexible) and having very fast and simple character creation.
Death in RQG can also result in a lot of loose narrative threads as the character is meant to be integrated within their community and their own plot. This can cause major issues.
My point overall is that RQG’s combat is a non-feature for Glorantha. It is harmful to the play experience in a way that other combat systems would not be, and it is the best example I can bring up for how the system and the world are at odds.
2. Progression
Before I go into how RuneQuest’s progression suits Glorantha, it is good to understand how character growth works within the world:
Skills: Characters get more skilled at certain actions, such as the use of swords or climbing or summoning spirits. These skills are used to progress in the god cults, sorcerous orders and shamanic societies.
Cults etc: Characters progress in their “guilds” as they overcome skill challenges. This gives them access to more and greater magic, knowledge of the world and the ability to perform HeroQuests.
HeroQuests: HeroQuests are the character’s method for progressing beyond mortal limitations. These quests result in rare magical items, artefacts and blessings of a temporary or permanent nature. There are no mechanics for these HeroQuests currently, and there does not seem to be any plan to implement them. See point 3 for a description of what HeroQuests are and for my issues with that.
Social: Eventually this all feeds back into the character’s standing in society (in theory), and how they are integrated into the world order. This allows them access to temporial and material benefits.
Broadly, in Glorantha the setting, characters progress like so:
Plebe: Junior members of their society, with an initial initiation into a cult and a few weak skills. This was the default starting position in older versions of RuneQuest.
Adventurer: Skilled members of their society, usually still at an initial initiation level but with skills that will let them quickly progress to the mid ranks. This is the starting position in RQG. (I know people will get very angry about the term “Adventurer” but, if you do, it’s proof that you didn’t actually read my last article.)
Rune: Runelords and Runepriests in Glorantha terms. Skilled and well initiated, potentially integrated into more than one cult. Likely have magical weapons and armour. Ready to do HeroQuests. Can be reached by players in RQG.
Hero: More of a Demi-God than a hero. Usually chosen by some God as their main champion, and associated heavily with that God. Have completed a lot of HeroQuests. They are capable of defeating full armies of Runes and Adventurers on their own. Cannot be reached by players in RQG.
In prior editions of RuneQuest, there was an expectation of progress from Plebe to Rune-level of a character. This was a clean natural progression and it felt like the world topped out at Rune-level, with some ancient or chaotic monstrosities far above that.
Now in RQG, the progression has been compacted from Adventurer to Rune. The world is, however, filled with Hero level characters like Prince Argrath, JarEel the Razoress and Harrek the Berserk. (Someone is going to say, “They were there already!” and sure they were, but their actions weren’t as well mapped or obvious.)
This would, normally, be a Greyhawk style problem (“Why doesn’t Elminster just solve everything?”) that can be sidestepped quite easily.
However, a short period after the recommended start date (1625), the Hero Wars begin in full. The Hero level characters mentioned before start fighting and killing within the recommended starting area (Dragon Pass). Within two years (1627), Prince Argrath beats the Lunar Empire in Dragon Pass.
And players are really unable to challenge them. The system does not support characters growing to a level strong enough to deal with these demi-gods. The player characters are unlikely to have even grown fast enough to be at Rune-level by the time the battles in Dragon Pass take place.
A response to this that I have seen is, “Players just become Argrath/JarEel/Harrek’s advisors and confidantes.” Wow, what a fun experience that sounds like, players love nothing more than playing second fiddle to a lore established DMPC.
This issue is mostly due to how grounded the system of RuneQuest is, but it is also because of my next point…
3. Metaphysics mechanics
As mentioned in the previous article and earlier in this one, there is a serious lack of mechanics for the metaphysical aspects of Glorantha. There would be two ways of managing this as Chaosium, which is to either publish a decisive explanation of the metaphysics of the world or to allow a limited view of the metaphysics through mechanical implementation.
One of the main things lacking implementation is HeroQuests.
If you are new to Glorantha, a HeroQuest is a type of ritual that involves a character stepping into the world of mythology (God Time) and re-enacting the myth as their chosen god. The character is expected to follow the myth as it is written or to deviate in clever ways in order to receive benefits that they otherwise would not.
One myth would be “The Hill of Gold”, where a minor sun god (Yelmalio) goes to the hill in order to banish winter. When he reaches the hill, he is disarmed by a storm god (Orlanth) and then wounded by a god of the trolls (Zorak Zoran) who steals his powers of fire. He is then healed and goes off with companions that he had thought lost. This results in him being considered the god of the winter sun, which shines light but does not provide warmth.
A character could follow this myth exactly and be wounded and then healed, and provide a bonus to their endurance or a return of old friends. Or a character could try to (with difficulty) retain his weapons from the storm god and fight against the troll-god, to bring back magical armaments or the ability to use fire magic.
HeroQuests are even in universe a known mechanism for advancing in power beyond mortal limitations. They are used throughout the lore intentionally to empower friends or harm enemies, as well as to prevent droughts, famines and myriad other things.
They are unbelievably core to the lore, to the progression of characters in setting and even to the maintenance of Gloranthan societies.
But there are no mechanics for them.
It should be clear why this is causing issues at this point. One of the core pieces of lore and progression is not implemented in the system.
Before I do my final word, I have seen two responses to this point:
“Just make the mechanics yourself”: First off, I am an average DM. I am not a game designer. I work a job and use tabletop to relax. Also, the lack of clear metaphysics means that it can affect things downstream in a negative way. Finally, I can do it but then why am I paying $100+ to someone when I should just make the rules up myself?
“It should be narrative”: If you say so. As above, I am neither an actor nor a screenwriter. A mid session HeroQuest should not require the rest of the session to prepare for. The expectation that places on a DM to be the perfect being is frustrating and that is why I disagree with this idea.
Final Word
I love RuneQuest and I love Glorantha.
But it is obvious at this point that the setting and system have drifted apart.
Glorantha has grown more fantastical per individual character as time has gone on, and RuneQuest has stayed much the same.
As I mention in the final word of the previous article, I think a lot of this is due to how Glorantha was preserved as a setting through LARPs and video games. The QuestWorlds (formerly HeroQuest) system also allows a much higher threshold of power and that was a principal advancer of the lore through the years.
My next article will be how to fix these issues as best as we can.
Honourable Mention: Nanofiction
There is a strange lack of implied setting in the RQG core rulebooks, by which I mean nanofiction pieces to set tone. There is “Vasana’s Saga”, which is a lot of mechanics. And there is the homelands and the family history. But it feels quite disconnected from Glorantha. This is in comparison to something like Exalted, where the setting shines through mechanically and in nanofiction pieces.
It seems like there is an expectation to purchase either the Glorantha Sourcebook (for $40) or the Guide to Glorantha (for… $150) on top of the rulebooks. If this was the case, I would have imagined the Sourcebook being included in the slipcase set.
Honourable Mention: DM support
There is also a lack of DM tools for constructing adventures, rewards, challenges or really anything of the sort. It feels like there was meant to be a Gamemaster book that fell apart and instead Chaosium was left with the Gamemaster Screen Pack. The pack contains some information about enchanted metal items, but nothing to aid a DM in making their own adventures.
Broadly, it would also be nice to understand how different experiences should be described to players, but I think that is a separate matter entirely.
† All art from is from RuneQuest: Roleplaying in Glorantha.
There was a deeply unsatisfying feeling when I realized there weren't mechanics for a lot more of the metaphysics in the setting. I'm deeply in the school of "system matters" when it comes to ttrpgs and it regularly feels like a lot of modern systems seem to ignore the importance of writing out those systems for the important parts of their settings.
1. The Perrin Conventions are bad actually.
2. Perhaps Exalted was made to do RuneQuest with an actual Hero tier.