Post originally by MountainGoblin at 2003-12-30 05:18:19
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You haven't actually addressed in your review just how HeroQuest represents "the best introduction newcomers to Glorantha have ever had". In fact, I own the book and, as a newbie to Glorantha (despite having played RPG for some fifteen years or more, I only played RuneQuest once) I find the book is a disaster from the point of view of giving a coherent world view or even allowing you to start playing without acquiring some other books to detail the world.

In your review, you mention a number of details that are not (at least if I recall correctly) in the rulebook: the explanation for rivers running the way they do, and the journey of the sun. This is precisely what's lacking from the rulebook: that kind of oh-so-important little detail that makes the world work... In fact, I had quite a surprise when I picked up the HeroQuest "Glorantha" book (in the french translation) and discovered quite a lot of details about the Gloranthan sky that would be very important in some conditions and difficult to introduce during gameplay without players saying something like "oh, and how come this wasn't obvious all along?". I mean, the actual description of the world is only about 8 pages long, at the end of the book, with a map that lacks a scale and the names of features don't correspond to the text describing it...

Another problem with the basic book is the amazing lack of detail regarding cultures... Take the Esrolians: the drawing featured on the two page description of their culture depicts two women with (apparently) very dark skin. At first, I thought they were some kind of "black" culture, but they had more or less the same gods as the Heortlings... What is going on? Well, the "Glorantha" rules reveal that they are, in fact, a seperate branch of Heortlings!

Anyway, I was actually planning to write a review addressing this, so I won't go on any further. I'd just like you to explain why you think it's "the best introduction newcomers to Glorantha have ever had".