Chaosium President Rick Meints shares stories from a life-time as a collector of all things Chaosium
I was sorting through some things when I came across these original maps from 1979. Drawn by William Church, they debuted in the 2nd edition RuneQuest Rulebook. For years they were tacked up on Greg's office wall and slowly suffered decay and exposure to the elements. The lettering may look odd because it was done with Letraset dry transfer letters, one letter at a time.
I find the place names on the map noteworthy because Greg rewarded many of his White Bear & Red Moon playtesters with the honor of naming a place on the map. Other place names were also made up from rather quirky origins. Greg and I chatted about them a few years ago and I thought you might find them of interest:
William Church's instantly memorable and evocative Gloranthan cartography is available singly (Dragon Pass and Prax) and combined as one map, at the Chaosium Redbubble store. These maps come in various formats including rolled posters. Our Redbubble store features assorted other Gloranthan and Call of Cthulhu cartography too!
William Church's Dragon Pass - Prax map also features in RuneQuest Classic (RQ 2nd edition), available in hardback, POD softcover, and PDF.
*Ducks, Ducks, and more Ducks: Greg Stafford, along Brian Crist, Rory Root and several others, were all really into comics, including Carl Barks' Uncle Scrooge and Marvel's Howard the Duck. Brian and Rory both ran comic book shops as well. Being a big fan of Carl Barks' art, Brian Crist asked to have Duckburg on the map. Greg and he compromised on Duck Point so Disney wouldn't get their feathers in a bunch over the name. But despite the name, ducks were not actually in the game (or Glorantha) just yet.
In 1977, as the monsters were being developed for the RuneQuest RPG, Ducks made their first appearance during play testing, mainly as a Hobbit equivalent. Ducks were described but not pictured in the 1st edition of the RQ Rulebook in 1978, nor the 2nd edition published in 1979. The earliest depiction of Ducks I can find for RuneQuest is Jennell Jaquays' cover art for Wyrm's Footnotes #8, drawn in 1979:
followed by Rick Becker's Duck silhouette in FOES in March of 1980:
Ducks were formally added to the 4th edition of White Bear & Red Moon in 1980 when it was renamed Dragon Pass. Three new City Militia counters with that silhouette were labelled as Ducks, Ducks and, More Ducks.
The rest is history, and the majestic race inspired by Uncle Scrooge and Howard the Duck has been with us ever since...
RuneQuest co-creator Steve Perrin sheds further light on the story:
"Rick Meints suggested I reveal who is behind the curtain in the story of the origin of duck kind...
The story starts with a gifted miniatures sculptor named Neville Stocken. Neville had a problem of never seeing an IP he didn't want to do figures for. His attempt to do Star Wars figures is legendary, and can be found on the internet. Just Google his name.
Neville was a good friend of Greg Stafford and did several miniatures for Glorantha including Dragonewts, Lunar hoplites, and classic depictions of Herrick, Jar-eel the razoress, and Gunda the Guilty.
So Neville saw the cover of Howard the Duck #1 and soon a card showed up on the spin racks of game stores all over the country of Barbarian Duck and His Old Lady. Extremely true to its source, and Marvel's lawyers were not amused.
So Neville came to Greg and asked Greg for a Gloranthan Place for Barbarian Ducks and their Old Ladies, to show Marvel that the inspiration was not the comic book. As it happened, we, the authors of RQ, were looking for a hobbit-like adventurer for the game. Howard passed the physical (small, feisty, distinctive feet), and the ducks of Glorantha were born.
We're all familiar with the official story of how the ducks were humans cursed for cowardice. Other origins have been put forth, and of them all I prefer that promoted by Steve Lortz, one time associate of Neville's and sadly no longer with us.
It seems in one of the Great Conflicts that festooned Glorantha's early history a cabal of sorcerers sought to summon a thousand foot long fire breathing dragon. Somewhere along the way, a scale marker was misplaced, and instead of a thousand foot long fire breathing Drake, they got a thousand cigar-smoking male ducks. The question arises as to how these male ducks perpetuated the race. The answer is the Barbarian duck's Old Ladies. This is a fantasy world, after all."
I was sorting through some things when I came across these original maps from 1979. Drawn by William Church, they debuted in the 2nd edition RuneQuest Rulebook. For years they were tacked up on Greg's office wall and slowly suffered decay and exposure to the elements. The lettering may look odd because it was done with Letraset dry transfer letters, one letter at a time.
I find the place names on the map noteworthy because Greg rewarded many of his White Bear & Red Moon playtesters with the honor of naming a place on the map. Other place names were also made up from rather quirky origins. Greg and I chatted about them a few years ago and I thought you might find them of interest:
- Biggle Stone - Clint Bigglestone, one of his playtesters.
- LACA - Los Angeles, California "city of brown air".
- Cam's Well - Greg's wife Cam Stafford.
- Corflu - correction fluid, aka Tippex, or White-Out.
- Duckpoint - compromise with Brian Crist requesting Duckburg*
- Tourney Altar - Art and Ray Turney (RuneQuest authors).
- Wilm's Church - William Church (cartographer/artist).
- Nochet - when one of his players asked if a certain location had a name yet, Greg pointed at the unnamed city and said "not yet".
- Swenstown - Steve Swenston, artist.
- Hendrikei - Hendrik Pfeifer, one of his playtesters.
- Jansholm - Ian Pfeiffer, who taught Greg to play D&D.
- Tada's High Tumulus - Tadashi Ehara (early Chaoium staffer, and editor/publisher of Different Worlds magazine)
- Pimper's Block - Jeff Pimper (All the Worlds Monsters author).
- Hender's Ruins - Steve Henderson (RuneQuest author).
- Jonstown - Bill Johnson (WB&RM editor).
- Rory's Well - Rory Root, playtester and comic store owner.
- Pairing Stone - Steve Perrin.
William Church's instantly memorable and evocative Gloranthan cartography is available singly (Dragon Pass and Prax) and combined as one map, at the Chaosium Redbubble store. These maps come in various formats including rolled posters. Our Redbubble store features assorted other Gloranthan and Call of Cthulhu cartography too!
William Church's Dragon Pass - Prax map also features in RuneQuest Classic (RQ 2nd edition), available in hardback, POD softcover, and PDF.
*Ducks, Ducks, and more Ducks: Greg Stafford, along Brian Crist, Rory Root and several others, were all really into comics, including Carl Barks' Uncle Scrooge and Marvel's Howard the Duck. Brian and Rory both ran comic book shops as well. Being a big fan of Carl Barks' art, Brian Crist asked to have Duckburg on the map. Greg and he compromised on Duck Point so Disney wouldn't get their feathers in a bunch over the name. But despite the name, ducks were not actually in the game (or Glorantha) just yet.
In 1977, as the monsters were being developed for the RuneQuest RPG, Ducks made their first appearance during play testing, mainly as a Hobbit equivalent. Ducks were described but not pictured in the 1st edition of the RQ Rulebook in 1978, nor the 2nd edition published in 1979. The earliest depiction of Ducks I can find for RuneQuest is Jennell Jaquays' cover art for Wyrm's Footnotes #8, drawn in 1979:
followed by Rick Becker's Duck silhouette in FOES in March of 1980:
Ducks were formally added to the 4th edition of White Bear & Red Moon in 1980 when it was renamed Dragon Pass. Three new City Militia counters with that silhouette were labelled as Ducks, Ducks and, More Ducks.
The rest is history, and the majestic race inspired by Uncle Scrooge and Howard the Duck has been with us ever since...
RuneQuest co-creator Steve Perrin sheds further light on the story:
"Rick Meints suggested I reveal who is behind the curtain in the story of the origin of duck kind...
The story starts with a gifted miniatures sculptor named Neville Stocken. Neville had a problem of never seeing an IP he didn't want to do figures for. His attempt to do Star Wars figures is legendary, and can be found on the internet. Just Google his name.
Neville was a good friend of Greg Stafford and did several miniatures for Glorantha including Dragonewts, Lunar hoplites, and classic depictions of Herrick, Jar-eel the razoress, and Gunda the Guilty.
So Neville saw the cover of Howard the Duck #1 and soon a card showed up on the spin racks of game stores all over the country of Barbarian Duck and His Old Lady. Extremely true to its source, and Marvel's lawyers were not amused.
So Neville came to Greg and asked Greg for a Gloranthan Place for Barbarian Ducks and their Old Ladies, to show Marvel that the inspiration was not the comic book. As it happened, we, the authors of RQ, were looking for a hobbit-like adventurer for the game. Howard passed the physical (small, feisty, distinctive feet), and the ducks of Glorantha were born.
We're all familiar with the official story of how the ducks were humans cursed for cowardice. Other origins have been put forth, and of them all I prefer that promoted by Steve Lortz, one time associate of Neville's and sadly no longer with us.
It seems in one of the Great Conflicts that festooned Glorantha's early history a cabal of sorcerers sought to summon a thousand foot long fire breathing dragon. Somewhere along the way, a scale marker was misplaced, and instead of a thousand foot long fire breathing Drake, they got a thousand cigar-smoking male ducks. The question arises as to how these male ducks perpetuated the race. The answer is the Barbarian duck's Old Ladies. This is a fantasy world, after all."
