Part 11: 1330: Sacrifice or Temple?

Also a good source for faqs about the game and how it is played: Gamefaqs. Sometimes the simple answers are best. If you're dead-set on the old KODP websites, a few of them are still up on the Internet Archive.


Ortossi was elected chief by an overwhelming vote. The crafters, a small and poorly represented group among the tribesmen, grew dissatisfied that they had no representation on the ring, and began to grumble, but the rest of the clan rejoyed that they were once again led by a follower of Orlanth. As for Heortarl, he accepted the clan's decision with apparent good grace. No one commented aloud on the black eye he had somehow received the night of the reorganization... it was bad form to comment on possible kinstrife.

Next up, let's take a look at the magic of our clan.



Here we see the magic screen. All magic comes from the gods--well, at least all the magic the tribes know of does. By praying and sacrificing to a specific god, we can curry their favor. The simplest thing to ask for is a mystery--this will teach us one of their miracles, of specific heroquests, or maybe more about our legends.



We can also review the legends our clan knows--and we know quite a few! Let's check out the list of the stories of our people!

How Things Began, The Sword Story, The Contests, The Storm Age, The Making of the Storm Tribe, Humakt the Champion, Issaries the Conciliator, Lhankor Mhy Finds the Truth, Orlanth and Aroka, Orlanth the Justice Bringer, Chalana Arroy Heals the Scars, The Great Darkness, Elmal Guards the Stead, Uralda's Blessing, Ernalda Feeds the Tribe, History, The Dragonkill WarThe Dragonkill War, The Pharaoh, Early Settlements

If you read the stories, you'll see that we don't know them very well. They're like stories a kid would tell---who did what, why, done. They give us a rough overview of the actions of the gods, but without details they provide comparatively little guidance. Let's leave all this alone for now---with a trickster on the ring attempts to learn mysteries will be more successful overall, but we put no magic into mysteries, and we've got a thousand other things to get done this year.

We can also sacrifice to certain gods for a divination. Lhankor Mhy can tell us what a specific neighbor really thinks of us, and reveal deeply-hidden grudges for our diplomats and traders to fix. He can also tell us who our greatest foe is, the clan or army that is most likely to show up with an agenda and a sword. The ancestors can tell us if there's any hidden treasure in our lands, but that's a little useless, as the time we spend praying and sacrificing we could spend actually searching our lands for hidden treasure--no cost to do that, and we actually get to keep them if they're there.

We can also pray for miracles. We only know three at the moment--Orlanth has taught us rain, which promotes crop growth, and lightning, which makes our warriors hit harder in combat. We can't cast either, as a permanent temple to Orlanth is permanently providing both effects to us. We have no temple to Lhankor Mhy, which means his miracle, Literacy, is available to us to cast. Literacy provides a boost to our relations to other clans--together with the three magic we spent on Diplomacy during the sacred time, this would make Kuchulainn an unstoppable diplomatic juggernaut. Wherever we went, there would be left nothing behind but smoldering fields and new friends. So let's do that.



I don't see why we can't build a temple to Eurmal.

Ignore him, we're going for Literacy. The question is... sacrifice a few cows and get the effect for about a year, or build a small shrine to Lhankor Mhy (which has both an up-front cost in goods, and an annual upkeep of goods, cows, and sheep) and be literate forever?

Edit: The rest of the lore from the lore screen. This stuff is all background knowledge about the setting--what laws affect the Orlanthi, a map of the surrounding area, a list of the gods, and so on.

Calendar, Chaos, Page 1 + Page 2, Deities, Page 1 + Page 2, Forigners, Glossary, Heortland, Law, Regional Map, Runes