Truly, when I saw Weapons & Equipment (2022) announced, my eyes rolled. Of all the things I want from RQ, an equipment book is not high on the list. In fact, an equipment book feels like a remnant from an earlier age. Like dinosaurs, you just don’t see them around too often.

Well, as usual, I’m an idiot who should have a little more faith. This book, like the many catalog style books I have enjoyed (Chromebook, Street Samurai Catalog, Aurora’s Whole Realms Catalog), has dual functionality. Yes, there is equipment detailed. But in doing that detailing, the reader gets a peak into the world the equipment exists within. This affords us a point of view of Glorantha we don’t generally get — we get the mythic and the heroic and the spiritual across many products, but the mundane? It is easy to forget that there is a mundane side to Glorantha.

So yes, weapons and armor. But also trade goods. Cosmetics. Services like tattooing and (lol) funerals. Toys! There is discussion of metals (they aren’t like our metals) but also of pottery and weaving. Many means of travel are laid out, as are schemes for travel and property ownership — who doesn’t want a house?

All of this adds another layer of reality with which players can interface with Glorantha and it is the one the grounds all the others! This book makes Glorantha make sense in a brand new way. Turns out you can teach an old campaign setting new tricks!