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DAD LOST MY IPOD posted:the city is supernaturally cold; you must make a Constitution check at -4 every 6 years or take 1hp damage.  Compared to everything else the city has going on, 1 damage every 6 years seems like more of an annoyance than anything else.
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Aug 8, 2013 23:30
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DAD LOST MY IPOD posted:Haha, it's supposed to be hours, nice catch. It's still basically an annoyance and it's more for flavor than anything else. Yeah, only 1 damage at any interval not measured in rounds is essentially just going to be an annoyance, the idea of it being measured in years just made it hilarious. pospysyl posted:In the Heinsoo/Tweet Q&A thread, they talked about different ways to engage players with the game world. The Masquerade clans and the Werewolf tribes were methods of doing that. Forsaken doesn't have anything as effective as that to hook players in. The Apocalypse writers put a lot of effort in justifying and engaging werewolf PCs. Forsaken just states, "these are werewolves. They fight spirits. Go," which just doesn't add up. Without the tribes, there's no established flavor to any of the splats, just vague political notions. The success of the Changeling Seasonal Courts illustrate this. They're all directly engaged with the main (and really only) setting hook of the game: the Fae. There's nothing really guiding the Uratha to actually doing anything with what are supposed to be their core antagonists. Forsaken is the only nWoD game that is definitively worse than its oWoD counterpart. I could go at length as to why I like W:TA more than W:TF (I won't) but one of the things that stands out most to me is that they try so hard to be W:TA in some ways (the W:TF tribes are just combinations of 2 or 3 W:TA Tribes Storm Lords=Shadow Lords + Silver Fangs. Blood Talons = Red Talons + Get of Fenris add Wendigo to taste, still have the same auspices that have the same roles, the Crinos form is named Gauru) but then there are a lot of things that just seem designed to piss Apocalypse players off (just being in Gauru form is stupidly dangerous to you and the other players, instead of Metis you have Ghost Children which basically say "Nope, this is a humans only club, and if you try anything different the storyteller gets to kill you", but its almost comical in all the ways it's designed to dick over your players. Cut it out? It grows back with the womb, try to abort it? it'll force itself to be born right then and there) The fact that they replaced the W:TA creation myth with "your great grandparents hosed up big time, everyone blames you, you're probably going to die as a result, good luck" also makes it hard for me to like it. They had some great ideas, the Host are amazing, and Blood of the Wolf is one of my favorite books just for the amount of detail they go into, but it's hard for me to like the base setting as presented.
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Aug 9, 2013 00:38
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Erebro posted:Given what we've seen in the Children of Gaia reviews, I can hardly blame the writers. quote:They seemed to get over it in Forsaken Chronicler's Guide, though-one of the suggested setting hacks is making it so that The Wolf Can Cleave Where He Wants, Thank You, thus making it something like a game of familial intrigues, since werewolves having other werewolves as spouses isn't that strange, nor are feuds. Kurieg fucked around with this message at 02:23 on Aug 9, 2013 |
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Aug 9, 2013 02:13
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Alien Rope Burn posted:Not seeing the vast difference from Apocalypse? Given Apocalypse basically has the werewolves of the past be tremendous fuckups in every significant respect, the effect seems the same to me. By the time PCs enter the picture, things are roundly hosed and there's not much left to be done about it - hence "the Apocalypse". Right, but the spirit world doesn't seem to blame them (at least Gaia and more importantly Luna don't), and the more you read about the other Changing Breeds you realize that a lot of them were just as responsible for the war of Rage as the Garou were(Bastet), if not more(Nagah). The guilt the Garou feel over their crimes in the past is largely self inflicted, and the current feeling among the younger Garou is "yeah, everyone hosed up, that's great, but everyone needs to pull their poo poo together now or we're all hosed," and you've got things like the Ahadi, and the Amazon Basin Coalition where the Changing Breeds and Garou are working together.
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Aug 9, 2013 15:00
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Cyber-Papacy definitely.Evil Mastermind posted:One other thing of note is that the engineer's background states that your interest started when "you were a boy", but the picture looks like a 60-year-old woman. I'm not sure if that's really progressive or just a miscommunication with the artist. Or one of their tech-creations really didn't work the way they wanted to.
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Aug 14, 2013 18:49
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 Chapter 3 Part 1: People  Let's play a game: Find the least disturbing thing about this image. Australian Aboriginals In a short paragraph before we get into the meat of this section, the book posits that the Europeans "found them unfit guardians of Australia" which I think is attributing too much to their thought process. However since they absolutely have to demonize these guys "This view was plainly a lie, and some among the Europeans, particularly Garou Kinfolk, perceived the truth." Before the Invasion Aboriginal society was based upon the belief that spirit, land, and people were linked, and must live in Harmony. Their culture was rich in song, poetry, painting and dance. They also, apparently had no chieftains, instead decisions were made by those "with the most experience or were held in high respect" which sure is a funny way to dance around calling them Chieftain. But you know, I just don't think that we're extolling the virtues of the Aboriginals enough. quote:Spirit, land and people dwelt in harmony, with few territorial disputes, no master-slave relationships, and no class divisions. quote:Life was good to the Aboriginal people. They worked less than any European peasant to achieve the necessities of food and shelter. Child labor was virtually unknown, and children were given time to explore their world through play. Men hunted for meat while women provided vegetables. Many items in their diet would have been considered luuries in Europe. quote:The tribes cared for the land, ensuring that no creature bred out of proportion. Bushfires were started to encourage new plant growth. Waterholes were dug so that animals would revitalize a depleted area. These actions were motivated by a deep concern for the health of the land. quote:All Aboriginal tribes and families could trace their origins to the Tjukurka, the ancestor-sirits of the Dreamtime. Many aboriginal people thus shared the powers of the Tjukurka. Some could call storms, kill over a distance by pointing the bone, use telepathy to pass information in conjunction with smoke signals, cure illness, will their own deaths, talk with animals of the bush, and move silently and invisible. Certain rare individuals could enter the Dreamtime. Of course they were taught all they know by the Bunyip, and since the Aboriginals were so in tune with the spirit, they were never subjected to the Impergium, so they don't succumb to the Delirium "unless their traditional culture and spirituality have been eroded by white society and its rules." Yes, apparently listening to pop music and obeying laws is enough to instill centuries of genetic memory and fear. Aboriginals Today Aboriginals can be divided into two rough groupings, those who live in the cities, and those who live on the reservations. quote:Child mortality rates are 400-500 times higher in the reservations than in the white community. Malnutrition and alcoholism are common. The Aboriginals, on the advice of the white community, have changed their diet, foregoing the healthy meats and vegetables of the bush for Coca-Cola and junk foods. Diseases such as leprosy, tuberculosis and glaucoma, virtually unknown in white communities, are common on the reservations. It is expected that AIDS will become a severe problem among the outback Aboriginal communities unless drastic action is taken.  And then this image is just, here. It's like someone traced a jeans ad and then opened up photoshop and hit the 'more goat' and 'more wolf' filters repeatedly. And then told SCAR to draw it. Urban Aboriginals have it similarly bad, being "unfairly targeted by the authorities as breeding grounds of criminal activity", and a majority of the prison population are Aboriginal in origin. Also, the laws from the 1960's that granted rights to the Aboriginals have not been passed yet. The Squattocracy and Aboriginal Protection Board have systematically wiped out all Bunyip Kinfolk. Tribal elders that remember the Bunyip believe that the Rainbow Serpent itself prevents any new Bunyip from being born, and will continue to do so until all outsiders have been killed or driven from Australia's shores. Non-Aboriginal Australians This is another dry and relatively unoffensive chapter with one exception. quote:Australia's distance from England, and the vast spaces early settlers had to traverse in order to visit one another, encouraged self-sufficiency among the Australians. The Australian tradition of mateship was thereby founded. A mate is one's best friend, someone for whom you would die and who would definitely die for you. Mateship originated in the harsh conditions of the outback, when a man had to depend on his mate for all things. Mateship has been described as sexist and homoerotic, an expression of non-physical love between men who have been taught to believe that any form of tenderness, even toward a best friend, is unmanly and un-Australian. The bond of mateship endures today, even between total strangers, whos use of the word with one another indicates that they are men united against the world, and often against women. "Mate" is a code word, admitting its user to a secret society, a fraternal order. Just as mateship suggests all men are equal, it also suggests women are unequal. Derision and exclusion sometimes extend to anyone who is perceived as different, whether sexually, physically or racially. The Garou Tribes This section opens informing us that there are a grand total of 350 garou in Australia. Which seems like the author took the rough ratio of 1/50,000 garou to humans and just applied it straight to Australia’s then-current population without accounting for the fact that the garou-human ratio includes Asia, Africa, and South America where Garou are almost non-existant (and account for over 75% of the world’s population). The total combined with the tribal makeups and the ‘tribe exclusive’ Caerns we saw in the last chapter means that there are a few septs out there with maybe 1 or 2 active defenders, if that. Black Furies "The Black Furies have suffered immense guilt over the death of the Bunyip, now correctly perceiving it as a shameful atrocity." Jumping straight to atrocity are we, don't want to try out mistake or tragedy first? The Black furies are most at home in the outback, spurning the 'filth choked cities'. The first Black Furies arrived around 1800, since they were worried that, "as the traditional defenders of the wyld places", if they weren't there the environment would suffer. Of course, to the Black Furies 'environment' doesn't include people, and they 'culled what they saw as unnecessary numbers of Aboriginals'. This rightly pissed the Bunyip off, and they resisted the Black Furies advances into their territory. This 'insult to their pride' goaded them into backing the War of Tears. After the war they were appalled at where their "tendency for violence and pride" had led them. Since then they've tried to avoid violence, working with the Children of Gaia to guide humanity to a more peaceful relationship with Gaia. To this end they schemed to give Women the vote in 1902, er, wait, what? Organization There are about 25 Black Furies in Australia, concentrated in Arnhem Land and Kangaroo Island, though there are some in intertribal packs. Stand out members not given more detailed call outs include Circe Chisolm (Oh come on) who is 'regularly beset by visions of the apocalypse', and "The Lupus Ahroun Ball-Biter, who leads a rogue, nomadic Black Fury pack against rapists." Of the remainder, "Most Australian Black Furies subscribe to the Temple of Artemis camp, though the Amazons of Diana have considerable support. Freebooters ply their trade in search of Bunyip fetishes and lost caerns." I think when you number less than 10, it doesn't count as 'considerable support' anymore. So to summarize, of the 25 Black Furies in Australia, fully 1/5th go around biting the nutsacks off of rapists, some(let's say four or five?) wander around trying to find Bunyip things that were left behind, and there are a few other ones divided amongst urban packs, so there are maybe ten Black Furies left to guard their two Protectorates on opposite sides of the continent. Of the other tribes, they're closest tot he Children of Gaia("whom most Black Furies uphold as paragons of Garou behavior") and the Glass Walkers, who both thought the war of tears was a load of poo poo. They remain distant from the Get and Talons, but hate the Shadow Lords for stealing Tazmania from them.  Wungala Rose: Rank 4 Homid Philodox Wungala is a small aboriginal woman, bent with age, she hopes to "educate the whitefellas" and her own people to make peace between them. She was born in 1931, the child of a young Aboriginal maid and a greek-born shepherd who "carried the Garou Gene", of course, since she's a Black Fury, after her dad knocked her mom up, he disappeared. And then she was fired from her job because she was pregnant. As she grew up she realized that her tribe no longer loved the land and each other like they once did, instead turning to alcohol and being ravaged by disease. And again, since she's a Black Fury, her mother was killed by her uncle in a drunken rage, shortly after this the Furies showed up and spirited her away. She's now the leader of the Arnhem land Furies, and on the Jindabyne Council. She's devoted much of her attention to improving the lot of women in Australia, setting up women's shelters and the like, and trying to unite Aboriginals and the "whitefellers" in harmony against the Wyrm.  Voula Kostikidas: Rank 3 Metis Theurge Oh this can't be that ba quote:Metis Disfigurement: Hermaphrodite  quote:Image:In her Lupus Form, Voula is a gaunt, black, male wolf with burning green eyes. Her Homid form is that of a tall, olive skinned woman in her late teens, with long black hair, a thin face, and pain-filled green eyes. In Crinos form, Voula is hermaphroditic, with a woman's breasts but male genitalia. quote:Roleplaying Notes:You hate yourself, and compensate by inflicting that hate on other people. You are cold, detached and cruel. Do not hesitate to resort to violence in order to convince others to follow your orders, although your remorse is always great when violence gains control of your actions. Take every opportunity to revile the city and the weaklings who inhabit it. Although you hate the city, you hate yourself more, and so remain within it's confines, trapped in a vicious circle of self-loathing Anyways, Voula is the child of a Kangaroo Island protectorate Fury, and a Red Talon father. She's already despised by both for being a metis, but the Black Furies hate her because of her unique deformity. They kicked her out as soon as she was old enough to fend for herself. She eventually found herself in Melbourne, and took shelter in the Fitzroy Gardens, where she was visited by a vision of Artemis herself! She saw herself leading a pack of outcasts and re-opening the dormant Bunyip Caern where Fitzroy Gardens now stand. To that end she's created a suitable pack, but she thinks she'll lead them into disaster. She sublimates these fears by bullying and abusing her pack. quote:Although she has dwelt in Melbourne for many years, she hates the city; as a Black Fury, she knows that her true place is in the wilderness. Spurned by her tribe for not being a true woman, she feels that she must live a life of shame, and what place is more shameful for a Black Fury to inhabit than the heart of a metropolis? Wracked by guilt, tortured by doubt and self-hatred, Voula lives only for the fight against the Wyrm.  Bone Gnawers Bone Gnawers are fairly common in Australia, all things considered, breeding with dingos and... wild dogs, which isn't possible according to the rules. They've integrated themselves into working-class Australian culture, and as such are huge sports fans, and love beer. Remember Porkchop? The first Garou who landed on Australia? She was a Bone Gnawer, and of course the Silver Fangs hated her because she was a "provocateur" who held dreams of Bone Gnawer equality. Her preaching during the trip to Australia on the first fleet gave her more followers than they liked, so the Silver Fangs assigned them all to scout the interior, hoping they'd die. Of course they returned with maps and news, forcing the rest of the Garou to at least acknowledge their usefulness. They were scouts and combatants during the War of Rage, and after the truth was revealed declared a tribe-wide year of mourning, after that they were done. "We made a mistake and will remember it for the rest of our lives. But this doens't mean we should live our lives in the shadow of that mistake. We survive." There are about 40 Bone Gnawers in Australia, more than half live in Sydney where they have the Hobo Caern in the old hotel. Others remain mostly in the cities. Notable Bone Gnawers include the Metis Ragabash "Choco-Loco", who tricked a powerful Vampire into waking up an hour early and walking into the sunlight, killing himself, which again doesn't really mesh with the rules here but sure. Homid Galliard "Carn-the-Pies"(I'm guessing this is a Football reference?) who is a fanatical Collingwood Football Club supporter. And Square-Eyes, a Metis Philodox from Perth that should probably be a Glass Walker(that's literally what it says). Silver Fangs and Shadow Lords hate the Bone Gnawers because they're hopelessly inferior. Red Talons and Fenris see them as decadent weaklings, but give them respect when it's due. The Fianna love them, because by loving them they piss off the Silver Fangs. There are two unique camps in the Australian Bone Gnawers, Fans and Idealists. Fans are giant hooligan stereotypes, they adorn themselves in the colors of their chosen Football or Rugby team, disdaining rival Fans, only letting the contempt wane after a good fight and a beer, and then they're friends until the next week's game. Idealists are the followers of Porkchop, but they seem to have taken the letter of her teachings rather than the meaning. Rather than elevate the state of the tribe they want to elevate themselves first hoarding money and goods rather than junk. The Silver Fangs dismiss them as nouveau riche.  Mother Pasta also has a unique Fetish, the Bowl of Perpetual Pasta, which is basically exactly what it says, though it's always slightly overcooked. Maria Condotta came to Australia from Italy in the late 1940's with her parents, after her father got a job on the Snowy Mountain Scheme. A number of Bone Gnawers lived amongst the laborers and realized that she was Garou, and took her into her tribe shortly before her first change. Once there she was... what quote:After her transformation, Pasta, as she was now known, stayed in Jindabyne for many years, marrying a Kinfolk boy and working closely with the Bone Gnawer representative of the Jindabyne Council. Father Meat-and-Three-Veg was also the leader of a large Sydney Bone Gnawer sept; as he grew older, he groomed pasta to inherit his position quote:Unknown to all, Mother Pasta has become unhinged by grief over the death of her husband five years ago. Her great love of pasta has been replaced by a growing desire for human flesh, ideally that of small children. She has practiced stalking children as they walk home from school, as well as street kids. To date, she has not yet put her fantasies into action, but it is only a matter of time. Although a suitable successor exists, in the form of Melbourne's Scratches-at-Fleas, it would be difficult to convince him of his worthiness. Meanwhile Mother Pasta nods and smiles, all the while coming closer and closer to acting out her insane fantasies.  Scratches-at-Fleas: Rank 3 Lupus Ahroun Wow, he has actual not horrible art, sure it looks more like a puppy than a wolf but I'll take it. Fleas grew up on the streets, and even then he was a social animal, sharing scraps with weaker dogs and snarling and barking at dogcatchers long enough for others to escape. It was during one such confrontation that he underwent his first change. One claw separating the Dog Catcher from his legs, the other ripping open his truck and freeing all the doggies. Now he applies his philosophy to humans, helping those who cannot help themselves, the homeless, helpless, and infirm. He is often called upon to help spring new cubs from places they might currently be being held, like hospitals, prisons, and Asylums. He's very popular as a result but also modest and self deprecating. Children of Gaia quote:Since the War of Tears, Australia's Children of Gaia have rejected violence out of hand, disdaining all who are dominated by Rage. They are aloof, arrogant and patronizing in their attitude toward "Gaia's fallen children," as they call their fellow Garou. They alone among the Garou are closest to the Mother, the Children smugly assert. The Children of Gaia exploit the guilt of the Australian Garou, and always manage to make the other tribes feel that their penance is inadequate. The Children of Gaia were early immigrants to Australia, after Raymond Love-of-the-Goddess died as a convict laborer, the Tribe came to the continent in droves, since they hate that kind of stuff. At first they spread out amongst the different penal settlements to try and minister to the suffering as best they can, but they realized it wasn't working, "In 1864 they were instrumental in ending transportation of convicts to the colonies." It doesn't explain how, they just were. After that they turned their attention to the suffering amongst the Aboriginal people, of course the Bunyip didn't approve of this, so the Children found themselves fighting a two front war against the Bunyip and the Aboriginal Protection Board. The more impetuous members of the tribe joined in the War of Tears, but once they found out the Black Spirals were involved The entire tribe in Australia swore to never raise a paw in violence again. They're Werewolves, that's dumb as hell. I guess they must never frenzy, ever, or have Ahrouns or Galliards in their tribe. For the past Century they've busied themselves healing the wounds inflicted upon the Garou by the war of Tears. Some think that the only way to combat those scars are by confronting them, so they've embraced psychology and psychotherapy. Others joined the church and are chiefly responsible for the Anglican and Uniting churches admitting women into the priesthood. And since they're the Children of Gaia, they also lead the protests that greeted the soldiers returning from the Vietnam War. Since those days they've kept in touch with the counterculture and green movements, and the book would have you believe that they are the sole reason the green movements are even able to function. "Some 20 Children of Gaia" are in Australia, and most of them dwell in the Nimbin Protectorate, though there's apparently one pack in the Daintree rainforest. Other children serve in multi-tribal packs, but they're invariably outcasts from their tribe, since they are "Ronin who have turned to violence", except that's not how being Ronin works, if you're Ronin you don't have a tribe, or renown, and other Garou would be loathe to interact with you nonetheless form a pack. They're probably just misuing the term because it's easier than saying "Oh yeah they're Children but we really don't like them because they like punching things too much. Want another hit?" Speaking of, important Australian Coggies include Stewart "Sweet-is-the-Morning', a Ragabash drug dealer who, because of his belief that mind altering drugs will increase humanity's love for Gaia, seeks to spike Adelaide's water supply with LSD. There's also the Galliard Kirsten "Songs-of-Harmony" who is a folk singer that travels up and down the east coast, and the Ahroun ronin "Love-Is-a-Bloody-Claw". Most Coggie Aussies are, unsurprisingly, adherents of the Patient Deed camp, but there are "A few followers" of the Imminent Strike. They work closely with the Black Furies, Fianna, Glass Walkers, and Bone Gnawers. And against the Silver Fangs, Get and Red Talons, and they are always quick to remind the other tribes that a Red Talon started the War of Tears.  Innana, Voice of the Goddess Rank 4 Homid Theurge The Roleplaying notes include "You have a short attention span" "You tend to randomly start practicing Tai Chi at unusual moments" and "Tell others to 'relax, flow, and feel the Goddess'". Also her gift list includes "Smell of (Wo)man" and she has one of the most punchable faces in the book. Innana was born "Crystal" to a hippie parents in a mudbrick house in Nimbin. She was raised on a steady diet of peace, love, and marijuana. She always heard voices wispering on the wind, and saw quaint creatures peering through the windows promising to take her to faraway places. When she changed it didn't really bother her that much. As a Garou her visions became more vivid and frequent, and as such was chosen to be the Voice of the Goddess for her sept. Unfortunately her visions often contradict each other, and she doesn't have the skill to decipher them, so she just accepts them as they come and changes her opinions accordingly. She's considered eccentric by the other members of the Jindabyne Council, which probably has something do with the fact that she dances naked every morning on the hilltops of nimbin to honor Gaia, and that she fumigates the Jindabyne meetings with cheap incense, or that she keeps trying to feed the other council members pot brownies and tofu. "She is neither insane nor simple-minded, but just clouded by the strength of her visions."  Cernonous, Arm of the Goddess: Rank 4 Metis Theurge His mother was Serbian, his father Filipino, and both were CoGs. They believed that their love was not unnatural, because love is of Gaia, not of the Wyrm, and Cernonous was raised in a loving home. So it kind of came as a shock when most of the rest of the Garou nation subjected him of prejudice and scorn. He eventually learned that his horns were what marked him as unnatural to other Garou, so he did what any sane Garou would do. He went to College and became a Geneticist to try and figure out a way to splice out his Metis taint. Wait what? quote:Years of study taught Cernonous much, and under the name Curwen Nostrum, he became one of the rising stars in Australian genetic research. The answer to his quest still eluded him, however, and Cernonous began shunning humans and Garou alike in favor of furious research and heavy drinking. Late one night, while staggering along Bondi Beach singing drunkenly to the stars, Cernonous received a vision of Gaia. He saw the Goddess dancing down a path of moonlight reflected across the waves, a Thylacine fawning at her feet. Since that day Cernonous has devoted himself to bringing back the Bunyip. His dedication to the Goddess brought him to the attention of his Tribe, and the unanimously elected him the Arm of he Goddess of the Nimbin Protectorate, unfortunately this also makes him a part-time member of the Jindabyne Council whenever Innana is too high to attend. He hates the time he has to spend away from his work, and he hates Innana whom he sees as a naive flighty airhead. He has experienced bigotry first hand, and believes the rest of the Garou Nation incapable of knowing Gaia's love as he does, so he spends most of his time on the Council reminding everyone that the War of Tears happened, and that they're all assholes by extension.  Diem: Rank 2 Homid Ragabash A refugee from Cambodia that fled Pol Pot's regime shortly before his first change. He was contacted by some Cambodian Garou that claimed him as their own, but he fled before he changed, and was taken in by the Children of Gaia. What does Diem do, you may ask? He's a nature photographer. Hoping to increase the love of Gaia by taking pictures of nature, and what is more beautiful in nature than a Garou in Lupus form? Also he feels conflicted, like he doesn't belong in Australia. So he's planning a trip back to Cambodia in the near future. I think this guy is supposed to be a plot hook, but he's completely uninteresting despite their attempts to make him otherwise. He also doesn't have a single combat ability, even Innana had at least 1 dot of Brawl. Fianna The Fianna have been strong on Australia since it's founding, and have long involved themselves with it's politics, earning them significant power and the ire of the Silver Fangs. Fianna Kinfolk arrived before the Garou themselves, as most of them were guilty of political crimes against the English. Bridget of the Flashing Eyes arrived in 1795, and was incensed at the treatment of their kin by Ear Blaze, which sparked their revolution. Since their rush to judgement lead to the death of an entire tribe, they've been more impartial and careful in their decision making process, which of course the Shadow Lords mock them for. There are 35 Fianna in Australia, divided between Gariwerd and Hunter Valley, the current Righ of Australia is Fingal Flashing-Claws, who is starting to show his age (being born before the first World War). Other 'important' Fianna include the Lupus Galliard Colleen "Foe-of-Despair", who's stirring songs can lift the deepest Harano. and the Homid Philodox Dermot Millane, who fought in the War of Tears in a past life, and can tell tales that bring tears to the eyes of the fiercest Ahroun. Presumably if these two were to talk to each other, the universe would implode. The camps are all well represented other than the ones that are more concerned with their homeland. The Whispering Rovers camp is particularly prominent, and one pack made of camp members roams the country as the Irish folk band known as "The Rovers". As far as their relationships with the other tribes, they blame the Red Talons and the Get of Fenris for the War of Tears, the hate the Silver Fangs for being the Silver Fangs. Australian Fianna are "more Mature" than their cousins elsewhere, and their relationships with other tribes are "excellent", even apparently with the Shadow Lords, even though they were also sort of very responsible for the War of Tears.  Bartholomew(Yes that is a man) Wise-in-the-Ways-of-the-Wyrm: Rank 3 Homid Theurge James was born in northern Scotland to an Irish Mother and a Welsh Father, "the quintessential Celt." He emigrated to Australia when he was 16, prior to his first change. After a relatively painless transition, he began a dashing career of raids on Wyrm Tainted areas and Spiral Caerns, retrieving stolen fetishes or trapped spirits. Though one day his lust for glory got the better of him, disguising himself as a Spiral he raided a Silver Fang caern for a stolen Fianna fetish, and in the process he killed a young Silver Fang girl named Amanda Grace-of-Gaia. After that, James was dead, and Bartholomew was born. He was horrified by the lengths he would go to for glory, but was still driven to find things, so now his life's work is to catalogue all the spirits of the Dreamtime, to better understand them and to try and convince them to work with the Garou instead of against them.  Fingal Flashing-Claws: Rank 5 Homid Ahroun The youngest son of a family of working-class Irish Australians, Fingal was born in 1910. Despite the large gap of years between him and his father, he was always treated special. Why is that, you may ask? Well because his father was Crushes-the-Wyrm-as-Grapes-beneath-his-Paws, the Righ of Australia, and Fingal was the only one of his children who changed, so he was being groomed to succeed him. Instilled with reverence for his tribe, guilt over the bunyip, and Hatred of the Siver Fangs. After his father was slain before his eyes, he took his seat on the Jindabyne council, where he fights a constant battle, both politician and physical, against both the Wyrm and the Silver Fangs. quote:Recent advances in technology frighten him, and in such matters he defers to the Glass Walkers, whom he considers allies against the Silver Fangs. It is partially because of the Glass Walkers' advice that Fingal has not acted to stop the spread of industry and technology in his protectorate. Fingal now wishes for nothing more than to die in Ireland, a land he has never seen. His son is a braggart who will probably succeed his father one he passes on, but he's less a fighter and more a boaster and sings exaggerated tales praising his own glory.  No'iri'n Ni Dhonaill: Rank 3 Homid Ahroun No'iri'n is a troublemaker, even amongst the Garou she doesn't fit in, questioning assumptions and beliefs held for millenia. After her right of passage she returned to Melbourne only to find it held no attraction for her anymore, so she left and joined the Tower Hill Sept. Unlike most Ahroun she isn't a mindless killer, though she's a decent warrior. And unlike most Fianna, she doesn't despise the Silver Fangs. She believes that the fued between the tribes diverts their rage from the Wyrm. She also thinks that the Garou need to stop wallowing in self pity over the death of the Bunyip, since mourning what is lost ignores what can still be saved. She's a huge proponent of Aboriginal land rights and similar issues, which has made an enemy of the Red Talons and Get of Fenris. She speaks her mind at all Fianna moots and has a growing following amongst younger members, she's in the running for the Righ of Australia, in her own mind if nowhere else. Get of Fenris Australian Get are extremists, their savagery and blood thirst are only exceeded by the Red Talons. They hate humans, and want to instate the Impergium in Australia to make mankind fear them again "as they should." They are linked with National Action, Neo-Nazis, and 'similarly distasteful movements'. The get deny any guilt for the War of Tears, which 'blinds them to further wrongdoings'. Right now their main concern is the fact that other Garou, even their best friends the Talons, breed with dingos, diluting the purity of their wolf blood. Though individual members showed up as early as 1800, the tribe didn't show up in force until the gold rush of the 1850s when news of humanity's expansion into the untamed bush rallied them to action. Led by Jarl Thorstrom Blood-Drinker of the Swords of Heimdall, they arrived in force to take charge of the 'improperly guarded continent'. His first action was to stir up racial dissent on the gold fields, inciting riots and then slaughtering any Chinese miners that they could find. Thorstrom fell trying to take a Bunyip Caern, and his succesor Black Ivan fanned the flames of the War of Tears to get revenge. Even after the truth got out, he refused to admit fault. "Even if the Bunyip had not been of the Wyrm, the could have been, now or in the future. Best to destroy the potential contagion now lest it spread." Their numbers were weakened as many warriors fell during the War, their refusal to breed with Dingos didn't help, nor did the fact that the Australian climate is about as far from Germany's that you can get. Despite their disdain for the 'weaker' tribes, they participated in the first Jindabyne Council thinking it would be a one-shot occurrence. Their belief was that they would passionately argue to introduce the Impergium in Australia, the other tribes would think it was an awesome idea, and put the Get in charge of Australia. They said no, the get were flabbergasted, and accidentally agreed to join the council full time. Right now their only real allies are the Red Talons, diluted through dingo blood they may be, and the Shadow Lords. Bone Gnawers and Glass Walkers are hopelessly corrupt, Black Furies and Children of Gaia are weaklings, Fianna are Cowards for rescinding their judgement against the Bunyip, and Silver Fangs are already Wyrm-Tainted and should be destroyed, they just need to convince the other tribes first. There are about 20 Get in Australia, divided amongst the Mjolnir's Thunder, Glorious Fist of Wotan, and Swords of Heimdall camps. Note that when I say that, understand that I mean "Suicidal nutjobs that seek death in glorious battle no matter the collateral damage", "An all Lupus camp who think that humans are only good for food", and "Nazis, not neo-nazis, straight up 'worked with the SS' Nazis". Notable get include Hans Dieter, a Homid Ragabash who leads National Action, the European Lupus Theurge Sings-of-War, who seeks to oust the Jarl, believing that no Woman, especially an ape, should lead the Get of Fenris, and Hrothgar Bloodfang, a gay Homid Ahroun, rejected by his family and tribe and currently living in Melbourne. You know what, I'm going to review Get of Fenris: Revised after this, we need to showcase a good Revised book and the tribe deserves better than "Nazi nazi nazi skinhead kill the Chinese and the gays". Carla Grimsson: Rank 4 Homid Philodox The Get representative on the Jindabyne Council, she's got pure Nordic heritage even though she's been born and raised Australian. She was born in rural New South Wales before it got engulfed by Sydney, she's disturbed by the spread of suburbia. She's a determined campaigner against immigration into Australia, because of this she's often lumped in with the younger racist members of her clan. "Carla is not a racist and in fact has worked hard to temper her colleague's aggression against the Aboriginal people, who she believes have every right to be in Australia(as much as any human can claim that right). What Carla fears is the remaining Australia wilderness will be eaten up by housing as more and more refugees come to Australian shores. For the moment, Carla, bitterly wearing the mantle of racist, argues against immigration at the Jindabyne Council." She's not a racist, honest, some of her best friends are Aboriginals, she just hates those damned foreigners. Glass Walkers The Glass walkers were involved with the European invasion from the earliest days, seeking freedom from the stifling rule of England's Silver Fangs. They sought to build an experimental urban colony in harmony with Gaia constructed according to the ideals of their tribe. But the other tribes came along too and shot that idea down before it even started, so they simply integrated themselves into the various colonies as they were founded. The War of Tears gave them an opportunity to increase their power. Kanakis, a recently arrived Glass Walker and a ruthless politician, had previously sought to contact the Bunyip, without success. Eventually he finally tracked one down and attacked him until he revealed that "not until the Garou had found the balance that the Bunyip themselves demonstrated could there be meaningful communication between the tribes." Shortly after this he found out that Grayflank had been murdered, he was firm in his belief that the Bunyip weren't responsible, but he only made a token effort at best to stop them. He knew they wouldn't listen and by keeping aloof of the conflict he could improve his tribe's station. After the war, Kanakis formed the Jindabyne Council. After the Council's formation, the Glass Walkers formed the Board, a group of Glass Walker executives that rapidly advanced their power by controlling Australian economy and disparaging those who had participated in the Bunyip genocide. After World War 2, the Board rose to prominence to the determent of those involved in Organized Crime. Even though the Children of Gaia found links between some Glass Walker holdings and Pentex, the Glass Walkers were able to jettison millions in assets without losing much influence. There are about 40 Glass Walkers in Australia, most of them live on the Eastern Seaboard cities and Perth. Each of Australia's major cities has a Don or Lord that sits on the Board, which runs the tribe much like a Corporation. Most of them are concerned with increasing their own wealth and prestige, though some want to figure out a way to get revenge on the Children of Gaia for making them lose money. Younger Glass walkers want a decentralization of power, since it's very much a 'rich get richer' situation. Among these are the Homid Philodox Dances-with-Cursors who is an anarchist. The Metis Galliard Sings-through-Wires who is a pirate radio DJ, hijacking programs and playing back bushland transmissions. And Tuft, a "no-nonsense lupus Theurge, ambitious but patient", and that is all we are given on Tuft. The City Farmers and Urban Primitives camps are on the rise in Australia, much to the horror of the Board who are more traditional. Their only real allies amongst the tribes are the Bone Gnawers, who are useful lackeys, and the Fianna, who are allies in the political arena even if they conceal their true goals from each other. They hate the Silver Fangs, Get, and Red Talons, and some harbor a grudge against the Children of Gaia.  Teeth of Titanium: Rank 3 Lupus Ahroun Born Bloody Teeth, a Red Talon, he was captured during a raid against Perth's technomancers by Iteration X. They took him out to Autochthonia, a Mage Horizon realm that's basically super awesome magic tech land, and experimented on him for months, finally implanting him with a living mechanical entity which slowly and painfully turned him into a cyborg. He escaped and returned to his pack, who subsequently tried to kill him. He escaped from them only to be found by the Glass Walkers. They were fascinated by his condition and adopted him, renaming him Teeth-of-Titanium. He's served the Glass Walkers faithfully since then, and has risen to become the Lord of Perth, earning a seat on the Board. His struggle to master the machine has left him bereft of genuine emotion, and separated him from his bestial nature. He's a dedicated foe of the Technocracy, understanding their evil the way no other Garou ever could, and he rules Perth with an un-ironic iron fist, anyone who gets in his way is soon met with an industrial accident.  Mariko Ten: Rank 4 Homid Ragabash Mariko Ten came to Australia as a young girl, accompanying her father who was a high-ranking executive with Toyota. He had been appointed to oversee a Sydney production plant, unfortunately he was so good at his job that he was headhunted by Pentex. It was only through luck that the Sydney Glass Walkers abduct her before her father and his new friends arrived home to share dinner. To this day Mariko hates Pentex and it's pet Black Spiral Dancers, her father still hunts her but her position and power have allowed her to elude him. Her intelligence and determination allowed her to master Garou society and she swiftly climbed the rungs to become the Glass Walker Lord of Sydney. She has many connections among the Yakuza(she's Japanese, you see) and the Sydney Bone Gnawers, including Mother Pasta. She's obsessive and demands absolute respect from everyone she meets, including her own pack, and has been known to order the execution of people who transgress her. She also has a pathological fear of transforming out of her Homid form. She despises the wolf within her, and does her utmost to suppress her Garou nature. She prefers playing CDs at moots than the 'primitive' drumming and howling.  Don Mephisto: Rank 4 Homid Philodox He was born in Italy, and spent some time after his first change running with a wild wolf pack in the Abruzzi Mountains before returning to human society and taking a position within the Italian Glass walkers, earning extensive Mafia Contacts. He was appointed to his current position after the death of the previous Don of Melbourne, and has proven to be quite adept in the position. He's actually fairly well liked amongst the Garou in Australia, except amongst his own Glass Walkers. His position on the Jindabyne Council is more or less secure, though, as he's one of the few Glass Walkers earthy enough to not offend the Garou of other tribes. He uses his natural flamboyance to assuage fears and pass himself off as something of a buffoon, and has even managed to get a few Get and Red Talons to at least tolerate his presence. He's troubled by Mariko and her Yakuza contacts, but he's fairly certain his own Mafia friends will be able to keep him safe. I'm going to have to split this into two posts since I'm bumping against the Character Limit. Up Next: Red Talons through Wendigo and Others Kurieg fucked around with this message at 17:00 on Aug 15, 2013 |
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Aug 15, 2013 00:02
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Chapter 3 Part 2: All the rest As promised, here are the last few tribes, and the hangers on. Red Talons Australia's Red Talons are entirely of dingo stock, and since there are a lot of dingos in Australia they're proportionally more numerous than elsewhere. The Red Talons respect action above all else, and are ruthlessly savage in their pursuit of their foes, the Wyrm and Humanity. They do not acknowledge the leadership of any other tribe, refusing to interact with them except in times of war. The first Red Talons to arrive in Australia were exiles, members of the Predator Kings camp who were very vocal about the return of the Impergium, and were sent to Australia to remove their influence from the tribe. I repeat, the Red Talons exiled them because they were too extreme. Anyways, they pushed into the interior of Australia and bred with the Dingos they found there, but met resistance from the Bunyip. "Anger against the Bunyip grew in these Talons' hearts. Who were these strange Garou to prevent the Red Talons from roaming in the wilderness and the spirit world, which were their birthrights?" Eventually the Black Spirals found out about this and well, the War of Tears happened. Even after the truth was known they refused to believe it, since obviously they had stopped them from taking over the entire continent as was their birthright, truly they were villains. The fact that the other Garou blamed them just made them angrier. The only reason the Red Talons even bother to keep their seat on the Jindabyne Council is to try and convince the others to start all-out war against humanity. Their logic being that the united tribes were able to wipe out the Bunyip, why not humanity? Math is not the Red Talon's strong suit. Australia has around 45 Red Talons, divided amongst their four protectorates. The Leaders of the protectorates constantly fight one another to prove who is strongest, the current leader is Mamu of the Pilbara protectorate. The rest of the Jindabyne Council just laughs at them since no matter who's holding the seat, the only thing they'll say is Kill All Humans. The only camp that has any real numbers are the Predator Kings, and most of the "Aboriginal Attacks" that were waged against settlers were Red Talons trying to get humans to kill each other for their own benefit. The only tribe they have any real affection towards is the Get, with whom they are united in their hatred of the Uktena. Red Talons of "note" include Nose-to-the-Wind, a young Ragabash said to be as mad as a Black Spiral who plays pranks on his elders. Snarls-at-Thunder, an Ahroun with an insatiable hatred of the Uktena. And Teeth-Scrape-Bone, a Galliard who has met with a strange Garou who promises to make him the leader of the Tanami Protectorate.  Mamu: Rank 5 Lupus Ahroun Our first rank 5, and he's got the stats to match, his description however.. quote:Mamu almost never assumes Homid form, despising it as weak and helpless. On the rare occasions he appears in Homid, he has the appearance of a shaggy-haired sullen Aboriginal giant, standing well over six feet. His build is solid and rippling with muscle; his skin is a glossy black. In Lupus form, Mamu is a calf-sized dingo. His jet-black hair is shot through with red highlights. In Hispo, Mamu is the size of a Shetland Pony, a monstrous, terrifying beast.  Tremble in fear mortals! Mamu ran with a dingo pack the first two years of his life, always fighting his rivals and wanting to defeat them just to prove he could. The only one he couldn't beat was the pack leader, and near the time of his first change the pack leader drove him out. Of course after he changed he came back and killed him and took over the pack. Now he leads the Pilbara Protectorate and sits on the Jindabyne Council, he's the largest strongest Red Talon in Australia, but that doesn't really do him much good in the political arena, but he's learning, slowly. Him and Carla are working together to undermine the Uktena's representative on the council.  Rage-in-the-Streets: Rank 2 Lupus Ahroun As a dingo pup Rage-in-the-Streets was known as Outruns-the-Elders. He lived in Cape York with his mother's pack up until she was shot by hunters. His anger over this was nurtured by the other Red Talons, and he went into Brisbane with the aim of killing as many people as savagely as possible. quote:On his first night in Brisbane, however, Outruns-the-Elders was noticed by the city's Sabbat vampires, who immediately saw the potential for amusement in the young Lupine. Luring him into a trap with their Protean Discipline, the Leeches injected Outruns-the-Elders with a massive dose of heroin. To their surprise, Outruns-the-Elders survived the attack, but soon found himself addicted to the drug. Through his introduction to heroin, Outruns-the-Elders conceived of a new way to destroy the humans, by exploiting their own weaknesses. Renaming himself Rage-in-the-Streets, he learned all he could about drugs and their deadly possibilities. Rage-in-the-Streets now manufactures and distributes large quantities of illicit drugs throughout Brisbane. Rage-in-the-Streets is still observed by the Sabbat, and is their unwitting tool in a campaign to corrupt the structure of Brisbane society. Shadow Lords The Shadow Lords did not arrive in Australia in force until the refugee influx post World War II, although individual members were active before that. They did not participate in the War of Tears so they exploit the turmoil and guilt that members of other tribes feel. Maintaining their normal hostility towards the Silver Fangs has proven costly, however, as the Glass Walkers hold the true power in Australia. Traditional strategies don't work against the Glass Walkers, so the Shadow Lords have grown even more hide-bound and stick to their traditions. The first Shadow Lord to arrive in Australia was Boris Kuschena, who was appointed to determine the viability of Australia as a home to his tribe, he arrived during a hot dry summer, saw that it was a hellhole, and went home. He said that it was an "arid hell, and all the Silver Fangs deserved". Though a few members of the tribe "More treacherous and ambitious than even the Shadow Lords could stomach," emigrated to the colonies, trying to establish themselves as kings, far removed from the eyes of their elders. They fell to infighting and in the end only the most brutal, Tepes Godkin, was left. His reputation as a killer brought him to the attention of the Red Talons and the Get, who told him about the Bunyip. We already know his story. The rest of the tribe arrived after WWII, and found Tasmania most resembled the land they left behind, so they kicked out the Black Furies and claimed it as their own... except they took it in the late 1800s, after the War of Tears but before the Jindabyne Council was formed, the fact that they did it was one of the main reasons the council was formed in the First place, to mediate those kinds of disputes. Sounds to me like whoever wrote this section just wanted to mitigate the Shadow Lords responsibility for the War of Tears by making it a single rogue element that pushed for it while the rest of the tribe remained inviolate far away. Anyways, Today Tasmania is a Shadow Lord stronghold, and their rule there is absolute. Garou who cross the Bass Strait without their permission are taking their lives into their own hands, and will probably be killed by the Lords. There are about 20 in total, with most living in the Protectorate, with Two exiles( Alexandyr Petravich Kropotkin and Snarls-at-Shadows) prowling the Great Divide. The leader of the Tasmanian Protectorate is Vlad Volaschky. There are no Camp adherents in Tasmania, as that would distract their loyalty from their King, Vlad. Australian Shadow Lords are more conservative than their fellows overseas, since they haven't needed to adapt in the past 50 years in their own private fiefdom. Australian lords who travel overseas return complaining that they have less freedoms than their cousins. The Lords refuse to breed with dingo stock, and maintain a wolf pack near Cradle Mountain, they also send their young overseas in search of appropriate mates, to keep their stock pure. They disdain Bone Gnawers and despise Glass Walkers, they can't comprehend that the Silver Fangs are not dominant in Australia, and that the Glass Walker prominence must be an intricate Silver Fang plot. They find the Black Furies and Children of Gaia to be "Mewling Milksops", and distrust the Fianna for their prominence in politics, though some call for the Irish Garou to be used as tools against the Silver Fang/Glass Walker plot.  Vlad Volaschky: Rank 4 Homid Ahroun Vlad was born in a small village in Romania. He learned early of his Garou heritage from his grandfather, whom he later killed to gain control of his pack. He was forced to flee Europe by the invading Nazis, which gave him a hate of the Get of Fenris that he carries to this day. He found Australia's Shadow Lords to be directionless and disorganized, He shaped them into a powerful tribe through a combination of violence and willpower. Being a stranger to Australian customs, he clung to his European heritage, enforcing them upon the younger generations with violence when necessary. He considers himself and his tribe European, and will not brook any dissent in that matter, he still involves himself in European Shadow Lord politics, and is often absent from the Jindabyne Council meetings. He conducts all Rites of Passage for his tribe in Europe, as he believes Australia is an unfit proving ground for those of noble blood like his. Silent Striders Devastated by their involvement in the War of Tears, Australia's Silent Striders withdrew from Garou society. They instead form a loose confederation known as the Strider Circus. The packs perform separately, congregating once a year for the Grand Circus in the outback, where they stage a free festival. Taking time to exchange information and tell tales amongst themselves. Of all the Australian Garou, the Striders probably have the most knowledge of the Dreamtime and the Umbra, they hope that they can use this knowledge to atone for the past or find any Bunyip that may yet survive. The first Striders arrived in 1800, the early arrivals were all members of the Wayfarers camp and roamed the continent as a single pack. They were responsible for many of the early explorations of the continent along with the Bone Gnawers with whom the cooperated, but they were constantly turned back by the hostile spirits, dreamtime, and Bunyip, so they retreated to the new Stargazer protectorate of Eungella. Between 1830 and 1850, more striders arrived, and most of these were members of the Harbinger's camp who wanted to treat with the Bunyip directly. Eventually one, named Khufu, did succeed. Unfortunately immediately afterwards the War of Tears kicked off, and Khufu and his pack died along side their new Bunyip allies. Causing a rift between the Wayfarers and Harbingers to this day. After the War of Tears, the Striders decided to try and preserve what little they could of the Bunyip and the Dreamtime, so they formed the Strider Circus, small packs that would travel as performers and gather what knowledge they could so it could be preserved and shared. Today there are only 15 Striders in Australia, their packs within the circus include the Gampala Aboriginal Dance Company, the Circus Australia Acrobats, and the Tchingal Indigenous Music Collective(which also includes Kinfolk). Most Garou are aware of the circus, but not it's secondary purpose of knowledge gathering. The Striders shun other tribes, sometimes allowing Stargazers, Black Furies, or Bone Gnawers to travel with them for a time, but never for long and they never join the circus. They hold the Glass Walkers in high esteem, but are irritated by the Silver Fang's officious nature, and the holier-than-thou attitude of the Children of Gaia.  Grek Twice-Tongue: Rank 4 Metis Philodox Good god I hate that picture, its offensive in a way that has to be intentional. He's described as a hairless albino Aboriginal man of middle age, because one Metis deformity wasn't enough. Also: Grek has the Didgeridoo of the Past unique fetish, when it is played, all who hear it see visions of the story that is being told or danced to them. Grek is the only child of a Silent Strider and a Stargazer who traveled with the Gampila Aboriginal Dance Company for a week, long enough to conceive the albino boy. He grew up a circus child, and was forced to perform by his mother from a young age up until her untimely death on his 18th birthday. (What, did someone kill her as a birthday present?) He's universally respected for his storytelling prowess, but otherwise avoided by Garou who are not Silent Striders. Twelve years ago he was chosen by the spirits to be the new Silent Strider representative on the Jindabyne council, the Dreamtime itself screamed his name, and all the Theurges at the circus dreamed that Grek would be responsible for freeing the tribes from their guilt, though none know how. Silver Fangs The nobles of Garou Society are little liked by the Australian Garou, mostly seen as inbred upper-class fools. Their origins lie in the landed gentry of England, and more so than their foreign compatriots they show signs of inbreeding as they refused to marry outside of established Australian gentry and refuse to breed with dingos. The first Silver Fang was Earl Blaze of Uffington, we've already heard about him and nothing more is said here. Same with Greymane Sleekfur. His successor was Jeremy Fur-Crown Winthrop, who saw the War of Tears as a chance to resurrect his tribe's glory. After he found out the truth he committed suicide too. There are 35 Silver Fangs in Australia, the majority of which live in the Silver Fang protectorates which are the oldest settled parts of Australia and have the longest family lines. Younger members do leave the protectorates to form multi-tribal packs with other Garou. Noteworthy Silver Fangs include the Metis Ragabash Michelle Leaps-beyond-the-Reach-of-the-Wyrm who is Darius Winchester's Seneschal, who seems to have the best interests of her lord at heart but secretly wants his throne. Phillip Battenburg, a Homid Galliard who advocates Garou Equality and is therefore a Pariah among his tribe. and Chases Cars, a Lupus Ahroun from Adelaide so inbred and insane that he believes that Automobiles are the sentient servants of the Wyrm. The Silver Fangs look down on all the other tribes, because they're Silver Fangs.  Darius Winchester: Rank 5 Homid Ahroun quote:In his Homid Form Darius is a tall, slender man, with a pronounced lack of chin and a stutter. Although only 30, he is already balding, which concerns him unduly. He dresses in expensive, tailor-made suits and is never seen without a tie. He chain-smokes and is fond of lavish gestures, such as tossing handfuls of money at street urchins. In Lupus form, Darius is an inelegant, scrawny wolf. his fur constantly falls out in clumps. Despite his regal bearing he seems vaguely foolish. Anyways, Darius inherited the throne from his Uncle, and was saddened by the depths to which his tribe has fallen. He knows how guilty the Garou feel, and hopes to assuage that guilt(and save his tribe) by bringing back the Bunyip by any means necessary. So he works with the Silent Striders to collect Bunyip lore. With the Black Furies to protect the Dreamtime, and with Cernonous to clone the Bunyip back into existence. Most Silver Fangs think that his obsession with the Bunyip is just his own personal insanity, but some are regaining pride in themselves due to his noble quest. Stargazers The Australian Stargazers are half a step away from Harano, they believe that the Bunyip held secrets that could stop the Apocalypse, and now that they're dead the world is doomed to absolute destruction. Most of the tribe on the continent has fallen to the Wyrm and joined the Dancers. The first Bunyip arrived in 1790, and they saw the Bunyip and a people untouched by the Impergium as an opportunity to learn. But the Bunyip didn't want to talk to them, and their dealings with other Garou didn't make them any friendlier. They argued against the War of Tears, saying that if anyone was Wyrm Tainted it was the Garou with their burden of Rage. However when push came to shove they sided with the rest of the nation so as to not be ostracized, believing that this was the first battle of the Apocalypse, when all Garou would perish. But when the smoke cleared and it wasn't the Apocalypse most of them fell to Harano or the Wyrm. Now there are only 6 Stargazers in Australia, and they rarely leave the Eungella Protectorate. They include such cheery individuals as the Lupus Aroun Chisolm There-is-no-Hope, who searches for the ultimate meaningless death; and the Metis Galliard Indira Songs-of-Sorrow whose mournful wailing is tuneless and depressing. The other tribes basically don't even consider them Garou at this point, the Red Talons want to kill them and the Get of Fenris want to strip them of their protectorate.  Monash End-to-the-Darkness: Rank 2 Homid Ragabash Monash was born in Queensland to a single Mother, he never knew his father and his Mother would never speak of him. He changed early and ran away from home on all fours, eventually finding the Stargazer Protectorate, where he learned all he could and brought some hope back to the tribe. He's the Stargazer Representative on the Jindabyne Council only because no one else wants the position, and he's only been there a Year. Innana has taken him under her wing and "he is grateful to her for her aid and love". He's recently heard of the Rokea Weresharks that might live in the Great Barrier Reef, thinking that they are somehow the saviors of the Garou Nation, because when the Apocalypse comes they will be able to grant their aid. He hopes that by finding them he will break his tribe out of their Harano. This plotline makes no sense. Uktena The Uktena are sullen and mysterious to their Australian brethren, even though they've been on Australian soil for less than 150 years, they already control most of the powerful Bunyip Caerns. It's rumored that they seek revenge for the European usurpation of the Pure Lands. Rumors are all the other Garou have... but they're right. The first Uktena came to Australia hoping that the Bunyip, fellow victims of European aggression, would sympathise with their plight. Sings-with-the-Moon was the first to try and make contact but he was ignored, he had hoped to learn their secrets so he could bring them back to America and drive the invaders back beyond the sea, you know, in 1850. Instead all he got was wounded pride and a sense of vengeance, so he vowed to learn the Bunyip secrets no matter the cost. The Uktena shored up their numbers and waited for the rage of the other Garou to come to a head, once the Bunyip were dead, they moved in to claim the most powerful land for themselves. There are only 20 Uktena in Australia right now, and they maintain a tribal unity that has advanced to the point of xenophobia. The one voice of reason is Runs-with-Ghosts, the sept leader of the Katajuta Caern, but she's mocked for her open-mindedness by the Uktena of the Kimberleys and by Tjinderi Knowing-Smile, the Council Representative. Tjinderi is secretly grooming Bathes-in-Blood, the gatekeeper of the Katajuta Caern, to succeed Runs-with-Ghosts after she falls to an 'accident'. The Uktena are the only tribe to have chosen Aboriginals as kinfolk in large numbers, and take any attack on the natives as an attack against their own kin. Most Uktena are of the Earth Guide camp, and encourage the Aboriginals to return to their old ways and live in harmony with Gaia. Many Earth Guides are active in Aboriginal politics and work with Aboriginal organizations. The only member of the Ghost Dance camp is Tjinderi herself, who seeks to use the entire tribe to bring about her goal of an Aboriginal only Australia. Oh, and in case you had any doubts about them being the new Aboriginal tribe, the mechanical rules for Boomerangs as weapons are on this page.  Tjendiri Knowing-Smile: Rank 4 Homid Ragabash Tjinderi was stolen away from her Aboriginal family when she was five, and was raised by an American. Unlike many fostered children, she was treated well. At 14 she learned why, he was Commanding Howl, Uktena leader of the Kimberly Protectorate, and she was Garou. She accompanied him back to the US to learn of the tragedy of the Uktena and the loss of the Pure Lands, and Commanding Howl ensured that her loyalties lie with him and the Uktena, and not the Aboriginals. She returned to her homeland and set about learning all she could about the Bunyip and their secrets. She succeeded her adoptive father as ruler of the Kimberly Protectorate on his death, and his place on the Jindabyne Council. It is her goal to make the Uktena the most powerful Tribe, first in Australia, then the world, and then to kill every Wyrmcomer she can find. She passes on all her secrets to the Uktena Great Council, in hope that they can use the knowledge to reclaim America and Australia. Her ambition binds her to the individuals that actually make up her tribe, however, and she has two real challenges in her chosen successor, Jacky Gecko, and Runs-with-Ghosts of the Katajuta Protectorate.  Jacky Gecko: Rank 3 Homid Galliard Jacky here has a unique fetish, Yongar's Wings. This is a boomerang that deals Str+2 aggravated damage and will always return to it's user. For comparison, normal boomerangs deal 1 die of bashing, and don't return if they deal damage. Jacky was born on a reservation in the Northern Territory. He wanted to be a doctor from a young age, sickened by the poor standard of health that his people endured. His first change was witnessed by Tjinderi, but he remained adamant in his goal, studied hard, and became a doctor working for the Aboriginal Health Service and the Flying Doctors. He eventually saved up enough money to get his own plane, and has won some respect with the other tribes for saving injured stranded Garou no matter their origin or nationality. This respect and his distance from Tjinderi has allowed him to see that her goals no longer align with those of the Aboriginal people. As her loyalties lie with the Uktenna first, foremost, and always. Wendigo The Wendigo aren't here except as tourists. But they needed to have at least one token entry.  Joseph Blows-with-the-Wind Joseph is a Blackfoot Indian from Montana who came to study at Bond University on a scholarship. He loved Queensland so much that he never went home, and now spends his time surfing and dodging the Immigration Department. His ancestors keep telling him that he has a great destiny in store, and that he must remain in Australia, though he doesn't care why. To that end they appear to have helped him keep one step ahead of the Immigration officials for the time being. On a recent surfing trip, Joseph was caught in a vicious current and carried out to sea. Stranded on a small coral reef, he saw a school of sharks swim toward him. He was understandably surprised when one of the sharks assumed homid form and retrieved his surfboard before diving back under the waves. His ancestors have remained silent on the matter, which sucks because apparently Monash End-to-the-Darkness is looking for him. Because Sharks. The Jindabyne Council The council was formed in 1901 by Kanakis, to establish a multi-tribal council to coordinate Australia's Garou. It was necessary, he stated, in light of the federation of the Australian Colonies. The tribe of Jindabyne, in the Silver Fang protectorate of Wadbilliga, was chosen for its proximity to Mount Kosciusko, where the last Bunyip was slain. In this way the Glass Walkers are always able to lord the guilt of the War of Tears over everyone elses head at need. The Council defined the protectorate borders, and has the capacity to form the Ngalyod Pack to enforce or protect their decisions. Others Because there are more than wolves in Australia The Changing Breeds There might be Were-crocodiles here, there are however Rokea who protect the Great Barrier Reef. Mummies  RETURN THE SLAB quote:Abu Nwole is an African mummy created in a tribal ceremony after a great Zulu triumph in what is now Capetown. Abu was a chieftain, killed in battle, but responsible for his people's victory. Through sacrificial spilling of captive and Zulu blood, Abu was pulled back from death, becoming an undying mummy. Unlike his Egyptian Kin created by the Followers of Horus, he was not restricted to one body, but began an endless cycle of death and rebirth. Abu wandered for almost two centuries, eventually arriving on the shores of Australia 3,000 years ago. He made his home among the Aboriginals and on rare occasions helped the Bunyip in their endeavors. His later incarnations have been Aboriginal men. Abu didn't really care about the War of Tears, and in fact wouldn't give a poo poo about Garou at all were it not for the fact that Greyman Sleekfur killed his mortal lover over a century ago. He's freshly reincarnated and is going on a bloody killing spree of every Silver Fang he can find. Mages Before the Council of Nine, the Dreamspeakers lived with the Aboriginals. They were few, but were very powerful. Indeed, the name of the Tradition is said to come from these mages and their ability to trod the Dreamtime. The Bunyip resented them, because they stole power from Bunyip Caerns, but they were allowed to live because their great knowledge of the Dreamtime benefited everyone. Powerful as they were, they did not act to stop the Europeans, because they knew that the Europeans would kill the Bunyip. They did not know that the Europeans would then go on to kill a bunch of Aboriginals, including most of the Dreamspeakers. Supposedly the Nephandi played a part in this somehow. There's also James Stirling, immortal lord of Perth. Supposedly the only reason Perth still stands is because he literally sold his soul to the Nephandi in exchange for a nonaggression pact. The Dreamspeakers and Hollow Ones also have interests here, as do the Technocracy, which the mages are finally realizing they should probably come to Australia and fight. That's it for chapter 3! Next up: "Villains"
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Aug 17, 2013 05:40
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AmiYumi posted:I had somehow forgotten about this. How hilariously dickish; that's the sort of trap that you just know a DM has announced with a trollface, followed by victory pelvic thrusts to celebrate his TPK. Count Chocula posted:Is this all the were-sharks get? They should be a huge part of the setting - even the nicest tourist beaches have a few shark sightings a year and in the World of Darkness I'd expect were-sharks to basically hold tourism for ransom. There's also the Stargazer who's looking for the sharks, and the Wendigo that was saved by the sharks (and apparently was destined to be saved by the sharks). First edition Werewolf didn't give too much page space to the other Changing breeds, each one got a page or two with a rough summary, stats for their forms, and what gift lists you could steal from to give them something resembling a theme.
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Aug 19, 2013 23:12
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Chapter 4: Enemies  Why does SCAR keep getting work? quote:The Wyrm has been in Australia longer than any Garou. When the Bunyip arrived in Australia, fleeing the rage of their brethren, they found Wyrm-beasts active in the land. The Bunyip destroyed some such monsters, binding others with the aid of Dreamspeaker mages among the Aboriginal people. Today the Wyrm's most powerful tools are humanity, and the resources humans can unwittingly bring to bear against the environment. Black Spiral Dancers There are a few Spiral packs scattered across Australia, with the ultimate goal of controlling the Dreamtime and all the spirits therein. They hope to use the corruption of the Dreamtime to hasten the corruption of the physical world. They arrived shortly after the rest of the Western Garou, and "discovered to their delight that the Wyrm's work was already being done in Australia." They just spurred the Europeans on to greater atrocities in the name of "civilization", and laughed as the Garou let it happen.  It kind of kills the mood of the whole murder-death-kill-atrocity train when you've got two dudes lovingly embracing and whispering into each other's ears. Not to mention the guy leaning against the frame of the page Were the Spirals an actual unified force, the Dreamtime would have fallen decades ago. Thankfully they're fragmented and insane. The occasional schemer can rise to prominence, but they're usually either quickly killed by someone else's insane plot, or fail to find the organized traction to get their ideas done. The one thing there is a unified front on, is interest in Bunyip lore and artifacts. Most of the Garou nation sees this as hilarious as they are "Afraid of an enemy long dead." But the Stargazers rightly believe that they're trying to get control of Ngalyod the Rainbow Serpent, and use it to do their work in the Dreamtime. quote:Australian Black Spiral Dancers are fanatically religious and often kidnap other Garou in order to deprogram them, opening their eyes to the wonders of the Wyrm. Such unwilling converts usually end up dead rather than enlightened. Worshipping the Wyrm as a force of balance, the Black Spiral Dancers present Australia's vast areas of wilderness and plagues of introduced animals as evidence that the Wyld is out of control. The Black Spiral Dancers are agents, not of destruction, but of necessary restraint - or so they claim. They contend that the cities, constructs of the Weaver, must be allowed to thrive, supplanting the Wyld so that order may be restored. But they won't ignore religion. The Priests of Polution: A Sample Dancer Pack  Moonscreamer: Rank 5 Homid Theurge Moonscreamer's possessions include Greyflank's still glowing heart, It's been enchanted as a fetish that hides the Wyrm Taint of any that carry it. And yes, he's dressed like a priest, complete with collar. quote:Moonscreamer's Kinfolk parents raised him according to the strict rules of their religion. His childhood was punctuated by regular beatings, reinforced guilt and long periods of loneliness. When he reached puberty and the Change overtook him, Moonscreamer killed his parents, laughing insanely all the while. From that night on, Moonscreamer has restrained his madness, conducting his life in a cold and rational manner. Anyways, his ultimate goal is to corrupt all the spirits of Kakadu National Park, his pack is based in the uranium mine on the grounds. They do this by capturing and torturing the spirits caught on the Bawn of the Sept. Moonscreamer's ambition is such that he believes he can even corrupt Namarrkon, the Lightning Spirit.  Darren Mate-of-the-Wyrm: Rank 4 Metis Ahroun quote:In his Homid form, Darren is solidly built man of 22. He is always naked from the waist up; his chest is covered in coarse black hair. He wears kangaroo-skin boots and his jeans are held up with a belt of dingo leather. quote:Darren is the product of a rape. His mother was a Black Fury, his father a Black Spiral Dancer. The young pup, after eating his way out of his mother's womb, trotted up to the gates of the Ranger mine, sensing that the Wyrm would give him a home. Moonscreamer adopted the pup, who grew up astonishingly quickly. The rapid aging thing isn't just a throwaway thing, his metis deformity is that he's incredibly short lived, he's probably going to die at 5 years old. Because of this, he's incredibly concerned with his legacy, and spends most of his free time visiting Darwin and "using his Animal Attraction to impregnate rich women, ruining their lives and hopefully providing himself with a Garou heir." No that isn't a typo, he's apparently a fertile Metis. When he's not going around breaking the rules of the game, he's trying to die a glorious death in battle.  Sister Mary McMartin/Cavorts-in-Blood: Rank 2 Metis Galliard Yup, her metis deformity is that she has a split personality, and that split personality is a Nun. quote:Flowing black hair frames her soft white face; her sympathetic eyes gaze dreamily into the distance. As Mary, she captures her hair beneath her black nun's habit. As Cavorts-in-Blood, she dresses like a street prostitute, in fishnet stockings and a low-cut dress.  There's two pieces of artwork of the Hookernun, and none of the other members of her pack. I leave it as an exercise to the reader as to why. She was a child to two Spiral Parents from the Hive of the Corrupted Flesh. After she was forced to walk the spiral, her personality fractured. Part of her embraced her heritage, but the other half "rebelled" and went as straight laced as possible. Moonscreamer found her when she was 'Mary', and took her under his wing since she fit into his already existing delusion. Mary is unaware of Cavorts-in-Blood's existence, though the reverse isn't true. And... oh come on. quote:Having recently become pregnant as a result of her alter ego's orgiastic reverence of the Wyrm, Mary believes herself to be blessed with an immaculately conceived Wyrm-child, the savior of the Black Spirals.  I think it's the crosses on the one-piece leather tutu that really sell the picture for me.  Pustulent Claws (Bluey): Rank 1 Metis Ragabash A third metis, but at least he's not fertile (that I know). Instead he's a petulant acne scarred teenager. He was spoiled as a child, as his parents provided him with plenty of small animals to torture and kill. Eventually they decided it was time for him to learn how to hunt and kill humans, not just animals. But of course he rebelled at this because he just wanted to 'play'. So his parents forced him to walk the black spiral early. Of course, being a petulant child he kept his eyes closed so he isn't completely insane, just deeply disturbed. Moonscreamer took him into the pack to use him as his chief torturer. quote:The small pack keeps to itself, avoiding the workers who live in the mine compound. Inquisitive workers soon disappear, and the mine staff has learned not to question the presence of a priest, nun, psychopath, and teenage boy on the premises. I know people in the World of Darkness are supposed to be blasé about evil, but seriously. Do they wave to the nun as she walks by? What about the man-eating prostitute? Pentex quote:Pentex has maintained a presence in Australia for only 50 years, but in that short space of time has fostered much environmental degradation and spiritual corruption. Pentex-controlled companies have the worst record of job-related accidents in Australia and house their workers in notoriously poor conditions. Unknown to employees, Pentex buildings are constructed over chemical dumps and insulated with asbestos. Air and water supplies are saturated with minute but dangerous concentrations of toxins. Major Pentex operations are their paper mills, that use Australia's hardwood forests to make low-quality paper bags rather than building materials or just leaving them be. They're also high-cost/low-efficiency and dump a lot of waste mercury into the rivers. They've got extensive mining interests, and sludge and slag waste runoff into the water tables and by extension the ocean. They've also got their hands in multiple surveyors offices, falsifying records to make mineral-poor/vegetation-rich areas look more appealing than they are. They support the gun lobby and pay a bounty on dingo scalps, and support the sheep and cattle industries in their efforts to lobby for more grazing land. They support the tourism industries, but only in as much as they degrade and exploit the environment, like skiing, fishing, water-skiing, motor racing, and 'eco-tours' through environmentally sensitive areas with overloaded diesel buses. The two main offices in Australia are in Sydney and Perth, with a branch office in Wellington, New Zealand that they also oversee.  Remember the great spaghetti spill of '89? Man that was a terrible year. Jeffery Blight, QC The COO of Pentex Australia, he first rose to Pentex's attention when he was studying law at Melbourne University. Ruthless and Corrupt even then, he would seduce and blackmail his lecturers to gain the highest possible marks. He was also a member of the debate team, and made waves during a nationally televised debate competition when he argued in favor of medical experimentation on prisoners. He went on to become a corporate lawyer, and used bribery and extortion to ensure he never lost a case. When Pentex asked him to join up, his only stipulation was that they use their considerable power to have him appointed Queen's Counsel. At Pentex, he was appointed head of the Special Projects Division, where he pioneered genetic manipulation and cybernetics research for the company. I guess he minored in biotech while he was learning to be a lawyer. After two years he decided it was time for a promotion, and he bribed and murdered his way into the position he holds today. The Board of Directors is aware of how he got his position, and approve of it. But now he's seeking appointment to the Board himself. Jemina Christianson quote:Jemina was born to a wealthy, upper-class family and educated in private European schools. In Switzerland she first encountered the supernatural powers that pervade the World of Darkness, in the form of an elder Ventrue. Having read Plato, Machiavelli, Dante, Marx, Kropotkin, Stirner, and Neitzche, Jemina was ready for a lesson in true power. Their entrance exam for her required the death of Perth's Vampire Prince, since they thought he was working with Stirling. Rather than risk her own life, she riled up the Anarchs and told them where his haven was and how to get past his defenses. The technocracy accepted her with open arms and promised to protect her from the vampires and James Stirling. Then they had her infiltrate Pentex, and a combination of her own ambition and technomantic power has seen her rise to the Head of the company's Perth branch. Her relationship with Jeffery Blight can best be described as "a deadly game of chess/murder with occasional pauses for hatefucking". The Squattocracy The Squattocracy is all but defunct, only being kept alive by a few conservatives within Pentex who still see it as necessary. The powerful members within it's structure don't want to see it fail, and are more concerned with their own wealth and prestige than the service of the Wyrm. The influence they have with more traditional members of Pentex has so far kept Blight from streamlining them into a shallow grave.  Let's play a game, how long does it take you to notice the chicken? Sir Vivien Winchester Winchester owns a vast ancestral sheep ranch in the outback of New South Wales. His ancestors were the original founders of the Squattocracy, and he sees Pentex as brash American upstarts lacking in breeding and gentility. He's never seen without his suit and monocle, his skin is leathery, his eyes are bright and hard, and he wears a white hairpiece. Oh and he used to hunt Aboriginals for sport, with a gun. He regrets the Aboriginal Protection Board's incarceration of the tribes on reservations as they have robbed him of his fine sport. He spends his days in his sprawling homestead, only leaving when he has to go to board meetings. He hates Blight and Martina Loupenski, and has been sending his son George to Perth in a vain attempt to enlist Jemina as an ally. Aborignal Protection Board Rather than killing through violence, the APB kills the spirit in the guise of cultural assimilation. Stealing children from their mothers, preventing Aboriginals on their reservations from practicing their religion or speaking their own language, and just generally being assholes. The APB still exists today in GOTHIC PUNK AUSTRALIA even though it doesn't in the real world. It's an independent organization, though it's head sits on the Pentex Australia board of directors so they can coordinate efforts. Martina Loupenski Born to Polish parents in a working-class suburb of Melbourne, Martina studied as a social worker before joining the APB. Oh and she was raped by her father as a child, which caused her to attract a Bane which possessed her and turned her into a formor. Now she's the Head of the APB, and is Blight's easily manipulated pawn. She hates Vivien for his derision of her Slavic heritage and his outdated clumsy methods of corruption. Also we have one of my favorite pictures in the book here  I have no idea what's going on, but that is the politest pouch monster I've ever seen. Vampires Australia's Geographic isolation prevented Vampires from arriving here until the mid 1500's when Portugese ships found the Continent seeking a mythical isle of gold south of Java. They were fleeing the political turmoil of Europe, with the Inquisition and the Anarch Revolt. When the continent was rediscovered in 1616 by Dutch Explorers, the Brujah and Malkavians that came with them were swiftly slain by the Bunyip or the Sun. It took the arrival of the English prison ships for them to establish a real foothold. As the human population grew and new settlements were founded, the vampires moved with them, though they were kept in check by the Bunyip. But then the War of Tears happened and the vampires moved into every city large enough to hold them. Now they're too firmly entrenched for the Western Garou to get rid of them, good job guys.  Bat wings do not work that way! Tongues do not work that way! What is wrong with you? Melbourne Melbourne is ruled by the crime boss Squizzy Taylor. She deposed and diablerized the previous ruler Montague Lytton. A gangster in her mortal life, she was embraced by a Brujah in the 1920's and saw no reason to stop with her current career just because she was dead. Perth Perth is under Anarch control following the death of Lumley. They gave the rest of the Vampires in Perth a 'join or die(again)' ultimatum, and their numbers have been shored up by a steady stream of refugees from the East who chafe under Camarilla rule. Of course James Stirling isn't too happy with the state of affairs, and the Glass Walkers are cooking popcorn and waiting to watch the inevitable shitstorm.  Does getting turned into a vampire gently caress up your hands? Is that the new clan weakness? Nosferatu: get hosed up bat wings. Toreador: get hands like that deer from Adventure Time Sydney Sydney's kind of fractured right now. The current Prince Sarrasine is an enigma. He claims to be Toreador but no one knows who his sire is, even him. Most dismiss him as Catiff and therefore able to safely be ignored, most of the Suburbs are ruled by lesser Princes that Sarrasine hasn't brought low either because he lacks the power or is planning on using them as a part of his own schemes. Oh and he makes regular trips to the Hive of Corrupted Flesh to have orgies with the Black Spirals. Just thought you should know. Up Next: The Dreamtime- It's like the Umbra, but better!
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Aug 31, 2013 22:34
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Robodog posted:Squizzy Taylor was a bloke. Count Chocula posted:I was about to point that out. Thanks, promos for Underbelly: Squizzy, for that knowledge.  How did I miss this.Earlier in the book they were talking about a "Leslie 'Squizzy' Taylor", which I tried to look up and found this guy. So I was assuming they just grabbed the name and made up a character. I didn't think to see if there was a Squizzy Taylor.  The fact that they were fairly insistent on Taylor's lack of bloke-hood also directed my research elsewhere. I'm guessing they saw Leslie, decided that it was a girls name, and hit a full stop.
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Sep 3, 2013 20:01
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Chapter 5: The Dreamtime  We're entering the SCAR zone, they must've assumed that no one would get this far and put all the bad art here. In the real world, the Dreamtime is the name given by the Aboriginal people to the legendary past, when the world was created and their ancestors walked the earth. It's also a place that still exists and can be visited today ("A concept that confuses Europeans", because the white man can't understand I guess). Their oral tradition represents their histories and legends that trace 50,000 years of tradition, and is the longest continual history of any people in the world. There are over 200 Aboriginal tribes, each with their own tales of the Dreamtime, with their own ancestors, names for plants and animals and geographical features.  And names for the giant land tumors In the In the Australian Penumbra, diprotodon and giant kangaroos live side by side with Nargun and Mimi. The Penumbra in Australia has always been closer to the physical world than it was elsewhere. The Aboriginals honored the land and spirit as one, so they were never sundered the way the rest of the world was. The cause of the severance was debated for many years, whether it was the Weaver spinning her complex webs, or humanity's fear and denial of the reality of spirituality. But the Aboriginals were so much The Umbrascape The Dreamtime resembles the natural Australian landscape as it was thousands of years ago, untouched by the Europeans. Powerful wards placed by the Bunyip upon the dreamtime have preserved the Dreamtime as it was when they first arrived, so it remains unfamiliar to the garou of today. Which seems kind of weird. Why would they lock down the dreamtime? Wouldn't that prevent it from developing naturally? That's a special kind of hubris for the most spiritually in tune tribe to have. The only way it makes sense is if they were operating with the knowledge that the Europeans would arrive eventually and gently caress everything up. So the reason the Dreamtime survives is because the bunyip run the metagame like pros. quote:Some Moon Paths in the Dreamtime lead to the prehistoric Realm of Pangea. Garou may enter Pangea and not realize it until confronted by a grazing herd of dinosaurs. Other Moon Paths lead to the Legendary Realm and to the Atrocity realm. In this last Realm, the War of Tears is endlessly replayed, and Aboriginals are endlessly poisoned, raped, and shot. The Dreamtime is bathed in eternal twilight, the setting sun is always in the west, and the rising moon always in the east. Physical deserts are marked by ethereal sandscapes. Central Australia is still dominated by a prehistoric inland sea. Real world forests are Penumbral rainforests. Tree kangaroos, brightly colored birds, and wombats running everywhere. Australian Megafauna are also still alive here, Giant kangaroos, ground sloths, flightless birds, Diprotodons, giant wombats, Goannas, and Marsupial Lions and thylacines. In the areas where the physical world has been "scarred by the actions of mankind" it is no longer pristine. Sure it's still trees and megafauna loving everywhere, but the forests where cities would be are covered in spider webs and dying. Places of great evil are rotting and populated by banes. Pentex facilities have glowing trees and pockmarked radioactive ground. The Dreamtime itself seems to reject these changes, and Garou who visit it have found that moon paths twist and turn, and some never come back. According to the book, most Garou only step sideways in Australia as a last resort. Inhabitants of the Dreamtime quote:The Dreamtime is a place of wonder and terror. The Dreamtime remembers the genocide of the Bunyip and has not forgiven the Garou. Its spirits are unfriendly and must be coerced or threatened into communicating. The Black Spiral Dancers are trying to form alliances with certain dreamtime spirits, with some success. Anyways, Inhabitants.  Today, son, you gaze upon the giant snatch and become a man. The Earth Mother Gaia goes by many names in Australia: Imberombera, Ungulla, Waramurungundi and Eingana. She's primarily concerned with the health of the people, animals and land, and is responsible for the fluctuations of the seasons. She came from over the seas, carrying the Aboriginal tribes within her body. As she moved across the land she formed the hills and rivers; planted yams, waterlilies, palms, and other vegetation; and gave birth to the Aboriginal tribes. Sometimes she appears in the Penumbra as a gigantic woman carrying vegetables, roots, and a digging stick. The Wyrm's corruption is evidenced by scabs and weeping sores on her back. She moves through the dreamtime as she pleases, stopping to rest in the shade of trees or on the banks of rivers. The Rainbow Serpent Ngalyod, Imberombera, Borlung, The Rainbow Serpent has many names. What is agreed on is that it is the most powerful incarnae in Australia. No one knows what gender the Rainbow Serpent is. According to some tribes, The Rainbow Serpent created the mountains and rivers of the outback with the undulating coils of it's body as it slithered across the primal land. In other tales, The Rainbow Serpent, concerned for it's creations, swallowed up all life, keeping them safe within its belly. As each one was held in stasis in this way, they added their colors to Ngalyod's skin and soon he was every color in existence. Of course a world without color was kind of boring, one without animals and plants even more so, so Kookaburra flew up, distracted it with his bright wings, and stabbed it in the stomach, allowing all life to escape from the wound. Ngalyod still wanted to protect all life, so it gathered up the individual drops of blood and formed them into the Bunyip. Except the Bunyip were werewolves who came here over the ice bridges that didn't exist.  Ngalyod inhabits the waterholes of the dreamtime, spending the hot afternoons curled up at the bottom of the bodies of water. After the rain, it arcs across the sky from one body of water to the other. But, uhh... Apparently there have been no rainbows in Australia since the Bunyip have died. Sure. Ngalyod has not forgiven the European garou for the death of his children, but he's beginning to see them as a potential ally against the wyrm.  I'm trying to think of an Olympics joke but failing. Gnowee the Sun A long time ago, there was no sun, everyone lived in darkness. Thus they hunted by torchlight and it was always cold. A woman named Gnowee lived with her young son at the darkness at the edge of the world, one day she went out hunting for yams, and reached the edge of the world. Like any logical person, she then decided to climb underneath the entirety of the world and pop out the other side, unable to find her son, she climbed up into the sky to try and find him, in the process becoming the Sun. She wanders the sky during the day, peering down for her son, at night she travels beneath the world until her search begins again at dawn. So she's the sun, and is apparently visible in the Dreamtime as well, except the dreamtime is in perpetual twilight, remember? I mean, come on book, if pressed I can forgive you forgetting the origin story you gave the Bunyip, that's from this chapter, how'd you forget that? Meeka the Moon Meeka was a greedy man who stole food from his nephews. One time when they went hunting they invited Meeka along. They found a very tall gum tree with witchetty grubs in it, and Meeka said he would climb to the top of the tree and gather all the witchety grubs for himself. Once he reached the top, his Nephews told him "Hey dude, I bet the stars are pretty good eating too." And once he dug his fingers into the sky to try and get at them, they cut the tree down, leaving him trapped. So it's not actually the moon up there, it's just a pale overweight goon. No one knows what happens to him during the day, supposedly he turns into a fish and swims to the other side of Australia.  Heeeeyy Hooooo Namarrkon the Lightning Spirit An angry misogynistic spirit who enjoys destruction, rain, and storms. He's not evil, just... you know... angry and misogynistic. Dreamtime Spirits  Women, am I right? Bagini Bagini are female spirits with sharp claws on their feet and hands. They force men to make love to them, draining their will in the process. They appear as voluptuous young Aboriginal women clad only in their long hair. They rely upon smiles and their rounded figures to distract a victim from the claws. They're spirits of conception that live in southeastern Australia. They find a lone man and attempt to seduce him, if he resists they become enraged and cut him to pieces. Wyrm Corrupted Bagini set nets and eat their victims once they're pregnant.  Fly my pretties! Jannok Ferocious wyrm spirits that travel in hunting flocks and pursue their quarry relentlessly. They look like bipedal humans with batlike wings. They can't be used for flight, but they allow gliding. They climb up trees with their weak hands, and glide at their prey, making a single attack with their wickedly clawed feet before gliding away to another tree. They inhabit areas where great sorrow occurred, like, you know, everywhere a Bunyip has ever died. Koala Koalas are actually the spirits of lost children. They can be convinced to teach gifts if you're nice to them.  Thylacine jaws could open this wide, yes, but they didn't have the muscle structure to actually bite hard. Kurpannga The hairless devil dingo. He's larger than a bull, with tendons and veins rippling across his bare skin. His teeth are long and wickedly sharp and bloody saliva drips from his jaws. Kurpannga is Wyld incarnate, a powerful Jaggling of revenge created by the medicine men of the Mulga-seed tribe. The Hare-wallaby people, the Mala, had arrived at Uluru to initiate their young men into manhood. the Wintalyka, or Mulga-seed men, heard of this. They sent their messenger, the bellbird Panpanpanala, to invite the Mala to a ceremonial dance, and asked them to bring some material for body painting. The Mala, angered by the request, sent only white ash and an uncivil reply. The Mulga-seed people urged their medicine men to take revenge for the slight. Thus Kurpannga was created, and went and slew all of the Mala. Today, Kurpannga haunts the dreamtime around Uluru, and bears a powerful hatred for anyone he considers a stranger (which includes the Garou). So, being warlike and imperialistic is bad. Wiping out an entire tribe and creating a creature of eternal hunger just because they turned down your dinner invitation, A-OK.  Not racist we swear Mimi Tall, thin earth-spirits, so fragile that they dwell within the rocks lest they be swept away and destroyed by the wind. They're a shy race of hunters that creeps out of the rocks on still days to dig for yams and slay small game. Fianna believe they're Fey that are only acting like spirits to gently caress with the other Garou. Eight feet tall, stick-thin bodies, long arms and legs, huge eyes and ears, fingers like a bunch of twigs. "They represent elongated caricatures of the Aboriginal people." Most cave paintings in Australia are are either of them or done by them.  This thing will kill you. Nadubi Wyrm spirits who steal children and poison those who wrong them or tresspass on their lands with their spines, which inflict a slow and painful death. They're four feet long with spindly arms and legs, skin that resembles charcoal, long spines protruding from their knees and elbows. Their faces are a featureless expanse of wrinkled skin and they let out constant wracking coughs even without mouths. When they die nothing remains but a pile of charcoal. Special mention needs to be made of their unique charm. quote:Poison Spines (Power cost: 5 per attack; the poison injected by a Nabudi's spine after a successful Brawl attack is fatal, even to Garou. The Garou may be cures with the Gift: Resist Toxin, or if she can somehow gain the favor of a major spirit with healing powers, but otherwise the poison is invariably fatal.) Nargun Earth-spirits that are made of rock and fire. They're immensely strong and capable of surprisingly rapid movement despite their appearance. They appear as large boulders when still or asleep, but when angered or active they have short powerful limbs, dark hollow eyesockets, and big strong If you leave a fire burning in the dreamtime, you may find yourself surrounded by Nargun when you wake up, though they're slow to anger and really just wanted to get warm. They're the immortal enemies of the Ninya ice-men and delight in melting them. Ngarang Malevolent spirits that dwell in the roots of ancient trees, they're Wyrm-corrupted Turongs(We'll get to them later, the perils of alphabetically sorted lists). They're tall and emaciated with long hair and beards, with wiry arms that are nonetheless hideously strong. Their skin looks like bark that has been scorched by fire. Apparently they were corrupted by Black Spirals who fed them human flesh, so now they crave it, hiding in the hollows of trees and reaching out with their long arms to grab humans and pull them into their homes.  It's pretty damning when the best thing you can say about a piece of art is that it's not horrible. Ninya The ice-men mentioned earlier. They were originally Wyld spirits but were corrupted by the Wyrm back when they wandered the ice caps that encompassed the world (what?). They resembled aboriginals but have pale skin, white blood, and icicles for beards and hair. They're made of ice and scatter frost as they walk. Fierce heat melts them so they live in terror of the Nargun. They were birthed by the earth mother when the world was formed. They dwell in a network of caverns beneath Mount Connor, near Uluru. They hope that when the Wyrm takes over the world, they will be allowed to build glittering palaces of ice and frost like they did back in the Ice Age. When one of them dies they all mourn since no new Ninya have been born since the world began.  (sustained scream) Potkurok Trickster frog spirits that resemble shoulder-high frogs with man faces. They're inquisitive and love playing jokes, and nothing makes them happier than driving Garou into a frenzy with a well timed trick. They aren't malicious but HATE THE GAROU because that's just what spirits do nowadays.  Dinosaur Hunter Turok Non-corrupted Ngarang. They look the same but have non-burned bark. They roam the tops of trees, dropping twigs on people they don't like, people they especially don't like may get branches or trunks. Possums are their allies and they worship Moodai the Possum spirit. The Fianna think these guys are fey too. Wa-tha-gun-darl The bulldog-ant people, great builders and one of the few Weaver spirits found in the dreamtime. They're 16 inches high and resemble anthropomorphic ants. They dwell in sprawling tunnels close to the surface, usually in the dreamtime's temperate bushlands. As weaver spirits, they often use traps to catch their prey, though larger prey gets taken down by a swarm. If one member is in danger, the entire hive rushes to their defense. Their manifested forms are rather weak (no strength, 1 stamina, one health level) but for each Wa-th... antperson who's nearby and spends a power point during the same action, they all get a cumulative strength and dex boost. So sure individually 30 of them might go down like wet paper, but they can bench-press the moon and beat you with it. The Bunyip quote:The European Garou were correct in claiming that the Bunyip were different than them, but their assertion that the Bunyip were not Garou could not have been more wrong. Australia’s indigenous Garou were closer to Gaia than were their immigrant cousins. The Bunyip, in their centuries of solitude, had become peaceful creatures. Far from participating in the atrocities of the War of Rage, the Bunyip rarely fought or argued. They were more solitary than other Garou, shunning a pack existence and living in isolation… The Bunyip were the authors of many Australian Aboriginal myths, and guardians of the Aboriginal spirit. Next we have all the gifts the Bunyip used to have, and you know, for “peaceful creatures, unaccustomed to war” they have one of the best combat gifts I’ve ever seen. quote:Bloody-Mindedness (Level Five) - The Bunyip spends two Willpower points. Afterward, nothing save death can distract or dissuade the Bunyip from her chosen task. She need not eat or sleep. If the power is used in combat, the Bunyip becomes oblivious to any other opponents and consequently may not dodge their attacks. Her soak Dice Pool versus these attacks, however, is doubled Versus the chosen opponent, the Bunyip gains one extra attack per round, and the difficulty of all actions against that target are reduced by one. She also becomes immune to supernatural attempts to dissuade her.  How do you get proportions this wrong? The Spirit Tribe So their brutal slaughter at the hands of the Europeans broke the Bunyip from the cycle of life and death. They felt betrayed, and felt that Gaia had abandoned them. So instead of passing on to her womb to be reborn, they remained as spirits haunting the Penumbra. But that’s not all. quote:Ghost Bunyip’s power is drawn from the Underworld, the Dark Umbra where the spirits of humans go after their death. The Bunyip, however, are not wraiths, but a unique spirit tribe. Rather than dwelling in the Underworld, they feed upon the death energies emitted by it, allowing them to exist as ghosts in a Realm at the edge of the Penumbra. Their great anger of their unjust destruction poisons the Dreamtime, turning the spirits and the land itself against the Garou. Despite the atrocities committed against them, they have not turned to the Wyrm. In addition to all of the gifts the bunyip had access to (yes, including Bloody-Mindedness), they can force the dreamtime itself to attack any Garou near them, drain their gnosis or the Gnosis of their caerns, induce a depression from which death is the only escape (unless they succeed on a diff 8 willpower roll), force the Moon Bridges that the Garou are traveling on to drop them off in the Atrocity realm with no means of escape. Or reverse the gauntlet, trapping the Garou in the umbra with no means of escape. Basically, if the Ghost Bunyip find you, you’re already dead. Totems There are a bunch of totems, I’ll only go over the more remarkable points. Ngalyod the Rainbow Serpent quote:Ban: Children of the Rainbow Serpent must become parents as soon as possible for the Rainbow Serpent is a spirit of creation and birth. “Yeah I have to sire a child to sate the rainbow snake that lives in my head.” “What?” Mu-ru-bul Tu-ru-Dun the Bunyip A Furred, flippered, scaled monstrosity with a long mane. Bunyip was a favored totem of the tribe that bore his name. quote:Ban: Bunyip asks that his Children honor him by drowning one enemy each year in fresh water I repeat, “a peaceful people unaccustomed to violence”. Kendi the Frill-Necked Lizard: Wyrm Totem This guy isn’t that interesting except, well quote:(followers of Kendi) also gain a spined neck ruff of bone and scale, completely protecting their throats(3 extra soak to the neck). Like reptiles, they may regulate their metabolism by absorbing heat, acting at up to double speed(two actions per turn) for a number of turns equal to their homid form’s Stamina. They may only do this once per scene, however. Up Next: How to run an Australian Chronicle Kurieg fucked around with this message at 01:10 on Sep 18, 2013 |
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Sep 18, 2013 00:28
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Chapter 6: Dreaming the Dawn  Remember the ant people from last chapter, here they are Dreaming the Dawn is the name of the example chronicle that White Wolf included as a good way to get players involved in Australia. But it could probably best be summed up as "Against all odds, a pack of competent Garou are put in a position of power in Australia." But first White Wolf needs to tell us how we're supposed to feel about this. quote:Mood and Theme  Wait, you mean I can shrink them down so people can't make out the details? Great! Setting and History The chronicle starts out in the Wadbilliga Protectorate, which was described earlier. It's a mountainous region with a few alpine plains formed by retreating glaciers. It's been Silver Fang territory ever since their Kinfolk settled the area in 1821. One of the first Garou into the area was a Shadow Lord Mystic named Doctor Lhotsky, which means it's time for some Revisionism. In GOTHIC PUNK AUSTRALIA Lhotsky used members of the Wiradjuri and Krauatungalung tribes to try and get in touch with the Bunyip during his expedition to the Australian Alps in 1834. When he didn't get results, he killed his translators, blaming them for his failure, the Bunyip then hunted him down and killed him in retribution (A PEACE LOVING TRIBE UNACCUSTOMED TO VIOLENCE). The Silver Fangs moved into Wadbilliga in force during the 1860's gold rush, and after the War of Tears they took over the Bunyip caern that stood atop the 1500-meter Crackenback peak, which overlooks the town of Jindabyne and the artificial lake created by the Snowy river scheme. The Silver Fangs backed the creation of the Scheme, much to the dismay of the rest of the Garou nation, but they didn't really care. The town of Jindabyne itself sits on the shores of the lake that shares it's name. Its previous location is now underwater, and while the Gravestones from the cemetery were moved to the new location, the bodies themselves were not. Due to it's proximity to many popular ski resorts, it's population can increase by a factor of 20. The Silver Fang Court of Wadbilliga AKA "Four assholes you're going to learn to hate and a single decent human being." Michelle Leaps-beyond-the-Reach-of-the-Wyrm Michelle is the current Seneschal of King Winchester's court. She's a metis Ragabash and the only offspring of an illicit liaison between her Silver Fang parents. She seems large, hale, and hearty in all of her forms, beyond her brittle claws which are her disfigurement. She secretly lusts after the throne, because she thinks Darius is hopelessly weak and inbred. Which is an odd point of view for a Metis Silver Fang to have. But she knows that the Fnag will never accept a Metis Queen, which just pisses her off all the more. As Darius' Seneschal, she's responsible for making sure his commands are carried out, so she just makes sure that the ones she doesn't like don't get carried out. She hopes to revitalize the Silver Fang bloodline once(if) she becomes queen, and make sure that Metis are no longer ostracized within her tribe. Tames-Spirits-with-her-Snarl A Canadian Lupus Theurge, Tames is the Shaman of the Lodge of the Moon. She was well liked by the spirits in Canada, so when she got to Australia and all the spirits wouldn't give her the time of day, she got pissed. Then she decided to kill a few to make an example. It hasn't really improved matters. Duke Anthony Pierce The Steward of the Lodge of the Moon, Anthony is a homid Philodox with a wonderful idea: he wants to wipe out Australia's entire dingo population. Despite being born and raised in Australia, he thinks of himself as English and views everything uniquely Australian with contempt. He considers himself superior to all other garou that aren't Philodoxes, and believes that those who breed with Dingos aren't technically werewolves. He makes sure that 'business' comes up in Riverina or Gippsland whenever Mamu is present in Jindabyne. M'lady Kathryn Hope The Steward of the Lodge of the Sun, and another Homid. quote:A Philodox, she despises blacks, Asians, and all other foreigners save the English, and makes no attempt to hide her racism. Subconsciously, she fears that the Silver Fangs have been weakened by inbreeding, but manifests this fear as loathing of all other tribes and "lesser races." She deeply distrust the Uktenna for breeding with Aboriginals, and believes that Tjinderi lusts after the leadership of the Council (she's right, but that doesn't make her not racist), and allies herself with Carla leader of the Get. She can't understand why Carla keeps getting rebuffed, I mean, obviously the rest of the council should realize that they need to kill all the brown skinned people. Nick Meads "Stubbornly referred to as Nicholas by the other Silver Fangs at court" Nick is a homid Galliard and the Squire of the Lodge of the Sun. He's also the Garou in charge of the sept's defense. He's an able warrior, thrill seeker, and risk taker. He loves dangerous sports like bungie-jumping and hang-gliding, using his Garou abilities to survive what should normally kill him. He loves Wadbilliga, and spends most of his time skiing or white-water canoeing in the protectorate. He thinks the rest of the tribe are boring and arrogant and will sometimes tease Darius and the rest of his court to the point of frenzy before fleeing into the Umbra. He'd be an all around decent guy, were he not secretly lusting after Tjinderi Knowing-Smile, vowing to protect her from(read: kill) Mamu if he ever openly attacks her. Others  Gangrel can't do this? What? Diana Wentworth Diana is a 12th Generation Gangrel Vampire that grew up in the late 1800s. During a family trip to the Blue Mountains, she met a vampire and was embraced. "Free of the restrictions of Victorian society" she disdains clothes as a mortal affectation. And spends most of her time naked or in wolf form. It was in wolf form that she met Darius Winchester, the Silver Fang king, who thought she was a werewolf. She didn't correct him until he was too in love with her to care. If anyone were to find out about them, Darius would probably be forced to abdicate. For her part she's agreed to not feed upon any Silver Fang kinfolk, or embrace anyone inside Wadbilliga. But she's still 'willful', and is entertaining the prospect of embracing Darius just to find out what would happen. Snarls-at-Shadows A shadow Lord Lupus Ahroun that was Exiled from Tasmania by Vlad for arguing with him over the beauty of the Australian wilderness. Vlad Volaschky hates the Australian wilderness except for those pieces which remind him of Europe. She fled to the mainland and now hides in the Snowy Mountains with a misfit pack of her own creation. She's taken it upon herself to keep the high country free of 'apes' and their depredations of the wilderness in the name of progress and recreation. They harry ski resorts, and destroy construction equipment. So far their attacks have been attributed to ecoterrorists. Recently they've become aware that the spirit of the Snowy River is still alive, bound by webs though it may be. They that by keeping the Snowy Mountain free of humans, they might win its favor as a totem. With its power she hopes to take Vlad's place on the council. The Jindabyne Council The council members are described again, there's a little more information given but it can mostly be summed up as: Fingal opposes every motion that even smells like something Darius would like; Darius wants Cernonnous to replace Innana and thinks Grek Twice Tounge was sent by the spirits to see him into glory; Carla, Mamu, and Vlad are hilariously racist; Mother Pasta wants to eat Monash; Don Mephisto is playing everyone for his own benefit; Tjinderi wants everyone to give her their protectorates out of the goodness of their hearts. The compact of the council forbids violence while a meeting is in session, and to date no member has died while a meeting is in session. Each representative vows to enforce the council's decisions within their own protectorates, but their own viewpoints make it somewhat difficult to come to decisions, to say nothing of enforcing them. The Ngalyod Pack Named in honor of the bunyip's totem spirit, this is sort of the Australian equivilent of the silver pack. Traditionally they operate as the Jindabyne council's arm in getting things done. Traditionally members serve for 10 years, after that a new pack is formed. Replacements are chosen by a special meeting of the Council. Appointments to the pack are sometimes made for more political reasons than because of their skill or renown which weakens the overall structure of the pack. The initiation takes place in a complex ritual on Cub island in the middle of Lake Jindabyne. The new members must swim a kilometer through the water to the island, which I should remind you is in the middle of the Australian Alps. There the council members await them, seated around a ceremonial fire. The whole ritual resembles an aboriginal initiation rite. quote:Beginning with the extinguishing of the fire. Next, the ritemaster daubs the pack members with blood and ochre, and cuts them with a shard of bone. Charcoal is rubbed into the wounds to ensure that they heal as raised scars. The ritemaster then uses a large stone to knock out a front tooth of each pack member this symbolizes their coming of age as a pack, and the loss to Gaia of the Bunyip. It is considered unseemly to show any pain during any part of the initiation. There are also a few different fetishes that the Ngalyod pack gets
That said, it's time to get into our nine part adventure. Introduction: The Visions of Grek Twice-Tongue It's come time to select a new Ngalyod pack. The last pack, which was made up entirely of Ahroun, saw it's role as a military one. So it spent all it's time fighting Pentex and Black Spirals, and ignoring the needs of the spirits because for some reason someoen thought it would be a good idea to make a pack entirely out of Ahroun. Unsurprisingly the council has had difficulty coming to a conclusion over who should be the new pack, but last night Grek had a vision. A new pack formed of young garou, untested by even their rite of passage, THE PLAYER CHARACTERS! The rest of the council agree if only to stop the arguing. Part 1: Spirits of Vengeance The player characters are summoned by the leaders of their respective septs and told that they are to present themselves to the Jindabyne council, no explanation is offered or given. When they arrive at Crackenback, Grek says they have some great destiny but can't be more specific. But before they're invested with the powers of the Ngalyod pack, they must first undergo their rite of passage. This seems like a good time to point out that this probably means that the player characters are probably somewhere around the age of 15. Darius sends them to the town of Thorpdale in eastern Victoria. The spirits there are angry and any garou that enter it are being harrassed. Their rite of passage is to go there, find out what disturbed the spirits and fix it. The Aboriginals of the area, the Kurnai tribe, were massacred early in the area's history, leaving only a few survivors. The last of these, Alice Price, was murdered by her husband, Doug, the owner of the town's only hotel. quote:Doug Price, a white Australian, is a surly Alcoholic. He killed Alice in a drunken rage. Her body is buried in the hotel's basement. Price has told the regulars who drink in the bar that Alice has 'gone walkabout'. He acts the role of the betrayed husband, claiming he took Alice in and treated her with love, when in reality she was no more to him than a slave and a body on which to slake his lust. The spirits of Thorpdale really liked Alice, and after she did they started screaming and howling in the Dreamtime, waking up the slumbering spirits of the Kurnai. The player characters succeed by finding Alice's corpse and interring her in the traditional way of her people, and killing Doug Price in revenge. Unfortunately there are two people who will oppose them in this. Sir Rodney Snipe is an insane Silver Fang who lives north of Thorpdale, who thinks he's still living with his mother who has been dead for decades. He drives his Rolls-Royce into town to drink at Price's bar which is likely where the PCs meet him. Once he finds out that they're Garou, he invites them up to his estate where he shows them his large collection of guns and trophies, and tells them tales of when his Garou ancestors settled the area, slaughtering all the uppity Aboriginals and binding the most rebellious spirits in a Spirit Drum, which he uses as an ottoman. If a PC uses spirit speech they can hear the spirits screaming but can't understand them, if they break the drum they're grateful and lead the pack to the Dreamtime grove of gum trees where the spirits of the Kurnai lie upon their corpse platforms. The ghosts still bear the scars of their violent deaths. The Aboriginal Dreamspeaker Murulami is the other impediment, and he's sworn an oath to destroy the Garou. Because. He uses his magic to make the spirits distrust the Garou more, and hopes to create open war between the spirits and Garou. He's gotten a few spirits convinced to attack the PCs when they enter Thorpdale. His ultimate goal is to confront Sir Rodney with the ghosts of the Aboriginals, drive him into a frenzy, and have him kill a few white folk in the process while breaking the veil before his eventual death. Part 2: The Weeping Sun Once they return to Jindabyne, they go through the initiation ritual, and are given what fetishes were not lost when the pack made entirely of Ahrouns went off and got themselves killed. When a player touches the Nameless Stone, they have a vision of a Thylacine fleeing a Black Wolf into a cave full of Aboriginal Art. Fingal Flashing-Claws tells them that they should go visit Bartholomew Wise-in-the-Ways-of-the-Wyrm who might be able to help them. When they arrive at Bart's house in the Blue Mountains, a Solar Eclipse happens. Bart agrees to help them if they help him "Rescue the Sun". He leads them to the fossil-rich Jenolan Caves in the Blue Mountains where Gnowee the Sun has been trapped by the Black Spirals. They led her here by saying her son was in the caves, but actually hope to use her to wake a wyrm beast the Bunyip sealed here centuries ago. And, you know, let him eat the loving sun. If the player characters can convince Gnowee that the BSDs lied to her, she burns them all to ashes, but still needs the players to guide her out of the cave, at which point the eclipse ends and Bart offers to help them.  What is going on here? Part 3: A Tiger by the Tail At some point later Bartholomew contacts the pack and tells them that the vision has something to do with the Tasmanian rainforests near the Franklin River. After Grek hears this he commands them to travel to Tasmania and investigate. Vlad becomes enraged and says that visitors are not welcome on 'his island'. He threatens the PCs but backs down when the rest of the council allies against him. Vlad stalks away muttering 'dark threats'. In Tasmania they find little actual help. Younger members of the tribe will try to bait them into attacking, and the elders will only act to stop the Younger ones from getting killed. When they search the rainforest they find an abandoned training camp, littered with spent cartridges. The ground is tamped down by many boots of various shapes and sizes. Silver bullets are embedded in all the nearby trunks. The Shadow Lords deny all knowledge if questioned. The pack also finds rocks painted with symbols leading them to Murulami, chanting in a clearing. He hates the Garou and threatens them, but runs away rather than engaging them in a straight fight. Near Murulami's clearing they find a cave decorated with the pictures from their visions. It is a lost bunyip caern, Murulami's notes indicate that the caern will not be reactivated until the skull of it's last guardian is replaced. Murulami himself was trying to reawaken it to gain the favor of its totem. When they return to the Cradle Mountain sept in Tasmania, they're 'greeted' by Vlad Volaschky. He rants and raves about how he would kill the players as trespassers were they not here on council business. He allows them to stay for now, but assigns Fyodor "a slow-witted by burly young Ahroun" to watch over them. From Fyodor they learn that the skull is being kept in a caern at the peak of Cradle Mountain. They have to distract him long enough to sneak into the caern and steal back the skull. When they bring it back to the cave, the Caern reawakens and Bookbook the Owl, totem of the caern, appears and offers to be their pack totem in gratitude. Her parting words are that most spirits still distrust them, and that only the fact that they bear the Rainbow Serpent's seal may save them. Back in Jindabyne, the Council debates on who will administer the new Caern. They eventually decide (perhaps after some prompting from the PCs) that the Council themselves will administer the caern. Vlad, of course, is pissed off because it's his caern, and the pack now has his undying enmity.  What is up with the random geometric shapes? Part 4: Lightning Dreaming After this, the Council sends the Pack to the Arnhem Land protectorate. Wungala Rose isn't available to greet them, instead they're met by Climonestra, a lupus Theurge. The pack are welcomed warmly but told only female members will be allowed to the center of the Caern. Climonestra tells them that they're trying to awaken the Namarrkon Caern, and that the Guardian Spirit will not speak to Black Furies. She asks them to intervene on their behalf, and surprisingly, Climonestra is actually pleasant, helpful, and doesn't have an ulterior motive. The totem remains silent until a fierce tropical storm breaks out over the Caern, during the Tempest Namarrkon manifests but only speaks to the male members of the Pack. He agrees to reopen his caern on the provision that the characters help him destroy the Ranger Uranium Mine. When they tell the rest of the Black Furies this they're thrown into turmoil. The older members of the sept remember their pledge against violence, arguing instead that peaceful protest and petition will bring about change. The younger furies, lead by Climonestra, argue for action. Eventually the peaceful furies win out, Climonestra frenzies and runs off to the mine alone. The Priests of pollution kill and dismember her, and her cadaver is dropped out on the outskirts of the Caern by a Ranger truck. This drives even the peaceful members of the sept into a frenzy and they all charge the mine. Well at least the good guys aren't the only ones who make terminally stupid decisions. Potential allies in the fight include the local dingo population (which a lupus might be able to drive into action). And one of Black Furies bitterly suggests that they should ask the Gumagan(crocodile/dinosaur shapeshifters) if they can find them. But if the PCs look for them, all they find are Aboriginals who say they've heard of the Gumagan but believe they're all dead. Namarrkon will aid the Garou, sending a supernatural storm to pound the open mine. The battle is fierce, many Black Furies will die. The Pack must personally battle Darren, who will scream "This is just a skirmish, the real battle is yet to come - the sleeper will fall to the Wyrm" when he dies. The battle ends with Father Moonscreamer being eaten by a massive crocodile.  Finally some strangely relevant art. Part 5: The Ghost Who Howls As they prepare to leave Arnhem Land, a message from the council arrives for them. The Sept of the Waking Dream has been attacked. Several members are dead, another is hopelessly insane. Younger members of the sept, a pack lead by a lupus named Biting Fang, have been attempting to awaken the Rainbow Serpent, guided by the spirits of the Mulga Seed people. Of course, since the Mulga-Seed people hate the garou, the rite they taught them is the one that they used to summon Kurpannga the Devil Dingo. Now Kurpannga's roaming the sept and killing all the Garou he can find. Runs-With-Ghosts is the leader of the Katajuta protectorate, and is one of the few Uktena who actually welcomes outsiders. Bathes-in-Blood(No, really), the Gatekeeper and a close friend of Biting Fang, is actively hostile towards the pack. And they need to gain her trust to learn the truth of what happened. Fortunately, Bathes despises Shadow Lords, if there's a Lord in the pack it might cause problems, but if they tell her about their adventures in Tasmania it will go a long way towards impressing her. She also believes in the sanctity of Caern and Sept, anyone who believes similarly will also gain her trust. As a last resort she'll trust anyone who can best her in a fight. She'll tell them of Biting Fang's hope of awakening Ngalyod, though she doesn't know where he gained the knowledge to actually pull it off. The last surviving member of the pack is a lupus Ragabash named Wanambi. She's completely mad and can no longer shift out of her dingo form. The sight of her own reflection or any other dingos will drive her into a terrified frenzy. If they try to force her to talk she'll run away, in any case she'll run away the next night and her half-eaten corpse will be found the next morning by the last sept guardian, her body surrounded by huge dingo tracks. In the dreamtime, the cave where Biting Fang was slain is inhabited by the Mulga-Seed people. They're bitter and angry, because their land was taken from them. If the characters promise that the caves won't be used by any other tribes, particularly their hated foes the Mala, they may tell the PCs about Kurpannga. If they're angered they'll call Kurpannga to attack them, only the plot trinket stone will make The Devil Dingo back down. If they negotiate with the Mulga and Runs-with-Ghosts, promising that the caves will remain free of Garou and tourists, they'll call Kurpannga and perform the ritual to dismiss it. Of course while they're celebrating, Runs-with-Ghosts will come to them angrily and claim that Kurpannga has slain again. Bathes-in-Blood is set to march upon the cave and force retribution, as Kwik-Kwik the Keeper of the Land has been slain, and his body was dumped in the Glade of Ancestors in the center of the Caern. Runs-with-Ghosts begs them to enter the dreamtime and confront Kurpannga. When the return to the cave they don't find Kurpannga, instead finding a Ghost Bunyip in thylacine form, blood dripping from its jaws. It leers at them and whispers "Watch for the Rainbow" and then dissapears. When they return to tell Runs-with-Ghosts what happens, she tells them that one of the Devil's Marbles, which are rumored to be the eggs of the Rainbow Serpent, is missing from its resting place. The Uktena are furious and send the Pack away with no thanks. If they investigate the site of the Marble, they find Garou sized pawprints and wyrm taint lingering. Tire marks lead south.  Did I mention that the art in this chapter has little to do with the text? Part 6: Shadows on the Mountain When the pack return to Wadbilliga, Don Mephisto summons them to a special meeting of the council. No'iri'n Ni'Dhonaill has challenged Fingal Flashing-Claws for his seat on the council. The rest of the members sit in silence as the short but bloody fight carries itself out. Mephisto accepts No'iri'n as the new member of the Council but admonishes her for spilling blood at Crackenback. Then out of nowhere Grek breaks into a howling rage, screaming that the Council are nothing but posturing fools who would rather bicker than fight the Wyrm. If no one else will save Wadbilliga and the Snowy River, he will. Then he limps down the mountain, Darius orders the pack to follow and protect him. Grek leads them into the heart of Snarls-at-Shadows territory. They rise out of the snow to surround Grek and the pack, snarling that they don't recognize the authority of Jindabyne. Grek tells her that he's a Council member and he demands that she let them pass. A challenge ensues, with one of the pack members standing in for Grek. If the characters are victorious, Katya will listen to Grek's story. Grek recently returned from a trip to the Snowy River tunnels, which are currently infested with Black Spirals. They're killing the spirit of the Snowy river, already weakened by turbines and irrigation systems. The Black Spirals have dammed the dreamtime reflection of the Snowy River and are polluting it with their own 'foul effluents'. Katya apologizes profusely to Grek and dedicates herself to Grek's service. Once they reach the spiral dam, they're outnumbered two to one. During the fighting, one of the pack members is supposed to notice one of the rocks in the dam shudder at the noise. It's actually a nargun and if they can awaken it it starts fighting the Spirals. Of course without the stone, the whole dam collapses, the Snowy River breaks through, and suddenly awakened and very angry, it rushes forward. The spirals are all caught in the wash and the PCs have to flee to avoid being drowned. Once they get topside again they find that the Snowy River has broken it's banks and the Murray 2 dam, flooding the upper stretch of the Murray. And if this map is any indication, that's quite a bit of land that's flooded. Indeed the book says that many many humans are now dead and countless farms are now submerged beneath the rivers waters. Our heroes, ladies and gentlemen.  This is so horrible it wraps back around to hilarious again. Part 7: Hope in Delirium When they return to the Council, they're shaken by the events. And demand the pack manifest their totem and summon their spirit allies so that all the council can benefit from the packs success. After this scrutiny, the pack is asked to handle a simple matter while they decide what to do. Publicly, they're asked to go to Brisbane to find Rage-in-the-Streets and bring him to the council. Privately, Mamu asks them to kill him because he has dishonored the tribe and should die with honor. Innana asks them to bring him to Nimbin so that he can be healed and purified before returning to Jindabyne. In Brisbane the pack likely has trouble finding him, since they're probably looking among the wild dog packs and in parks and gardens. When they look in the nightclubs they'll eventually discover "Martin Rage", the clubbers and druggies will direct them to him as a dealer of some high end drugs with a foul temper. Of late he's been dealing in "Space", a powerful hallucinogen that's stronger than LSD that allows its users to "See their lives from orbit". If they use Sense Wyrm on a Space user, they'll find minute but definite traces. Persistent inquiries will inform them that heavy Space use drives it's users into a violent self-destructive frenzy. They won't initially find Rage-in-the-Streets, but they will find a small pack led by Felicia Quest-for-the-Moon, a Homid Philodox CoG. She knows all about Space, which 'creates a bridge' to the Wyrm, and gradually pollutes the user driving them to depraved acts. She believes it's produced by Pentex but lacks proof, believing that the Sabbat might know more. She also asks them to go to Eungella once they're done in Brisbane, as the Stargazers need their help. If they just roam the nightclubs asking for Space they'll eventually attract the attention of both the Police and the Sabbat. quote:These anarchic young vampires will present themselves before the characters peacefully, but threateningly. They are not looking for a fight, but will throw their full strength against the Garou if need be. Leather-clad, pierced and tattooed, the Sabbat are every parent's nightmare taken to an extreme. They are led by Skin-Job, who delights in wearing human faces as masks. In the real world, the Gold Coast headquarters is a moderately tall office building of glass and steel. In the dreamtime it's a tower of sinew and bone, oozing pus onto the landscape. It's guarded by a First Team and a human security force. If they break through them, they find Rage heavily drugged and unable to move. They destroy the Space, and either kill or escape with Rage. Depending on what they do they make some council members happy and other very angry. Then Felicia escorts them to the Web of the Dreaming Hands Caern, where they hope to learn more of the Spiral Plot. Part 8: The Edge of Despair Monash End-to-the-Darkness greets them at the Caern, he's grateful for their arrival as his tribe is full of despair. When they tell him what the Sabbat told them, he offers to let them sleep in the Web of Dreaming Hands during the next new moon, which conveniently is in 3 days. In the meantime he asks them to help raise his tribe's spirits. When he's done talking, a gunshot rings out. Cherri Backwards-glance has just blown her head off with a shotgun. Indira Songs-of-Sorrow begins wailing and Chisolm There-is-no-Hope runs out of the camp screaming that he'll be dead by dawn. To save the Stargazers, they need to use the rapport they've gained with Australia's spirits to contact Fog, the spirit of the Caern, and convince him of the hopeless state of the tribe. They need to show him that the Stargazers mean him no harm and that it's okay to speak to them again. Fog will return some purpose to the Stargazers by giving them a new task, protect nearby Hinchinbrook Island from tourist development. When they finally sleep in the webs, they're taken into a shared vision. They see a stone falling from a black hand towards a still lake, where it shatters rather than splashing, then that hand squeezes a river, making it bleed red onto another rock, that bursts open to reveal a black worm. and a rainbow arching over Kosciusko that turns black as it reaches it's zenith, raining black foulness on the alpine plains, and then a white wolf slain by a thrown dagger, and the snow gums that ring Crackenback Caern wilting and dying before a southern gale. If somehow they aren't able to figure out "Go back to Crackenback, stupid." Indira can point them in the right direction, saying it's a "cry from Gaia, arising from a spiral plot". I should also point out that, if the PCs didn't parlay with the Sabbat (which is an incredibly stupid idea anyway), they would have no idea to ask about the Black Spirals. So there's got to be more railroading going on.  "A wolf eating its own tail is an Oroboros right?" Part 9: The Awakening When they return to Jindabyne, they find the council much as they left them, sans Vlad. They're working together better than ever, now that Fingal is gone and not being obstructionist, even Mamu is agreeing with some of the plans formed by Darius, No'iri'n, and Mephisto. Multi-tribal strikes upon Wyrm infestations in the Dreamtime are going to happen, and the pack is going to serve a role in further plans. They will negotiate peace, then communication and understanding with the spirits of the Dreamtime and the Garou. The council swears to give the pack whatever assistance they can provide. They're slightly less happy to hear about the Black Spirals, but agree that they can't stand before their new spirit of cooperation. Adding to the happy spirit is the fact that Joseph Blows-with-the-Wind has asked to be given a seat on the council. He's probably going to have his wish because Vlad isn't there. He's sent a message indicating that "Kinfolk business in Europe has called him away. He indicates that he will attend when this has been cleared up, whereupon he will address the Jindabyne Council concerning radical changes to Council Operations." Those radical changes are him raiding Crackenback with a commando team of Shadow Lords armed with Klaives, and Kinfolk armed with AK-47s with silver bullets. Led by Vlad Volashky. The ensuing fight is bloody with neither side able to gain an advantage. At the height of the fighting, Boobook bursts out of the umbra and screams that they need to follow her to the Umbra, because the Rainbow Serpent is in danger. Fog, Kanau the wedge-tailed eagle, and any other spirits the pack has befriended. The assembled Garou stop fighting, and fall to their knees in awe. If the characters seize the initiative and call upon the Shadow Lords to join them, all but Vlad do so. If they don't and leave with Boobook, Vlad will take the caern once they leave. If they're torn between staying and leaving, a terrible scream rings out which is so loud and terrible that everyone drops to their knees screaming in agony. A rainbow arcs over the caern and Mephisto begs the pack to guide them. In the Dreamtime, Boobook transports the pack to the upper slopes of Mount Kosciuko. Anyone who's traveled to the cave where the last Bunyip died will recognize the site. Below them is a small lake, it's waters are boiling and hissing as a horde of Black Spiral dancers are howling and cutting themselves, bleeding into the lake. The waters turn black with their blood, and in the center a huge round boulder (the missing devil's marble) protrudes from the surface, a rainbow arcing from a crack in the rock. The good news, Nagalyod is alive again, the bad news is he's corrupted by the spirals, blackness erupts from the egg and consumes the serpent. The Ghosts of the Bunyip ring the lake, watching impassively. The pack also recognize Murulami. He gestures wildly, running up to the Garou and tells them that while he still hates them, he doesn't want Ngalyod to be corrupted, and will help if he can. He tells them that the nameless stone fetish they hold is actually one of Ngalyod's scales, and if they can attach it to the great snake he will be purified. The pack must fight their way to Ngalyod and affix the scale, at which point he slaughters all the remaining spirals. The Wrap Up The book offers a few ways to end this. If they don't save Ngalyod, then well, Australia's hosed. The Dreamtime will be completely corrupted and the real world will follow suit. A purified Ngalyod might swallow up all the Black Spirals and vomit out White Howlers. If Ngalyod is wounded his blood might fall on the Bunyip spirits causing them to be reborn in flesh. He might be angry and rage across the physical world, destroying the European settlements. They might gain Ngalyod as a true totem. Also, the reason why Vlad attacked? Well, see, some of the members of the Jindabyne council die, and the pack members get asked to fill the vacant seats! At rank 1! This ending makes no god damned sense. There is no way a Shadow Lord would do this, ever. Even if they succeeded, the rest of the Tribe would probably kill him for shaming himself, and the tribe as a whole. And the tribe would probably have to pay severe reparations as a result. Even then, the attack has no payoff, there's no comeuppance for Vlad, the attack holds no weight because it just.. stops, when the plot rears it's ugly head again. There's also the fact that the story basically consists of the pack going around from Tribe to Tribe either telling them to stop being idiots or exposing them for the duplicitous assholes that they are. Even No'iri'n just kind of shows up and removes an obstacle to change for them. It's like Australia has just kind of stayed locked in place for the past 100 years just waiting for the PCs to show up and fix everything in the course of a few months. Thankfully however, that's all. Book's done. At least it ends on a really dumb note.
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Sep 21, 2013 07:25
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I'm choosing to believe that this is the end result of someone using the tweening tool in photoshop and really screwing up the anchors. Because having a head spontaneously erupt from your crotch is the least of that ladies worries right now.
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Oct 8, 2013 07:22
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Majuju posted:It's actually pretty loving cool, but it's also 900 pages of meticulously-detailed cityscape, so it's very unwieldy and the chance you're going to get $120 of True Setting Value out of one book is pretty slim. It's also almost comically huge. We had a demo copy at my FLGS we used to threaten to bludgeon people with if they didn't play nice.
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Oct 19, 2013 18:13
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MonsieurChoc posted:Yeah, this started around the end of the second edition and became the norm into Revised: Supernaturals aren't nearly the Secret Masters they think they are, and they get surprised by humanity all the time. Yeah, one of several problems that revised CoG had was the party line of 'every single advancement in human history was our doing, except for the bad stuff.' Thankfully it's an outlier in revised. Even Demon danced somewhat gingerly around the nature of religion if I remember correctly. Kurieg fucked around with this message at 03:28 on Oct 23, 2013 |
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Oct 23, 2013 03:25
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Halloween Jack posted:The Garou are the least sympathetic protagonists in the oWoD. Their stance on every other supernatural race is "Kill them" or "dunno, might as well kill them, better safe than sorry y'know." quote:The dumbest thing in Werewolf was the Seventh Generation, a Wyrm-worshiping cult of evil Republican lobbyists who are extra evil because they run child pornography ring, and was run by an evil Mountie. To quote one of the WW editors, "This is the World of Darkness, not the World of Liberalism," and they were quietly killed off with the justification that King Albrecht wiped them all out in a crusade. Halloween Jack posted:How did they deal with the True Black Hand, anyway? Did they say that they had always just been one faction within the Sabbat, then destroy their ghost castle and kill most of them off? I'm not sure if their level of control within the Sabbat was ever really defined, but they got rid of them in a way that made sure that no author could bring them back, ever. See, when something in the physical world is destroyed, it can show up in the afterlife if it has enough resonance with something else that's died there, this is known as a relic. Dude gets stabbed with a knife, he has a relic knife in the afterlife. The main base of the "True" black hand was Enoch, the first city. Caine's first city, which was a ridiculously powerful relic because of all of the people that died there. So when the wraiths found out about it, they did the only sensible thing, they used an even more powerful relic on it. Fat Man. The resulting explosion destroyed Enoch, broke the prison holding the Demons at bay, and (I think) created the avatar storm somehow.
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Oct 29, 2013 06:05
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Do style points turn into XP at the end of a session like similar points do in other games? Cause "Sure you can help out your friend, but it'll cost you Experience Points" seems like something Wick would encourage.
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Nov 3, 2013 05:47
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Plague of Hats posted:Hey so I made a site to put F&F reviews on both in case of thread archiving, to make them a bit easier to read (site formatting aside) and to allow them to be read despite the paywall. It is currently sparse, but I can copy-paste with the best of them. I am interested in getting permission from reviewers, though I can also abandon all my heroic work in the face of stern disapproval. Suggestions and pointers on how to make things look better or more readable are also a plus. Yeah go ahead and copy my stuff over. People who want to read about oWerewolf can read about it.
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Nov 8, 2013 00:12
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Kavak posted:I'm not opposed to it- horrifying stuff like that is why I read this thread. Yeah, I'm enjoying it too. I find this stuff hilarious. quote:to how to cure AIDS(eat salt, which will absorb all your blood, that has the AIDS in it, then poop out the salty AIDS-rocks, then drink water to recover your blood), to how to make dragons(take crocodile DNA, boil it so it expands, that will make the crocodile bigger, dragon-sized, then add in some wing DNA from a bat or something  I pity this man's biology teacher. Kurieg fucked around with this message at 06:05 on Nov 10, 2013 |
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Nov 10, 2013 06:02
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How do Renegade Beings work with encroachment. If they're already 100% monster how do they get more monster, so to speak.
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Nov 11, 2013 20:41
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Davin Valkri posted:
Ravnos were written out for a couple of reasons, their clan power was Chimerstry, which allowed them to create illusions that were more real than reality. Used properly you could invalidate any social or combat encounter by making your foe react to false stimuli and do something dumb. They were also the "Gypsy" clan, and they fell onto a lot of the same problems that the Gypsy oWoD book had. They also had a clan specific path known as the 'Path of Paradox', more commonly known as the 'Path of whatever I was going to do anyway' because of it's hierarchy of sins. quote:10 - Refusing to commit diablerie on the elder of another clan Stargazers got shipped overseas because they had 5 Willpower and Kalindo. Before that change almost every single combat monkey was a Lupus Ahroun Stargazer with 5 dots in kalindo.
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Nov 12, 2013 20:54
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Mr. Maltose posted:Didn't the Technocracy do that thing where they used satellites to Sun Laser Ravnos? Or was that in addition to a nuke instead of in place of? In addition to. And it wasn't just a nuke, it was a spiritually awakened nuke, so it not only wiped out the real world, it destroyed the spiritual reflection of it. One of the Kuei-Jin Bodhisattvas was conjuring a perpetual storm over the site of the fight so that they could keep going even during the daytime and to keep the mortals away. The nuke didn't kill Ravnos, but it killed her, so then they pulled the sun-mirror thing from Batman and Robin to burn him to ash, because regular sunlight wouldn't cut it.
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Nov 12, 2013 21:11
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Alien Rope Burn posted:It bears adding that the Ravnos were not only terrible Romani stereotypes, but had a psychological compulsion to commit crime. Well of course, it's a hierarchy 2 sin to not steal, I'm just doing what I have to to keep from becoming a ravening beast. They tried to 'salvage' the Ravnos by turning them into a tribe of Indian mystics who tried to understand karma and dispel the illusions that shrouded the world, but it didn't take. And their hierarchy of sins had "failure to kill another vampire" on it, so it made you a hit in groups.
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Nov 12, 2013 21:27
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Evil Mastermind posted:Didn't the three of them get into the huge fight in the desert in the Middle East that got magic-nuked by the Technocracy? According to my oWoD Cheat Sheet, Saulot took over Tremere's body, Tremere's soul fled and took over Goratrix' body, Then Tremere bound Goratrix in a magic mirror, called the Antitribu to a house party in Mexico City and killed them all.
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Nov 12, 2013 21:32
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And the Hengeyokai are so much better than those baka Gaijin Sunset People because they've never warred against their own kind, except for that one time they warred against their own kind. But that doesn't count because the vampires tricked them.
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Nov 12, 2013 21:42
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I just love the stupidity of the Asian branch of the Technos being named "Zaibatsu".
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Nov 13, 2013 02:36
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Mr. Maltose posted:I think their actual name is The Five Metal Dragons, but everybody in "the west" calls them the Zaibatsu because who the gently caress cares it's oWoD. Oh, okay, that's infinitely less dumb then.
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Nov 13, 2013 02:48
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Kai Tave posted:I am in no way, shape, or form a WoD gamer, I wound up passing that whole milieu by in favor of Feng Shui and Shadowrun, but hang around any tabletop RPG forum long enough and you're bound to accumulate knowledge of the various different Mage flamewar-starters simply by osmosis and this one right here is one of the biggest. From what I'm given to understand the guy in charge of making Revised what it was did what he did precisely because, as you say, people were playing Mage as a game of weird arcane heroics when a few people in charge thought it should be all grim and grounded and bleak. So a number of the changes in Revised, prominently among them the Avatar storm, were put in place specifically to be invisible walls intended to push people into playing Mage "properly." It's worth noting here that after being removed as the line editor on Werewolf, Bill Bridges took over Mage shortly before work begain on Revised. I'm betting most of the "Get out of the umbra, sit your asses down, and let me tell you about how technology is bad." parts of Mage Revised were his doing. Bieeardo posted:I had similar feelings when the new editor for Vampire came in, wrote a huge essay in which he revealed that the Assamites were no longer under their Curse, and mentioned at the very end that Baba Yaga had cacked it. At the time, it felt like a new comics line editor coming in with a bushel of opinions and an eagerness to put them into effect, a la Spider-Man's marriage getting retconned. Likewise oChangeling Revised, where the tension between modernist commoners and ironically hidebound, medievalist nobles was wiped away in favor of the Old Ways being Good, and anything you couldn't sneak past a Renfaire costumer being Bad. I'm not sure where the changeling change came from as He's not listed as an editor on that book, but I'm sure there was some cross pollination of ideas there. I think Apocalypse (and by extension Werewolf: revised) is the only book where the young upstarts who don't believe in absolute strict adherence to hidebound ritual are shown to be correct.
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Nov 13, 2013 15:25
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In the few Pre-Revised books I've been able to get my hands on, Glass Walkers were David Xanitos level schemers that were actually running the Garou Nation behind the Silver Fangs backs but were selling their tribe to the Weaver in the process because they aren't TRUE WOLVES. Post-revised they're just one tribe with problems amongst an entire nation with problems. The only real overt references to them being ebil and wrong is in Red Talons (surprising no-one) and Stargazers, where much of the second half of the book boils down to "Every other changing breed in the world is wrong, the Weaver is the true enemy. Only we, unclouded by rage as we are, are properly equipped to see the truth of things." The one thing that Apocalypse does do is that one Koinetzko ascends to power, he realizes that the Shadow Lord generations-long revenge plot will probably end up getting everyone killed and rather than filling every single position of power throughout the nation with Shadow Lords(like his tribe expects him to do) he instead puts people suited to that position, regardless of tribal affiliation or even fealty to him. It works, but everyone is left kind of going "What the hell just happened?"
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Nov 13, 2013 16:28
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Bieeardo posted:They ended up putting the kibosh on Glass Walkers cybering themselves to the gills, didn't they? Not as sweeping a change as things like the Avatar Storm, but given that some of them were basically angry daggits it was a breath of fresh air. The head of the Cyber Dogs had more than a few screws loose and I think at one point he was kidnapping lupus from other tribes to forcibly cyber them to try and show people how awesome cybertechnology was, including some Red Talon pups. Once the rest of the Glass walkers found out he was kicked out of the tribe and hunted down. There are still a few around but they're much more subdued and well aware that they're persona non grata in the tribe.
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Nov 13, 2013 17:02
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Halloween Jack posted:An optional rule is different dice. In this system, children roll d6, mortals roll d8, supernatural mortals roll d10, eldritch roll d12, and “extremely powerful” eldritch roll d20. I guess superhuman stats and magickal powers aren’t enough. I'm willing to bet they didn't care about balancing playing cards vs dice vs tarot vs gambling because ultimately it doesn't matter, the Storyteller is the only one who's opinion matters. That said, I can't entirely hate a system that allows for a competent 6 year old to beat up a god who rolled badly.
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Nov 13, 2013 20:38
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Count Chocula posted:Wait why didn't they use CyberWolves to sell werewolf instead of ecoterrorist hippies? They sound way cooler. Cyber dogs didn't officially exist until 1996, they were outed in 1998, and their leader and his inner circle were killed in 1999. Glass Walker 1st Edition was published in 1995. They didn't get any mechanics or rules until after they had been almost wiped out. I'm pretty sure they were introduced as a part of the Tribe Novels, as I think Konietzko was the one who told Genereader about them, and since she outed them her Camp rose to lead the tribe. This means that 1st Ed Glasswalkers, the book that gave us this image  had no rules for Cybertechnology at all. On the other hand, that was probably for the best. 
Kurieg fucked around with this message at 04:34 on Nov 14, 2013 |
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Nov 14, 2013 04:23
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My copy of Double Cross just came in the mail, can't wait to crack this thing open considering your review and the fact that my friend just referred to it as "S-CRY-ED and Guyver had a baby."Cyphoderus posted:Japan's Self-Defence Force (the cuddliest name for the military ever)
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Nov 20, 2013 22:52
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Libertad! posted:Dragonborn from Races of the Dragon can gain flight at high enough level as well. Same for Raptorans, and they have no Level Adjustment. Dragonborn, Raptorians, and Kobolds can all get limited forms of flight that can turn into 'real' forms of flight at 5th level, the same level that Sorc/Wis get Fly as a castable spell. So yeah they're only 'protecting' four levels worth of exploration. Level adjustments and racial hit dice always seemed so arbitrary to me, They tried to turn creatures into 'classes' in Savage Species but they were still substandard.
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Nov 23, 2013 06:59
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Selachian posted:
I love the inexplicable blue cougar that is either shirtless with one hell of a neck deformity, or the only non-anthropomorphic cover model. As well as the Octopus with eye stalks(?) and the Couatl(???). Down With People posted:That's Eberron, isn't it? The big war that shook the world is over, and now everyone lives in magic super-cities with trains and robots and poo poo. Yeah, there was a 100 year war combined with extraterritorial super-corps that were using funding from every side to develop new and better weapons of war. Surprisingly(for a fictional setting) they also used the fruits of their research for public sector work. Though quite a few technologies only work due to quirks of the setting. For example, Sharn is only possible because it exists in a manifest zone of the Plane of Eternal Sky. The buildings are literally buttressed against the plane of elemental air.
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Nov 25, 2013 23:47
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David J Prokopetz posted:As a tiny nitpick, Baldur's Gate is mid-to-late-2E, not 3.5E. While I wouldn't stake money on the correctness of my recollection, I believe that wall of iron was indeed subject to dispelling in the particular version of game on which it's based. That might be a combination of 2e's rules and the limitations of the engine, I'd imagine player who decided to be a dick and just fill up on Wall of Iron and put them down everywhere, rest, and try again would crash the game if they were persistent and indefinite. Though I may be wrong having not played Baldur's Gate.
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Nov 26, 2013 06:22
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I want to go visit the Strange Fire Area, I'm sure it's nice this time of year. I love how the British are bulldogs, the Germans and Greeks are gorillas, the Spanish are baboons, and the Italians are all wolves who've apparently split themselves up between Garibaldic and Napoleonic viewpoints. But the Norwegians? Snow Wizards.
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Dec 13, 2013 00:13
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So clerics and Paladins draw power from inside the self, because the divine doesn't exist and they're all about self empowerment and improvement. Yet druids exist completely unaltered. Libertad! posted:This is the only teamwork feat listed, but if there are others it would still be useless. Because Improved Teamwork effectively grants the character's teamwork feats as bonus feats to other party members. Human Tactics does the same thing, but on a limited duration. Maybe it's meant to be used for people not part of the party, although "party" is really broadly defined.
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Dec 14, 2013 17:06
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Xelkelvos posted:On the note of Teamwork feats, isn't that the same trick Inquisitors get at 2nd or 3rd level? Also, if there's no divines, what is the Inquisitor parallel? An ardent atheist? Inquisitors get it at 3rd level, and one of the paladin archetypes can just give everyone one of the teamwork feats he knows. But Wick-humans can't be Inquisitors anyway quote:They can be any class in the Core Rulebook except Cleric and Paladins (because they don't worship gods) or the Monk. I'm confused about this last ban, as the class is all about self-improvement and discipline. They can't be any of the Advanced Player's Guide classes except for the Cavalier. There are no explanations for these restrictions, either.
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Dec 14, 2013 22:47
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Humbug Scoolbus posted:Savage Species had an even more detailed system that still sucked. The leveled system that Cook used in Arcana Unearthed/Evolved is the best actually. Savage Species gave us the Ooze Bear Raptor Paladin and WOTC's response to over templated character ridiculousness, so it's not all bad WoW d20 had some relatively decent rules for monsters-as-characters, even a few that allowed for spellcasting progression as they were natural spellcasters. You just need to make sure that the creatures are as powerful as a player would normally be at that level, which means giving them some nice carrots every now and again.
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Jan 5, 2014 22:09
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