Okay, first things first: wow, what great discussion on that last post. You guys are doing Werewolf proud. Obviously, not every concern there can be addressed (and to point out said obvious, because some of them are diametrically opposed), but it’s a mass of information that our authors have to work with.
Care to give them a little more?
One of the things that’s been evident as you put together a big pile of Werewolf is that the Gifts are a lot more asymmetrical than Disciplines are. Because they don’t follow a strict progression with one power per level, but rather are treated as lists of options from which one chooses freely, over the years new Gifts arose as accumulation. You didn’t have to add five new Gifts in a Tribebook: you could add three, or seven. It would take a remarkable coincidence for all the tribes to wind up with the same number of Gifts, much less the same number of Gifts at each level. And tragically, said coincidence didn’t take place.
(I know, right? It would have been great.)
As a result, one of the things we want to do is make those lists overall a bit more symmetrical. Make sure that every breed, auspice and tribe has roughly (though perhaps still not exactly) the same number of Gifts as their brethren. In a few cases, this may mean making some new Gifts; most of the time, though, it means choosing obscure Gifts to bring forward and make more relevant, or in the case of a group that has a few too many Gifts, choosing the more obscure ones to leave out.
Which leads us to the question: What Gifts are—
No, wait. If we’re doing this, let’s go all the way. What Gifts, rites, fetishes and totems are things that you would hate to see go? If it’s a choice between three obscure tribal Gifts in a Dark Ages book, which one is the leader? Which are the fetishes that just have to be in there? Which are the obscure rites that are critical to the game’s feel even if at present they need to be mechanically more compelling for anyone to use them? And heck, if you’ve got some criticism of obscure Gifts, rites, fetishes or totems that don’t need to be revisited, we can accept that too, though obviously the real question is what positives to include.
For the purposes of this question, assume that everything in the core book is good. It’ll be in there. But we have a lot of supplements out there. Multiple editions of some supplements, like Umbra: The Velvet Shadow and Umbra.
What is the stuff that we dare not forget?
Interesting approach. For me, it was okay, that certain tribes had more gifts than others. It kind of suits the Uktena to have magical powers and it wouldn’t be fair to compile several technology effects into one gift, just to match a number.
That said, a guideline on how many gifts a character should “normally” have, would be nice.
As for gifts, that I feel should be included:
Eminent Domain (Silverfang One from Wild West; should be included into that other Silverfang gift that influences first perception, though)
Tinkerer’s Touch (Theurge Two from Wild West Companion; should be added to Glaswalker List)
Faceless Stranger (Silent Strider From Wild West Companion)
Shape Smoke (Homid Cliath, from Frontier Secrets – Used in modern days to prevent the Fire Department to send it’s men to a place, the garou doesn’t want them)
That’s what was on top of my head. Really a list of gifts, that I couldn’t go without is hard, for there are so many that fit this or that character.
However, there are some Core Book gifts, that would need rework, too. Really. “Sense of the Prey”. Argh!
Just to duplicate what I said in Holden’s thread along the same lines:
The Personal Umbral Digital Assistant and the Labrys of Isthmene are pretty iconic fetishes of their respective tribes (Glasswalkers and Black Furies) , and I would be sad to see them go. Even though the former probably requires a tech-upgrade that would probably also require changing its name.
And the rest I need to think about.
Likewise, aren’t Jarlhammers pretty iconic for Fenrir?
Wow… Dont make me choose.
Lets see…
Corebook Gifts:
Homid: Persuasion, Staredown.
Metis: Create Element, Sense Wyrm, Burrow, Curse of the Hatred, Gift of the Porcupine, Wither Limb.
Lupus: Hare’s Leap, Sense the Unnatural, Song of the Great Beast.
Ragabash: Open Seal, Blissful Ignarance, Sense of the Prey, Taking the Forgotten, Luna’s Blessing, Whelp Body, Thieving Talons of the Magpie.
Theurge: Mother’s Touch, Sense Wyrm, Spirit Speech, Command Spirit, Exorcism, Grasp the Beyond.
Philodox: Resist Pain, Scent of the True Form, Truth of Gaia, Strength of Purpose, Weak Arm.
Galliard: Call of the Wyld, Call of the Wyrm.
Ahroun: Razor Claws, Spirit of the Fray, True Fear, Silver Claws.
Black Furies: Sense Wyrm, Wasp Talons.
Bone Gnawers: Cooking, Resist Toxin, Tagalong, Scent of Sweet Honey, Odiuos Aroma, Infest.
Children of Gaia: Mother’s Touch, Resist Pain, Luna’s Armor.
Fianna: Persuasion, Resist Toxin, Faerie Kin, Call the Hunt.
Get of Fenris: Razor Claws, Resist Pain, Might of Thor, Hero’s Stand, Horde of Valhalla.
Glass Walkers: Cybersenses, Elemental Favor, Summon Net-Spider.
Red Talons: Sense of the Prey, Trackless Waste, Gaia’s Vengaence.
Shadow Lords: Aura of Confidence, Fatal Flaw, Seizing the Edge, Luna’s Armor.
Silent Striders: Sense Wyrm, Speed of Thought, Messenger’s Fortitude.
Silver Fangs: Lambent Flame, Sense Wyrm, Luna’s Armor, Silver Claws.
Stargazers:Balance, Inner Strength, Wisdom of the Seer.
Uktena: Sense Magic, Shroud, Spirit Speech, Spirit of the Fish, Spirit of the Bird, Fetish Doll.
Wendigo: Call the Breeze, Resist Pain, Cutting Wind, Call the Cannibal Spirit.
wow… and thats only for the Gifts on the Corebook.
later…
Um, you may want to re-read the posting first where he says:
“For the purposes of this question, assume that everything in the core book is good. It’ll be in there”
They’re looking for Gifts/Rites/Fetishes/Totems from supplements, or older editions that should be included. 🙂
Where can i edit my post?
(I feel so stupid… well, even more than other days).
Sorry.
(Fuck!).
*chuckles* It’s okay. You were just a bit excited. It’s understandable.
You can edit posts over on the forums, but unfortunately you can’t even delete posts here (only the blog moderators can.)
The Weaver demands permanency. 😉
To me, the single favorite gift that i’ve always wanted is “Summon Talisman” for Silent Striders. Printed in Player’s handbooks it allowed these wanderers to grab their dearest goodies (dedicated items) from afar. It was a very practical and very in-character gift, one i’ve always seen as something of a Silent Strider classic.
While thinking of the Striders – D’Siah is an iconic weapon for them and Descent into the Dark Umbra is practically a must for any Striders delving into the affairs of unliving,
Okay, right, just kindof glancing over various books and seeing what jumps out at me:
Gifts:
Hush (Lv 1 Ragabash, book of auspices) is the ultimate “Kick under the table” gift. I really like gifts that emphasize the pack social dynamic, and this one does it in spades.
Unified Force (Lv2 Galliard) and View the Battlefield (Lv 3 Galliard, both from Book of Auspices) both emphasize the hell out of the Galliard’s support and pack unification role.
Pack Tactics (Lv 1 Ahroun Book of Auspices) meanwhile emphasizes the battlefield leader role (as opposed to the more obvious and simplistic bruiser) and makes the pack tactic mechanic more attractive
Tongues (Lv 3 Homid Players Guide to Garou) Just an insanely useful but not overly powerful gift. Not sure why it disappeared from the corebook between editions, or why it’s ranked so high.
Prey Mind (Lv 1 Lupus PGtG) just a very lupus gift.
Stinging Blows (Lv 2 CoG PGtG) offers a really great enemy-manipulation effect that’s reminiscent of 4th Ed D&D’s various “marking” powers. Stuff like this makes combat more strategic and interesting.
Data Flow (Lv 3 Glass Walker PGtG) is, as it says, the definitive Glass Walker Gift. Also, basically necessary for operation in any city with a lot of cameras.
Summon Talisman (Lv 2 Silent Strider PGtG) just seconding Asmodai on this one
On Patrol (Lv 2 Bone Gnawer Tribebook) this is just a fantastic gift for garou in densely populated areas who aren’t looking for someone in particular. The ability to extend other “sense weirdness” gifts is fantastic.
Laugh of the Hyena (Lv 3 Bone Gnawer Tribebook) because I just enjoy the hell out of the image of a vampire using dominate on a Gnawer, and the Gnawer laughing uproariously in his face.
Domestic Seeming (Lv 2 Child of Gaia Tribebook) I feel like more gift lists should have this gift. The ability to go “no, I’m a dog, shut up” is crazy handy for any garou operating in urban areas that doesn’t want to be limited to their humanoid forms.
Wounding Lies (Lv 5 Shadow Lord Tribebook) It’s like evil pinocchio. I feel like that’s all I need to say here.
Dam the Heartflood (Lv 4 Silent Strider Tribebook) because fuck vampires, that’s why.
.Rites:
Appease the Traffic Gods (Book of the City) is just really adorable. I don’t know why I like this one so much. It’s just so weirdly animistic and yet so urban.
Rite of the 13th Floor (Book of the City) is a much-needed analog to the Rite of the Shrouded Glen for Skyscraper Caerns.
Preserving the Fetish (PGtG) drives home the fact that fetishes are living things.
Soothe the Scars (Black Fury Tribebook) emphasizes the furies’ greater concern for human victims.
Rite of No Trespassing (Bone Gnawer TB) like the 13th floor but for outdoor urban caerns. I feel like these two and the Shrouded Glen could all be rolled into a single entry.
Little Rite (Glass Walker TB) very iconic of the tribe, very thematic, not a ton of mechanical effect.
Promethean Daze (Glass Walker TB) same as above
Rite of Bane Binding (Uktena TB) this is the Bane Tenders’ entire schtick. It can’t really be left out
I liked that there was a Dark Ages “speak in all languages” Fostern gift in additional to the Adren gift “Tongues”, that also allowed understanding of written texts.
Hmm, I don’t have a lot of Garou supplements, but I’ll look at ’em and see what I liked best. Are Rites, Fetishes, and Talens from the revised core auto-includes, or should we petition the ones we like best?
Uktena Revised:
Overlook (2) The Uktena are all about learning Things Werewolves Were Not Meant To Know, but they also want to learn Things I Did Not Want You To Overhear and this is a good way to do that.
Another’s Moccasins (2) For any werewolves who don’t consider bloody violence the solution to every problem, this is a great Gift, and very thematic.
Guardian’s Fortitude (4) It’s hard to imagine how Bane-Tenders manage without Gifts like this one.
Rite of Balance (3 Accord): An example of things other than a Rite of Cleansing that may be necessary (but not always sufficient) to cleanse taint.
Rite of the Spirit Cage (3 Mystic), Rite of Bane Binding (5 Mystic), and Bane Seal (Fetish level 5): So very Uktena.
Black Furies Revised: I agree with the above about Soothe the Scars. Others:
Flames of Hestia (3): If this Gift is to be reprinted, a review/revision/clarification of how it compares to Rite of Cleansing (and Rite of Balance) seems necessary.
Spirit Smugger (1, Sisterhood): This is the sort of very useful Gift that I’d think more Garou would have tried to invent.
Ritual of Acceptance (2, Accord): This is a very thematic Fury Rite, but it isn’t entirely clear to me whether it is for cubs or ranked Garou who renounced their tribe (the latter seems to be intended) and some clarification of how it interacts with Rite of Passage and/or Rite of Renunciation might help.
Bearing the Caern (5, Caern) It’s much like the Rite of Caern Building, except the difficulty is always 8 no matter what. If the Rite of Caern Building is revised/rewritten, please take a look at this one as well.
Avenge the Innocent (Punishment 4) and Curse on the Household (Punishment 5): These Rites are very thematic for the Furies, while the latter also demonstrates how some Garou go too far in their zealousness.
Coin reader (lv. 3 Fetish) This could be very useful. The Wyrm doesn’t always get in your face with giant ravening monsters. Its tentacles of corruption poison the world in much more subtle, secret ways. Garou who want to adapt to addressing this need things like this.
Labrys Fetish (3), Bow of Artemis (3), and Labrys of Isthmene (4) are iconic Fury weapons.
Silent Striders Revised: Agreed on D’siah, Dam the Heartflood, and Descent into the Underworld. Other than that, as others said Striders seem to have fewer cool Gifts that aren’t about running fast. Some suggestions to reprint:
Scale of Ma’at (3) but please fix the spelling. It’s Ma’et or Maat, not Ma’at. Really. The ‘ and the second A are the same consonant (ayin) and don’t belong together. (pet peeve)
Heavens’ Guidance (1)
Grim Resolve (1, Harbingers)
Ghost Touched (3, Hargbingers)
Mindblock (4, Swords of Night)
Gathering of Wanderers (Caern Rite 2) Very iconic sort of thing for Striders to have to do, sadly for them.
Rite of Purification (Death 2) Silent Striders no doubt know that some Vampires like to play “games” with dead bodies, and may suspect that some werewolves eat brains, so it makes perfect sense for them to do this with their dead.
Rite for the Watchful (Death 4) Not sure why this is a Death rite, but I like it because it shows a side of the Striders rarely revealed: the practices and culture their tribe had before the curse.
Rite of Meeting and Parting (Minor Rite) Little things like this (and lots of other Minor rites) really help to bring Garou culture(s) alive.
Ritual of Dormant Wisdom (Mystic 4) How can you leave the Eaters of the Dead out of W20? They’re so creepy, Wyrm-tainted, freakish, horrific, and charmingly good at pretending to be normal Silent Striders.
D’siah (3), and by extension Jambiya (3) and Owl Talon D’siah (5) are the iconic weapons of Silent Striders.
Umbra Revised:
Sense Weaver (Theurge 1), Parting the Velvet Curtain (Theurge 3), Realm Wisdom (Philodox 2), Scent of Disctinction (Galliard 3), Web Walker (Glass Walkers 3)
Rite of Dreaming (3), Rite of the Silver Forge (4)
Charms: All of them. The more spirit charms, the better.
Moonsilver, Wyldstones (5), Water of the Silver Lake (talen)
Well, for me almost all the Gifts and Rites are cool (although some of them are merely cosmetics).
The greatest problem that I see is the escalation of power. To have a Level 3 Gift you have to be a Rank 3 character, a mid-seasoned Garou with more than a few stories played.
I run a great chronicle during five years (although the time in-game was only one year) and the characters only achieved enough Renown to have Rank 3. Well, it is a little depressing for my players to play hundred of hours and not being able to choose the most powerful Gifts when other templates can start the game with Spheres/Disciplines/Arcanoi in their maximum. Werewolf the Forsaken fixed this a little (yes, I know that it’s a different game, but it has some great ideas that we could use) linking the level of the Gifts with a particular Renown, not whith the Rank.
I would like to see some change in this particular mechanics. It would be great to have a greater option to pick up the powers of Gaia to kick some Wyrm-ridden asses…
I actually like it. The basic Garou Package is already very powerful, stats wise. A Cliath Ahroun will beat the everliving unlife of most stating vampire/mages with little trouble, even if the vampire has level 3 disciplines and the garou has level 1 gifts. That is doubly true if you use the Dark Ages treatment of how disciplines affects garou. The Level 5 gifts always had kinda of a legendary status to my players, stuff that made them look up to their elders and jaws drop to hit the floor during battles, specially because i made level 5 garou specially rare in my games.
You can’t edit those posts, can’t we? Well, i was going to add that ‘your milleage may vary, though.’
Another solution would be to have a lot more of Gifts in the first Raks, because the greater levels are unreachable for the players. I agree that the 4 and 5 levels are the stuff of legends and the greatest among the Garou but the three first levels could be more.. Impresive.
What i think is really worrysome is the lack of rules for advanced character creaton. I runned a homebrew multi-storyteller scenario where i live (Akin to the Laws of the Wild LARP ideas, but with tabletop rules: I was never much of a fan of Larping on Werewolf, even if it’s my favorite White Wolf game ever…), and at the time i had to homebrew my own rules for creating garou of higher rank, years before they suggested it on the revised edition, and even so the stats wouldn’t match many of the RAW characters on the sourcebooks, specially on the Athro-Elder level, where the XP pool between characters sheets varied wildly. That should be a MUST HAVE on the new edition, with suggested stats from Ranks 2 to 5. (6 well, i think the GM would have free rein there… 🙂 )
I think that’s probably because rank was only loosely correlated with character power or experience. You could be a fantastically experienced rank 1 if you never did anything that merited a rank up for years and years (or fucked up too often while doing it), or you could be a Rank 5 with only a bare minimum of XP because you kept getting thrown into high-renown situations before you were ready for it and somehow ended up carrying the day anyway. So the decision of “how much XP do I want this character to have” and “what rank do I want them to be” are only loosely connected questions.
I should point out that the first situation was something we tended to refer to as “the swiss army garou”. He may not have any gifts above rank 1, but he has *all* the rank 1 gifts.
True, i understand that, but i think if a guy screws up enough times to negate the renown he gets by doing stuff (and earning his XP points doing so) then he probably won’t survive long. And to attain higher ranks, a minimum XP level should be required, because you didn’t earn those renown points by sitting on your chair and reading the news… 🙂
Well, I mean, you have things like the Shadow Lord Camp the Children of Crow, whose entire job is basically to throw themselves on the shame grenade and generally do shitty dishonorable things for the sake of the pack. They’re basically built to lose renown like a sieve so everyone else doesn’t have to.
There’s about two pages worth of that in one of the supplements at page 56-57… I think it’s in ST guide.
So yeah we could use a liiitle bit more about creating elders info 😛
You know, Vamps got whole books dedicated to it.
I would not be against seeing “Outside Gifts” (from other Fera, or the likes) that are as costly, if not moreso, than native B/A/T gifts. As Gifts are “Tricks learned from spirits (in most cases), or others with such knowledge of how to perform them” (paraphrased), I don’t see why a spirit wouldn’t necessarily teach Lick Wounds (for instance) to a Garou, but it may require a higher level, greater cost, or RP service to the spirit to do so.
And if such gifts WERE allowed to be learned by Garou (and, more importantly, included in the book), some examples of those that would work well for Garou might be fun to give. But I won’t waste the space with those unless I think that adding those would be helpful to the conversation.
The same could go for Rites/Totems, but with greater restrictions.
Fetishes, well… I suppose it depends on the spirit bound to the item, as to whether or not it’s malevolent or benevolent to the user, and if that’s a restriction to the user.
((I’ve posted a similar post of interest on this topic over on the forums at http://forums.white-wolf.com/default.aspx?g=posts&m=1267646 for greater discussion.))
There are already a bunch of gifts in the Bone Gnawer book stated to have been learned from Ratkin.
I suspect most of the fera gifts are going to end up wherever the Fera do, and as far as I understood it the rules always said you could learn fera gifts, you just had to buy them outside T/A/B
Could/should some be included then in the W20 book if they particularly fit the game? (“This Gift was in the Nuwisha book, but does it mean it shouldn’t/couldn’t be in the W20 book for Garou to have access to”) Just a thought.
But if Ethan and Holden want to keep it just to “Gifts for Garou, in Garou supplements” then I don’t want to fill the conversation with gifts that will just fruitlessly muddy the discussion. 🙂
Well if the fera end up in the companion (assuming there is a companion), then it would just be redundant.
So many questions…
As it is already, the Fera have FAR fewer Gifts unique to their Breeds than the Garou do… I’d rather let the Fera retain SOME unique abilities, and bring to the fore/revise/improve/invent more low-rank Garou Gifts instead. Otherwise they Fera who do show up in games will look utterly lame because there’ll be almost nothing they can do that Garou can’t do better.
I would really really love to see Spear Dancing get back in, from the revised Fianna Tribebook if I recall correctly. I’m also seconding the vote for Jarlhammer, it’s a totally iconic weapon for the Fenrir. (I’d also love to see the Jaw Klaive make an appearance for the Red Talons and lupus Fenrir).
And I had a system question/clarification- if a Garou undergoes the Rite of Renunciation to take on a new Auspice, do they automatically gain or lose Rage to match their new role, or would a Theurge turn into an Ahroun with Rage 2? The rite doesn’t mention that, and I can’t find an answer anywhere. Sad times. (Considering giving a plot NPC the rite for story purposes in my game)
I don’t think his rage changes, just like the rest of his stats (other than renown and gifts) doesn’t change much. I think it would add a numerical problem that is uneeded, because extra rage bought with experience would have it’s real XP value varied, specially on the higher end. That player would win/loose XP points, which would make an odd choice of game development…
So I agree with many here that state that there are a ton of Gifts/Rites/ect. that we would not want to see go away. But instead I’d like to address a different specific niche here…
Camp Gifts: Some Camps have them, some don’t. Some have more, some have less. Perfect example: The Silver Fang Lodges of Sun and Moon; Sun has a handful of Gifts spread out over the Ranks, Moon has 1 (possibly 2, I don’t have the book handy) per Rank making for between 5 and 10 Gifts for that Lodge alone. There seemed to be more Camp Gifts listed in the first rendition of the Tribebooks, many of those went away during the rewrite.
If you are going to go so far as to put Camps in the 20th Anniversary Book (which I certainly hope you do), can we get a standard set of Gifts for each Camp? Even if it is just to say, “At Rank 1, Camp X get’s the Homid Gift Persuasion (see page…)” They don’t have to be brand new and original Gifts for each level of each Camp, though some original Gifts are great. But it will give Players more of a reason to seek out membership in a Camp for something more than story purposes, and it gives a mechanical benefit that helps make each character unique and different even if you are dealing with two PCs of the same Breed, Tribe, and Auspice.
Black Furies: Kneel (Wild West)
Spirit Ripper (Wild West)
Bow of Pegasus (Dark Ages)
Gaze of the Gorgon (Dark Ages)
Fianna: Woadling (Dark Ages)
Maybe some Camp Gifts for the Fianna?
Agreed, but I could say that about multiple tribes (Bone Gnawers most prevalent, as they have a lot of camps but very little mechanical benefits to them).
Cousin’s coat is a lvl 1 Lupus Gift form Wild west-line(can’t remember the exact book)
What the gift did was that you would change your wolf form to look like your nearest “cousins” living nearby I.E wolfs in the wild and dogs at the cities. While this was very handy for a Lupus it wasn’t the gifts most useful side. It masked your “supernaturality” completely from mundane & supernatural powers and senses, power depended on successes rolled. And had no activation cost, lasting as long as you didn’t change shape from Lupus form.
I abused the ever living crap out of this lovely gift in one of our games 🙂
Considering how bizarre high-Pure Breed Garou look for most tribes, that sounds like a quite useful Gift.
No, I am not a black and white piebald freak of nature, I’m a totally normal mundane grey wolf. Stop staring at me.
Out of curiousity, where are the pure breed “breed standard” appearances for the various tribes described?
Furies: Black and white (see revisited cover)
Get: Gray or blond
Silent Striders: Phraoh dogs with black fur
Silver Fangs: pure white with blue eyes.
White Howlers: White and gray with blue eyes.
Wendigo: Pure white, icy claws, blue eyes and aurora around them in crinos.
Fianna: Reddish, with yellow underbelly, or black, both with green eyes.
Shadow Lords: pitch black pitbull like wolves.
StarGazers: Green eyed black wolves.
Child of Gaia: Calm, tame looking wolves.
I know that this isn’t the “change the mechanics” thread, but I’d feel a lot better about those weird appearances if they were toned down a lot in Lupus, and only really looked that strange in Hispo and Crinos. If the Lupus forms only hinted at these traits (Silent Striders having longer ears and being browner than grey, Shadow Lords being darkish grey, Silver Fangs being lightish grey) it would be much more reasonable to imagine them being able to hunt in the wilderness without blowing their camouflage on a regular basis.
Glasswalkers: Revised (p.74) states that it’s believed that they were “Tall and proud, with glossy dark coats and eyes full of intelligence; these days, some Walkers meet that description, but they don’t have the power of a recognizably pure bloodline to back up the good looks.”
Shadow Lords being darkish grey, Silver Fangs being lightish grey) it would be much more reasonable to imagine them being able to hunt in the wilderness without blowing their camouflage on a regular basis.
Silver Fangs are Russian…Siberian wolves, they are white so that they can hunt, in the snow. Just like the actual white wolves which exist there. And being that all wolves hunt at dusk or dawn, the lowlight periods of the day, them being of a dark color in any wooded area, any are not snowy or a sandy desert, is a perfectly useful color.
So Silver Fangs are white, Shadow Lords black (also serving a much needed analogy for deeper themes between the two tribes)
Still object?
Oh, another thing I really liked of the Forsaken game that we could use: specific lists of Gifts unique for the Auspices. It makes the Ahroun more warrior-like and the Theurge more magical, reinforcing the roles of the Garou culture.
And talking of more specific Gits, Sense the Weaver and Sense the Wyld are a must. I think to remember a Gift from the Werewolf Player’s Guide called Change Body (I think that it’s the correct name, I only have the Spanish version “Cambiar Cuerpo”) that allowed to reallocate the dots of your Phisical Attrubutes that matched with the very concepts of Shapesifter.
I think you’re speaking of Body Shift, and yes, I do believe those Gifts are useful. Maybe taking Sense Weaver from Wyld West for Glass Walkers and giving it to the modern Glass Walkers. Yes, in a world where Weaver is growing by leaps and bounds, it is still good to be able to sense it.
As for gifts, I’d like to have some things incorporated, that apply in general to gifts and their description.
1. Spirits may teach gifts, that seem characteristic to them. As for “Hare’s Leap” basically each spirit that represents an animal that is known to jump far or even non-animal spirits that are somewhat linked to jumping are valid teachers. Spirit teachers given with gift descriptions are just examples not exclusives.
2. Gift names are garou given and certainly may be different regionally and/or within different tribes. The naming of gifts in the rulebook is for convenience sake and it might also be the name garou gave to that specific gift, however, that doesn’t mean a spirit knows this ability by that name. Basically a garou petitions not for “Razon Claws” but to be taught how to sharpen his claws, so that they be more effective in battle.
3. Gifts may be taught….
3.1. …by spirits. Such requires little time after the spirit approves of the petition. Learning might take the form of actual instruction the garou, or be as simple as granting the ability, maybe after some test is performed. This might even be symbolical, like the spirit requesting a high mountain flower as payment for instruction. Once the garou climbed the mountain top he became aware for gaias beauty while seeing the sunrise. The spirit stated, that this awareness was requirement for the gift, while the flower task was not. An oath of secrecy is a common payment for a gift taught (as of Axis Mundi), further limiting the possibilities for foreign gifts. In some cases, learning a gift can require as little as 5 Minutes or take hours or even a day or so. Spirit teachers may be found through…
3.1.1 ….tracking them down. As a rule of thumb, one needs to travel to a Caern of the same or higher level than the gift one wants to learn to find a spirit powerful enough to teach that gift. If a spirit isn’t appropriate for living in the vicinity of such a caern (like a Rage spirit at a caern of Harmony), such attempts may fail, though. It is perfectly okay, to track down spirits, who live in the Umbra away from Caerns, but this may lead to side quests.
3.1.2. …summoning the spirit. Obviously a minimum level of spirit should be needed for a certain level of gift. Like lesser Jacklings for level one and two gifts and so on.
3.2. ….by other garou. This needs instruction and training, which takes time, but also might upset spirits as their domain: who is granted a gift as well as being occasionally rewarded or worshipped for granting them. Training also includes failed attempts which might lead to side effects, depending on the gift.
4. In the game world, spirits are free to teach a garou any gift they think he deserves. Level restriction is for game balance and should considered as “the way it usually is”, but it should be stated explicitly, that spirits might grant gifts early or refuse them, if appropriate.
4.1. However, certain spirits might have a tradition of teaching some tricks only to a special lot of garou and it might be hard to convince them otherwise. This is especially true with “signature gifts” of certain tribes. Maybe old pacts were formed.
5. Gifts are given freely. One might challenge a spirit for a gift, if appropriate, but one can’t force a spirit to grant a give, even with the use of Gifts and Rites (like “Command Spirit”). One might also trick a spirit, although this might not be so easy as spirits are at least partially aware of the Renown a garou has (reference to “When nobody saw it, did it happen” sidebar from ST’s Hanbook revised, which should definitely enter W20)
6. Once learned, the gift function through the garou. Unless specifically stated otherwise, no spirits are needed to perform the effect of the gift. Gifts aren’t lost or forgotten, however certain powers might block access to them. Gifts also remain, if a garou changes tribe or auspice or loses rank through punishment rites.
7. Garou aren’t born with gift knowledge. If they make a good case they might convince a spirit to grant them a gift even before the Rite of Passage. After the rite of passage a young cliath is required to learn a gift that reflects his auspice, his tribe and his breed respectively. Usually such instruction is done in a ceremonial way, with the spirits summoned as a present to the new cliath (as suggested in MET)
8. Gifts aren’t all for the taking. Spirits grant gifts, so the garou will protect Gaia but also ask for some homage. If a garou asks for to many gifts, without the time to show that he is worthy of more gifts form the spirits in general, spirits might refuse to teach him. As a rule of thumb a ST might decide that a player shouldn’t spend more than a fifth of his characters experience points on gifts.
9. If the ST doesn’t like that approach, he may opt for alternatives, that might rid the game of parts of it’s mysticism but allow to follow the chronicles plot more closely. Such options, as found in Axis Mundi, could be
– All gifts are taught by Elders
– All gifts are taught by pack totem
– All gifts are self-taught
– All gifts are learned through vision quests
– All gifts are learned in downtime
That’s it. At least what I could think of. Especially the cultural significance of gifts and possibly the fact, that not all garou know all gifts available should be addressed.
I agree with a few ideas, but disagree with a lot more of others. I do think the Gift is a boon, a favor. It is given, but can, and must, be taken away if abused. It would also make sense to make spirits immune to any gift they are able to teach. It makes no sense a fear spirit be affected by a fear-creating gift. He already IS fear. The same if the garou looses rank: Why should the spirit keep his part in a bargain with someone who proved that he wasn’t ready for the power? Legend is full of those kinds of stories of power and redemption.
I don’t think there should be a caern-level requirement for gifts, becase some are learned on-the-go on quests (or are the quest goal in the first place), and because reaching higher rank is hard enough already.
Some gifts should also be hard to learn (from spirits at least). Why should a spirit teach a garou how to be commanded (level 2) or worse, molded into something else (level 5)?
One must consider that Gifts also have XP-cost in them, so taking away gifts would essentially mean removal of the spent XP from the player being punished.
I don’t actually have a problem with that. After all, nWoD morality is already the same way: buying it up takes XP, but you can still lose it for in-character behaviour.
My objection ito the idea of spirits taking gifts away is entirely flavor-based. Gifts are powers you learned from the spirit, as a creature of spirit yourself. The spirit teaches you to change your spiritual makeup to emulate the spirit’s own in a certain way. They’re not powers you’re *borrowing*. If I teach you how to make a really kickass souffle because I think you’re a really cool guy, I can’t make you un-know the recipe just because you turned out to be an asshole and slept with my girlfriend. Same goes for gifts, and it’s why the spirits guard them so jealously. Once that cat is out of the bag, there’s no putting it back in.
Allowing spirits to strip gifts at will makes it more like divine spellcasting from D&D, except you have a hundred different gods you have to keep happy. And that doesn’t sound like fun to me.
It also doesn’t leave much room for bribery by Ronin, who don’t have any rank at all but can still learn Gifts. Presumably, becoming Ronin doesn’t strip you of all the Gifts you were taught, either.
I will try to find where I think I remember reading it, but I thought I read that gifts were “tricks a Garou learns. Even if he goes down Rank, he is considered to still know and be able to use that Gift.”
As for being able to learn a gift from Garou, this is how most Bastet learn their Gifts (from each other, not from Garou.) So, unless the magical cats are super-special that way, I don’t see why there can’t be a way to do it. I thought I remembered (maybe in 2nd Edition) rules for learning gifts from other Garou as well (more difficult, and took a long time to learn.)
@New Ideas
Actually they aren’t new. It is found in several books, or as subtext in them, which I felt needed compiling in the description if what Gifts are and how they work.
@Taking away gifts / inappropriate use
Well, taking a gift back is stealing and I think is has been written in subtext at many places, that once learned the garou is capable of using the gift on his own as well as solely responsible for what he does. Obviously there are certain garou who have certain points of view on how and when to use gifts that range from “in the duties for gaia only” to a usage that includes recreational means. But doing it one way or the other should only be reflected in a characters renown gain/loss. Spirits, especially not the spirit who taught the gift, do not constantly observe and judge a garou and if they failed to create guidelines for gift usage at the point they taught (or assumed they were known, but weren’t) than that’s their problem. (Actually one gift requires renewed verbal approval of the spirit who taught it after each use. It’s in Hengekokai iirc.)
Besides that, there is a gift, that allows to block the gifts of others in Book of Auspice (Theurge level 3). And there might be other ways to limit a garou’s access to gifts, like cursing him to feel pain each time he uses that specific power. But learned is learned and one can not unlearn a gift, especially not those that are reflexive or are permanent in nature. That said, memory manipulation might work.
@Immunity to its own power
A spirit that teaches “Falling Touch” won’t fall if the gift is used against it?
A spirit teaching “Lover’s Touch” can’t be healed by that gift?
Doesn’t make sense as a general rule. Might make sense as a case-to-case decision, but really shouldn’t be in a description about Gifts but in a description about Spirits that represent abstract concepts (like Fear) a their powers.
@Losing rank
Also something already written iirc, that should be added to description of Gifts, so it might be easier found. Same as with abuse, the spirit had it’s chance to decide whether or not to teach the trick.
Besides that, if spirits could simply remove gifts, each garou who is corrupted would instantly be stripped of all his gifts and had to relearn them through banes. That’s simply not a appropriate thing to happen.
@Caern level requirement
Also a rule already used that needed to be compiled again. And, as you can see, there are ways to circumvent that, by having an character who can do this summon the appropriate spirit.
@Command spirit / malleable spirit
Because a garou of that auspice and renown should be able to use this power with honour. The gifts also affect banes and spirits allied with forces that oppose Gaia (and vice versa if the student is a BSD and the teacher a Bane). Malleable spirit might be used to heal corrupted spirits (not their Form but their Essence), by removing the corrupted aspects from their being. Command spirit might also affect lesser spirits with animal like intellect, unaware of the greater good or gaia. A spirit that bears and impersonates Authority, like Falcon, might bestow that power to a garou, so he can quickly get this spirits to perform a task in service of the garou’s choice for Gaia.
@Learning from garou (or other fera)
As I said, I compiled Infos and subtext, that I feel should be part of a central description what gifts are and how to learn them (and what other options there are if that suits you better).
There actually was a paragraph somewhere about it taking longer and being based on “trail and error”, rather then being bestowed the power (although spirits might also use such mundane instruction as opposed to spiritual teaching). It explicitly stated that it was dangerous, too and referred to “Silver Claws” and how painful the learning might be and what possibly could go wrong.
That said, obviously each person, who has learned a certain gift might be able to teach it. The limitation being gifts that the student lack certain requirements for (Some Corax gifts require wings/feathers which garou don’t have).
Besides that, Kinfolk:Unsung Heros explicitly states that teaching by a garou is a possibility, although instruction by a summoned spirit is often preferred since they are better teachers, more patient and less patronising than garou, reflected in a 5XP discount for the gift.
The gift you’re thinking of that required explicit approval was Heaven Thunder Hammer.
I will quibble and say that this bit:
“if spirits could simply remove gifts, each garou who is corrupted would instantly be stripped of all his gifts and had to relearn them through banes”
Doesn’t quite fit with my understanding of the world of werewolf. Most spirits not explicitly aligned to one aspect of the triat or another seem to be pretty apathetic to the whole “greater struggle for the world” thing. I think there was a tendency among werewolf players to assume the whole spirit world was divided up into 4 teams (weaver, wyld, wyrm, gaia) when I always got the impression that most spirits were on Team Fire Spirit (or whatever). That’s why they had to be bound with ancestral pacts in the first place, instead of just coming up to garou and giving them all the gifts for free so they could go fight the good fight.
Which is to say, I think *most* spirits don’t really parse the difference between a gaian garou and a BSD. There’s just “am I obligated to this guy or not?”
Anyway, moving on, while there may have been stuff written about Garou as teachers for gifts, I really don’t much care for that aspect (for whatever that’s worth). If garou can teach them to each other, it kindof removes the mystical and spriritual aspect of them. Just my opinion.
@Spirits
I actually agree. Most spirits don’t have human-level intellect anyways but represent certain aspects and therefore probably can’t see the greater picture anyway. And they aren’t necessarily aligned or allied with any part of the Triat.
As for the gift teaching aspect, I believe that THE PACT doesn’t mean that spirits have to teach garou gifts, however the garou want, but that spirits should teach garou gifts, as they (the spirits) see fit. Certainly, the garou might think otherwise, though. Certain garou over the course of history have convinced high ranking spirits, made pacts or otherwise established that having a special auspice, breed or tribe was a prerequisite for certain gifts, therefore creating signature gifts rarely found outside those groups (and possibly jealously guarded by the garou, too, who also believe auspice, tribe or breed to be a prerequisite).
However essentially, any given spirit is, within the limits of his own perception and cognitive power, able to revisit those defacto traditions.
Also, all spirits usually serve the aspects they represent and therefore also themselves. As such secrecy about the gifts is a self-serving purpose.
Besides that, however, spirits should be able to tell the difference between a BSD or a Gaian Garou. The Storyteller’s Handbook tells that spirits might not necessary know what a garou did or didn’t do, but that they can sense renown to some degree (and even how deeds not publicly known affected renown). So, a gaian spirits, or any spirits for that matter, should be able to tell a difference there. However, that doesn’t necessarily mean that the spirit cares. A Rage spirit, for example, would sense how aggressive a garou is and judge wheaten or not he is worthy of that gift.
@Garou teaching
It shouldn’t be common, that such happens. But is was possible in all editions of Werewolf before, and should be mentioned in W20.
However Axis Mundi established other options, and I find, they should be mentioned too, so a ST could pick one, as fits the chronicle’s needs.
I think some spirits decide for themselves that they don’t want to teach X Gift to Y auspice/breed/tribe. Some spirits favor particular tribes/breeds/auspices, or Changing-Breeds, or consider certain Gifts inappropriate for certain groups. And your spiritual makeup (more often breed and auspice, but potentially also tribal totem relationship) should have an effect on ability to learn certain Gifts.
Gifts were too focused on in general by players who wanted more bang for their buck. 😛 It made sense that some Tribes had access to more Gifts, while others relied less on Gifts and more on their innate abilities, or learned skills. It was part of the /rp/ of it all.
However some Gifts could have been either more streamlined so their systems worked more smoothly, or condensed?
The LARP system needs to be tweaked, in terms of costs. The Book System was fine and ensured that Gifts were not “common”. Even commonly known Gifts were not sought after in the same way they are in LARPs. (Its almost like a “catch ’em’ all” mentality). So when a player ran out of common Gifts to buy, they began “collecting” rarer and less well known Gifts.
Skill and abilities were more important in Werewolf, as was rp. I’d like to see that come back.
V20 did not contain mechanics for MET/LARP. So other than the same sort of “Here’s what LARP is, and how to use Rock/Paper/Scissors” page V20 had, it likely won’t contain MET/LARP rules. So that’s a problem you don’t have to worry about. 🙂
I remember a brief MET introduction in V20, although no specific rules for each discipline.
Besides that, checking MET is a good choice for the authors anytime. It addresses a lot of practical problems and in-setting inconsistencies, like…
Why does each cliath have a gift of breed, auspice and tribe, when cubs are born with no gifts? Could a cliath simply not learn one of those?
How is a common moot’s plan of procedures?
So, MET should really be considered a valid source on the Werewolf Setting, especially in regards to every-day’s life.
Rite of Dormant Wisdom (Silent Strides Tribebook) and the Rite of Mocking the Serpent (Rage Across Egypt) are interesting oddities for the tribe. I’d just put in a request to make falling via the former a bit less certain. Presently, the constant threat posed by giving up Gnosis for using it on the most useful targets, which further accelerates the fall it causes, makes never giving it any mind a… (sunglasses) no-brainer.
As gifts that I wound’t want to miss:
Grandmother’s Touch and Lover’s Touch (level 2/3 Children of Gaia)
Castigate (level 3 Theurge from Book of Auspice)
I wouldn’t be missing Grandmother’s Touch.
Theurges should get a gift to heal spirits.
Soakgifts (Luna’s Armor, Steelfur, Trollskin) are to powerful in my opinion – at least as tribegifts. If there was a Soakgift for the Ahroun though, the intertribal challenges would be a bit more balanced. And Ahroun a bit tougher in combat…
I think that it might be best to pick a couple of extra gifts per tribe that most exemplify that tribe’s purpose or that they demonstrate a use for. Red Talons, for example, have Hidden Predator (which changes tooth/claw wounds to knife/bullet wounds), which is exactly the kind of thing they’d need to get away with what their stereotype says they do.
Actually, like the other Fera, I would like to see more of a ‘General’ gift list. It was one of the things that made little sense to me that the Garou didn’t have in relation to the others. I mean, out of this general list, I could see Spirit Speech(because, lets be honest, ANYONE should be able to talk to Spirits, or even just understand them, and thats IF you wanted to make it a gift, ala Forsaken), Razor Claws, Sense Wyrm, and Sense the Unnatural are all gifts I would like to see be in a lower ranked ‘General’ List, and you can make VERY good reasons for ALL of those being generalized as it is in their perview, as Gaia’s Defenders, to have to do their job.
My understanding was that everyone could talk to spirits, and the spirits could choose to talk back, since most of them knew languages *other* than spirit speech. It’s just that a lot of them behaved like the stereotypical french person dealing with american tourists: they pretended not to understand until you forced their hand.
Spirit Speech was just a way of removing their plausibly deniable reason to ignore you.
I would like to see each Gift list be “unique.” That is, as little crossover as possible, especially at the tribal level. It stands to reason that Gifts shared by entire breeds or auspices might have become so commonplace in a given tribe to actually become tribal Gifts (Persuasion, Razor Claws, etc) but the Gifts that start out as tribal should STAY that way (Resist Toxin, Luna’s Armor, etc)
Also it’d be nice to hone the Auspice Gifts a bit to really bring it home what each Auspice is about. The Philodox and Ahroun Gifts are particularly dull in this fashion.
Perhaps expand the Gift lists to one additional Gift per level, if there’s room to do so
Please, PLEASE avoid the “general Gifts” idea – these lists exist for the Fera because most of them are missing Auspices or tribes (or in case of the Corax, all three categories) No, not every Garou should have access to Spirit Speech – This is a Gift that makes Theurges invaluable. Though I suppose a point could be made that a great number of spirits can be communicated with WITHOUT the Gift.
It could also be argued that perhaps Sense Wyrm could be an innate ability of the Garou to some degree – It’s a Breed Gift, an Auspice Gift, and a tribe Gift for pretty much everyone, after all. Perhaps make the Gift a more “refined” use of it, much as there are Gifts that serve as a refined extra for things like animal attraction or lupus senses.
As for particular Gifts… in Dark Ages, Mothers’ Touch (and one presumes similar Gifts) use Empathy rather than Medicine as their go-to ability. This makes a lot of sense to me – particularly as a lupus Theurge has Medicine as a restricted ability. It also clarifies that the difficulty is 5 for beings without Rage. This should be carried over.
Rite of Cleansing needs to be handled somehow. I frequently see players throw this thing around all over the place, because, well, “I have a level 1 Ritual that cleanses ANYTHING!” is a really neat thing to have. Maybe it should be more arduous or less effective to some degree, in order to make “purification” less casual than this Rite makes it.
Similarly, Rite of Binding can get a little crazy for a level 1 rite. Just AS WRITTEN, one could theoretically bind an incarna into a twizzler. It’s not that the rite is too powerful, just that it is easily misused when interpreted literally. Maybe a little clarification on the terms of service, and that making a talen requires effort put into the item, as per Hammer and Klaive. In fact, transposing some H&K info over period would be really awesome.
Fang daggers need to change or go away. They were ludicrous in 2nd edition, and now with Revised / 20th systems having attack successes count for damage, they’re insane – sure you can’t spend Rage, but you only need to hit once, ever.
As for totems… Okay… Look at the totems of the 13 tribes. There are supposedly the biggest, most bestest totems out there, empowered as they are by worship by entire tribes of Garou. So why then are they almost uniformly WORSE than their counterparts in other sourcebooks? Most of the Wisdom tribal totems are okay – Unicorn might even be a little too good – but the rest? These guys need to be updated somehow, badly. Re-jigger their stats to make them fit their roles (Griffin is a totem of war that lets you talk to birds? Uhm?) give them cost discounts for their tribes, something, I don’t know what. From a “fluff” standpoint it’d be nice for the totems to have a little more involvement in their tribes as well, rather than being “far off and inaccessible”
The 4-point totem power, “totem allows communication between pack members regardless of distance.” Instant silent intragroup brain-radio is NOT a good feature for any game, much less one built on suspense and horror. It removes a LOT of risk, mangles mystery, and just generally causes problems in my experience.
I liked the 4 point power of communication, for it creates the idea that every member knows what the other thinks, which is great in battle. Over perhaps que we could give it a maximum range (a few hundred meters, kilometer at most) so the pack members could “feel” their brothers and sisters nearby.
I agree, the mindlink serves a very important purpose in the game. It enforces that the pack is TIED together not just with the totem, but each other. It also helps in battles, because the members can mentally plan the strategy of the fight.
As for taking away suspence? It can be used to add to it. If a packmember dies suddenly, ALL the members feel it. And go looking for the member, aside from potential frenzy rolls. Without the link, there would be less of a hurry to go and help.
Also, the link combats the biggest problem I’ve seen in online games; treating the totem and pack as little more that stat additions.
The mindlink was updated well in Forsaken, I thought. They made it sight-range only, and limited to very short thoughts.
Yeah, in addition to being stat additions, it becomes a walkie-talkie.
It’s still better than “Okay, you are part of this pack, have +2 rage and +1 stamina… what, you expect us to be together and FIGHT together? Nonsense!”
At least with the bond, you have connection and reason to fight with your packmates, rather than just arbitary stat bonuses and nothing else.
Having a magical cell phone in your head doesn’t actually do anything to keep the pack together. I’ve consistently see it do the exact OPPOSITE, in fact. It’s the ultimate “split the party” power – everyone goes their own way and they can communicate just fine.
A pack’s bond is a RP thing, not a systems thing. You honestly CAN’T try to make rules to simulate it because all that will happen is that players who don’t want to operate as a group will STILL not operate as a group, and will simply use the mechanical attempt to force them to do so as just another Kewl Powerz.
Something that I am seeing and purely a suggestion as we are talking obscure retention.
Why not take the “wyrm camp” gifts / rites, and roll them into the BSD. Shorten that list out entirely. I have a list of gifts that would be interesting to keep. as well but I am finishing up work, so it will be later.
Honestly If I could change one thing and one thing only, not the gifts rites…it would be a core book thing, Because I am sorry Thunder’s ban is more appropriate for playing vampires with fur then being the dedicated warriors of Gaia that get their hands dirty when others don’t or won’t.
The Dark ages ban of taking the arrogant or foolish to their proper level makes more sense thematically, and LYING is punishable offense in garou culture, read wounding lies, and the honor (the totem’s type) being big in truth telling…Also if you want to make them better diplomats and or liars, Subterfuge is more in line then Etiquette.
I’m writing the Gifts for this book for the 13 Tribes. Hi!
While there are a lot of great suggestions here, and it’s definitely helping to give an idea of what the general community considers iconic, I’d like to take a moment to talk about how I’ve been moving through this assignment in general, and see if it meshes up with what you want to see when W20 lands on your doorstep.
The way this works is that I have X number of words to fill with nifty powers. It’s a big number– much larger than any of the previous Werewolf corebooks ever had– but still not unlimited. Once I hit that number, I have to stop. And as big as the number is, it’s nowhere near close to enough to fit in all the Gifts we’ve ever had published, even if I cut all of them down to half their original wordcount. So the name of the game is to fit as much awesomeness in the space provided as humanly possible.
Some things became very clear, very fast, when I started compiling material: different tribes, breeds, and auspices all had not only different numbers of Gifts published (and at different levels!), but because these Gifts were written by many different authors, they also had Gifts of vastly different quality and focus. Glass Walkers have awesome, fun, useful Gifts coming out of their ears, for example, while the Silver Fang Gifts have very few Gifts that aren’t lodge-centric; and most of the Black Fury Gifts are either camp-based, or revolve around the Maiden-Mother-Crone concept from their Revised tribebook (meaning I can’t include them in W20 because I don’t have the space to recreate the conceptual framework they’re aimed at). Meanwhile, the Bone Gnawers have a gigantic list of tribal Gifts, but no Camp Gifts at all!
With all that in mind, my selection process has been based on the following criteria:
• Lots of games end, for whatever reason, before the PCs manage to get up to high Rank, so lower-level Gifts are more likely to see use at more tables than high-level Gifts are. As a result, I’ve tended to include more level 1, 2, and 3 Gifts than level 4s and 5s.
• I want to fit in as many Gifts as possible, and so have selected with a bias toward concise, punchy, useful powers over powers with extremely complex effects or half a page of mythological flavor text, UNLESS those Gifts are REALLY iconic.
• I want the Gifts to be broadly applicable at as many tables as possible, and so have avoided Camp Gifts, unless I could spin them out into tribal Gifts without ruining the flavor. There are literally dozens of Camps in print and I don’t want to use up half the chapter’s space trying to provide a broad cross-section of them—I think it would bite too deep into making the tribal lists good, and I’d probably still end up having to leave out your favorite Camp anyway.
• I’ve tried to keep the Gift lists -roughly- symmetrical, but the structure that contains the best content seems to be a bit uneven. For example: EVERY list (Breed, Auspice, Tribe) has five level one Gifts right now, but after that it gets slightly uneven. Most lists have four level 2 Gifts above that, but a couple only have three, and some have five. Most lists have two level 5 Gifts. A few have three.
• I’ve tried to load the lists primarily with unique Gifts, but shared Gifts are part of the Werewolf experience as well, and I haven’t shied away from that. However, it also really sucks if most of your list is recycled Gifts, so I’ve allowed the Gift lists to vary in length slightly—right now most of the tribes have 18 Gifts in total, a few have 19, a couple have 20. I don’t want to take away shared Gifts that have always been in the lists, but also don’t want to leave one Tribe or Auspice feeling like Captain Copy-Paste while the next guy over is rocking fully exclusive awesomeness, and so that sort of slight asymmetry seemed like the best answer.
Mind, the writing isn’t done yet. I’m still trying to get the lists to match up as best I can, but in general, I’ve been focusing on getting all of the -very best- material in place over having all the options line up perfectly.
What do you think?
(As a point of comparison, Revised Gift lists for the tribes were 11 Gifts long)
Sounds good to me. As someone who’s played a Homid philodox Silent Strider, I have to really nod my head at the idea of some Gift options just being more boring than others.
I’m a little saddened by the notion of there not being Camp Gifts. However, maybe it would be simpler, if camps are covered at all, to just note what SORT of Gifts they favor.
I take it that with the focus on broadly useful Gifts, narrow stuff like Snow Running or Dead Stick probably aren’t going to “make the cut”?
Yes.
(Also, Dead Stick is probably the worst Gift I’ve managed to find so far across all three previous editions.)
Dead stick would be great as a talen/fetish and not a gift.
Also, are there going to be any Gifts that aren’t reprints? Are we getting original content in the Gifts at all?
*crosses fingers*
Yes, I’ve been adding entirely new Gifts to flesh out the lists. Also, as an update: We’ve decided to push the wordcount a little bit so that every list gets an even 20 Gifts.
One idea: You could spread out some of the more awesome gifts by moving them from one list to another.
As you note, the Glass Walkers have a ton of really useful gifts, as do the Bone Gnawers. But many of those Gifts don’t necessarily need to be exclusive to the Tribe– they could easily be moved to a Homid Gift list, and be available to any Homid. Some of the other Gifts that are currently listed as for one Tribe only in their Tribebook could just be moved to Auspice lists as well.
Overall– I think it would be better if most of the Gifts weren’t Tribe-specific, but rather moved to Auspice or Breed Gifts. If you had a word count, I’d say that all Breed Gifts should take up 1/3 of your word count, all Auspice Gifts should take up another 1/3, and all Tribe Gifts should take up another 1/3.
Gift Lists for specific tribes got to be so big because of the way supplements got produced. Each Auspice got 1/5 of a book. The Lupus Breed got it’s own book, Homids got a 1/2 book in Book of the City and Metis got maybe a 1/3 of a book in Guardians of the Caerns. Each Tribe got an entire Tribebook, and their powers list varied depending on the interests of the author. In play, Breed, Tribe, and Auspice should be about equally important to any given character. The power lists need to represent that much better.
Similarly, with Rites, Rites could be pooled together entirely as one big group, without division by Tribe. You should cut down on the Punishment Rites, as they’re the strong purview of Philodox. I would say that in paring down the Rite list, attention should be paid to what Auspice is most likely to use the Rite, and then to balance it such that each Auspice effectively has the same number of Rites.
Finally, with Fetishes and Talens: I feel that it would be more useful to have the Hammer and Klaive rules on creating Fetishes and Talens than a list of pre-made Fetishes and Talens. Maybe even make them more explicit in terms that apply directly to combat, so that power levels are more consistent. As I say in my own reply to the general post, I think that a lot of the things that have become ‘iconic’ are that way more because the published systems for those things are out of systemic balance than because of particular style points. You could keep all the style points if you had a more explicit means of determining what makes a Rank 5 Fetish vs. a Rank 3 Talen (and the means of creating them, IC and systemically).
I’d agree with adding the Hammer & Klaive rules, and a small list of iconic Fetishes and Talons. Most of the Fetishes in my games have always been originals; the exceptions tend to be traditional weapons (i.e. Klaives, Labrys, etc).
I don’t agree on moving most of the tribal Gifts. Those really helped flesh out and bring to life the different cultures and spiritual relations of the tribes. And remember, for most of Garou history tribes were much more isolated geographically from one another and generally hostile, and until recently they didn’t have multi-tribe septs. It makes sense they would not share their tribal gifts, and that their totems’ broods would not do so either.
Oops, forgot to add, I don’t want to see the tribe-specific rites made general either.
Makes sense when your doing all the compilation. With all the tribes and everything your space is important.
11 gifts long, plus tribe books, and all that mess. You have your work cut out for you.
And them some. Each setting book had a few new Gifts, so I’m not surprised if the final count includes gifts mostly from the core books & players guides.
Oh, no. It’s a very diverse collection, with the best Gifts showing up from a huge array of books across all three editions.
I would really love to see more general unaligned totems like CityFather/Mother, Earthquake and Bull in the book. Too often a new group argues about totems along tribal lines, the Silver Fang wants Falcon, the Bone Gnawer General Lee etc.
Having a slew of unaligned totems eases the choice, plus maybe a single “iconic” totem beside the tribal totem for every tribe like Easy Credit for the Glass Walkers or Wolverine for the Red Talons.
I’d also like to see more non-tribal totems. And I’d like to know whether such totems also have spirit broods with minor incarnae under them, or if only tribal totems are important enough for that? I’d prefer the former.
I actually would love to see the Core book Gifts on the table. The overt, superheroic type Gifts (Spirit of the Bird is the best example) that deviate from wolf-like/animalistic powers or spiritual powers. I’m less concerned with keeping the number even than the quality or fit of specific Gifts.
Moving on to things to keep…
Homid Gifts: Climb Like An Ape, Rooftop Sprint (Book of the City)
Lupus Gifts: Axis Mundi, Boon of the Animal Fathers (Ways of the Wolf), Venom (Werewolf Players Guide)
Galliard Gifts: Song of the Siren (Werewolf Players Guide)
Philodox Gifts: Sense Balance, Take the True Form (Werewolf Players Guide)
Theurge Gifts: Web Walker (Book of the City), Spirit Path, Umbral Sight (Werewolf Players Guide)
Black Fury Gifts: Moonshadow (BF Tribebook)
Bone Gnawer Gifts: Ward of the Road (BG Tribebook)
Fianna Gifts: Faerie Light, Howl of the Unseen, Luck of the Irish (Fianna Tribebook), Ley Lines (Werewolf Players Guide)
Get of Fenris Gifts: Call Great Fenris (GF Tribebook)
Glass Walker Gifts: Weaver’s Eyes, Encrypt (Book of the City), Agro-Culture, Tractor Beam (GW Tribebook)
Shadow Lord Gifts: Purigy Scent, Pure Identity, Raven’s Wings, Mask Taint (SL Tribebook), Summon Stormcrow (Werewolf Players Guide)
Silent Strider Gifts: Summon Talisman, Long Running (Werewolf Players Guide)
Silver Fang Gifts: Truce of Helios, Honor Pact (SF Tribebook)
Stargazer Gifts: Inner Light, Resist Temptation, Imaginal Mantra (Stargazer Tribebook)
Uktena Gifts: Natural Camouflage, Umbral Compass, Strength of the Guardian, Spirit’s Horse (Uktena Tribebook)
Wendigo Gifts: Ghost Pack (Werewolf Players Guide)
Rites of Accord: Clear the Miasma (Book of the City), Rite of the Hunting Ground (Werewolf Players Guide)
Mystic Rites: Luna’s Spear (Caerns book), Rite of Blood Kin (Werewolf Players Guide)
Rites of Punishment: Rite of the Lone Wolf, Rite of Stolen Wolf (Werewolf Players Guide)
Tribal Rites: Rite of Parted Veil, Rite of Resolution (CG Tribebook), Rite of Heritage, Rite of the Lodge House (GF Tribebook), Descent into the Dark Umbra (SS Tribebook), Rite of Adoption, Rite of Bane Binding (Uktena Tribebook)
Fetishes: keep all the Claw Carvings, Wyrm Scar, Peace Pipe, Moongleam, Memory Cup, Thorn Bow, Spirit Axe, Soldier’s Bag (Hammer & Klaive), Amazon’s Labrys (Black Fury TB), Lost Keyring, Rover’s Whistle (Bone Gnawer TB), D’siah (Silent Striders TB), Power Spike, Key to the Umbra, Gnostic Bag, Hearthstone (Werewolf Players Guide)
Talons to keep: War Paints, Grass Darts, Spirit Pill (Hammer & Klaive), War Whiskey (Fianna TB)
Not a Red Talon fan?
Love the Talons. I just don’t recall too many gifts outside the core book that really grab me as essential.
So I feel something needs to be said:
I think many of the most iconic non-corebook Gifts/Rites/Fetishes are that way because they are some of the most systemically advantageous. So in terms of play, whether you’re talking forum roleplay, chat roleplay, TT roleplay, or even Larp roleplay, these gifts become iconic because they are easy ways for PC’s to have a power that renders a lot of systemic advantage.
What I would like to see more of from the writers of Werewolf 20 would be some rebalancing of the systematic rules behind the Gifts/Rites/Fetishes/Talens. MANY of these in the Werewolf supplements were clearly not playtested, and many more not written by someone with any mind towards game balance. Conversely, a small handful of the Tribe Books are excellently written with game-balance in mind– which puts those Tribes at systemic disadvantage in wider play against PC’s of Tribes where game balance clearly had no impact on the authorship of that Tribe’s Tribebook.
Others are broken if you consider a wider-setting game where PC’s of different Tribes will be in regular conflict with each-other– say a chat or forum game. Some of them are broken in just a tabletop setting– Electroshock, for example, makes most Glasswalkers who reach Rank 3 more combat deadly than Ahroun of other Tribes who reach similar Rank, which is unbalancing in fairness when, say, you have a Fianna Ahroun whose GW packmate built for social stats consistently outperforms him/her in combat with the use of a single Gift. It’s a Rank 3 Glasswalker. Compare it to Pin the Eagle’s Wing, Rank 4 Fianna, which while a little more diverse, the conversion of power point to damage just isn’t equivalent– one Gnosis for one extra damage, with a cap of 4 extra damage if you spend 4 Gnosis.
With so many years of actual play– I think we can tell which of the Gifts/Rites/Fetishes/Talens are more broken then others, and most of them are likely to make the list of the most iconic, as they’re taken/used repeatedly for their systemic advantage. A number of us have had to houserule these powers in to fairness for years now as ST’s. So some serious effort needs to go in to re-balancing the systems behind these powers/power items to be consistent, and the Tribe’s balanced against each-other not just in terms of how many powers/power items they have, but also in what those powers and power items return for the same basic investment of XP and power points (Rage/Gnosis).
I think that authors did think about game balance, however the result didn’t always satisfy all readers. That is, partly, because some authors or play testing groups incorporated some “unmentioned” context, that other readers might not see.
Put to the extreme, each player probably agrees that, if a duel takes place to entertain other garou at a moot, Silver Claws probably aren’t appropriate.
My personal nemesis “Sense of the Prey” is another example. Prudent readers should recognise that the gift should have some minimum requirement to significance of the “anything” one needs to know about the person to track. If not one could always find a killer simply by the fact, that he killed that person and the gift would allow to find anyone and therefore render all investigative plots void.
So, it is true, that probably all gifts should be revisited, to check if their description is solid and how great their impact is on the game. Also for their playability would at certain points need some tweaking. Best example is “Scent of the true Form” pre-DA:Werewolf. The mechanics were balanced but if I have to tell the player to roll against 8, for a critter difficult to tell apart from a human, I usually already reveal that there might be something about the gift’s target. Unless I lie, of course. Or state “just roll and tell me all the numbers that come up”. With the relatively slow Storyteller System, that was always a oddity. Rolling against a ficed difficulty and have the successes determine what you can separate from humans works much better.
nWoD was much better in this regard, too, chancing to much (like incorporating Defense) would destroy the WtA-Feel. Still, some re-evaluation of gifts, even from the core rules, is appropriate.
But I don’t see any need to aim for a equal level of power for each tribe/auspice etc. That simply doesn’t make sense and forcing it would also hurt the feeling of the game.
As for the “Elektroshock” gift. If I spend three Rage for nine levels of agg damage I could also have three additional actions. With Strength 2 and claws that’s 8 damage dice per hit in crinos times 4 (for a regular + 3 additional actions) that is usually 4×4=16 damage. Sure, each soaked separately (if agg is allowed to soak), but I didn’t calculate in net successes from hitting and assumed a fairly low strength for an Ahroun.
So, the benefit is the reach (limited by conducting materials) and that it might work within the limits of the Veil. But besides that, the gift doesn’t give a unfairly high advantage in combat. Although, I assume the damage is normally soaked (because it isn’t stated otherwise).
I think this applies even to some core book Gifts. I think ALL Gifts need to have their mechanics reviewed. The Great Leap (Silent Strider 3) allows the Garou to jump up to 1400 feet (if he has a 5 Strength in Homid), or roughly a 1/4 mile. The Uktena can telekinetically move a 1/4 ton of material (Hand of the Earth Mother, lvl 4), turn invisible, and fly. Some of these are too powerful.
I don’t see why the electroshock gift example is bad. Yes, the galliard can create more damage than the ahroun, despite focusing on social skills. But lets take it in reverse, the galliard is giving a nice damage output, despite focusing mainly on social. That way, when there is combat, the galliard is of use, despite their social focus.
When you go to combat, you go into it not as individuals, but as a pack. Therefore, the ability to actually do some damage despite focusing on different skills is an advantage not a loss.
I’ve never heard of Electroshock being described as “Iconic.” Control (Simple / Complex) Machine, definitely iconic Glass Walker Gift. Steel Fur, fairly iconic. Jam technology, a veritable must-have. I didn’t even know there WAS a Gift named “Electroshock” until you mentioned it, and I had to go look it up.
Yes, it’s a good Gift. It’s also a rank 3 Gift. Know what another good rank 3 Gift is? Faerie kin. Which would you rather have, the ability to blow your Rage-wad to fry one guy, or the ability to summon a unit of magical commandoes? I mean, since we want to compare Glass Walker and Fianna. We could compare Balor’s Gaze to Attunement, too…
Some Gifts are just going to be better than other Gifts. Werewolf juju is unique in the WoD systems in that it does not follow a progressive linear model of power. Some level 3 Gifts are going to be stronger or weaker than other level 3 Gifts. The stronger level 2 Gifts might be more powerful than the weaker Level 3 Gifts.
Some Gifts are honestly bad. Some are honestly broken. And the damned thing is it’s hard to make really clear calls on which is which, due to the varying difficuylty of acquiring Gifts, the abilities of the tribes / auspices they’re in, and that sort of thing.
Take Coup de Grace, for instance; You hit, activate the Gift, and deal double damage. It’s a potent Gift for a Black Fury. However it’s also a Camp Gift for the Fenrir “Fangs of Garm” camp. In the Black Fury Gift list, it’s really potent. In the Get of Fenris Gift list, it’s frankly obscene. “So I get razor claws, AND Might of Thor, AND Coup de Grace, you say?”
The Gift itself isn’t the problem – it’s the placement, in that instance.
Also Gifts come about by Garou going out and trying to talk spirits out of them. So a tribe like the Glass Walkers or Uktena, who actually go out to take risks to learn all this new stuff as a matter of tribal culture, are bound to be the ones who discover a greater share of potent Gifts. While the Silver Fang is content commanding his kinfolk to heave a boulder, the Uktena goes “I wonder if I could get a spirit to teach me how to do that with my BRAIN…”
When it comes to Gifts, I’m glad to see that in later supplements, more effort was made at balance; the Wendigo, for instance, were horribly outmatched in the Wild West, but gained tremendously in 3e (I think that Last Stand was a great choice for them). Having played/run Werewolf for years, and having collected almost all of the splatbooks eagerly, my principle grievance with Gifts is in the Auspices. The Ahroun get AMAZING Gifts; they’re especially potent because they’re direct, strictly mechanical, and require little to no Storyteller interpretation. Stack that up next to Soul’s Guilt for the Philodox out of the Book of Auspices, and you’ll see a huge disparity; the latter Gift has little in the way of mechanics, requires strict Storyteller interpretation, and offers little gain even if successful!
If you’re going to keep the Philodox Gifts in a “judge” niche, may I suggest offering specific social benefits/penalties when interacting, as a result of success? As for other Auspices, the Theurges are potent within their own domain, and Ragabash have some of my favorite Gifts, truth be told, but the Galliards are lacking somewhat I think. Fog of War is one of my favorites for them, but they seem to lack a cohesion with their Gift set that the other Auspices have. Perhaps focusing more on their combat/inspirational prowess would serve them better.
Wait, I thought Fog of War was a ragabash Gift.
It’s a Fianna Gift, a Gallaird Gift, and a Ragabash Gift.
and in all cases *awesome*. one of the better Galliard Gifts, especially for that level. I feel like the Galliards had a weird niche that wasn’t fully explored, and just kind of got crammed with a bunch of stuff, like Illusions, or Mindspeak, or emotions twisting, when their four Rage and “second string Ahroun” nature was ignored. To use an outside reference, why not make them more like Bards from Dungeons and Dragons? Good support roles, and a few fun tricks, but some decent ass-kicking in the process.
The gifts from Dark Ages and Wild West, honestly, are by a large majority, superior and more useful to Garou life than a lot of what’s found in the Core… and many games don’t allow or make it very difficult to access “outdated” gifts as lost lore.
To me, there needs to be a clarification on the rules for getting older gifts in modern times… and honestly, a lot of them- such as the Firearms gifts from the Wild West, have absolutely no reason to dry up in garou society. Why would Homids stop caring about guns?
Indeed, some of the wyld west-gifts are really good.
This more of a fluff musing than anything…
And leads to another question… How does a gift “die out”? I mean it’s a gift from the spirits and as long as the spirit that teaches it is there to teach it should be available, shouldn’t it?
Or maybe it’s more about asking the right questions, and if you haven’t heard of the gift or seen it in use you don’t know to ask it from the right spirit to be taught, in the first place?
I’d assume because the Garou ask for other Gifts, or begin favoring other spirits. I’m sure the Glass Walkers patronize far different spirits than they did in 1850 or 1320.
I must agree, some of those gifts are vastly superior, sometimes because of their RP usefulness or because of their incredibly strong theme.
Cousin’s Coat, Brand of Suspicion, Faceless Stranger, Dramatic Entrance and Primal Song are all Gifts that epitomize certain themes, I would almost call them iconic when it comes to illustrating the specific abilities associated with Breeds/Auspices/Tribes.
Personally, gift wise I think the werewolf era Trick Shot could stand to be updated…had a lot of fun with that one. I also love the gifts from Rage Across the Heavens. For fetishes…I agree with others before me, the jarl hammers should definately stay. As for totems, I would be sad to see O’ Mighty Dolla or the American Dream go
Oops, forgot a gift there…from Outcasts…Hide the Wolf. That one proved useful in crossover games and non crossovers alike
It seems to me that O’Mighty Dolla and Easy Credit deserve a third variant, the Euro. It would be fun to have a money totem for European Garou, with a ban of not leaving Europe.
We could call it Euro Bondage 😛
Har, har…
It’s a funny thing playing Werewolf and having to look for equivalents when it comes to certain things. I remember having to explain that the Elk Tooth Necklace isn’t made out of Elk/Moose but out of Elk/Wapiti. Werewolf is very heavy on things that are American, but which aren’t as pronounced on other continents, and if you have things from outside they play up unrealistic stereotypes (2ed was really bad with those things, Rev. Ed. toned it down).
Agreed, some of the older WW.material was really poorly researched.
Things got better in later revised books and so did gifts & rites imo.
Considering how many games centred in cities and other things that were frequently wanted I’m surprised that many of the most useful and most craved supplements like Book of the city came out as late as 2003 (I think)
Oh, something new came to mind.
The Rite and the Background of the Rite from Silver Record is a must. Iconic to the garou, not really but still a piece of their culture and maybe iconic in the way, that it isn’t enacted that often and has plenty of requirements.
For LARP. I find that the main book, tribebook, Rage Across Heavens and Players Guide to Garou are the go to book of gifts for the majority of players. Rites come from all over the place. However Rite of Pizza, Rite of Teacher, Rite of Spirit Brew are very common place in most games.
I think the amount of gifts are less of the issue than the effectiveness of the gifts.
You have some tribes loaded with gifts that give attribute buffs, ability buffs, rerolls, etc. While you have some tribes that give all targeted or specific effects.
Like Lupus Gifts to Homid Gifts are a good comparison too. Homid gifts like persuasion and ubermensch which are buffs far out shine gifts like Call the Great Beast and Beast Life.
Buff powers usually outshine other powers. With vampire it wasn’t as big of an issue because it was easier for vampires to learn the base three disciplines (Potence, Celerity, and Fortitude). For Garou there are some tribes that are just way better off because they get better buffs.
More dice/traits goes further than “neat tricks”. So to seek balance you need to retool some of the gifts of all the groups so they all have focuses and buffs that let them compete.
I agree. Even the mental powers in Vampire (Presence, Dominate, Auspex) have more specific effects capable of dramatic outcomes.
Right. That’s a huge difference between a lot of Gifts and the powers of other supernaturals; some Gifts had the luxury of focusing on fluff, whereas hard and fast mechanics were necessary for everyone else. Even if Cousin’s Coat did nothing more than, say, add a die or two for rolls to ‘blend in’, it would be something; and the Rank 1 Gifts were cheap enough that you could get a couple for fluff, but by Rank 3 it became impractical. Also, I agree with the disparity between the Tribes; the Silver Fangs have some AMAZING Gifts, while the Children of Gaia don’t seem to be nearly as capable. Pre-Revised Wendigo were in terrible straits as well.
The primary issue with gift balance is an ideal of ‘Foundation’ vs ‘Special Effects’.
Foundation powers are the powers that make you better at other things. Gifts that give extra dice, gifts that lower your difficulties (hugely powerful), gifts that give you more actions, gifts that let you do more damage on regular types of attacks, and gifts that give rerolls are all examples of this.
Special Effect powers are unique tricks or effects.
The foundation powers often stack. If one person just has more dice, or way lower difficulties, or in many cases both, then they will most of the time just be more successful than everyone else.
So some tribes have many such powers. Stargazers for example, Wendigo, Get of Fenris, and others.
While some tribes just don’t.
So to balance these, every tribe needs an equal amount of these types of gifts. Now of course you don’t want all the gifts to do basically the same thing, just with different fluff.
So each tribe’s “buff” or “foundation” powers should be focused in different ways, so that they all can compete.
This of course eventually comes down to combat though as well. They are all werewolves after all, and combat is a larger part of the game than it is in most other genres of the WoD. So each tribe needs to be good at certain types of combat as well.
Now Breed, and Auspice gifts should also be balanced in such ways. Every grouping having it’s strengths and weaknesses, but each actually getting dice, difficulty, etc modifiers for their strengths.
This really becomes even more pronounced in the larp games, were dice and difficulties translate to traits and retests, etc. Then those with the most just win. Though I realize that the larp balancing is a whole different can of worms, just trying to use it to prove the point of inbalance gone wild.
Special powers aren’t so special when you can never get them off, because the Stargazer over there can stack his shit to have difficulties of 2 to dodge everything…and no one else can even touch that. You get the idea.
This may seem like a gratuitous complaint, but could there be a *little* more on Rank 6 Gifts? Rank 6 in general is vague in the extreme, and I think it’s good that Legendary status is difficult to achieve (though a little more info, such as how many there often are at any given point, would be nice; according to the Storm Eater’s demise, there was at least one from each tribe at one point). However, there’s a tremendous disparity in their Gifts, and half of the tribes don’t even have one. The Book of Auspices was great for this (so EVERY Garou has access to at least one), but compared side-by-side, the tribal Rank 6 Gifts do *not* stack up. The Stargazer one is great (re-usable, consistent effects, purifies the user; great), as is the Silver Fang Gift (roll well and waste a vampire? Yes please!). The Uktena and Get of Fenris Rank 6 Gifts are pretty weak, though; both one-shots, one that leaves the character as a spirit who forgets himself and goes away, and the other leaves you permanently maimed. Truthfully, the Get Rank 5 Honorable Death Gift is a better one shot in my opinion.
As for the Auspices, most of them are fantastic, though the Theurge Gift printed in Book of Auspices was way too vague, I think. Storyteller discretion can vary widely, and a little more in the way of guidelines for manifesting a totem spirit in an area would be most helpful.
Chaos Mechanics should be moved to homid level 5. Homids are always trying to multitask and this gift would allow it to all homids, not just glasswalkers. Again it is a case of some powers being ridiculously powerful.
Want to definitely disappoint some people?
Leave out some gifts.
Want to not disappoint people while possibly impressing them?
Keep all previously published gifts, improve upon the badly written ones, and write some new ones to fill in the gaps.
I’ve been playing a Wendigo for several years now in various games. By the core book they are pretty weak, but when using the tribebook in 3e they become one of the more physically powerful tribes. If you wish to keep this theme, they must retain, Last Stand, Strength of Pine, Shelter of Needles, Bark of the Willow, and Whiteout.
I’d love to see as maybe a Glass Walker & Bone Gnawer gift an updated version of the Dark Ages Get of Fenris gift that allows them to ignore iron based weapon damage. (The name escapes me)
But, as it’s updated and become a GW and BG gift makes them (not immune but resistant) to lead or steel jacketed rounds.
You know what you guys have always forgotten to do with Gifts (as far as I know) that I would LOVE, more than anything, to see you add to this?
A “make your own Gifts.” guideline.
WAIT WAIT DON’T RUN AWAY YET hear me out.
I recall from second edition that you could get renown for discovering new Gifts. Gifts, being asymmetrical and misc., often based more on mythological powers being represented or ideas that sounded neat at the time, they seem to have little real balancing for how useful they are per rank. In all honesty they rarely felt like power progression and more like beautiful tapestry. New misc. abilities that complimented your character’s tribe and their niche, regardless of if your Gurahl was ever going to be near enough to a stream for one free fish every day or not.
We have Gifts that allow you to survive 100 foot falls without having to roll a single die of bashing damage. We have Gifts to convert your claws to magic silver. We have Gifts to make you smell human, to do most anything. But what we don’t have are some guidelines on roleplaying and constructing your own Gifts the way a Garou may build a fetish. At least, to the best of my recall.
I would *adore* sections on ideas on ways to hunt and find spiritual mentors on learning these talents and advantages. They could be worth whole campaigns in themselves, with players trying to figure out asymmetrical methods of discovering new powers. If we could only have some manner of.. power scale.. to help balance out these arbitrary Gift rules.
I understand that Gifts coming from your breed, your tribe, your auspice, being handed down cultural staples, are easier to learn and more readily available. And, in the case of the Metis Teeth of the Skin (rank.. 3? 4?) Vs. the Rokean Teeth of the Skin (Rank 1!!), some Gifts come sooner for some cultures, more than others, based on their niches, strengths and weaknesses. Some way to help make sense of this arbitration might be fun.
You don’t even have to try and squeeze existing Gifts into this new theoretical method of balancing player made Gifts. Old Gifts are tried and tested, hand-me-downs, boons from great spiritual pacts, Gifts from Gaia’s bosom itself. These new things are constructs of heroes. Flawed, imperfect. Learned from questionable spirits. Of questionable power. But then again, some Gifts in the tribe’s arsenal had to come from an architect. And if they came with the blessed instruction of a great spirit after a magnificent adventure? Well.. that just lends a certain tear jerking beauty to their propriety. In my opinion. Old Gifts and standbys would be exempt from needing to fit the player-made Gift balance and creation rules. But just having them would be nice.
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