So, we’ve had a lot of great feedback from you folks- I really love it when you all start describing what you’re seeing in your mind’s eyes. Ethan and I took the original write-ups, and with very few notes back and forth, came up with these revised descriptions based on the ideas generated by these discussions. Ethan has been nice enough to include the why’s of our thinking here, so, I hope, folks can see that we considered all of your ideas before coming to these descripts. Sometimes we changed the pieces big time, others we’re very close to the originals. Thanks again for lending us your ideas and enthusiasm. We’ll be back after the new year with more blogs as W20 really starts to get rolling. (I understand the the writing assignments are being handed out this week).
Thanks-
–richt
Black Furies: Mari Cabrah is our centerpiece; she’s fairly recognizable in Homid, Glabro or Crinos, so any of those would work well. A violent piece; Mari’s a fighter. Probably have her taking apart a Black Spiral Dancer, and another one bleeding out on the rocks. Set it outside, in the Mediterranean – rocky slopes, the sea in the distance maybe. In the foreground the head of a Gorgonlike statue lies among the rocks, with snaky hair and a foul expression – a nod to the female figures of vengeance from myth.
Ethan’s comments: Mari is one of the two signature characters that became signature characters not by design, but by just being so distinct and awesome that she caught our imaginations. Josh Timbrook said Albrecht killed her in the “Flipbook of Doom,” but Bill and Rob Hatch vetoed that, feeling the setting benefitted more by having Mari in it. I agree with them. Distinctive in Homid as well in Crinos, no question in my head that she belongs in this piece. We shifted to something more generally Mediterranean for the scene, to imply the tribal origins without being too stereotypical – I’d almost have gone for something Scythian if I thought it wasn’t too obscure.
Knocking apart a slave ring was an interesting suggestion, but I felt it would make for a messy composition – you need at least one Fury, plus enemies, plus victims, plus enough of an environment to tell you where they are – and that’s a lot of distractions leading away from the Fury who needs to be the clear star. It’s the sort of illustration that would make a good fullpage for a Tribebook, but I felt we needed more focus for a tribal fullpage.
Bone Gnawers: The setting will really sell this one: someplace run-down and hellish, a Rust Belt abandoned construction site or junkyard or junk-strewn underpass. The kind of urban wasteland that the Bone Gnawers populate. We see one to three Bone Gnawers (artist’s choice), maybe in a mix of Hispo, Crinos or Homid, clambering over the junk or abandoned vehicles or whatever, like they’re stealthily creeping up on someone. They’re the stealthy boogeymen of the bad part of town, and they’re about to tear someone apart. Avoid making them look like luckless and homeless: they’re street survivors, hunters, with improvised weapons that have been turned into fetishes, and strong enough to uproot a parking meter and murder you with it.
Ethan’s comments: This one seemed to not inspire much controversy. Either we didn’t have a lot of Bone Gnawer fans commenting or the Bone Gnawer fans were relatively content. I’ve always been really fond of the Tribe of Rat, and I wanted to catch the idea that the “lowest of the low” isn’t outside the Garou ecosystem: it’s an entire rung of the ecosystem they have to themselves. Lowest does not mean weakest or most cowardly. The back alley, the sewer, the abandoned block – those are their domain.
Children of Gaia: A more peaceful shot for this one. I kind of like the idea of a Child of Gaia (in Homid or Lupus form) crouched over a small luminous seedling that’s growing up in a blasted piece of ground. Around it is carnage, though: dead Pentex soldiers or fomori or something, and the blood pools and runs around, with the seedling on kind of a dry, pure island. The Child of Gaia doesn’t look happy about what she’s done, but she’s done it all the same: we see her as someone that believes in nurturing and someday healing the world, but who has to kill in order to protect.
Ethan’s comments: This page furthered some discussion, but ultimately it was a motif I chose for a couple of reasons. The seedling, more than a human or packmate, represents Gaia – focusing on protecting humanity over the entirety of the planet feels a bit more like the humanism of Mage than the fight for balance of Werewolf. “Your Mother is dying – when will you Rage?” I think the juxtaposition of compassion and the painful necessity of doing what werewolves were created to do, being the Fangs of Gaia, speaks to the heart of the tribe.
Fianna: Three Fianna in full Crinos form, howling to the moon in triumph. Outdoors, could be a hilltop in Europe or Appalachia. At least one of the Fianna wears heavy Celtic jewelry and has a long gae bolg of a spear; another should have some more modern accessories (a web-belt or other bits of camping/survival gear), and the third shaggy with little decoration (a lupus, maybe). They surround a standing stone that’s carved with Garou glyphs (most notably the Fianna glyph), and several severed fomor heads are piled around its base. The werewolves are bloodied but exultant: their howl is a song of glory and passion.
Ethan’s comments: I was reminded that the Fianna should howl, and I slapped myself for forgetting that. We should absolutely have a fullpage where werewolves howl to the moon, and while the Red Talons would also work (as the most wolfish of werewolves), the Fianna are locked in. The fairy ring is also just the right amount of hint to the tribe’s old ties – while we have lots of European fans who hate the idea of “Darby O’Gill and the Little People with werewolves”, this is the kind of hint that can be read as benevolent or potentially sinister, depending on just how “good” you prefer your Good Folk to be.
Get of Fenris: A violent piece. A Get in Crinos form, some bits of Viking-esque trappings, soaked in blood and with several open wounds, in the middle of battle against Black Spiral Dancers wearing bits and pieces of modern trappings (like a commando unit, think Dog Soldiers, gone horribly twisted). A second Get, sorely wounded, crouches defiant behind the first, ready to fight on to the end; alternately, if you prefer the look of this, the other Get may already be dead, klaive laid across his or her chest by the furious packmate who now tears the enemy apart for retribution. At least two enemies in human form (Dancers, or maybe fomori?) wearing paramilitary gear are torn to bits on the ground: the Get have made a good accounting for themselves.
Ethan’s comments: Some of my metalhead friends would never forgive me if I didn’t show the Get of Fenris at the very least in a page about fighting. While I understand the appeal of showing them doing something nonviolent to break the stereotype, to some extent it’s like having Evan as the signature Wendigo: the Get have only one fullpage, and they’re the most warrior of warrior tribes. The fallen ally proved the stronger idea, I note – it shows us the tribe’s depth of feeling for one another. They’re willing to die to the last in Ragnarok, but that doesn’t mean they don’t care about losing their brothers and sisters.
Glass Walkers: A Glass Walker in Glabro, wearing a hoodie but with wolf-eyes gleaming out from under it and those taloned Glabro hands. Pretty good casual street clothes: a nice vest over the hoodie, good slacks, sort of like someone that’s going to an interesting outdoor concert. She’s confronting a small group of werewolf hunters – humans, in army surplus gear, with guns – in a lonely train terminal (maybe a little art deco) at night. The big plate glass windows behind her are exploding into shards, flying around her and at them, as she gestures: she’s using the supernatural Gift of Elemental Favor to command the element of glass and attack them.
Ethan’s comments: The original plan was… okay, but not inspired. We got a lot of great feedback on how to fix it – problem was it wasn’t exactly all of a piece. Suggestions ranged from “cyberimplants” to “not too much tech,” from “cubicle farm” to “outdoors,” from “hacker with a room full of flatscreens” to “urban predator.” As you can see, there was no real consensus for me to work with. Ultimately the recommendation that really sang to me was showing the moon, reinforcing the connection to Gaia even in the cities. The Glass Walker, not seated or standing, but in motion. It took a while to get the right expression for this, so here’s the next pass.
Red Talons: Lupus or Hispo form, several of them. Hunting through the woods. They’re showing that kind of wide-eyed excitement and snarling jaws you see on those photos of wolves fighting, just this side of crazy but clearly healthy animals. One of the trees (or boulders!) nearby has the claw marks of the Red Talons tribal glyph. At least one has jaws smeared with blood.
Ethan’s comments: Not a lot of controversy here; notably one suggestion was to stress that the tribe is dying and sick, but this is a tribal fullpage. You don’t want to turn people off of any tribe with their fullpage art – there are reasons aplenty for some people to say “wow, I would never play a Talon” in the text, so that’s covered. It’s worth noting, I guess, that one of the things I love about Red Talons art is that it’s always so very lupus: you know they’ll have the most art in the wild, stressing that desire to cast off everything human that lurks at the heart of the werewolf myth.
Shadow Lords: Margrave Konietzko should be the head of this piece. Homid form, sword-klaive in hand; he’s out on the balcony of an old Eastern European castle, manor or other structure. A thunderstorm rolls in the sky, and the lightning half-lights the Margrave and half-throws him into shadow. He’s giving an order to some other Shadow Lords who are visible only as silhouettes, great thick-necked werewolves that are about to go out and rend the hell out of their enemies. The piece emphasizes their subtlety and cunning; this is a tribe that will hit you hard when you’re not looking. Lightning and shadow – the Shadow Lords are so well suited to art with strong chiaroscuro.
Ethan’s comments: The Margrave has rightfully earned a place as one of the greats. Created to give Albrecht a more sane and dangerous rival, he jumped in with a strong visual image, established himself as a rival with a point, and earned immortality with his speech from Apocalypse. I can’t think of a more Shadow Lordish Shadow Lord.
The “add thunder” feedback was precisely what was needed. Didn’t have much arguments here.
Silent Striders: The Strider should be in Crinos form; the Anubis-looking werewolf is just so distinct. Bits of Egyptian jewelry are of course appropriate. This piece should emphasize speed, grace, agility – the Strider is leaping at full tilt on a vampire. (Naturally it would take place at night; moon in the sky!) This is taking place in a barren stretch of desert: not Egypt, literally, but you can pick from Middle East, American Southwest or Australian outback. The vampire is holding some sort of mystical artifact, a statuette probably, that indicates it was stolen from Garou or their Kin – something ancient and Assyrian or Persian for Middle East, something Native American if the Southwest, something Australian aboriginal (from the lost tribe of the Bunyip!) if Australia. We could even throw in an owl (I love barn owls, but you can choose) in an upper corner – it might look at first like the owl is trying to escape the fray, but then when you realize that Owl is the Strider totem, perhaps that’s how the Strider found the vampire…
Ethan’s comments: This also seemed to be one of the more popular concepts. Mostly we added more detail. The desert scene at night is something I expect Ron to do well; he loves landscapes, and this is a striking one.
Silver Fangs: A duel, a struggle for power. Lord Albrecht (not King Albrecht, mind; he should look as he did as of 2nd edition or his Rage card) in a duel against another white-haired Silver Fang; Albrecht is in Glabro form, and defending himself without actively trying to kill his opponent (yet). However, his opponent, in Crinos, is mad-eyed and clearly not extending the same courtesy. The setting is outdoors, probably on a high mountaintop with a falcon circling overhead and the moon in the sky. There may be some other Silver Fangs on the lower slopes watching the duel, but they’re not critical; include them if the composition is right.
Ethan’s comments: Remember when I said Mari was one of the two signature characters not by design but by awesome? Albrecht’s the other. He is archetypal of the player character sort of Silver Fang, the redeemer (I’ve heard many grand stories of players’ Silver Fangs rising to power and renewal). But it was a good suggestion to have a duel, and that gives us a chance to showcase the other kind of Silver Fang, the Storyteller character rival and madman, the King Lear that players so desperately want to avoid becoming. It also shows us that the internal conflicts among the Garou Nation are present even at the very top.
Stargazers: Someone in Glabro form, trying to control their Rage through doing martial arts katas or something similar. The werewolf’s face is contorted with anger but they’re pushing it back with discipline. A temple courtyard or Zen garden might make a good background with the kind of circular patterns that imply motion and cycles; stars overhead. Perhaps there are old claw marks and cracks on the pillars: this place has been defended before in the past, and it will be defended again.
Ethan’s comments: The Stargazers have always been tricky – they represent, essentially, the desire to not really be a werewolf so much, yet people play Stargazers because they want to play werewolves. (Werewolves with high Willpower, I suspect.) There wasn’t much dissent on the idea I’d proposed, so it stays fairly intact – the appeal of the Stargazers is that they can achieve their goals, and the interesting thing about them is that it isn’t easy.
Uktena: An Uktena in mid-ritual, binding a snarling Bane into a ritual painting on a rock. The Bane is being sucked in, turned into an elaborate drawing. It’s fighting as best it can, but so is she: it’s a battle of wills that she’s winning. Surrounding the Uktena as she performs this rite is a ghostly form of another spirit, an antlered serpent (a small avatar of Uktena itself). The werewolf is in Homid or Glabro; her trappings should tend toward a mix of modern and Hopi, Pueblo or Navajo, one of the Southwestern nations.
Ethan’s comments: Another one that seemed to hit the mark first try, though I was rightfully called out on being a little generic about the American Indian identity. So we’re going to the deserts to contrast with the Wendigo. The mythological Uktena is technically a Cherokee critter, but with the Croatan also East Coast, that must have been a pretty crowded region… so we’ll target the other portion of traditional Uktena stomping grounds. for Another excellent point to add more character would be to invoke the Bane Tenders – which makes the ritual far more interesting now that it’s an outright struggle.
Wendigo: A hulking Wendigo in Crinos form, stalking through a winter landscape (Canadian or Pacific Northwest-looking forest). There’s blood on the snow, and the Wendigo has the severed head of an enemy (human-looking with sharp teeth, as if a lightly mutated fomor or a Dancer with odd dentition in Homid) in its hand: his muzzle is also blood-stained, maybe we even see a carcass behind him with a bite taken out of its torso. Amerind trappings, of course. The violence has just happened, but the Wendigo has yet to calm down and revert to human form. The Wendigo stares out at the viewer, the bloodlust still evident in his or her eyes.
Ethan’s comments: The most comments we got from this were of my own thinking: “not Evan, please.” I agree; Evan’s a good character, but he’s not good at being an iconic Wendigo. He contradicts the point of the tribe, like an old money Bone Gnawer. Naturally, I wanted snow and the hint of cannibalism in this piece — those are the motifs that tie the classic wendigo myth to the werewolf dynamic, and I have always found it works great.
No Fourteenth Piece?: No fourteenth piece.
Ethan’s comments: Thirteen fullpages is plenty; we don’t want to burn Ron out! So we’re sticking to the Garou Nation – these are the archetypes that make Werewolf: The Apocalypse great. I don’t mean to imply that the Black Spiral Dancers aren’t a tribe, or that the Bunyip or Croatan weren’t – but none of them are currently in the Garou Nation. You’ll get some pretty iconic art for those other guys anyway, never fear.
Nice to see ‘we’ can have our say too.
I am already curious to the results.
Btw, I made a group on Facebook for the fans (as was done for V20) join us on Werewolf the Apocalypse: 20th anniversary.
It’s still building up, but its there to promote the product and this site.
Thanks! That’s great! Just like with V20, this Anniversary edition can use all the word of mouth info you folks can spread.
Nice. I can’t wait to see the art.
I do want to put in a good word for my old friends the Stargazers, however. I don’t think they represent not wanting to be a werewolf (although that’s a good description of what others think about them) so much as denying that what others accept as a werewolf’s nature _is_ nature. It’s nurture; the true path is to overcome that nurture and find the real hidden nature. Their asceticism and Willpower are tools for overcoming what other Garou all-too-easily accept as The Way of Things. Of course, others can say they’re in denial and chasing phantoms or ideas so abstract as to be irrelevant to Gaia’s dilemma, but so it goes.
Where does that leave those of us who regard “nature vs. nurture” as a false argument and wrong approach?
The “so much” part is vague, but kinda the key phrase: They don’t want to be werewolves to the extent that others define werewolf behavior. They want a level of control that is not very “werewolfish”, if you will.
All of which is another way of saying “Stargazers are tricky to represent because showing a Stargazer flipping out and killing people in a berserk frenzy can be jarring, but flipping out and killing people in a berserk frenzy is one of the iconic elements of Werewolf art.”
I have to say, I really really really like these all. Especially the Silver Fang, Glass Walker and Uktena ones, which show an aspect of each tribe that most art usually ignores.
So long as they “feel” right; that’s really the key. We didn’t want different for the sake of difference- not with these being celebrations of why fans find the Tribe cool.
Indeed. Simply meant that these pieces discuss aspects of the tribes that are seen in text, but not always in the art.
Especially the Silver Fang picture really captures the struggle between those who cling to old ways, and those who want the tribe to move forward. Silver Crown and Silver Fang tribebook revisited discussed it at lenght, but to have an art piece symbolising it, that’s cool.
Agreed; as a big Glass Walker fan it’s great to see their tribal image invoking the city as their home and not just technology. And; Elemental Favour: Glass + Glass Walker? Lovely.
I’m really, really pleased. Having been involved in the discussion on the original ones it really looks like this is a great balance between the requests that people made and the designers being able to say “no actually we want to do this.”
Well, we knew what we wanted to say and weighed you folks’ ideas against that. Lot’s of great ideas that added to our fined tuned or really refocused our original descriptions, so it was harder when we couldn’t use a cool idea.
I think you did a great job listening to the ideas and requests of the players/fans, as well as balancing that with your and White Wolf’s own visions/direction for the Tribes. I can’t wait to see the sketches/final works as they arrive.
I can’t believe I didn’t think of it beforehand, but the inclusion of the Tribal totems somewhere in the pieces (where appropriate) is a great idea too.
Might I suggest perhaps even a single noticable cockroach on one of the subway column, for instance?
And even now, please look into a process by which posters of the pieces can be ordered PoD at some point? 😀
Will do!
And on top of that, have a fantastic Christmas, New Year, and Holiday season!
Perhaps next Christmas I will be reading my W20 beneath my Glasswalker poster and giving my comments for the W20 companion. 🙂
OK, here’s my thoughts on the Glass Walker one. (Of course I’d leap in on them.)
I’ve always argued that every tribe has at its heart a myth, a story. Sometimes this is obvious, like the Get of Fenris. (Well, duh: Fenris itself is the myth.) Othertimes it’s a bit more obtuse (the Red Talons is a primal mythology, it’s actually very close to the Garden of Eden.)
The Glass Walkers, in their typical post-modern way, are the Myth of Progress. The idea that tomorrow will always be better than today. That every scrap of accumulated knowledge and information improves the world, bit by little bit.
I think the picture described has some of that. The city is crucial (of course) and the dressiness works (I’d be inclined to go a little more high class, myself, but that’s just taste). What I do disagree with is the art deco touch: Reflect on the character with the environment. Make it up to the minute stuff: Show the video billboard in the background, etc. Surround the Glass Walker with the stuff of our accumulated knowledge, never a look to the past. NEVER a look to the past.
I find it tricky to agree that the Glass Walkers believe that tomorrow will always be better than today, because, well… the Apocalypse is coming. If they’re right, then the entirety of the Garou Nation is looking kind of dumb, and if they’re wrong, then the Glass Walkers look kind of dumb. It’s hard to do Werewolf: The Apocalypse without a pervading level of fatalism in the face of Ragnarok, and I do want the Glass Walkers to feel like they’re inhabiting the same setting as everyone else (and that they’re aware of it).
It’s the same way with the concept of never looking to the past: we all know that’s a mistake, and that it primes you to make the same mistakes your forebears made. I do agree that the Glass Walkers should be free of nostalgia, and refuse to romanticize the “good old days” — but if they champion a mindset that what we have right now is the only thing that you should look at or pay attention to, again, they don’t look quite as smart as we’d like them to.
Would you believe I lost the link to the blog?
The Glass Walkers know that the Apocalypse is coming, but they also believe the Apocalypse will only be averted by something in the future; if something in the past would have fixed the problem, then it’d have DONE it already. No, it’s got to be something new. Something different.
To me, that’s the key to the tribe, and it explains neatly their love of man. Man’s the changing species, the one constantly innovating, the one constantly rejigging the formula. They figure that if anyone’s going to figure out something that could save the day, it’s going to be them.
These sound awesome although I’m still disappointed that the Black Spiral Dancers won’t be getting the full page they deserve but I can live with that loss. Especially since I’m fairly certain we’ll see them aplenty in the artwork, although mostly in a position where they are taking a beating it seems but still. And Werewolf does already have one gorgeous full page for them by Ron in the cover of the Book of the Wyrm.
Also as a minor detail I would hope that the Vampire that the Strider is confronting has some serpent like features as a nod to the Setites responsible for the Striders plight.
I like it- assuming Ethan is cool with the serpent hint, I think we should add that.
My one worry would be that a vampire with serpentlike features is not really recognizable as a vampire any more; it looks like a serpent-guy, and the distinctive trademark of “fangs” that lets us recognize vampires would also be expected of a serpent-guy.
Just depends on whether we want an iconic “Striders really hate vampires” piece or a “if you know Striders have a history with the Followers of Set, you know what’s going on here” piece. I kind of like the former — the war between werewolves and vampires regardless of tribe and clan is pretty iconic of the game — but if we want to put a more clear vampire in another piece we’ve got room.
Why not have the clan symbol or something upon the vampire that the strider is fighting? something that hints that it is a follower of set without being obvious about it?
@sean: My thoughts exactly. This way it would be noticeable by those of us who know the lore, but still enjoyable by those who just need to recognize the character as a vampire.
Will the three lost Tribes (Croatan, Bunyip, White Howlers/Black Spiral Dancers) possibly be included in a similar fashion to the “extinct” Clans of Vampire? What about the other Changing Breeds and their extinct cousins?
(So many questions……. So definitely wanting this book……)
It does make you realise how massive the Werewolf universe is compared to Vampire’s. You have dead clans? We have dead tribes, a bunch of other species plus a bunch of dead species plus all those creatures that inhabit the spiritual copy of the universe and all of the alternative worlds attached to that spiritual copy world…That gets your Lahmia in perspective don’t it?
There’s great stuff in all our gamelines and it’s all about where you find the coolth. Just do me a favor and let’s not put up any fences when comparing them, please. What’s great is that WoD contains so many levels of depth and so many ways that folks can enjoy it- across the gamelines or specific ones- it’s all good.
It wasn’t really a dig at Vampire. I love all the games. But I think we have to be realistic about the W20 world being a much broader (rather than a much better) one and as such possibly not being able to contain every extinct line that V20 did.
Letting Ethan or Bill handle this one.
They possibly will. I would say that the scale of likelihood runs from “rather likely” for the three lost tribes to “rather unlikely” on the end of getting Camazotz/Apis/Grondr details.
…but what about the “weremegatheriums” mentioned in 1st edition? 😉
Don’t worry, after the changes over the years, I won’t hold you guys to that sorta thing. 😀 it’s more just one of this “funny early concepts” that were weeded out long ago, I’m sure.
The World of Darkness is full of unreliable narrators.
I still disagree with the Children of Gaia concept.
BUT I’M SO EXCITED!!! EVERYTHING IS GOING TO BE SO GREAT!!!
(Better than V20).
And i’m thinking: How would be a Black Spiral Dancer fullpage art by Rebecca Guay?
Mm, yeah Rebecca Guay is good.
What other artists are you hiring for this? Do we get to tell you our favorite Werewolf artists/dream teams, or have you already picked them all out?
Please, let’s not start comparing the lines again, can we avoid that this time around? 🙂
BUT I’M SO GLAD YOU’RE EXCITED!
BSDs and Rebecca’s beautiful art are a mismatch of cosmic proportion- it might be genius.
Yeah, her style is more suited to calmer pieces and umbral stuff, I think. I would like to see Richard Kane Fergusson’s take on the Black Spiral Dancers, though. That could be interesting.
Haha, OK somehow I responded on the comments for the previous post instead of this one. Oops, don’t know how to delete that. I’ll just repeat what I said there in case that comment thread isn’t being read anymore:
Awesome! These all look great. The above poster’s point about art deco not being right for the Glasswalkers pic is good. I like that the werewolves in these pictures are allowed to be in forms other than crinos — that form is overused in some art where the werewolf is not doing anything nearly violent enough to use that form. I’m glad to see it’s not being overused for these.
I guess the one other thing I’d add is to please not have Fair Glabro women — their glabro forms should be just as hairy as the males. Not with shaved legs.
Thank you all for making W20 and for letting us give our feedback! I think I’ll be checking this blog every day. Looking farward to seeing what you have!
Point taken, re: Glabro forms.
Don’t quite agree with the Deco concept in that I’ve always seen it as celebrating both a futurism and the control of wyld by man- excellent backdrop for a GlassWalker to strike out against human hunters. But Ethan might have deeper thematic ideas.
To pull from your earlier posts- I haven’t started to assign art besides these full page pieces and have asked for that very input in a couple different venues- so if you missed me asking before, please let me know your favorite artists now. I’d love to hear.
Finally, checking every day is cool, but we probably won’t get into high gear with posting until deeper into the New Year.
Yeah, I don’t frequent the official White Wolf forums, so I must have missed the earlier W20 open dev communications.
So who are my favorite artists for Werewolf?
Well Ron Spencer is one, and you’ve already got him on board. Ron does the best creepy, slimy, misshapen, freakish monsters and twisted fomori, and his frenzying and fighting werewolves are great, too.
Steve Prescott is another. For me, his werewolves capture their horrific nature the best — he does a really great job of making them truly terrifying monsters, even when you know what they’re doing in that specific scene is necessary or good. Perhaps he comes closest to capturing what werewolves look like to human eyes (OK, maybe not, what with Delerium, but still). He is perhaps still painting werewolves for Magic: the Gathering right now, but hopefully he has time for another project as well. (I think the M:tG set arts will be finishing fairly soon.)
Rebecca Guay was mentioned. She’s just generally one of my favorite artists, and is a good fit for those rare calm, contemplative moments in Garou life, and the beautiful sights that still exist in Caern, wilderness, and umbra.
Richard Kane Fergusson is another of my all-time favorite artists. He’s done some Werewolf art in the past, and I think his style is especially well-suited for umbral scenes, spirits, untouched wilderness, and violent battles. Maybe rites, too.
http://forums.white-wolf.com/default.aspx?g=posts&t=53804
We talked a while back about artists, but feel free to add your thoughts too!
Other artists I’d like to see: I somehow forgot to mention Melissa Uran; her stuff is always great, especially her black and white line drawings, and probably fits for Werewolf more than Rebecca Guay’s style. Also the artists of the pictures on p. 38 and p. 127 of the Revise core. (Usually I can’t find signatures.) And maybe John Cobb.
There are some artists I would prefer not to have return: Leif Jones, Joe Corroney, Steve Bryant, Paul Phillips, and the artist of the spread on p. 28-29 of Revised corebook. Also someone suggested bringing in Wayne Reynolds, but I really do not like his work.
I’m glad to see that there’ll be a comic instead of the non-comic Revised has. I prefer the 2nd edition comic intro format more.
There should be a picture of the five forms. The one in the Revised corebook is pretty awesome, except for the hairless legs in glabro, and the hispo seems much smaller than the crinos, whereas I thought they were supposed to be of similar size.
I would like the Fera at least get a few pages and images overall, maybe even a page each, especially if they can each have a color picture… unless you guys are planning a W20 companion that would have room for them. But if including them means cutting out important material about the umbra, spirits, fomori, Spirals, or the like, then probably they should be left out (or just get a paragraph each) as they are not essential for play.
One last suggestion: please drop the tribal weaknesses. Most of them represent cliched stereotypes more than good roleplaying.
When we were talking about art deco, Rich mentioned that he saw it as very “Weaverized” — those kinds of strong, smooth lines, that dedication to symmetry while still celebrating organic curves and motion. I had been considering it for the Silent Strider piece, because art deco is very pulp (and the Striders have a great pulp vibe), and because it drew a lot on Egyptian inspiration. Rich recommended against it for the Striders, though, on account of that Weaver-form edge.
Does it suit the Glass Walkers? I think so. There’s a point to be made about associating Glass Walkers with “now now now,” but I also think it’s hard to properly appreciate human culture if you disregard any ideas from the past. I think also part of the romance of werewolves is that they’ve been around forever; they’re not a new thing, and I don’t mind taking visual cues that the Glass Walkers got their name when the first skyscrapers were being built and mixing those cues in with their adoption of the latest Weaver-gadgets.
After reading the descriptions listed above and taking into account that the art will be by Ron Spencer himself I can only say the following:
This. Is. Going. To. Be. Great.
Great work guys keeping us psyched for W20. Keep at it! 🙂
I. Agree.
Thanks.
🙂
Ethan – The Bane Tenders are the best part of the Uktena. What could be cool is Bane Tenders dealing w/ancient drought banes being woken up by global warming.
Also, Interestingly, there’s a very clear “Uktena” analog amongst Southwestern sedentary peoples (Puebloans and ancient Puebloans as far as we know). They have the Great Water Snake, Avanyu, who is pretty much as far as Werewolf goes Uktena.
Excellent thoughts, Amado. Drought Banes, all awake and basking in wildfires, are a great way of emphasizing the continuing relevance of ecological disaster. “Pray for rain and God sends fire,” indeed.
I had a feeling that there had to be some water snake analogues out there, but I wasn’t familiar with any. I appreciate the name-check. I’ll look for that.
Another thought just occured to me looking over the Stargazer illustration. I tend to associate the Stargazers much more with the Fierce Deity figures of Buddhism. Maybe instead of a rock garden, the werewolf is meditating and raging at the foot of a statue or painting of, say, Vajrapani or other Dharma-protecting ancestors (Dharmapala in Tibetan Buddhism).
I’d like to know why the Fianna were chosen as the ones with the modern accessories. I’m not complaining, the picture sounds great, and i love the inclusion of a hint to the Fae.
I just wondered, why the Fianna?
I expect to see the Bone Gnawers and Glass Walker with modern accessories and outfits either by default or as described, and Mari and Albrecht are both pretty modern in dress (less notable in Crinos, but that’s true for many Garou).
In the Fianna pic, one of them’s wearing modern accessories because there are three of them. That’s enough diversity to show that the tribe honors its past, but also that there are modern Fianna who reflect the world they were born into. Even if you want the Fianna to stay to the stereotype of “legendary badasses from the British Isles,” the SAS may qualify…
… W20 SAS? 😉
Also its worth remembering that of all the ethnic origins groups in Werewolf the British/ Irish come from some of the most urbanised areas available. In comparison to Russia, America, Africa, Eastern Europe and even Greece we have almost no wilderness. There are no wolves in Britain and Ireland anymore. Thus they are quite a good choice for being the most homid orientated of non-urban tribes.
This aside I’m a big believer in the idea that all werewolves have some link to human society. I don’t really believe any but the most radical of homids would have trappings that link them to the modern world. That solitary starting dot in gnosis has to come from somewhere.
Love the Glass Walkers one. Very much emphasizing the idea I like for them, that of urban guys, but werewolves anyway. I don’t see them like they are so much Tainted by the Weaver (although other Garou might disagree), but that they’re the ones willing to fight at Her domains, and that means using Her ways or it’s a lost cause. You can’t fight in a city by appealing to nature spirits the old way, and you won’t stop the city growing or ignore what happens in there.
Silver Fangs, I really like the fight. It’s like: Yes, you are a Silver Fang, you’re supposed to alpha the pack. But to be an Alpha, you have to take the position and show you’re worthy time and time again. And that, more often than not, means fighting for it, like every other pack-structured species in the world. It’s not like it’s easy being a Silver Fang and be Alpha.
And I forgot about Howling Fianna, too. It’s great like this.
Kudos.
You totally need to release the Fianna one as a t-shirt so I can buy a three-werewolf-moon.
Other things I would like.
Focus a little less on rule stuff and give us some help.
Compared to VtM, WtA is a lot wider and a lot less bound in rules. I am especially talking about the Umbra here, which can differ a lot between ST’s. Perhaps also a short description and shortened stats of things Werewolf can encounter ?
I just found this forum and am sure I will be leaving plenty of comments about my favorite game ever.
But, unrelated to this post, I have a reference spreadsheet I compiled with a (I believe) complete list of attributes, abilities, gifts, rites, fetishes, etc. listed in all of the original books. I would be more than happy to share this with you guys if it would help at all with your work. Let me know.
Just to help wrangle content here (for the general masses): The Open Development blog really isn’t a forum, per se. Its feedback should be related to the content at hand, if possible.
However, there is better place (for now) to offer things for the masses and suggest/offer stuff for Werewolf (whether for older editions, or W20), and that is the official forums at http://www.white-wolf.com.
Information, ideas and the likes for Pre-W20 content can be suggested at the White Wolf forums CWoD>CWoD>
http://forums.white-wolf.com/default.aspx?g=topics&f=16
Information, ideas and the likes for the W20 upcoming content (Onyx Path) can be suggested in the White Wolf forums CWoD>Onyx Path>
http://forums.white-wolf.com/default.aspx?g=topics&f=30
… there is a “W:20” thread there, but there may also be a W20 forum set up when the project begins just like there is for V20 in the CWoD forum… one can hope.
All of the artwork and tribes look amazing.
I would really like to see write-ups for the White Howlers (pre Spiral Dancers), the Spiral Dancers, and the other lost tribes. It would be amazing to see those write ups and gifts.
Thank you for including the Stargazers.