Thanks so much for your comments on the first batch of Steve Prescott sketches for the Tribe two page spreads- keep your thoughts and ideas coming folks- we’re listening. And because you didn’t come here to listen to me chatter, here’s Steve’s notes and then the art:
Once again, some of these have feet running off the page – they’ll be
fully drawn. Unicorn will be a light sunny golden color behind the
running wolf. Red Talon will have a primitive griffon in background –
haven’t worked out Shadowlord totem yet – Let me get back to you on
that.
Commented these on the induvidual pictures, but gathering them here too.
Children of Gaia: My favorite thus far, I like the flowery nature theme and the calm expression on the wolf’s face. The necklaces and autumn leaves are also a nice touch.
Red Talons: Spot on Red Talon, thought I think its ears are a bit too long.
Shadow Lords: I love the knightly-yet-suspicious pose on the Lord. Gives them dignity yet enforces their nature as manipulators.
Only problem I have is the length of the sword, unless it changes size depending on the form, that’s a huge thing to be carrying around in homid. Maybe slightly shorter?
Bone Gnawers: I like the feeling of this a lot. Focuses more on the ‘urban predator’ than ‘homeless omega’ aspect of the tribe.
All in all, these are AWESOME pictures.
That’s supposed to be the Margrave!? That image is boring. The Margrave should be more intense and intimidating. Hope you jazz it up a few more notches with the Totem. The Margrave should be an 11, this is mediocre 4 at best.
Reading prior blog posts– so, 3/10 gender identifiable Garou are female, one of those 3 being of a Tribe that’s exclusively female? Talk about male privledge. It looks like the only female Crinos will be Mari Cabrah (let’s hope she and Albrecht don’t end up as dull as the Margrave). In retrospect, maybe the Fenris should have been a big scary Crinos Valkyrie.
Also, not to be all Rage.. the CoG and RT are pretty spot on.
As opposed to 4/10 gender-identifiable Garou being male, and 6/10 being in Crinos/Hispo/Lupus and of uncertain gender, yes. From a purely Homid/Glabro standpoint, it’s two women to one man. I’m pretty satisfied with those numbers. I don’t think it skews heavily male unless the viewer is one to assume that all Crinos-form Garou are male because they don’t have bewbs.
d00d, the Silent Strider has a beard. The Get of Fenris has a longer and braided beard– unless that’s his braided chest hair (in which case, weird, and triply weird if that’s a woman with braided chest hair.) The Fianna’s sash is the kind of sash that goes with a Kilt (a male piece of clothing). You’ve explicitly said the Shadow Lord is the Margrave (a dude). So at the very least they’re dressed and/or managing their facial hair (or body hair, potentially in the case of the Get) like dudes.
Crinos isn’t as gender neutral when you’re dressing your characters up and giving them facial hair.
And that’s ignoring art school 101 differences in drawing male and female forms– you’ve made these characters anthropomorphic enough to have recognizable gender traits.
The Strider has a “beard” yes. It is also in Crinos, a form where both genders have fur all over. Nothing stops a female from braiding the fur on her chin into a beard. In fact the Egyptians wore fake beards, and one famous woman did so as well. Nothing about that beard says anything about the characters gender.
The Get certainly does not have a beard, it just has braided the fur on the chest. If you think it’s weird, that’s your prerogative, but it doesn’t say anything about the gender. As for “triply weird”, how come ? Because women don’t have chest hair ? Again, it’s in Crinos. Women generally don’t turn into 9 feet furballs either. In fact, I would say that that is probably a female Get, since the Viking tradition of wearing jewelry like torcs was mainly for females.
I still wish that these pieces weren’t using canon characters that are already the subjects of the Ron Spencer pieces (I really wish these were just representations of characters the players were likely to become, rather than established characters that the “poster art” pieces are portraying already. But, the choice has already been made.
So, I suppose if this doesn’t look like the “I’m going to wet myself by the scary Margrave” in Canon, then I actually like it a bit more if it represents a more typical Tribal character than a legendary one.
MY concerns for the Shadow Lord piece are:
Sillouette: The silouette on the piece is pretty bland. There isn’t the same dynamic to it as the other pieces with limbs, tools, and other things giving a more interesting outline. The SL here doesn’t really have that dynamic with him just standing and leaning on the sword. Without turning him at least 3/4 view, I’m not sure how to modify this without really starting over again.
Feet: Be careful with the thickness of those feet below the ankle–they’re staring to look like they are fur-wrapped, or wearing boots of some sort. If he IS wearing something, then they are fine to my eye, but if not, they’re just a bit thicker than I’d personally like to see.
I’ve said it once, but I’ll say it again: Steve’s sketches rock! Can’t wait to see them (and W20) finished!
Once again, these are all great. The Bone Gnawer is especially good.
My only complaint is that the Red Talon’s ears are too long.
I think “long ears on werewolves” is just his style. Even the CoG’s ears are long. In Crinos, I think we’re just used to that style. Then again, the Red Talon is in hispo too, so the long ears are a bit more like the Crinos’ long ears too, if you want to say that, but they’re just as long as the CoG in Lupus. So, like I said, it may just be his style. 🙂
I like the Children of Gaia the most.
It’s a very peaceful looking wolf, and the imagery is just beautiful.
The Shadow Lords one i have mixed feelings about. Although I love what Prescott did with the gauntlets (which looked pretty mudane in past incarnations), I don’t really dig the Shadow Lord crinos form drawn that way. They are meant to be stocky, wide and shorter than most werewolves, and correct me if I’m wrong, Yuri’s lineage is as pure as they come (dating back to the founding of Judges of Doom and more). He should look more like a stocky, insanely well-built Shadlow Lord. Other than that I like his pose. Maybe a shorter muzzle, and more jewelry/pieces of armor could work too, since the Margrave is so high station, and a Theurge. He should have a few fetishes, aside from his sword (which I think could look more Garou-ey, with some glyphs and crow feathers hanging from it, I dont know).
The Red Talons need some more identity as a Red Talon, and not just a bad ass wolf. Love his pose to death, it’s very menacing and threatening, but I think he could show he is from a very hardcore tribe. Maybe with a glyphed human skull entwined with his fur, as if to make a fetish, or a as a warning.
The Bone Gnawer is perfect. I prefer homid depictions, but this Glabro is great. It shows muscle without making her look too male (which is the case with most Crinos forms I see). Great rendition of a glabro!
Look, I love the Margrave as much as anyone but I have to say I have some problems with the Shadow Lord piece. It’s all been stated but first off the pose, not only does it fail to capture the shall we say majesty of the character but this is more or less the same pose (albeit in Crinos now) from the back of the first Lord tribe book.
The other issue (also brought up) is the Margrave, really? I love the guy and all but just like Mephi, Mari and the other “poster children” we’ve seen enough.
I think now that I have seen the 2nd batch that some are REALLY nice and some need work or something to tie them better to a Tribe.
The Red Talon and Fianna are nice images, but I expect them somewhere in the book, not on the tribe page. They do not radiate the tribes core emotion/goals etc.
I think on the 2nd batch the Bone Gnawer needs work, especially the face (eyes). The Silent strider does nothing for me… and the Red Talon is ‘just’ a threatning wolf.
Overall I miss Homid forms as most seem Glabro to me.
I want to point out (at least it’s my belief) that these images are meant to represent a single “character”, not the Tribe itself. The Ron Spencer pieces are (again, to my understanding) meant to represent greater aspects of the Tribe in one piece, while these images (being in the Character Creation section) are meant to represent just one character of a Tribe. In the Margrave/Albrecht/Mari cases, they represent particular legendary characters (because apparently you can’t have too much of important canon characters, even in a character-creation section), but the others are potential PC characters–examples of what COULD be played/archtypical characters.
Now, obviously some tribes are a bit more common within their ranks and so one character is going to look much like any other in general concept (Red Talons, for instance) while others are just too varied in their looks/attitudes to attempt to show all of those facets in one “character” drawing (like Glasswalkers, Get, Fianna and the likes)… at least, that’s my thoughts.
Also, I doubt these will have background coloring, but if so, expect to see far more gray hairs (if any left at all) on Richard’s head by Gen Con as he tries to do text-wraps around the figures. 😉