UPDATED
Ok, Got some fairly big chanages comie here. I think they will probably be up tommorow morning.
The changes are, there will be two write ups. One called "On the Nature of Werewolves" which will be a general essay on ALL werewolves. It will contain information about the following:
A General description covering all breeds of Werewolf.
The Nature of the Werewolf infection.
How the infection is passed and how it takes effect.
The first change.
Why silver harms Werewolves.
There traits and abilities (in general).
There connection with the moon and why they are connected.
Restrictions, what they can and cannot do.
The Other will be a Breed write up for what were formerly the "Noble" werewolves. They are now simply a breed of werewolf and will full under the general rules for all Were kind, though of course being a breed they will tray in some ways from the geneneral rules. As well they will have a sperate history, which will be what THEY belive. Which will be basicly their creation myth.
I hope this will allow everyone to get what they want out of this while still remaining fairly true to the Buffy and Angel mythos.
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Werewolves [Feedback, please]
Wow that's really good. Me like :) (Especially because I was planning on creating a werewolf character in the future, that's half my work done :D...and the bit about the beginning of time's gonna help my midseason storyline :P)
Werewolves [Feedback, please]
I really like this idea as well. I think the two distinct kinds of werewolves are a very good idea. Nice work, Nick.
Werewolves [Feedback, please]
Lots of really good ideas there, and this will be extemely helpfull to all that wan to do writeup or any research on werewolf's before a write up. Well done :D
Werewolves [Feedback, please]
the second one is very white wolf based amd since white wolf can do no wrong ! 8)
Werewolves [Feedback, please]
It is very White Wolf, but then again prior to white wolf who knows much about the society and orders of werewolves at all? I am not so sure about the "protectors" stuff and am willing to wait and see if there is going to be any plot stuff surrounding it.
For my part I think that most of the Noble types beleive it to be legendary and don't really havey sort of connection to that past unless they personally know a 1000+ year old werewolf who is closer to it.
Werewolves [Feedback, please]
I must say, my concept of werewolves is that they live a normal human lifespan. I would have thought the Noble line of werewolves was more like a lineage rather than individuals. So before the Slayer, the Noble lineage was responsible for protecting the Earth and so on, but individual werewolves still died at 70 or 80 years, unless they died earlier by combat (as tends to happen with Slayers, too).
That's really my only point of contention. Why is there a need for the werewolves to have a living history, with 1000+ year old people still kicking around? There's really nothing in most werewolf mythology to suggest that any of them live inordinately long. I'd find it more manageable if the Noble line had been simply passed down as the werewolves bit humans they knew could become Noble, and maintain the line that way. Then we avoid that whole nasty business of having super-powerful and old beasties running around out there.
Maybe if they really, really need to consult the elders, there might have been an old ritual (probably long forgotten by the current line, which has forgotten most of its history, and simply know that they're able to control their lycanthropy unlike most werewolves) in which they can do a spirit quest (much like the American Indian spirit quests) to contact their ancestors.
Werewolves [Feedback, please]
Ok, I just updated the outline. I personally like it quite a bit more now, thanks especially to heather for her help with some ideas. The history portion is pretty much done, it just needs some editing and polishing but the basic ideas are all there and acceptable with everyone as far as I know. So now I will move onto the more technical portion, The Nature of the Werewolves and how they work. I will hopefully have it done sometime tommorow.
And again if you have any ideas or worries just lemme know!
Werewolves [Feedback, please]
Yeah, it's definitely coming together now. :)
Werewolves [Feedback, please]
Ok, first an admition. While I love White Wolf's Vampire and Mage backgrounds I dislike their werewolf concept therefor I'm going to dislike any concept that borrows as heavily as this one does from Werewolf.
Not that I have anything against borrowing perse I think we can all accept we've moved well beyond the canon concept of Buffyverse vampires (and White Wolf has been a major source of inspiration there too)
Essentially where do the known buffyverse Were's fit into the concept? Especially Oz. Is Oz a feral werewolf or an abandoned noble. Since nobody came forward to teach him even after it became obvious his family is aware of werewolves presumably he's a feral. If so then in a period of 6 - 9 months including a significant amount of travel Oz managed to ind a way to control his change. Which gives the idea that Feral's can't control their change a little bit of a problem.
It could be argued that maybe his family didn't realise he had been infected afterall Oz went to the scoobies to help with his situation but I feel even if they did realise they could offer nothing more than locking him up.
The two other Were's I'm aware of Veruca and the woman in Season 5 Angel both seem to fit their description of a 'feral' werewolf.
Finally While I'm not sure what was going on with the white haired goddesses floating around the end of Season 7 I am pretty sure that they were critical to the creation of the slayers and I'm also pretty sure they weren't werewolves.
Given all of the above I'd prefer to jettison the whole Noble/Feral concept (especially considering my dislike of White Wolf's werewolf concept)However that does mean we need to create a credible means by which a werewolf character would be playable.
To do this I'd suggest we invoke The Watchers usual blindness to the supernatural situations that fall outside their worldview. Take a look at vampires - The council line is that a vampire bears no resemblance to the person before they were turned however we can be pretty sure this isn't true. Your vampire self may be an evil skanky version of you but it is in many respects you.
In a similar way I think the council probably dismiss victims of Werewolfs as untreatable. Afterall Giles probably the most open minded watcher we've come across basically locks Oz up. In effect saying this is an untreatable condition that you're just going to have to accomadate. Season 4 Oz pretty much shows that to be far less than the truth.
Returning back to Oz in season 4 (and i could argue I'm being generous on the whole timescale) it took him 6 months to learn enough for him to be confident that he could control his inner wolf as it turned out he was wrong but 6 months is a very short period.
Two other events suggest that even untrained a Oz retained a certain amount of control over his wolf version. The first is in 'Beauty and the beasts' (not totally sure of the ep title) Anyway OZ is being kicked around by the abusive boyfriend just before sundown. At sunset we get the the immortal line "Time's Up. Rules change" and Wolf OZ pounds the bad guy down even while less dangerous prey are around (An argument could be made for territorality but I'm trying to be generous here...)
The other event is Season 4 when Veruca attacks Willow. Oz runs to the rescue and the Werewolf faced with both his 'mates' chooses Willow (at least until the bloodlust takes control)
All in all I feel that there's enough ambiguity in the canon representation of Werewolves to allow for a character to be played with any amount of control from none at all to absolute. Season 5 Angel introduced the concept of very different werewolf breeds. As such I feel that we can create a rich and interesting werewolf background without borrowing quite so heavily from Whitewolf (Who's werewolf concept I remind you I dislike...)
Werewolves [Feedback, please]
Well, actually, Oz's family do know he's a werewolf. They're hoping he can find a cure for his cousin. (It's in the book about Oz's adventure after he leaves Buffy to try and control the wolf...can't remember what the book is called right now :P).
There's also the fact that a very, very old werewolf helped him (a monk...yup, also in the book). Now this dude fits the description of a Noble perfectly.
Right, that's the pendantic bit out of the way :)
I completely forgot about the book until now hehe...but I totally recommend you find it and read it. You never know, it might help and give inspiration(?!? :?)' Lemme see if i can find what it's called.
OK; it's called: Oz: Into The Wild by Christopher Golden.
Werewolves [Feedback, please]
i actuley love the idea of white wolfs werewolf concept and the common misconcpetion is that they are the good guys svaing humans from all the horribal evils in the wolrd which is uber wrong consideirng they where teh frist ones to realy start to cull the human species back in the day and the only reason they hate vampes and such evil is becuase they can smell the sorce of all distrution in eatch creature of evil ...sorry going geekey
peace n love am out
Werewolves [Feedback, please]
Having played WW's Werewolf series and having run a couple of successful campaigns there are things I like and things I dislike.
For our purposes, I'd like to keep this on Robin's objections. I suppose I have to ask if your biggest objection is a werewolf society? Or is it the werewolf traditions?
In talking with Nick he wanted to leave open the possibility of haiving a uber-powerful werewolf enemy of big-bad potential. Not for right now, but for later on. The ways of gaining power in the Buffy-verse are age (like vamps), magic (like Serapis), or being super powerful from the beginning (like demons).
Heather and I suggested that a werewolf's power could flow from the collective--the pack. This made the werewolf unique among the big-bads we've faced so far in that his following gave him power, and a conflict might actually make him more powerful by rallying more wolves to his aid.
That neccessitates a werewolf society. Without any Joss Whedon materials to draw on, we have made a pseudo-WW society. Tribal, nature-oriented, and tradition-bound. Different enough that there isn't any conflict with WW copyrights and seperate from the werewolves that have been presented by Mutant Enemy (a seperate breed--supported by their mythology).
What do we have? A werewolf that isn't a werewolf.
How many times have we rejected a vampire that isn't a vampire?
So back to the problem at hand...Its a werewolf so it MUST have the primary werewolf elements:
So throw out the "formerly humanity's protectors", and throw out the "noble werewolf" concepts. Throw out the connection to the ferals...make 'nobility' a personal choice and say that anyone converted has to undergo a feral stage until they master the wolf inside.
There is no physical difference between feral and noble. There is only the difference of the methodology of dealing with the wolf inside. The so-called 'Noble' werewolf isn't less bestial, he only controls the "uncontrollable" aspects of the change.
Those that have chosen to control the wolf band together for mutual support since it takes a lot of emotional stability to maintain the non-feral states. Emotional upset can trigger the change. Within these "werewolf 12-step packs" there are a few individuals who have discovered an unusual phenomenon...
Bands of werewolves can pool their power through an 'alpha' leader. This leader can undergo a "ritual of cleansing" to allow him to tap into the beast without losing control --thus transcending the beastial nature. If someone was mentally unbalanced they might still complete this sort of a ritual and wind up becoming a serious danger...especially if they have a fanataical following.
The rest of the background that Nick has is just window-dressing to make it seem more mystical and pompus (no offence Nick, I like what you wrote). Is this more in keeping with your preference, Robin?
[/]Werewolves [Feedback, please]
I'm not adverse to a werewolf society, indeed werewolves while wolves are also human both those animals are highly social. If you want to move beyond simple 'animalistic' killers some sort of social grouping is absolutely necessary.
What annoys me about the WW background (and yes Jamie I'm aware that the werewolves aren't humanities protectors. Currently the were's are fighting for gaia first their own survival second and humanity assuming it even registers on the radar come a distant third. But it is a simple point that humanity are a part of gaia and you can't save the latter without saving the former.) is that it seems to me at least to glorify in the concept of The Noble Savage and I'm sorry but that just sets my teeth on edge. Nicks concept carried through that attitude and I tarred the it with the same brush.
However that being said I like a lot of what you present Dave but perhaps it doesn't go far enough. Lets make the packs about control control of yourself control of the group. What the pack and it's individuals do with the addition cointrol is upto them and no moral value is attached to that ability
I'd prefer to see a continuum of possibilities from individuals (and packs) like Oz who feel guilt for every life they've harmed during their transformations to other packs that like Veruca glory in the power and freedom of their animal sides and use their link to the pack to ride even closer to that freedom.
I'd like to see the packs that are as tradition bound as anything dreamt up by WW and packs as hip and modern as only Baz Luhrmann could do. Please lets not get tied down to the simple binary opposition of Noble/Feral, Good/ Evil and Controlled/Uncontrolled
Werewolves [Feedback, please]
Dave, Sorrow It doesent say they protected humanity. It says they protect this world, humanity is in this world but they no more protected it for them, than for themselves. Im not big on the whole protectors of nature concept anyway, its just makes sense for a creature that would be more intune with nature to wish to defend it.
I just want to have a Werewolf that can:
Exist outside a pack, because haveing a pack of werewolves in an urban setting is just going to be a pain.
Thats powerful, because Werewolves are just to cool to not to kick ass.
That change change form at will, because 3 days a month isint a whole lot to get anything to exciteing accomplished.
That doesent look like what was show in buffy, because regardless of how much I like buffy the damn things looked like angry overweight chimps.
All of which could be alot mor easily done than the way I choose to go due to a recent ep of Angel season 5 where they say there are multiple breeds of werewolf. If you guys think it would be easier i'll just say the above are just traits of a rare breed of werewolf and we can drop writeing a big backstory and write up and do it that way, either way is good for me I just want to have that kinda werewolf to play.
And yes in WW Werewolves dont care about humans since almost all of them are just puppets of the Wyrm anyway. They just want to stop the world from ending.
Werewolves [Feedback, please]
Ok, in response to ongoing misgivings here, I think I should point out that Nick has already covered that there are a variety of individual responses to the event of becoming a werewolf. His writeup on the 'Feral' type of werewolf includes this:
It's possible people have just missed it - it's kind of buried in amongst the rest of it, but the idea is that a "feral" werewolf is not necessarily good or evil - it just is. The human who was bitten is the one who determines their course. It's up to the human whether they roam free, revelling in their bestial nature, or whether they lock themselves up each month, or whether they have the willpower to do something about controlling the change (as Oz did).
Likewise, the "noble" type of werewolf probably has its members who are less inclined to fight the good fight than others. They are simply humans who have been bitten and have been tutored by others and taken into a pack, which would seem not to happen so much - if at all - with the ferals. Some of those pack members will be fiercely loyal, and others will be more inclined to sit back and watch the footy with a good beer, I'm sure.
Part of they mythology of these 'noble' packs are that werewolves were once protectors of the Earth, but these days who can tell myth from reality? The current reality of these noble werewolves is that they exert more control over their change than their feral counterparts (in general) and they tend to be more in tune with each other and with nature. The larger a pack, the more power flows to the pack alpha, making him stronger.
Now, Nick wanted to avoid having a powerful werewolf that had to cart around a whole pack with him, so that's how the idea of the 'hibernation' came about. That the alpha of a pack can essentially have a sort of sabbatical - head off into the wilderness and attune himself more fully with nature, to the extent of virtually becoming part of it for the period of his 'hibernation'. The power he had garnered from being a pack alpha remains with him, and when he emerges he can head off to find a new pack. That way, Nick can introduce an npc who is fairly powerful but doesn't lug around twenty or so other werewolves.
Now, to me that's sufficiently far removed from any White Wolf treatment of werewolves (though I was more of a Mage and Vampire player, so my knowledge of Werewolf is limited I admit) to be perfectly acceptable here. There's no good/evil dichotomy, there's no dependence on the idea of the 'Noble Savage'. Forget White Wolf... this isn't it.
Werewolves [Feedback, please]
Heather pretty much got it, I'll be doing another go over of the history portion and then i'll actully do write ups for the feral/noble types that will hopefully address these issues. And hopefully that will take care of any misgivings that come up. I hope to have tha posted tonight/tommorow morning.
Werewolves [Feedback, please]
For simplicity just post it as a new thread in the "Character Diary" forum. I can copy and paste from that and as it is refined it can be amended.
Werewolves [Feedback, please]
Ok, Me and Sorrow talked and we worked things out. The problem wasent really to big its just kept getting off track and bickering about little details that really werent problems at all. Now that we talked I honestly think we can get something everyone will be happy and something that will allow for characters of varying levels of complexity without haveing to confine or deifine ones character as heavily as was needed previously. As said in the update I hope to have the next revision up tommorow moringing or perhaps late after noon, either way I think I can have something that everyone will like and be able to agree upon as a bse, and from there we will buff and polish as needed.
Thanks to everyone whos helped so far!
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Ok I when I update the post will be in the Diary forum.