Werewolf 2.0 & Nine Ways It Could Be Streamlined
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Tho I've been challenged to respond to Crusader's increasingly off-topic Ad-Hominem Attack Theatre, I really don't have the time. Sorry.
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One of the main themes discussed is that for a werewolf, half of the horror/violence is not external but internal. That the damage you can wreak on those around you should be as terrifying, in some ways, to the character/player as to those that might be on the brunt end of it.
You're placing far more emphasis on this than the book does. The changing is only jarring the first few times. Afterwards not so much. Spiritually attuned werewolves change once a scene or they feel discomfort, low harmony werewolves feel no pain from shifting at all. Lunacy is a natural part of the order, there are even gifts allowing a werewolf to change the kind of lunacy he or she inflicts.
They go on mechanically at some length, to make gauru as attractive as possible. To make it a first resort. The Wolf-Man battle form in Forsaken 2.0 is vastly more powerful (on an order of exponetial magnitude) vs the Forsaken 1.0 form. You heal all non-agg damage a round. Enemies get like half their Defense. It's intense.
To be clear, Enemies of lesser rank use down and dirty combat rules, meaning they only count their dexterity or wits as their defense. This does not include supernatural opponents or spirits of a higher rank or mortals with a template or pretty much anything you would most likely be fighting. They also automatically fail any social roll not based on intimidation and any mental roll that isn't perception based or a resistance. Additionally, the rules are very clear that they have to attack an opponent or the thing nearest to them if no opponent is available. None of this spend willpower to control your rage shit like before. So it's not all sunshine and flowers like you want to present it.
But it's still undercut by the inclusion of dalu/urshul who serve very little purpose in the grand scheme of things. They are 'safe' forms, with only benefits attached and no real risk of losing self control. It encourages a more blase, toolbox like approach to one's shapeshifting. It becomes banal, and rings hollow when they devote repeated paragraphs to how storytellers should play up the bone-cracking, flesh-displacing horror of changing forms, and how players should always be reminded of how bizarre and strange it is. That's hard to do when they're changing forms 20+ times a night. Ultimately, hishu and urhan lose out. The two forms that DO have immensely strong thematic components. Why be a wolf, when you can be a big strong wolf?
Again, you're reading far too much into the shapeshifting thing. The book does not spend that much time on the shapeshifting hurts bit. It even explains that it doesn't hurt for low harmony, spiritually attuned wolves are required to shift and balanced harmony wolves only feel pain the first few times. While it's jarring, per the book, it feels right. So it's something you attune to. Dalu and Urshul have their place. Urshul can't communicate with humans but can speak first tongue and can apply tilts to physical prey. Dalu can move among humans but also gain the ability to force people protecting prey away from the prey. Hishu applies a penalty of your PU to a person's roll to track you if you're in a populated area. Urhan allows you to interrupt other people's actions by spending essence (essentially it's werewolf celerity). So get real. They all have great benefits. The fact that you are not aware of how to use them does not mean that the benefits don't exist.
In the same way, I think they undercut the conceptual theme of the werewolf's true monster being themselves, by adding a bunch of even more horrific Shadow-related monsters for them to fight.
WoD's theme has always been that there are bigger, scarier things than you out there. So no. No it really doesn't.
It's true that Forsaken 2.0 does mitigate this aspect of the game already. In fact, the Bone Shadows are the only tribe with a duty to hunt spirits and most werewolves will never enter the Shadow. In many ways, Bone Shadows are the Uratha of Forsaken 1.0. You can't even step over at loci anymore.
False. Read the book bro. All werewolves have attachments to the spirit world. In fact, the Irraka are the only werewolves this time around with a spirit gift to step sideways into the shadow. Would you like to actually read the book and come back to us?
So Forsaken 2.0 already emphasizes Wolf-Man and de-emphasizes the Shadow. I pretty much just took it to a Mountain Dew-esque extreme. So as to not clutter up my player's brain bandwidth with themes that felt already half left by the wayside, and only lingering for the benefit of veterans.
Forsaken 2.0 emphasizes the shadow to an extreme. The entire origin story is about the shadow. You realized this right?
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Ok now I have a question, you mentioned before one of the reason to get rid of the Shadow is that few people in your mind do it right.
But then you play up the theme of the primal horror of shape shifting which granted is in the books but I have never seen touched on a mush except for first change/ becoming plots. So wouldn't by your own arguments mean that should be cut as well? -
@Alzie said:
To be clear, Enemies of lesser rank use down and dirty combat rules, meaning they only count their dexterity or wits as their defense. This does not include supernatural opponents or spirits of a higher rank or mortals with a template or pretty much anything you would most likely be fighting.
This is wrong. Down and Dirty is a single contested roll that resolves combat and ignores a defense roll. This applies to "most humans, spirits of lower Rank and non-supernatural animals". It further states "In normal combat, opponents count only their Dexterity or Wits to their Defense; they may not add the appropriate Skill (normally Athletics)." (WW 2.0, pg 97) So in gauru, this applies against all opponents that do not count for Down and Dirty.
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@Glitch
That's a fairly literal reading of the rules, I suppose, but I'd read that as still referring to the creatures specified: normal humans and animals, spirits of lower rank, etc, rather than supernaturals, higher ranked spirits and such.To me it seems to be saying that if those lesser creatures are alone (as in individual or a group of lesser types), use Down and Dirty combat resolution, but if they're in a group of more powerful enemies you use normal combat, but those lesser creatures are still at a disadvantage.
The alternative is that it's not at all specific and thus applies to everyone everywhere, and a Rank 5 werewolf in any form is filled with primal fear at a Rank 1 werewolf in gauru, which seems pretty dumb, though I guess it's possible.
Also, reading up more on the forms here, Werewolf 2.0 has done a pretty good job of indicating how they're all useful, and why, yeah.
On the subject of shapeshifting, it doesn't seem like a matter of primal horror at all really. Or at least one that passes quickly.
Werewolf 2.0, page 96:
An Uratha with high Harmony struggles with the change. To say it’s painful is an understatement on the level of saying that the universe is large. The body, mind, and soul shatters and reforms at once. Muscles tear and rebuild themselves. Bones have to find new places to fit. Sure, everything regenerates instantaneously, but every single nerve in the Uratha’s body screams out in agony for those few seconds. She quickly gets used to the sensation, but the first few times, it’s jarring like nothing else, and removes her consciousness from her surroundings.
A balanced-Harmony Uratha feels discomfort, but it’s a natural discomfort, like the first time she invited a lover inside her. **It’s not ideal, but it’s right. **
A low-Harmony Uratha feels no pain. In fact, the change brings with it a warm relief. The spirit-attuned Uratha feels discomfort any time she spends more than a few hours in one form, and every chance she has to shed a long-held form is like a foot rub after a marathon, or a hot bath after a prize fight. She must change shape at least once every scene. She can spend Essence to avoid this shift, as long as she isn’t stressed.This is all stuff @Alzie mentioned, but I figured the whole quote couldn't hurt. The 'horror of shapeshifting' doesn't really seem like a big focus, especially since at even Harmony 7 where you start the entire shift takes virtually no time at all.
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@HelloRaptor Down and Dirty doesn't have some sort of number limit. It's exclusively in situations where the enemy is considered weaker. In WW, pg 165, it even specifically says, "Maybe she's picking on people weaker than her, like a Gauru werewolf faced with a mob of normal people."
It then specifically says what rules apply in normal combat.
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@Glitch said:
@Alzie said:
To be clear, Enemies of lesser rank use down and dirty combat rules, meaning they only count their dexterity or wits as their defense. This does not include supernatural opponents or spirits of a higher rank or mortals with a template or pretty much anything you would most likely be fighting.
This is wrong. Down and Dirty is a single contested roll that resolves combat and ignores a defense roll. This applies to "most humans, spirits of lower Rank and non-supernatural animals". It further states "In normal combat, opponents count only their Dexterity or Wits to their Defense; they may not add the appropriate Skill (normally Athletics)." (WW 2.0, pg 97) So in gauru, this applies against all opponents that do not count for Down and Dirty.
I somehow doubt very much that the intention was to make any combat with a gauru werewolf resolve in a single roll of dice. If that was the intention, then all the other time they spent explaining normal combat rules and how they regenerate and what stats increase was pretty much wasted.
Edit: Nevermind, I'm being silly. It only applies to lesser opponents. So any combat is a stretch. I guess the intention was to make the fear of gauru tangible. Which is nice, it's one of the reasons I like the new Shadow Paranoia condition.
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Down and dirty combat is a (very convenient) way of making those otherwise terribly long fights whose outcome is assured last a lot less without requiring the ST to handwave them altogether. In 1.0 even if you were faced with a few thugs with knives it'd have taken a while to cut through them.
Having said that, in 1.0 mooks like that were actually a threat. A lot less so in 2.0 due to the power boosts across the board.
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@Ganymede said:
Why not just let us all know?
For the same reason HR already brought up. No one actually gives a shit (except Theno), and it's tangential at best.
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@Alzie said:
Again, you're reading far too much into the shapeshifting thing. The book does not spend that much time on the shapeshifting hurts bit.
I didn't go on about it 'hurting'. I just said that it repeatedly advises the storyteller to play up the drama of the transition.
Forsaken 2.0 emphasizes the shadow to an extreme. The entire origin story is about the shadow. You realized this right?
It's not as emphasized as in Forsaken 1.0. You realize that was the point I was trying to make, right? I came to this conclusion by various means, such as there no longer being spirit children from taboo matings, its harder to step over into the Shadow and more discouraged, and only Bone Shadows are as focused on spirits as all uratha were in Forsaken 1.0.
Thanks for the feedback.
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@ThatGuyThere said:
Ok now I have a question, you mentioned before one of the reason to get rid of the Shadow is that few people in your mind do it right.
But then you play up the theme of the primal horror of shape shifting which granted is in the books but I have never seen touched on a mush except for first change/ becoming plots. So wouldn't by your own arguments mean that should be cut as well?Perhaps if things were streamlined a bit, one could sustain focus in areas closer to werewolf's theme. Shapeshifting, and the act of changing itself (often involuntary, frightening and violent) is supposedly as central to the werewolf experience as drinking blood is for a vampire, or avoiding sunlight.
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If you're really curious, send me a private message.
Follow up: I asked, he refused. Made my night. Tangental Ad Homenem Theatre comes to close. Thanks to everyone who enjoyed this, if anyone did.
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So things being done badly on a mush is only a reason to get rid of something if you don't like it? Gotcha. You know you could save everyone time by just admitting you ditched what you didn't like. there is nothing wrong with that. But when you keep using argument like people do it wrong anyway but that have that only apply to things you want it to it just looks sloppy.
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@Thenomain said:
Follow up: I asked, he refused. Made my night. Tangental Ad Homenem Theatre comes to close. Thanks to everyone who enjoyed this, if anyone did.
To be fair, I didn't refuse outright. I gave an extremely reasonable precondition.
I guess this means we won't be friends, after all.
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@ThatGuyThere said:
So things being done badly on a mush is only a reason to get rid of something if you don't like it?
You've nailed it.
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@crusader said:
It's not as emphasized as in Forsaken 1.0. You realize that was the point I was trying to make, right?
Why have you been referring to 2.0 in the thread title, even before the edit, if you were talking about 1.0?
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@Wizz said:
Why have you been referring to 2.0 in the thread title, even before the edit, if you were talking about 1.0?
What?
I said the Shadow isn't as emphasized in Forsaken 2.0 as it is emphasized in Forsaken 1.0. I already described how. It was in response to a post someone else made, which mostly relied on Forsaken 1.0 assumptions.
Just out of idle curiosity, has anyone else in this thread even read the Forsaken 2.0 pdf, and compared it to the first book? Has anyone in this thread even storytold a game of werewolf? Aside from Glitch.
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@crusader said:
@Thenomain said:
Follow up: I asked, he refused. Made my night. Tangental Ad Homenem Theatre comes to close. Thanks to everyone who enjoyed this, if anyone did.
To be fair, I didn't refuse outright. I gave an extremely reasonable precondition.
I guess this means we won't be friends, after all.
Ladies and gentlemen, Bane.
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Tangental Ad Homenem Theatre has ended.
Tangential Ad Hominem Theater begins.
Can't you find someone else's thread to troll?
http://i.imgur.com/fhUtdpI.jpg
Honestly, if you weren't a decent coder, website builder and community organizer, I don't think anyone would have a use for you.
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@crusader said:
@Thenomain
Honestly, if you weren't a decent coder, website builder and community organizer, I don't think anyone would have a use for you.Nope, I'm good. Likewise, stop hitting yourself.
