#uratha

(Image is not mine. Taken from the Werewolf The Forsaken book "Signs of the Moon". )

I don't know what it is about this image but it manages to be so wonderfully bittersweet within a dark setting. Werewolf dad watching out for his kids and making sure they are okay. Still trying to be a part of his family's life even while fulfilling the duties of the Uratha.

Bloody The Pelt (••••• •)

Action: 12 hour ritual Dice Pool: Int + Occult + Shadows (3 times) Cost: 1 permanent Willpower + 3 lethal damage Duration: Indefinite

The character enchants the ingredients and then combines the two to create a Weargwulf Pelt. Each ingredient is enchanted in a 4 hour ritual and combining the two is another 4 hour ritual, adding up to an overall 12 hour ritual where each piece is a step of the whole. Each step must be done within the same 24 hour period. Each step requires a succesful roll and 1 lethal damage to complete. Failing the roll means a loss of time and having to sacrifice the damage again, while a dramatic failure ends up spoiling the ingredient and a dramatic failure for the final ritual will result in the loss of a non-permanent Willpower. The overall ritual requires 1 permanent Willpower to complete, which need only be invested at the end when everything else has succeeded.

The ingredients are the intact, skinned pelt of a gray wolf and one liter of blood taken from an unwilling Uratha. The pelt may or may not be tanned, though it's recommended. The blood has to still be "viable", as in if it were perfectly normal human blood it could still be donated through transfusion. Refrigeration can extend the "shelf life". The werewolf had to have been tortured during the extraction of the blood. Gathering neither of these ingredients is part of the ritual and is something that is expected to be done before you start.

Special: This caligo may be broken into three 2-dot caligines, each representing one of the ritual steps and tagged as Pelt, Blood & Final after the caligo name. Different warlocks may learn each step and collaborate to perform the overall ritual. In this case, only one of them has to sacrifice a permanent Willpower at the end of the ritual. The warlocks enchanting the ingredients may work simultaneously and may move on to enchanting more as the last warlock works on the final product.

Artifact: Weargwulf Pelt

This cursed artifact is a gray wolf pelt that has been darkened as if stained with soot. Contained within it is the stolen power of the Uratha, corrupted into a shadow of the real thing. To be used, it must be worn, over the head like a hood, around the waist like a belt, over the shoulder like a cape, whatever. The user must be Darkened or a Mnemosyne with a Vice of Rage, Violence or something similar along those lines.

By spending a Willpower, the character may assume the Urshul or Urhan forms of an Uratha. If the character has the Withered merit or otherwise possesses Inner Night*, they may instead spend a Willpower and a Shadow to assume the Dalu or Gauru forms. While transformed, they have all the innate physical abilities of a werewolf and their forms, their strength, speed, senses and regeneration. The "weargwulf" has no bane to silver and their bane to jade changes to affect them as silver does the Uratha.

The Pelt may only be destroyed by the flames of Purgation or by being left unattended in a Tainted Place while the Taint is destroyed, via any method.

Here are the lodge concepts -- I also have rough drafts for the Lodge of Doors and Lodge of the Hook Hand, but I'm less certain about getting into those as those are like "official" named in book Lodges.

If any of these spring out to you, let me know in the comments or tags! I want to focus down one Lodge and have it refined and written by January.

Or rather like. The main two.

Gretchen is an Irraka Bone Shadow, who experienced her first change when she was down in Missouri looking for birds while trying to complete research for her Doctoral Degree in Ornithology. While there, she met May, a local who offered to help show her around. Thing is, May is an Iron Master and Gretchen would have been easy prey for the hunt. Would have, except Gretchen, who was lost Wolf-Blood, experienced her first change when May attacked her. The two fought, with Gretchen eventually losing, mostly due to lack of experience.

In her pack, Gretchen is... borderline the leader, which is something that most folks meeting her wouldn't expect. She isn't the most smooth of people, but she has ambitious aims and in step with her wife, May, is one half of a dedicated duo intent on keeping their territory on lockdown.

What's really worth noting about Gretchen, though, is that she's a member of the Lodge of Doors. Her mentor there, a grizzled man by the name of Old Cutter, is a guy in her city who owns a rifle store. It's highly likely that if Gretchen weren't an Irraka, she would not have been able to track Old Cutter down and prove he was a member of the lodge, but the natural stealth of her auspice proved a major help. Upon introducing herself, Gretchen was allowed in as she passed the initial test of "prove we exist".

While most people overlook her because of her demeanor and apparent nervousness, Gretchen is one of the more menacing pack members, and she takes her duty very seriously.

The second, Erszebet, is a bit more off the wall, because she was born to the Predator Kings. That she is a Rahu, however, makes it clear that she was never scoured of her auspice. In fact, Erszebet was essentially believed to be useless in her youth, but she witnessed the brutality of the Predator Kings and took it to heart. When she was given to a pack leader as a mate, Erszebet managed to get away -- because the stress of the situation forced the first change out of her. She left the old leader with many deep scars and raged into a nearby campground, killing four people; when she woke up, she was naked and soaked with blood in the alley behind a club... two cities away from her origin point.

In her years as a Ghost Wolf, Erszebet did many, MANY rough jobs. She broke kneecaps and killed as needed -- and she doesn't know it, but one of the people who approached her was a Bale Hound, testing her for later use. After an incident involving a woman's runaway husband and Erszebet's baseball bat, she was dragged into a meeting, bound in silver-twined rope.

It is highly likely she would have been killed. However, it immediately became clear that she truly knew nothing of Uratha life. As such, she was taken in and allowed to adapt-- which led to her joining the Bone Shadows due to her curiosity about... well. The Hisil.

Erszebet is an unconventional Bone Shadow, which is likely why she wound up in the Lodge of the Throatcutter, a Lodge for Bone Shadows that pride themselves on being "rougher" than their kin. As her initiation, she had to hunt and kill a spirit stronger than she was.

Four hours later, Erszebet received her tattoo of admittance.

Rival Pack for my Werewolves! I rolled dice to determine these people and this is what the dice gave me.

Valerie // Silent-Strides: Hunter-in-Darkness Elodoth (half-moon): the "Pack Mom". Will kick Derek to death ; 80s hair but is going grey ; Early pioneer of Nail-Claws ; In sales.

Zach // Mauled-A-Pack-Alone: Hunter-in-Darkness Elodoth (half-moon): "Nirvana's #1 Fan, Maybe". Proud of his 2 chin hairs ; Won a fight at school ; Freshie ; Val's son ; Thinks Milton is cool.

Beth // Ragged-Tears: Bone Shadow Cahalith (gibbous moon): "The Hippie". Still chubby as a wolf ; Pagan ; Doesn't need the glasses anymore (wears them anyway to avoid suspicion) ; Embroiders her own overalls. Her totem spirit is a sunflower. (We all love Beth.)

Milton // Snagged-By-The-Dust: Blood Talon Ithaeur (crescent moon): "I'm Not A Fuckin' Vamp!". Brother to Miles ; Older but smaller ; General failboy ; Has a walkman ; Horror fan ; Goth/Industrial/Metal fan.

Miles // Locks-Jaws: Blood Talon Rahu (full moon): "My Bro's A Fuckin' Vamp!". Brother to Milton ; Younger but larger ; Bouncer/security for clubs/venues ; Loves to mosh ; War-movies fan ; Punk/Rock/Metal fan.