History TabletopGame / WerewolfTheForsaken

* LinearWarriorsQuadraticWizards: Werewolves are the most powerful starting level player characters in the NewWorldOfDarkness, but mages eclipse them at higher levels. That being said, higher level werewolf abilities are nothing to sneeze at, and mages have a huge weakness in their need for preparation-werewolves start excellent at both planning and reacting to ambushes and only get better.

** The Brineborn from ''War Against the Pure'' are basically shapeshifter expies of the [[CthulhuMythos Deep Ones]]. Only they aren't hostile towards humans as a rule and are, in fact, pretty pathetic. Their own legends say that Mother Ocean has forsaken them and they have no place amongst humanity, they can't get more than ten miles away from a large body of water without getting weaker and weaker, they can't swim for more than a couple of hours before having uncontrollable panic attacks, they can't even breathe water for longer than an hour or so even in their fishy forms.

* TakeThat: The game's primary antagonist faction, The Pure, is essentially a giant Take That to the Garou Nation from WerewolfTheApocalypse - or at least to the {{Flanderization}} they underwent later down the line - with their rabid, religious zealotry, bigotry, obsession with eugenics and hatred of mankind being presented as exactly as twisted as they are.

* NatureHero: The Hunters in Darkness tend to be like this. One of their tribal gift sets is actually called Nature (another is Elemental) and allows the player to do things from speaking to animals to using the entire forest as their personal mine field.

* ProudWarriorRaceGuy: Storm Lords and Blood Talons.

* '''Ithaeur''': Wise shamans and spiritmaster, though they dislike that last one. Ithaeurs forge fetish and alliances with the spirit world. They are linked to the Crescent Moon. Their AUspice gifts are ''Crescent Moon'', Shaping, Elementals.

'''Elodoth''': Honorable judges and ambassadors. Elodoths make sure the pack's relationship with others are good and their prey's... non-existent. They are linked to the Half Moon. their Auspice Gifts are ''Half Moon'', Insight, and Warding.
'''Irraka''': Cunning stalkers and murderers. Irrakas assassinate the pack's prey stealthily and quietly, killing them one by one. They are linked to the New Moon. Their Auspice Gifts are Stealth, ''New Moon'', Evasion.
'''Ithaeur''': Wise shamans and spiritmaster, though they dislike that last one. Ithaeurs forge fetish and alliances with the spirit world. They are linked to the Crescent Moon. Their AUspice gifts are ''Crescent Moon'', Shaping, Elementals.
'''Rahu''': The warriors who uphold the Purity of the Uratha. Rahu are the ones who strike hard after their pack soften the prey up or who make sure their attention are on himself. Their Auspice Gifts are Strength, Dominance, ''Full Moon''.

Werewolves, as the children of the moon spirit, take their calling in life from the phase of the moon their power and personality are most closely linked to: A full-moon style werewolf is a mighty warrior, while those linked to the new moon are stealthy scouts and outriders, and so forth (these moon signs are called Auspices in the terminology of the game).

* BloodKnight: Blood Talons (their name is something of a hint). Exhibit A: they consider the hunter aspect of a werewolf's existence the most important part. Exhibit B: almost all of their rituals involve ''someone'''s ass getting kicked. Exhibit C: their extra part of the Oath of the Moon forbids them from surrendering in a fight unless they would make the offer to their opponent in similar circumstances.

* CanonDiscontinuity: ''Unihar'' (see FetusTerrible on this page). Going into Second Edition, the writers realized that their existence is a terribly sexist thing and have spoiled the fact that the child of two werewolves is simply an abnormally potent [[HalfHumanHybrid wolfblood]].

%%** The Lodge of the Lake. That is all.

* PrestigeClass: Lodges pretty much function as this.

* SilverBullet: Silver is precious to Luna, which means it turned against the Uratha when she cursed them. Silver makes the Forsaken's blood boil on contact, dealing aggravated damage. On top of that, in rare cases it turns their HealingFactor cancerous. They still get a better deal than the Pure, who never sought Luna's forgiveness; the Pure can't even ''touch'' silver without getting hurt. Wolf-blooded with the A Wolf's Meat Tell in 2e also get itchy rashes just by touching silver, reflecting their ability to regenerate.

* SoulEating: The nature spirits (possibly other types, unsure) consume other spirits to become more powerful. They often acquire traits of the consumed spirit as well, unless it was another spirit of the same type or one that would be "in its nature" to eat, an example being a fox spirit eating a rabbit spirit.

* GuileHero: You read the description of the Irraka up there, yes? Also, the Iron Masters prize Cunning and their initiation rituals are usually designed to encourage applicants to think outside the box.

* AntiMagic: Some Gifts are this. Lordly Will makes your character immune to supernatural mind-affecting powers. The Will Of The Winds allows you to cancel out all supernatural weather effects within a certain radius. But the ones that really take the cake are things like Darkened Moon, which causes the target to immediately lose ''all'' access to Auspice Gifts ''in addition to'' canceling Auspice Gifts that are currently in effect on said target, and the entire Wolfslayer Gift tree (which does things like stripping away Totem benefits to completely killing a werewolf's regeneration).

* AwesomeButImpractical: The general opinion of Gauru (War Form) in 1e. It should be the coolest and most lethal of forms, but it suffers from various problems that mean many fans never bother to assume it; Urshul is almost as effective a fighter -- better, in some ways, since it has access to certain combat options that Gauru doesn't -- and doesn't have the limitations of "you can only take actions to attack or run away" or "you risk flying into Death Rage every turn you remain in this form".
** 2e tries to rectify this problem by beefing up Gauru substantially with, among other things, a supercharged HealingFactor that completely restores all non-Aggravated damage instantly. However, it's still at risk of Death Rage and now has a time-limit, so opinion differs on if they succeed.

While not officially a "limited cycle" like the later lines of ''PrometheanTheCreated'', ''TabletopGame/ChangelingTheLost'' and ''TabletopGame/HunterTheVigil'', Werewolf did have the fewest official sourcebooks of an "unlimited cycle" (like ''VampireTheRequiem'' and ''TabletopGame/MageTheAwakening'') released before White Wolf declared they were giving up traditional print for [=PDFs=] and print-on-delivery.

** As of Second Edition, [[HalfHumanHybrid Wolf-Blooded]] can work like this; a person who suffers a dramatic failure resisting Lunacy actually absorbs some of the Moon's power and becomes one during the triggering werewolf's next auspice phase. Please note, however, that this doesn't actually change a Wolf-Blood's personality in and of itself, and they're inherently immune to further Lunacy. Hence why Uratha avoid relying on Lunacy to protect themselves; it doesn't discriminate against, say, [[HunterTheVigil Hunters]], and wolf-bloods develop werewolf-like traits. [[TookALevelInBadass Please take a moment to realize why this would be a really bad thing for the werewolves.]]

* NighInvulnerable: Werewolves in 2e are superhumanly tough, capable of shrugging off anything that isn't silver or magic. In game crunch, they explicitly only take Aggravated damage from supernatural attacks and from silver, nothing else. Not even massive bodily devastation is inherently dangerous. So you can run a werewolf over with a car, blow it up, drop a tree on it, catch it in a rockslide... and it'll ''still'' heal up and come right back after you in a few minutes.

** The Lodge of the Lake. That is all.

** Ansar-zalag, a idigam that devoured a star-spirit and got its powers. It usually attacks and burns down every werewolf it can find not for revenge but ForTheEvulz and ego.

* LightIsNotGood: Two examples, one a lot more sympathetic than the next:

** One of the supplement books, ''[[http://www.amazon.com/Skinchangers-World-Darkness-Chris-Campbell/dp/1588463354 Skinchangers]]'', has a character in it called Shuichi Kurama; who is possessed by a fox-spirit named Yoko. The manga/anime series ''YuYuHakusho'' has a fox demon named Yoko Kurama who was mortally wounded and took refuge in the womb of a pregnant woman, Shiori Minamino, and was reborn as her son, Shuichi Minamino. Even the description of Shuichi Kurama -long black hair, a pleasing face, a friendly demeanor, dresses in traditional clothes when he can get away with it and school uniforms when he can't- matches the one of Yoko Kurama in the manga (anime changed his hair color from black to red).

* DemonicPossession: Spirit hosts.

* LinearWarriorsQuadraticWizards: Werewolves are the most powerful starting level player characters in the NewWorldOfDarkness, but mages eclipse them at higher levels. That being said, higher level werewolf abilities are nothing to sneeze at.

* SewerGator: One potential manifestation of a powerful sewer-{{spirit|s}} from the "Predators" supplement book is described as a deformed giant rat riding "a great albino alligator".

The Forsaken band together into tribes, loose sociopolitical groups who share the same patron spirit: Blood Talons, the tribe of fierce warriors, Bone Shadows, the shamans and spirit walkers of the Forsaken, Hunters in Darkness, the hardy and bestial scouts and explorers, Iron Masters, the urban and cosmopolitan wielders of human technology and society, and Storm Lords, the generals and high kings of their kind. The antagonistic Pure werewolves have tribes as well: The zealous fanatics of the Fire-Touched, the cold and manipulative Ivory Claws, and the hunter-warrior gladiators of the Predator Kings.

* SewerGator: : One potential manifestation of a powerful sewer-{{spirit|s}} from the "Predators" supplement book is described as a deformed giant rat riding "a great albino alligator".

* SpiritWorld: The Hisil (also known as the Shadow, or the Other). Given that it's the twisted reflection of the ''World of Darkness'', it's not really surprising that it has more in common with ''Franchise/SilentHill'' than most. To give you an idea of the things that happen in there, mall-spirits lure other spirits and Werewolves into them. Where they are then devoured by the greater building spirit.
** Rather like the mall in Discworld/ReaperMan, actually.
** To be specific, Silent Hill is a Verge keyed to the protagonist's emotional state. The normal town is in Twilight--unrelated to the terrible books, it's a different layer of the world that spirits exist in when they're not in Shadow--and the Verge opens up, taking the character into Shadow for the Otherworld.

* CityOfAdventure: Denver and the surrounding areas.