True fear and other house rules

True fear is now rage vs victims willpower instead of physical traits vs willpower.

Just so future ahrouns know. It's still amazing.

Can we please house rule Primal Anger?

In tabletop it lets you sacrifice one health level a scene for 2 rage, in Larp it was poorly converted to allow sacrificing any number of health levels for 2 rage each. Remember, this is a basic gift.

2 'free' rage a scene is still amazing for a basic gift.

Checking other garou game's house rules they all seem to agree on this change.

If they sacrafice to many wound levels and dont spend for Resist pain well they can spend all the rage they want they just cant initiate any challenges or they end up loosing ties. I think too many people forget the wound penalties which could very well be a deciding factor.

Realistically I support limiting some of the more Broken BASIC gifts and this is one of them.

I can say from experience that Primal Anger in conjunction with healing magics is extremely broken. I would support houseruling it.

Or any of the many gifts that give extra health levels also (making it "free").

On the other side of things - don't forget the potential for frenzy.

*sigh*

I guess I have to defend it, since this is obviously due to me.

It is a metis only, and one of the bennies of being a hated and ostracized breed, with a huge amount of negs, is pretty kewl gifts.

It is only once a scene, and it is easy to go crazy with. it requires a fine hand and can easily backfire when you use it, the enemy drops and you are left near frenzy with a ton of rage, leaving you prone to wyrm frenzy

it literally can kill you if you do one level too much, or make you useless with wound penalties.

In a game with basic gifts like fatal flaw, clap of thunder, true fear, which house ruled is still busted, and totems like wolverine, having the metis have one admittedly kewl basic gift is fair.

As the guy who:

* Took this gift directly to the face and
* has next to no meaningful experience with Werewolf

I felt the gift was fine. A quick glance through the base LotW makes it pretty obvious that the powerscale is pretty heavily ramped for Werewolf. Each Auspice can do something ridiculous straight out of the box, with no Splatbooks necessary. A Rank one Philodox can become an army of one. A Rank one Galliard is a debuff machine. An Ahroun can stunlock someone indefinitely. Taking the Forgotten is just begging to be used as a grief-tool for Ragabashes, nevermind the mind-cracking potential of their other rank one gifts.

It's almost like it was written with making you feel awesome in mind.

It's only usable once a scene, and the damage is agg. If we nerf this one, we should probably nerf about a dozen other rank one gifts. I'd strongly recommend we think long and hard before starting this precedent. Usually when you nerf something, something else becomes unbalanced to replace it-the dynamic is thrown off. :Z

Here's a request to make something MORE awesome: The Iskakku maneuver "Dragon Emerges from Mountain" (TB: CoG Rev. pg. 83) says that once per combat, you can thrust your staff straight into an enemy's face and inflict 2B. But as per Dark Epics, staves inflict two damage by default. Do you guys want to change what this maneuver does, or just get rid of it outright (not all the Iskakku maneuverse have TT-to-MET analogues as it is).

After looking at the Iskakku stuff as written for MET, I think it's biggest benefit is the fact that it's a retest for itself: Thusly, you can have 10 ability retests for your Melee, essentially. A lot of the effects are pretty...lackluster, at least for certain Auspices.

It's much better in TT, yeah. The best justification for getting it is to get Iskakku 5's maneuver...

Which is still pretty solid justification for dropping 5 XP into it.

Upon consideration, while this power seems busted, and it's amazing, the tabletop version is only marginally weaker and only because if they want a huge rage pool for a battle they need to carry it through multiple scenes and risk frenzy. Even if this power was house ruled it wouldn't stop insane rage gains it would just change when and how those gains occurred.

As it is for anyone to use this power effectively in combat they either need to use it lightly or have a pack mate ready to heal them. Overreaction on my part to hearing OMG eleven rage.

...followed immediately by "OMG, no target for the Ahroun with eleven rage, he's gonna eat us!"

I was flipping around my Werewolf book (one of these days, I'll try to sit through a full cover to cover reading, I guess) and found myself questioning our HR.

Now that True Fear is Rage vs. Willpower, does it count as a Rage Challenge? More specifically, is every instance of True Fear use cause for frenzy?

I think you may be over complicating things at this point, but to be fair, I'm just getting a feel for the system.

The reason it was changed, was because as it was before, I could overbid anyone who was rank 3 or less, 100% of the time. Then they're hosed for pretty much a whole combat. They can decide to be brave, and die, or they can choose to flee. That was it for their options. This way the max traits are at least fairly compared between the different trait categories, and rage sounds appropriate for instilling terror ala the curse.

I understand the reasoning there(though the more I look into it, the more I start wondering if you'll land a TF without some kind of Will-debuff/Rage-buff), I'm simply wondering if it triggers other things that happen when you test rage.

This is coming from someone else who doesn't really understand it either, so I could be misinterpreting what a Rage Challenge constitutes.

Shields the Heart wrote:I understand the reasoning there(though the more I look into it, the more I start wondering if you'll land a TF without some kind of Will-debuff/Rage-buff), I'm simply wondering if it triggers other things that happen when you test rage.

Oh, you're likely to land it. Keep in mind that nobody starts with a Willpower as high as an Ahroun's starting Rage; in order to have an even chance, the defender HAS to sink points into Willpower.


Now, part of the problem, I think, is that people assume True Fear (and Falling Touch) do more than they actually do.

True Fear prevents the target from attacking. It doesn't prevent him from doing anything else. The target could, for example, call up spirits and say "Protect me!" The target could throw up defensive gifts. The target could step sideways, or go airborne with Spirit of the Bird, or do anything else that's not an attack.

Likewise, Falling Touch simply prevents the target from initiating physical challenges. It does NOT cause him to lose his next four actions. That vampire you just knocked down can still Dominate your butt, or pop Majesty, or do anything that doesn't involve physical challenges.

I think if we stick to the text of the abilities, they won't be nearly as unbalanced as I've seen them get in some chronicles.

I think the number one thing we're worried about is PvP, but the real reason werewolf powers can be broken, and I'm trying to remind myself of this repeatedly, is that real werewolf games tend to be predominately PvE. If we nerf all the best powers, it's only going to hurt us when the BSD's and Fomori start rocking out base book powers that WERE balanced with the gifts we formerly had. I know I'm one of the offenders.

Yes. It's really important to keep in mind that while PvP applications must always be considered, your real enemy is the the world.

In a vampire game, I would feel bad about killing a player as an ST, and would apologize for hitting them with a plot bus... but in Werewolf, we have to not hold back our punches as storytellers, or the world has no meaning. That's a huge mindset difference. Not just for staff, but for players as well. Live together, die alone.

/Structurally, the first six months of this game should look like the first season of lost.
//This has nothing to do with houserules.
///I like to think out loud.

Not sure its a question of 'nerf' so much as get it right, a lot of the gifts... true fear, staredown, falling touch, et. al. are all pretty nebulous in their mechanics, mostly coming down to the question of 'what constitutes an attack' which the victim cant do for the duration.

I cant see any reason to call true fear or staredown an attack, so I wouldn't be surprised to see two ahrouns glaring at each other waiting for mental traits to run out. Because staredown tests against willpower, I'd think someone under the influence of inspiration would automatically resist it the first time. Its a scarily dangerous gift, but I dont think it needs any more modification beyond whats already been changed.

PvP really is a concern also. Garou dont tend to agree or get along easily. The differences between some tribes and auspices all but guarantee there's be internal strife. Its part of the background of the system as to why things have shaped up how they have, but in this case we're also looking at the PvE trouble down the line. Every gift we're mentioning is something that the BSD's have full access to as well.

True Fear cannot be used in response to True Fear, as True Fear is considered an attack, according to ST ruling. It's already been asked in someone's reports when trying to spend exp.....

Yep. There's a strong PvP element inherent to Werewolf. While werewolves should be awesome in combat against the Wyrm, there needs to be a certain amount of balance so the sept isn't dominated simply by those with the juiciest gifts.

When considering whether an ability in a game is broken, my basic benchmark is this: is this your opening shot in virtually every fight, regardless of circumstances? If it is, chances are it's broken.

True Fear, and Falling touch are broken then.

Not really.

It might be your first shot in a one on one... but other situations? completely different.

Say I am an ahroun in a pack with a shadow lord. my first chop is inspiration.

his first chop? Clap of hunder, all of our pack (save me) auto wins the not falling down stun, 1/3 or more of all the other enemies? Down.

Are we Rank threes? Because then my first action is a combo, I primal anger 6 health levels, and then friend in need 12 rage or so to another Ahroun, and while he is a whirling dervish of agg my theurge/cog team mates heal me on their action, and I go in swinging. depending on how the fight flows, I will either throw chops or friend in need will power to the galliards, my gnosis to the theurges, and health levels to who ever looks like they are dropping

If I am a shadow lord ahroun, I create one with only appearance and misc social traits, step back and cold voice of reason (stops them from attacking me for three full turns, and, in order, Razor claws, fatal flaw, seize the edge I know do three damage a smack and fight in hispo (same phys traits, way less negs, bonus to senses, keeps appearance traits so i can defend myself much better socially) and now both my bite and my claws do three, and I can throw in an offhand action at the end of the raging, all this while my pack buffs the shit out of us, and debuffs the other guys.

you got to remember, werewolf combat is about comboing, not just with other packmates, but with mutiple gifts with each person, and having combos for every situation, 1 vs 1 (where true fear and falling touch are king), pack (s) vs horde of enemies (where clap of thunder/inspiration is awesome), or pack(s) vs one big scary bad (where having debuffing the main bad, and buffing your boys makes the difference between a win and a lot of funerals)

So, yea. I would hate to fight a ahroun with true fear straight up. But that same ahroun or even three of them, with TF will not do as well being charged by30 small bad guys as a well comboed pack where two of those ahrouns combo up clap and inspiration starting at range, and neither of those sets will do as well against a massive big bad as asilver fang galliard who dumps a debuff (using tribe thing and performance and calling crinos negs to win against the superior opponent and immediately spending the will power to refresh to do it again next round) and the COG theurge sucking up five of his rage with Calm and the Black fury metis uses curse of hatred at the enemy rank 5 BSD (who has enough will power that he would likely win the true fear chop if that is all the ahroun had) while the ahroun drill him with actions, distracting him enough that the ragabash takes the forgotten on his klaive after having suddenly stepped sideways the previous round in a dodge to make him burn off more rageby the time the fight starts going, he is down 2 will, 7 plus rage, has -11 traits in all categories is missing his klaive and would run, except the get philodox used halt the cowards flight... and next turn it looks worse when even the ragabash can over bid him.

and that is without leaving the base book for dirty tricks, tips and combos. Support Class cog Ahrouns are boss. Tank/DPS metis philodox rule, crowd control get ragabashes, off tank/dps shadowlord galliards... all are equally sick, in their specific situation. Wicked sick. And we are still losing to the wyrm. lets not go powering down our gifts, because i doubt the STs will lighten up the opposition in return. and as for saying, well I can never beat that ahroun ina brawl... why the hell are you brawling with ahroun unless you are one? You don't see me picking pockets or doing punishment rites? This is a caste system. Know your social role. and realize how to subvert it in genre with the right gifts and some teamwork and imagination.

I'm going to put on my WoW Gladiator specs for this one.

From what information I have (I don't own the splats)? Assuming you aren't mixing and matching out of Auspice/Breed/Tribe?

Ahroun vs. 1: Ahroun are stunlock rogues. If you can't trinket out of the stun/catch a lucky miss-spree, you're pretty much done.

Ahroun vs. Group: The Ahroun is probably screwed. Unless the Ahroun can functionally ignore the majority of the group somehow/only one or two members of the group are threats to him, he shouldn't be opening with the stun.

Group w/Ahroun vs 1: Depending on composition, the Ahroun may have better options available to him. There are a handful I saw that looked downright sick in team-affairs.

Group vs. Group: Here's where things get good(I'm not going to lie: A part of me looks forward to GvG). Ahrouns are still stunlock rogues, but they should be doing things like peeling and debuffing for others (again, depending on composition) to set up for burst-down kills.

Bear in mind, this is only really true for Basic-gift ranks. Once you get to intermediates, it looks like things change/get a bit more rounded. TF/FT are still manly tools, but they're situational.

Modded to add: GODDAMNIT IGGY. YOU STOLE MY THUNDA.

That's assuming you can freely mix and match the best gifts of all auspices, breeds, and tribes, Iggy--I don't think that's a guarantee. Happened a lot last chronicle without too many repercussions, but I get the distinct impression that the STs are going to be stricter about enforcing consequences in this chronicle.

As for "not brawling with Ahrouns," we both know that it's a nice theory, but it only works until the Ahroun says "We do it my way or I beat the crap out of you." Now, that doesn't happen ALL the time, but it does happen.

As it happens, I'm not saying True Fear needs more of a reduction; I think rage versus will is balanced, as long as we remember that it's not Hold Person, and the person who gets hit with it has options. Ditto Falling Touch; as long as we keep in mind that it's not "I hit you, do nothing for four actions," I don't see any problems.

.Thunda-snow?!!

I am not assuming you can mix and match the gifts, I am saying mix and match your pack mates! develop plans based on what you have and can have! You know, plan of actions? Tactics? Also, when Ahrouns do that, you have two options, challenge them over the issue, and have the challenge master set a challenge, which will certainly not be a fist fight. or, conversely, you get a bigger meaner ahroun to show him why being a jerk is bad, a big mean ahroun with a hatred for bullies, maybe one in your pack or tribe.

...or, alternately, a Bully who'll bully for you. Same end result though.

Point taken. I'm not sure anyone's calling for anything to be further nerfed, though, so I'm not really sure what the argument is about at this point.

(BTW: Sent you a message on Facebook, Iggy--drop me a line?)

I asked a question about TF and Frenzy.

Sadly, that question was left behind.