Changing Ways thoughts

[Ana Mizuki]

Huh? Transphobia is a not a problem solely in the West(not saying that YOU said that), so I'm not sure why that was needed to be said.

I do agree with you on the weird placement and text considering the next chapter's discussion.

Sorry, I meant that the reasons given in the sidebar sounded coming from the perspective of such people. "Why do you doubt Gaia" and such. Ignoring that gender switchers have a long tradition in mythology all around the world, things that garou viewpoints should be based more on, rather than the strict gender binary.

Or that some trans people do not want or need a surgery to feel themselves in their own bodies.

[Fat Larry]

Sorry, I meant that the reasons given in the sidebar sounded coming from the perspective of such people. "Why do you doubt Gaia" and such. Ignoring that gender switchers have a long tradition in mythology all around the world, things that garou viewpoints should be based more on, rather than the strict gender binary.

Or that some trans people do not want or need a surgery to feel themselves in their own bodies.

Agreed 100%

[Saur Ops Specialist]

1. Does it really matter if the thing that's killing Gaia is being killed by global warming?

Last I checked, the usual setting element of the death of Gaia and the Wyld being pollution fundamentally hasn't changed. Global warming is something that happens because of pollution. Not sure what the deal is.

This is a change that works in a manner entirely different from PCB contamination in the St. Lawrence River or all of the nuclear testing sites. Its primary impact is the loss of habitat to an artificial onlap sequence, which would naturally set the stage for more oceanic concerns as the seas swallow up land - islands, at first, and then coastline on continents. This seems like it would be a natural fit for making the Chulorviah front and center and having them rant about a "promised night" or something of that variety, in a very Lovecraftian twist where stopping the cult means enacting policy changes. It could lead the Garou into conflict with the Rokea over who gets to share the Steep from the Rorqual. It would lead to conflicts of Garou against Garou as the loss of caerns drives sept members inland, possibly to serious rivals who don't exactly welcome them with open arms.

A kind of disturbance like the Avatar Storm makes no sense, and its description smacks of some kind of "cosmic punishment" that Werewolf does very well without. Only consequences, here.

3. Regarding the rest of the criticisms...you still don't have decisive proof that those were nuWW mandate changes.

Where else would that future fates sidebar come from? And why else would the writing dispense with so much of what was written, just like how the stated goal is to treat all of the past editions' material as unreliable? I mean, in Revised, Pegasus would straight-up boot out a Fury that abandoned her metis son or gave him to another tribe, much less killed him. The entirety of the metis chapter ignores entirely what the tribal totem thinks should happen in every case. This seems kind of important, given that they're the main spiritual advocates of large bodies of Garou and also the primary active patrons of Garou society.

[Ana Mizuki]

Where else would that future fates sidebar come from? And why else would the writing dispense with so much of what was written, just like how the stated goal is to treat all of the past editions' material as unreliable? I mean, in Revised, Pegasus would straight-up boot out a Fury that abandoned her metis son or gave him to another tribe, much less killed him. The entirety of the metis chapter ignores entirely what the tribal totem thinks should happen in every case. This seems kind of important, given that they're the main spiritual advocates of large bodies of Garou and also the primary active patrons of Garou society.

Well, to be honest, the totems are ignored in revised as well. What with Stag and Falcon accepting metis just fine, but the tribes themselves making the poor sods into nigh useless garou with their abuse. Pegasus not snapping at a male metis sacrificing Fury is weird, sure. But the precedent is there.

I don't mind the wide variation of tribal opinions, the chapter is -still- better to me that the previous metis one just by having non-whiny narrators and decent look into what goes into a metis' life. However, a lot of the descs on tribes could have used research into how their local cultures treated their disabled/bastard children. Especially with Silver Fangs, the description is very flat and doesn't really portray the nuance the tribe has had.

To me, especially given just how long this book was in writing (and was even in 'post-editing development' for a while), I do think that the current descriptions of the tribes were the result of a massive rewrite.

[Maris Streck]

Definitely a topic that has to be handled with delicacy and one where it is impossible to please everyone.

Let's assume that everyone here is a nice person and has nothing against homosexual or transgender people in real life and we'd all actually like to see less discrimination against them. That said, it feels really a forced issue into the Werewolf continuity, like they wanted to look gay friendly and politically correct at all cost... I mean, is this only a selling point for you? To lure SJWs into buying material? =p

The Garou are the most reactionary society in the whole WoD. I can't see any room for LGBTs beside hiding or ronin.

So, in order to make sure people understood that published adventures are totally optional and only as real as any group feels like making them, which you and everyone else obviously already know, and safeguard against their ideas for the future of the Garou nation, they invalidated the 84% of the book that deals with previously published history.

I quite liked the time travel adventure too, to be fair. There are a few points I didn't really understand in the handling of the time zones -not sure if they're plot holes- and I realise that it might become a bit boring to have a campaign of 20 differnt scenarios on time travel, but overall it felt quite decently made.

[Ana Mizuki]

Let's assume that everyone here is a nice person and has nothing against homosexual or transgender people in real life and we'd all actually like to see less discrimination against them. That said, it feels really a forced issue into the Werewolf continuity, like they wanted to look gay friendly and politically correct at all cost... I mean, is this only a selling point for you? To lure SJWs into buying material? =p

The Garou are the most reactionary society in the whole WoD. I can't see any room for LGBTs beside hiding or ronin.

To me, it actually is the opposite. Garou culture maybe somewhat based on human culture, but it isn't the same. Remember that, at least here in the West, huge part of why gay people are discriminated and abused is due to the Bible/similar books saying that gay people are wrong and being gay is a sin.

Garou do not have that book, their Litany and ways are much older than that. Given they also are part wolf and wolves do engage in homosexual activity, that would colour their perspective. As well, engaging in homosexual activity hasn't been a no no in myths that some of the garou tribes are based on.

Basically, it would be more weird for garou to hold such strong hatered for homosexuality, given their culture.

[Fat Larry]

That said, it feels really a forced issue into the Werewolf continuity, like they wanted to look gay friendly and politically correct at all cost... I mean, is this only a selling point for you? To lure SJWs into buying material? =p.

Oh, well I have plenty of other thoughts on the matter(especially regarding the authors), that I'm simply not going to share on these forums. Onyx Path, and these forums as a whole, steer to the far left. Which, hey, it is what it is.

So my opinions are generally not wanted nor accepted as I've been told time and again.

I'm here to enjoy(or try to enjoy) the books they pump out. It's my escapism.

[glamourweaver]

The Garou are the most reactionary society in the whole WoD. I can't see any room for LGBTs beside hiding or ronin.

My problem with this statement is its underselling how reactionary they are. It's presenting them as only reactionary to values that went global in the 18th and 19th centuries or so. As opposed to reactionary with the values of historic cultures that had no qualms whatsoever about homosexual behavior and strong recognition of people who crossed out of gender binaries.

I mean even today, many cultures that are more homophobic than the modern west are in fact significantly less transphobic, recognizing wrong-gender-assignment as a correctable mistake.

The idea that 'the past' and 'cultural traditionalism' = homophobic and transphobic is a very culturally narrow and ahistorically recent view.

The only principle that strikes me as a cultural value that cuts through the Garou Nations that will be a problem for some gay people, is the cultural mandate to reproduce. But assuming that requirement is met, at my own table the Garou don't care what other relationships you have with humans or wolves (though Garou/Garou sex is as forbidden in same-sex cases as male-female cases). And the only tribe to have a reason to care about members' gender identity are the Furies. But that question should really be easily settled by who Pegasus is willing to accept into the Tribe. If Pegasus accepts trans women into the Tribe, the transphobic members don't have a leg to stand on. Certainly the Greek Myth of Sypretes is precedent for someone who "became" a woman being accepted into fully female order.

[Hispothesis]

I finally bothered to make a forum account just so I could come talk about Changing Ways. I'm most of the way through the Lupus chapter and, while I've enjoyed a lot of things (especially the metis chapter), I have formed a collection of beefs of varying sizes. I apologize in advance for length:

Minor Beef: The idea that the only way for there to be fat garou is through "dedicated" idleness/indulgence (p12) is pretty unnecessary, and doesn't account for other reasons why people can be overweight. It's enough to say that fat garou are uncommon due to their biology and leave it at that without moralizing about it.

Major Beef/Inconsistency: Women's bodies and trans Garou. Hoo boy. The whole Wolf Women header's (p13) handling of termination of pregnancies and birth control among Garou is a bit of a mess and is inconsistent with other lore. I also have this problem with the treatment of transgender characters in the Werewolves and Gender sidebar on p19. Central to both sections is the idea that werewolf speed healing will prevent a character from having an abortion performed (when most abortions are outpatient procedures and, based on my research, not inordinately painful compared to most garou activities) or from receiving gender reassignment. In this same book we are told that werewolves can voluntarily suppress their healing to allow for ritual scarification, tattoos, and body modification. This is especially true of nonmetis in breed form, as those forms heal more slowly anyway. Cosmetic alterations become accepted as part of the Garou's body's understanding of who/what they are, and it seems outright bizarre to me that this understanding could not extend to gender presentation (as the book is willing to accept that gender is a matter of spirit here).

The idea of werewolves using contraception is rejected because their bodies reject "chemicals", but at the same time it's accepted that Garou can awaken the spirits of plants to feel their full effects. There are natural contraceptive/abortive methods, and werewolf women are women. Even if it's a social taboo, the idea that they don't have access to contraceptives/abortifacients in any way while Garou can awaken weed to get high sprains my disbelief. This is to say nothing of multiple references to contraception in the metis chapter. Even though it emphasizes that contraceptives are less effective between Garou, it's still more than the Wolf Women section allows. It's even outright stated on p61 that Fianna usually terminate metis pregnancies, but this flies in the face of the earlier part of the book that says werewolves can't abort. Werewolves struggling to avoid conceiving metis has always been a little silly to me, but I've been willing to accept it as a setting thing because it follows the spirit of the law of the Litany and magic is magic. Trying to completely explain away the problem with werewolf regeneration doesn't work when exceptions to werewolf regeneration are right here in the same book.

Also, page 50 says a pregnancy can't survive shapeshifting after the second trimester while Wolf Women says that pregnant werewolves aren't restricted until shortly before birth. I suspect the former is supposed to be specific to metis, but it's not specified. Which is true? And, if shapeshifting causes a pregnancy to become inviable, why is it not acknowledged as a means of terminating a metis pregnancy even if such a thing is anathema to most Garou?

I also want to say: I don't have a problem with Garou being jerks about transgender characters, Garou being jerks is a big part of what they are and this setting. "Garou are jerks" is one of their central flaws as a splat and a huge theme of their fiction. The variance between cultures among Garou gives STs the freedom to use as much or as little of this in their chronicles as they please. That's a good thing. It's when it starts to become "werewolf biology/magic says you can't do anything to ease dysphoria without going on a big spirit quest even though there are parts of the lore that this contradicts" that I particularly take umbrage. Go ahead and leave varying levels of social taboo in the mix, it makes sense, but it's better to leave the definitive can and cannot of how the world works in the hands of storytellers and players. You can vary levels of animosity from npcs to account for player comfort because werewolves aren't a monolith, but it's harder to make a case that you're including trans characters (and the players that may want to play them) when there's a clear line of "lol sorry you can't even have basic accommodations because magic". Garou suffer. Let trans Garou suffer because they're Garou just like everyone else, it's not necessary to make specific lore exceptions just to make them suffer more for being trans.

(Also: I'm aware not all transgender individuals want to go on hormones or have surgery, this just isn't about that.)

Major Beef: Crinos. The handling of the Crinos description (around p23) is very Forsaken. Yes, Crinos is a Rage-heavy form, but to my memory it's never been this drilled down and restrictive in description. There are also two references to "needing high Gnosis" in shapeshifting in this part of the book (here and, if I remember, in the partial transformation section), which makes zero sense with either mechanics or previous lore. Rage has always been associated with shapeshifting, even the fine mixed morphs used in Kailindo require Rage expenditure and not Gnosis. The sidebar that explains what "high Gnosis" optional mechanic means appears pages later, adding to confusion.

Even if it were in a more appropriate place, I still balk at the idea that it's somehow harder to get to Crinos than the other forms. Needing high Gnosis to do it outside battle and some young Garou not even knowing they can? Buddy, it's an easier shift difficulty than Glabro or Hispo. Whether people like it or not, Crinos has always had a ceremonial/noncombat place in Garou culture, even if your ST can fairly call for you to make more rage checks.

I'm really displeased about the revisionism around the Crinos form. I like Crinos form the way it is, and I'm sure I'm not alone in that. I sure hope this is not a marker of things to come in W5. It has a lot of cool/fun factor, and part of why I never took to Forsaken is the restriction of the big bad wolf form.

Missing Information: Longstrider. Starting on page 59, who is Longstrider? We do not have any identifiers for this narrative npc. Confusingly, she talks in the Red Talon bit as if she's a member of that tribe while also identifying herself as a Silent Strider in that section.

Inconsistency: Page 63 talks about how aggressively anti gay werewolf/werewolf relationships the Glass Walkers are even though a previous section talked about how they tolerate/even encourage them. This would've been fine if it were identified as unusual, but the character that talks about it states it like it's a whole-tribe norm.

Typo: A Wendigo on p68 is probably supposed to be Snake Killer, not Snake Killder

Inconsistency: Is it the "tongue of the Wild" or "Garou tongue"? An early section in the book uses the former, later sections use the latter. It's no skin off my back if both are valid, it was just weird.

Minor Beef: While the section in the metis chapter about the acceptance of homosexual werewolf/werewolf relationships because they don't produce children was very interesting (and it's good to see gay inclusion), it doesn't really bother with nonhomophobic reasons why those relationships might be rejected except "because Litany". I recall in older editions there was mention of the issue not being metis children, but the pulling away of Garou from their kinfolk by having insular relationships with one another. Another concern that would be good to bring up is fraternization. For example: A pack leader loves a member of the pack, can they fairly weigh that Garou's life vs the lives of the rest of the pack in crisis?
I also thought the repeated expression of the idea that gay werewolves fight all the harder to protect werewolves that will breed was pretty misguided.

Major Beef/Lore Violation: Page 90 has a reference to the existence of male homid Black Furies AND to Red Talons kidnapping homids from other tribes to make them breed with their wolf kinfolk. Both of these are, needless to say, extremely out of character for these tribes!

Eyeroll: I skipped ahead and found the new pack terminology. Really? Zedakh, uldakh, taldakh? Can't we just admit alpha, beta, and omega are not really accurate ideas to real wolves and move on? I'll agree with earlier sentiment in this thread that the words also feel a lot more WtF than they do WtA, but that's a lesser factor than my general feeling of ugh. One of this game's problems for new players is the sheer amount of jargon and silly words, don't make this even harder for me.

Now, on to the good: I really enjoyed most of the metis chapter! Maybe some of it wasn't as fleshed out as other parts, but I really liked the varying views presented in septs here and the portrayal of metis childhood. Lupus chapter has been okay, the early part stronger than the middle (which isn't bad so much as it is just kind of bland, my eyes keep sliding across it). I appreciate that it gives some structure for players to potentially work from when deciding what their cub's prechange life was like. I definitely appreciate that we finally have some modern depiction of wolves as a family group instead of the old Alpha model, and acknowledgment of the differences between wild and captive packs. The descriptions of living life with Rage and how it can hamper and misguide werewolves as well as help them were also useful to me, and will help me get this idea across to new players.

I'm not finished yet, but I'm more than halfway there and here's where I sit.

[tasti man LH]

The time travel story is 27 of 165 pages (not counting the Kickstarter backer lists). What they also declared non-canon (apart from the other adventure and Storytelling advice, which anyone can obviously take or leave for their game as they see fit) are 22 pages of painstakingly researched history of the Changing Breeds across several editions of game line, reconciling conflicting legends, scraps of information, and real world time periods to give a coherent view of shapeshifter history so groups could set a game in any time period. And they made non-canon 71 pages of even more painstakingly researched detail into what the Wars of Rage were and how they shaped the Garou and Fera nations we know today (including the War of Shame etc.). And (for those who liked it) they made non-canon the 13 pages of the War of Dragons and how they shaped the future.

So, in order to make sure people understood that published adventures are totally optional and only as real as any group feels like making them, which you and everyone else obviously already know, and safeguard against their ideas for the future of the Garou nation, they invalidated the 84% of the book that deals with previously published history.

...material that, as you have stated yourself, was based off of pre-existing canonical material. Which would mean it CAN'T be completely non-canon.

Where else would that future fates sidebar come from?

Based off the precedent set in M20, metaplot ideas that you don't have to follow if you don't want to? And merely offering a suggestion of a potential future?

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No, what this all comes off to me is a rather clumsy way of nuWW to cover their asses.

That they know full well any additions or changes to metaplot canon is going to be met with controversy and outcry. Especially since history shows that when Revised hit and all the gamelines were End Times, quite a few people weren't happy with the changes That they're declaring: "Ok, look: if you don't like the new material and changes, you don't HAVE to use them if you don't want to. As such, if you wanted to ignore these books, you're not only in your right to do so, but nothing will be lost if you do."

Best case, it's them acknowledging that canon additions and changes can be polarizing for fans and are letting people know that they're aware of it. Worst case, it's nu-WW being cowards on not wanting to take any responsibility for any fan backlash that happens.

And, well, we won't know for sure until Werewolf 5th actually comes out to find out if any setting details that directly contradict any information from the W20 books.

Inb4 "But look at what they're planning for WoD5th edition!!! They're CLEARLY dictating the direction of what they want to do! Isn't that, by it's definition, declaring what canon is true/not true?!"

...and this isn't 5th Edition. We're still in W20. Something that nuWW has significantly less direct control over versus OPP.

[Ana Mizuki]

Hispothesis Damn, hit all the parts I had issue with as well.


Anyway, yeah, more and more I am beginning to really think the book got some massive rewrites to resemble its current form. That, and just stuff taken wholesale from Forsaken. Which to me is extremely confusing, because the two games now run concurrently. There is no reason for Apocalypse to be like Forsaken and vice versa.

To the trans thing, there is no reason why switching gender should be treated as this huge and rare thing. Given spirits are genderless, and the concept of switching them being a staple in myths, it shouldn't be that rare of a situation. Especially as trans people didn't suddenly pop out of the earth when 20st century began.

Longstrider thing was a good catch too. Especially their double tribes XD

This book is a mess O.o

[Saur Ops Specialist]

...material that, as you have stated yourself, was based off of pre-existing canonical material. Which would mean it CAN'T be completely non-canon.

That's the thing - the new plans are apparently to root up everything. It's been mentioned as how they're dealing with Vampire; it's probably also what they're doing with Werewolf.

Based off the precedent set in M20, metaplot ideas that you don't have to follow if you don't want to? And merely offering a suggestion of a potential future?

The Avatar Storm never affected Garou at all. Changing that detail is a truly bizarre retcon.

-----------------------------------------------------------------

No, what this all comes off to me is a rather clumsy way of nuWW to cover their asses.

That they know full well any additions or changes to metaplot canon is going to be met with controversy and outcry. Especially since history shows that when Revised hit and all the gamelines were End Times, quite a few people weren't happy with the changes That they're declaring: "Ok, look: if you don't like the new material and changes, you don't HAVE to use them if you don't want to. As such, if you wanted to ignore these books, you're not only in your right to do so, but nothing will be lost if you do."

Best case, it's them acknowledging that canon additions and changes can be polarizing for fans and are letting people know that they're aware of it. Worst case, it's nu-WW being cowards on not wanting to take any responsibility for any fan backlash that happens.

And, well, we won't know for sure until Werewolf 5th actually comes out to find out if any setting details that directly contradict any information from the W20 books.

Inb4 "But look at what they're planning for WoD5th edition!!! They're CLEARLY dictating the direction of what they want to do! Isn't that, by it's definition, declaring what canon is true/not true?!"

...and this isn't 5th Edition. We're still in W20. Something that nuWW has significantly less direct control over versus OPP.

They can order rewrites of anything and ghost write in whatever they want to. They have ultimate control over the license. They have very direct control, even if this is still (technically) a W20 book, and by all accounts, they did exactly this with Changing Ways.

[tasti man LH]

They can order rewrites of anything and ghost write in whatever they want to. They have ultimate control over the license. They have very direct control, even if this is still (technically) a W20 book, and by all accounts, they did exactly this with Changing Ways.

Which either way, is still speculative on what they did/didn't rewrite and change themselves. Which I have no reason to believe without hard, decisive evidence.

And here, some we do, some we don't.

There's a difference between "I *think* nuWW made some changes and rewrites" versus "I *know* nuWW made some changes and rewrites."

[Fat Larry]

Hispothesis
To the trans thing, there is no reason why switching gender should be treated as this huge and rare thing. Given spirits are genderless, and the concept of switching them being a staple in myths, it shouldn't be that rare of a situation. Especially as trans people didn't suddenly pop out of the earth when 20st century began.

Onyx Path has been putting sidebars about transgender info into their World of Darkness books for the past few years. Some, like Mage, have a ton of stuff devoted to it.

I wouldn't be surprised if this WAS something from Onyx Path(especially considering some of the writers on this book), and by trying to be inclusive, it simply came across to some as offensive.

Maybe we'll hear from someone to set the record straight.

[Fat Larry]

There's a difference between "I *think* nuWW made some changes and rewrites" versus "I *know* nuWW made some changes and rewrites."

Very true. And there are some here who outright despise White Wolf/Paradox/Martin, etc. and will throw shade at them at every chance.

Not saying that is what's happening here. Just saying I KNOW it does happen.