Ok....apparently we are going full Forsaken.

[Ana Mizuki]

They have had problems with people saying their works for 5th edition are Nazi friendly, and I am guessing that means they were worried about the possibility of people asking 'why are the Nazi werewolves still in you Nazi lovers!?' if they attempted to rehabilitate them in the setting reset. Its possible they have even decided to make them a fallen tribe specifically as evidence they can point to to say 'see, we made the Nazi werewolves the bad guys so how can we be pro-Nazi?' if people try to call them such again in the future.

The funny thing is, that I have seen MUCH more dislike for the Talons than Fenrir. Yes, Fenrir 1st ed tribebook is bad, yes their tribal symbol IS suspect. But those things are now 30 years old, there are generations of WtA players who've only known revised or W20.

Generally, Talons wanting to kill humans/eating humans is seen as a much MUCH bigger obstacle to get through. The misanthropy, the fact that they refuse to engage with humanity and them being mostly lupus are huge roadblocks to most.

Of course, this is how I've experienced things.

[Mizu]

The funny thing is, that I have seen MUCH more dislike for the Talons than Fenrir. Yes, Fenrir 1st ed tribebook is bad, yes their tribal symbol IS suspect. But those things are now 30 years old, there are generations of WtA players who've only known revised or W20.

Generally, Talons wanting to kill humans/eating humans is seen as a much MUCH bigger obstacle to get through. The misanthropy, the fact that they refuse to engage with humanity and them being mostly lupus are huge roadblocks to most.

Of course, this is how I've experienced things.

A bunch of jerk wolves that want to kill all humans is blatantly fantastic so people can easily go 'oh, it is just a game', nazis hit people where they live and therefore invoke a more visceral reaction from people. At least, that is my working theory on things like why people were so mad at the notion that blood drinking undead abominations might sometimes choose a skinhead for the embrace (because vampires are known to be paragons of virtue that would care about that). Having to become a predator who drinks human blood to survive (and are probably enslaving people into your feeding herd and turning them into ghouls and stuff) is blatantly fantastic so people can go 'its just a game' when thinking about such evil acts. But being a nazi is something from real life so it becomes serious business compared to the other evil things vampires do.

[Heavy Arms]

They have had problems with people saying their works for 5th edition are Nazi friendly, and I am guessing that means they were worried about the possibility of people asking 'why are the Nazi werewolves still in you Nazi lovers!?' if they attempted to rehabilitate them in the setting reset. Its possible they have even decided to make them a fallen tribe specifically as evidence they can point to to say 'see, we made the Nazi werewolves the bad guys so how can we be pro-Nazi?' if people try to call them such again in the future.

Revised and W20 already laid plenty of ground work here by having the Fenrir get more serious about pushing out the Nazi and similar ideological movements within the Tribe as a weakness bringing them down; thus requiring removal.

Additionally, the WoD5 books are supposed to be making all of these changes to make the games fit better with 2020 than 1990. "How do you combat radicalization within your ideology," is a very important subject in current times, and the Get were well positioned after W20 to be good avenue to explore this while still making it clear that Nazis are bad.

The way you keep any reasonable complaints about the Get's Nazi history in check, is by having the Get more on from purging the Swords, to starting to seriously deal with why the Swords had such an easily time being part of the Tribe in the first place. You don't white wash history and just declare the Get redeemed. You put the Get on the path towards redemption now that they've recognized the need for drastic change. Just like Wraith's developer talked to a well respected Holocaust expert, and some of the changes happening in W5 are clearly from some level of listening to advocates for better respect for indigenous people, there are people out there who can talk about how to discuss these topics in the game in a way that doesn't diminish the horrors of Nazism, while still addressing what to people with ties to such movements do when they see how bad they got and want to be better.

Yes, it's work. Yes, it's not free to hire such consultants. But it's not some impossible hurdle to address the concerns of people that are worried the presence of the Fenrir in a "back to the basics" edition returning them to being pro-Nazi and thus tainting the game with them being protagonists.

Cutting the Fenrir is a solution too, but it's ultimately the lazier one, and much like my complaints about translating Native words into English, is just a surface level fix. There's still a lot of room in WtA for Garou that end up falling into human radical bigotry without the Get there (ironically the Red Talons being the most obvious examples without any human born members of the Tribe). This is, really, getting back to one of the long standing core themes of the game: The dichotomy of the Garou's ideals and their actions; how their dedication to their cause blinds them to the moral compromises they make along the way that ultimately have consistently undermined their long term success.

A bunch of jerk wolves that want to kill all humans is blatantly fantastic so people can easily go 'oh, it is just a game', nazis hit people where they live and therefore invoke a more visceral reaction from people.

While true, most polls I've seen over the last few decades (include ones done by large fan clubs with hundreds of members) consistently show that the Red Talons are one of the least played Tribes, while the Get are frequently toward the top. The Nazism in the Get's history is not the turn off to actually playing Get that the fantastic bigotry of the Talons is.

Say what you will about any implications from there, but if you're just looking at what gets played, the Talons are generally and consistently towards the bottom of the list. The visceral reaction to real world vs. fantasy isn't the deciding factor (also WtA Tribes are all tied to real world stuff, plenty with ugly history, so WtA fans in general are less likely to put that visceral reaction as their primary motivation).

At least, that is my working theory on things like why people were so mad at the notion that blood drinking undead abominations might sometimes choose a skinhead for the embrace (because vampires are known to be paragons of virtue that would care about that). Having to become a predator who drinks human blood to survive (and are probably enslaving people into your feeding herd and turning them into ghouls and stuff) is blatantly fantastic so people can go 'its just a game' but being a nazi is something from real life so it becomes serious business.

Or, you know, we can put complaints in their real context. The complaint about the neo-Nazi in the Brujah Clan write-up in V5 was the moral equivalence drawn between a public defender, an Internet content pirate, and an alt-right bigot. That's what got people upset (on top of already being upset about things like a certain Ventrue premade character).

The problem isn't that vampires might embrace a neo-Nazi. The problem is saying at least one Clan (and one of the largest Clans) is somehow incapable of differentiating between the dedication to justice a hard working lawyer trying to defend clients in a broken justice system, and a white person claiming they're the real victim of racism, would be bad if it was an explicitly in-charcter issue, and is worse when painted as an authorial position that there is some way to look at them as the same quality of individual.

[Mizu]

Or, you know, we can put complaints in their real context. The complaint about the neo-Nazi in the Brujah Clan write-up in V5 was the moral equivalence drawn between a public defender, an Internet content pirate, and an alt-right bigot. That's what got people upset (on top of already being upset about things like a certain Ventrue premade character).

The problem isn't that vampires might embrace a neo-Nazi. The problem is saying at least one Clan (and one of the largest Clans) is somehow incapable of differentiating between the dedication to justice a hard working lawyer trying to defend clients in a broken justice system, and a white person claiming they're the real victim of racism, would be bad if it was an explicitly in-charcter issue, and is worse when painted as an authorial position that there is some way to look at them as the same quality of individual.

And my point is that its a mistake to assume morality comes into it when a vampire is picking out someone to turn into the next generation of undead abomination. There is no moral equivalence being drawn because morality is not something a vampire takes into consideration when choosing the next curse victim. Someone who cared about morality wouldn't be passing the curse onto someone else in the first place, let alone seeking out the most morally upright person they could find to burden them with now having to feed on other human beings to survive.

[Heavy Arms]

There's a moral equivalence drawn in how that specific passage is written. Appealing to the larger nature of vampires doesn't change that, nor is it an honest recounting of why people got upset.

[Mizu]

There's a moral equivalence drawn in how that specific passage is written. Appealing to the larger nature of vampires doesn't change that, nor is it an honest recounting of why people got upset.

I'm unable to find a quote containing the exact wording at the moment (I don't own a copy of V5 and am not having luck finding it online), so maybe you are right and I am not remembering some passage that adds moral equivalence. But so far as I can remember it said something like 'they are looking for people that buck against the system' without anything about 'for a good and moral reason' being stated (or implied given that they listed neo-nazi alt-right types as an example).

[Heavy Arms]

Moral equivalences don't mean you're saying everything about the set being compared is good, just that they're the same. The passage says the four examples are all people the Brujah embrace to fight and protest who come from "inside" the system instead of being outsiders (the previous passage) or seeing to the Clan's ideals from a more thoughtful position (the next passage).

The list of examples of people that seek to rebel against oppression as active fighters for the cause includes someone who's beliefs are all about being an oppressor, while the other examples are all people that attempt to subvert the current system as it stands (for a varied set of reasons). The neo-Nazi doesn't fit, but is included in the group of morally motivated fighters of oppression that make up the Rabble.

[Lashet]

Generally, Talons wanting to kill humans/eating humans is seen as a much MUCH bigger obstacle to get through. The misanthropy, the fact that they refuse to engage with humanity and them being mostly lupus are huge roadblocks to most.

Of course, this is how I've experienced things.

I wouldn't be so sure. I mean th tv show Hannibal was quite succesfull. Despite Lector is cannibal, villain and corrupter, he killed indescriminately and was Equal opportunity Villain (google TvTropes). And when it came to media, indescriminate cannibal is more sympathetic for audience than Nazi (hell, in old prequel he was a victim of nazies). IMO, right now there are two 'red flags' for a character, that should be avoided at all cost: active bigotry (racism, nazism, homophobia, etc.) and sexual abuse/violence.
Btw, Exalted Lunars were deeply rooted for latter (both as victims AKA Lilith, and perpetrators AKA Mahasuchi). However, in this case the writers just rewrote their backstories.

[Ana Mizuki]

I wouldn't be so sure. I mean th tv show Hannibal was quite succesfull. Despite Lector is cannibal, villain and corrupter, he killed indescriminately and was Equal opportunity Villain (google TvTropes). And when it came to media, indescriminate cannibal is more sympathetic for audience than Nazi (hell, in old prequel he was a victim of nazies). IMO, right now there are two 'red flags' for a character, that should be avoided at all cost: active bigotry (racism, nazism, homophobia, etc.) and sexual abuse/violence.
Btw, Exalted Lunars were deeply rooted for latter (both as victims AKA Lilith, and perpetrators AKA Mahasuchi). However, in this case the writers just rewrote their backstories.

Well, Hannibal is still a human who has no intention of performing a wide scale human killing. He is not killing humans 'for the greater good' while living in the woods and eating raw deer. He is a sophisticated man who just happens to enjoy the long-pig.

One of the biggest hurdles with the Red Talons, is that a lot of people don't like the idea that all human progress is bad. Also living solely in the woods and having no human contacts. There is a reason human kin are playable while wolf kin are usually NPCs.

Besides, as Heavy Arms pointed out above, the Talons are often the least popular tribe while the Fenrir are so popular that they can often be 50% of the garou in online games. None of these Fenrir are played as nazi or intolerant, either.

I'm not bringing this up because I want them to bring back Fenrir. The issue I have is, that if we must take out tribes, we should consider what tribes actually fit the 'street level' gameplay and get played. The Talons are not the tribe for either.

[Lashet]

Well, Hannibal is still a human who has no intention of performing a wide scale human killing. He is not killing humans 'for the greater good' while living in the woods and eating raw deer. He is a sophisticated man who just happens to enjoy the long-pig.

One of the biggest hurdles with the Red Talons, is that a lot of people don't like the idea that all human progress is bad. Also living solely in the woods and having no human contacts. There is a reason human kin are playable while wolf kin are usually NPCs.

Besides, as Heavy Arms pointed out above, the Talons are often the least popular tribe while the Fenrir are so popular that they can often be 50% of the garou in online games. None of these Fenrir are played as nazi or intolerant, either.

I'm not bringing this up because I want them to bring back Fenrir. The issue I have is, that if we must take out tribes, we should consider what tribes actually fit the 'street level' gameplay and get played. The Talons are not the tribe for either.

1) Agree. Nevermind what you're doing, the piont is doing it wit a style. If you forgive me 40k reference, Dark Eldars are better than Orks (despite being more immoral) 'couse they"re more sophisticated.

2) As non-American, can I ask - the ethnic ties are good or bad?

[werewolf43]

Ok. From my perspective - person whose family had a complicated history this is how things are. My grandmother survived concentration camp in Ravensbruck. Brother of my grandfather was a pilot in Luftwaffe and probably in Nazi Party. His cousin was in Polish Home Army. Can I stand fictional tribe of werewolves? Even the evil ones? Yes. Even if during the visit in Aushwitz I was the furiousest in my entire life? After seeing pictures of children almost starved to death? Yes cause it is a fictional tribe of fictional creatures. The game only touches lightly the terror and horror of WW2, it is only mentioned in few paragraphs. The developers highlited the topic but they did not write a lot tactfuly.

In 1 ed tribebook comic shows how separated tribe is - those fighting against Nazi Germany and those on Nazi side. Get - as Heavy Arms mendtioned - was doing it's best to root out the cancer that Sword of Heimdall was. Besides fiction and real live are two different things. And if the game is only based on older editions they could remade them, maby making them strict Norse without any historical flaws. In the Heart of the Forrest there is possibility of playing them, but their story isn't black and white.

Question is what game they want to release and how much their ,,unfettered creativity" is muted by need of making politicaly correct game.
Ps. I remember wery well stories about the war and terror during WW2. I remember tears of grandmother after reading letters from people that survived the camp. Game is a game and reality is another thing. At the end you can always silence the topic around the table. That is the curse of modern times. Anyone could feel offended for serious resons and trivial and any reason can be trivial or serious for anyone, and public pressure for balancing is problem ignored by many. Thankfuly I'm old enought to not worry about it but it will doom next generations.

[Ana Mizuki]

2) As non-American, can I ask - the ethnic ties are good or bad?

As a fellow non-American, the ethnic ties were bad because there was little communication between the creators and the people they were depicting. Hence why they were (mostly) removed.

[Lashet]

As a fellow non-American, the ethnic ties were bad because there was little communication between the creators and the people they were depicting. Hence why they were (mostly) removed.

Right. The best thing I got while studing abroad and communicate with students of other countries - don't touch anything ethnic/national related even with 10-feet stick. You don't know anything anyway, neither you will understand.
(Even though I got quite post factum... which I'm ashamed)

[Heavy Arms]

The other side of the issue the ethnic ties, is that even if you do them well, you cause problems. A simple example is just the sheer number of ethnic groups that are out there. Giving each ethnic group that lives just where their are wild wolf populations now, would end up with dozens of Tribes to give them all equal respect and consideration when looking at how a Tribe should be relating them. Even with the best writing that avoids all potential offense, you end up with a game that's entirely too much to use.

The better solution is to have the core character types not tied to ethnic groups, and then give space for individual groups to add those ties in on a more personal level that fits with the group's desires.

One of the places I think W5 should be taking from Forsaken 2e is how Forsaken handles packs: A central group of werewolves that control some locale of importance to a community, with concentric circles of kin and trusted humans around them. What the pack is centered around sets a lot of tone for the game. It could be a criminal kingpin's luxurious home, a legitimate business with strong ties to a specific subgroup within a larger area, a cultural center or religious building for a local minority group, etc. Let the players take the lead on what sort of issues they want the game to center on in this sense.

[AnubisXy]

Funny enough, the Red Talons have always been my favorite Tribe. I like how they're not tied to any sort of human ethnic group so they're more the pure fantasy group. I find they also exemplify the two main conflicts of Werewolf: the Apocalypse (the internal balance between man and wolf as well as the fight to save nature from the Wyrm/humans) better than any other Tribe.