Werewolf: Forsaken RPG (Werewolf: The Forsaken) [Hardcover]

I had never played the old Werewolf game, having found Mage: The Sorcer's Crusade, to be immensely complex, I wasn't going to touch WtA with a cattle prod.

Having read Vampire: The Requiem, I eagerly awaited for my copy of Werewolf: The Forsaken. I had accidently gotten "The Pure" supplement book for Christmas, and read it while I waited for the Christmas crunch to die off, and then ordered Werewolf: The Forsaken. I found "The Pure" had released a wealth of ideas from my mind, so needless to say, I couldn't wait to read about the other half of Werewolf society; as well as finding out about the spirit world, Totems and auspices.

The book is laid out excatly as Vampire: The Requiem. With a small introduction, setting (explaning Werewolf society), character, special rules and systems and Storytelling; as well as two appindecies.

The book and game are great, it's just the Storytelling chapater, which for me wanting to tell stories, is the weakest part of the book. It's "sample" stories are anything but inspiring. The game is awsome, I believe, I love the idea behind it, the idea of werewolves and spirits mingling, a paradise world that werewolves had once ruled, shape changing and the coolest thing of all, Werewolf mythology.

The World of Darkness Rulebook is needed for this book, but I found trying to make a character hard, after all what does a werewolf need with rescources? Contacts and fame? What can ignorant mortals do for spirit rearing creatures of the night?

Could of generated a wealth of ideas had the Storytelling chapater been more indepth. I give it four stars because I find the premesis of the game to be amazing, much better than Vampire: The Requiem, but lacking insperation in that single chapter. Also, I don't like the idea of having to play with a lot of players, prefably five; one for each auspice. I've never had five friends in one place!

Great book, cool game, poor Storytelling chapter.

Remember you need the World of Darkness Rulebook for this game.

Within White Wolf's World of Darkness series Vampire had always been dominant with games such as Werewolf taking a background role for many groups. This has been largly due to the less familiar setting of the wilderness along with the simple fact that the rules were just too complex for all by the mose die hard WOD fan to fully uterlise.

The second incarnation of Werewolf - The Forsaken rectifies both these issue as well as smoothing out many of the issues with the background and mechanincs that have impaired an otherwise solid RPG.

Unlike the recent Vampire update - The Requiem there is more to this book that mearly a sleeker version of the old. The whole Werewolf mythos has been completly overhauled, with completly new background and history. The Lupine (wolf born) side of Werewold has been totally scrapped which can only be a good thing. I never knew anyone to really play Lupine and it only ever served to further complicate an already messy system of abstract mechanics.

The spirit element of the game has been retained but rather that the wolfs being the children of mother earth and defenders of the natural world they are now the ones responsable for the destruction of the garden of eden. They are hunted by their own kind had bond by spirit oaths that predate the earliest records.

Finally the Forsaken have many a new enemy to contend with. Gone are the days of Vampire hunting. The new book even suggest it possibe to form allianceswith such creatures. The greates foe of the Forsaken are the Pure. These are other Werewolfs that did not take part in the destruction of paradise and seek the forsake so that they might be brought to Justice. This offers the oppertunity for real clash of the titans style battles between raging Garu that never really worked in the older system

All in all WW have managed to take all the potential from thier previous game and mold it into a strong, simple and effective RPG that stands as a strong contender for the best WOD game to date

Let us hope that the upcoming Mage: The Awakening maintains the increadably high standards that this and other recent WOD titles have displayed

Yeah, laugh, we all did - either nobody at White Wolf noticed that the new incarnation of Werewolf would be forever referred to as 'WtF', or they did it on purpose, frankly, I'd hate to have to call which it is.

What about the product itself? The book is dull on the outside, but the cover keeps the pages together and we can't really ask more than that.

The 300 odd (some very odd) pages are printed in black and brown inks - the brown text is mostly in a scrawly looking typeface that is supposed to evoke thoughts of Savage Fury(tm). It's actually pretty readable compared to the special fonts of the other three supers books of the nWoD.

The book is solid and shows high production values throughout, it will stand years of play. The artwork within is a mixed bag, some of it - no, most of it is top-hole, but here and there we are let down. One full-page image in particular sticks in my mind - I nearly expect to see Scooby-Doo in the background somewhere - it's just cartoony.

This being a White Wolf book, it is stocked to the gunwales with bad fiction. I've yet to meet anyone who knows why, but it's always there - like an uncle at a wedding.

Hold on tight: Werewolves are no longer just violent hippies out to defend Mother Earth (Hooray).

In this brand new WoD, werewolves are actually attractive as player characters.

It seems that way back when, there was a paradise of sorts where material and spiritual co-existed, in a fairly violent law-of-the-jungle sort of way. Long story short, a subset of werewolves (Uratha as they style themselves now) destroyed this paradise by killing the being that enforced its laws - it was one of those 'damned if you do and damned if you don't' things. So now they're damned - or 'Forsaken' if you see.

Today, the descendants of the original Uratha are the guardians of the material from the spiritual, and the spiritual from the material. They also spend a lot of time fighting other Uratha over Loci - spiritual Checkpoint Charlies that are highly prised.

It is a fascinating and deep setting light-years ahead of the old WtA. It alone is worth the entire WoD reboot.

Characters in WtF are divided into 'Auspices', that is, five groups differentiated by the lunar phase phase under which the Uratha transformed for the first time. Rahu - of the Full Moon are the greatest warriors, whilst Elodoth of the Half-Moon are gifted judges and diplomats. Of course, it is easy and fun to play across these stereotypes. (Incidentally, I too would be more comfortable with the traditional four, rather than five phases of the moon - but White Wolf want all of their supers to have five 'clans').

A Werewold has no choice about his auspice (though the player does, of course) but chooses a tribe - a political and social affiliation, and possibly a Lodge - a sect within a tribe.

Auspices, Tribes and Lodges affect which gifts (superpowers by any other name) a Werewolf can learn, and how hard it is for him o do so. If you are familiar with any of the other nWoD supers, you will know how all this works.

I like this product lots - it is good. It, like all of the nWoD games is so much better than the old WoD that any comparisons are worthless, they are utterly different games (these games are good!) and no game has benefited more from the reboot than Werewolf - it is a game people will actually want to play now.

It is not quite as easy as Vampire for a new player, I think, but it is the best game to start with (other than a mortal game).

I suggest you buy it.