Werewolf: The Forsaken - Blank It

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Chapter II: Character
represent that his character (like he himself) speaks Spanish
as well as English. He also takes Direction Sense (which
costs one Merit dot) to show that the character knows the
local area well and can find his way around it easily. Finally,
Jack spends his last Merit dot to purchase another one-dot
rite, picking the Rite of Dedication.
STEP SEVEN: ADVANTAGES
Jack’s next order of business is to determine his character’s
advantages, both those determined by his traits, and
those relating to the werewolf template. He first determines
his Virtue, Vice and Harmony (i.e., his Morality), then his
Willpower, Defense, Initiative, Health and Speed.
Looking at the Virtues and Vices, Jack sees his character
as one who upholds Justice but falls prey to Sloth. The
character wants to make the world a better place, but with
all that’s changed now, he’s adrift and doesn’t know how
to do so. Next, Jack looks at Harmony, which starts at a
standard 7. He could trade in one or two of those points for
additional experience points, but he opts not to do so, since
it seems important for his Elodoth character not to have
less Harmony than the average starting werewolf character.
That being the case, he goes back and records an Essence of
7 (as per Step Five), since the two traits start off equal.
Jack’s character’s Willpower is equal to his Resolve
+ his Composure, so he records a 4 for that trait. His
Defense is equal to the lower of his Dexterity or his Wits,
so he records a 2 for that trait since his Dexterity is a 2
and his Wits is a 3. It’s important to note, however, that
the Gauru, Urshul and Urhan form add +1, +2 and +2
respectively to a werewolf’s Dexterity, which will bump
this character’s Dexterity up to 3, 4 and 4. Therefore, his
Defense increases to a 3 in Gauru form (since his Dexterity
and Wits are equal) then remains a 3 in Urshul and
Urhan form (since his Wits of 3 is then lower than his
modified Dexterity of 4). The character’s Initiative undergoes
similar changes as well. Starting out in Hishu form,
this trait equals the character’s Dexterity + his Composure
(which, for Jack’s character, equals 4). It remains the
same in Dalu form, but it increases to 5 in Gauru and 6 in
both Urshul and Urhan form as the werewolf’s Dexterity
increases by one in Gauru and two in Urshul and Urhan.
Next come the character’s Health and Speed, both
of which change because of two separate factors. In his
base Hishu form, Jack’s character’s Health is equal to his
Stamina + his Size. As his Stamina is a 3 and his Size is
the base human 5, his Health is 8. In Dalu, the character’s
Health jumps up to 10 since the character’s Stamina and
Size both increase by one. In Gauru form, the character’s
Stamina and Size each increase from the Hishu baseline
by two, so this character’s Health equals 12. In Urshul,
the character’s Stamina increases by two from his Hishu
Stamina, but his Size increases by only one, so his
Health equals 11. In Urhan form, the character’s Stamina
increases by one from his Hishu baseline, but his Size
decreases by one, so his Health remains the same in Urhan
as it was in Hishu. (For Jack’s character, that’s an 8.) Jack
notes all of that variation down carefully on his character
sheet so as not to have to keep doing the math in his head
as his character switches forms during the story.
Speed is equally variable in terms of the character’s
Strength and Dexterity, so Jack calculates his various forms’
Speed just as meticulously. In Hishu, he adds his Strength
(3) to his Dexterity (2) as well as his species factor (5),
which yields a 10. In Dalu, his Strength increases by one,
so his Speed becomes 11. In Gauru, his Strength increases
by three and his Dexterity increases by one (from the
Hishu baseline), so his Speed becomes 14. In Urshul, the
character’s Strength and Dexterity both increase by two,
and his species factor increases by three. Therefore, his
Speed equals 17. The species factor increases by three and
the character’s Dexterity increases by two as well in Urhan
form, so Jack’s character’s Speed in Urhan form is only 15.
Jack has Michelle double-check his math on all that
before carrying on. Michelle then reminds him that he loses
one dot from his Manipulation in Dalu form (dropping
that trait to 1 in that form) and three dots from it in his
Urshul form (dropping it to effectively 0 in that form, since
one can’t have a negative Attribute). When they’re both
satisfied that he’s added everything up and noted it all down
correctly for all five forms, Jack moves on to Renown.
STEP EIGH T: SPARK OF LIFE
Jack’s character is now all but ready to play except for
a few details. Those details include a brief story of his past
as well as his general goals for the future. They also include
explanations for why his various traits are as high or low
as Jack has made them. Jack has done most of this work
naturally in the course of crafting his character, but he
decides to add a few touches to the character’s background.
He decides that the character’s family (father, mother and
younger sister) are all unaware of the werewolf legacy he’s
inherited. In fact, he decides that his family isn’t even wolfblooded,
and that the character is secretly the bastard child
of a one-night stand his mother had with a shady character
she hasn’t seen or heard from since. Jack also decides that
his character’s parents think he’s staying in college to attend
graduate school rather than just living in town and working
for the campus police. Only the character’s sister knows
the truth, and she uses it against him to extort money or
favors. Michelle tells Jack that she intends to go over such
pivotal character-building moments as the First Change,
tribal initiation and the formation of the pack as part of the
forthcoming prelude, so Jack decides to wait until then to
go any further. All he has left is to think of a name for his
character, and he starts with the character’s human name.
He picks Eric Russell — he just likes the sound of it — and
decides that people just call him Russell at the campus
police station. He then decides to build a potential werewolf
deed name from there; although the prelude hasn’t happened
yet, he likes the sound of “Russell Sheep’s Clothing,”
and figures that it will be an appropriate eventual Uratha