Umbra in Werewolf: the Apocalypse

[@SrPepe1977]

Even though I already had all this cosmology in my mind from reading Mage and having played Werewolf, you make it sound really interesting. Thanks for the video.

[@ZigCopasetic]

The umbra you ran in werewolf was brilliant. It was alien, I liked that you used all the aquatic elements because we all know what water is like. It was a very cool experience and easy enough to get to. What has always confused me is the process of how to travel from one umbra level into something like the underworld or to something like Malfeas or umbral realms. I've heard it described as a will process or a need to actually travel through portals.

[@Neisza]

Actually there are many types of Umbra. Werewolfs travel through "Middle Umbra" which is shamanistic. Most mages and vampires with high Auspex can enter High Umbra/Astral Plane, and wraiths as well as vampires with Necromancy - Dark Umbra. Some Koldunic Sorcery rituals allow vampires to enter Middle Umbra too (since that kind of blood magic generally focus on commanding nature spirits and was supposed to kinda reflect Slavic paganism).

[@slumlord6821]

Love these videos. Suscribing. There's a roleplay server in SA-MP, aka Grand Theft Auto: San Andreas online, where we roleplay a world in where humans do not know about the supernatural. Our lores are greatly based off Classic World of Darkness, and being myself the Werewolf Moderator, these videos will essentially help me in teaching the cubs about the basics about the whole Werewolf: The Apocalypse. Thank you pal.

[@ThisIsEDX]

I was convinced by your videos to add werewolf revised to my collection, sounds like a game that would resonate with my group more than vampire. I'm probably doing one on one for vampire.

[@hammeredshitsteak]

Glad it brought up nostalgia :D Werewolf is definitely my favorite RPG ever.

[@ulkem]

In game terms, you have to have three dots on the Sphere Spirit to "step sideways" per say. There are unique places only for spesific spieces, like Wolfhome I suppose it was. It's not that it's impossible to enter but its nearly impossible to get out "alive". There is little mentioned in the book Axis Mundi about kindreds stepping sideways but if I recall correctly you take a lot of aggravated damage or something. I haven't found the rules for kindred about entering the Umbra yet.

[@hammeredshitsteak]

It's pretty much made so that werewolves are the only ones. But there are mages who are powerful enough to do it. Wraiths too, since wraiths live in one section of the umbra.

[@bwrpwr]

I'd imagine a powerful enough Thaumaturgy ritual could manage it.

[@anyoneatall3488]

I guess

[@gabriellaskey6798]

HEAVY! that was bad ass dude thank you

[@hammeredshitsteak]

+Gabriel Laskey You're welcome :)

[@hammeredshitsteak]

Thanks man! :) Yeah the near umbra is full of those portals were you can just walk into those realms you mentioned. I ain't a fan of them, but yeah, that's how you'd do it.

[@thunderbird885cc]

you still playing WOD ? I am creating a story for Alaska right now. I'm suprised that WW never did anything with Alaska having a Red Talon Sept in the Wrangell mountains.

[@hammeredshitsteak]

Sounds good! I'd like to have a Werewolf Alaska setting book :D

[@WorldofLos]

I would love to play werewolf the apocalypse again. It has been too long....

[@rynrandall9761]

I love your videos. I'm so new to WoD but I'm playing in Second Life and I'm seriously getting my butt kicked by a theurge shadow lord. Your videos are really giving me a lot of help in kicking his butt back.

[@hammeredshitsteak]

+Amy Randall Thank you. :)

[@nehrumoreiradesousa6302]

veeeery nice!

[@hammeredshitsteak]

Thank you. :)

[@TheTrueFelight]

Just wondering. Are vampires able to get into the umbra at all? Or is the journey only possible for shapeshifters?

[@anyoneatall3488]

Mages are also able to go in there

[@willscott1727]

Great video but I do have a question that I hope you might be able to answer ...... would it be possible for a Umbra path have the ability to control the space time continuem?

[@hammeredshitsteak]

Thanks man, good to hear. It is my favorite game so I'm glad the bug got spread :) Too bad about vampire though, but hey it ain't everyone's cup of tea.

[@droidzilla22]

Some of the things I want to know are 1. Do Wraiths show up in the Umbra? 2. If Wraiths are spirits and the umbra is the spirit world, do you get to get to all the places in the Wraiths underworld as you journey further? 3. If not, why not? I think that would give the game good stories to work with. Maybe make it that werewolves can go into the underworld but that the longer they stay the more they lose in health and gnosis, maybe making it harder and harder for them to leave. Sorry if this stuff seems ill informed. I used to play back in the 90's but have taken a long break and I'm looking to get back into it.

[@hammeredshitsteak]

Don't worry about it. I'm actually not well versed at all with Wraith, but from what I understand the world of the dead that the wraiths inhabit is in the umbra, but in some sort of a locked up hard to reach place. It's the same place which the cappadocian clan in Vampire can contact with their diciplines, but I don't think it's that intentionally tailored to work together with Werewolf. But hey, in a roleplaying game your imagination is the only true limit, so go ahead and explore the idea!

[@goawayplzthnx]

Wraiths do not appear in the Umbra outside of the Dark Umbra, also known as the Shadowlands. That said, certain shortcuts in the Penumbra pass through the Dark Umbra and are favored by the Silent Striders. But the golden rule of the Umbra is: it is whatever you wish it to be, as long as you can back it up for animistic reasons, which he goes into a bit in this video. Want wraiths in your W:TA game? Make up a reason why the restless dead should be bleeding into the penumbra. Create a place where ghosts would haunt. Have fun!

[@goawayplzthnx]

Wraiths are technically not spirits. They are persistent ghosts (transient souls) that exist on the periphery of literal oblivion and they were once living physical beings, usually human. Werewolves can reach the Dark Umbra by wandering far enough (accidentally) through the penumbra, or there is a rite that gets you there, and I think that the striders have a gift for it. The Dark Umbra is DANGEROUS. It is a fundamentally Wyrmish place, because the fact that ghosts persist is a violation of Gaia's intended laws regarding life and death. The Defiler Wyrm's perversion of reality in this regard makes ghosts possible, and that means that, for Garou, the Dark Umbra is a nasty place, crawling with Banes and unsavory Wraiths who have amassed power in their afterlives.

[@anyoneatall3488]

Do you think w20 umbra the velvet shadow is worth buying?

[@hammeredshitsteak]

I have no idea. The w20 books have looked pretty neat, but I haven't read it my-self. :)

[@anyoneatall3488]

@@hammeredshitsteak did you read the old umbra supplements?

[@hammeredshitsteak]

@@anyoneatall3488 Yes. I've read the "Guide to Umbra" and "Book of spirits". I recommend the guide to umbra, as well as the 3 guide books for Wyld, Weaver, and Wyrm.

[@anyoneatall3488]

@@hammeredshitsteak thank you

[@anyoneatall3488]

@@hammeredshitsteak what does exactly ad the guide to the umbra

[@laucorn123]

I am going to be playing a Shadow Lord Theurge Black Spiral Dancer in a up & comming game is there any advice anyone could give me?

[@hammeredshitsteak]

Only advice I have is have fun :)

[@laucorn123]

hammeredshitsteak lol thanks :)

[@raven-wf5gt]

How is your game coming along?

[@laucorn123]

It sadly fell through :(

[@AwakesBeforeSun]

Metis theurge is the best!

[@HowToPnP]

So, I am an absolute noob, so how do Angels (if there are demons, there should be angels, right?) factor into all of this? Are they agents of the Weaver or are they a separate kind of entity? Just asking because I would like to know how Christianity as a concept plays into Werewolf und how churches would show up in the Umbra.

[@hammeredshitsteak]

The truth is, that the World of Darkness monster worlds don't meld together nearly as well, as many of the writers like to think they do. The fact that "Demon: The Fallen", and "Dark Ages: Inquisitor" both legitimatize the Christian mythology of God and Lucifer as real, completely takes away the ambiguous corner stone of "Vampire: The Masquerade" of weather or not Vampire's are literal descendants of Kain. Then when you put that in to the "Werewolf: The Apocalypse" cosmology, where vampires are just plane old "Wyrmlings", and God would have to be some sort of a vindictive Gaia spirit, it takes all the meaning and character totally out of it. My approach has always been to only take the world and monster cosmology you're running a game for seriously, and then make the other monsters fit that world. If you're running a Demon game, fully engross your self in the demons, angels, God, Lucifer, fall of man, heaven and hell world, and when you're running a Werewolf game, do the same for it's animistic, shamanism and mysticism. Those two worlds don't fit well together, and forcing it by making the peaces fit, just damage both in my opinion. You're free to do as you wish, but that's how I do it. In my Werewold: The Dark Ages campaign for example, the church was the biggest, and most patternspider web covered building in the whole village, as seen from the umbra, because for Werewolf's shamanistic cosmology, it made sense for me to present human religion, as a rigid construct, made by fearful, confused and exploitative humans, unaware of how the world truly works, as that's a Garou privilege to know. If I were to run a Inquisitor game, I'd show the Werewolf traditions, as primitive and savage paganism, that contributes to Satan worship, and threatens the whole of Christendom.

[@HowToPnP]

I think some pieces fit quite nicely. Sure, other factions lose their “specialness” when seen from some others perspective. But my question is: What would the “Christian God” be in the eyes of werewolfs? Sure, you can preach about perspective all day long. But that doesn’t change reality. Demons might see themselves as victims of an cruel uncaring God, but they still do horrible things. So the facts about all this stuff would be the same for everybody, they just interpret the facts differently. So after spending way to much time on the White Wolf wiki I think I found my answers. How does the abrahamic God fit into the Werewolf cosmology? Answere: He doesn’t! God abandoned the world, when the war or rage happened. So problem avoided (it’s no solution, but at least we don’t have to worry about it) But how do churches show up in the Umbra? The Weaver has an agent called the Patriarch, who is basically a spirit of dogma and order. And (according to the wiki) some think, that he is the inspiration for the abrahamic God. So problem solved: Churches are full of webs. “God” has left the building, while some Weaver-spirit poses as “God”. And Angels (if they show up at all) are simply spirits of order and dogma. Makes at least some sense. Sure, it’s less special that it is from a Christian perspective, but that’s the point! Werewolfs are savage beasts, who worship pagan/demonic Idols. Because we (as outsiders) cant differentiate between Wyrm and Wyld. We don’t know the culture and (seen from the perspective of modern human society) forest dwelling beastmen are kind of primitive. It’s a question of perspective.

[@d4arken3ds0ul]

HowToPnP afaik there completely separate from the wyrm weaver and wyld They exist in the same universe but separately I think demon goes into this a bit but cannot confirm

[@Koni1693]

Hi I've been playing vampire the masquerade for about year now, but i'd like to try werewolf with my friends. Do you have any music which fits umbra's mood? Is there anything that you could recommend?

[@hammeredshitsteak]

Koni1693 Sure! I personally like to use "Dark ambient" music, and "Lustmord" is one of my favorites. There's lot's of movie and videogame soundtracks that fit well too if you ask me. I don't use music during sessions these days, because I mostly play online, and it would create a horrible cacophony. I listen to this mostly to get inspiration. I'll link you some here :) kzbin.info/www/bejne/kKabomuPoK99o9k kzbin.info/www/bejne/j4uymoWYoLyXhK8 kzbin.info/www/bejne/b2nFppeCrLqfsKs kzbin.info/www/bejne/eXO1cp6mjbmgedU

[@Koni1693]

hammeredshitsteak Thanks a lot. That's something i've been looking for :D

[@hammeredshitsteak]

:)