Werewolf the Apocalypse: Spirit Guide ________________________________________________________________________ “Our revels now are ended. These our actors, As I foretold you, were all spirits, and Are melted into air, into thin air: And like the baseless fabric of this vision, The cloud-capp’d tow’rs, the gorgeous palaces, The solemn temples, the great globe itself, Yea, all which it inherit, shall dissolve, And, like this insubstantial pageant faded, Leave not a rack behind. We are such stuff As dreams are made on; and our little life Is rounded with a sleep.” - The Tempest, Act 4, scene 1, 148-158 1 Introduction: This is a guide designed to help storytellers, players, and prospective players a vision of how spirits are handled in the Mind‘s Eye Society‘s Werewolf the Apocalypse Chronicle. This guide seeks to illustrate how spirits are to be created, role-played, and tracked, as well as defining these spirits and how they interact with the Umbra. To do so, we will be using the following books to educate and illustrate:  Laws of the Wild, revised (MET).  Werewolf the Apocalypse, revised. (Table-Top)  Axis Mundi: The Book of Spirits. (Table-Top)  Umbra, revised. (Table-Top)  Umbra: The Velvet Shadow, 2nd edition. (Table-Top). When utilizing spirits, it‘s often helpful to attempt to get into the mind-set. This is difficult, because spirits are alien and foreign to any mindset that human beings have. To this end, there are several pieces of media that might be helpful for you. Books & Websites:  The Power of Myth by Joseph Campbell. This book illustrates the Hero‘s journey, and the steps and obstacles heroes must go through in order to complete their quests.  At the Mountains of Madness by H.P. Lovecraft. This is a good example of being face to face with the ―other worldliness‖ of exotic Umbral locations and the strange spirits that reside within them. Not all spirits are there to help.  A Christmas Carol by Charles Dickens. A classic, yes, but one that illustrates the alien, yet, selfish nature of spirits.  Native American Mythology. Looking into our past and the lessons and parables presented show us a wealth of ideas and the mind-set for beings as simplistic or complex that you can create.http://americanfolklore.net/folklore/native-american-myths/ , http://www.native- languages.org/legends.htm 2  World Mythology. Building spirits that would hang around Fianna? Shadow Lords? It might be useful to delve into the history of your spirits and figure out if they‘re reflections of where they come from or if they represent certain locations. http://www.windows2universe.org/mythology/worldmap_new.html ,http://www.gods -heros-myth.com/, http://www.pantheon.org/  Riddles. When you have a mixed group, riddles can be a useful tool to gauge how your players interact with spirits. Spirits revel in riddles and games, and here are a few sites with riddles to get you going. http://thinks.com/riddles/a1-riddles.htm http://www.riddles.com/ http://www.rinkworks.com/brainfood/p/riddles1.shtml Films:  Pan‘s Labyrinth (2006) http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Pan%27s_Labyrinth , useful in showing entities that are both alien, foreign, and terrifying. Great if you want to showcase the darker aspects of the Umbra.  Constantine (2005) http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Constantine_(film) , this movie is useful in showing what happens when Garou go to places like the Atrocity Realm, the Abyss, and other places that are only used in grand and glorious quests. One should take away from this movie the danger and ferocity of these places and their inhabitants.  Labyrinth (1986) http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Labyrinth_(film) , useful for showing various realms and aspects of the Hero‘s Journey. Also, the strange, foreign, and alien creatures who aren‘t as they appear to be, can be a boon for a storyteller to trick or confound players.  Final Fantasy: Spirits Within (2001) http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Final_Fantasy_Movie , useful for showing how spirits can descend upon locations and people, and what happens when PCs face overwhelming odds.  Snow White and the Huntsman (2012) http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Snow_White_and_the_Huntsman , useful for showing how entire landscapes can be changed by spiritual forces, and how some Umbral domains may look. 3 TV:  Once Upon a Time (2011 – ) http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Once_Upon_a_Time_(TV_series), the character of Rumplestilksen in particular, and the way that he makes his deals with the main characters can be helpful in building pacts and in dealing with characters.  Avatar: The Last Airbender (2005 to 2008) http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Avatar:_The_Last_Airbender , specifically for the Spirit World. The Face-Stealer, Wan Shi Tong, the Spirit of Knowledge and numerous others. This alien and foreign nature are contrasted with his secretive and strange nature. It is a good example of players giving chiminage to a spirit.  Supernatural (2005 – ) http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Supernatural_(TV_series), for so many reasons, specifically the nature of dealing with the supernatural, and realizing that there are bigger and darker things that wait for you across the Umbra that are beyond human comprehension.  The Buffy-verse, Buffy the Vampire Slayer & Angel (1997 – 2004)http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Buffy_the_Vampire_Slayer_(TV_series) &http://en.wikiped ia.org/wiki/Angel_(TV_series), for alternate dimensions, magical items from the other side, dealing with otherworldly beings, and most importantly, false destinies.  Stargate SG-1 (1997 to 2007) http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Stargate_SG-1, while not dealing with spirits, the show dealt regularly with walking into alien worlds, alternate realities, strange environments, and how human-kind dealt with such things. 4 Chapter 1: Lexicon The spirit world can be a confusing and complicated place. In an effort to help make sense of some of what you are about to encounter, please take some time to familiarize yourself with some of the common terminology. Abyss: An Umbral realm which is tear in the fabric of creation. The Abyss is a yawning, chasm that consumes everything that is forgotten or abandoned. In its depths are things long gone and things best forgotten. As the Apocalypse approaches, it steadily grows larger. Aetherial Realm: Stretching across the Umbral heavens, portions of the Aetherial Realm wend their way across the barrier between Earth and the Deep Umbra. Powerful Garou tend to Anchorheads, places where travelers may pass through Earth‘s Gauntlet to other worlds; many of these distant realms are staunchly defended by the Stargazer tribe. Aetherial totems strong influence on this realm — the ―planetary Incarnae‖ of Luna and Helios are among the most powerful. Airts: (Old Form) The pathways leading into and through the spirit realms (moon bridges, spirit pathways, etc.) Ancestor Spirits: Garou are faithful to tribe and Gaia unto death and beyond. The spirits of the long- dead wait in the Umbra, watching the exploits of their descendants and ready to aid the living with knowledge, wisdom or perhaps by lending their expertise in combat. Anchorhead: Elusive spirit gates leading into various Realms and other areas in the Near Umbra. Apocalypse: The age of destruction, the final cycle, the birth of death, the everlasting corruption, the end of Gaia. A word used in Garou mythology to describe the time of the final battle with the Wyrm. Many consider this time to be the present. Arcadian Gateway: Here one may find a dying relic of a bygone age, and perhaps portents of the future. This realm is the manifestation of the fae in the Near Umbra, a place where emanations imbued with faerie energy act out the classic roles of fae myth. However the ailing plight of the fae has affected this realm; an Endless Winter slowly advances across the landscape, destroying the old ways. If Garou seek truths about the Fair Folk‘s past, they had best quest here soon. 5 Atrocity Realm: Millennia of suffering from all the world‘s victims have created the Atrocity Realm, a place where the worst cruelties and tortures have been immortalized. No Garou seeks this place for glory — those that come here do so to learn, no matter how painful the lesson. Awakening: The process of arousing a slumbering (inactive) spirit. When performed on plants, this is known as sanctification. The Rite of Spirit Awakening is used in this process. Ban: Limitations placed upon the spirit by its nature or by something else. Bans represent what the spirit cannot do, will not do, or may do in certain circumstances. Bane: Evil spirits that follow the Wyrm. Many different kinds of Banes exist, including Scrags, Kali, Psychomachia and more. Binding: The process of attaching a spirit to a Garou, making it his servant. Garou generally feel that spirits should only be bound when needed. Blight: Any corrupted area in either the spirit world or physical reality; a realm reflecting either the most perverse and desecrated ideals of the Wyrm, or the static and dehumanizing agenda of the Weaver. Bone Rythms: A minor rite used to pay homage to one‘s totem spirit. Caern: A sacred place; a meeting spot where the Garou can contact the spirit world. Caern Heart: The most sacred part of a caern is its center. This is the spiritual heart of the caern. The caern‘s heart is where the Gauntlet is nonexistent, and hence the place where the most powerful rituals are conducted. Calcification: The actor process of becoming woven into the Pattern Web by a Pattern Spider. Celestine: The greatest spirits; the closest things the Garou have to gods. Examples are Luna (the Moon) and Helios (the Sun). Charms: Powers of a spirit that are usable by a spirit to help or harm. Chiminage: favors or deals made between spirits and Garou, currency for services performed. Chiminage is also used to describe services performed for the proper spirit in exchange for fetish creation or services rendered. 6 Corruption: The act of destroying, devolving or debasing life; also, the overwhelming effects of the Wyrm‘s actions. Cyber Realm: The war against the Weaver has come to the glass and steel skyscrapers of the CyberRealm. In the urban squalor of the streets below, anarchists and idealists gather their forces. High overhead, the Weaver dominates a high-tech realm. ―Corporate ladders‖ of webs stretch across many vertical miles. Computer terminals scattered throughout the upper levels grant access to a sub-realm known as the Computer Web. Dark Umbra: Few werewolves know much about the Dark Umbra, the realm of death. When a werewolf dies, his spirit returns to the Earth Mother; some Garou linger on as ancestor-spirits to guide their kin, while others are said to be reborn in different bodies. For this reason, most werewolves have less a fear of death than a fear of dying poorly Deep Umbra: The aspects of the Umbra that lie outside the Membrane. Reality becomes more and more fragmentary the farther one travels from the Realm. Disconnection: Werewolves who spend too much time either in the Umbra or away from it may experience disconnection. This dangerous condition can lead to madness or even Harano. Lone wolves are more likely to suffer from disconnection than pack members. The cure for disconnection is to step sideways. Domain: A mini-Realm in the Umbra, usually connected to a larger Realm in the Deep Umbra. Drones: Humans merged with Weaver-spirits, the Weaver version of Formori. Engling: A spirit sent by Gaia for the purposes of renewing her brood. Their purpose is one of sacrifice, being sacrificed to give Gnosis to Garou. Enigmatic Spirits: Most of the spirits that Garou deal with are tied to something concrete and understandable, such as a type of animal or plant. Some have no such connection, though. Lacking a frame of reference, they are often difficult to comprehend. Epiphling – A spirit that represents an abstract idea or concept. Erebus: Gaia‘s wrath manifests in caverns below the Umbrascape, where failed Garou atone for their greatest sins. Sinister broods of black or silver Crinos brutes exact punishment against werewolves. Their charges writhe in a river of molten silver. Visitors may pass through and learn from the errors of others … 7 or may challenge the broods for knowledge and power. Charyss rules here, watching from the parapets of a castle in the center of a silver lake. Flux Realm: Anything is possible in this highly transitory realm. When the Wyld faded from Gaia, it‘s said, he left his heart in deep in the Umbra. Now the Weaver has encased it and trapped it in the Flux Near Realm. Pure madness and energy surge here. Fomori: (singular ―formor‖) Humans who have been corrupted by a wyrm spirit and draw supernatural power from it. Gaffling: A simple spirit servant of a Jaggling, Incarna or Celestine. Gafflings are rarely sentient. Gaia: The Earth and related Realms, in both physical and a spiritual sense; the Mother Goddess, the great spirit the Garou serve. Garou: The term werewolves use for themselves. Gate: The ancient places have many strong ties. In times past, mighty spirits forged gates between realms in the Umbra. Gates transport travelers from one location to another instantly. They are permanent constructs able to withstand any force that a werewolf could bring to bear. Gatekeeper: Liaison to other septs; monitors the moon bridge. Gauntlet: The barrier between the physical world of Earth and the spirit world of the Umbra. It is strongest around technological (Weaver) places, weakest around caerns. Ghost: Ghosts are the spirits of dead humans who are somehow prevented from passing on to their final reward and are marooned in the Dark Umbra. Glen: A domain where the Wyld is supreme. Their earthly reflections are places of great beauty, while their Penumbral shadows are ideal for meditation. Helios: the celestine spirit of the sun. Impergium: The 3,000 years immediately following the birth of agriculture, during which strict population quotas were maintained on all human villages Incarna: A class of spirits; weaker than the Celestines, but still greater spirits by any measure. 8 Jaggling: The spirit servant of an Incarna or Celestine. Kenning: The empathic calling some Garou perform when howling. Kin-Fetch: A spirit, sometimes bound into a fetish or talen, which serves to alert nearby Garou that a First Change is about to occur. Klaive: A fetish dagger or sword, usually of great spiritual potency and nearly always made of silver. Legendary Realm: The legends of the Garou live on. Packs in the Legendary Realm can experience the lives of their ancestors in this Umbral realm. Incorporating the legends of all the tribes, it has created a mythic fantasy realm, a place that never was, but will exist until the end of time. Galliards give this realm strength by reciting tales from the old days. Luna: the celestine spirit of the moon. Malfeas: Just as the Cyber Realm pulses with the growing power of the Weaver, Malfeas bears witness to the diseased might of the Wyrm. Though the Wyrm itself may make its home in the Deep Umbra, the most corrupt and demented of its servitors have flocked here, to the realm born of its most hideous dreams. Membrane: The barrier between the Near and the Deep Umbra. To breach it, an Anchorhead must be found. Moon Bridge: A gate between two caerns; it most often appears during moots. Moon Path: One of Luna‘s many gifts to her children are paths through the mists of the Umbra. A moon path appears in the Penumbra as a shaft of moonlight. A werewolf who touches the light can find herself travelling on a moonbeam with the mists of the spirit world swirling all around her. Naturae: The spirits a Garou is most likely to encounter are nature spirits. Some are the spirits of dead animals that haven‘t yet cycled to life; others are generated from significance (or belief in such significance) of a place or thing. Near Umbra: The spirit world surrounding the Gaia Realm. The Pact: The ancient pact between the Changing Breeds and the spirits. The spirits agreed to empower the shapeshifters‘ rites if properly performed and teach them Gifts, as well as agreeing to enter into 9 material shells in order to serve their wielders. This is not, however, a one-sided affair. The oldest rule of spirit negotiations is that nothing is free; a shapeshifter must offer something in return in order to gain a fetish of any power. Pangea: This Umbral realm is a world before civilization; a world before the Impergium. Pangaea is a spiritual memory of primal Earth, as it was and as it should have been. Dinosaur kings and bronze- skinned human tribes live on as Pangaean spirits. Packs have been known to degenerate here over time, resembling their ancient ancestors more with each passing day. Pattern Spider: The most common Jaggling servants of The Weaver, pattern spiders preform any number of duties for The Weaver. Peeking: Garou are able to peer into the Realm from the Umbra and, with some increased difficulty, the reverse. While performing this activity, the werewolf becomes completely oblivious to what is happening around them, unless is wounded. In the Umbra, a peeking Garou‘s eyes glow brightly, and her expression is one of obvious intense concentration. Penumbra: ―Earth‘s Shadow‖; the spirit world directly surrounding the physical world. Many, but not all, terrain features have reflections there. Prophecy of the Phoenix: A famous Garou prophecy, said to foretell the signs that will lead to the Apocalypse. Reaching: Traveling into the spirit world. Realms: The worlds of ―solid‖ reality within the Tellurian. Earth is referred to as the Realm. Other realms include Summer Home, Malfeas, etc. Scar: Created during the Industrial Revolution, this Umbral realm once reflected the idealistic efficiency of mechanical perfection. The Wyrm and Weaver have since claimed the realm as their own, sacrificing captured spirits to create Wyrm-tainted fetishes. Every employee‘s nightmares come to life here. The soul¬-deadening horrors of the workplace thrive in Scar. Shrine: A place on a caern‘s bawn set aside to meditate or pray. It is a place to do homage to a spirit, to dedicate victories to a totem, or to ask for aid. Packs often have shrines dedicated to their totem, although Garou with a close personal tie to a spirit (such as an Ancestor-spirit) may keep a personal shrine as well. 10