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More Characters from White Wolf Games
🕑 Added 2022-03-14 16:00:01 +0000 UTCTo wrap up last week's "Characters from White Wolf Games", I'll add the last ones. These weren't all the characters I had; oddly enough most of the characters I drew these pictures for were mostly NPC-types and what I called "quasi-characters"-- I used them to get the players on (and keep them on) missions, give information, etc. SO they had stats and artwork done for them so the players could focus.
Above: "Claudia", a Bosnian Muslim in the midst of the breakup of Yugoslavia (the game took place in the early to mid 90's). While most of our focus was on the Pacific North West group, I'd also had plans to have a group on the East Coast/Atlantic/Europe group. One of the reasons is a character I'll explain later.
But I was always fascinated at the thought of "traditional monsters" (werewolves and vampires) being caught up in human politics and wars. I figured these beings would have their homes and local ties and beliefs like anyone else, and wouldn't be expected to ignore these things just because of their special nature. In fact, some might like human wars, because to an extent they can hunt openly and if anyone leaves a trail of bodies, it would be dismissed as war events, rather than investigated as crime.
Cassandra Snow was a Vampire, but a seafaring one, which I thought was going to be interesting to try to balance. In the breakup of the Soviet Union, she ran across the crew of a Soviet Navy Turya-class patrol hydrofoil, and, as a Vampire, she was able to dominate them. She came from a seafaring family and felt comfortable on boats and ships, and felt that being a sea hunter would be ideal, since law on the high seas is hard to enforce and frequently goes unenforced. She felt she could hunt with some impunity on unflagged ships or poor merchantmen, and occasionally pull into a port, get some blood from some hapless victims, and be out on the water before anyone caught on.
Unfortunately she had not factored in the high maintenance and costs of operating a naval vessel, even a small one. They pretty quickly turned to general piracy and shore raiding for supplies, and as their military-specific supplies dwindled (like ammunition for the larger deck guns) they had to ration it for emergencies only. As the Captain, she had to see to provisions for the crew, and in general become as much a small business administrator as a Vampire Captain. It made her a bit grumpy but she wasn't about to abandon her plan and was determined to make it work somehow.
White Wolf Games didn't have just Vampires and Werewolves/"Garou", they had other fantastical creatures too. Fairies were one creature they had that came along later. This character, Sheila McCafferty, was one of the Fae, specifically a sub group called a "Pooka", which were people that had animal like tendencies (in this case, a fox). If I remember correctly the Pooka fae could turn into these animals if they wanted, or adapt "partial" forms like we see here.
My game group never really got into the Fae because by the time the book came out we were already heavily invested in the Vampires and Garou adventures and we didn't want to add too much more. I created this character more as an experiment, and used the animal-like Pooka class specifically with the intention that she would be encountered morphing in or out of an animal form by a Vampire and get mistaken for a Garou by a young and inexperienced Vampire, and the other Garou would go to aid her only to discover her true nature afterwards and be confused-- so basically, "adventure kicks off because of mistaken identity". It never happened, as our gaming group was also beginning to break up as people got bogged down in higher job positions, marriages and expanding families, and our once-copious free time started to get used to pursue other things.
This last character was, ironically, my first character. I found out about the White Wolf Games through a friend at work, and he was into the Vampire stuff primarily (our group mostly centered around Garou). I got the Vampire player and Gamemaster books and made this guy, Arich Horst, my first White Wolf character. He was from the Gangrel clan of Vampires, a class that could turn into sinister-looking black wolves instead of bats.
He had an unusual story and his background was non-standard for a Vampire. He started out as a soldier in the Imperial German Army of World War One and was fighting in their southern front, in the Austro-Hungarian Empire regions. He and his squad investigated an old castle that appeared to be lived in and, thinking it might be Russians from the Tsar's army, they went to investigate. It was an old Gangrel Vampire, who dominated Arich and fed off his men.
Eventually, time passed and Arich was the day servant to the old Vampire, protecting him as he slept during daylight hours and sometimes rounding up a homeless peasant or two to feed him. Eventually, World War Two happened, and then Hungary got absorbed into the Warsaw Pact. Eventually, a Soviet KGB Colonel found out about this weird old guy that lived in a castle in the mountains and started investigating, eventually figuring out what the real story was. Horrified, he was determined to destroy these creatures and led an assault on the castle.
The old Vampire was ready for death, but before dying her turned Arich into a Vampire and set him loose on the human world. Adapting to the modern age, Horst began travelling and hunting, adopting a nomadic lifestyle to stay one step ahead of pursuers.
So Arich Horst was going to be the center of my European/Atlantic adventures, but for the most part we ended up focusing on the PNW Garou group instead. Weirdly, Arich was one of my last characters to get artwork done, and I never even finished inking him. Sadly, our game group broke up and we mostly went our separate ways, but the 1990's White Wolf Games period was one of my favorites.
Until next time!
Comments
John Bandow
This is so awesome!
