Is Lycanthropy a real curse (or just to the Dm?)

[TheElfLord]

Okay, so in the near future I'm going to be running my players into several repeated encounters with werewolves. The chances are that somewhere along the line a player will be bitten. It is also possible a character will (secretly) fail his save.

Now I would expect my characters to react to possible infection by working very hard to cure themselves. I also know players love to (either accidentally or purposfully) screw with the DM plans. This means my afflicted player may choose to endorse his condition and the benifits it gives him.

This idea is throwing up some flags as I worry about party balance and the providing suitable future encounters.

[Mewtarthio]

That's why the template causes an alignment change. Tell the players, in advance, that if they ever fail the save against alignment change (or use Control Shape to willingly take animal form, changes alignment automatically), they become NPCs. If that seems harsh, just let them know that you will enforce the alignment change rules, and most players will try to avoid needing to make Will saves.

[Vasdenjas]

Afflicted Lycanthropy can be pretty bad. If your PC's are primarily good, espcially if there's a Paladin, have them infected by an evil Lycanthrope. The first full moon, they change into that creature, and act in that alignment, causing great concern to those who cannot stray. Just have one person who has an alignment restriction (Monk, Bard, Pally, etc) infected by an opposing aligned Lycanthrope, and they will definitely want to cure it. (By the way, were wolves are Chaotic Evil).

[Chronos]

Or even if you allow evil PCs, the other characters would be perfectly justified in kicking that character out of the group.

On the other hand, if you and your players are tolerant of having an evil character in the party... The afflicted character will get a significant power boost in the short term, but in the long run the level adjustment and racial HD will leave them lagging behind the rest of the party.

[Miles Invictus]

Simple solution: Rule that whenever the afflicted character's alignment is forcibly changed (such as by changing into animal form), that character is treated as an NPC.

Note that voluntarily changing form causes immediate and permanent alignment shift, while involuntarily changing form causes an alignment shift while transformed. End result, they never get to enjoy the benefits of the condition. This gives them a big incentive to find a cure and punishes them for trying to exploit the situation.

I think it's a bit harsh, personally, but it'll make sure they don't purposefully get infected.

[Crow T. Robot]

If your PC's are primarily good, espcially if there's a Paladin, have them infected by an evil Lycanthrope. The first full moon, they change into that creature, and act in that alignment, causing great concern to those who cannot stray. Just have one person who has an alignment restriction (Monk, Bard, Pally, etc) infected by an opposing aligned Lycanthrope, and they will definitely want to cure it. (By the way, were wolves are Chaotic Evil).

The only problem with that is that pallies are immune after 3rd level. At that point they are free to get up close and personal. This happened once.

GM: Oh boy, time to make you fort save.
Player: No.
GM: Yes
Player: <Flips through pages> No.
GM: Damn

The fight ended right after the smiting started.

But anyways, the alignment change for shifting might be limited only to the time of shifting. Afterwards things go back. Of course this means the werewolf is basically a monster (Possibly in control of the GM) and bodies are going to mount as a result.

[raygungothic]

I've twice run games in which PCs became lycanthropes. It simply happens when they're off camera. They're in town, investigating the deaths and disappearances, and eventually they run out of spells and sleep. In the morning there are more deaths... clues that THEY are the perpetrators only happen later.

I've never tried to do this in a campaign that was intended to run for much longer, though. You might want to make it curable after a special quest.

[Driderman]

In the end, I suppose it's up to you.
Personally, if I ran a story which involved a PC contracting lycanthropy, I'd do it the 'classic' way: Do the save rolls in secret, not letting the player know whether he's infected or not. Once the change comes over him, he becomes a DM-controlled NPC and, much like the werewolves of the classic tales, doesn't remember his heinous crimes when he awakes again.
Of course, should said player decide to voluntarily make use of his dark powers, a whole world of possibilities open up, the first of them being a permanent alignment change.
This doesn't necessarily mean the immediate end of the character as a PC, but unless the campaign is geared to tolerate a Chaotic Evil werewolf in the party, the character will probably have to be retired soon, either permanently by silver or by restraining him somewhere where People Who Know About Such Things will guard him/try to undo the curse.

A thought: For dramatic effect, the first time the player fails an involuntary save, have him leave the room and take over the character as he transforms and attacks his allies, only letting the player back in the room when his character comes to his sense. Alternately, if you think his teammates may actually kill him outright, just have him sit in the farthest corner and tell him that he's not allowed to say a word. That way he at least gets to witness his demise. Of course, if raise dead is easy to come by no reason to do that. Would be a rather fun scene, the last thing he remembers is getting angry and the next thing that happens is that he wakes up in some temple with a cleric muttering incantations over him, while his buddies are watching him apprenhensively, weapons at the ready.

[Mewtarthio]

I think it might be best to review the core rules of Lycanthropy as an Affliction. Oddly enough, you'll notice that a high Wis score is actually a bad thing for a lycanthrope: Every time you are transformed involuntarily, you can make a Wis check to become "aware" of your condition. Before you're "aware," you become an NPC if you get involuntarily transformed, but you also don't need to make the Will save against permanent and irrevocable alignment change. Feel free to specify whether or not they can voluntarily fail the Wis check.

[UserClone]

It's never made sense to me that a Werewolf would be Chaotic - Wolves are social pack animals with a well-defined hierarchy.

[Prophaniti]

I never understood where they pulled these mandatory alignments for the different lycanthropes from anyway. I mean, why are werewolves CE but weretigers neutral? And why are werebears good? It just seems so arbitrary, espesially the mandatory hate for wolves, who will only attack humans in the rarest of circumstances. Lycanthropes should be neutral because animals are neutral. This isnt to say they wont attack people and eat them since, hey, some animals do that. And if an afflicted person becomes aware of their transformation, there would be a will save every time to mantain control while in animal form. Otherwise instinct takes over and its back to npc land!
That's my 2cp anyway.

[Driderman]

I never understood where they pulled these mandatory alignments for the different lycanthropes from anyway. I mean, why are werewolves CE but weretigers neutral? And why are werebears good? It just seems so arbitrary, espesially the mandatory hate for wolves, who will only attack humans in the rarest of circumstances. Lycanthropes should be neutral because animals are neutral. This isnt to say they wont attack people and eat them since, hey, some animals do that. And if an afflicted person becomes aware of their transformation, there would be a will save every time to mantain control while in animal form. Otherwise instinct takes over and its back to npc land!
That's my 2cp anyway.

Well the depends on what approach you take to Were-creatures. The classical werewolf is a creature cursed by dark powers, which goes a long way to explain why it is chaotic evil.
Of course, if your approach to were-creatures is that they're just some sort of fleshy animal Transformer, alignment really shouldn't figure in to it.

[Psionic Dog]

Think Diskworld here. Alignment is based not on how the creature behaves, but on what all those superstitious commoners think. Since the villagers fear the forests, have trouble with wolves eating their lambs, and tell horror stories about wolves at night, they believe wolves are the evil agents of devils and vampires. And belief asserts itself until it becomes fact. The few rangers and druids who know better aren't numerous to dispel this belief.

Any way, as a player who likes to play afflicted lycanthrops, I can say that a character has to spend considerable resources before the benefits outweigh the curse. Loosing humanoid form, speaking, ect is painful. If a player shows interest in keeping the 'curse,' peer-pressure by party member or the suggestion that the player won't gain any more class levels until the animal HD and LA have been paid off ought to make all but the most stubborn player reconsider. Until a player can buy ranks in control shape they will be helpless before the curse.

Lycanthros can make campaigns interesting, just try to time it so that a player won't gain a level while aware of their affliction. If PC's start investing in curse-coping then a cure could hurt them.

[Jarlax]

read the section at the end of lycanthropy about "lycanthropy as an affliction" then go to the section that describes the control shape skill. these are your balancing factors.

first any PC afflicted will have to go on a CE rampage at least once before they can become aware of their affliction. they prefer family and friends so its likely that the party will have to put them down just to defend themselves. if they fail that DC15 wisdom check then it will be repeated any time they take damage or its a full moon.

second even if they become aware of the affliction they are subject to a DC25 control shape check (a skill they have no points in) every full moon or when they have lost 1/4 of their hit points and again for each 1/4. failing that check places them in animal form until the following dawn with no chance to retry the failed save. any caster or gear heavy PC will actually be restrained by their animal form, rather than improved.

finally to get the most out of their new powers they have to pass a DC 15 check to become hybrid form (which they have no points in yet). but they also need to pass a DC 20 check(meaning a natural 20 on the dice or at best maybe a 17 with +3 wis) to return to normal form. and if they fail that check they are suck in hybrid until the next dawn with no retry. this becomes a problem for the PC who then has to avoid contact with anyone, in case his affliction is discovered.

[Mojo_Rat]

Lycanthropes represent the primal terrifying beast. They also represent the worst aspects of humanity come to the forefront in combination with that terrifying beast.

The nature of actual wolves is meaningless. As an example no one ever insists that Worg or Winter wolf should not have the alignments they do.

The Werewolf is intended to be the creature of legend the terror int he night that turns from human form and stalks its living victims be they old ladies small children or even grown men.

All the were creatures are at least somewhat on this theme representing negative ideals of either humans or the animal forms. That is why it is a curse. It works best for Were Rats and Werewolves. The Wereboar can really be the terrifying boar orf legend flying into a berserk rage that all the kings men and beasts cannot take down.

However youw ant to do it but the alignments they are given is suiable. Really the exeption is the werebear to the rule.

[Mewtarthio]

However youw ant to do it but the alignments they are given is suiable. Really the exeption is the werebear to the rule.

Werebears bug me. I see no reason why all the paladins of the world wouldn't be lining people up to be bitten by werebears. Granted, you could make the same argument for CE Blackguards and werewolves, but werebears have the enforcement of Law on their side and the idealism of Good (People may have valid complaints about being forced to be Good, but any halfway decent propagandist can frame them as wanting "the right to harm their fellow man"). Besides, it's not much of a curse: For CE, it's quite easy to say that they give in to their violent nature and kill at random, but what do you do for LG? They give into their benevolent, orderly nature and found soup kitchens at random?

[Turcano]

Well the depends on what approach you take to Were-creatures. The classical werewolf is a creature cursed by dark powers, which goes a long way to explain why it is chaotic evil.
Of course, if your approach to were-creatures is that they're just some sort of fleshy animal Transformer, alignment really shouldn't figure in to it.

Well, the RAW practically admits that lycanthrope alignments are completely arbitrary anyway; for example, I think that werebears are only lawful good because of Beorn (which still doesn't make sense -- he always struck me as a chaotic kind of guy).

Also, lycanthropy carries another curse as well. It's called "LA +2."

[boomwolf]

Actaully there is a problem with werewolves.
While by the core books they are chaotic evil, wolves are not chaotic nor evil by nature (if you use DND defenition on real wolves.)
Actaully, the average real wolf is a LAWFUL NEUTRAL animal, not a chaotic evil. so the "werewolf" has very different alignment then wolves.

Besides, even then, there are exceptions. (a werewolf can be neutral good or something. it happens. jest like good drow and evil highborn elves.)

Besides, turn into NPC? thats dumb. really. you are still a PC, jest have a new alignment that you must follow.

About the "helpless before he levels up" you get skill points when turning werewolf, and you "class skill" is control shape. so high int char is ok.


all the lycanthropy system is flawed from the base. no point messing with it. the disadvantages are few and the advantages are high, you jest need to find the right lycanthrop to bite you.

[Mewtarthio]

Actaully there is a problem with werewolves.
While by the core books they are chaotic evil, wolves are not chaotic nor evil by nature (if you use DND defenition on real wolves.)
Actaully, the average real wolf is a LAWFUL NEUTRAL animal, not a chaotic evil. so the "werewolf" has very different alignment then wolves.

I'd peg a werewolf as Neutral Evil, actually. Remember, you're not dealing with a regular animal: You're dealing with a creature with human intelligence consumed by animalistic instincts. When a pack of wolves hunts in the wild, it is neither good nor evil; it simply is. When a gang of humans succumbs to an urge to hunt and kill the weak, it is decidedly evil. As for ethical alignment: The pack dynamic is outweighed by the fact that werewolves are extremely unlikely to work with anyone outside the pack. Besides, Lawful lycanthropes have some disturbing implications (namely, their ability to work with established human governments means that, sooner or later, some government will intentionally infect its citizens with lycanthropy).

Besides, even then, there are exceptions. (a werewolf can be neutral good or something. it happens. jest like good drow and evil highborn elves.)

Drow don't need to make Will saves to avoid becoming Evil. Drow live in a society that encourages Evil; therefore, they are mainly Evil. Werewolves are completely consumed by their desire to do Evil. They are irredeemable as their curse prevents any sort of conversion. Even if you could reason with them, any progress you made would be undone the next time they took animal or hybrid form and felt the rush of their wolfish instincts take over.

Nor can they be cured once they've fully succumbed to the curse (unless it's been less than three weeks since they contracted lycanthropy, in which case a cleric can cast remove disease on them): The only cure essentially requires a willing target (the Will save can be failed voluntarily otherwise), and no lycanthrope that has failed the alignment shift will want to be freed. Essentially, the only way to cure a lycanthrope that has succumbed to his animal nature is to magically force him to accept the cure, either by magically changing his alignment (eg via a helm of opposite alignment) and curing him before he fails a Control Shape check and reverts to his original alignment, or by compelling him with a geas or dominate effect and ordering him to make the save (in which case, he'll likely be more than a little unhappy with you and will likely have to be imprisoned--he's still got the lycanthropic alignment, after all--but at least now there is some glimmer of hope).

Besides, turn into NPC? thats dumb. really. you are still a PC, jest have a new alignment that you must follow.

No, your very nature has been changed. I believe that such a harsh punishment is necessary, lest lycanthropy become a cool new set of toys. Besides, you just got a +4 boost to your ECL. It'll be a long time before you level up if you stick with your feeble human party, and in the meantime you'll be somewhat more powerful than anyone else.

About the "helpless before he levels up" you get skill points when turning werewolf, and you "class skill" is control shape. so high int char is ok.

True, there is that. You get two Animal HD, giving you 2x(2+Int) skill points. You can dump them all into Control Shape and suffer later (when everyone else has two more HD from superior class levels) if you wish.

all the lycanthropy system is flawed from the base. no point messing with it. the disadvantages are few and the advantages are high, you jest need to find the right lycanthrop to bite you.

Only if you treat lycanthropy as a suite of cool new abilities, rather than as a curse, disease, or affliction. If you don't enforce a drastic change in not only alignment nor even personality but also the very nature of the character, the bite of the werewolf transmits nothing more than +2 Wis, +2 HD, low-light vision, +2 natural armor, scent, DR/silver, and alternate forms for the cost of needing to keep track of Control Shape and an ECL boost. Again, taking away a character sheet and declaring someone an NPC may seem harsh, but the alternative is for players to look at the advantages of lycanthropy and actually consider it as a valid option. I wouldn't let a PC slain by a vampire return to play simply as a CE guy with +8 ECL (even if they killed the master vampire controlling him); how is lycanthropy any different?

DISCLAIMER: You are, of course, entitled to your own opinions. If your campaign world works best when werewolves simply have controllable violent tendancies, or even are just misunderstood, that's fine by me: It's your world after all. Maybe the ECL penalties alone will convince people to seek healing, or maybe you have other ways of preventing this sudden spike in power.

[Nowhere Girl]

I'd throw out the lycanthropy rules as written, at least as they pertain to alignment, and replace then with something more realistic and interesting. Wolves aren't chaotic evil; that's just stupid. As mentioned by another already, wolves are closer to lawful neutral. Felines are closer to chaotic neutral, and wouldn't you know it, the feline were is farther from chaotic than the lupine were in D&D. And werebears are lawful good for some reason. Why's that, exactly? "Um, er, uh ..."

No. No, no, NO. DUMB.

That does not mean you'd have to throw out the "change involuntarily and kill people in the night" thing, however. Think about it: wild animals do attack people sometimes, especially if they feel threatened -- such as if they find themselves suddenly in the midst of a city, surrounded by people. Would you like to run into a bear wandering down the city street where you live? I rather think not. I know I'd prefer not to! Of course, if it's the D&D idea of a werebear, I suppose it'll be running around helping little old ladies cross the street and giving money (held in its mouth?) to the poor ... good grief, see how stupid that is?

A werewolf should not be chaotic evil, but it should be scary just the same if uncontrolled, because you basically have a wild animal that acts like a wild animal popping up in the midst of civilization attacking livestock and, possibly, people. A werebear should not be lawful good, and it should be scary ... even more scary that a werewolf because it's a bear!

[kpenguin]

Remember, lycanthropes aren't really hybrids of animals and humans. They are cursed creatures created by magic and they still retain their intelligence in animal form. Thus, they are separate from the animal's usual alignment.

This really the same thing as all magical beasts or monsters based on animals. Horses have no particular alignment, but their magical counterparts are chaotic good (unicorns & pegasi) and neutral evil (nightmares).

Werewolves seem to be based on the werewolves of legend, which are mostly chaotic evil. Werebears seem to based on Beorn from the Hobbit... or the werebears toys of the 80s.

[Destro_Yersul]

My take on it is that it should be curable as long as you haven't ever tried to use it. Do the blanking out and that sort of thing, maybe have a few people show up dead...

Any self respecting good character is going to want to cure this sort of thing. So why not give them a way to once they figure it out, time delays be damned?

[raygungothic]

Besides, Lawful lycanthropes have some disturbing implications (namely, their ability to work with established human governments means that, sooner or later, some government will intentionally infect its citizens with lycanthropy).

I love it. May I steal that someday?

It has a twisted logic to it. Lycanthropes are quantifiably superior. Ruthless lycanthropes therefore sieze power. Before long, citizenship requires lycanthropy, nonlycanthropy implies serfdom. Expansionist empire building ensues, as the Lawful-aligned werewolf citizen-soldiers of the Lycanthrarchy have an easy time massacring the human forces of neighbouring states. They're a bit Roman, a bit Fascist, and probably a bit more work needed to prevent them from becoming too cheesy. At least PCs who find themselves here would have to be very, very careful to keep a low profile rather than wading in blasting, so it should lead to some interesting adventuring.

This will probably have to happen on an alternate Prime Material or a convenient demiplane so that totalitarian Lycanthrarchy doesn't totally destroy my campaign world.

[mostlyharmful]

My computer no work good today , please ignore.

[mostlyharmful]

Werebears bug me. I see no reason why all the paladins of the world wouldn't be lining people up to be bitten by werebears. Granted, you could make the same argument for CE Blackguards and werewolves, but werebears have the enforcement of Law on their side and the idealism of Good (People may have valid complaints about being forced to be Good, but any halfway decent propagandist can frame them as wanting "the right to harm their fellow man"). Besides, it's not much of a curse: For CE, it's quite easy to say that they give in to their violent nature and kill at random, but what do you do for LG? They give into their benevolent, orderly nature and found soup kitchens at random?

All hail Glorius Werebearia! It shall inherit the earth with its intergrated social dynamic, well regulated population and OVERWHEALMING MILITARY POWER!!!

Personally I don't get why it's damage reduction not regen, they should get hurt by everything but only be put down by silver and/or fire. I know the DR fluff is of a wound healing over instantly but it still doesn't sit alongside traditional werewolf stories and myths. I guess it'd be too powerful but then with 2 crappy racial hit dice and a +2 infected and +3!!! natural LA it already seems pretty handicapped on the long haul and over powered immediately

[Nowhere Girl]

Remember, lycanthropes aren't really hybrids of animals and humans. They are cursed creatures created by magic and they still retain their intelligence in animal form. Thus, they are separate from the animal's usual alignment.

Yes, but it's still just arbitrary and stupid. It's even worse than color-coded dragons, which also always bothered me on some level ("Boy, it's sure a good thing nature decided to color code all of the dragons according to their [required] alignments so we could skip alla that boring interaction stuff and get straight to the killin'!").

Like, hey, gold dragon, why are you lawful good? What's your motivation? What experiences, and what conclusions drawn from those experiences -- or what teachings passed down to you -- led you to that worldview? What, drawing from that experience or those teachings, could you tell me about why I should think the same as you do?

"Uhhhhnnnn ... duh ... Iunno ... I was written in the Monster Manual that way?"

*sigh*

Yes, I simply hate that kind of thing. I like my monsters a little more complex, more like they are in, say, World of Darkness ... and I see nothing wrong with bringing those expectations of complexity and depth over to D&D. The gamers all grew up, and gaming grew up somewhat, too. It's time for D&D to grow up.

[kpenguin]

So... your complaint is with the way monsters are forced into certain alignments? I can understand that.

That's one of the many reasons I like Eberron: flexible and blurred alignments.

[Lord Lorac Silvanos]

On the Alignment issue:

The individual were-creature entries have an inflexible alignment for some reason. However the actual template gives as much leeway as needed.

Alignment: Any. Noble creatures such as bears, eagles, and lions tend to produce good-aligned lycanthropes. Sinister creatures such as rats, snakes, and wolves tend to produce evil-aligned lycanthropes. This is a reflection of how these animals are perceived, not any innate quality of the animal itself, so the alignment of the animal form can be arbitrarily assigned.

[kpenguin]

Mmmm... given the template's description, how about a setting where a lycanthrope's alignment while in animal form is determined by the afflicted's personal view of the animal?

[Nowhere Girl]

So... your complaint is with the way monsters are forced into certain alignments? I can understand that.

That's one of the many reasons I like Eberron: flexible and blurred alignments.

That and the fact that the alignment choices are nonsensical to the point of incoherence in many cases.

At least a red dragon being chaotic evil can make ... some kind of vague, twisted sense, if only because there's no real-world analog for them. Dragons don't exist in the real world, even a little bit, so they can be whatever we want them to be on paper. Even if it is ridiculous.

Werewolves don't exist in the real world either, but wolves do. And it's kind of hard to overlook the resemblance of werewolves to, y'know, wolves. Not to mention that "wolves" is right in the name of the beast. So why are werewolves evil? Is it because wolves are evil? No, because wolves aren't evil. So is it that all weres are evil? No, because some are good, and in fact werebears are lawful good. Wait, lawful good?? Why are werebears lawful good?!!

Damned if I know ...

It's just silly to the point of being self-contradictory and utterly incoherent. It doesn't even make sense within its own reality, whereas at least color-coded dragons sort of do (even though it's still silly). Weres aren't automatically evil. Wolves aren't evil at all. But put the two together and POOF! EVIL! Why? Because they said so.

Psh.