Thursday, October 29, 2015

All Hallows Eve #3: Adventure Seed for a Loup Garou




18th century engraving of a werewolf devouring a woman

Here are stats for normal wolves. In French folklore packs of wolves are sometimes led by a Loup Garou or werewolf, so normal wolf stats will come in handy. In the adventure I ran, I included a very large pack of normal wolves led by the werewolf. Their lair was in this cave complex, based on a real cave.

Normal Wolf

These predators can be frightening on their own, and are the subject of many tales used to frighten children. However, wolves also hunt in packs, where they become especially deadly to their prey.

Might 1                Daring 2               Savvy -1              Terror 0

Defense 1            Lifeblood 10

+3 Attack w/ Bite: 1d6-1 Damage; + Pull

Pull: If bite is successful, victim must roll Might (-1) or be pulled to the ground and At a Loss until they spend a Minor Action to stand up. Wolves do +2 damage while target is At a Loss.

Wolf of Soissons -- an Adventure Seed

In this adventure the werewolf is a creature of rage and vengeance. A man who willing took on the curse of the loup garou to get his revenge.

The town of Soissons is in the Province of Picardy about 100 kilometers northeast of Paris. It lies in a bowl-shaped area in the Aisne River valley with the rim of the bowl formed by the surrounding hills. The main church is the gothic-style Cathedral of Saint Gervais (Cathédrale Saint-Gervais-et-Saint-Protais de Soissons) which was completed in the late 13th century. Any other town with a surrounding rural or uncivilized area could be used instead.

A werewolf is terrorizing the town for revenge. Seven years ago, the beautiful daughter of a local woodsman was coveted by the Governor but she resisted his advances, scratching his face. In revenge he had her put out of the town in the winter shoeless and naked – “since she has the manners of a wild beast, she should run with the beasts.” Her father protested, but he was struck down by the guards, shackled in the town square, and scourged. While he was confined in the town square, the woodsman cursed the Governor and the townspeople with many a blasphemous oath saying that as he and his daughter had been treated like beasts, their revenge would be as terrible and ferocious as that of beasts.

The Governor instructed that the town walls be locked and that none should aid her on penalty of death. And so she disappeared into the night. Her father was taken by the Governor’s guard Odo, scourged, and locked in the chateau dungeon. Presumably the woodsman was killed since he was not seen again His daughter was never seen again and her body was never found.

Unknown to most people, the Woodsman escaped captivity but he was not in time to save his daughter. He found her frozen body partially eaten by wolves. Howling in grief, he buried her body under a cairn of stones. In his rage he called on the devil and damned his soul in return for vengeance. The devil made a bargain. For six years the woodsman would run and feed as a black wolf without the intelligence of a man. If he survived, than in the seventh year he would become a werewolf with the cunning and form of a man so that he could seek his vengeance. But after the seventh year, the devil would claim his soul. During the past six years he became leader of a huge pack of ferocious wolves. Now in the seventh year, he regained his awareness becoming a werewolf. Now he seeks to gain revenge before his soul is forfeit.


The party must deal with the werewolf. There are two methods available. One is to figure out what has occurred and why and to somehow reconcile the Woodsman to his daughter’s death. At a minimum this will require that they bring the Governor and Odo to account for their crimes. They will then need to remove the curse of lycanthropy from the woodsman. As a temporary measure while they are trying to find a way to free him from the curse, they could chain him up around the full moon, but given his unearthly might that will require special, very strong bonds.

The second method is to track the wolves and eliminating them by brute force. This will work against the wolf pack, but not against the werewolf – unless they know of and use methods effective against a werewolf. If they do not learn of his unique nature, they may fail to kill the werewolf the first time and they may need to return at the next full moon to track and kill him.


Bad winter weather is a factor throughout this adventure. It may cause loss of composure due to exposure and will increase the misfire rate for black powder weapons. Gun locks and powder will need to be oiled and wrapped in rags or cloth to protect them from wind and damp.

Werewolf

A victim of another werewolf’s bite, at the full moon this creature becomes a near unstoppable wolf-man hybrid. Only silver weapons can bring one down. It is said that there may be a cure to the disease that causes this condition, but Alchemists and Magicians who know how to make it are hard to find.

Might 6                Daring 3               Savvy 0               Terror 2

Defense 1            Lifeblood 20

1d6+1 Protection: Impervious to Harm protection vs. damage except damage from silver; werewolf recovers all damage by any means except silver at the end of the scene even if it seemed to be slain.

+4 Attack w/Savage Bite: 1d6 Dmg; +Pull, + Lycanthropy

+4 Attack w/Claws: 1d3+1 Dmg;

Pull: If Savage Bite is successful, victim must roll Might (-6) or be pulled to the ground and At a Loss until they spend a Minor Action to stand up. Wolves do +2 damage while target is At a Loss.

Lycanthropy: A victim of a werewolf’s bite may become a werewolf by the next full moon. Take the damage that the werewolf’s bite caused the victim, and cut it in half (round down). Use this number as the difficulty for a Might check. If the victim fails the check, they become a werewolf at the next full moon, using the above stats. In this form, the player is not in control of the character, and the character’s personality is replaced by that of a completely feral monster. 

EDIT [16 NOV 2015]: I should have included this sooner. Here's an item that may be helpful when confronting a loup garou. No stats are included since my players haven't yet figured out what this thing does.

<< Previous All Hallows Eve | Next All Hallows Eve>>


No comments:

Post a Comment