Paul Bode's Roleplay Game

This is an exceptionally long story and only a very brief history is included here, most of which players helped create with their blood of their characters. The story has encompassed many groups, many caerns and many years with many of the details being lost. An apology for those that notice that I have missed things they consider important out.

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The Get-of-Fenris control a powerful caern at St. Albans, its totem is Fenris himself and the Get are the envy of most of the garou in England. They share the caern with Shadow Lords, but the Lords have only a minor say in the running of the caern. The leader Kern is opposed by the Shadow Lord Kendrick when some pups arrive. Kendrick supports them and uses them to gain support and take leadership. He wins a savage fight against Kern, and Kern is killed. Happy years pass for the caern, even though its power wanes. The Shadow Lords try to get popular support by changing the caern as a place of hope for lost pups. The caern changes its name and it becomes officially 'The Caern of the Lost Pups" and the spirit Swan replaces Fenris as the main totem. The Fenrir are furious. Years of defense take its toll and the last member of Kendrick's old pack dies at the railway station. Kendrick tries to save him personally but gets captured and corrupted by the Wyrm. Able to conceal his taint, he blames the caerns fall from glory on a Fianna Cormac. Cormac is eventually killed because he realizes Kendrick is Wyrm tainted  and tries to swing the caern against him. When evil Kendrick runs a moot, the caern falls, yet for a moment, Kendrick regains control and pushes the young garou on a spirit bridge to safety. Among them is John Constantine (JC). The caern falls to the Wyrm due to a new bane 'The Brain Dog' which can change reality.​

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A new life is built for the young garou, now experienced cliaths at Manchester and the Sept of the Green. There a inspirational speaker Mother, who is caern leader is tying to unite the garou of England. Her motive is due to the fact her peaceful caern has few ahrouns. All the Children of Gaia ahroun go to live at Sept of the Legion in Caerleon as that is where all the fighting and glory is. The cliaths learn of the Legend of the Three Johns, in which three garou unite to avert Apocalypse for years. Two of them, go by the name of John, but the third remains a mystery. With the growing fame of the cliaths Mother begins to show great progress at Moots and all the tribes begin to trust her. The Wyrm understands the threat of garou unity so it sends forth an army to Manchester. On the very eve of unity, Mother is killed by a formori's lucky blow. The tribes begin blame throwing and all her work falls apart. The Wyrm steals her body and return her as a zombie to upset the garou of the 'Sept of the Green' and defile her memory. It works and the few Ahroun are led into an ambush and are killed. In chaos, the CoG at Manchester agree to allow some Red Talon ahroun to live in the large park grounds for much needed defence of the caern. Other than this though, Manchester becomes a closed sept, only recruiting from the Children of Gaia. In a series of assaults the garou prove victorious in a great battle and the Wyrm's forces pushed back.

 

 

 

 

At this time, the Shadow Lords at Sept of the Castle (the rest of the Kendrick line) assault the Wyrm pit as St Albans and free Swan and cleanse the caern. It is weak, but again pure. Distrustful of the caern, elders refuse to go there, so it ends up being run by cliaths.  Colchester's new active pack leader Jonathan Brimble becomes the caern leader and earns the garou name 'Choice' for his deeds over the years here. To appease Swan, a deal is made; there will always be a Black Fury caern guardian who will do the work of the totem and be the confident with which the spirit can speak. The only surviving garou from the old caern is a overweight priest called Father Wimbish. He aids the new caern by coming the head theurge. The caern is often under serious Wyrm assault, but as it survives its reputation begins to improve and it is aided heavily by the Sept of the Castle.

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​The Cliaths from Manchester return to confront a Wyrm tainted Kendrick, who is now on the run. A great Wyrm beast is controlling him and so the three Johns (now reunited) convince the mages near St Albans to all turn against the Wyrm. Kendrick manages to get enough control to allow the garou and mages to put in a final blow. The Wyrm beast dies, and Kendrick becomes a legend. The mages have a temperamental truce with the garou at St Albans. JC and the Johns go on to find a White Howler rumored to be the perfect metis. The Get oppose them and soon the White Howler and one of the Johns is killed. JC packless begins to wander, disliked by most for his slanders and half truths. Jean De Grace, the second John falls in with the garou at St Albans.

 

 

 

 

Time passes, during which a Fianna 'Nicky Davis' openly opposes Lord Gilliat (the youngest brother of Kendrick) as he challenges to become king of England. Gilliat wins the crown and exiles Nicky to a barren caern. JC insults the new king at his coronation and makes a new enemy. The Shadow Lords come to power and immediately secure their leadership with new laws. The Get, angry about some of the new laws put their greatest warrior 'Lothar' into training, ready to challenge Gilliat at the next available Grand moot.

 

 

 

 

Another group of young garou, aided and supported by the Glasswalker 'City Streets' pack are raised at the Sept of Sherwood. The caern leader James Purcell agrees to give them caern places. Kenny Mitnick learns he is the brother of Space-On-Disk and also learns of his twisted heritage. Kenny is killed though in a leadership dispute with Jean De Grace. Under new leadership this group then learns of a new bane 'The Haephodant' a beast that can make copies of people and things and can hide its Wyrm taint. The doppelgangers are harmed by salt so the young garou unite as two Salt Packs to combat them. The pack is aided by hidden messages in a David Bowie song 'Life on Mars' which also prophecies the death of one of the packs mates. One team pursues the trail of the Haephodant to Mars and there combat and destroy the queen spirit. The second team deals blows to the doppelgangers on Earth, killing many of them but are not able to get to all of them. George Bush, now a copy, remains in power and the garou fail to get close to him. The Salt Packs disband. A grand moot sees Lord Gilliat lose his crown (and nearly his life) to the Fenris Lothar in a hard fought challenge. Lothar spares Gilliat to acquire favour with the garou council at the moot. The show works and King Lothar is sworn in. The Get bring a battle focus against the Wyrm and many see this as a good thing.

 

 

 

 

The Caern of the Lost Pups, train a young Silver Fang 'Stefan Hein' and his pack mate. However, after a time Stefan falls out with Brimble (now called 'Choice') and leaves to go to The Sept of the Seabird, the caern ran by the exiled Nicky Davies. Here the tragic Hein is arranged to marry Rosanna Testini, last of the Austere Howl, a now extinct lineage, even though he secretly loves another garou. Their son is destined to rule England and turn the tide of the Wyrm. Deimos, the cryptic Theurge at St Albans takes a keen interest with the boy who is known as 'Bear' after his kin fetch.

The next batch of pups to leave St Albans unite under the caern totem 'Swan' and through many adventures acquire plenty of renown. One of them Martin 'Silvertongue' Jenkins comes under the wing of Lord Gilliat. Together these garou go and discover a strange fetish called the Spear of Heavenly Light said to have stabbed Christ. The journey costs them their totem and a rivalry forms between Swan and Silvertongue. The spear is given to Lord Gilliat to look after.

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At a visit to Sept of the Castle, the boy picks up the Spear of Heavenly Light a fetish that all others struggle to attune. The spear accepts him readily, however Lord Gilliat does not allow the spear to leave the castle. Hein, despite attempts on his life goes into main stream garou politics.

 

 

 

 

Silvertongue and his pack 'The Un-scorched Branch' go on a quest through Europe searching for a lost klaive. They are joined by a pup of the Shadow Lords called Antoine. Back at home a young Children of Gaia girl channels the spirit of Mother and the hope of garou unity is brought back. As people rally around her, King Lothar and Lord Gilliat realize that her power brings an end to the Crown. The American Silver Fangs under Albrecht also support her. Gilliat enlists Antoine to kill Grandmother as the Un-scorched Branch pack falls to pieces in Egypt. Silvertongue goes to live with some mages as a way to secure himself a klaive. Antoine nearly succeeds in killing grandmother and she is gravely wounded but manages to recover.

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An inquiry led by Albrecht is sanctioned into the assassination attempt. Silvertongue is recovered from the mages and when they return they learn that Gilliat and Lothar both backed the attempt. However Grandmother turns out to be a Queen Haephodant and kills JC in a public show of power, she then is chased back into the umbra by Daemon Wright and Silvertongue. The incident with the Queen Haephodant causes a severe breach of the Litany in Manchester causing much problems for the moot there. The salt packs reform as a new queen threatens the garou nation. A pack has an uneasy allience up with a BSD pack to hunt down and destroy the bane Queen due to its assault on a BSD pit. The two teams go all out and hunt the bane to its watery lair and in a massive battle injure the Queen so badly that the spirit crawls into a dark place to die. Almost all of both packs died in the battle, but it was learned that JC was not in fact dead...but had tricked the haephodant queen with some petty hedge magic. With some new found respect he limps back into Garou society.

 

 

 

A new pack comes out of 'The Caern of Lost Pups' and cause 'The Massacre of St. Albans' in which many people were killed and others injured. One of the pups even damages the 'Fighting Cocks' itself, which is then closed for repairs. Magnus Christguard is included in a breeding programme at Dover and fate takes an interest in him as also the possible 'Pendragon'. On their many journies with Owl as their totem the pack went to France and stayed at a Silver Fang caern where a Child of Gaia metis showed them the future of the fall of St. Albans through the change of its totem to Black Swan. This pack had actually been sent by 'Choice' to push this agenda, so confronted with this vision they made plans to prevent the fall. They went to the 'Sept of the Cardboard Box' where they reaquired a caern stone for moonbridges. They promised to return it, but the Silver Fangs at the other caern kept it. St Albans changes its totem to Black Swan and during its first moot, most of the pack who helped change it died in the assault. Magnus Christguard was the only survivor and he saw the caern once again get reclaimed by The Get-of-Fenris.

 

 

 

Magnus joins with another pack and for a while travels as a broken man. He travels into the legendary realm to prevent disturbances by a dreaded haephodant but they avoid confronting it. Lord Silvetongue helps some of the pack escape from a prison realm where they were held. Finally the Bonegnawers from 'The Sept of the Cardboard Box' catch up with Magnus Christguard and he stands for tribunal, punishable by 'Stone of Scorn'. His other pack mates disrupt a Black Spiral pit in a plane crash and evade hunters. One of the pack, about to become a Black Fury is forced to join the hunters. St. Albans having gone through so much, yet again falls to the Wyrm. Plans are made to recover it but few are as excited by the prospect as they once were.

 

In Manchester another small group of young garou, mixed with a Glasswalker pup helped support the caern through its troubles. Seb, a warrior Bonehnawer led the group and helped stop the development of a new type of Formori. A Silver Fang, last of the Austere Howl and a lupus to boot aided the group, his garou name 'Watches-the-Lake'. A Shadow Lord Ragabash who was more of a warrior than most ahroun Jason. The arrival of the Silver Fang caused numerous political problems, as many did not want the tainted line of Silver Fangs to re-emerge, some feared it. However, Marianna Barclay did much to protect him, so they stayed close the the caern. They had heard of the curse on the leader and worked to protect the caern from trouble. Indirectly, they churned up an intense struggle with the City's vampires. Manchester's Red Talons had been getting more agressive and more people were disappearing at night in the Park. The caern's alliance with the Get-of-Fenris in Helsby was becoming more tenious and only Marianna's political skills kept the alliance in check.

The pack became known as the 'Seekers of the Stone Peace'.

 

A group of pups are located and due to the fall of St. Albans there is no place to train them. As no caern currently has space, a poor decision is made to send them to 'Caern of the Seabird' - the ill-named caern of shame. One of those garou is Tristan Greyholt, a silver fang of considerable note, of old Russian stock, from a line of kin that had been forgotten about. A young Glasswalker from the wealthy London Glasswalkers, 'Matt' Gordon Matthew Atherton-Smythe. A Fianna loved by her people, but far from home, Moira. A Silent Strider mixed stock with Uktena stock, Hadya Dariz. Lastly there was the religous orphan of mixed English and French Shadow Lord stock. His father had bre for love, and illegal love between two woaring camps. Together the group became 'The Thundering Paws' and took Stag as their totem.

 

The caern leader, the provactive Nikki Davies did her best to teach them, but political pressure made the young pups expore other caerns to adopt them. Manchester though full, did they best to support them after they helped save the totem from corruption and the curse that was laid on the leader Marianna Barclay. The pack went on a great umbral quest to destroy the Wyrm corruption that eaten into the Unicorn spirit at caern heart, eating its confidence and bring rage to the spirit. They uncovered that the caern had been secretly contaminated by a Haephodant, a shape changing bane. The pack went to James Purcell at Nottigham, famous for dealing with these banes to plan to destory the bane. The pack had helped Seabirds theurge 'Laura West' and had become very fond of her, but she had to return to her caern.

 

While building renown at the caern with various tasks, the Thundering Paws learned that Manchester had been attacked by the Wyrm. Although the caern was safe, its leader Marianna Barclay had been comatosed by a silver bullet, shot into her head. Though surving the wound, she later died. The Get Stephen Rothman had died defending the caern, and with this death the last alliance between Get and Children came to an end. The Seekers of the Stone Death pack foiled an assassination attemt on the King of England, with Seb helping to save his life. With so much death the totem with so much rage, changed aspect and become the Black Unicorn, the protector. Sadly though, the damage was done. The Caern Guardian took leadership and 'Broken Tooth' became the new leader. The pack Seekers of the Stone Death broke apart.

 

The Thundering Paws took the battle to the Haephodant, but had not realised that one of the pack had been replaced by the shapechanger. David was abducted and for some time they ran with David without realising it was not him. When they discovered this fact, the bane weakened fled and the pack did not have the skills to take the fight to it. Attending a kin funeral, Matt's Black spiral father 'Digital Raven' tried to convince him to join the spirals. When he refused, the Spiral pack went against their leader and slaughtered the Glass Walker family. Matt's corruption came out and he was taken to tribunal. The judges, judged him harshly and he was sent to the Lake of Silver to purge his sins. With this the pack broke apart and they went their own paths.

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Rage Across Britain - A final campaign

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Matthew - Carson Cotes (Wendigo, Theurge)

Neill - 'Aertemis' (Black Fury, Galliard)

Marc - Matt Atherton-Hyde (Glasswalker, Ragabash)

 

 

Overview

 

After the failure of the pack to eliminate Lord Steel Matt was called in to Nottingham were a second pack was formed in secret. Carson Cotes, a native American carrying his own death cowl and Artemis a Black Fury who had fallen out with the Isle of Man. Together they met with the King of All Garou Albrecht and one of his pack. With direct orders they formed a pack and due to some special rite formed a Phoenix Pack. Carson became the pack leader. The pack was given orders to find the way to defeat Steel and destroy the Lord of Hate, who had possessed the body of Matt's little brother. The pack with advice went into the Battlefield Realm searching for how the Lord of Hate was defeated in the past and a way they might be able to save the child host. After several Penumbral jumps through an Ancestral realm, the Legendary Realm they arrived at the Battlefield Realm. Here they went on a realm search for the Battle that led to the defeat of Lord Steel. They learned that the Aztec's had defeated the Spanish host for Steel after a great battle in combat by making the Lord hate himself by isolation and eventually kill himself. This prevented the slayer becoming the new host. Armed with this information, they returned to the physical World.

 

The World had changed in the absence and Lord Steel had caused many of the people in the World to become formori called 'Faded'. The formori could take a huge pounding from non-spiritual weapons, felt no pain and their skin was transparent making them like zombies. The military had been overwhelmed and some governments had fallen about the World. The death toll went into the millions in built up cities. Finding travel hard, as many roads were blocked or barricaded, they headed to their local caern...The Caern of the Camper's Tent. At the caern, they found the leader and many ahrouns absent due to the Rage that was pouring into the World from Steel. Many ahroun had been locked away or killed as they had succumb to frenzy. Shocked they realised they had lost 6 months of time while in the Umbra.

 

They agreed to help the caern recover some missing kinfolk and had several confrontations with the faded. Informing the caern members on how to kill Lord Steel in case they failed. They received some help from the caern, but also learned that the caern moonbridges had been destroyed as some caerns had fallen. They rescued a group of women, one Dionne, who decided to come with them. On the journey at night, DORMIN was released by the Glasswalkers - who had become the 'Shards-of-the-Machine' and changed sides. The AI went into the internet and took over all the computer systems worldwide in a matter of minutes. Seconds after that, the World's nuclear arsenal was launched or detonated on their pads. The World's superpowers, already pressed by Faded were destroyed in the exchange. Only the seat of DORMIN was not hit, England was not nuked, but the Penumbra became entrenched in the pattern web, cutting the umbra of to all but the most skilled theurges. The spiritual tearing destroyed many avatars, killing mages, spirits and many garou. Phoenix, now fully awoke as the Apocalypse had now begun. Soon, they learned that Dionne was in fact the last of the haephodant's that had plagued Matt's old pack. Phoenix, now incredibly powerful performed a Rite of Cleansing on Dionne on orders of Carson, destroying the bane. The spirit of Kendrick gave them some assistance and a message to hand to his brother 'Father' in Manchester. One of the nights here, they were visited by the ghost of Hepecarter, which turned out to be merely her klaive. It told the group that the Black Furies had left the World and attacked Maelfas directly. The klaive could not be lost and it kept returning to the last Black Fury now Artemis and the sword became one of the traveling companions of the group.

 

Arriving in Manchester they learned that the caern was on the verge of collapse. The caern leader Father questioned them on the fact they had not confronted Steel, even though they had prepared for the conflict. They delivered the message about a new resistance fighter near Dover. Father had a working moon bridge, the one to the Silver Fangs in Dover. He agreed to go with them after being told about 'The Great Bear', a hero who had returned to the shore. The Silver Fang caern was mostly ruined and the Silver Fangs proved unhelpful. They parted ways with Father and headed into London with a plan to rescue Digital Raven being held at the lair of Lord Steel.

 

London was ruined, despite raiding military bases there was little that had not already been looted. Fallout had arrived with them and the pack took to wearing radiation suits. They were blights everywhere and people were found only in small hiding groups, or the hordes of Faded who came out at night. Using his Rite of Questing Stone it led the pack to Digital Raven, who was being held at Matt's family home.

 

In an attempt to rescue Digital Raven with the intent to use him as a way of controlling Lord Steel and making him irrational, they broke into the house and set of the alarm. One of the formori called its master and a final confrontation ensued with Lord Steel.

 

A battle on the rooftop ensued and by shear luck and by accident, they disarmed the Lord of his blade and using Phoenix blasts of cleansing destroyed the Lords steed. A similar blast of blight hit Matt, the pack thinking he was killed continued the fight. Using specialized gifts they were able to push the boy host into a critical injury, causing Lord Steel to focus on keeping his human host alive. Realizing Matt was in lupus form, but little of his body remained, they scooped him up and Lord Steel and drove North from London. They found a abandoned car maintenance depo where they rested for the night. During the night Digital Raven released during the attack spoke with Carson trying to stall the group so he could kidnap his young son. The same night Buries -the-Dead arrived and quickly took pushed the group to kill Steel immediately. The pack decided that one of them, would commit suicide to slay Steel and preventing the killer becoming the new host. With Buries-the-Dead's spirit bells they could contain the spirit to stop it from possessing anyone else. Buries did not agree with the plan, but went with Carson's decision.

 

With some discussion Matt said he would end himself and his brother. Buries used a Monkey bone to bring the human child back for a final discussion with his brother. Here Matt learned that his little brother had actually killed people under the influence of Steel and had enjoyed his new power, no longer being ignored. Matt calmed him saying no one would hurt them anymore, said his farewells then detonated his suicide jacket. Realizing what had happened Digital Raven took over all the weaver items in the room and attacked.

 

When Carson and Artemis awoke they were naked and found no trace of either garou, and their hideout had been utterly ruined in their final fight. Lord Steel had been defeated, but the World was in ruin.