The inhabitants of the spirit world share their secrets with werewolves and other shapechangers. In accordance with pacts struck long ago, the spirits teach Gifts, magical abilities of many sorts, to the Garou. Tribe, breed and auspice all influence a spirit’s willingness to teach a particular Gift to a Garou; every community within the Garou Nation has its own secrets and connections.

There’s a story behind each Gift: A spirit bound itself to a pact to teach that Gift to Garou who meet a particular qualification. Storytellers and players should keep this in mind when characters use Gifts in play. See “Systems,” below, for ways the vital history of Gifts can matter in the course of a game. 

Gifts do not come automatically or mechanically. Living spirits teach them, and when a Garou fails particularly impressively in his fundamental duties, the spirits can revoke their Gifts. The Gifts come to allow Garou to accomplish their assigned roles and tasks more thoroughly, not to do whatever seems like fun. Gifts are divided into three levels. Basic Gifts are available to cubs from the moment of their First Change, while Advanced Gifts are granted to those Garou who have done great deeds. A new Garou begins with one Basic Gift each from the lists for her breed, auspice and tribe. The player can spend freebie points to acquire more starting Gifts during character creation and can buy others after play begins with experience points.

 

Learning Gifts

The quickest and most reliable way for a Garou to learn a Gift is through dealing with spirits. Either the Garou petitions a suitable spirit himself, or he requests an elder to do so on his behalf. No spirit teaches a Gift to a werewolf who hasn’t earned the proper rank, and only spirits allied with the Garou willingly teach Gifts at all. The usual way to learn a Gifr is to travel to a caem with a power level equal to or greater than that of the Gift the Garou wishes to learn: level 1 or 2 for Basic Gifts, level 3 or 4 for Intermediate Gifts, level 5 for Advanced Gifts. The traveling Garou then petitions the spirit directly. The act of summoning a spirit to a powerful caem it shows proper respect and inclines the spirit to honor the request. 

Unfortunately, the world is sadly lacking in powerful caems as the Apocalrpse approaches, so it’s often necessary to seek compromises. The next best course of action is for the Gift-seeking Garou to ask a powerful Theurge to petition the spirit on the seeker’s behalf. The Theurge’s rank and expertise in rites can offset some of the penalty from using a weak caem.

A Garou may choose to enter the Umbra and seek out a spirit teacher directly.This is generally a bad idea. Inexperienced Garou can easily offend a spirit, and doing that in the spirit’s home realm leads to reprisals that may insure the Garou never gets home. Even a well-behaved Garou arouses spirits’ suspicion by making a request

without proper support and ritual.

Storytellers and players alike should keep in mind that spirits aren’t vending machines for Gifts. Every spirit has its ownpersonality, history, concerns and agenda. Garou who spend time cultivating the spirit’s company may win an ally as well as a source of Gifts, and spirits do sometimes return (without advance notice) to see how Garou use their Gifts. Werewolves who fulfill the general mission of the Garou and the more specific callings of their auspice, breed and tribe earn favor and may have an easier time dealing with pleased spirits in the future. Roleplaying the experience around the challenges to learn Gifts can strengthen a chronicle and help guide it away from clicht. 

Garou can teach Gifts to each other. This is inefficient, and when spirits find out that Garou have been doing it, some sort of atonement must almost always follow to restore spiritual harmony. Whena spirit teaches aGift, it merges withtheGarou’s soul and, in a period ranging from an hour (for Basic Gifts) up to asingle night (for the most complex Advanced Gifts), the spirit shows the Garou what to do and how it feels when the Gift works properly. When one Garou teaches another, on the other hand, it takes at least a full lunar month and often more. Practice requires a great deal of experimentation and often painful failure: learning Silver Claws, for instance, can render a Garou nearly incapacitated throughout the learning period. Garou teach Gifts this way because they must, thanks to the shortage of elders as well as of powerful caems. A Garou teaching a Gift to another Garou must be of the same Rank or above (or only one level less, if they’re packmates). Unless otherwise stated, Gifts may retest with the Occult Ability.

 

The Consequences

Once he leams a Gift, a Garou does not forget it.Once a spirit teaches a Gift, that spirit cannot remove it: It’s now part of the Garou’s own nature, an innate ability to call upon like the reflexes for walking. Garou who use their Gifts in disregard for the Litany and fundamental tenets of Garou society face social sanction, even as their Gifts continue to work. In the gravest extreme, Incamae and Celestines can block a Garou’s access to the Gifts their spirit broods teach. This is usually a temporary matter, Lasting until theGarou atones; blocking Gifts permanently is far more shameful than a mere death sentence. Most Garou live their lives without ever seeing a great spirit’s sanction imposed, though tales circulate about the unfortunates who suffer the consequences. The vast majority of packs and septs intervene to discipline or expel their rebellious members long before one of the kings of the spirit world can take offense.

Social sanctions can punish careless or inappropriate use of Gifts. For instance, Sense Wym doesn’t tell Garou that the targets are active minions of the Wyrm, only that they’ve been touched by the Wyrm at some point, perhaps through tainted food or a contaminated workplace. A Garou who uses Sense Wym to justify rampant slaughter and destruction is eventually going to lose Renown for foolish waste of effort and for failing to protect innocents: He’s forgotten that the Gift is a way to gather clues,  not a license for carnage. Likewise with other Gifts, which Garou might attempt to justify with appealing to just one of the taboos that define Garou norm. There’s seldom just one relevant principle, and Gaia gave Her warriors judgment as well as strength. Storytellers and players alike should feel free to ask “Was this agood idea?“ as well as to reward innovation and ingenuity. Garou who use their Gifts intelligently as well as courageously should earn favor for it.

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