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Toby Carter

Toby Carter, Elodoth member of the Lodge of Lightning

The Lodge of Lightning is a Lodge of the Iron Masters that takes its parent tribes mastery of adaptability role to an extreme.

The alleged spirit patron of the Lodge of Lightning is Lightning. However, it’s uncertain that the spirit Lightning itself actually watches over the lodge. One increasingly convincing theory suggests that although Lightning may have agreed to watch over the lodge, at any given time, the spirit watching might be one of Lightning’s many aspects (or “forks”) that actually plays the role of patron spirit.

Overview[]

“Lightning doesn’t strike twice” goes the human saying. The Uratha know better than that. Lightning is an implacable force, seeking the easiest route to its destination and reaching it with speed and power. The Lightning-Dancers, as the members of this lodge are often known, take the same philosophy in everything they do, from putting down a foe to winning a mate. They have, in a sense, fashioned themselves into the ultimate tools, making their very bodies extensions of their remarkable wills.

The Lightning-Dancers drive themselves to physical extremes, running for longer than most werewolves would consider sensible, going without sleep or food for long periods of time. A few, more cynical, observers have wondered if the latter behavior is responsible for the quite remarkable flashes of insight that the lodge members are capable of displaying. That attitude betrays the slight jealousy that the lodge occasionally invokes in others. Werewolf culture is built on success (in part, in atonement for the past), and the Lightning-Dancers are focused on that goal as few others.

Membership[]

Lodge members don’t become mentors easily. Would-be initiates need to work hard to attract the other werewolves’ attention. After all, like all lodge members, they’re almost certainly already deeply focused on some task or another, and unwilling to be distracted. An Iron Master who persists long enough to get a mentor’s attention when they're finally free to give it has passed the first stage of the initiation, even if they don't realize it. Now, things get really hard. For the next few months, the would-be lodge member becomes one of the mentor’s obsessions. They turn up unexpectedly and unpredictably in the young werewolf’s life, demanding answers to questions, aid with tasks and unexpected insights on anything from the interplay of urban-spirits with those of nature to the redecoration of the mentor’s apartment. Any werewolf who fails to cope with this sudden broadening of their challenges has failed the second test.

Finally, the mentor actually takes the werewolf under their wing for a period of weeks. Both leave their packs for the duration of the initiation. The mentor takes on the role of Red Wolf, giving the initiate a task that appears, on the surface, to be all but impossible, and then shadows the werewolf on this quest. The exact form of the quest is entirely at the whim of the mentor. The lodge has no proscribed guidelines or prepared quests. Instead, the mentor makes the challenge up on the spur of the moment. Typically, quests will be against the nature of the werewolf. A Rahu might be forced into extensive negotiations with spirits, while an Elodoth might be forced into desperate combat. The nature of each initiation varies wildly, as individual as the mentor and initiate, with one exception. Each initiation finishes with a long journey into the Shadow Realm, and a battle with the weatherspirits of a spiritual wood. This is, in truth, the very wood where Strength of Rock faced Lightning, and where Red Wolf waits to see if a new Uratha is worthy of his favor. Werewolves who fail this final test no longer die. Red Wolf accepted Strength of Rock’s wisdom in that. Instead, they awake cold, wet and disheveled on some street corner, with the knowledge of unworthiness heavy in their hearts. In time, their mentors resume contact and start the initiation again. Failure is no crime amongst the Lightning-Dancers, but, then, lack of determination most certainly is. When, and only when, at the last, the would-be Lightning-Dancers reach inside and find both new reserves of determination and new ways of achieving their goals, then they will be accepted into the lodge.

Game Mechanics[]

The following are an overview of the game mechanics.

Prerequisites[]

  • Cunning ••
  • Wits •••

Benefits[]

Members of the lodge receive a +1 modifier die to any Stamina roll made to stay on their feet or roll with an impact. Their secondary totem, Lightning, grants them access to Weather Gifts as though they were tribal Gifts

Fetish[]

Lightning Rod (••): Is there anything much that isn’t powered by electricity these days? The power goes down, and everything from the shower (electrical pump) to the building’s security system breaks. This little device makes that happen. A lightning rod is a lightning-spirit bound into a lump of metal that has already been part of a object of some kind. Raw metal is no use — it must be metal that has been worked and formed into a distinct object. Rods, used in support frames of various kinds, are the most common, but anything from computer components to a tin can will serve. The owner places the Lightning Rod against the electrically powered device they want to naturalize, and invokes the spirit within the fetish, temporarily knocking the spirit out, unless surge protection is installed. This fetish is great for wrecking computers and opening electric garage doors, but not so useful against proper building security systems.

ThumBot (••): Iron Masters of the Lodge of Lightning often give this useful fetish to their new members. This USB "thumb-drive" contains an information-spirit that can spiritually scan any computer that it is plugged into and give information about the computer's user. This is not a data analysis program; it's scanning the nascent spirit of the machine for resonances left by the user. Generic, emotion-based information such as the emotional state of the user, sex and so on can be revealed with only three successes; more are necessary to learn more detailed information such as the user's name. The information is displayed on screen as the fetish works, but is also stored on the ThumBot for later perusal. The info is automatically erased the next time the ThumBot is used. An awakened computer can store the spiritual data from the ThumBot permanently.

  • Durability 2 (reinforced to 4), Size 0, Structure 4
  • Action: Extended (3-10+ successes; each roll represents 1 minute)[1]

Storm’s Eye (•••): A Storm’s Eye is a small piece of urban rubble, such as a broken chunk of building rubble, or a piece of broken glass, worn around the neck of the owner. Within is bound a spirit associated with peaceful days, such as a sunshine-spirit, a low-winds-spirit or a drought-spirit. When the bearer invokes the power of this fetish in poor or dangerous weather, from tropical storms to blizzards to storm force winds, the fetish moderates the power of the weather in the immediate environment of the werewolf, leaving them free from potential direct harm from the weather. The fetish will not protect them from indirect harm (they can still drown if they fall into a flooded river) or from supernaturally directed weather (such as a storm-spirit’s Blast Numen), but natural weather will not directly harm them, whether as extremes of temperature or direct force.

References[]

Werewolf: The Forsaken Lodges
First Edition
Blood Talons Lodge of CerberusLodge of the EinherjarLodge of GarmLodge of the Lone WolfLodge of NightLodge of the ShieldLodge of SwordsLodge of Wendigo
Bone Shadows Lodge of BaitalLodge of DeathLodge of DoorsLodge of Hallowed HallsLodge of HarbingersLodge of the Hundred DaysLodge of the Hungry GhostsLodge of ProphecyLodge of the ReapingLodge of Voices
Hunters in Darkness Lodge of AshesThe Brotherhood of Eshu's CapLodge of CarrionLodge of the Empty DenLodge of HarmonyLodge of RuinLodge of SeasonsLodge of the Sleeping BearLodge of Wrath
Iron Masters Lodge of 66Lodge of ArmsLodge of the Hidden HuntLodge of LightningLodge of MetalLodge of ScrollsLodge of SpiresLodge of StonesLodge of Wires
Storm Lords Lodge of CrowsLodge of the Final WinterKshatriyasLodge of the MaelstromLodge of NamarrkunLodge of SalvationLodge of the Shadow's StormLodge of the Shadow ThroneLodge of ThunderLodge of Winter
Auspice Lodge of the BoundaryLodge of the Broken PledgeEigner LodgeLodge of the Endless HorizonLodge of the Fury ChoirLodge of the HazzanLodge of Luna's TearsLodge of LycurgusLodge of the Second MoonriseThe Secret TribunalLodge of the Shadow ThroneLodge of the Spirit ChainsLodge of the Spoken WordLodge of the Starless SkyLodge of the Storm's Eye
Pure Lodge of AbsolutionBlood of KingsCouncil of EaglesLodge of Kin's BloodLodge of Night's FearLodge of PlagueLodge of Sana'aLodge of Vermin's Shadow
Others Lodge of the AdderLodge of ArkadiaThe Armée SauvageLodge of AvalonLodge of the Black WoodsLodge of Bloody SpearsBrotherhood of the Crossed SwordsLodge of ChemicsLodge of the CoyoteLodge of the CrossroadsCult of BonesLodge of EchoesLodge of the Endless MoonLodge of the Fallen IdolLodge of the FeastLodge of Fevered LightLodge of the FirestickLodge of Grey HuntersLodge of the GrottoLodge of Howling DeathLodge of the HuntLodge of IliaLodge of KletbyLodge of the LakeLodge of the LionLodge of LondonLodge of the LostLodge of Luna's DevoteesLodge of MammonLodge of ManiaLodge of the ModernistLodge of the Morning StarLodge of the NahualLodge of PraetorsLodge of QuetzalLodge of the Red SandsLodge of the RoseLodge of the SacrificeLodge of SaintsLodge of the SaviorLodge of ScarsLodge of ScavengersLodge of the ShepherdLodge of SilenceLodge of SongkranLodge of TearsLodge of the Thin ShadowLodge of Two WorldsLodge of the UnionLodge of UnityLodge of the Willow Branch
Mots EiwazValkyrja
Second Edition
Blood Talons Lodge of the Einherjar
Bone Shadows Lodge of the Hundred Days
Hunters in Darkness Lodge of the Hook HandLodge of Sleepless Earth
Iron Masters Lodge of the Shield
Storm Lords Lodge of The Roman Ritual
Ghost Wolves Eaters of the DeadLodge of the Field
Auspice Lodge of the ChronicleLodge of Gargoyles
Pure Lodge of Muspell
Others Lodge of GarmDreaming LodgeLodge of Quicksilver ChildrenLodge of the Screaming MoonThe Temple of ApolloThe Thousand Steel Teeth
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