Ghrollych's Lupine guide

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Ode to Lupines

Damn it feels good to be a lupine
A real lupine-ass garou plays his cards right
A real lupine-ass garou never runs his fuckin mouth
Cuz real lupine-ass garous don't start fights
And garous always gotta high cap
Showin' all his boys how he shot em
But real lupine-ass garous don't flex much
Cuz real lupine-ass garous know they got em

And everythings cool in the mind of a lupine
Cuz lupine-ass garous think deep
Up three-sixty-five a year 24/7
Cuz real lupine-ass garous don't sleep

And all I gotta say to you
Wannabe, gonnabe, cocksuckin', sekh-eatin' prankstas
Cuz when the fry dies down what the fuck you gonna do
Damn it feels good to be a lupine

Adapted version of Geto Boy's song 'Damn it feels good to be a gangsta'

1 Ghrollych's Lupine leveling guide

Ghrollych's Lupine leveling guide

Updated October 2013

Spoiler warning: information below includes details, such as solutions to puzzles or quest procedures, that you may prefer to discover on your own.

Starting off

Before you get started. This is how I came to level my Lupine. Everybody has different opinions about how to go about it but this is how I did it. You don't have to follow it step by step. Make your character your own! I've leveled a Lupine back in the day and came back to them around 2010ish. They're a classic and with all the changes have become less and less tedious to play. People have mixed opinions about them because they're Garou only, Neutral/Neutral, and are prone to berserkness. Well berserkness can be an advantage or a disadvantage depending on how you play. And now, our alignment slowly shifts back to normal overtime. So there's no more killing areas just for the purpose of fixing your alignment.

When I first created my character I started with these stats in the Argnash culture. I started off as neutral / honorable instead of neutral / neutral as well. This is just a guideline to give you a feel of things. I'm not claiming they're the best way to go but hell, you might as well know how I got started off.

40-Strength 80-Intelligence 90-Constitution 90-Dexterity 95-Willpower 60-Charisma 80-Perception

And I always put 40 points into Orienteering. That'll save you some training it at Pyrderi while your noobing about.

Caern Argnash gets killed and raided a lot so there should be a buncha loot scattered about for you to grab. Use your mad skills to sell it for some cash. Run to Losthaven(-21, -24, 0 Cimbra) to sell it and then train your Anglic at the schoolteacher.(Even though Ragarr is definitely one of the better romance languages out there). Also will make things easier if you go learn some finance from the banker. Grab a ring of flight from Valathyr, resize it if you have to and fly to Hanoma to join the Aisenshi.

Buy a beer from the bar in there and give it to Musashi. Set your martial devotion to unarmed combat and train up some shit. Just train up the skills you need to learn the 3 combat maneuvers and you should be good. Train whatever else you want while your in the guild. Musashi is a pretty good teacher and joining them allows you to train for cheap at Olaris so might as well take advantage of that shit while you can. Shit takes a ton of cash but its worth it and gives you a good head start on some skills you're gonna need later anyways. Get your 3 levels or more if you feel like it. I usually explore until level 10 then go do the At'lordrith's Riddle while in Aisenshi. This requires no killing at all and you'll end up at level 12-13. Don't go dying to rats.

Memorize those combat maneuvers so you can use them later as a Lupine(Hooray!) although you won't be able to use much more than rising torrent for a while. Chi strike requires 50% of your Discipline/Unarmed and 100% of your Telesma/Philosophy/Martial arts skills to add up to 500; chi kick is the same but 600. So if you don't have an association that will provide access to any of those 3 it might take a while to get them back. Again, rising torrent will help with things that don't resist crushing damage for a while. Chi strike and Chi Kick will help do more magic damage when you need it.

Anyways, leave those chumps(No offense but that's not why you're reading a Lupine guide) and fly to the guildhall (0, 18, 0 Calias). Don't forget to un-specialize in crap like Telesma, Calligraphy, Scholarship, Kyotsugo, Practice and Literacy unless you really feel the need to keep them. Karth should be chilling there by this cool little pool. You can drink from it or bathe in it if you feel like giving Karth a Voyeur show. Say, 'I petition for initiation' in Ragarr and you should be in. Gives you access to all the help files right away and nothing is hidden.

Set up all your specs. Unarmed combat, Stamina, Recuperation, Hardiness, Massive blow, and Carousing are always good. Karth trains Regeneration but I don't believe will intro the skill do you. You gotta get some chaos favor and head up to Erasmus in Discordia for that. If your wondering I used 4 specialty points into metamorphosis to start. That's the only non-standard thing there. Karth is a free teacher and only speaks Ragarr. Intelligence skills I usually start with Streetwise(training from Trixie), Tactics, and Anatomy. A couple points in Meditation, Centering, Channeling, and Introspection will help too.

Associations and Affiliations

Now I joined the Weapons of Vengeance but there are plenty of other good routes out there. Wandslingers, The Stalkers of the Gate, and WoV are incompatible with each other so pick the route you want to go. Stalkers are the least heavy on specialty requirements but don't give you much other than super-convenient travel. WoV have lots of spec access including Supernal Durability which is Hardiness on 'roids. They also take a ton of specialty points to join and ya gotta run all the way to the Nexus which can be a pain sometimes. Wandslingers have a way to teleport to there vigil and gain strength little by little. They get some bonuses and a lot of specialty access as well, also a very good choice. Again, join whatever you want. No Fur off my nuts. Whois Sammeth, Ghrollych, or Silvapup for examples. And we can't join the 9-spoked wheel association(No worshiping Gaia).

I also joined the Garbage Thondur too. We make a lotta garbage and its the best way to clean shit up that you aren't going to sell. They got revamped by Xekrin and now they're really cool. They get this little relic that boosts skills. As of now I got 800+ tokens so I got 8 different skills boosted about 40 points each. Very useful.

At level 113(Just thought I'd mention that) I joined the LDD. 1 spec in Intelligence and 1 in willpower and be chaotic. Pretty easy requirements for anybody else to reach but for me it was a pain in the ass. Since we go back to neutral you gotta kill, shift it as much as possible and run your ass off to the association leader. I took out Ft. Shantaari and Most of Shatterspire and by the time I got to the Hagbard I was already getting more ordered. You'll probably have this same problem if you go the other route and try and join Attuned. I did go murder Sang-Drax for Chaosfang though, which back in the olden days would make you more chaotic over time(dunno if it does now adays, just an added precaution).

Gear

As far as gear goes start off simple. I used a Paraquerlos and a chaos amulet at first, and slowing added resized gauntlets of might(from Victorio in Devonshire Catacombs), and a rare protosuit. There's lots of other combinations to use as well. Whatever works for you. Everything but the protosuit is pretty easy to come by. But a paraquerlos, chaos amulet, a compass, and a ring of flight are basically all you need. You got nightvision so you don't need torches. We really don't use weapons 'cause in the end are claws will do just fine.

I also like to add a few random fetishes to my equipment. You can get them from the Sleestak town Sseraka if find a sleestak player willing to go buy them for you(Racist bastards. Your gonna kill this place later just because they wouldn't sell you fetishes). They run off telesmatic weapon I believe so it puts a purpose to a few Charisma-based specialty points.

Boots of Flight/Agility are valid choices for footwear. And you can always piece-mail(not just using 1 piece of armor that covers everything) in some strata gear or dactids/noctids/apolekids/kinetids if you got order favor. Certain gear like Xyrikallix will probably kill you along with other some evil/chaos alignment-required gear. Maybe some holy/order gear as well.

Girdle of the Earthmother is pretty sweet for us Lupines. Boosts your Channeling, Recuperation, and Regeneration and also provides a bunch of resistances(Extropy at least). It appears on neutral/neutral people with certain skills that Gaia likes. It seems like it prefers Lupines especially.

Shapeshifting and Virtu

You got a new little command now that your in. 'Show lupine status'. It'll tell you your Rage and Gnosis and total Virtu and what form your in. Xekrin(another name drop for him) is a pimp and made it all colorful for us so da shit pops now. Each of our powers requires a certain minimum amount of Rage and Gnosis. Different forms will shift your Rage and Gnosis in different ways. So experiment a little to check them out. The physical attributes affect your rage and your mental attributes affect your gnosis. Charisma is a huge factor enough though there's little things to put points into.

Ok. You got 6 new forms. Those kentaur's can turn into a blob or a scary eyeball monster. But we got some good shit ourselves. Help triptych will show you the the pyramid and help forms will go into more detail. Garou is the base form. Doesn't require anything to maintain and is the most balanced. Homid is mostly human, Lupus is pure wolf, K'rinos is WoLFmAn Monster. Metis is a more wolf-like garou and Hispo is a more human-like garou. Later on you'll usually stay in a form when your running out to kill but earlier on you'll be switching back and forth so you can use different powers.

When you shift forms infront of non-lupines it stuns everything in the room. It will also replace lost limbs but spreads all the damage you received throughout your whole body.

Teleport

We got the sweet little power called Stepping sideways. It teleports you back to the guildhall. When you start off you'll probably only be able to do it in Hispo or Homid. So if your a million miles away it doesn't hurt to switch forms and just port back. 'step sideways' is the command. If your fighting in one of those forms(don't recommend it to start) its an easy way to escape.

Setting yourself up for Victory

Now that you've joined the guild and got some initial training in its time to figure out where you stand. When tweaking your specialties as you advance I find it always useful to check your attack/damage rating with your claws in and out of berserk. When you go berserk you'll notice that massive blow and strength are even larger factors in your damage rating and attack rating while your attack rating will drop dramatically.

Combat will become quicker and easier if you work on your attack rating first. Unarmed combat will always hold a majority of your Dexterity points but there are other skills in the dexterity category that will help you land hits as well. Don't worry too much about skills like Dodge, Tumbling, Dancing or Flight(Since you won't dodge worth a damn while berserk anyway and you usually don't want to be flying in combat). Intelligence and perception attributes also have a variety of skills that will help ya with you hit chance. Awareness, Anatomy, Streetwise, Tactics, Precision strike, Killer instinct, and Dirty fighting.

Now no matter what form we're in we're still right/left handed and in all forms except for Homid we attack with our mouths. When you switch forms both hands and the mouth attack will be put back to moderate attack preference. So if your using razor claws you might want to lower the attack rating with your mouth each time you shapeshift. This way your doing less slashing damage and more Lunar/Divine. Also if you have any extra combat maneuvers from Aisenshi or Hawkmen(If changed races to Garou from Aviar) you might want to consider throwing them into the mix. Since we naturally do slashing with our 3 attacks the technique Rising torrent might come in handy when you need to do crushing. Piercing Talon doesn't require flight to use and it's got a very high stun rate which would help you hit in berserk mode.

But don't forget, Lupines are all about Balance. So while you may want to spend all your development points in Physical stats remember that the mental stats affect Gnosis.

How to Kill

Now that you've messed around with shapeshifting lets check out some of the most useful powers. Lots of the powers are circumstantial but others you use all the time. Whenever your going out killing, make sure you summon yourself a spirit. Shift to a different form to summon one if you have to; it won't go away if you shift back. You can keep them and carry them around, and they resist slashing/crushing/piercing damage like whoa. Set yourself an alias to have you 'say Spirit, succor friends'. When your berserk gRrrrRAaa sometimes end up talking like GrrarrddRRR. So when beserking try 5<succoralias> to make sure you say it right at least once. These guys are expendable little bastards. I've gone through a million. They can report specialties if you ask them. I usually have them set there combat mode to cautious just for added defense. Forest/Jungle/Plains do earth damage, Desert/Tundra do Magick? That and there fieldcraft skills are the only differences. So now you got a meatshield, make sure you befriend him 'cause he's already befriending you. Carry him around if your moving so he doesn't slow you down(They're really light).

Next, shift to the form you want to kill in. Honestly I stay in Metis usually. K'rinos and Lupus are good when your starting off because they do crazy amounts of damage. Ridiculous amounts. Downside is you won't be able to use any powers until your get much higher Virtu. It's basically kill all, have your spirit succor you. Rinse and Repeat. 'Sanctify remains' will clear the room of corpses but not loot. Also gives you a small heal based on how much it dissolves. Should be able to use 'Razor Claws' and 'Forest Armour' right away. But not in the same form. Once you can use them together in a form you want to use that form for sure. Razor claws does Lunar/divine damage. Forest armour is like an aura that helps absorb lots of damage. Metis was the first form I could use both in. Razor claws are never really completely resisted by anything. So its always good to keep that going.

Ok, onto the next thing: Balancing of the Scales. There's lots of things you can't do while berserk like treating your wounds, speaking normally, or activating psionics but our powers still work. Balance works 2 ways. It heals shit that's neutral (like your spirit if he's getting wrecked) or does magick damage to anything non-neutral (75% of the mud). It also moves their alignment more towards neutral/neutral. So using it 100000 times on something will end up healing it. But it never gets to that point. While you berserk and your spirit tanks, use balance on shit you fight to remove limbs and slow them down. Works like a charm. If your spirit is getting beating to a bloody pulp you can use it on him to heal him. Of course he has an alignment too and if he's been killing with you for a while you might end up killing him. And as a side note, when your making your alias for this power use the full command for it--> Perform balancing of the scales (or whatever) <target/my opponent>. This was coded back in the day before the Balance channel existed so every now and then you get rookie Lupines shouting my opponent on the balance channel.

Continue until you Banehowl. This is a sweet power. Its got a little bit longer cooldown than other powers but it kills 'EVERYTHING'(Except other lupines/your spirit)! It rules. And it has this cool scary roar thing that people in rooms around you hear. It deals Mostly Entropic damage with some Sonic. It does do a little damage to you but its very minor indeed. Worst part of it is it might shock some of your Charkas.

Luna's Vengeance is cool when your fighting undead... And its nighttime. So it only works half the time. You got a detect magick and a detect alignment power too if case you want to check a guy out before you murder 'um. You got an ability to calm yourself if your berserk which helps if your getting dodged too much or you don't want something berserk. You also got an ability to make things stop fighting entirely (I swear I'll use it someday). And I already covered the guildhall teleporting.

Again, as you level you'll be able to use more and more of the powers in the same form. Stepping sideways might require you to switch forms for a while. After you switch forms your Razor Claws and forest armor disappear but you spirit won't. So make sure you re-buff yourself.

Things that may give you grief

There are few things that will 'cause you trouble; more-so when starting off than later levels. Some things have attack scatter that might get in a few lucky hits that would kill you even with your spirit protecting you. It depends on there combat mode and race. Orcs and Ogres almost always use attack scatter. Shit you fight that's berserk also has attack scatter. Later on when you get a lot of HP it becomes less of a problem.

The next on the list are things that do damages your spirit doesn't resist. It looks like they resist Cutting/Piercing/Crushing almost fully as well as all the elemental damage types Fire/Water/Air/Earth/Lightning I don't believe are resisted as much. I think all the spirits resist the same things. Entropy/Unholy/etc seem to fuck them up. So pay attention to what your opponent is wielding and how strong their special attacks are. It can drain your spirit pretty fast if you're spending all your time keeping your elemental alive.

The next thing is kinda a funny thing but it happens. Make sure your hands and head are covered when fighting. Blocking attacks with your claws and mouth might 'cause them damage or hitting things with certain auras. A piece of gear on each will usually protect it from that. Of course this doesn't apply to the forms that can't use armor so you'll have to just keep an eye out when using them.

Places to go, People are Meat (err..mm... Close 'nuff)

Places to kill. This is just a list of places I've killed as a Lupine. You'll have to pick and chose what you feel comfortable killing. I don't recommend taking on any of the huge swarming areas to start. Make sure you got at least 1 spirit to tank for you and take note of his health, if your noticing the NPCs your fighting are doing more than just cutting/slashing/piercing you'll have to heal the spirit more often. This is not in order of difficulty or anything like that. It's just a list of areas I wrote down as they came to me.

Og,(27, 8, 0 Calias) Ogres are pretty good xp and will always fill you up if your hungry and its right outside the guildhall
Underdark, From the entrance. id, d, 5w, 5n, 5d, 5n, 5d, 3n (westdown then all westward towards Yathryn and Shadowmyrk) (3n, then west to Loch Nether)
- Ghaunadaur priests aren't too tough. 2 in a room at time and the town won't aggro you if none of them are in the room. They also have a few kinds of drow powers that'll nuke chakras and hurt a little.
- Uvmothog, has a buncha random goblins/orcs/trolls as well as some svirfs and duergars. Trolls and orcs are the toughest and pack a lot more of a punch than the other guys. Northwest part of Loch Nether
- Syllyac, Vlekthids can psionically blast you but they're pretty weak. The townsfolk are easy, guards are harder. And I'm not 100% on this because its not really defined, but I think elite guards are even tougher? From loch nether entrance walk along the southwest wall until you see a southeastern enterance
- Shadowmyrk, Nylocs aren't great xp but they're there. There's a firestarter and few guys got some pretty mean attacks. I mostly just mention it because if you grab a drow corpse you can give it to the leader and he'll train you (speaks Dazask). From wd, 5w, u, n. make sure you fly when you leave that place
St. Paedric's Monastery (-25, 18, 0 Cimbra), used to be an easy place to kill. Pretty difficult now adays. A developer I won't mention pumped up the acolytes. Might want to check it out if your brave
Spiderwood(-23 -23 0 Cimbra right outside LH), Rachneis with boners. Also there's a buncha spiders that get progressively tougher as you go down. Bring a lit torch to burn away the webs. Cimbra right
Xi Feng Ming(-26 15 1 Ebiria). in, wi, d, search wall (until the wall slides open). Pretty underrated. The guys are pretty easy. Privates/sergeants/corporals/lackeys aren't worth much. Ogre privates are worth a little bit, Captains are worth more. A couple named NPCs down there are alright too. This is an awesome place you can clear out to get loot for cash. Also 2 trainers that train a good variety.
Halfmoon Bay(30, 22, 0 Korindim) People kill there. *shrugs* Semi easy and good xp for starting off. Cleo sells Lenses.
Vasbarghad(-18, 32, 0 Visgonia), from the entrance. 5s, 3w, 2s, will take you further in. Start with the shit outside the castle before you move in. If that's too easy move to inside. Skeleton guards and Zombies are alright xp, not too difficult. Later you'll move to Ghast's/Wights further in and the named guys which are pretty tough. Guards sometimes have Carbonite helms which are cool for people who are dazzled. You can use our Turn power on them if its night.
Shadow Tower(13, -4 2 Quetlatl), Don't kill the damned guards Shit the cells progressively gets harder as you move upwards. Stuff on top is pretty rough. None of the shit in the cells is neutral so its not too rough for us t'all.
Vargan(-5, -22, 0 Gardagh), go to -9, 9 Vargan. Then d, 2 e, all s, all e, n, d. That'll get you to the tunnels of random shit to kill. Gets tougher as you go down. Garous aren't affected by banehowl and all the shit is neutral so no balancing. Just nom nom nom shit's face off. Always good xp. pretty easy indeed
R'lyeh(28, -36, 0 Northeast Atlantic Sea). I like this place. Good Variety. Crazy cultists to kill, Abominations (semi tough), Deep ones (if you feel like Seafood), and Gogtzgul up top (1000X tougher than Vlekthids). Be careful if your berserk underwater, you'll drown super fast. So bring a ring of water breathing if you want to kill Dagon/Hydra.
Jhan(25, 10, 0 Andala) Dakshin's underneath are really good xp.

Those are some good places to start. But later on you kill whole towns. Here's a few of the flavors you'll be sampling. And most all swarm.

Corna (Moretsu and Tsuyoi are pretty good defenders.)
Jhan (I don't usually kill this place, but when I do I drink Dos Equis. Really I don't, its got a Masseuse you can run to pretty quick from the guildhall.)
Fort Shantaari (Tirana, Dame Merista, Amlithor and that other guy I can't remember the name of will make it to you eventually in there.)
Shatterspire (Hieron and Vodax are pretty tough so is the rest)
Temple Bloodmoon (Slaves are cake. acolytes are aiight. Priestesses are biatchs)
Ivory Tower (Kill Strom First)
Teryx (Go to the top, knock off all there wings and work your way down. Then banehowl at the bottom. A page of xp messages? its Hilarious! Check out that sweet statue on the second floor. whois that sexy mofo?)
Mycenae (Bulls on Parade)
Sanctuary (Fun stuff)
Kolond (This place is a little tougher. You and everything else is berserk. You'll get assassins sent after you after you've killed this place. They kinda suck.)
Caern Argnash (:(, Brantiss is tough and your powers don't work on him)
Thistlewood (Ghaelion is toughest. Random guy who warped into a zuth too. So are all kenders)
Yathryn (Everything in there can die)

Other notes

If your going up against a big badass, try and get berserking before you start fighting. If you're having trouble hitting something when berserk (Not at all) use the calm ability on yourself.
when you make an alias for 'assume <insert-deathdealing-machine-here> form' also make it re-equip yourself. Some forms can't use gear but it doesn't hurt.
Shift to a less energy draining form when idling.
Eat remains when your hungry, if your in the guildhall drink from the pool.
If your full always use 'Sanctify Remains'. It gives you little heal based on the stuff you offer up to it.
Somebody else suggested this. Make your Stepping Sideways alias also say 'Train me in all in Ragarr'. This way you don't forget to take advantage of free training at Karth.

If you have any questions feel free to ask me. I hope this is helpful to somebody somewhere. I Hope you enjoyed it and I hope it helps. -Insomniac

Idle tips

End of spoiler information.

Lupines main page

Retrieved from "http://wiki.lostsouls.org/Ghrollych%27s_Lupine_guide"

Categories: Spoilers | Guides | Newbie Resources

 Places to kill. This is just a list of places I've killed as a Lupine. You'll have to pick and chose what you feel comfortable killing. I don't recommend taking on any of the huge swarming areas to start.
-Make sure you got at least 1 spirit to tank for you and take note of his health, if your noticing the NPCs your fighting are doing more than just cutting/slashing/piercing you'll have to heal the spirit more often.
+Make sure you got at least 1 spirit to tank for you and take note of his health, if your noticing the NPCs your fighting are doing more than just cutting/slashing/piercing you'll have to heal the spirit more often. '''This is not in order of difficulty or anything like that. It's just a list of areas I wrote down as they came to me.'''
 *[[Og]],(27, 8, 0 Calias) Ogres are pretty good xp and will always fill you up if your hungry and its right outside the guildhall
 '''If you have any questions feel free to ask me. I hope this is helpful to somebody somewhere. I Hope you enjoyed it and I hope it helps.'''
 ''-Insomniac''
+'''Idle tips
 {{endspoilers}}