Gnosis
Gnosis represents the spiritual connection between Gaia and Her Garou children.
It grants them entry to the spirit realm of the Umbra, opens them to the spirits in nature and helps fuel their powerful Gifts.
Gnosis Traits are not described with adjectives. You simply have permanent Gnosis - your normal limit of Gnosis Traits - and temporary Gnosis, your expendable Traits. Without Gnosis, you would be cut off from Gaia’s spiritual wisdoms and caresses -you could not travel into the Umbra or access many Gifts and rites.
At the other extreme, with too many Gnosis Traits, you sometimes find the worlds blurring and may have trouble distinguishing one side of the Gauntlet from the other.
Just as Rage Traits are spent to affect physical activity, Gnosis is used to affect more spiritual matters.
- You cannot spend Rage and Gnosis Traits in the same turn, except when certain Gifts mandate for them to be spent as part of a
requisite for the power. These two forces are very powerful on their own and would overwhelm a Garou’s spirit and body with the
clash. For example, a werewolf cannot spend Rage for multiple actions and activate a fetish in the same turn.
- Each silver object or irem containing silver that you carry on your person reduces your effective Gnosis rating by one Trait per
silver item carried. This effect is temporary and will dissipate one day after the silver items are discarded, where you will regain
any lost Gnosis Traits
- Many of the Gifts call for a varying number of Gnosis Trait expenditures.
- Gnosis is used to attune or activate a Garou’s fetish. Instead of winning a challenge to step sideways, you may choose to
circumvent this requirement and spend a GnosisTrait. Now you may step sideways into the umbra automatically without any
possibility of failure.
Regaining Gnosis
You can regain Gnosis in one of a number of ways:
- Spend 10 minutes out of game in meditation, reflecting the
time you take to renew your connections to Gaia (which
doesn’t mean sitting under a tree and picking your teeth).
Then you may spend one of your Meditation Ability Traits or
Mental Traits to recover one Gnosis Trait. You must already possess the Meditation Ability in order to perform this feat.
- You may participate in the Sacred Hunt, one of the most frequently performed activities at Garou moots. It is a ritual performed for the good of the people and the caem, in which an Engling spirit is the chosen prey, summoned and then hunted down. This
ritual can be undertaken in either the Umbra or on Earth. After the prey has been caught and “killed,” all werewolves who take
part in the hunt give thanks to the spirit for the gift of its life. Upon a successful hunt, all participating Garou completely replenish
their Gnosis pools.
- There are certain Rites and Fetish powers that can lend temporary Gnosis to your pool.
