Red Talons (Werewolf)
One of the 13(is) werewolf tribes in Werewolf: The Apocalypse, the Red Talons pull double duty as the Lupus (wolf-born werewolf) dominated faction and as the "genocidal anti-human faction".
Seriously, that kind of sums up everything you need to know about the Red Talons. They hate humans and humanity, and they believe that Gaia can only be saved by annihilating or subjugating humans, who they view as a prey species that has been tricked into thinking itself a species of predator and is thusly an abomination against all that is good and natural.
Unsurprisingly, this makes them the go-to beatstick for White Wolf writers and edgy GMs who want a convenient mouthpiece to heavy-handedly rant at the audience about the Evils of CivilizationTM; the same applies in reverse for the less misanthropic side, where the Talons are a common source of in-tribe villains and the occasional BBEG.
There are not that many Red Talons around, since they only accept Lupus into their ranks and those aren't exactly common. As a result, they only have a small number of kukloi:
- Predator Kings: The ones who want to wipe out all humans, now.
- Warders of the Land: The "moderates" who will kill any human who enters their territory, but won't go out looking for them.
- Dying Cubs: The extremists among extremists, who secretly practice rituals empowered by torturing and sacrificing humans in an effort to fight the Wyrm. Almost certainly doing more harm than good, considering it's implied that these rituals may or may not come from the Wyrm itself.
- Whelp's Compromise: The rare Red Talons who think that their "kill all humans and reject all human civilization schtick" is a bit much. They call themselves the Anti-Extinction Faction, and try to promote human conservation and education about the need to respect the wilderness, especially wolves. Literally all of the other Talons hate their guts and consider them weaklings without the stomach to do what supposedly "needs" to be done, just in case the name didn't get that across.
The Red Talons are generally considered the That Guy tribe amongst fans of Apocalypse, courtesy of their incredible misanthropy (even by oWoD standards) and the difficulty of properly roleplaying one (see the Lupus part of the main W:TA for why). If a player wants to play a Red Talon, you'll frequently save yourself a lot of trouble just booting them beforehand or pre-emptively banning Red Talon PCs from your game (unless they have a really good concept for a character, preferably one that isn't another "I'm rebelling against the evils of my race!" Drizzt knockoff).
Even White Wolf, in an uncharacteristic display of good sense, decided they were kind of a dumb move - the Pure Tribe known as the Predator Kings in Werewolf: The Forsaken are almost literally the Red Talons in the New World of Darkness. The only differences are that they've dropped the "wolf-bred" thing (and even then, there are in-universe rumours...) and that they're very much unequivocally the villains, rather than the weird "They're totally heroes, gaiz!" attitude that was ham-handedly scattered through several areas of their oWoD lore.
