What makes a monster? There’s nothing inherently evil about the ability to assume the shape of a beast. Many Wardens of the Wood have this gift. The shifters speak of champions of Olarune, guardians of the wild that walk as bears or boars. Selkies and other fey shift their forms, but have no innate desire to harm the innocent. It is not the ability to change shape that makes a skinchanger a monster; it’s the murderous spirit that hides within, regardless of the outer form. Surely you’ve heard the warnings—’Fear the wolves that walk among us,’ or ‘Beware the beast that wears a friendly face.’ It’s said that the first skinchangers were created by the overlords to spread terror among the children of Eberron. These creatures aren’t the deadliest monsters spawned by Khyber, but the fear they create can be far more dangerous than any wolf’s bite. How many communities have torn themselves apart trying to find hidden rats? Worse yet, those who fall to the bite of these beasts rise again as monsters themselves. Make no mistake: a werewolf may wear the face of someone you knew, but your friend’s soul is dissipating in Dolurrh. What you face is a murderous tool of the overlords which seeks to torment and kill the people its victim once loved. 

—Dorius Alyre Ir’Korran, The Manual Maleficent

The lycanthrope is an iconic creature with a dramatic role in Eberron. In the ninth century the Church of the Silver Flame fought a brutal war against lycanthropes in the Towering Wood, hunting them nearly to extinction. But lycanthropes can still be found across Eberron. From the champions of Olarune to the Great Pack of Droaam and the Bilge Rats of Stormreach, lycanthropes remain. This article examines the role, rules, and different strains of lycanthropy as they might be represented in the current D&D rules, followed by a discussion of the Silver Crusade and answers to various questions about lycanthropes in Eberron.  

But before we go further, let’s shoot the were-elephant in the room. Lycanthrope means wolf man. So, why do we use it to refer to wererats, werebears, and more? Well, this is D&D, where medusas are a species and gorgons are bulls that breathe petrifying gas. It’s NOT an accurate term, but it’s the word the rules use, so I’m going ahead and using it here. But within the world, I think “lycanthrope” is an academic term, if it’s used at all; I’d expect people in everyday life to call them skinchangers, shapeshifters, were(whatever)s, or to use words that have their roots in the languages spoken in the world.

LYCANTHROPE STORIES

Traditionally, lycanthropes are often cast in one of two very different roles. On the one hand, you have them as defenders of the wild—people blessed with the ability to assume animal form, or animals blessed with the power to assume a humanoid form. On the other, you have people who have been cursed with lycanthropy, who become murderous monsters when the moon is full. In D&D, werebears are traditionally presented as protectors while werewolves and wererats are predatory… but mechanically, aside from alignment, they all use the same rules. This remains true in the latest edition: werebears are good, but they still spread their gift as a curse. Originally, Eberron said that you could have good wererats and evil werebears, but that alignment was linked to the afflicting lycanthrope—if you’re bitten by an evil werebear, you’ll become an evil werebear. Over the years I’ve expanded that concept to suggest that there are completely different forms of lycanthropy that come from different sources—that the “blessed” defenders of the wild are tied to Olarune, while the cursed predators are associated with overlords or daelkyr. In this article I’m taking that further and establishing clear mechanical distinctions between gifted and cursed lycanthropes. What follows are a few ways to use lycanthropes in a story. 

Champions of Nature. Adventurers might encounter a powerful bear defending a sacred spring from evil spirits; after they help defeat the spirits, this bear might become an elf and thank them for their aid. Conversely, adventurers could encounter a pack or wolves attacking an Orien caravan, wolves that cry out with human voices when wounded. Likely, the adventurers will assume these creatures are monsters… but in fact they are champions of nature trying to destroy the cursed cargo being transported in the caravan. This sort of story overlaps with tales you might tell about the Wardens of the Wood or the Ashbound. But such champions can be entirely normal people aside from their lycanthropic gift. It’s also possible that this sort of lycanthrope could only have access to this blessing under certain circumstances: the wolf pack described above only become wolves when there is a threat to the region they have to deal with. Whatever the specific role of this sort of lycanthropic guardian, a key point is that they have a purpose; there’s a reason they’ve been blessed. This purpose could bring them into conflict with adventurers, such as when the wolf pack has a good reason to attack the caravan the adventurers are defending. One of the primary goals of Eberron is to present players with interesting decisions; what do the adventurers do when they’re caught between a Dragonmarked house pursuing the advancement of arcane science and the werewolf who says that what they’re doing endangers the ancient woods?

Fear of the Wild. When you set aside the blessed lycanthropes and focus on the cursed, the first thing to remember is that there’s nothing natural about them. Real wolves rarely prey upon humans, but cursed werewolves are driven to prey upon humanoids; some editions call out that evil lycanthropes explicitly prey on the people they loved in their former life. Cursed lycanthropes aren’t natural wolves, they’re metaphorical wolves; they’re the Big Bad Wolf from faerie tales. They embody people’s fears of the wild and more directly of the hidden predator. REAL rats don’t actively scheme and intentionally spread disease; but wererats undermine and infest the cities they dwell in. When dealing with the cursed lycanthropes, remember that you’re dealing with the products of demons and daelkyr; they are a mockery of the natural world, not a celebration of it.

A Corrupting Force. In some editions of D&D, people can fight the Curse of Lycanthropy. But in most editions, there is at least a period where a cursed individual loses control of their actions—and in many, a path by which the cursed individual’s morality and personality are eroded until they are fully shaped by the predatory drives of the curse. Because of this, anyone can become a murderous lycanthrope. Even a man who is pure of heart and says his prayers by night can become a wolf when the moon is full… Because of this, the Curse is a force that can turn allies, friends, and loved ones into deadly enemies. The image of the good person chaining themselves in the basement when the full moon is on the rise is a key aspect of this story: the person who doesn’t WANT to hurt anyone, but who knows that they are going to become a murderous monster. This is a powerful tool that makes lycanthropes compelling enemies: their ability to corrupt the innocent, and the terror that they could turn YOU into a monster. When dealing with cursed lycanthropes, the DM must decide on the intensity of the curse and what it drives its victims to do. Are they driven to murder innocents and spread terror? Are they drawn to serve the cause of an overlord or daelkyr? Can the curse be resisted or overcome? 

A Hidden Threat. Lycanthropes can be a challenging enemy. But what makes them terrifying is their ability to hide among innocent people—made worse by the curse’s power to corrupt those innocents. When you arrive in a small town, anyone could be a murderous werewolf waiting for the moment to strike. If you find one wererat, you can be sure that there’s more scheming in the shadows. While this can be a challenge for adventurers, the fear of other innocents can be an even greater problem; as anyone who’s played any form of Are You A Werewolf knows, innocent people can often be hurt as panicked townsfolk hunt for the wolves in their midst. Imagine that a group of adventurers arrive in a small town, with a task that will take them a week to complete. That night someone is murdered by a beast—and someone accuses the adventurers of harboring a werewolf. Can the adventurers prove their innocence? Can they be entirely certain one of them isn’t a werewolf? Can they find the true threat? A twist on this is if it’s not a lone wolf, but rather that there’s a well-established faction of lycanthropes who play important roles in the town; the “murderous wolf” could be a rebel member of the line, or from a rival clan who wants the adventurers to expose the family. But is that actually what’s best for the town? Typically, there’s no way to identify a lycanthrope while it’s in its animal form, and this is one reason lycanthropes fight in beast form instead of just murdering people with weapons. But stories often play with the idea that a severe injury to a lycanthrope in beast form might be retained in their humanoid form—so the butcher suddenly has a limp after the battlemaster tripped up the wolf that eventually got away.

An Unexpected Challenge. One of the things that’s compelling about lycanthropes is the fact that the typical methods and tools adventurers use may not suffice to defeat them. Perhaps the adventurers are dealing with a local crime lord, a crooked sheriff, or a cultist… and it’s all a simple, clear story until the villain laughs at the steel sword plunged through his heart. While there are issues with this, which is why 2025 has removed it, to me the challenge of you need to UNDERSTAND what you’re fighting and to find the tools you’ll need to defeat it is a fun story and makes dealing with lycanthropes a very different experience from fighting random thugs. With that in mind, what I suggest below is changing the vulnerabilities by strain. The point is to add an aspect that goes beyond the pure wargame of combat and that drives the adventurers to investigate, to learn HOW to defeat their foe. 

A Feral Apocalypse. Under the 2025 rules, lycanthropy can spread with astonishing speed. What happens when the wolves aren’t hiding, and instead mount an all out assault to spread their curse through a community? Can the adventurers find a way to contain this outbreak before it’s too late? Perhaps the adventurers are in a Vadalis enclave when an artificial strain of lycanthropy is released; can they prevent it from spreading out into the city?

THE 2025 MONSTER MANUAL

The 2025 Monster Manual is out. It includes the five familiar lycanthropes—werewolves, wererats, werebears, weretigers, and wereboars. It gives some loose lore suggestions—werebears are good and work with druids and fey! Werewolves are evil and some change when the moon is full! Weretigers consider their powers to be a family gift and like to protect things! However, the core mechanics are the same for all five types of lycanthrope and there are two major changes to the 2014 version. 

Silver Doesn’t Matter. Under the 2025 rules, lycanthropes have no resistance or immunity to normal weapons. They don’t have any sort of regeneration. Silver isn’t mentioned in their stat blocks or lore. Instead, the DMG makes silvered weapons a common form of magic item that adds additional damage if you score a critical hit against any sort of shapeshifted creature. There’s understandable reasons for this. It’s difficult to calculate CR for a creature with a situational immunity, because if the party is properly equipped the immunity has no impact at all, while if they don’t have the weapons they need it can be nearly impossible to defeat an enemy. As mentioned above, I like challenging a group of adventurers to find the tools they need; but for the casual DM or inexperienced players it can be a can of worms. So I understand the decision, but I don’t like it—and as a result, I’m suggesting alternatives later in this article. 

The Curse is Instant and Brutal. In most editions of D&D, the curse of lycanthropy is a slow affliction, something that might not even bother you until there’s a full moon. In many editions, player characters could become lycanthropes, using a template or just simple modifications to their character. Neither of these things are true in 2025. All of the five lycanthropes in the Monster Manual have the following effect on their bite attack (replacing ‘werewolf’ with the appropriate lycanthrope): The target is cursed. If the cursed target drops to 0 hit points it instead becomes a Werewolf under the DM’s control and has 10 hit points. The bolded text is part of the description, and indicates that the new creature uses the werewolf stat block. Let’s run down the effects and implications of this. 

The change happens instantaneously. The moon has nothing to do with it, and once you are cursed there’s no way to resist changing and turning on your allies when you drop to zero hit points. 

When you turn into a lycanthrope, you use the appropriate lycanthrope stat block and fall under the DM’s control. It’s not a template, meaning that the new lycanthrope has none of your skills or abilities. It is effectively a new creature summoned when you fall. 

The 2014 Monster Manual included rules for player characters becoming lycanthropes. The 2024 book does not, because again, it’s not a template. You don’t gain new abilities when you are turned into a werewolf; you lose all the skills and abilities you had and become an NPC under the DM’s control. 

I read this in the way that Dorius describes it in the Manual Maleficent. For all intents and purposes, you die when you drop to zero hit points while cursed; an entirely new creature steps in and steals your body. What’s left isn’t you any more. This is a very clear and clean effect for a wargame. But in my opinion it loses most of the drama traditionally associated with the werewolf story—the struggle to resist the curse, chaining yourself in the basement when the full moon is rising. Instead, it’s far closer to a traditional zombie apocalypse scenario, where the bite of a zombie can transform a victim within minutes and turns them into a loyal member of the ravening horde. Under this model, a single werewolf could set the destruction of a village in motion within minutes. It serves a purpose, and it works well for the cursed victims of the Wild Heart. But I want more options to exist within my campaign. 

Can it be cured? The entry has no direct explanation of how lycanthropy can be cured. The text of the effect is The target is cursed. If the cursed target drops to zero hit points, it instead becomes a werewolf under the DM's control. There's no question that if you reach the victim BEFORE they drop to zero hit points, you can negate this with remove curse. But what happens AFTER they are transformed? A gentle interpretation is that the ongoing state of being a werewolf is considered to be a standard "curse" and that as such, it can be removed at any time with a simple remove curse. A harsher interpretation—which I personally subscribe to—is that the effect of the curse is "transform you into a werewolf when you drop to zero hit points," and that once that occurs, the new werewolf is no longer under the effect of a curse.

The 3.5 rules of D&D had more detailed rules for the curing lycanthropy. Under these rules, a cleric of 12th level or higher could cure it magically if the cure was performed within three days of incurring lycanthropy. After that point, it could only be cured if the victim underwent remove curse or break enchantment during a night of the full moon, and at that point they had to succeed on a DC 20 saving throw (and consider that an unwilling creature can always choose to fail a saving throw!). To me, the ultimate issue is that remove curse isn't a high level spell. At 3rd level, it's part of every day life in the world. If that's all it takes to cure any lycanthrope, it strips a lot of the fear and drama from the story. The idea of the lycanthropic purge is that terrible things were done in the name of rooting out hidden lycanthropes; if all it takes is casting remove curse and oh, job's done, that's not much of a story. On the other hand, the 3.5 rules were based on the model that it would take days for someone to succumb to lycanthropy, during which time they could seek a cure. The 2025 rules strip that away; if there's no way to cure the affliction after that initial transformation, it's pretty ruthless. Ultimately, the way I see it is that 2025 lycanthropy is a form of death; it's an alternative condition to dying. Remove curse is a 3rd level spell, on par with revivify. Like revify, it should be a valid option if you use it quickly; but after a little time has passed, you need something more powerful, on the level of raise dead—such as the 5th level greater restoration. Even then, I'd want to add an element of challenge—the equivalent of the 3.5 saving throw requirement—that also prevents you from just being able to strip away, say, Zaeurl's lycanthropy with a simple spell.

So with that in mind, here's what I'll do; you'll have to decide what makes sense in your campaign!

Lycanthropes who are born with the condition (IE Changing Folk) or who receive it as a gift (Olarune's Blessing) or through an item or bargain (Skinwearers) can't be cured. Likewise, exceptionally powerful lycanthropes—the creatures I call "alphas" in the later sections—can't be cured.

Remove curse can remove lycanthropy before it is triggered (by the victim dropping to zero hit points), or if it is administered within a day of the initial transformation. Greater restoration can remove the curse of lycanthropy up to a month after the initial transformation. Wish or spells of similar power can always remove lycanthropy.

If someone casts remove curse, greater restoration, or a similar spell on an unwilling victim—such as a hostile lycanthrope—they must make a successful spell attack roll against the target and the victim gets to make a Wisdom saving throw to resist the effect.

There may be another way to cure a specific lycanthrope based on the story behind the strain. Perhaps there's a celestial relic, a rare herb charged with the energies of Irian, or an experimental treatment House Jorasco and House Vadalis have been working on that can cure a lycanthrope. The point is that this is an interesting story—not just the expenditure of a spell slot.

Ultimately, the 2025 Lycanthrope is a platform to work with. To start with, I’m going to suggest some variant abilities that could be added to existing lycanthropes. Next, I’ll talk about the ways I’d combine those options with lycanthropes we’ve already mentioned in canon and kanon lore, along with some other ideas. Of course, the ideas for lycanthrope strains are still valid even if you don't use the 2025 rules!

VARIANT TRAITS

These abilities could be added to a current lycanthrope. With that said, there’s no direct way to map them to an increase in CR, because the impact on combat will be entirely dependent on the degree to which your adventurers are prepared for the challenge. As such, it’s up to you as a DM to consider how these changes will affect the encounters you’re setting up—and to reward your players for overcoming greater challenges. A few other things to consider:  

Bane materials. In a number of these abilities I refer to bane materials. It’s an interesting challenge to have an enemy who can’t be killed or slain by normal weapons. But now that it’s not part of the stat block, there’s no reason that weakness has to involve silver. It’s an easy choice and thematically appropriate for the children of the Wild Heart, supporting the Silver Flame and the Silver Crusade. But it makes sense to me that lycanthropes created by the daelkyr would be vulnerable to byeshk rather than silver. Meanwhile, champions of Olarune might be resistant to harm from all worked metals, but vulnerable to weapons made from wood or bone. If you want to get wild, a fey lycanthrope could have a weakness tied to their own story: perhaps they can only be hurt by a weapon dipped in tears, or they take no damage from anyone who has the frightened condition. The key to introducing a new sort of bane is that there needs to be a straightforward way for the adventurers to uncover it. Consider whether the weakness is simply common knowledge; after the Silver Crusade, it makes sense that MOST people know that silver is a common bane for lycanthropes. If a creature has a different bane, how are the adventurers supposed to find out about it? Is it just a skill check? Is there a sage or a library who knows the answer? You want this to be a challenge for your players, not a source of sheer frustration. 

Limited by Form? A second question to keep in mind is whether a trait is restricted to certain forms. The lycanthropes of the 2014 Monster Manual possess their damage immunity in all of their shapes. But if a lycanthrope only possesses invulnerability in its beast or hybrid forms, it gives them a concrete REASON to fight in animal form rather than to use weapons and equipment while still benefiting from invulnerability in humanoid form. It also solves the question of whether you can easily test for werewolves by inflicting minor injuries on them in humanoid form. 

WEAPON IMMUNITY. The lycanthrope is immune to bludgeoning, piercing, and slashing damage unless it’s dealt by a weapon made from their bane material. This is the most extreme version of this trait, and can be frustrating for melee-focused characters. Consider what options are available for such characters. Can they improvise a weapon using the bane material available to them? Can they hit the enemy with a torch? A second question is what this invulnerability LOOKS like. Does a sword bounce off them? Does it injure them, but the wound heals right away? Do they get injured, but don’t react to the damage—continuing to fight even with arrows piercing their body? If this invulnerability manifests in humanoid form, this could be an easy way to reveal a lycanthrope.

WEAPON RESISTANCE. The lycanthrope is resistant to bludgeoning, piercing, and slashing damage unless it’s dealt by a weapon made from their bane material. This means that a melee-focused character CAN choose to ignore the trait and fight using their normal weapons and techniques; it will be harder, but it’s possible. 

REGENERATION. The lycanthrope regains 10 hit points at the start of each of its turns. If the lycanthrope takes damage from a weapon made from its bane material, this trait doesn’t function at the start of the lycanthrope’s next turn. The lycanthrope dies only if it starts its turn with 0 hit points and doesn’t regenerate. Drawn from the Loup Garou from Van Richten’s Guide To Ravenloft, this trait has the advantage that it’s just as relevant to spellcasters as it is to warriors. It’s not simply that swords won’t kill the wolf—it will recover from fire and acid as well, rising again and again until someone finishes it off using its bane. I like the flavor of this more than simple immunity, but even more than immunity, if the adventurers don’t have knowledge of and access to the bane material, you’re placing them in an impossible situation. Beyond the bane material, you could choose to add other damage types that would have the same effect; lycanthropes tied to the overlords might be hurt both by silvered weapons and by radiant damage. 

UNNATURAL VITALITY. When the lycanthrope is reduced to zero hit points, it enters a cataleptic state that is indistinguishable from death. It appears to be dead to outward observation and spells used to determine the lycanthrope’s status. While in this state it has the blinded and incapacitated conditions and its speed is zero. It remains in this state until it suffers any damage from a weapon forged from its bane material, at which point it dies; or until the moon rises, at which point the state ends and the lycanthrope gains the benefits of a long rest. This trait has a powerful long-term effect, but doesn’t change the balance of combat. Adventurers can defeat the lycanthrope using all their usual weapons and spells, but unless they know what it is and how to kill it, it will rise again. This is ideal for a slow burn story, where adventurers face a villain and don’t realize they’re a supernatural creature until they’ve killed the villain once only to have them return the next day. A question to consider is whether there are any ways to get around this. If the lycanthrope is dismembered, will that kill it? Will it reconstitute itself at nightfall? Or will it remain ‘dead’ until the pieces are brought back together, at which point it will rise again? This can allow for a cult that steals the preserved head of a long-dead lycanthrope from some vault, because they’ve located the rest of his body…

NO INFECTION. This lycanthrope does not curse its victim with its bite attack. For creatures where the condition of lycanthropy is a blessing rather than a curse, it doesn’t make much sense to spread it like a zombie plague. 

ONGOING INFECTION. When a creature is cursed by the lycanthrope’s bite, their hit point maximum is reduced by the damage of the bite attack. This damage cannot be undone until the curse is removed. When the cursed creature attempts to take a long rest, they must make a Wisdom saving throw (DC 12); the DC is increased by 1 for each full moon. If the cursed creature fails the saving throw, they become a lycanthrope under the DM’s control. Once this occurs the curse is removed and their hit point maximum is restored; at this point they are a lycanthrope, and the condition can only be removed by a wish or similar level of power. At the DM’s discretion, the character could remain in control of their actions while in their humanoid form, but have to make the Wisdom saving throw every time they attempt a long rest, losing control and becoming a lycanthrope whenever they fail. This retains the idea that a victim could carry the curse for a while, struggling against it. It keeps the simplicity of the 2025 approach in that when the victim transforms, they become a lycanthrope of the appropriate type under the DM’s control; it’s not a template, and they don’t retain any of their skills or class features. When using this approach, the DM could make removing the curse more difficult than simply casting a spell; perhaps the victim needs to acquire a certain herb, or be stabbed with a weapon made from the lycanthrope’s bane material to ‘kill the curse.’ 

SLOW INFECTION. This follows the rules for the Ongoing Infection, but the victim cannot be transformed by dropping to zero hit points; they can ONLY be transformed by failing a saving throw while taking a long rest. 

FERAL BOND. The lycanthrope can cast animal friendship, speak with animals and beast sense at will, but only targeting beasts of the same type as the lycanthrope’s beast form. For a guardian of nature, this reflects the lycanthrope’s connection to the natural world. For a cursed lycanthrope, this represents their ability to corrupt nature and twist it to serve their purposes. 

RESTRICTED SHAPE-SHIFT. The lycanthrope can only use its Shape-Shift bonus action when certain conditions are met. This could require the lycanthrope to be in possession of a particular object, such as a wolfskin belt or a set of hide armor. It could be limited to a certain time or place—they can only change while illuminated by moonlight. It could require the lycanthrope to spill blood, or even only be possible when the lycanthrope reduces a humanoid creature to zero hit points. The DM must also decide whether this applies in all forms. It could be that a cultist of the Wild Heart can enter wolf form at will, but can only return to humanoid form when they reduce a creature to zero hit points. Once they accept the gift, they HAVE to kill, or else be trapped in animal form. 

BESTIAL SHAPE-SHIFT. When this lycanthrope uses the Shape-Shift bonus action, they can only assume an animal form or their true humanoid form; they do not have a hybrid form. This is an option to distinguish a strain and prevents them from relying on weapons when they aren’t in humanoid form. 

STRAINS OF LYCANTHROPY

Canon lore provides no absolute origin for lycanthropy. It’s suggested that it could be tied to Eberron, Lamannia, or Olarune, and that this gift could have been corrupted by an overlord or by the daelkyr. Some believe shifters are descended from lycanthropes; some say that the reverse is true, and that the first lycanthropes were blessed shifters. To all of this, I say why not both? Here I describe six strains of lycanthropy. Of these, skinchangers are by far the most common; when people say “werewolf” they generally mean “skinchanger.” Most people have only heard of the others in stories, if that; it’s up to you to decide if any of these strains even exist in YOUR Eberron. 

SKINCHANGERS

Animal Forms: Typically Wolf and Rat, though any predatory creature is possible.  

Standard Origin: Overlords (Wild Heart, Eldrantulku)

Common Variant Traits:  Resistant to physical damage unless caused by silvered weapons; (Alpha skinchangers only) Immune to physical damage unless caused by silvered weapons, Feral Bond

When people in Eberron curse the “wolves that walk among us,” they’re talking about skinchangers. This is an ancient affliction first unleashed at the dawn of creation to turn the children of Eberron against one another. Skinchangers are predators whose primary purpose is to sow fear—murdering innocents in the form of beasts and tearing communities apart from within. While we generally speak of “The Curse of Lycanthropy” as if it was a single, monolithic force, during the Age of Demons overlords created dozens of distinct skinchanger curses and released them into the world. When introducing a group of skinchanger lycanthropes into a story, consider the following factors. 

Overlord is the ancient fiend who unleashed this particular curse upon the world.

Beast is the animal form associated with the curse. 

Behaviors are the defining types of actions the curse drives its victims to perform. 

Duration establishes if the curse is continuous or intermittent. A continuous curse transforms the victim and dominates their behavior from the moment it takes root. An intermittent curse lies dormant most of the time, but strikes with powerful intensity under specific circumstances, such as when Barrakas is full or when the victim becomes angry.  

Intensity reflects the degree to which the curse overrides the personality of the victim. A strong Skinchanger curse completely destroys the personality of the victim, leaving a shell pursuing the indicated behavior, while a weak curse leaves the original personality intact but embeds the desire to carry out the imposed behavior. 

A vital point here is that the overlords created these curses, but the curses are now wild within the world. The typical skinchanger doesn’t know they’re tied to an overlord. A scholar would say “See how these wererats have taken over the criminal underworld in this town? It’s clearly a skinchanger curse associated with Eldrantulku, driving them to undermine the established order through subterfuge.” But the individual wererats would say “Eldranwhatnow? We’re getting rich, you idiot.” 

With all these factors in mind, here’s a few examples of Skinchanger curses. 

The Ravenous Wolf: Wild Heart, Wolf, Murder, Intermittent (Moon), Strong Intensity. This is the classic sporadic predator. When the curse activates, the victim becomes a wolf and is driven to murder innocents. While under the influence of the curse, the victim has no memory of their former self and is purely driven by predatory instinct. This curse activates when Barrakas is full; at other times it has no influence over the victim.  

The Wolf Pack: Wild Heart, Wolf, Murder and Sow Fear, Continuous, Medium Intensity. This curse transforms the victim into a cruel, sociopathic predator. The victim retains the memories of their former life but all loyalties and attachments are erased and replaced by absolute devotion to their pack and its alpha. Their primary motivation is to spread fear and to satisfy their predatory instincts by killing other sentient humanoids. Where the Ravenous Wolf kills indiscriminately, the Wolf Pack chooses victims and timing carefully; the goal is fear, not body count. The wolf pack might have the power to kill the village in a night, but instead they may kill once a month, or time killings to match the arrival of strangers—maximizing the fear and confusion.  They almost always kill with tooth and claw; they want people to fear the hidden wolves. Despite the name, someone carrying the Wolf Pack curse may operate as a lone wolf hiding within a community. 

Scheming Rats. Eldrantulku, Rat, Undermine Existing Order and Prey Upon Others, Continuous, Weak. Eldrantulku the Oathbreaker wants mortals to fear one another. He delights in crime, corruption, and intrigue. In the same way that Rak Tulkhesh loves violent bloodshed regardless of who’s fighting, Eldrantulku loves anything that drives betrayal and cold-blooded murder. This is the foundation of Eldrantulku’s common wererat curse. Victims of the curse retain their memories of their former life, but any existing allegiances are replaced with a deep loyalty to the rat pack and its alpha. Beyond that, the primary drive of the curse is to achieve power and influence at the expense of others. This may be achieved through crime, political intrigue, or blackmail. The point is that an individual wererat might SAY they’re running a gang or blackmailing nobles for the money, but in fact they’re driven by a deep-seated desire to prey upon others—but to do so through clever schemes rather than brute force. This urge is less powerful than that of the Wolf Pack, but it’s inescapable and undermines any prior morality. 

Plague Rats. Ashurak, Rat, Spread Disease and Fear, Continuous, Strong. Ashurak the Slow Death delights in spreading disease, typically through enchanted minion rats. While Ashurak wererats can be feral folk hiding out in sewers, they sometimes take over sanitation departments or rise to other positions allowing them to control the response to disease; House Jorasco has dealt with a number of wererat infestations over the centuries. Just as Wild Heart werewolves won’t murder everyone in a village, Ashurak wererats don’t want plagues to kill everyone. The Slow Death thrives on the fear and misery caused by disease, and prefers lingering suffering rather to brutally swift death.

These are just a few examples. The Wild Heart has “Ravening” strains for many different predatory animals. The Cold Sun has a “Scheming Serpent” curse that mirrors the Scheming Rats of Eldrantulku, but with a stronger intensity. On the other hand, these can be seen in the world: the Bilge Rats of Stormreach are Scheming Rats, while the Great Pack includes a large Wolf Pack in addition to stragglers carrying other curses. It’s also the case that Skinchangers born with the curse are often less dominated by it. This is notable with Zaeurl of the Great Pack, a hereditary alpha leading a band linked by the wolf pack curse. Her instincts drive her and her “children” to be terrifying predators, but she has been able to channel those impulses to serve the greater good of Droaam and the Great Pack. Even now, they want other Droaamites to fear them—but they allow Zaeurl and the Daughters to determine their prey. 

The most defining features of the Skinchanger curses are the shifter in morality and loyalty and the drive to carry out the core behavior. A virtuous knight afflicted with the Wolf Pack curse becomes a serial killer whose loyalty to the pack replaces their former devotion to their nation and their faith. A Ravening Beast maintains their loyalties and morality most of the time, but both are wiped away while the curse is active. While the curses on their own don’t compel any sort of allegiance to an overlord, there are certainly cases where a Cult of the Dragon Below cultivates a skinchanger curse—so you could have a cult of Ashurak who are also plague rat skinchangers.

Note that when the Lycanthropic Surge took place, it seized control of all lycanthropes—skinchangers carrying different curses and lycanthropes of different strains—and increased the intensity of the effect. Regardless of whether they were responsible for the surge, this is something the Wild Heart and Feral Hand are capable of. Plague rats may be creations of Ashurak, but the Wild Heart can dominate any skinchanger.

Variant Traits. The best known trait of skinchangers is their resistance to physical damage, save for the touch of silver. Most skinchangers can be hurt by other attacks, but only silver strikes true. More powerful alpha skinchangers are fully immune to physical damage save for wounds caused by silver. Skinchangers will appear to be hurt by mundane means, but they just don’t feel pain or suffer the full consequences of those injuries. So a simple cut on the palm isn’t enough to tell if a person is a skinchanger. During the lycanthropic purge, countless innocents were slain while undergoing tests to determine if they possessed a skinchanger’s resistance to injury. 

The ability of skinchangers to pass on their curse is also something that waxes and wanes. During the Silver Crusade, the curse was instantly infectious and followed the rules as presented in the 2025 Monster Manual. After the Crusade, it became far less potent, following the Slow Infection rules. It’s up to the DM to decide whether a particular strain uses the standard rules or if they only have the Slow Infection. It’s also worth noting that while the Church of the Silver Flame did its best to wipe out skinchangers, it’s impossible to truly exterminate them. It’s certainly rare, but the overlords can always reseed the curse. A leader of a cult of the Dragon Below can become a newborn alpha skinchanger. There are cursed artifacts that will infect those that carry them with the skinchanger curse. And there are truly ancient skinchangers with Unnatural Vitality, who have been buried—in some cases, their bodies cut in pieces and scattered—who wait to be released again.

Is it hereditary? The curse of the Skinchanger can usually be passed on to children. The curse drives the behavior of the individual, shaping their personality and infusing them with powerful instincts to kill or corrupt. However, someone who deals with these influences from birth is less likely to be a slave to them than someone inflicted late in life. This has already been called out with Zaeurl of the Great Pack, who’s a fierce predator but pursues the interests of her pack and Droaam. 

PUPPETEERS

Animal Forms: Any predatory creature

Standard Origin: Overlords (Wild Heart, Eldrantulku)

Common Variant Traits: Alpha only - Weapon Immunity (see below) and Unnatural Vitality

Puppeteers are a variation of skinchanger lycanthropes. The skinchanger curse changes a victim’s morality and loyalty, but they still retain some memory of their former life. The puppeteer curse is a malevolent spirit, and it takes full possession of the creatures that succumb to its curse. While puppeteer lycanthropes are living creatures, the mortal soul has left the body and all that’s left is a shell being manipulated by the spirit. The puppeteers of a particular pack are all controlled by a single mind, and are thus aware of everything experienced by members of their pack. If they choose, they can speak with one voice; however, the puppeteer can also maintain a semblance of autonomy among its pack members, though it can struggle if multiple members of the pack are required to engage in complex tasks or conversations at once. 

A puppeteer can only maintain a certain number of pack members; it’s up to the DM to decide what this is. As long as it is below that number, it uses the standard rules for spreading the curse and transforming victims found in the 2025 Monster Manual. Once the maximum pack size has been reached, members of the pack lose the ability to transmit the curse, and any cursed creatures who haven’t been transformed lose the curse. The ability is regained as soon as a member of the pack is slain. A creature under the protection of Protection from Evil and Good or other effects that protect against possession cannot be affected by the puppeteer’s curse. 

Puppeteers are extremely rare. To date they’ve been encountered in the Talenta Plains and the Demon Wastes. The Mournland could be another place to find a puppeteer.

Variant Traits. Each puppeteer pack has an alpha member who possesses Weapon Immunity and Unnatural Vitality. As long as the alpha remains alive, the spirit can always restore its pack. If the alpha is slain—fully slain, accounting for its Unnatural Vitality—all of the other members of the pack fall into a cataleptic state. It’s up to the DM to decide if they can be cured and restored at that point—or if they’re truly dead. 

There are two distinct forms of puppeteer, and this determines the nature of the puppeteer’s bane material.

Fiendish puppeteers are vulnerable to silver. Their beast forms are hideous and move in unnatural ways. They are typically driven by native fiends associated with Eldrantulku or the Wild Heart, though they don’t necessarily serve the interests of their overlords. While in beast form, a fiendish puppeteer’s creature type changes to fiend. 

Undead puppeteers are driven by cursed or restless spirits. They are vulnerable to weapons made from the bones of their original body, weapons they owned in life, or the weapon that originally killed them; they will also permanently die if they are buried in hallowed ground. Undead puppeteers typically have smaller packs than fiends. Their bestial forms appear to be dead, with exposed bone and dried blood. While in beast form, an undead puppeteer’s creature type changes to undead. 

Is it hereditary? No. If there’s room in the pack, a child could be immediately possessed, but a child born to a full pack won’t be possessed. 

DYRRN’S CORRUPTED

Animal Forms: Any

Standard Origins: Daelkyr

Common Variant Traits: Regeneration (Byeshk, hereditary lycanthrope); Ongoing Infection (hereditary lycanthrope) or No Infection (afflicted lycanthrope); Bestial Shape-Shift

The daelkyr Dyrrn created this curse and cast it into the world. It spreads along two vectors. It is hereditary, and Corrupted lycanthropes pass the curse to their offspring. It can also be transmitted using the standard rules, with the Ongoing Infection variation. However, only lycanthropes born with the curse can transmit the curse; those transformed through a bite cannot spread the curse any further. As such, a pack of Corrupted lycanthropes often has a leader who inherited the gift and established the pack, but they can’t spread exponentially; only the leader can spread the Corruption. 

Each strain of Dyrrn’s Corruption is associated with an alignment (typically neutral or evil), a beast type, and a moon… for example, neutral tigers tied to Rhaan. With that said, the bestial forms of Corrupted lycanthropes are typically unnatural in some way (which is consistent throughout a particular strain). Those neutral tigers might have translucent skin and fur, or barbed tongues instead of teeth, or extra tails that are actually lamprey-like tentacles. This could result in additional abilities in animal form—a climb speed, swim speed, unusual attack, or something similar. In addition, hereditary Corrupted lycanthropes are very difficult to kill; they possess regeneration that can only be countered by byeshk. 

When Dyrrn’s Corruption takes hold, it destroys the personality and many of the memories of the victim. While there are neutral strains, they are alien in their outlook, and a player character overtaken by the curse will become an NPC. Each strain of corrupted lycanthropy is driven by its own inscrutable instincts. Some are aggressive or act as Cults of the Dragon Below; others are simply enigmatic, creating strange monuments in the wild or howling in eerie choirs. 

Is it hereditary? Yes.

SKINWEARERS

Animal Forms: Any

Standard Origins: Thelanis, Overlords (Sul Khatesh, Eldrantulku) 

Common Variant Traits: No Infection, Restricted Shape-Shift, Bestial Shape-Shift; Weapon Immunity and Unnatural Vitality (usually Silver, Beast Form only)

The classic Skinwearer is a cultist of Sul Khatesh or Eldrantulku who receives a Skinwearer’s Pelt—often a belt or cloak—that allows them to assume the form of a beast. They must pay for this gift with innocent blood; in some cases they can’t transform back to their humanoid form until they murder an innocent. While in beast form, a Skinwearer is protected from harm. Even if they are killed while in beast form, their Unnatural Vitality will protect them unless they are skinned; they remain in beast form while in their cataleptic state.

Skinwearers are usually agents of chaos who revel in their bestial power, or who wish to pursue a feud without fear of retribution. Those tied to fiends are typically vulnerable to silver. However, an archfey or animal lord could also grant a Skinwearer’s Pelt; in this case, their bane material would be tied to the story of the fey. The Karrnwood is home to a clan of bugbears called the Taarka'nasaar, which is closely allied with an archfey known as the Princess of Wolves. The champions of this clan are skinwearers who can assume the forms of dire wolves. Skinweavers aren't bound to any particular alignment. There are tales in our world of benevolent fey who require a magical pelt to change shape, which can be stolen by unscrupulous mortals; these stories could be inspired by mortals with Skinwearer’s Pelts. 

Skinwearers are rare and don’t spawn other lycanthropes. A Skinwearer’s Pelt has no innate power of its own; the would-be wearer must activate it by making a pact with the entity that created it. A Skinwearer's Pelt does have one special property: it transforms along with the victim when they assume their bestial form, reappearing when they return to their humanoid form.

Is it hereditary? No. However, it might be possible for a parent to teach their child to use their Skinwearer’s Pelt (even though its not normally transferable) or to present their children to the patron who provided the pelt. 

OLARUNE’S BLESSED

Animal Forms: Any, including non-predatory beasts. 

Standard Origins: Primal power

Typical Variant Traits: No Infection; Resistance to damage caused by metal weapons (Beast Form Only); Bestial Shape-Shift; Feral Bond

Olarune’s Blessing is no curse. It is a gift that is occasionally granted to champions of the wild, especially shifters, rangers, and barbarians. The Moonspeaker druids of the Towering Woods say that this power flows from the moon Olarune, and this is the source of the name; and certainly, those that carry the gift feel the desire to roam in their beast forms when Olarune is full, though they do not lose control. Others say that the power flows from Lamannia or Eberron itself. What is certain is that this gift is usually granted to people who already have some connection to primal magic, and that those who receive Olarune’s Blessing feel a strong drive to protect the natural world and its creatures. Olarune’s Blessing manifests spontaneously and can’t be passed on. Some of those who receive the gift have ecstatic visions of a glowing figure charging them to defend the wild; others discover the blessing with no prior sign or warning. Those who carry the curse often possess resistance to damage inflicted by metal weapons, but this doesn’t shield them from unarmed strikes, falling damage, or attacks made with weapons of wood, stone, or bone. 

Humanoids who carry Olarune’s Blessing gain the ability to assume the form of a beast that is respected or revered in the region in which they are blessed, and usually feel compelled to embody the positive traits associated with that animal. The bear is a common shape for the blessed in the Eldeen Reaches. However, any animal is possible, including non-predatory animals. 

In the Talenta Plains, this gift is known as the Second Life; typically, it is found among skilled hunters who have lost their dinosaur companions, and who gain the ability to assume the form of that creature. The gift is also found among the Qaltiar culture of the drow in Xen’drik, where the blessed are known as spirit walkers. 

Is it hereditary? Not usually. Like a Skinwearer, it’s possible that one of Olarune’s Blessed could guide their child down the same path that led to their receiving the blessing, but it’s not innate.

THE CHANGING FOLK

Animal Forms: Any 

Origins: Thelanis, Primal

Common Variant Traits: No Infection

There are countless stories of people who are also animals—the Bears that Built a Barn, Brother Fox and his Wily Ways, the Wagons of the Wandering Wolves. Most scholars say these tales are inspired by shifters. But in the Moonlit Vale of Thelanis there are people who embody these tales, peaceful folk who shift freely between humanoid and bestial form. A few families of the Changing Folk have found their way into Eberron. Most seek to keep their distance from the outer world, remaining in isolation in Thelanian manifest zones and dwelling in their stories… but a few yearn for adventure and travel into the world beyond. 

Changing Folk aren’t cursed and can’t transform other creatures. Those born in Thelanis are fey, and they wither if they travel too far from Thelanis or manifest zones; those born in Eberron are humanoids. They are exceptionally rare, and most people in the Five Nations have never met one of the Changing Folk. Some families of Changing Folk might be bound to a particular beast form. Other families might be more like shifters with the Beast Within—an individual can only assume a single form, but each person discovers their own shape.

Variant Traits. By default, the only gift Changing Folk possess is the ability to assume an animal form. However, they are many different tales of the Changing Folk, and a particular family might possess any of the traits described above. 

Is it hereditary? Potentially. It depends on the strength of the story of the individual and on the location in which the child is conceived. Children born to a family of Changing Folk in the deep woods will always inherit the gift, but should a shapeshifter go to Sharn, get work as a blacksmith,  and marry a dwarf, their child may be purely mundane.

ADVENTURING LYCANTHROPES? 

The 2025 Lycanthropes don’t provide an option for player characters to become lycanthropes. When you’re transformed into a lycanthrope, you fall under the control of the DM. Mechanically, this is far simpler than trying to balance a host of new abilities, and it reflects the idea that it’s a curse that transforms your personality and motivation. However, Olarune’s Blessing and the Changing Folk are lycanthropes who aren’t cursed or compelled. If you’re working with this idea from session zero, the simplest ability is to work with some combination of shifter and druid and to describe your magic and class abilities as drawing on that gift. Use the Primal Savagery cantrip from Xanathar’s Guide and say that it’s just you extending your claws. However, if the DM wants to grant a true taste of lycanthropy, I’m providing a supernatural gift for Olarune’s Blessing. This doesn’t grant Weapon Resistance or Feral Bond, but hey, it takes time to develop those traits! There’s no limits on the number of times the shape-shifting power can be used, but the fact that it doesn’t transform equipment is a limiting factor. Needless to say, this is a supernatural gift with no innate balancing factors! Grant this gift at your own risk, and consider its impact carefully before you do! With that warning in place, have fun! 

BEASTS BEYOND THE BASIC FIVE

The broad idea of skinchangers and many cursed lycanthropes is that they assume the forms of predatory creatures—animals that people fear. However, this restriction doesn’t apply to Skinwearers, Olarune’s Blessed or the Changing Folk, and even with predatory lycanthropes it makes sense that they should take on the forms of predators that are local to a region. When you’re in the Talenta Plains, it’s much more fun to have a pack of wereclawfeet than to deal with rats or wolves. 

At the end of the day, the differences between the five lycanthropes listed in the 2025 Monster Manual are very minor. It’s a question of hit points, ability scores, and a trait or two. I don’t have time to homebrew a bunch of alternate stat blocks, but it’s fairly simple to use the existing blocks and simply shift out the beast type associated with them. Are you dealing with a small beast? If so, use the wererat block as the base. Large beast? Work with the werebear. Medium beast? Decide which of the others works the best for your needs. For example, the clawfoot is a medium beast with 40 foot speed and Pack Tactics… which makes it a good match for the werewolf stat block. If the beast has an iconic ability, consider if there’s something you can remove to make up for the addition, such as the werewolf’s Pack Tactics or the weretiger’s Prowl. If I was making a weresnake for Q’barra, I might use the Werebear template as a base and go ahead and give it the Constrict ability (for a constrictor snake); if I’m working off a giant venomous snake, I’d use the werewolf template, remove Pack Tactics, and say that their bite attack deals an additional 4 (1d8) poison damage. In the case of a wereowl, I’d use the wererat stat block, but allow them to assume a tiny owl form with a 60 ft fly speed. 

LYCANTHROPES IN THE WIDER WORLD

Most of the ideas discussed here refer to lycanthropes in isolation. But how do they interact with other forces, like the Dreaming Dark or the dragonmarked houses? First of all, most strains of lycanthropy are very rare. Skinchangers have always been the most common and widespread, but they were hunted almost to extinction during the Silver Crusade. It’s impossible to utterly destroy skinchangers because the overlords can make more—but they are still rare today and still hunted by the templars and other forces when they appear within the Five Nations. There can be a nest of wererats in Fairhaven if you want there to be... but they'd want to be quiet and clever about it. Beyond this, cursed lycanthropes typically have an enforced loyalty to their creators and their pack, which prevents a lot of casual alliances. A PACK may make an alliance—as seen with the Great Pack of Droaam allying with the Daughters of Sora Kell or the wererats of Stormreach allying with the Boromar Clan—but you don't have a lot of individual cursed lycanthropes breaking away from their creators. Uncursed lycanthropes are another story; there are blessed lycanthropes among the Wardens and Moonspeakers in the Eldeen Reaches, and you could easily have a Skinwearer concordian in the Aurum. In general, however, the broad idea is that lycanthropes are a thing that people know exist and that they are afraid of—but that since the Silver Crusade, few people expect to actually see one.

The Silver Crusade and the Lycanthropic Purge

Skinchangers and corrupted lycanthropes have been present throughout the history of Galifar. Throughout most of human history on Khorvaire, these lycanthropes had a limited ability to spread their curse and most operated in isolated packs and clans—threatening their local communities, but not seeking to spread into new territories. Templars and knights of Dol Arrah dealt with these creatures whenever they found them, but no one considered lycanthropes to be a serious threat. Olarune’s Blessed, skinchangers, and the Changing Folk were known only through stories, and largely avoided contact with mainstream civilization. Lycanthropes were one reason to stay on the road and to avoid the deep woods, but they weren’t seen as an everyday threat.

Around the Ninth Century, there was a shift in Lycanthropic behavior. Packs of werewolves began coordinating attacks. Wolves from the Towering Wood began raiding western farms, and wererats established warrens beneath the cities of western Aundair. Victims were often left alive and afflicted. While terror spread among the common folk of western Aundair, the nobles largely dismissed the claims. Sages in the Church of the Silver Flame confirmed that afflicted lycanthropes could now spread the curse. They realized that the raids and urban actions might not be as random as they appeared - that this could be the groundwork and preparations for a serious large-scale assault. Combined with the risk of exponential expansion, this was a potential threat to human civilization. Templars were dispatched to Aundair, and fears were confirmed; there were more lycanthropes than anyone guessed, and they were better organized than had been seen in the past. What followed was a brutal guerrilla war; the templars had numbers and discipline, but they were fighting an unpredictable and extremely powerful foe that could hide in plain sight and turn an ally into an enemy with a single bite. Thousands of Aundairians and templars died in these struggles. Cunning lycanthropes intentionally sowed suspicions and fomented conflict between templars and shifters, resulting in thousands of additional innocent deaths.

The precise details of the war aren't chronicled in canon and likely aren't known to the general public. I expect it happened in waves, with periods where the templars thought the threat had finally been contained... only to have a new resurgence in a few years. Various things to keep in mind…

Canon has never established what caused the surge in lycanthropy that drove the Silver Crusade. I have long said that it was the near-release of the Wild Heart, but that is a Kanon answer and you could certainly come up with a different one. Perhaps it was Dyrrn the Corruptor. Maybe it was a Vadalis Monarch with an Eldritch Machine that’s hidden in the heart of the Towering Wood. SOMETHING caused a surge, and the templars and their allies ultimately defeated it. 

The denizens of the Towering Wood have ALWAYS been fighting the fiends in the woods. Avassh and the Wild Heart have created countless horrors. During this period, the shifters and Wardens of the Wood were on the front lines; things were even more dangerous IN the woods than they were outside of it. At various points during the Silver Crusade, templars worked with shifters and druids. This ties to the point that Shifter communities sought to protect Olarune’s Blessed, seeking some way to free them from the curse, but that the shifters hated skinchangers just as much as the Aundairians did.  

With that said, wererats excel at sowing discord and whatever power was behind the surge WANTED to get potential allies fighting each other. In some cases, violence between templars and the denizens of the Wood was the result of short sighted prejudice. But in many other cases those conflicts were engineered. Shifters are just as vulnerable to the Skinchanger curse as humans, and all it takes is a few shifters transforming into werewolves at a crucial moment to trigger a panic and a massacre. Wererats infiltrated the templars, the Aundairian farmers, and the shifter communities and sought to inflame fears and to bring out the worst in people. People did terrible things during the Silver Crusade, but it’s important to keep in mind that it was a brutal, terrifying conflict in which hidden enemies were actively working to maximize discord.  

Whatever the power was that drove the surge—daelkyr, demon, dragonmark—eventually, someone brought it to an end. The curse no longer spread as easily as it had, and blessed lycanthropes and Changing Folk were freed from whatever overarching influence had been driving their aggression. But while the threat was largely neutralized at this point, people didn't know that. There'd been ups and downs before. Beyond this, the Aundairian people had suffered through decades of terror and they wanted revenge. This is the point at which the Purge shifted from being a truly heroic struggle and became something more like a witch hunt, with mobs seeking to root out any possible lingering lycanthropes. Tensions with shifters continued to escalate as bloodthirsty mobs sought outlets for their fear and anger. A critical point here is that at this point, most of the aggressors at this point were no longer Thrane templars. The primary instigators were Aundairians who had adopted the ways of the Silver Flame over the course of the Purge. For these new believers, the Silver Flame wasn't just about defense; it was a weapon and a tool for revenge. This is the origin of the sect known as the Pure Flame, and its extremist ways can be seen in priests like Archbishop Dariznu of Thaliost, noted for burning enemies alive.

The take-away here is that the Purge began as a heroic struggle against a deadly foe, and the actions of the templars may have saved Galifar from collapsing into a feral savagery. But it ended in vicious persecution that left deep scars between the shifters, the church, and the people of Aundair. And if a DM wanted to pick up this story, it could be happening again. 

Q&A

One of the core ideas of Eberron is that creatures aren’t locked into an alignment. Why is this different for lycanthropes? 

If you use the strains I’ve suggested here, it’s not locked in for all types of lycanthropes. The Changing Folk have no fixed alignment. Olarune’s Blessing and the Skinwearer’s Pelt are gifts that can be bestowed on anyone. TYPICALLY I might expect a Skinwearer agent of Sul Khatesh to be evil and a champion with Olarune’s Blessing to be good, but that’s not an absolute; someone with Olarune’s Blessing could be a ruthless predator who makes a bloody example of the poachers they hunt. Alignment is specifically locked in for skinchangers, corrupted lycanthropes, and puppeteers, because it IS a curse that overwrites the victim’s personality—essentially a form of possession. Even there, what I’ve suggested is that over time it’s possible for a skinchanger to put their own desires ahead of the curse. This is the idea of Zaeurl: she’s evil, sure, because she IS a ruthless predator, but she’s acting on behalf of the Great Pack and working for the greater good of Droaam instead of just murdering people to spread fear for the Wild Heart. 

How prevalent were lycanthropes during the Dhakaani Empire?

This varies by strain.

Skinchangers and Puppeteers were a threat during the time of the Empire. However, the Dhakaani are an intensely urban culture and are also highly regimented. Their strict structure and discipline would make it somewhat easier to identify lycanthropes and they’d surely be wiped out wherever they were found; the Dhakaani were far more ruthless than the templars. With that said, given that they were a very urban culture, they likely had Wild Heart skinchangers as a regular threat on the fringes of their society fueling fear of the wild.

Dyrrn’s Corrupted were, IME, created as one of the weapons unleashed during the conflict that brought down the empire. 

Skinwearers, Changing Folk and Olarune’s Blessed are rare now and were rare then, and again, wouldn’t have been encountered often in the deeply urban centers of Dhakaan.   

What’s the relationship between Lycanthropes and Moons? 

I’ve suggested that Olarune’s Blessed are tied to Olarune and that each line of Dyrrn’s Corrupted are tied to a specific moon. As a whole I haven't associated Skinchangers with moons, in part because under the current rules there's no mechanics related to the moons; however, I suggested that the "Ravenous Beast" variation of the curse could be tied to a moon, giving the classic "I need to be restrained when Barrakas is full" story. Personally, I'd tie each strain to a SPECIFIC MOON because otherwise, yes, there's almost always at least one full moon. A particular family of the Changing Folk could have a tie to one or more moons, perhaps having a gift that grows stronger for each full moon in the sky; a Changing shapeshifter might make a great Moonspeaker Druid! But at the end of the day, mechanically there’s no blanket rule for all shifters.

What happens if a Skinchanger Wereboar tied to the Wild Heart has a child with an Ashurak Wererat? Or one of the Changing Folk?

We’re talking about magic, so there’s no absolute certainty. In either case my inclination is that the character would inherit lycanthropy from just one parent — similar to kalashtar lineage. So they’d be an Ashurak Wererat or a Wild Heart Wereboar; you wouldn’t end up with a Boarat or an Ashurak Boar.

Is it correct to assume that the children of a Skinchanger who mates with a mundane human will be shifters?

No, that's not what I'd say at all. In my opinion, the connection between lycanthropes and shifters is more nebulous than that. Olarune’s Blessed could be involved, but we’ve noted that people don’t KNOW whether shifters or blessed lycanthropes came first, We've called out that with shifters it's not necessarily clear what animal they are tied to, and that shifter traits aren't hereditary (that is, that a Beasthide shifter can have a child who becomes Dreamhunt). If shifters ARE related to lycanthropes, I think it's the process of many generations.

With that said, if you want to use shifter MECHANICS to represent a hybrid child of a human and lycanthrope, there's nothing wrong with that. I'd just personally say that the character isn't a traditional shifter—that the mechanjcs are the same, but that there will be obvious physical differences (this character would be more obviously linked to the particular animal, would be driven to a specific subrace, etc).

Why didn’t the Templars cure the lycanthropes during the purge?

When possible, they did. They certainly tried to cure their comrades who were cursed. However, there’s lots of things to take into account here. 

Just as the mechanics for lycanthropes have changed, the mechanics for curing lycanthropy have changed. In 3E it required a 12th level cleric, a very significant level of power in Khorvaire. In 5E it’s not clear whether a lycanthrope CAN be cured once the transformation has taken place; I’ve already given my thoughts on this above. 

Inherited lycanthropes can’t be cured, and there were a significant number of inherited lycanthropes among the enemies the Templars faced in the Silver Purge.

For that reason, many members of the Pure Flame asserted that lycanthropes simply couldn’t be cured; the only way to make sure is to burn ‘em.

During the height of the Crusade, the Templars were often hard pressed and possessed limited resources. Many of the methods for curing lycanthropy are slow or unreliable; they simply didn’t have the opportunity to contain victims of the curse and attempt a cure. But again, there definitely were those who tried whenever it was possible. 

Which type of lycanthropes escaped to Lamannia?

You could find any of the strains of lycanthrope as refugees, though I'd say that it would be Olarune's blessed who would have been most keen to find a sanctuary that would keep them from having to fight or kill innocents. I've said here that Olarune's blessing is NOT hereditary; one interesting possibility would be to say that it IS hereditary in Lamannia, so that there are communities of blessed lycanthropes in the Twilight Forest.

Could there be a family of lycanthropes in House Vadalis? 

Sure! First of all, you could easily have a secret group of cursed, evil skinchangers hidden within Vadalis, who would function just like skinchangers anywhere else and who would be out to spill blood and sow fear. But you could also posit a bunch of other options…

A line descended from afflicted skinchangers who are able to use the Mark of Handling to resist the demonic instincts. 

A line who’ve intermarried with a family of Changing Folk. Personally, I’d only have this stick if it was a family who respected the stories and traditions of the Folk, which would most likely be the Grayswift family described in my Vadalis article. With that said, IME the Changing Folk are supposed to be rare, so I’d be inclined to make it a secret. 

A line (perhaps tied to the Seryans) who have refined their own strain of Dyrrn’s Corruption. Maybe it’s safe and stable… and maybe it’s not,