After making a post in another thread I got to wondering. Why are the werewolves in Skyrim so rare? There's Sinding, a few in the Silver Hand lairs, a few rare encounters through Dawnguard (which only happen if you're a werewolf, and thus tied to the Companions for some reason), and the pack on Solstheim. Another thing that would have been nice is if Sanies Lupinus was in the game, since your character can still be infected by vampires, and there are plenty of them, even before Dawnguard. I suppose the werebears are another, but at least Dragonborn added some in on Solstheim, but well, why not in Skyrim too? I'm seriously wondering.

I know there's always mods like Moonlight Tales, but still. Why was it done like this? Were they just added late in development, or was it because they were too tied with the Companions, it would have been game breaking or too much work providing an alternative for lycanthropy? Yet what about enemy werewolves, why are those so rare? Also weren't werewolves kept a secret before the game's release when vampires weren't? Maybe that played a part in it?

Or are there lore reasons for it? Is it possible the Silver Hand nearly wiped them all out in Skyrim? I'm not calling going to call that a theory or hypothesis though (since that might be using the words wrong), and I don't want to call it a "headcanon" just yet, unless there's more going for it. Or did the Bloodmoon event that happened in Morrowind (and possibly Skyrim, if that red moon in Hircine's quest is anything) have something to do with any of this? I could get behind the Bloodmoon being why they weren't present in Oblivion, but I feel like that's been long enough for them to be back around, but maybe not though (especially if there's another Bloodmoon going on during Skyrim).

So yeah what are the thoughts on this? Could things have been different (outside of mods) in regards to werewolves and werebears? Any lore that I missed that might hint at why things are the way they are here?