What do you do at LARP?

We do many, many things at LARP, but all of those things revolve around the core component of a group of people coming together to play out their characters for the purpose of a greater story. We may devolve from time to time into tangents of the overall story or to unrelated topics such as movies or video games, but generally, we come together to experience and be a part of a story told for and with the help of the group.

We LARPers, for if you LARP then you're a LARPer, play a Live Action Role-Playing Game... and sometimes more than one. If you're wondering specifically what we do, well: It's kind of like an episode of "Who's Line is it anyway?". The setting is described by the Storyteller and the Assistant Storytellers, and the Players have to visualize the locations using their imagination. They describe their character and their character's actions and even act out the actions as best they can. Together, the Players and the Storytellers all work to forward the overall and nightly plot.

LARP is where a group of "Players" (the people acting) gather together to play their "Characters" (who the Players are acting as) while a "Storyteller" (a moderator of sorts) runs the "Chronicle" (the ongoing story) as a whole, setting up the N.P.C.'s (Non-Player Characters) for the group to interact with, as well as describing what Players "see" (the setting) as they play their characters. Each Player determines their own character's reaction to the events put before them, and their reaction (along with the reaction of other Players) can determine the course of the Chronicle's plot or current events.

Much like a game of Sim City, there isn't an overall situation for one or more people 'winning' in LARP. The main story and the NPC's are created by the Storytellers, and the Players play their characters, but the goal for any one person varies greatly. One person may want their character to be a pack alpha, or to help found a Caern. The Storyteller may want the Players to stumble across something that may create conflict or focus the group. It truly depends on the person what they get out of it.

Role-Playing itself can be a task for some. The understanding that you are not your character can be a difficult one for some to wrap their mind around. One of the main highlights of LARP is getting to play a character who is nothing like you actually are in real life. Thus their strife, glory, and tribulations are not your own. You may enjoy very much coming to LARP to play with your friends, but is quite possible that your character and your friend's character will hate each other. These things happen.

Your character may be dumber or smarter, more upbeat or more negative, more outgoing or more shy, than you actually are. Understanding the difference between the experiences of yourself Out of Character and the experience of your character In-character is one of the most difficult things to get behind... for if you cannot make that distinction, the story and the experience itself will both suffer.

Lastly, though, we have fun. That's what LARP is for. If you want to have fun, then come to play. If you end up not enjoying yourself, that's OK too. You're free to make your own choices, and playing a character can be very therapeutic for some. Being able to step outside of yourself and do things, say things, be things that you would never be able to be in real life... those are the experiences, along with the social aspect of hanging out with friends to do it, can be very rewarding.