LARP Writers' Workshop 2011 Point-Form Minutes

Atttendees

• Bee, Berndt, Andrea, Jo, Lara, Philip, Rudy, Rolf, Jeremy, Desilu, Simon, Adrianna, Camilla, Justin, Roxy

Types of LARPs

• Boffer LARPs
• Theatre-style LARPs
  • Gamist (plot driven)
  • Immersionist (understanding what it's like to be a particular character)
  • Dramatist (player objectives different to character objectives)
• Murder mystery dinners
• Campaign LARPs

Overview of a LARP-writing process

• Idea phase (often long; variable in length)
  • Lara:
    • Black Coffee Blues started with an idea for one character.
    • Consequences came from the idea for a setting.
    • Historical research can be a rich source of ideas.
  • Simon:
    • Revenge of the Yak had a giant spider diagram.
  • Jo:
    • Using Fiasco to generate characters.
  • Co-writers are very useful for shooting down ideas.
    • If you're writing alone let ideas simmer for a week—if it still looks good it's probably a good idea.
• Selecting number of characters.
  • Gender flexible characters are very useful.
  • Subtextual relationships.
  • Allies are very powerful effects in LARPs.

Planning

• Small LARPs become implausibly connected.
• Small LARPs can be more emotionally intense.
• Selecting setting:
  • Historical settings.
  • Established fantasy settings.
  • Homebrew setting:
    • Money, travel.
• Situation and containment:
  • Storms.
  • Official events.
  • Exploding collars.
  • Phones?

Comparing LARPs to other forms of storytelling

• LARP writing can be beneficial for other writing forms because it emphasises character construction.
• Writer has less control—tight plotting is more difficult.
• Only medium where player embodies a single character.
• Collaborative—you write characters and then give to other people to see what they will do with it.
• Comparisons with Improv:
  • Could possibly workshop characters.
  • In LARPs the players are the audience.
  • LARP has simulationist aspects

LARP gimmicks

• NPCs who die early.
• NPCs who are pseudo DMs.
• Cards:
  • Silly LARPs can get great use out of cards.
  • Power limit LARPs.
  • A bit like designing a small card game.
• Telepathy:
  • Need to define what telepathy is.
  • Lots of DM work.
• Unconciousness or anything that take people out of the LARP is tricky.
• Limited resources are good.
• Envelopes:
  • Can write numbers on people's name tags or on objects and let people open their correponding numbers when they see the numbers.
  • Useful for conveying information that is trigger by events.
• Items:
  • Identical items.
• When writing mechanics think about whether they require a DM.
• Players shouldn't be asking you over to talk ask about their characters—that should already be in there character sheets. DMs should only be called over to handle unusual situations.
• Insane characters:
  • Different world view.
• Insane asylum LARP:
  • Red objects behave differently for players and for non-insane NPC DMs.
• Food can be used as a gimmick:
  • Race specific food.
  • Characters bring food into the LARP with them.
  • Setting specific food.
• Poison.
  • Tricky because food is both in and out of character.
• Underlying world rules:
  • Important to make these things clear.
  • E.g. does a small mask constitute a disguise.
• Being able to call in outside help.
• Size of venue can make a big difference:
  • Lighting.
  • Sound.

LARP combat

• Rock, paper, scissors works nicely.
• Nice idea: rolls can't kill you—players have to explicitly decide to kill another player.
• Having non-combatants be able to influence combat, or be emotionally invested.
• Freezes:
  • Keep them short.
  • Enforce them properly.
  • Use distance moved as time ticks rather than fixed amounts of time (in order to discourage running / sprinting).
• ???
• Character sheets completely in-character.

Tropes

• Keeping two groups separate and then mixing them.
• Ships, Islands, Space stations, Submarine.
• Masters, servants, merchants (layers).

Anti-tropes

• Can be soft barriers to interaction, hard barriers are not good.
• Character changing:
  • Suddenly losing all your goals / progress for the last hour is not fun.
• Romantic subplots.
• No real guns or knives.
• Characters who have amnesia.

Controlling pacing

• Finding people takes time.
• Formal negotiations take time.
• Collecing M out of N requirements.
• Resource contention.
• Players being able to delegate to other players.
• Having to interact via intermediaries.

Sanity-checking characters

• Broad-opened goals:
  • causes, kleptomania, dependents
• Dramatist LARPs can be tricky for new characters.
• Check each characters motivation in each of their plots.
• Check difficulty of each goal.
• Mentally cast the worst person in each role.
• What would happen if you ran the LARP without each character.
• Check allies and enemies:
  • Evil == minority position + self interest.
  • Allies being blackmailed won't help you when you're down.
  • One real ally is a good idea.
  • Minions are allies.

Writing character sheets

• Memorable, pronouncable names.
  • Titles are really helpful!
  • Short forms of names are realistic and useful.
• Some people like double-spacing others don't.
• Some people like two-column.
• Name, single line archetype plus age, life history, recent events, summary of people you know, equipment and special abilities.
• Good production—images, nice format, booklets.
• Which information is widely known, which is secret.
• Get proof-readers.
  • Preferrably not one of the writers.
  • They can help DM the playtest.
• Stick blurb at front of general background if you want people to read it.
  • People's first encounter with your LARP.
  • Have it spell-checked. Show of your LARP.
  • Mention style of LARP, seriousness.
• Writing style infuses character with personality.

Running a LARP

• Keep debriefing short.

Writing solo vs with co-writers. Many characters vs few characters. Naming characters. Costuming. Casting. Gender switching.

• Book: Nordic LARPs.
• Roxy is writing a LARP about historical figures from the medical school.