Froth Froth Froth

A fair bit of prior warning to people. This post is entirely to satisfy my LARP froth. LARP = Live Action RolePlay. Live Action RolePlay = win. Epic, epic win.

I mentioned in an earlier post something called LARP. I may have mentioned it in more than one earlier post, but since they are coming up to 'bout a year old now, there isn't much chance I'll remember, given my track record.

Anyway, a couple of weeks ago, I went to my first truly big LARP event. I've not talked about it sooner because, well, you know how it is. Revision yadda yadda, exams yadda yadda... You know, just the entire reason I'm visiting the great northern wilderness for.

Anyway, I went to Wigan for one of the big CP events, one that is held there every year. I am now going to sum it up in 10 words. No particular order I hasten to add. just, the words that say it the most to me, as a complete newcomer.

1. Mud. Soo, soo much mud. I lost my boot in the mud whilst cooking bacon. EVERY morning.

2. Rain. I have been assured that it usually pelts it down at Wigan and this year was no exception. Although there was enough sun to get sunburned. Go figure.

3. Bacon. I have come to the conclusion that LARPers Aren't actually entirely human. They can apparantly live off bacon alone. They seem to be some sort of half carnivore, half machine construct.

4. Kit. Ranging from the ooohhh my word Iwoot to good grief, is that for real? mostly Iwoot though. Shiny shiny kit. Weapons and shields and bottles and bags and uuuummmmm LARP shinies.

5. Tents. Some beautiful IC ones and some funky (and huge, and tiny, and colourful...) OC ones. Having to take off boots before I could crawl into the tent was fun too. I had to hang my socks out to dry.

6. Roleplay. Done live style. No dice for these hard core members of the gaming community. I saw things that genuinely moved me that weekend.

7. Battles. Epic, EPIC battles. Both observed and participated in. Watching you could see patterns and where these pattens broke up and where people when down. Participating in them? Chaos. Amazing chaos. You are focused on the person in front of you, the one who is trying to hit you. If you're lucky, then they go away and there is another person in front of you. If not then you go away and there is another person in front of them.

8. Death. Most notably to me, my own death. And funeral. and standing down ceremony. I cried. Blubbed like a baby. You forget the outside world to that level. It's pretty immense. And intense.

9. Monstering. An uber uber uber part of the weekend. A chance to let your character rest a little and play something else. An angry cripple, a vengeful goblin, an upset ogre. Doesn't matter if you die. Coz, you know, monsters can respawn. Monstering is so so much fun. A chance to just let yourself go.

10. Refs. White tabbards, hi-vis vests, paggering :p They kinda make it work. they stand there, looking a bit out of place if they have the high-viz vests on, they make up the monsters and get them to where they're going and telling them what they need to do. I liked the refs I met. They were geekier than I was.

Well, the explanations there make it slightly more than ten words, but take the first word of every point and then the rest as a sub-vocal blurb. THEN it works.

The entire weekend remains as a series of snapshots. The frying pan, the standpipe with it's lack of a drain, Gate guard, the alchemists meeting, Water carrying for the monsters and then dying because of the monsters. Dying, and the funeral, that bit is fairly clear. Strong emotions attached I guess. And the OC tent. Thinking I had broken the zip, fixing it. breaking the zip on mine and then another sleeping bag. Lord knows what I would have done had the event been any longer. And then packing up. That bit was rather busy and then the journey home? I didn't even get out of Wigan before I was asleep.

All in all, it was one of the most amazing weekends I've had in a long while, to the point I'm still frothing about it on a near daily, if not daily basis. Leek is next. I want! I want NOW.

I'm sorry the formatting is so dense folks. apparently, it doesn't want to do what I'm telling the computer to do. I'll see if I can fiddle with it when I'm back on my machine, and back in FireFox. Also, sleepies and lack of spacing means that there ARE mistakes in there. I just hope I caught most of them.