Another for the What-If pile: A Larp Convention

Uh, not all of the games would be from existing campaigns, so the XP potential isn’t all that fantastic.

I think this is a great idea, and if I was rich enough, I’d even travel to it.

The US already does this with InterCon. And Australian tabletop cons have a strong LARP stream (eg check out the freeform stream (theatreform LARP) at Phenomenon this year).

However, for various reasons, I think it would work better as a standalone, one-day event. Firstly, because its cheaper and easier to organise than something big and flash. And secondly, because piggybacking on BattleCry means dealing with the fact that most of your potential audiance is already committed to doing something else that weekend. Battlecry’s tabletop RPG stream already seems to suffer from this problem (in that it loses people to the war- and card-gamers), and its probably better not to force people to make another choice.

(Obviously, supporting LARP at BattleCry is a Good Thing too. But if you want to take Vienna, take Vienna).

Keep it simple, rather than aiming for the moon. If it works, you can always grow it later.

It also lets people write small-medium one-off games secure in the knowledge that they can get 10 or 20 or 30 people.

A lot depends on the size of your LARP. A 10-player game you can run in someone’s living room (or equivalent space). A 30-player game, you’re looking at needing something bigger, or perhaps several interconnected rooms. Sanctuary needs a big room, plus 4 smaller ones (to represent the factions paces), though the latter can probably be discarded.

[quote]START

  • 10am to 12pm: larps A and B
    LUNCH
  • 1pm to 3pm: larps C and D
    AFTERNOON TEA
  • 5pm to 7pm: larps E and F
    FINISH. Dinner and socialising? Or a big evening larp with everyone?[/quote]

Firstly, I think you need three hour sessions. If a game runs short, that’s fine - more time to costume for the next one. But if it runs long, people are screwed.

Secondly, the evening slot is the perfect place to run one large game rather than several smaller ones, which would also provide a unifying experience for the event.

A lot of larp styles that we see less of in Auckland work better over short timeframes, because they are jammed-packed with action. This is particularly true of “freeform” style larps, where the characters are written by organisers. There is just so much interaction packed into the characters and their relationships that you hit the ground running with masses to do, and within a few hours it’s all done. I’ve only played a couple of these larps, but the fast pace was awesome and although I usually prefer an all-weekend format the short form worked really well for them.

For me it would be so convenient to play several larps all in one day, whether they were freeform intrigues or physical-combat missions. I love the idea of playing a bunch of different genres. That’s the convention feel, and we don’t really have it for larp here.

I agree with IdiotSavant that attaching it to Battlecry wouldn’t work, for the reasons he says. And I agree we should start with one day and consider a weekend later.

Well i used new topic didnt I

Sorry I guess I just take time off of work and I was a last minute assignment guru at Uni…

I was thinking that sometime in August when it is not too hot not too cold would be gooc for a large larp national linked game conclave or at least between uni terms when there is a stat weekend and no other big event on. (List keeps growing) and Battlecry would be a good time to organise a multiple larp game convention so we can use it to attract more players to the games? i think both could work

And for Anna K she wouldn’t be the only organiser for a national game conclave as there would be heaps of writers/organisers from the other centres to help.

I do Like Sundereth as there are a lot of Quest Elements that I like and some that I thought needb to be fixed that Have. But I also think the existing games that are around could still exist just using this system and creative writing to link the Kingdoms together…

Core expenses:

  • Venue. The big one which dictates everything else.
  • Printing, both for advertising and games. The latter will be expensive - Sanctuary spent $100 on printing the character sheets etc, so expect at least that per 60 players. Advertising costs depends on how many flyers you decide you need to hand out at games or stuff in libraries and games shops. Obviously, if you can steal printing from an employer, then you’re fine. You’ll also need envelopes etc
  • Prizes: not an issue if you don’t have any; alternatively you could scam some from games shops and NZLARPS supporters if they seem appropriate.
  • $100 of enumerus (spot the Ars Magica player): everything else.

In addition, you may need to worry about the budget for each game, for snacks, set-dressing, essential props etc. KapCon told Sanctuary to work on a paltry $300. Dressier games will want more.

And approaching it from the other end: how many people do you want or expect, and how much money can you screw out of them? Are you aiming for 30, 50, 65 people? There’s a direct tradeoff between cost and attendance, so you need to think carefully about this.

(Some sample numbers: KapCon budgets on 100 people at an average $15 each, but we do everything cheap. ConFusion, a one-day event in Wellington, charges $10 or $15, and aims to attract ~40 people. We’ve figured that in Wellington the market will bear $20 for a one-evening LARP, and if you’re charging past that, even for a one-day event, your pool of attendees will drop. but price expectations may be different in Auckland).

For a first time event, I’d suggest keeping it to one day, and see how many LARPs and players you get. Besides, you can always run that second big LARP the next year (you are planning to make this an annual, rather than a one-off, event, right? :slight_smile:

…if you were going to book Motu Moana for a Saturday later this year, now would be the time to do it. They book out well in advance except in the dead of winter.

If it was in Wellington, I’d suggest Turnbull House. It has three floors, each with a large room and several other spaces. And its relatively cheap for community groups.

Not sure if you have anything similar in Auckland. But if anyone knows a school teacher, talking to them about borrowing some classrooms between terms might be worthwhile.

Turnbull House is a great indoor venue, but it doesn’t have sufficient grounds to run an outdoors adventure-style larp. I really can’t imagine spilling over on to the lawns of Parliament House. :wink: (Although I’ve played frisbee there, before.)

One of the things I loved about Mordavia (and other larps) was how late they went into the night and the potential for early morning things. Prehaps there could be an “over larp” which runs during the times not specificaly scheduled for other larps.

I think the point here is not to run a full length larp at a convention but a few teaser lengthed larps.
Of course some larps lend themselves to short periods.
Fantasy larps could run a tournament or a monster hunt or something along those lines. With credit to Alista, a series of challenges, like his running of the Wraiths would work perfectly, which took ~2.5hours.
A convention followed by weekend length games of the clear favorites in the future would be the ideal I think.

For theatreform, 3 hours is full-length, and the games are more likely to be standalone rather than “teasers”.

But ultimately it would depend on what people offered to run.

What you say is true but I did also say that some larps are suited to short lengths…

IdiotSavant - Thank you so much for your comprehensive overview of convention costs. I’ve run weekend larp games but I’ve never run a convention before, your overview of costs is really helpful.

I am leaning towards maybe doing a one-day event this year and expanding next year if it works. 60 attendees would be ideal, but that’s a very large number of larpers to get in one place in Auckland, and hasn’t been seen since Mordavia ended.

It’s a large number for Wellington too, and we’re only able to do it by piggybacking on kapCon (though Wellington by Night and Aliens Apocalypse used to get that many players, so they’re definitely out there).

Given that this event will be shorter and presumably cheaper than a Mordavia weekend, your pool of potential attendees should be larger as well. To point out the obvious, more people can afford $30 and a day than $75 and a weekend. But you may also want to consider part-rgistrations (say, $10 per session) for people who only want to show up to the evening game.

How many people go to the various Vampire games in Auckland? For theatreform, that’s a major audiance pool, and you’ll need to tap them.

If you’re not sure that you can get the people, it’s probably better to start small and plan to grow, rather than risk running an event which fails. If you run something, and it works, then your job gets so much easier the next year, and your audiance pool that much larger and more energised (as previous attendees will advertise for you by word-of-mouth). but its getting over that initial hurdle which will be the difficult bit.

Let’s skip to the least practical but most enjoyable part: coming up with a name!

Larp camp!

The First Annual New Zealand Live Action Role-Play Convention

Abbreviations are for pansies.

Great minds think alike. I’ve been calling it LarpCon when talking about it so far, but that’s a placeholder, like “Larpzine” was when talking about the pre-name Immersion.

Let the great debate begin!

MasqueCon (which when pronounced, sounds like "Mask On)
Chimera
Tuakoi Live :wink:

ImmerseCon