Minutes for January Auckland Regional Committee meeting

nzLARPS
#1

Present: Mike Curtis, Anna Klein, Luisa Parkinson, Dave Agnew, Adam Parsons

Apologies: Philip Brown

Opened: 19:35

Minutes:

-Chimera actuals received - made a profit due to catering budget underspend. Discussion ensued around developing project management expertise with the NZLARPS community. Committee to consider project management training. Scrum was suggested as a potential methodology.

-Armageddon actuals received- Made a loss, was very successful, a lot of resources for the future.

-Teonn actuals received. Made a loss due to venue price hike, prop budget overran, we got a dragon costume. Still awaiting a catering receipt, Zara is in discussions with vendor. Discussion ensued around best practice forlarge-scale projects relevant to reporting timelines, expectations and procedures re: accounting for projects and money management.

-Knightshade Actuals: Made a loss, building the Hamilton community. Adam raised a question around completeness of the submitted actuals (a player may have been missed from the actuals).
Action: Mike to contact Jared to discuss whether any adjustements need to be made.

-Committee agreed to refund Tigger for a tire blown out at Witch House. Special requests for compensation are considered on case by case basis.

-Financial forecasts for Teonn May game. Would like to see a better breakdown of the prop budget- assets, consumables and hires.-Action Point: Get in contact with Motu Moana. Start to pay for venue upfront to avoid price hikes?
Action: Anna will be requesting a new forecast, more detailed breakdown. Suggest no less than $150 on cleaning supplies.

-Western LARP: ran at a loss due to several no-shows, went over budget on the food. Great game, got to meet a French larper, everyone very happy.
Action: Put it to the community on how to deal with no-shows, who are becoming an increasing problem.
-Wellington have requested that Auckland donate any spare costumes. Committee agreed that we should be able to provide any surplus costumes, to be identified at the next gear rationalisation.
Action: Muppet to organise a gear rationalisation day, as soon as the weather is dry.

General Business

-Chimera database: Had an offer from Mike Jensen for email scraper, Norman suggested Google Docs. Decided to create a local application that Anna will use to manage Chimeria participants, and upload regular updates to an online database. Users will be able to view their current games and other options .
Action: Mike will talk to Ryan about what needs to be done.

-Backdrop thread on the forum: Chimera is the only thing in Auckland which would use it, and we already have access to a green screen through Ant Vaughan. Auckland doesn’t need one.

-Mike hasn’t submitted actuals for the last Multiverse game. Actuals are done, receipts are missing. He will submit next month. He apologised.

  • Project Dates: GMs should check when things are being run. In the event of a clash, there should be communication between GMs and work things out.

-Chrono/Teonn Clash:
Action: Mike to discuss with Blair and Teonn team to see if either game can moved.

-Calendar: Jackie has volunteered to edit the calendar. Part of the committee process must be to check the calendar.
Action: Sticky in the forum - Link to the calendar, plus all committee members put a link in their signatures.

  • Absent committee members. Committee members need to be aware that the target date for committee meetings is the first Wednesday of the month. Dates are typically changed by discussion in the committee forum.
    Action: Mike to post to the committee forum about how everything works.

-Discussion ensued around the number of projects being run, especially be relatively inexperience organisers. It would useful if a committee member was specifically tasked with assisting larp organisers. One suggestion was to reinstate the Project Officer position on the committee.

  • Adam raised an issue around combat safety. Suggestion that NZLARPs puts together guidelines in Safety with LARP weapons. How they should be used, what they should be made of, etc. Combat guidelines such as bo headshots, no thrusting, avoid giving swung weapons to newbies.
    Action: Organised “Larp combat training session” before the next Teonn- May 12th, One Tree Hill probably.
    Action: Go through gear library and embargo any items that are considered unsafe.

Closed: 22:25

#2

[quote]-Chimera actuals received - made a profit due to catering budget underspend.[/quote]What was the profit? I’m curious, because there was a lot of debate last year on what to set the entry fees at.

#3

The convention itself lost $200 but the catering (done on a separate budget to help keep me sane) came in at an $800 profit which I am excruciatingly embarassed about. The catering budget was designed to come in at a $300 surplus to help balance out the convention’s loss but our catering spent well under the budget, and hence the surplus.

#4

Knightshade actuals adjusted. 1 player had retrieved gear shed items and was given a donation equal to the player fee for doing so but this had not been noted. Spreadsheet updated and resent.

Note - lost income from no shows to this game were equivalent to the loss made and resulted in a large surplus of food. Food was awesome, Tanya Wheeler did a great job.

#5

[quote=“Anna K”]The convention itself lost $200 but the catering (done on a separate budget to help keep me sane) came in at an $800 profit which I am excruciatingly embarassed about. The catering budget was designed to come in at a $300 surplus to help balance out the convention’s loss but our catering spent well under the budget, and hence the surplus.[/quote]Oh well, good to have some surplus as a backup for the next con, then.

#6

Would you like me to prepare a project for the Combat safty event for use of props from gear shed and the other idea’s such as the sizzle Mike suggested? Might be an idea to get an official one going for this. Let me know if you would like that for the next ARCM

#7

[quote=“Mike Curtis”]

  • Adam raised an issue around combat safety. Suggestion that NZLARPs puts together guidelines in Safety with LARP weapons. How they should be used, what they should be made of, etc. Combat guidelines such as bo headshots, no thrusting, avoid giving swung weapons to newbies.
    [/quote]It would be great to have a document giving weapon specs that are generally considered ‘safe’. Not every game would necessarily want to use them, but it’d be useful if someone’s setting up a live combat game to be able to point to a standard and say “at least as good as this.”
#8

The best proof against no-shows is to get people to pay in advance. An early payment discount encourages this. People are much less likely to miss something they’ve paid for.

However, there will always be some no-shows such as people who are sick or otherwise unable to attend even if they want to. Forecasts should ideally account for that by estimating how many people won’t turn up and pay, while still turning a modest profit.

#9

[quote=“Ryan Paddy”]The best proof against no-shows is to get people to pay in advance. An early payment discount encourages this. People are much less likely to miss something they’ve paid for.

However, there will always be some no-shows such as people who are sick or otherwise unable to attend even if they want to. Forecasts should ideally account for that by estimating how many people won’t turn up and pay, while still turning a modest profit.[/quote]

I’d also suggest making the game fees non-refundable. Especially on the limited space events.

#10

Also, every effort should be made to avoid changing the date of a game once people have signed up. It’s sometimes unavoidable, but GMs can minimize this from happening by:

  • Double-checking the larp calendar to make sure there aren’t conflicting events
  • Double-check their personal calendar to make sure their game isn’t going to clash with their own schedule
  • Look for venues that are all-weather appropriate if possible
#11

With regards to clashes. Was the fact that the upcoming Teonn day game was also billed to clash with The Phoenix Rising monthly LARP, which does have NZLARPs affiliation, also discussed?

I’m curious. Shut me up if this is something that’s inflamatory.

#12

I’m not sure what you mean. My understanding was that there was an error in the FB event that said it was going from March 3rd-March 10th, hence apparently clashing with The Phoenix Rising but obviously the day game wasn’t going to last a week. The intended date was the 3rd of March, which was locked in before the clash with Chrono was realised.

Is there more to this clash than we were aware of?

#13

Further to my post above, here is the exchange from the FB event wall that discusses it. I’ve highlighted the relevant sections in red:

#14

[quote=“Anna K”]
Is there more to this clash than we were aware of?[/quote]

As far as I’m aware, when the 3rd was first put forward, before it was ‘locked in’ by players signing on, there were suggestions of placing it on the 10th. I’m curious as to whether OWBN was considered at that point, before it became moot anyway.

Ah, feels like I’m blowing smoke, so perhaps it wasn’t an issue this time after all.

#15

This sounds like an issue you need to raise with the Teonn GMs rather than nzLARPS. If the Teonn team briefly considered putting the game on the same night as the Phoenix Rising, it occured briefly between the time of 2:30pm and 4:15pm on the day the game was announced (I checked the timestamps on the FB event and the Teonn forum). The committee can only deal with actual proposed clashes, not ones people might’ve thought about - we are not the thought police :wink:

In any case, jadikel has posted the listed of dates for the Phoenix Rising’s events hints this year which will be very helpful for any future game planning.

It should be noted as well that the committee is limited in what it can do about game clashes. We can mostly just advise very very strongly against running a game against another one, and even then we can only advise nzLARPS projects since affiliates and non-nzLARPS projects don’t come to the committee for approval, and nor do we any authority to tell them what to do. We do our best to advise people and can take part in negotiating date changes but the committee is mostly an advisory body with limited authority.

#16

Thanks for that. No worries here, and in agreement regarding ‘advisory’ status of the Organisation.

#17

[quote=“Robza”][quote=“Anna K”]
Is there more to this clash than we were aware of?[/quote]

As far as I’m aware, when the 3rd was first put forward, before it was ‘locked in’ by players signing on, there were suggestions of placing it on the 10th. I’m curious as to whether OWBN was considered at that point, before it became moot anyway.

Ah, feels like I’m blowing smoke, so perhaps it wasn’t an issue this time after all.[/quote]

Can you point out what weekends don’t have a monthly lrp happening please?

As far as i am aware they happen on the 1st, 2nd 3rd and 4th OR 5th weekends of a month… I know the NZLARPS committies are currently working on a plan to add more weekends to the month but so far we are out of luck - care to help us out on the legwork?

#18

[quote=“Xcerus”]

Can you point out what weekends don’t have a monthly lrp happening please?

As far as i am aware they happen on the 1st, 2nd 3rd and 4th OR 5th weekends of a month… I know the NZLARPS committies are currently working on a plan to add more weekends to the month but so far we are out of luck - care to help us out on the legwork?[/quote]

  • The first weekend of the month currently doesn’t have a monthly larp.

  • The Phoenix Rising is on the second weekend. Dates for this year are in the calendar section of this forum.

  • Nexus is usually on the 3rd weekend, but is during the day so occasionally moves; for instance, I believe the Nexus February game is planned for the last weekend in February since Battlecry is on the third weekend. Nexus haven’t announced their game dates for this year as yet.

  • I’m not sure whether Tides of Change is planning for the 4th weekend or the last weekend of the month (or whether they’ve decided on a regular date at all), though their first game is announced for the 28th of January.

#19

Cool - there is 1 weekend a month thats free to run larps… that lets us have 12 (ish) full larps a year… yay?

Clashes with monthly larps I can tolorate - they happen all the time.

Clashes between campaign larps - I find irresponsible.

#20

Well with Pheniox Rising and Tides they are evening games so things can be run up to the 5pm time slot (and often do).

There are also fridays for evening games avalible through out the year (which don’t conflict with the monthly games as most are in the evenings of the saturday)

So theres alot of spaces for full non-weekend larps as well.

Also Tides of change is reasonably flexible. If space is lacking in the calender or there’s only certain dates you can book a venue and you tell us enough in advance and there is enough of a cross over of players (we’re unlikely to move for 1 or 2 people) we can run on the same weekend as Nexus (although its not an ideal situation as theres alot of cross over between the 2 games and people are very “played out” by the end of the day).

I think we can squeeze stuff in, if we just communicate.