Nationwide Fantasy Larp Ideas

How do you see character death being handled ?

Would a Quest character (as an example - who typically won’t die in Quest, despite being in situations which would lead to permanent death in other larps such as Mordavia, Wolfgang, Skirmish) who dies in a different larp still be dead in Quest ?

I replied to Viktoria that I believe roleplaying to be about experiencing and trying different things, if you get too tied up in your character you are doing yourself a disservice.

I think Death should not be irreversible but certainly a very expensive proposition by powerful characters/mages

So most starting characters probably could not afford ressurection. Maybe unless they do a great boon for a church of something. People should have to make up a new character perhaps at negative experience? not too sure

This is how I forsee character death in a fantasy setting.

It would certainly make people a lot more careful in combat less prone to charging in without fear for their life.

[quote=“Mike Curtis”]How do you see character death being handled ?

Would a Quest character (as an example - who typically won’t die in Quest, despite being in situations which would lead to permanent death in other larps such as Mordavia, Wolfgang, Skirmish) who dies in a different larp still be dead in Quest ?[/quote]

You die in Quest. It is just that there are strong magic that can bring you back. If you visit another campaign and get splatted, you should report this to your organisers when you get back to you campaign and they can decide whether you are permanently dead. Also there is nothing that says that you have to bring a character back from the dead in a non-permanent death system. if you want to die every time, then feel free. We won’t stop you.

In Flipside: Sundereth I have written 2 spells that potentially return the dead. The first one (Reinvigorate Fallen) returns only the mostly dead, that is recoverable, non zombified corpses who have died in the last 24 hours. They take a significant XP penalty for any XP earnt in that game.
The second (reincarnate) requires nothing but their memory & their name. They take a 20% penalty to their current XP, stripping them of skills they may have already accrued & lose all XP accrued for the game up to the point they died. Reincarnate also allows dead characters to be reborn into what essentially might be a new character altogether.
Both of which are going to incur significant financial cost, potentially placing the deceased in debt, which in turn means they may have to work off the debt, a great way of incorporating plot for them.
Only those that wish to return are subject of course & it still leaves room for fates worse or more permanent than death. Rescuing a fallen comrades soul is another excellent plot device.

I’m intrigued by the idea but think we could talk about it for years. When can we have a test run of the system so everyone can fall in love with it?

Any time after I get back in to the country would be great.

Dylan

Depends on the system you’re talking about.
My basic combat system is ready to run. Skills & heroic abilities are not too far of. Magic is about 80% there. A test is only a matter of time away.
And then I need to find a couple of rules lawyers & power gamers to try to break the system.

I’ve been known as something of a rules lawyer and power gamer in my time. I look forward to testing the system as soon as I’m back in NZ. Hows about we set a time in March?

If you’re ready sooner then so be it but I find once people have a date they tend to get things ready for it.

Dylan

Got it, although from this discussion I had concluded that resurrection was routine and basically expected to be available to any character who wants it. Sounds closer to the Skirmish approach than I thought.

One of the risks with enabling character porting is that high-level characters will port to a different game (at high level) and then die, and then go home to their original game and get resurrected as a matter of course. i.e. they get all the benefits of high level and none of the risks.

I had a discussion of this concept with another Skirmish GM today. We both agreed that if they can get the player’s body back to the original game world, then it’s OK to get them raised (although it’s probably heaps cheaper to do this in the Skirmish world; typically, PCs only permanently die when the party gets overrun, and if they get the body back to the keep it’s relatively cheap to raise them).

Is this how you see this working, or would your players be able to be raised regardless of the proximate factors involved in their death ?

Well i guess I am about one of the biggest Cheese-a-muffins/ power gamers out there, even when I dont put my mind to it. " i made it a New Years revolution" to be proactive in my quest for lameness.

I would happily test it for you too.

[quote=“Mike Curtis”]

One of the risks with enabling character porting is that high-level characters will port to a different game (at high level) and then die, and then go home to their original game and get resurrected as a matter of course. i.e. they get all the benefits of high level and none of the risks.

I had a discussion of this concept with another Skirmish GM today. We both agreed that if they can get the player’s body back to the original game world, then it’s OK to get them raised (although it’s probably heaps cheaper to do this in the Skirmish world; typically, PCs only permanently die when the party gets overrun, and if they get the body back to the keep it’s relatively cheap to raise them).

Is this how you see this working, or would your players be able to be raised regardless of the proximate factors involved in their death ?[/quote]

Porting characters between different rule sets and into different campaigns is always going to be difficult. There are several layers of problem

First, just the different way the organisers see the game systems, i.e. permanent death. i think it is up to the organisers of the indivual games to see how they integrate a character back into their campaign. I.e. they have to pay for ressurect, it was all just a dream, a magic spell etc.

Second, characters also will want to port items between the campaigns.

Thirdly, occasional player dishonesty. Their magic sword was stolen and not recovered. When they return to their home campaign they do not report this fact to the administrators and keep their sword.

Maybe NZLARPS should set up a little committee to investigate protocols for porting characters between campaign settings.

I had a look at mythodea it looks great. This is the sort of concept I was looking for. Defined worlds with possibility for a player to create their own history if the GM’s accepted it. A semi-closed environment.

The Shop also has great fantasy platemail my only problem was it looked like polycarbonate and there was mention about Mild Steel but it is in German.

epic-armoury.de/

I tried finding a cheap flight to Germany in August but its well over 2k so no Mythodea experience lest i win Lotto. Shame The Gathering is around that time too. Could be a great yearly exodus for August bank holidays and Mythodea.

(Kneels and Prays)

Already wrote you a message - send me the text to the armoury you like and I translate it for you.
I don’t know if you got it right, the things you looked at, the deals are for NPC, as they need a lot of NPC and want them to look good. People can not play a character of the continent of Mythodea as a PC, or only with exceptions.

Magic items or anything transferrable will need to be discussed between GMs to prevent a magical arms race. How do we envision this happening? Even the most responsible and well meaning GM can mess up if they don’t know the status quo well enough.

What’s about a certificate for every special transferrable item, like a special spell or a flame sword?

In Germany you get a certificate from the GMs after you acquire a magic item. This way you can transfer the items without problems between different games/cons.

Example:

[i]The magical flame sword of death +5

The sword does +5 damage points by every hit. Mark the sword with a red cord at the cross guard.

GM signature and mark[/i]

By that way it’s very difficult to cheat. Do you use a system like this? I reckon it’s very functional in a smaller community than the German.

I guess with a nationwide game there would be separate kingdoms/worlds if the way theat the forums are going for a semi closed world.

A Forum for the writers could be used so a writer can say I am going to put this magic item into the game… how would this affect your game?.. If a writer became Magic item happy then there is going to be some dispparity because there are always going to be the stingy GM’s

However in saying that some GM’s may like a magic rich environment and some a magic low environment. You could have a world where magic items only work in the realms they were created except for perhaps the uber powerful Runeswords/artifacts etc that all creators would have to accept.

This fixes the problem of Trade and Oversupply. However if all Gm’s work in unison and can overcome the problem of Disparity and come to a happy medium then it could work.

The tag thing can become a bit difficult with Rings etc so maybe not attached to to itm but your could carry the cards. In Quest we put Bright yellow Gaffa tape on magic weapons and items however we leave no marke but a yellow ribbon could work.

I have one question - I’ve completely forgotten in the course of the thread :blush: - are we discussing the idea of setting up a network of interconnected games across New Zealand, or are we trying to make the existing settings compatible with character porting?

If you want a big nationwide larp I’d suggest making the rules fit on a single A4 page. One-sided.

That way, people can learn it is less than five minutes and start playing immediately.

Edit - think paintball…

That really is the question… I would think both could work with system adaption. And a creative group of writers and a semi closed system.

“The whole how was the universe created? scenario” The games could be drawn into a demiplane surrounded by mists. Each setting unique like ravenloft. People can only travel with particular magic items/ magic or portals"

Then the games would stay the same the settings the same the system different. It would be a nationwide larp and perhaps ata particular time of the year the mists clear at a point allowing a conclave of nations

With Dereks argument. That would make it difficult to have a number of spells. So one sheet of rules for the basic gameplay could work for a basic national convention where you want a basic game for people to play “Beginners rules” but with the interconnecting larp game it would not work.

However… you could have basic information for beginners for the more advanced game so they can get to grips with the system.

Ie

Combat works like such 1 point soak to limbs 3 points toso

Magic works like such. (Bolst spell 3 points of soak, blast 6 points etc)

Soak depletion. etc.

if this happened it could work in favour of a good robust system with an overview system for beginners allowing both players to play the same game wqith the same rules.

a single A4 page?

The degree of complexity in the mordavia rules is about the level of information we are looking at here if i follow this aright. And perhaps people might remember that for a while there Mordavia WAS pretty much a national Larp. we had players from all over the country participating.

So if we can agree on those rules when we played mordavia, why then do we need an uber simplified system that fits on a single page? I believe most of us are capable of reading a few pages of rules and/or a website, and have the capacity to think up good characters and rules calls.

Frankly this idea of a national larp worked well enough in the days of one world by night, we ran characters and plots internationally (yes internationally) successfully for over 15 years.