[quote=“Mike Curtis”]
It’s not true to imply that a closed system is “finished”. Rather, it is “scope complete”. [/quote]
Scope complete means limited. In our world (i.e. reality), the universe is finite, but has no boundarys, borders, beginning or end. Why would I want less from my LRP?
Yeah, I was going to say what Mike said.
This is what I meant by resolution. The organisers defined the high-resolution scope of the setting (the overall map and realms, usually with some input from players) but players could at any time fill in grey areas at the low-resolution level on the map so long as they did so in a manner consistent with the established setting. So a PC could add a small town, but not a big city because PCs should already have known about it. They could invent a local guild house, but not a whole national guild (unless they were attempting to found a new one, which one player did).
Players usually couldn’t invent a race of people, because others would have already heard of them. One player who was keen to play a centaur was diverted into playing it as an NPC, and a consistent explanation invented for where it came from. If a group of players had come to us wanting to play rat-people, we may have considered it but would have wanted to know why no-one had heard of them until now. Even then, I would have discouraged them, because the existing races had existing relationships so they had existing reasons to interact.
Separately, we also didn’t allow stuff to be added that was obviously derivitive from a specific other setting.
There are three questions here I think:
Is the addition something that PCs should already know about? So how is it appearing out of nowhere?
Is the addition obviously borrowed from a fictional source in a way that is offputting?
Will the addition diversify the setting in a way that splinters it, reducing the likelihood of interesting interaction?
A closed world avoids these questions by only allowing players to add to the setting with a limited scope.
Rules are a separate thing entirely. We’re talking about closed and open worlds here. The world is the setting, not the system/rules. As Mike says, we took a lot of input from players on rules. We even had an organiser/player focus group before doing a major revision.
EDIT: Added third question.
Supposing you’re right, can I come play a killer robot driving instructor who travels back in time for some reason at the next Quest game? She’ll probably also be a Viking princess, Darth Vader’s other long lost daughter and a worshiper of Cthulhu.
Supposing you’re right, can I come play a killer robot driving instructor who travels back in time for some reason at the next Quest game? She’ll probably also be a Viking princess, Darth Vader’s other long lost daughter and a worshiper of Cthulhu.[/quote]
although not quite as extreme as this a fest event in the uk was run quite successfully soemtime around 1993 that had shadowrunners alongside fantasy characters and cthulhu investigators.
The difference being that this was not an overall campaign arc but a once a year event for larpers across the UK and Europe to get together in a sort of Larp Naama event.
is it then the focus of the national larp to actually have an overall long term story arc? if it is then certainly the points that Ryan raised are of importance to its success, but if the focus is to act as an annual gathering then surely the “rules” could be relaxed to allow all types of players to participate?
[quote=“Wulfen (David)”]
is it then the focus of the national larp to actually have an overall long term story arc? if it is then certainly the points that Ryan raised are of importance to its success, but if the focus is to act as an annual gathering then surely the “rules” could be relaxed to allow all types of players to participate?[/quote]
I don’t think we’re actually talking about a national larp event, we’re just discussing whether an ‘any goes’ system would at all work.
I wouldn’t mind playing an event with fantasy characters and Cthulhu investigators side by side. It’d probably be hilarious. Do I want spaceships and Elder Gods suddenly invading St. Wolfgang’s Vampire Hunters? God no.
[quote=“Anna K”][quote=“Wulfen (David)”]
is it then the focus of the national larp to actually have an overall long term story arc? if it is then certainly the points that Ryan raised are of importance to its success, but if the focus is to act as an annual gathering then surely the “rules” could be relaxed to allow all types of players to participate?[/quote]
I don’t think we’re actually talking about a national larp event, we’re just discussing whether an ‘any goes’ system would at all work.
I wouldn’t mind playing an event with fantasy characters and Cthulhu investigators side by side. It’d probably be hilarious. Do I want spaceships and Elder Gods suddenly invading St. Wolfgang’s Vampire Hunters? God no.[/quote]
ah good point i had the wrong window up (bloody microsoft)
as for an anything goes system, that would require a completely separate setting, sort of like palladiums rifts game.
[quote=“Alista”][quote=“Mike Curtis”]
It’s not true to imply that a closed system is “finished”. Rather, it is “scope complete”. [/quote]
Scope complete means limited. In our world (i.e. reality), the universe is finite, but has no boundarys, borders, beginning or end. Why would I want less from my LRP?[/quote]
There would be exactly one reason: Because this is the vision you have for the larp.
I’m not trying to prescribe one way or the other, it really is a matter of GM / community preference.
I was merely pointing out that the advantages you were ascribing to “semi-closed” systems were largely present in closed systems as well.
Supposing you’re right, can I come play a killer robot driving instructor who travels back in time for some reason at the next Quest game? She’ll probably also be a Viking princess, Darth Vader’s other long lost daughter and a worshiper of Cthulhu.[/quote]
I know you are picking a really extreme example . If you had to play this really limited character, had only 3 months to live, I just got laid and at least three planets are in alignment we would probably settle on a character based on a Iron Golem. If you want you can train people to drive wagons, but it seems pointless and people would laugh at you. If you wanted to pay the CP you could be a Count. If you want to pass that off as being a princess of one of the costal raiding tribes what the hell. the King will probably have you executed for impersonating nobility or being above your station. I could write a couple of modules about that. Darth baby is a well known Dark elf mage and we wouldn’t normally allow you to attach to a known character or NPC, but as I said if you have three months to live then it probably won’t have a long term impact on the game. We have had the occasional Cthulh worshiper in the game (Along with clerics of the Walking God, the God of Orcs, the God IRiS and other weirdball religions.) However as the Cthulhu Mythos is not in our game it will give your character no benefits.
Because you chose such an extreme example, you would end up with a very weak charcter, with predefined and limited skills, probably no or limited advancement and who would be on the run and executed as soon as spotted . While permanent death is difficult in our system, it is not impossible.
I, personally, would advise you to take a non-guild Dark Elf if you wanted to take that course.
I would like to think that a long term game with the structure Ryan and others are wanting and a great system could work. Then you could transfer your character between the games and have much more scope. A Closed Diatribe writers forum where each writer interracts with each other talking about what is happening in different areas and where they want the nationwide plot thing to go. Then each year you could have the nationwide Larp NAAMA for example.
nod sounds like a pretty good idea. 
A council of writers is what I would like to see too, with a system enclosed within a reality with boundaries but enough also scope to for players to play most fantasy characters. That would be my goal, the whole purpose of me attempting a system of my own, is not to cloister my idea but to give it to everyone. Add that to the council of writers for such a system & I think we’d achieve virtually everything desired by players of fantasy larps. ANd it could be done for multiple genres I am sure.
Just to stick in my oar, I’m philosophically in favour of closed system settings. Partly it’s the creator instinct in me (when I’m GMing), but also I think you gain something from putting people in a shared cultural context. The ‘anything goes’ approach can be fun, but in the long run, if everyone is trying to be different, then no-one is, and the cultural mishmash ends up less interesting to me than if the group dynamics are working well. Although, I agree that it’s a matter of taste.
I said in another thread, that although people are allowed to play what they want, they still tend to form or join groups, propably because of the same reasons you would prefer it.
From the discussions in this thread I’ve gone from somewhat open systemed to a mostly closed sytem. Closed but with some scope for uniqueness, your general culture will be set but open so that you can come from a village from the otherside of the world.
It’s great when we get a bunch of really good constructive posts, they’re just so useful.
I don’t think, that is working this way.
You can’t play a sire or count without other guys. Or how would you display your serfs, squires and lansquenets? A noble character needs “staff”. And a typically pen & paper group needs more characters than one or two.
I reckon people find together, build up groups and travel around, etc. - most larp characters see so many scares - why shouldn’t they travel in other countries to flee from scares? My characters travel very much. One is a squire on the tramp and the other is an explorer - so they need to travel. In a closed system I only have the chance to play the journey if a GM made a neighbour country con. Normally my characters don’t stay very long in countries, where scare goes around! 
I do agree with you Isaac, However you have to admit there really is a disparity in game culture because of the size of the games. To Allow everyone the opportunity to make their own background and have an established one. Even if a two or three people go for unique backgrounds it reduces your game possibility because of you have 6-12 players theres 30 percent of your game with travellers. Here we would probably be ablke to deal with it more easily than mythodea becaise our scope and player numbers are so small but that a large percentage going away from the game concept the GM wants to create. Especially if you want to build on small player resources. Attracting players to a stable story is probably easir than a story with lots of low to medium strength story lines but not too many strong ones.
In German larps the most PCs come from other countries and travel to the GM country. For native people we “use” NPCs as well as for native monsters. It’s the same in smaller games and bigger games (like the mythodea).
I see the attraction though for a GM to see his world enacted by PCs!
I just can’t see this working. There must be SOME limits at least in terms of a genre of some description. Otherwise you could end up with a complete hodge-podge of characters (think Bart Simpson + Batman + Winston Churchill + Grog the caveman + Bender the robot + Thor + …)
You NEED a genre for larp, otherwise it’s just cosplay.
It’s a must! Without a genre it will be an endless chaos.
Sure, it’s probably a scale. Something like this perhaps?
OPEN
On that Mythodea sounds like a 3 and Mordavia a 4. Lateral Worlds was perhaps a 1 or 2 (there were definitely some non-fantasy things there) and I understand that the Gathering in the UK has gradually moved from being very open to around a 3. Freeforms/theatre-style are typically a 6.
Then again, that scale is mushing together various considerations. Can players create: races, places, cultures, items, historical events, character history, character relationships? And at what resolution: minor or major? It’s totally possible that half of these could be open and the other closed, and it could be either half.