Tryst ~ letting go

Auckland
#1

I ran a session of Tryst last night called “Letting Go”. There were 9 players including me. I invited a group of people I thought could work well together in an intimate situation.

For info on what Tryst is see this thread in the Game Ideas forum: diatribe.co.nz/viewtopic.php?t=184

I was very happy with how it went. The mundane characters were versions of the players in the modern world, with various twists added to create an interesting scenario. This mundane aspect of the event was very emotional, as the subject matter was dark.

The grotesques looked fantastic and their interactions with the mundanes were subtle and bizarre. That aspect was rather sublime. Overall it definitely lived up to my vision of what it could be, and the players seemed happy with it too.

I’ll be putting the players handbook up online, and writing up an organiser guide so if anyone who was there last night wants to run their own session they could.

#2

Great game!! I enjoyed my self alot and the challange you gave (due to the nature of my character) for the game. I will defenatly rant and rave about it when i get back to Norway. And in Norwegian tradittion i will give you a rating from 1 - 6 (6 being the best!)

The game was well breifed, had a nice flow to it, and very memorable. The location suited the game a lot. And a standing ovation to Ryans briliant game handbook, I am truly impressed!

I wont give the game 6. Although it was good having a time limit for when the game was suposed to end, it distracted me that people living in at the venue (non players) came back before the game was finnished even though they where politely hiding in their room. Also there where some whaiting around inbetween game time, but there alwas is at these sort of events. Despite my criticue i still give the game 5 because i had heaps of fun and the game consept was brilliant.

When it comes to the players i can give no bad feedback. They all deserve a clear 6. I saw real and convinsing emotions and realistic reactions to the situations that occured. The players where also unfolding the game happenings in a way that suited LARP as a genre and made continuation of new plot and story easy to create. I think the reason for the players working as well as they did, not only sits with the player ability to improvise and LARP but with Ryans exelent orginasational skils and solid breifing. We where all on the same wave length!

All in all i can without a doubt give this game a solid rating of 5.5.

Good Work Ryan!!!

Hansi

#3

The reality of playing this game far surpasses any written description.

“Letting Go” was a very intense scenario dealing with a lot of heavy themes, it was a challenging role-playing experience but definitely very enjoyable to be part of. I really enjoyed the way to visible and invisible world melded onto each other seamlessly.

I hope you run more, Ryan, because it was excellent. Thank you for inviting me.

#4

[quote=“Anna K”]The reality of playing this game far surpasses any written description.
[/quote]

I agree, well put!

Hansi

#5

Thanks guys. There were definitely some things I thought could have been impoved, most importantly that I wasn’t clear enough with the grotesque players that it was their time to enter, so they entered late and that caused a little drag on the timeline. But it’s very hard to hammer every last nail home straight, and I was more than happy with the overall result.

This is the banner ad I sent out to players with their invite:

#6

It’s funny to revisit what people’s concerns were on just hearing the concept of Tryst in the other thread:

  1. the mundane players would just be NPCs for the grotesques to play with
  2. the mundanes would be cracking up at the grotesques and unable to concentrate

It didn’t pan out that way at all. It’s interesting to see how theories about how things will turn out and what happens when the rubber meets the road can be very different. I guess the moral is to trust your instincts and try things out, because practice trumps theory every time.

I’ve heard that some Nordic group ran a musical version of Vampire the Masquarade. As in, like a Broadway musical with the players singing their parts. It sounds like a stupid joke, but apparently it was sublimely good.

#7

[quote=“Ryan Paddy”]

  1. the mundane players would just be NPCs for the grotesques to play with[/quote]

That’s an amusing one. As a mundane, I had so much going on that trinkets moving around the room and books falling over were the least of my concerns.

I only had this problem at the initial sight of them but it’s amazing what you can will yourself to ignore if you try hard enough. I think a bigger problem I had was that they were so interesting looking that I had to resist the urge to just examine them.

As for that musical Vampire the Masquerade larp - man, Norway just has the best ideas.

#8

A real mover-and-a-shaker. Letting Go is a model for immersive dramatic interaction in larp, and further proof of wacky ideas being totally at home in a live environment… :slight_smile:

#9

Haven’t seen my swiss army knife since this event, used it downstairs for makeup. Anyone see it when we were cleaning up?