Why do you play...?

So as a Larper of pretty much 20 years I think I seen it come and go, the developments of the weapons and costumes and even rules.

I wanted to hear it from all of you.

What brought you here, the Larp world, and why did you choose your race, class, and archetype?

I would love to hear or rather read it. Go!

I was brought to this LARP in particular by a couple friends from college who went regularly. I saw them sparring at the Student Center, then ran into one in my 3d drawing class. She talked me into going back in 2002.

I NPCed for a few years while deciding on my main character, had a couple one or two event characters, then started Rayven in 2004. Initially I was going to pay an elf warrior, but I forgot the ears at home. Ran into "The Ardrum crew", they talked me into playing a barbarian instead.

Started the new character this year after paying an NPC for James that I straight up loved. The interaction I had with people as that NPC, particularly Alisandria, made me want to turn it into a PC.

I keep coming back, because no matter the problems you may have at game, in or out of game, there's always someone watching your back. Plus I get to beat up on Cooper.

I've been involved with TT gaming in one form or another for about 20 years. I first heard of LARP from the GM of a D&D2e campaign I played in when I was about 19, and had some interest in the concept since. Most of what turned up for LARP in my area were small, local OWBN groups that just didn't grab my interest. It was from a player in the D&D2e campaign I'm currently running that I learned of this organization. I started making my character in time for my first event - Witl '13.

My decision on character concept was fairly typical for a new-to-system player. I decided on a character like enough to me for comfort, and dissimilar to me enough to make it a little challenging.

I keep coming back for the people. Between the high standard of rp interaction that has more frequently than any other venue I play through provided vividly immersed gameplay, and the sense of community in and out of game, I'll stick around.

I've been playing tabletop since I was 6 and running games since I was 10. I've been running a (plus or minus) weekly table top game consistently since 1996. I played every system I could, and in 2001 published my own tabletop game.

I've been larping since 1992, though since 2000 it's been mostly convention based anime themed rps convention larps. I've been running those larps once a year since 2002,and together with ree and my friends wrote a system for those kinds of larps, for which I maintain the character database.

We were drawn to KR because ree thought Sean Moulson looked cool at nycc at the KR booth.

I picked barbarian in part because I thought it would be the race easiest to get away with not knowing anything about the world,and Inn part because it went well with Ree's Dryad. I went Druid because of the desire to be woodsy and simple and because my favorite d&d character of all times was a Druid. I had debated healer, but am really glad I went the way I did.

Oh wow.

Much like some of the others, I started out with table top when I was 4th grade (um…. A really long time ago) and I played a lot of rpgs since then.

Then I heard about larp from some of my wargaming friends. The first larp for me was right after I got home from the army- Laire when they gamed over at Thompson Park in Jamesburg. Me and a friend went over to try it and after a quick lesson on fighting and the rules, we became a quick recurring encounter. It was a ton of fun…. And I resolved to go try it again…

Some five years later, I started playing in the Double Exposure larp system… as a Jedi (biiiig star wars fan I am) and I played him for several years. Still have him too… should I ever get the chance to play him there again.

Then Leslie got me involved in Mind’s Eye Theater Vampire where my rather unusual Tremere used to be confused for an Assimite…. A lot. *grin* (Catch me when not IC at game and I’ve got some stories…)
Then after a few years of that and all the hilarity life threw at me, I was convinced to try KR at Dexcon 2013 by Leslie and Geoff. Not knowing what to play other than a Celt due to my Kilt which I was wearing there… I had my race figured out.

When I was handed a Ranger pre-gen, I had a budding concept and a class some of my RL skills would work with…. It was a large amount of fast thinking of background on the fly mixed with a crap- ton of unsureness of my first foray into KR that launched Duncan... And I haven’t looked back.

I’ve had a few wonderful NPC’s to portray since I’ve been here (an Old Merc, Westboro Valosian, Dwarven Ambassador…) and at some point, I’ll field an alt once I figure out which concept I think will be doable. But I’m enjoying Duncan a lot and finding what path he decides to travel down… Because Priest was never something I ever expected to become with him when I started.

I look forward to seeing what comes next.

Knight Realms was my first larp and I started two years ago this May. Once a week on Wednesdays, I go with my friends to karaoke. In early 2013, my friends Rob and Lance (the sneaky Winterdark guys in all black) would tell everyone stories from their experience at KR. It sounded like fun and Rob kept inviting me to come until I did in May of that year.

So, it's the day of the event and I'm supposed to pick up my friend Phil (Gilthu). Rob calls me up and asks if I can also take his friend Eddie to the event, tells me he's "pretty short but he's a cool guy."

Accurate statement.

When Phil and I get to Eddie's house, the guy comes out the door in a kilt, carrying a ukelele. First impressions, man.

Anyway, the minute Eddie hears my voice, he tells me "Dude! You need to play a bard!" The whole car ride from Union to Camp Sac was Eddie in the backseat serenading Phil and me with his uke and some explanation for how KR worked. Except I hadn't thought to bring a costume with me. Whoops.

That turned out okay because Romeo had a spare costume, consisting of a white tunic and white scrubs. I borrowed Eddie's belt--which I still use!--and a sword from Logistics.


(Talk about a Dashing Swordsman!)

Kate DeFranza helped me create my card and I walked out of Logistics as a bard. If it weren't for Eddie, I probably would have started as a warrior. For a good while, I tried to act like one too, but you can only do so much when you have 4 health and you're swinging for 2.

Still though, one of my most valiant KR moments happened at my first event. There was an NPC approaching a girl kneeling on the ground and he was threatening to cut off her head. Here comes newcomer Nalick raising his sword in defiance and shouting "Don't you dare!"

Then I was felled and thrown against a wall.

That was largely the end of that.

I was OOG shy and I like to think that Knight Realms played a big part in putting that to past tense. I wanted Nalick to be the opposite of that, so when I was at KR, I'd enter situations in-game that I wouldn't have thought to enter otherwise. I let the roleplay decide Nalick's direction and development and so far it's worked out pretty well. Nalick fell into the personality of a young Andorran, even before his baptism, which is fitting for a bard, I suppose!

I've always wanted to be a character in a book or a videogame, and with KR I can do both at the same time. In middle school and high school, I had friends who were on stage and I was always behind the stage. KR gives me the chance to do what I was too afraid to do back then, and all of you are like family to me.

I wanted to be a Square Enix character. Achievement unlocked.

Like John, I started in tabletop gaming when I was young. [Date Redacted] Played many many different RPG systems in my days through High School and College. At College I met a girl that got me interested in the SCA, well interested in her and thus interested in the SCA. Things didnt work out, and I graduated and then ultimately enlisted in the Army. At my first duty station, there was an active enclave of SCA. I joined then and was active through my time there and in Korea. My first taste of Larping came when I was in Fort Bragg, a friend of mine had a home run group of larpers, who introduced me to other larpers who introduced me to other games.

I got stationed in Korea, and did some things with the SCA out there, when I got back I wound up looking for larps and found NERO Alliance. Met some good friends and they told me about a Larp in Virginia, called Avalon. I played that for about fifteen years, only taking an occasional look at other larps, like NERO and one called Knight Realms in 2001. I met a cousin, brought her to Avalon and I visited her at KR a couple times. Eventually I drifted and continued with Avalon until 2008. I moved to Louisiana in 2011, played a Larp out of Mississippi called Nexus but otherwise did not larp until I moved back to NY in 2013. I came out to KR again in Oct of 2013 and been playing here since.

I have played straight human in all the larps, with occasional forays into Gypsy types. I like starting baseline, and making a character distinct through role play. Classes I have favored typically were rouge and warrior types. In Avalon I played a knight/paladin, for over a decade, so one could say that is my favored class. In KR I decided to try a little more supportive role, age catching up as it is. However I am still drawn to the idea of being a crusader, Cleric seemed to fit that ideal well for me.

Why larp? I like being with people of like mind, I meet more 'real' people in this hobby than anywhere else, which is ironic since we are all pretending to be our characters, right? Sometimes it takes examining yourself as you wish to be, to know who you are.

I first found out about LARPing when I was watching Role Models while on the plane back from my cousin's bar mitzvah. I thought the idea of fighting with foam swords in the woods looked pretty fun, and I always liked playing a different character than myself. I was insecure due to years of bullying, and I didn't feel comfortable as myself. I started at Amtgard, and found out about Knight Realms during a Comic-con (Like Jason I thought Sean looked pretty cool). I played Amtgard for about a year until I tried Knight Realms for the first time in June of 2013.

My first event was nerve-wracking. It really was. I worked hard on getting ready, but I was mentally unprepared. It was a lot, but what I got out of it was a community of awesome people that I feel comfortable being around. I found friends here that I would never replace and that I could talk to for days without feeling bored. The problem with people at school was that they were all the same. Same talk, same interests, same conversations. I tried to find people who were nerds and had similar interests to me, but they are hard to find, and even then they were very exclusive. Finding a community of open, awesome people who had the same interests as me was incredible.

I come back to the game because I love the world of the game as well as the people there. You're all really amazing people, and it has kept me here. I started a character where I would be kind of in the shadows, sniping people. That changed a lot. Kanas changed on his own as the things around him happened. He grew, and it was incredible to play that growth. He's become the representation of what I've had to deal with in my life: A short guy in a world of giants, facing things that are much bigger than him. Unlike me, who would back away, he would stand strong and be ready to face whatever comes at him. I am amazed by that growth, and I love playing that kind of mindset. I recently brought in an Alt who is the other part of my personality I have realized due to you crazy guys, the sarcastic, crass, and unreserved part of me that has been bundled up for too long. I am looking forward to playing him more and being that part of me that is seldom revealed in real life.

I played KR because I needed an escape from normal life. I come back to KR because of the people I met and the story that I met. I regret nothing.

While I was involved in trading card games and eventually tabletops, my real intro to larp was cosplay, something which I started outside of Halloween in about 9th grade. It was a welcome escape from the ordinary, and I got to be whatever I could make and put on. That was a major hobby for about 7 years before I first heard of larping. Technically my first game was a tiny anime con game, but apparently I did a good job because at the end I was awarded something for leadership and initiative. That was fun.
My curiosity was piqued, and I went to a couple of panels on larping so I could understand what it was and where it happened more. Then in July of 2013, a friend of a friend who I never actually met was throwing a birthday thing at the august KR event, and invited my cosplay buddy Erinn (and me in extension I guess) to come along.
Not gonna lie, I don't remember all the details as to why I started the way I did. We spotted Nyad, liked the thought of playing a race that gave no shits, and figured "eh, we've both painted our skin for cosplay, this should be easy enough." I don't remember why I picked alchemist to start with either, I think tea had something to do with it. The two of us decided to come in together as friends, Clytie and Iona, so we would have a safety net rp-wise.
Her character was killed on the new player mod and she wrote out into Kormyrian, leaving me all on my lonesome in a new game filled with strangers and surprise racism. First weekend I was petrified and didn't really know what I was doing. Suzie made me promise to be back at the next event, though, and in September everything clicked, I started a backstory, and figured out waft sort of tale I wanted to tell.
Larping has stimulated me creatively in a way I have never experienced before, allowing for a living breathing story to unfold with the contribution of a couple hundred incredibly bright and imaginative people. To be able to breathe life into something so... magnificent, it still blows my mind. Not to mention nearly everyone is wonderful and generous, a crowd of people very unlike the shallow masses I grew up around. You guys are my family, I could trust you with my life, and I'm looking forward to introducing my younger brother to this game at the April event.

Larping... well, I've been doing it since college as various Vampires, Anime characters, and GMing a LARP with Jason and Ree since 2006. We decided we were gonna go have fun somewhere in the woods where we can hit nerds with sticks.

As for why I chose Barbarian, I chose it because I wanted to play Jason's brother, since I consider him basically family in the real world, and we've known each other for a long time so I knew he and Ree who I also consider family would be able to make it work. Also, I happen to love the quasi-Norseman feel the KR barbarians have, and I've really tried to work that in.

Why I chose Berserker is a different story. As some folks may know, I'm a real life Pacifist. I don't fight, I don't hurt people, but I find conflict and war really interesting in the intellectual sense, so I study and examine it. The idea of a man who is rage unleashed is intriguing. Also, I really liked Berserk, the Get of Fenris, the Space Wolves, The Firstlaw Trilogy and a bunch of other things in fiction that featured Berserkers, but more than berserkers, they featured layered characters who had a destructive anger problem. The classes since then have all been roleplaying choices as Grimkjell's character has developed from unhappy keeper of his brother, to bright eyed fanboy to Magnus, to exhausted master of battle who just wants to keep his honor, and that of everyone else, as clean as he can.

Grim's archetype is the classic unchosen one. He has a harsh fate, always has and always will, and he was destined from the start to be outshined by his brother. He's always a little resentful and unhappy and dour, but he tries to do the right thing by everyone, and for a moment just be the Hero that he'll never acknowledge himself to be, instead of the Monster that he fears he is. What he's become since then has been as a result of roleplay. It all branches from his basic outsider-ness as barbarian. his unfamiliarity with culture, and his sense of standing aloof even in his own family. He's been willing to be used as a weapon, but instead has been given the task of becoming the one that guides that weapon, and I'm interested to see where that story takes him.

I was first invited at 14 by a friend of mine, as well as Luis (his karate teacher at the time)... I was going to go but got talked out of it by my dad, a couple months later they talked me into it, (i was 15 by then)

As far as character and class that was all decided for me my first event by my buddy... though the progression wound up being heavily influenced by the people i met my first couple events

Why I keep going... First off the people, I've met most of my closest friends through Larps, as well as my girl friend, my roommates and many others...

Why i still play Magnus... all i ever wanted to do since before i could walk was be a super hero, plain and simple.

This...is an odd question for me. My answer is bound to be as unconventional as I am.

I have been interested in acting and movies since I was six. that was when my parents took me to the Franklin Institute in Philadelphia for a show on movie special effects. I saw the power loader and queen alien from Aliens, and the Shark from Jaws, among other things. Add to this the copious documentaries on different aspects of special effects. I loved the ingenious ways that the effects were reached.

I got into LARP a few years later. The group was not good, but I met Leslie and John Tinney, as well as knowing of Larry Wile and Joe Hines. Leslie started working on getting me to KR but life had a roundabout for me, and I went to the University of Parris Island for my dual bachelor's degree in warfighting and making compost. This later led to a six month vacation in sunny Al Anbar Province, Iraq, where I had a crazy way of enjoying things- driving a truck loaded with flammable liquids in a place where people put bombs in the road. This was not a good choice, and it was decided by people who had shiny rank insignias on their collar afterwards that I should retire before my bad choices caught up with me. Those two things explain a lot of my eccentricities. I did take another detour into the Military Simulation/Airsoft community, and did that till it was no longer feasible. During my time back home, Leslie brought up KR again, and I was resistant, partly due to past bad experiences on the show Geeks Behaving Badly, part due to a rewired brain housing group. But I finally relented.

so Leslie and John worked on grinding those eccentricities down a bit, and I finally went in July of 2014. I opted for a Celt Warrior because, well, I already had much of the costuming and some ideas on how it should go (though I play the brooding Scotsman rather than the more sociable Irishman).

Where to begin… I started playing table top games (Warhammer) in 2002. I met John Tinney and Leslie a few years later and made a lot of friends through the Berks Gaming club. When a bunch of them started talking about KR and where interested in going I wanted to start into another hobby.
I figured with my knowledge of fighting, between studying traditional styles of fighting, fencing for a good 5 years of my life and having decent agility I would enjoy myself at Knight Realms. At a local comic book shop in the summer of 2014 I started looking at the rules and made a character based on what I thought was a good idea and what appealed to me. That night I went home and started looking for weapons and gear to use for LARPing as all I really owned was piles of camping gear. Two weeks later, I attended a fighter practice hosted by John and Leslie. Here I met a few people from the game, had conversations about the game and thoroughly enjoyed myself. I was pumped for the first event.
My first event I learned so much from not walking alone when you don’t have physical defenses, always have healing supplies on you and as a new player run from zombies. I am now happy to say I cannot wait to go to camp every weekend there is an event to be with my friends and enjoy beating the crap out of everyone with foam weapons too. I now have a few friends from college who are interested in coming up and should be on the May event. I can’t wait to see everyone at the April event as I am unable to go to the Alt Event.

First of all this is an amazing topic thank you Jeff.

So my LARPing story seems to echo a bunch of other people out in game world.
I started playing Table Top in 1999 (8th grade) with my bullies so they would stop beating me up. Being a theatre kid who was in school, acting class, voice lessons, and dance class for 18 hours a day was tiring and the only down time I got was at lunch. In 2000 I started to do some backstage work at the theatre I "lived" at. One of the people who I was working with overheard that my friend and I played in a Vampire: the Masquerade game and invited us to the official Cam game.
The problem was I was 17 and you needed to be 18 to play in the game or have parental consent. My wonderful father sat and watched as a group of "weirdos" pretended to be Vampires from 8-12 on Saturday night. And thus my LARPing career started. I played heavily in the Vampire game. Starting a gaming/LARPing club at my high school. I played until the game ended and I moved to Vegas.
Vegas I played a single game of NERO and the people at the game were very stand offish and I swore off boffer LARP's.
I joined a group (The Kingdom of Adrian) that was SCA like but not SCA with live steal and worked at the Las Vegas Ren Faire were I got to camp out and live the life for a bit. It was awesome and I really liked it.
After I moved from Vegas to New York I was firmly in the grasp of being an über nerd. I was looking for anything to meet other nerds as I was here by myself. I went to NYCC and talked with James, Joe and MaryBeth for hours dressed as a Power Ranger. The thing that made me want to try KR was the fact that you could ACTUALLY shoot archery.
I dragged my then girlfriend to the game, much to her dissatisfaction, and fell in love with it. I kept coming to the game and the ex stopped coming. (Funny enough when we broke up she took my sword and shield) And I think the rest is history for me.
I play Anhil because I wanted to be an archer and I enjoy Elves. His name came from a random Elf name generator on my first ride to camp.
And no you know....the rest of the story

I got into KR In January of 2013 courtesy of Ashley and the Rochester Crew. KR is my first LARP and I didn't do a whole lot of Role play before that.

When it comes down to how Sébastien came to life....Uhh.

For his name...'Sébastien Noire' is the name of a character in a PS2 game called Destruction Derby Arenas. His middle name is Orphéus because it started with an O and he has another last name (the one his birth mother had) which is Télus. Put it all together and you get SOTN which is my favorite of the Castlevania games. I actually came to game requesting to be called SOTN (So-tin) but then later dropped that to just being called Sébastien.

Once I stared realizing that he is nothing like the typical Coast Havener, I decided to write his story to imply that his birth parents are Kormyrian but his adopted family and the life he knew was in Coast Haven...It was as far away from the coast as I could make it...But technically...Still Coast Haven. "What's a nautical term?" "Why do I know so much about the sea..?"

I play Sébastien as a rogue/assassin because of all the RP games that I have played, the role of assassin was always my first choice...And it just so happens to be what I'm good at. Still haven't multi-classed..

I am truly grateful for everyone whom I've met at KR. I'm proud to a part of the Rochester crew and I plan on staying as a part of KR for as long as I possibly can. This game and all of you people have affected me greatly and I thank you all for that.

Dorn wrote: What brought you here, the Larp world, and why did you choose your race, class, and archetype?

What brought me here... like everyone, I loved dreaming/imagining/pretending to be someone/something else as a kid. Never really grew out of it.

Why I choose my race, class, archetype... that's something more deeper, personal. Let's just say the role I play was because if something I did not want, but felt I needed to do.

I have played role playing games since <mumble mumble> when I was in 6th grade. The only hobby I have done longer is computer programming.

I did traditional RPGs through college, toyed around with boffer combat a bit in college (not larp, just combat) and was drawn into the Night...Falls Vampire Larp, part of OWBN. There I met a whole host of friends including Larry Wile and Ben Theis. Later on I met Rebecca and she was involved in the SCA. We got married and did some SCA stuff for a while and I built up a persona for it name Valentine Graye. Fast forward a bit, Larry and Ben get involved in Knight Realms and I'm running an online and by appointment game store with Larry and my wife Rebecca. We meet a lot of new friends there including Alice. Larry talks to Alice about KR and Alice then helps convince Rebecca and I to try it out too. That was about three years ago.

I picked my first character because I already had the clothing from the SCA and so I just morphed Valentine into a Larp character instead of an SCA persona. I picked the role of merchant because it seemed like a good schtick and I liked to be "well traveled". Gambler seemed like it would be fun too since I enjoy playing cards and other games as well as doing some magic tricks for real.

During my RPG past I always liked to switch my characters pretty radically when it came time to change characters. So that no character I play would be too much like a past character. This held true when I was in the Vampire Larp and I played a Malkavian, a Tremere, a Brujah (very briefly) a Nosferatu and a Ventrue.

So when I started my second character at KR I created Ox out of the desire to have him be vastly different than Valentine. Then there is Thaddeus who is different than both of them. (Yes, I do tend to play a lot of alts) In April I plan to start up what I hope will be a long running character again. Gunnar is drawing a bit on a past character I played in a tabletop game. He is created in a large part to participate at KR with some wonderful new friends that my current characters haven't had as much of a chance to interact with. Also in part because I realized that I had been holding back a bit from my other characters. I still had the mentality learned from Vampire on how to defend oneself from PVP by not giving people anything to latch on to. However since having had the pleasure of being part of a mind blowing scene in January based around Atrus I was inspired to make a character who is much more outward facing ... who will get more involved in things and through which I will be able to experience much more of what KR has to offer. I have seen that a large part of the point of KR is to put your character out there so that it can be changed, beat up a bit, suffer tragedy and experience joy. So in April I will be starting a new KR journey.

I come back because Knight Realms is a place where both my love of gaming and my love of theater are not only accepted, but are always encouraged.

I am welcome by this player base.
I have never felt ostracized or lesser than.

This, above all, has been a unique experience for me.

I didn't get into cards or table top until college.

Up until then, I was firmly met with the "You are a girl, you really can't do these things/we're not going to waste our time on you" mentality from the nerd dudes I was surrounded by. Which was really stupid and made getting involved in anything super difficult since they had a strong hand in organizing and running most tabletop, card, and video game clubs.

So, I Theater'd hardcore.
I did chorus, marching band, Springshow, Musicals, I ran SING, I joined everything, all of it. I was *THE* theater nerd for a hell of a long time.

As I got to college, it flipped. Theater became super exclusive and hard to participate in.

The tabletop club, however, was INCREDIBLY open.

Karen Y. and Katie J. met me in the Dance Dance Revolution club and pulled me aside saying "Have you ever played D&D, because you're cool and we really need a sorcerer for our campaign."

I had zero idea of what that entire sentence meant.
Literally no clue. None. At all.
I was immediately swept up.

A few months later, a handful of the now famed "Purchase Crew" went to comic con, bumped into James Kimball, and immediately organized an enormous trip to Knight Realms through the tabletop club.


April of 2012, I wrote a slap dash character in the backseat of the car on the drive up to camp Sac.

And that's about it.

A week or two after graduating high school, I went to pick up my brother from the airport. He said "I'm gonna be gone this weekend, playing LARP with my friends from school". That was a Wednesday. Thursday and Friday morning was spent crafting weapons, putting together costumes, and reading the rulebook. Psions were recently re-written at that point and it looked really cool to me. Steven and I had a With Rowan, I was able to use my talents and passions to live out my childhood fantasy-adventure dreams with other people who shared the same interests.

I wouldn't be larping without all of you wonderful people.

You've heard it from me before, but I'll bite again:

I make fun for a living and igniting imaginations is really what I enjoy most. I also enjoy camping and running around between the trees and beneath the stars. My coworker and good friend from college, Taylor, informed me of a location where I could both work on bringing fun and magic into the lives of others AND spend some time 'round a campfire. It was a simple choice. I've never wanted to feel like a storybook hero myself, but I do discover a certain joy whenever I'm able to contribute or find a nice little angle to twist that might leave other players feeling excited. KR has a lot of opportunities for that. It also provides a fantastic environment in which to work on banishing shyness.