Playing a dominant character comes with its own set of challenges. Dominant characters come in different forms: authority figures (benevolent or not), antagonists, or outright villains. However, each of these figures presents the same challenges: establishing and displaying dominance in a credible manner, managing interactions with dominated characters, and balancing character domination with respect for player agency.
Roleplaying dominance can discomfit some players who feel they don’t belong in these roles, whether for physical or personality reasons or simply a lack of experience. Another perceived obstacle is that playing with status requires buy-in from fellow players. These factors have led to a widespread belief that playing dominant characters is overwhelming and difficult.
Contrary to this, we believe playing dominant is essentially performative and achievable through a series of techniques. We’ll provide you with practical tips to this end, on three topics:
Understanding your character’s function; and how you can calibrate for the part and structure your personal narrative
How to play on physical dominance when you can’t rely on an imposing physique to do the work for you
Tips and challenges for dominant play
The Function of the Dominant Character
Dominant characters have a variety of roles and functions that determine how they fit into a larp, and you should start by looking at your character in that light. The character can be a leader, an antagonist, or an oppressor, and they might be bringing the group together or providing dramatic conflict. Understanding where your character fits and what they need to do can support both pre-game calibration with other participants and character adjustments you might need to play. Ask the following questions and try to understand where your role fits on these scales:
Active ↔ Disengaged
Leadership: Is the character supposed to exercise authority, distribute tasks, take decisions, and make plans, or do they just occupy a privileged position where they are not expected to take an active role in decision-making? Are they part of enforcing the system or do they just benefit from it?
Brilliant ↔ Inefficient
Efficiency: Is the character good at using their power to achieve their goals, or have they ended up with power they don’t use well, like an officer placed in a position of command due to rank or family connections?
Benevolent ↔ Sadistic
Oppression: How does the character exercise their power in a dominant position? Do they only exercise power when confronted or pushed, will they try to intimidate or command others, or will they abuse their power for personal gain or just out of cruelty?
Legitimate ↔ Usurper
Legitimacy: For obvious dramatic reasons, a dominant character may face a challenge in some form or another. This question is important to examine closely, as it may determine the arc of your larp. A character who faces too much opposition might end up alienated from the rest of society.
Status quo ↔ Downfall
Trajectory: A character’s relationship with their own authority defines a lot about them. Are they trying to hold on to power? Are they trying to gain more power? Are they heading towards downfall? Do they suffer from power fatigue? This aspect of course is fluid, and prone to evolving over the course of the game in response to other players. However, considering potential narrative arcs in advance helps to calibrate and steer the game in the desired direction.
Once you understand these elements, you can figure out where you need to calibrate with other players:
How much will you need them to “play up” your character’s status?
How much delegation of tasks or power will the players of subordinate or submissive characters expect from you?
How much gamemastering does the dominant position entail and how can you make sure your needs for this function are met (ask the organizers)?
Is the character at risk of being isolated or alienated in ways that you don’t want to play out, and if so, which characters could work as a safety net for them?
Is there any aspect of the character that feels hard to play and that needs extra support or adjustment?
How will you display the emotions of your character? Do they have a public facade that they only abandon in more private settings? Will they try to keep face at all times? What could make them break?
There are several things you should track when looking at the function of your role and during calibration. First, you will want to avoid situations where other players do not seem willing to “play up” the character’s status, and if you don’t feel like you’ll be well-enough supported, you should request more “play to lift” to support your character, both from organizers and other participants. Second, dominant characters in leadership positions in particular run a risk of needing to perform runtime gamemaster functions. Try to anticipate these requirements and ask for support from the actual gamemasters as needed. Third, you need to understand how the dominant position will impact your character’s relationships with others, so you can steer toward interactions that will work. Finally, you should try to anticipate where the character’s narrative arc may go and specific challenges they may face, as you’ll need to direct your play more than in a less-dominant role.
The Physicality of Dominance
Dominant characters have power. Power, socially, almost always shows in the body. Self-assured people who feel power over those they’re in a social situation with take up more space. Physicality in larp is a useful tool. It conveys information non-verbally about who your character is, it signals how you would like to be played up, and it’s the basis for all emotionally-nuanced play. If you are playing on dominance, you are relying on other players to confer status on you or on your ability to wring respect out of them.
One of the main challenges in dominant play is tailoring it to bodies not commonly perceived as powerful. Younger, non-male, or smaller players may find it more difficult to convey something that will be read as the physical gravitas of a dominant figure. Even in larps where participants are not supposed to play to your real-life body, it can be difficult for players to eliminate the impact of unconscious bias on how they react. A useful tactic to work around this can be modeling your presentation on an example of a fictional character in a position of dominance analogous to what you will play, and also explicitly telling your co-players about what you’re doing to get the picture in their heads too. Good examples, depending on genre, might include Lyanna Mormont (from Game of Thrones) and Susan Calvin (from Asimov’s short stories).
Some suggestions on how to convey dominance in your character’s physicality:
Dress to impress. Make sure your costume stands out with visible accessories. Think crowns, tiaras, capes or billowing cloaks — elements that set you apart from everyone else or make you feel powerful.
Physical demeanor. Stand straight, shoulders back, head high. If you can’t look people straight in the eye, look at the point between their eyebrows. Do not smile just because of social conventions or out of politeness.
Placement. Place yourself in the center of the room, on the best seat. Surround yourself with your entourage. Do not make way for others. Keep others at a distance if you want to emphasize your superiority, or get right up in their personal space if you want to emphasize your ability to affect them.
Voice and language. Use a loud, projecting voice when you speak in public. Alternatively, speak quietly and force people to lean toward you, or have an underling speak in your place. Make pronouncements and do not waver in public.
Touch. The way we touch each other conveys a huge amount of status information and will affect both you and your co-players emotionally. Be careful about calibration and consent, and then look at how you can physically demonstrate dominance by how you touch your co-players.
Reaction. If you think your character is likely to be challenged during the game, plan your emotional reactions in advance to give the impression of unquestioning authority, regardless of what you’re feeling as a player.
Practice. If these tips do not come naturally to your body, practice in front of your mirror or with friends. Decide on a few gestures or expressions that you can base your performance on. This is significant if your body type is not conventionally read as dominant or you are not routinely rewarded.
Rules of Interaction
As a dominant character, some of the action in the larp will revolve around your character’s power and how they use it. This can include delegating tasks, social hosting duties, conflict management, bullying or hazing, and enforcement of rules, whether they’re pre-existing or just your whims. Looking at the rules that will structure your interaction with others can also be a good way to establish your character.
Here are a few things to think about around how you engage with others as an authority figure:
Start things. Don’t hesitate to generate conflict when it’s useful for you, or simply to initiate play — you have all the cards.
If you’re acting as a leader, delegate as much as you can, but remember to make the tasks playable.
Take breaks and rest; being dominant can be exhausting (especially since players in dominant roles need to devote more mental space to emotional safety and care in handling conflicts, emotionally charged or violent scenes).
Wear a watch — you’re more likely to need to set the pacing of play in a dominant role.
Again, prepare in advance. For example, if you know you need to deliver a certain scene, it may help to have brainstormed some ideas for it.
There are some unique challenges for dominant characters:
Managing adrenaline levels and “villain fatigue”. Playing an outright villain, or even an antagonist can be draining. If you have a lot of victim players to interact with who are all be interested in similar abuse stories, it can also be quite repetitive. It can often be lonely at the top — social exclusion and conflict play can take a lot out of you, emotionally. Self-care and rest is important when playing dominant. Consider making sure you have a positive ally playing close to you for emotional support. If possible, also have someone you share power with so you can tag each other in and share responsibility.
Work with your victims to share the burden of arranging scenes.((See Playing an Engaging Victim by Katrine Wind and Karijn van der Heij in What Do We Do When We Play?)) Inside the fiction, the dominant character may be initiating a scene, but (especially on a meta-level) it doesn’t have to work this way. In particular, you don’t always need to be the one who comes up with the ideas. Encourage players of lower status characters to talk about how they want their characters to be ordered around, dominated, or abused — this will make your job easier and make their games better.
Think about what happens when you’re
“off the clock” in character if you’re playing someone with formal authority. You probably don’t suddenly start treating other characters as your peers, even if you’re playing a kind leadership figure. There can be a lot of interesting play in the subtle friction here, especially if your character’s status conflicts with their own needs or desires.
Conclusion
Not everyone enjoys playing dominant, but it can be accessible for anyone. Playing dominant means using a specific palette of social dynamics when you engage with other characters and shapes which kinds of narratives and challenges you will play out, but with a good foundation, you’ll both have a lot of room to improvise and the confidence to do so . Having a good grasp of how to perform dominance will make your play both more credible and more interesting. Thanks to Simon Rogers for some of the ideas in this piece and early discussions about it.
Non-player characters, even when inhabited by players, are less than human. They are props and toys for the player characters to do with as they please.
Keynote: Nordic Larp, NPCs, and the Future, Jaakko Stenros, Oslo, 2017
The Non-Player Character is an interesting legacy of table-top roleplaying games where the gamemaster would play all of those characters not under the direct control of the players. For larps they have proven useful as plot devices, as functionaries of the game used to make a specific event happen at a specific time or in a predetermined way; or as short term characters who may only be present for a part of the larp. They exist at the service of the larp, and their existence and agency are secondary to those of the player characters. For the purposes of this chapter we will use the term “supporting character”.
For example the Krampus in Midwinter (2020) are supporting characters whose function is to torture, terrify, and re-educate Santa’s elves when they are naughty. The design suggests that all players must visit the Krampus at least once during the larp, and thus the people taking on the role will find that their (functional) play will be intense and unrelenting, but that they will have little time to simply play the character. From a design point of view the Krampus should not have full agency to affect the outcome of the larp, because they have too much power and too high a status.
Similarly guards in a prison larp may spend much of their time moving inmates from one place to another, or teachers in a magic school may have little time to explore personal plots. Antagonists often find themselves falling into a purely functional role, even if they are not supposed to be supporting characters, for much the same reason. However, a larper who takes on a supporting character is role-playing, embodying and experiencing a character with their whole body; so the experience can be just as powerful, or traumatic, or bleed-inducing as playing a full player-character. This short piece asks what we can learn from the NPC, and whether there are any techniques and methods that we can adopt for normal play.
Making Game for Other Participants
Some supporting characters are net producers of alibi, designed to create opportunities for play, to offer that invitation to the players, and to give them explicit permission to engage. A supporting character would not normally directly affect the story of the larp,unless specifically designed to do so. A supporting assassin who murders the queen is less interesting than one who tries to blackmail a player character to carry out that murder, as this second approach creates play for other participants. For example, in Countdown (2019) the host of a live TV show knows that one of the contestants is pregnant; a fact that she is unaware of. Whilst it would be a dramatic reveal to announce this to the world, doing so would reduce the agency of her player. Instead, the host whispers in her ear and leaves it up to her whether or not to let the secret out. Her character arc is her own, and her play — and moments of dramatic revelation — are more important than his. For players this is a generosity of spirit, an acknowledgement that the shared experience of larping is significant and that sometimes our own experience is not paramount.
Providing Alibis for Interaction
In addition, this idea of producing alibi is a useful tool for all larpers; we may create opportunities and invitations for interaction every time we speak to another player, but some larpers may need a more explicit invitation to engage.
“Would you like to dance?” Samuel asks William. This is a literal invitation to play, but William’s player is nervous. He wants to engage, but has not yet made the step from audience to participant. It is very easy for William to say “no,” to look away, to stutter an excuse.
“Can you dance?” is a more interesting opening. If William says “yes” Samuel can follow it up with “Well I can’t! Can you show me how?” and if William says “no” Samuel can either offer to show him, or can admit he is also gifted with two left feet and they can learn together. In every instance the supporting character is offering the player a reason to say yes. A nuanced version of this can be used for oppression play; the antagonist offers a reason to escalate in their line of questioning,
“There are people who you care for?”
“Yes”
“Well if you don’t answer my questions, we will come for them next”
or
“No”
“Then why resist?”
offering the victim both something to fight for and a reason to capitulate.
The supporting character creates new stories and activities, but when these opportunities arise, they pass them over to players and step away. The supporting character creates opportunity for play (makes game), cedes opportunity for play (gives game), and encourages play from all parties (produces alibi). But we can all do this, it simply involves a little extra work: steering for generosity.
Avoiding “Blue-on-Blue” Action
One of the pitfalls of having supporting characters is that they can end up playing scenes amongst themselves. This is particularly common with high status characters. It makes sense to the story for the king and the wizard to argue in the throne room, but their high status tends to force everyone else to become an audience.
High status characters take the spotlight simply by existing. Players want to talk to them. They have access to information and contacts, and they are responsible for taking decisions. Sometimes a co-dependency emerges. Players bring information to the supporting characters rather than sharing it with their co-players, although the supporting characters often have insufficient capacity to assimilate and disseminate the information; so the information gets lost. This bottlenecking comes from poor management or poor design.
Finally there is a high-status tendency to perform; to deliver a speech that takes ten minutes when it could probably have been done in thirty seconds, and when a high status character is talking it is difficult for a lower status character to interrupt. Instead they can facilitate conversation to ensure that everyone who wants to be heard has an opportunity to be heard.
There are lessons here for players, as every criticism aimed at high status supporting characters applies to any high status character. High status players need to be aware of their privilege and use it to create opportunities for everyone to engage.
A larp is a compressed fiction; it offers a finite amount of playable dramatic space which is shared by all participants. An experienced player should be aware of the space they take up and look for ways to share or cede that space.
Hug Your Antagonist
Antagonists are often written as supporting characters because they perform a one dimensional, one directional, or disposable function. An oppressor may do terrible things to generate game for their victims, but it is hard for the victims to willingly engage with their oppressors outside of this context. Indeed characters who are dangerous and powerful can end up isolated. Their energy is directed at their victims, but beyond that interaction there is little opportunity for them to engage with the story. It is a lonely experience to play the sociopath bully.
I was playing an oppressor, and I honestly felt like a ‘Service Top,’ I never really got to play the character at all.
Aleph Behaviour Player, Conscience (2019)
It is easier for a supporting character to interact with an antagonistic player character. Perhaps the alibi of being in a supporting role and thus not having to find a good diegetic reason to interact with the antagonists helps. Because supporting characters are not fully in play, they are in a position to notice when a player character is isolated or disconnected from play and can engage with them and bring them back into the fold.
Recognising the narrative labour carried out by antagonistic co-players is important. Players can engineer interactions with characters who are awful, without expecting awfulness or oppression in return. If we fail to do this, we are treating our antagonist as a supporting character, not a co-player.
Serial Focus
Some players are willing to interrupt what they consider to be a non-dramatic scene in order to inject their own drama, or to further their own play. Supporting characters sometimes adopt the “nothing is more important than the player I am talking to right now” technique; this is a strictly serial order of interaction — essentially a queue — which means that they will always finish the scene or conversation they are having before moving on. The news that another character is bringing might be important to your larp, but it is not as important as the play you are having right now.
Creating an Accessible Character
A well designed supporting character heuristic is to always engage, to always make play, to always have a conversation. Supporting characters tend to accept invitations to play more easily than some player characters (or some players.) This is the most important lesson we can learn from supporting characters: to always find a reason to engage, to initiate play, and to offer other players alibi to engage with you.
We do not want to emancipate Non-Player Characters, we want Non-Player Characters to have the agency to emancipate themselves.
When larping, players don’t always wear costumes, and even when costumed, a character ought to be more than a funny hat. Here, we offer practical ways to flesh out how a character moves and speaks, in the hope of making it easier for you to do so.
Analyzing your Character
However much or little information you receive on the character you will be playing in a larp, you will probably form a mental image and decide where you want to take them. The aspects which define a character are numerous, so a list of identifying traits is a good start, if you know how to translate them into your play.
Walking the Walk
Once you have an idea of how the character should appear to other players, there are different aspects to consider when defining those characteristics. This section will focus on bearing, posture, gait, and breathing(An interesting tool to consider when designing motion aspects is Laban Movement Analysis (sometimes: Laban/Bartenieff Movement Analysis). For larp purposes, LMA has been written about by Erin Marsh in the Nordiclarp.org blog (see bibliography).). When making these choices, it’s good to consider the difference between internal and external perception. Does the way I move or hold myself convey the meaning I want it to, or is it just in my head?
Bearing, Posture, and Gait
Inner perception or posture can affect your outer bearing in a useful way. Putting yourself in the right frame of mind translates well into the way you stand, sit, or walk. Practice in front of a full-length mirror or film a video: seeing the effect helps you calibrate it.
If you struggle with finding your own, copy signature mannerisms from actors. E.g., for arrogance in servitude, look no further than Stowell, Alun Armstrong’s role as a butler in season 5 of Downton Abbey((https://www.imdb.com/title/tt3962976/fullcredits?ref_=tt_cl_sm#cast, 21. October 2019)). Films and TV offer many such examples for a variety of traits.
Gait, the way you walk, contributes a lot to a character’s general appearance. Walking on the balls and toes of your feet, keeping the heel off the ground will make you appear slightly taller, more willowy, and lighter on your feet, while stomping heel first can seem more decisive. Experiment!
As a practical example, take the run of the Shakespearean larp Forsooth, where, for the major role of a count (we’ll disregard for the purpose of this paper that a funny hat was worn), arms and hands were held a certain way: shoulders down, upper arms closer to the body, lower arms outward, palms turned more or less upwards, which might have been sustainable for a longer time. In contrast to that, a butler/servant character was portrayed as bent over forwards and partly sideways, with a rounded back, hunched shoulders and the head thrown back, so as to always seeming to look up at his ‘betters’ – this works for a limited amount of time, but remaining in that role over several hours on end, let alone days, might well have ended painfully.
Be aware that while a more or less obvious limp is a sure way of changing the look of your gait, it really shouldn’t be done for comedic effect, but rather have a medical or possibly psychological reason in the character’s background. “It looks different” is not a reason, it’s lazy characterization.
Breathing
You can also use breath for character building. Slower, more pronounced breaths can suggest frailty, which can underline old age or some ailment or other; this is something Holger used in
Bunker 101 (Chaos League), playing a character who had aged beyond the societal limit for being supplied with anti-radiation drugs, by pausing to “catch his breath” or coughing every now and then.
Talking the Talk
Your speech pattern is an easily recognisable characteristic, and changing it up will affect both how others perceive your character and how you perceive them in relation to yourself. Speaking differently will increase the difference between you and your character.
There are many elements to speech — tone, volume, register, speech pattern, etc. Your tone is connected to the way your voice travels through your body as you make a sound: a tone can be nasal, if you speak a lot through your nose, or raspy if the sound travels up your throat in a certain way. Volume is, as indicated by its name, the volume with which you speak; you can whisper or shout. Your register is the part of the total human vocal range your voice moves within; someone with a deep voice has a lower register than someone with a high voice. The amplitude of the register varies from person to person — trained singers have usually developed a broader register than someone who mostly uses their voice for everyday chats. The speech pattern is all other little quirks that mix into the way you speak; your accent, potential stutters, a lisp, using certain words more than others (e.g. “like” or humming a lot) and so on.
All of these vocal elements can be changed, though some (such as broadening your register) require more practice than others. The easiest are tone, volume, and minor speech pattern alterations. Although changing the way you use your register when you speak is effective, it can be hard to avoid slipping back into your “vocal comfort zone” as the larp goes on without constantly having to focus on the way you speak.
Tone
Changing your tone of voice is simple, and does a lot for your character portrayal. This allows using people’s unconscious biases (e.g. “soft people have soft voices”) as quick shorthand to enforce your portrayal. A snooty character might have a nasal voice, a scarred warrior a raspy one, a caretaker a soft one, etc. Be aware, though — raspy tones can damage your vocal chords and result in a sore throat if done incorrectly, so avoid those unless you know how to use them safely. Remember you will have to sustain this tone for hours or maybe days. The further away from your natural tone you go, the more challenging this is going to be.
Volume
Volume speaks volumes — we alter our body language depending on how much space we are comfortable claiming for ourselves, and the same happens to the volume with which we speak. A self-assured character will not have a problem being loud, while a confused or shy character will speak quieter, maybe even whisper or mumble at times.
Speech Pattern
The most cost-effective speech pattern changes are small. What are your character’s favourite words for expressing joy, anger, awe, etc? Do they often lose their trail of thought mid-sentence? Perhaps they interject themselves with constant uhm’s and eh’s, or click their tongue a lot? Think of a few quirks and try combining them. Decide what to keep and what to scratch — less is more, especially before you get used to playing with your voice. Play around until you find a voice you feel suits your character, while still being comfortable to maintain. If it feels uncomfortable, change it. A sore throat, cough, or loss of voice never made anyone’s larp experience any more fun.
Avoid fake accents: they are difficult to do well, and even more difficult to do without engaging a lot of unintentional, misguided, or outright offensive cultural stereotypes((The same goes for stereotypical speech impediments, such as stuttering. A disability is not a costume.)). Perhaps you are willing to put in the required effort, but let’s be realistic — we always leave larp prep to the last minute, and no one is going to believe that Scottish accent practiced overnight. Instead, focus on original, smaller changes!
Sustainability and Safety
If the physical and vocal tools you’re employing need to be sustained for the duration of a larp, consider both the safety and health of the player. The length of the larp and your physical fitness may reduce the viability of some choices. For example, certain changes to tone and register require a lot of work and risk damaging your voice if practiced without professional guidance — especially over a longer period. However, if you are a trained vocalist, you may already know how to safely experiment with these. For every technique we present here, players should ask themselves whether it’s sustainable for the purpose of the particular larp and/or role they want to use it for.
Conclusion
Now that you have assembled the bodily and vocal identifiers for the character, remember that practice makes perfect. You may not have the chance to do that for a mini larp, but before going to a bigger event, try combining the different aspects you chose, putting yourself through the expected emotional states of the character, imagining situations they might need to react to; and see how your design holds up to all of these. Practice your character voice and movement around friends to see how you’re able to sustain them during intense social interaction. Be honest about them, don’t be afraid to discard those not up to your expectations, be creative, be safe, and remember to have fun!
Playing a super-rich character in a larp probably sounds fun and easy. It is neither, at least not at all times. Centrally, it requires a fine line of balancing, in order to not take the role over the top, but sufficiently close, in order to provide the most optimal playable content to other participants. We believe, based on our experiences at for instance, Tuhannen viillon kuolema, (Pettersson, Hannula et al, 2018), that this is best done in groups or ensembles. That way, an individual character’s affluenza((The unhealthy and unwelcome psychological and social effects of affluence regarded especially as a widespread societal problem, such as A: feelings of guilt, lack of motivation, and social isolation experienced by wealthy people. B: extreme materialism and consumerism associated with the pursuit of wealth and success and resulting in a life of chronic dissatisfaction, debt, overwork, stress, and impaired relationships (Merriam-Webster) )) becomes part of a greater whole rather than a corny stereotype.
Creating a believable super-rich character is difficult. How to combine a real, playable personality, with a sense of affluenza? Role-playing usually requires a sense of connection and interaction, so the player has to be able to convey playable realism and a sense of unreality at the same time. Avoiding satire, comedy or outrageous in-game spending is usually recommended, unless the larp organizers specifically want a two-dimensional non-player character. Like simplified villains, they can of course fit some larps, but here we want to look at a more realistic approach.
In our experience, the first element for successfully constructing a super-rich character is the origin of their money. This has a significant effect on character personality. For example, it is possible to play someone who has inherited their money as either ruthless and efficient or as complacent, but if the money has been earned somehow through one’s own actions, the character will probably default to the former — even if they are now resting on their proverbial laurels. Remember to interact with other characters: a character who has ennui, or just hides in an enclave, is not useful as more than story decoration. However, by approaching the ennui and talking about it, or planning the enclave (as in Tuhannen viillon kuolema), creates playable content for others.
The second recommended step is to find at least two types of affluenza. The character should optimally be able to deviate from typical middle-class behaviour in at least one way, and be outrageous to poor characters in at least one as well. If these are different things, all the better. They should also be playable, so that they come out during play often enough. Maybe it is an off-hand art purchase that is expensive, but not immensely so, or the firing of several people during a phone call that others can hear. A classic solution is to emphasize in play how “everyone could be rich, if they just worked as hard as I did”. Unless the character is supposed to be a ruthless tycoon or something similar, however, it is far better to come up with more interesting ways to express the increasing removal from understanding the realities of those who earn or own less. One of the best ways we have found for emphasizing this, is to select some things (e.g., optimizing travel without caring about prices) that are not at all easy to the poor or even the middle class, but which the super-rich character takes for granted.
The third suggested step is to find at least two types of mental relations outside of the social class of the character. These are ways in which the character believes that they relate to other people. It is very typical for even the very rich, at least in the Nordic countries, to think that they are “not that different, just wealthier” from hard-working people with less money. Therefore, playability and interaction increase, if the rich character has situations where they can sincerely say “I’m just like you in this regard.” For some topics — like both characters going to the gym, even if one of them has a group of personal trainers and the other a student discount – it can create believable temporary empathy. In many others, this can be used to emphasize the affluenza, because the rich character’s statements will sound dissonant to the other, who will not likely see the presumed “similarity”.
The fourth step is linked to the third one. The artificial affluenza gets more realistic, if there is not just one or two contacts outside one’s economic core group, but rather a large number of characters from the middle class and “poor people”. Power is not taken, it is given, in this case by the other characters’ reactions. Playing the rich among others of similar standing provides little content to others, and can quickly become boring. Doing so in an environment of economic differences that are not just transactional creates fruitful play — and emotions — for all concerned. While playing aristocrats and their servants has its own charms, playing a rich character in a more open setting offers more possibilities.
Finally, playing rich is best done in a group of rich characters, each of a different type. Tuhannen viillon kuolema really emphasized this point for us, in its contrast with many other larps with similar themes. One super-rich character can easily get satirical, even if played well and with good care. A few of them together, with different types of estrangement, become a surprisingly realistic group of people. This also enables some of them to take the play to the level of occasional satire, especially if such satire still reflects something seen in real life (think “pharma bro” or “trophy-hunting heiress”).
Ensemble play has been part of Nordic larp discourse since 2003, but the community is yet to define its exact role in larp design. In this chapter we draw insights from different ensemble-driven art forms, and demonstrate how ensemble skills facilitate better play. We also discuss the most common challenges preventing ensemble play, and offer suggestions and tools for overcoming them.
Ensemble play is most noticeable when a piece of art (music, story, dance, larp) is not defined in advance, but emerges in real time. A symphony orchestra or a Shakespeare troupe can, of course, be described as an ensemble even when their content is pre-defined on sheet music or a script. For the purposes of larp, however, we find it more relevant to look at ensembles that discover and create their piece in the moment.
Musical jam sessions, devised theatre, and other co-creative art forms share a specific characteristic with larp: they all rely on the players’ ability to constantly calibrate their play, and collaboratively negotiate and renegotiate what belongs into the piece, and what is left out.
In a collaborative ensemble performers actively give and take opportunities to shine, and derive enjoyment from their own contribution as well as from the contributions of others. They balance the attention they give to themselves, the group, and the piece, and focus on creating something together as well as on their individual performance. This, we find, is an accurate description of rewarding ensemble play in larp, too.
How do we know when play is ensemble play? A good sign is spontaneous and mutual delight and surprise: what is happening right now is rewarding, meaningful, and unpredicted. Most importantly, we can see from the eyes of our co-creators that they are experiencing the same joy — even if outwardly our characters are screaming in rage. We have become partners in crime, sharing a unique moment in a unique reality, all facets of which are not necessarily visible to others.
Larp Magic — or Ensemble Play in Action?
Most larpers are familiar with the concept of larp magic: a scene, storyline, or chain of events that unravels in the most rewarding way possible, without anyone planning for that outcome in advance. Some larp magic certainly happens due to luck or coincidence — serendipitous occurrences like weather and random encounters can heavily impact our play — but preconditions for surprising and auspicious play can also be consciously created by a skillful ensemble.
To a performer’s eye, larp magic does not look entirely incidental. Most professional performers learn through their practice that a well timed buildup towards a satisfactory resolution is a matter of applying specific skills, such as:
listening to co-creators;
anticipating opportunities;
picking up cues and impulses;
paying attention to content other than your own;
building for delayed gratification;
deciding when to act, when to take space, and when to step back.
All of these skills are regularly employed at larps in order to create more rewarding and fluent play. Some of them are inherently codified in play instructions like play to lose and play to lift.((Play to lose/lift is an interaction guideline in Nordic larp, that instructs players to drive scenes towards the most interesting story, rather than success for their character. (Wilson 2019))) The notion of playing in ensembles is not new in the Nordic larp tradition, either. Johanna Koljonen refers to ensemble play when describing a particular playstyle in late 1990s Sweden:
The ensemble player employs aspects of his role to support the initiatives of his co-players with the express purpose of creating satisfying dramatic situations for the group experience. The ensemble is collectively responsible for the dramatic arc in the whole game as well as each scene, and may choose to do something implausible or illogical to achieve the most moving narrative.
Koljonen 2007
The first Nordic larp to methodologically design for ensemble play was Mellan himmel och hav (Between Heaven and Sea, 2003). Played over three days in Riksteatern (The National Theater Company) in Stockholm, Sweden, the larp was preceded by three weekend-long workshops, during which the participants learned how to play as an ensemble: How to listen and react to each other’s feelings and impulses, and how to collectively mediate the larp’s artistic vision (Gerge 2004).
In Mellan himmel och hav, ensemble workshops were not only a means to an end. The ensemble creation itself was an inherent part of the larp’s experience design. Ensemble members became fellow creators, contributing to every aspect of the larp, from character creation to narrative design and meta-techniques. The goal of this extensive process was to create an atmosphere of trust, and empower players to explore the intimate interpersonal themes of the larp. (Wieslander 2004)
The co-creative ensemble play in Mellan himmel och hav facilitated unprecedentedly deep exploration of diegetic social roles, and formed a powerful connection between the players in the ensemble (Stenros 2010). Similar ensemble workshops were further explored and developed in several other designs, such as System Danmarc (2005), Totem (2007), and Delirium (2010) (see Stenros & Montola 2010). Today, a subset of ensemble methods are commonplace at larp workshops. Some typical practices include:
having structured discussions about needs, wishes, and feelings of co-players,
calibrating physical contact and body language,
co-designing character relations and social dynamics,
and making collective decisions about play styles and themes.
While the word ‘ensemble’ is rarely used in Nordic larp discourse, the importance of ensemble play is still implicitly recognized in our design paradigm: If players do not know how to collaborate and collectively coordinate their play, our larps simply stop functioning. The designer vision of the larp is ultimately brought to life by players’ individual and collective actions and interpretations. The more collaborative and compatible those actions are, the more elaborate and nuanced play we can build on them.
Successful ensemble play creates high resolution larping: subtle and nuanced character interaction of high quality and high detail (Nordgren 2008). Practicing ensemble skills makes us more open to different social cues, signals, subtexts, body language, and invitations to play – and the more details we notice, the deeper and more vivid our interpretation of the play becomes. Mutually observant high resolution play helps us see each other better and feel more seen ourselves. Consequently, playing in ensembles cultivates a culture of trust and inclusive co-creation.
In summary, ensemble play in larp is a method that relies on active inclusivity and reflexivity. Any collaborating group of participants that recognizes the importance of each participant’s experience and takes collective responsibility of the scene and the larp, counts as an ensemble.
An ensemble player is reflexive about their surroundings in order to support the initiatives of their co-players, and employs aspects of their character to facilitate both individually and collectively satisfying play.
Ensemble Pedagogy in Art
Many workshop methods used in Nordic larp, including the ensemble creation benchmarked in Mellan himmel och hav, are based on practices developed for and within pedagogical and artistic contexts. Ensemble exercises and methodologies have been explored and formalized by countless teachers, artists, authors, and gurus, and are used everywhere from art schools and universities to artist think-tanks, improv groups, drama therapies, team building retreats, creative communities, and even literal cults.
While the exercises themselves have many inherent similarities from one context to another, there is a crucial difference to their use in larp: Larp does not have the established institutions, nor the gurus((Larp gurus, self-proclaimed or otherwise, are designers, organisers, and academics – not teachers of player skills.)). An art student and a larper may both engage with similar ensemble methodology, but only the former has their performance evaluated by a mentor or a teacher.
A teacher has a mandate to observe students and suggest where their weaknesses and strengths lie. In larps we play with our peers, and evaluative feedback on someone’s performance is rare, and often socially complicated((Positive commendations for good play, such as Facebook threads after a larp, of course count as feedback. However, whilst reading about enjoyable and praiseworthy play can be empowering and inspire us to explore more of that kind of play, praise tells us nothing about our individual and collective weaknesses. At their worst, public commendations can give players with high social capital more of that capital, without addressing the problems associated with it.)). In certain ways this is a missed opportunity: Many of us appreciate advice on how to become better at something we love. Without external feedback, our means of learning new skills are limited to things we individually notice through self-reflection, or stumble upon by trial and error.
The authors of this article have had the privilege of learning ensemble skills in professional contexts, both inside formal institutions and outside of them. During our years studying music and theatre we have come across multiple methods and exercises for practicing ensemble play. One of these methodologies, The Viewpoints (Bogart & Landau 2004), introduces a paradigm for co-creative ensemble work we find highly relevant to Nordic larp.
Originally a composition method for theatre, The Viewpoints teaches real-time artistic collaboration through movement, space, sound, and gesture. The method has influenced performer training widely outside its formal contexts, and offers a framework for exploring ensemble play as its own skill set.
The Viewpoints focuses on a spectrum of aesthetic principles: How to think about movement and sound in space and time. The simple act of walking across a room can be analysed in the vocabulary offered by The Viewpoints, eg. Tempo, Duration, or Spatial Relationship. This helps performers communicate what they see and hear, and also gives them tools to improve their skills by concentrating on one or more Viewpoints at a time.
Training in the style of The Viewpoints often involves open improvisation sessions using specific limitations or instructions, such as:
Only five people on stage at any given time.
Everyone sits down at the same time. Nobody decides when, and nobody gives the signal.
Exactly three people have to be singing at all times.
When the facilitator gives a signal, the music must switch to a new key. Nobody signals the key in advance. The music must continue uninterrupted.
The purpose of these exercises is to develop the performers’ ability to pay attention to the ensemble and the space, whilst at the same time making individual choices about actions and aesthetics within the piece. The reflexive analysis and the creative decision making required in the improv are very similar to the mental processing most larpers engage with during runtime in larps.
Through improv, artists are taught to receive and react to external impulses — cues that initiate action. For example, if someone claps their hands, another person may use that as a trigger for their own unplanned reaction, eg. jumping, falling down, or yelling. While this is a very simple example, it forms the basis for more complicated co-creation. Being able to interrupt what one was previously doing in order to react spontaneously to new information is a useful ensemble skill. In larps, noticing and reacting to cues (both diegetic and non-diegetic) guides our interaction with other characters, and connects us to the play around us.
The Viewpoints sessions and exercises are often done with a portion of the group observing as audience. This serves an important pedagogical purpose: Noticing interaction patterns that are hard to spot when we are in the middle of the action. In the action, we are often wrapped up in our own feelings of pleasure, anxiety, or wanting to make a good impression. We may feel like we are listening and reacting to others, but the observers can clearly see whether this is actually the case, and whether we succeed at collaborating with others. Feedback on our ensemble skills helps us become more observant of and reflexive about our co-creators.
Observers also help performers think about their aesthetic choices within the piece. If everyone bunches up together in the center of the space, or all play the lead melody, observers may point out that the edges of the space, or specific harmonic layers, are left unused. Through this feedback performers can evaluate their contributions in a wider context. Next time, before introducing their initial idea, they may look for the gaps in the piece, and contribute to those instead.
Observing the improv is also an active learning experience. From the audience we see the anxiety in the performer who is out of ideas — and their gratitude when others collaborate to support them. We see the beauty of a spontaneous flock of people moving as a group, with no apparent leader. We see the performer who consistently tries to control the way the exercise unfolds, and the one who breaks the flow by refusing to put themselves in the limelight. We see the collective frustration when something is fundamentally not clicking.
In larp, we do not have formal structures for observing each other’s play — but that does not mean we cannot learn from it. Through methods suggested later in this essay (eg. switching between solo and accompaniment, embracing stillness and boredom) we can become more conscious of the multitude of cues and interactions around us, observe what kind of play they create, and adjust our own play based on what we learn.
Forming Larp Ensembles
Like any other aspect of larp, ensembles are a designable surface. As designers, we can explore methods that facilitate collaborative play and ensemble formation in our larp((A comprehensive selection of useful methods can be found from Larp Design (Koljonen et al. 2019), esp. “Designing the Mechanics You Need” (Wilson 2019).)). As players, we can think about our interaction with other players within the ensemble framework, and make conscious decisions about negotiating and calibrating ensemble play both before and during runtime. A good starting point for designers and players alike is to acknowledge that an ensemble is not simply created when players get along together naturally — it is formed and maintained through conscious efforts and skillful play.
Most pre-negotiated larp ensembles are formed through character relations. Whether pre-written by designers or co-created between players, a diegetic friend circle, military squad, or secret society creates a natural premise for an ensemble. While the characters may have known each other for a lifetime, the players, however, often have not. They need to bridge that gap by employing ensemble skills: being reflexive about each other’s suggestions and cues, and collectively embodying the essence of the character group.
Ensembles are also organically formed in individual scenes. During runtime, any combination of characters interacting with each other positions players into momentary ensembles. This is often where our individual ensemble skills become most visible: Even if we have no idea who these characters are and what they are up to, are we still able to join the scene, collaborate with other players, and allow something interesting to happen?
Players failing to collaborate as an ensemble can easily wreck even the most carefully designed storyline or character group. Conversely, a successful ensemble can create amazing play even in the shoddiest of larps. For this reason it is understandable that some players prefer custom ensembles (i.e. playing with people they already know) and even custom scene content to those randomly created through casting and organic gameplay. While there is nothing wrong with a moderate amount of pre-planning and custom casting, overly opportunistic ensemble optimization can lead to unwanted exclusivity — or what Anni Tolvanen calls the dance card school of larping.
Popularised in 19th century Vienna, a dance card was a system for booking partners in a ball: A lady would pre-plan her evening by accepting dance invitations from particular gentlemen, who would book specific dances from her dance card. In larps, players pre-negotiating content with pre-casted ensembles are metaphorically filling out their dance cards — and the fuller the card, the less availability there is for new, unexpected dance partners.
Dance card larping produces ambivalent outcomes. If our attention is focused on exclusive plans with pre-casted ensembles, we are not open to impromptu invitations and reflexive serendipity. Furthermore, players who are not part of pre-negotiated cliques may feel excluded and rejected, especially if some of their plots or relations get pushed aside for more appealing dance card items.
The core difference between dance card larping and successful ensemble play is inclusiveness. While both may contribute to amazing and powerful scenes and story arcs, only the latter creates open and equal opportunities for co-creation. Organic ensemble play — accepting and embracing the unpredictability of ensemble compositions — leads to mutually cooperative exploration and discovery, where everyone’s presence is acknowledged, and everyone has the possibility to join play they find interesting and meaningful.
Understanding Solo and Accompaniment
Conceptually, all players in an ensemble have equal agency in any given scene. The same is not true for the characters, as the narrative or dramatic spotlight is often focused on particular characters (e.g. a murderer and the police officer who just caught them), while other characters remain in the background (bystanders witnessing the arrest). Some characters may have more diegetic agency to impact the scene than others (the officer can give commands to the murderer as well as the bystanders).
In order to be inclusive collaborators in an ensemble, we need to map((Mapping is the mental process by which a player tracks the overall structure of the larp and their character’s current position within the fiction. (Saitta, Koljonen & Nielsen 2020))) what is going on in the scene, and figure out whether we should contribute to it by solo or accompaniment.
In the context of larp, a solo is best described as the initiative to set the tone or the direction for a scene, a plot, or a narrative. A soloist positions their character into a central role in the scene, and/or strongly steers towards specific interaction or outcome. A solo gets its power from accompaniment: Other players reacting to it, supporting it, and building on it. Without accompaniment the scenes and narratives we build become incoherent and meaningless. If no one acknowledges the murder of the queen, did it even happen?((In Nordic larp discourse this dynamic is also referred to as inter-immersion: the existence of a character being dependent on all players collectively treating the character as a part of the storyworld.))
In an ensemble we have the privilege of expecting support for our solos, but also the duty to make sure everyone else’s solos are given the support they need. Essentially, the division between solo and accompaniment acts as a tool for self-reflection: Which role am I currently taking? Which role would best support the scene or my co-players? Which role would create more interesting play?
Dynamic play relies on players introducing solos and giving new directions to plots and scenes. Concurrently, it’s useful to remember that refraining from a solo does not mean stepping into sidelines or being less important to a scene. Accompanying others requires as much (or even more) skill and focus, and can be as rewarding and enjoyable. Taking turns between solo and accompaniment means we can both boldly suggest our own ideas, and gracefully give space to others without the fear of being ignored or forgotten.
Overcoming the Barriers to Ensemble Play
Most of the barriers to successful ensemble play relate to our needs, desires, ego, and fears. The barriers are not unambiguously negative player traits — most are useful in the right circumstances and in moderation. In this section we talk about how to recognize the impact of our barriers to our play, and how to turn barriers into constructive player skills.
The Desire for Perfectionism
Ironically, the desire to create something flawless is one of the easiest means to prevent anything amazing from happening. Aiming for perfection, we may plan, practice, and steer our play to the point where we are no longer larping, but performing a script. If we fixate on avoiding imperfections and hold on to past failures, we are not open to unexpected challenges and invitations to play.
So what can we do? Instead of dreading failures, embrace them. Some failures we can move past gracefully, while others will turn out to be gifts. If we are in sync with others, and engaged in mutually supportive play, even our unexpected fumbles can be collectively picked up and transformed into something beautiful.
The Hunger to Play Big
This barrier entices us to play our scenes with fierce commitment to our vision, without pausing to consider whether our play is in sync with others. Instead of looking for a way to collaborate with the ensemble, we focus solely on what works for our character.
Some very talented players fall into this trap, and their performances can indeed be impressive — but are they listening to or playing with others as equals? Few players enjoy spending their whole larp playing second fiddle to someone else’s neverending solo, no matter how believable and powerful that solo performance is.
The hunger to play big can be hard to solve on our own, because we are not always aware of how forceful our impact is on others. Luckily, there is an easy solution to test this in play: Instead of acting on every impulse and idea that pops up, try deliberately letting some slide by, and actively make room until others take initiative.
The Fear of Standing Out
Hiding inside an ensemble is another barrier to play, although an understandable one: We may fear appearing demanding, weird, or uncool, and rarely go for the play we truly want. We may feel easily rejected and would rather withdraw than ask to be included.
Being part of an ensemble does not mean that good things will come to us without us needing to put our necks out. We have all met or personally been the devastated player in an afterparty who did not get the play they wished for. Sometimes that player was indeed lacking the support they would deserved, but sometimes they also did not step forward when they should have done so.
The moment to claim our space rarely comes on a silver platter and with visible safety nets attached. It is simply on us to take the jump, and trust that our ensemble will catch us. To quote the beloved icon of audacity, Carrie Fisher: Stay afraid, but do it anyway. What’s important is the action. You don’t have to wait to be confident. Just do it and eventually the confidence will follow.
The Obsession with Larp Magic
The perfect can be a powerful foe of the good. If we chase the most magical scenes and the best exclusive plots, we often miss what is right in front of us. We may have a specific bar for satisfying play, and deem anything below it unworthy of our attention and effort. We can even become envious and frustrated if we think a better scene is happening elsewhere.
For an ensemble to function, we must play the scene we are actually in, not the scene we wish we were in. Players pining to be somewhere else, doing something else, suck all the energy out of an ensemble. Treating the present as a hindrance to our preferred play is not only unconstructive, but also disrespectful towards our co-players. Larp magic always begins with interaction in the here and now: concentrating on the present brings us closer to it.
The Terror of Silence
One barrier is the fear of being still. We may want to make sure we have something going on at all times, to have our dance cards full, and avoid boredom at all cost.
Silence, stillness, and empty space are essential ingredients in any work of art. Trying to fill every empty moment prevents us from noticing that something is already happening. A player who bursts in on a delicate scene with an outlandish agenda is often attempting to fix a problem that does not exist.
A good ensemble player discovers the scene, instead of forcing it to happen. If we challenge ourselves to indulge in moments of in-character stillness and spend some time just observing, we are likely to spot something interesting. Others may even join our stillness and start something that turns out to be unforgettable.
Disagreement Over Matters of Taste
Differences over taste need not be barriers to a working ensemble. However, if we feel like others do not understand our play style or we do not understand theirs, this can become a hindrance. We may conclude that no functional play can come out of this situation, and give up on co-creation entirely.
Taste differences will arise — but a generous ensemble player does their best to try out and support different kinds of play. Even in the rare situation where finding a functional compromise seems unlikely, it is good form to remain open to collaboration of some kind. Sometimes we just have to pick our battles, and that’s completely normal in creative work.
Social Bias
Most players put strong emphasis on player chemistry, attractiveness, verbal skills, or social status. This is human. However, remaining unaware of our biases creates barriers for play. If we do not challenge our prejudices and inhibitions towards people who do not fulfill our criteria, or who we think are unapproachable or “out of our league”, we needlessly limit the composition of our ensembles.
Larping is an intimate activity, and it would be irresponsible to say that everyone can play as an ensemble with everyone else. Yet, sometimes our reluctance to play with others is a question of lukewarm chemistry or petty prejudice, not insurmountable social conflicts.
A picky or suspicious attitude towards coplayers destroys the co-creative trust needed to form an ensemble. Unless there are serious real-life implications involved, we should never entirely ignore someone’s request for play. Being respectful and open-minded costs us very little — and may make a huge difference to someone else’s larp.
“Today’s Just Not the Day”
Finally, there are times when good ensemble players show up, are present and reflexive, contribute both solos and accompaniment, and have the desire to create and maintain the ensemble — and the magic still does not happen.
Accepting things as they come is an inherent part of ensemble play: we need to let go of the things that are not working out. In any given larp we interact with several overlapping ensembles. They will not all be equally functional, nor will they all be equally good matches to our personal preferences. The natural ebb and flow of co-creation always includes weak, embarrassing, dysfunctional, and disappointing moments, and a strong ensemble, as well as a strong ensemble player, faces those moments with grace and acceptance.
We Give and We Gain
We all join ensembles with our personal challenges, inhibitions, talents, and resources. The task in ensemble play is not to perform perfectly in all areas simultaneously, but to calibrate our own fears and desires, and contribute in the moment with what we have.
Ensemble play grants us moments of magic we cannot predict or design. It also makes us challenge our insecurities and inhibitions, and contributes not only to better player skills, but a better off-game community by creating play where players feel supported and able to take risks; fostering unexpected connections and rewards for cooperation; adding nuance to characters by giving them a wider array of interactions; providing the framework for a personal practice of social intelligence; and reducing the impact of off-game social hierarchies on who gets to play.
Bibliography
Anne Bogart & Tina Landau (2005): The Viewpoints Book: A Practical Guide to Viewpoints and Composition. Theatre Communications Group, Inc.
Tova Gerge (2004): Temporary Utopias: The Political Reality of Fiction in Beyond Role and Play. Ropecon.
Johanna Koljonen (2007): Eye-witness to the Illusion: An Essay on the Impossibility of 360° Role-Playing in Lifelike. Projektgruppen KP07.
Solmukohta 2020 is over and you can find all the talks here! This years Finnish edition of the Nordic larp conference Knutepunkt was held online, as the Covid-19 pandemic made physically meeting up impossible.
The program was streamed as video and we’ve gathered all recordings of talks here, together with transcripts and slides where available.
Solmukohta 2020 Keynote speakers: Kjell Hedgard Hugaas, Sarah Lynne Bowman, Usva Seregina and Jonaya Kemper.
Sarah Lynne Bowman – Integrating Larp Experiences
In this keynote, Dr. Sarah Lynne Bowman will discuss the importance of integration practices for concretizing and completing transformative processes after larps end and daily life resumes. She will present different techniques for integrating transformative experiences into our off-game lives, including creative expression, intellectual analysis, emotional processing, mindful transitioning to daily life, interpersonal processing, and community building.
Kjell Hedgard Hugaas – Designing for Transformative Impacts
In this keynote, Kjell Hedgard Hugaas will make the case for why we should design larps that invite the potential for transformative impacts on players. He will discuss the importance of transparency and intentionality when designing for impacts in domains such as emotional processing, social cohesion, educational goals, and political aims.
Larps and larp related events have started to become more common for children, but there’s a gap between ages 12 and 18. They’re not children anymore, yet not old enough to attend adult-themed larps. We are at risk of losing this age group if there are no games for them, when there’s often no big reason to exclude them. Janina Kahela has organized several larps for children and separately for teens as participants of “grown up larps”. After a short intro the program will host open discussion in the comment section on the subject.
Kaisa Kangas – Seaside Prison – Designing Larp for Wider Cultural Audiences
Seaside Prison is a blackbox larp financially supported by Finnish Cultural Foundation, about life in Gaza. Lately, art and entertainment in general have been going towards interactive and immersive dimensions, and there has been interest towards the larp toolbox among, for example, performance artists. However, wider cultural audiences often find traditional larps hard to approach since they take a lot of time and require preparation. One of the ideas behind Seaside Prison is to create a package that is easier to approach. The larp is run in a theatre environment and employs sound, light, and video projection. Could this be a joint future for larp and theatre? In this talk we discuss how the larp was created, its aims, and the possible futures for larp in the culture establishment.
Mátyás Hartyándi – Larp – Oddity, Hypernym or what?
A talk about the future and self-definition of larps for those who are interested in overlapping activities and/or multidisciplinary cooperations. As the meaning and praxis of Nordic larps evolved and expanded during the last two decades, some of its larps became nearly indistinguishable from other established forms of role-playing (e.g. process drama or socio drama). Is this a bug or a feature? What type of relations can enrich larp? And (how) should we react to these changes? Larp has the potential to become a new, inclusive, and all-encompassing umbrella movement, but inbred ignorance in its circles might also limit its recognition in favor of more established forms. How can the larp movement stay geniune yet be open to change? And what kind of role should larping take in the eyes of outsiders?
In this talk, the speaker will offer an overview and typology of different kinds of safewords and gestures currently in use, a consideration of what requirements and parameters need to be taken into account in choosing safewords for a larp, and an evaluation of benefits, risks and problems that might arise with different types of safewords.
The focus is on finding safewords that contribute to the creation of a “brave space”.
Alessandro G. – Designing Nostalgia – Techniques for Larp about Memory and Ageing
In this talk we will explore how larp design can deal with memory, past, and ageing. Is it possible to use those factors to enhance our larp experience? Are there specific techniques? Can we use nostalgia as a design tool? We will explore these themes and present design solutions and case studies based on sound, non-linear timelines, smell, objects, character writing and transpartent design. Expect a dynamic and enaging talk, open to questions.
Charles Bo Nielsen – Bad Romance
Content warning: sexual assault, violence
How to use bad romance to play more comfortably with people you have less chemistry with. It can often be easier to play romance that doesn’t work out well, because it gives a good excuse to keep intimacy to a minimum while still having a lot of meaningful relational play. This talk will also include more non-binary examples, after some well founded critisism of that lacking in an earlier talk on romance. Expect lots of awkward romance memes!
Jost L. Hansen – Solmukohta TV
Solmukohta TV (also SKTV, KPTV, or SK-KPTV) is a sketch show about larpers, made by larpers. SK/KPTV is a tradition that started at Knudepunkt 2015 in Denmark. The show used to involve just the four host countries, but last year we opened up so any country can submit their videos to include even more people in the fun. This new tradition will continue at SK20. Come and watch whatever madness participants have come up with!
Usva S. – Living or Larping Consumer Culture? Exploring the Commodification of Larp
In the recent years, we have witnessed a definitive growth of the larp community and a growth in recognition of larp in wider culture as a legitimised activity. As larp begins to be more present in society, the wider culture also penetrates the social structures of larp as a community and an activity, one of the central outcomes of which is the commodification of larp. In this talk, I discuss how larp is becoming commodified, what that means, and what the repercussions of this development are for specific events as well as the community at large.
Russians love mechanics and philosophy. In this talk, we’ll tell you about some best practices in Russian larp mechanics, and also explain how they work to enlighten these larps’ ideas or to move the story forward.
Using music for fighting, origami for science, duct tape for flashbacks, pins for sex… we can continue this list forever!
Mikko Heimola, Nino Hynninen, Jukka Seppänen – Shearing Sheep and Holding Ballots – Community Building in a Post-Apocalyptic Campaign
Content warning: pandemic
Second Year (Toinen vuosi) was a 4-part larp campaign about building a community of survivors immediately following an apocalyptic pandemic. The larp focused on community building and practical aspects of survival – how a group of strangers coordinates their interests, how norms and institutions develop over time, and how consultants build a chicken coop. The presentation discusses pros and cons of this setting for a larp and what aspects should be given special attention in larp design.
Eleanor Saitta, Johanna Koljonen, Martin Nielsen – Maps, Loops, and Larps
Have you ever thought about what you actually do when you larp? How you understand the game around you and decide what to do next? Have you thought about that awkward period at the start of a game where nothing connects yet? In this talk, Johanna, Martin, and Eleanor will try to make sense of the way we manage information and make decisions during play.
Elzbieta Glowacka, Karolina Fedyk – Never Prepared, Always Ready
Numerous larps, particularly sandbox larps, give the players the opportunity to engage in preplay – be it short scenes in the form of play-by-forum rpg, memes, quizzes, or letters to and from the characters. Not all playing styles are conducive for preplay. While such tools can improve the experience, they are not for everyone, and in certain rare cases they might even affect the larp negatively. In our talk, we’d like to share our thoughts on how to recognise such situations and approach preplay, or lack thereof, in ways that will be beneficial for all the larp participants.
This presentation aims to address alternative approaches to sandbox larp preparations and techniques of getting in character for people who can’t or don’t want to engage preplay in forms mentioned above, and more. It covers both exploration of one’s role and outward-oriented means of getting to know your character through costume, practical tools to approach character creation and designing character arcs. Finally, it addresses FOMO and ways of alleviating it, to make the game as enjoyable and memorable as possible. Might also contain topics of attention and focus, simple mnemotechniques, tools for relation building like mind maps, and onions.
Lindsay Wolgel – Larp/Theatre Crossover in NYC
This is a talk about the larp/theatre crossover work currently emerging in NYC, based on the projects Lindsay has been a part of in the past year as a professional actor in New York. Productions include Sinking Ship Creations’ Off-Off Broadway show The Mortality Machine, Calculations by Caroline Murphy of Incantrix Productions, OASIS Travel Agency (an immersive theatre/nightlife/alternate reality game blend with participatory elements by Silver Dream Factory) and more! Discussion includes the experience of being a hired facilitator/actor in these pieces as well as the trend of commercial “immersive experiences” in NYC.
From Twitter and Facebook to custom-created platforms, social media has been used in larp both in- and off-game. This talk looks at the various social media platforms, their pros and cons, and how they have been employed or faked in various larps. We also take a peek at the future of social media in larp.
Kol Ford – Mind the Gap: Barriers to larping for people from backgrounds of structural poverty
Larpers that come from a background of structural poverty face significant barriers when attempting to fully participate in larps. This talk looks at the challenges faced by such individuals both as participants and as organisers as well as presents the strategies developed by poorer larpers. By looking at the strategies that are already being adopted, we can see what we can all do as a community. Existing larp structures, such as subsidised tickets and crewing, work really well, but a lot more can be done!
The talk is aimed at larpers who are interested in doing what they can to help larpers from poor backgrounds to participate. The goal is to open a discussion about what we can do to help more people feel welcome and included in our hobby. We will talk openly and frankly about the difficulties that we face as participants and organisers, as well as explore ways in which larpers are already addressing the above described problems. We will further explore common barriers faced by the various types of poverty, the unique problems faced by their different circumstances, and the benefits of widening participation to include people from poor backgrounds.
Josefin Westborg, Anders Berned, Kol Ford, Mike Pohjola – 500 Magic Schools for Children and Youth
This programme item brings together the NGOs, companies and other entities that run magic schools for kids and youth. Each organisation will be presented with a focus on what they have in common, what they do differently and why, and how they can inspire each other. The aim is to create knowledge exchange and inspire others to start up magic schools. One goal in the programme is to agree on when we would like to have 500 magic schools for kids in Europe (and how to get the funds to start it up).
Mika Loponen – Turku Manifesto 20 Year Memorial Burnin’
20 years after the first Solmukohta of the Millennium, we gather to celebrate the first great political act of Finnish larp: the publishing of The Turku Manifesto – and it’s subsequent burning as an act of political vandalism. Loved and loathed for two decades, the proponents and the opponents of the manifesto agree on one thing: no larp related work prior to the manifesto has affected the art form as deeply – nor has been discussed as heatedly and widely. At the 20 year memorial burning, we delve deeply into the uncompromising vision of the publication – and then burn the hell out of it. Hosted by Mika Loponen, the original arsonist, with A VERY SURPRISING SURPRISE GUEST!
Chris Bergstresser – Peacock – a Global Larp Clearinghouse
Getting information about larps in the hands of players is an ongoing struggle for organizers. And finding out what larps are being run is equally challenging for players. I have a proposal — and a prototype — for a larp clearinghouse named Peacock. It includes standards for larp data and a website to share that information.
This talk will show the basic features of the system, along with the design decisions, to be followed by a discussion about the remaining steps to reach a public beta.
Thomas B., Mélanie Dorey, Michael Freudenthal – Is Immersive Theatre the Future of Larp?
Content warning: sexual assault
Thomas B. is an opinionated connoisseur of larp, dilettante larpwright, and immersive theatre debutante. While repeatedly ranting about the word “immersive”, Thomas will cover highlights of larp-ish events such as Assassin’s Creed in Napoléon’s mausoleum, costume parties in Versailles, a murder mystery in the prison cell of the Marquis de Sade, physically chasing the plot train in NYC, and larping with unprepared actors in theatre basements. Mélanie & Michael co-wrote The Lost Generation, an immersive theatre party focused on seamless narrative design. They will present a vision from the field as well as examples from their design. All attendees welcome, no prior experience necessary.
Late contribution. This video was not part of Solmukohta 2020 online programme.
Let’s take a larp design perspective on our current (Western) life/culture, analysing the roles we get offered to play in our contemporary societies as if it were a Nordic Larp. What world design are we exposed to? Which factions, which campaigns can we choose? What conditions, items, and degrees of freedom are we given? Can we influence the narrative, goals, or ending? Through a game design perspective we might gain a deeper understanding of our agency, rewards, and challenges.
All Talks
You can also fin all talks in this YouTube playlist:
Update 2020-05-01: Added “Life As Bad Larp Design” by Herwig Kopp.
Thomas B. is an opinionated connoisseur of larp, dilettante larpwright, and immersive theatre debutante. While repeatedly ranting about the word “immersive”, Thomas will cover highlights of larp-ish events such as Assassin’s Creed in Napoléon’s mausoleum, costume parties in Versailles, a murder mystery in the prison cell of the Marquis de Sade, physically chasing the plot train in NYC, and larping with unprepared actors in theatre basements. Mélanie & Michael co-wrote The Lost Generation, an immersive theatre party focused on seamless narrative design. They will present a vision from the field as well as examples from their design. All attendees welcome, no prior experience necessary.
Thomas B., Mélanie Dorey, Michael Freudenthal
[CW] sexual assault
Q&A from the original viewing at Solmukohta 2020 Online event
PART 1:
Anonymous 1:n OK, what /is/ eläytim… Something?
Thomas B: immersion in character
Anonymous 2: What’s an example of a non-immersive party?
Michael F: Smoking outside? (Nah, that’s still peripheral participation)
PART 2:
Anonymous 3: Looks fascinating! i imagine it’s played in French?
Melanie Dorey: Yes it’s played in French for now but we are thinking about opening an English speaking version 🙂
Anonymous 4: plateauwriting I would call “devicing”
Melanie Dorey: Oh okay thanks !
Anonymous 5: I like this production process overview timeline but what happens after Showtime 😀 #experiencedesign
Melanie Dorey: We’re not covering in so much in the talk but can talk about it after in the live chat if you are interested 😀
Michael F: Pretty much it’s a party. People are talking about themselves, about each others views on fun things like war or artistic creation, then later yelling at each other, or supporting each other. Just a party. But Melanie will put it differently!
Melanie Dorey That allowed the cast to differentiate participants and for the actors to know what interaction to do with the participants
Melanie Dorey Note : all types of interaction are the same price
ANON5: I wonder how this would work with my aversion to larping with NPC:s? I always experence them as being “empty” because they aren’t played by a fellow player who wants things for themselves and that they should stop wasting time on me and go play with someone who appreciates them.
Thomas B: you could avoid talking to them and talk to the other guests instead
Thomas B: some other attendees were basically larping, others more shy and just an
Anon6: Would love the name of the book and the auther about queer games and degamification
Anon7: I believe it is this one:
Ruberg, Bonnie, and Adrienne Shaw, eds. Queer game studies. U of Minnesota Press, 2017.
Michael Gyr Yes and Video-Games Have Always Been Queer!
Anon8: A very mudane question to this amazing project: What did the tickets cost? Did you get support/sponsing from other sources?
Melanie Dorey We don’t really cover that in the talk but can talk about it after in the live chat
Melanie Dorey Very briefly : all the costs were covered by tickets
Melanie Dorey And we didn’t have any support or sponsoring
Michael Gyr The tickets were 55€ (early bird) to 65€ but the next production budget needed more to cover the cost and make a small margin, and got to 68€ – 78€.
Hanne Grasmo Michael Gyr OK, that is not much: I paid like 290 dollars for similar experience in NYC.
Michael Gyr The Paris immersive scene is just starting. Also, we would like to be as accessible as possible and it’s a bummer because the production costs a lot. Kol Ford’s talk this year was inspiring in that light.
Jenny M. Nordfalk The definition of being a professional is that you get paid, I guess? maybe there should be a third group in between the actors and the audience? We went to an immersive interactive murder mystery last year and I had a lot of guests coming up to me after and thanking me along with the actors..
Michael Gyr We had people mistook for actors AND actors mistook for audience. That was the intent of blurring the lines alright 🙂
Anon9: Who’s your photographer? This all looks gorgeous.
Melanie Dorey It’s Les Garçonnes Studio !
Anon10: How many hours did the actors use for preparations? Where they paid for all of that???
Melanie Dorey We had about 10 full days of workshops and rehearsals with the actors (which is not a lot), we didn’t have the budget unfortunately for the rehearsals but all the show nights were paid
Anon11: What were the buzz words given to the most interactive participants, and hiow did they work?
Melanie Dorey They were secret phrases about the characters personal lives (like something you would know if you were an acquaintance)
Melanie Dorey Like “How was summer in the Riviera, Zelda ?”
Anon12: Were they different for different players and towards different characters, was it like giving the players relationships with the actors characters?
Melanie Dorey Players had different characters but each character had only one secret code
Anon12: Did the actors then take extra responsibility for those players? making them part of their group?
Melanie Dorey Yes those participants were part of their “crew” for the night
Anon12: Perfect, how many players did every actor have in their crew? and as it only the most intersctive feathers or did all players take part in a crew?
Melanie Dorey Yes it was for the most interactive feathers only (as it included more intense interactions), and each character had from 5 to 7 members of the “crew”
Anon14: Was it possible for the participants to change their feather during the performance?
Michael Gyr Very good one. No it was not. But if you were to talk with the cast while wearing a “I don’t want direct interaction” feather, they would adapt their behaviour towards you, and talk with you (with a little caution). Also, all feathers all looked nice (golden, black with a golden tip, red with a golden tip).
Anon13: If possible would you implement that feature for a rerun or was it best as it was?
Melanie Dorey I think it could be a possibility to include that feature in our out of game safe zone !
Anon15: What was the number of involved people in the team overall? Light, sound, production design, actors, concierges etc. On your team and from the rented location if any
Melanie Dorey We had overall a team of 15 people for the staff (production, filming, venue, bar,…)
Melanie Dorey 2 people from the venue
Anon12: How many actors?
Melanie Dorey 7 actors, 3 musicians, 2 bartenders, 3 people from production
Anon16: What major things did you change from run 1 to run 2?
Melanie Dorey We changed : set design (moved furniture), lighting, acting direction (by prepping to better answers to participants and implementing yesterday’s successes and mistakes)
Melanie Dorey Mostly the change of the set design was a huge improvement because it allowed participants to feel more legitimate in the space
Anon16: Did you as designers had a vision for content (not only aestetics) before you started researching and designing?
Melanie Dorey We wanted something that was truly interactive and felt like a legitimate party for everyone (cast AND participants) : we didn’t want to have a frontal story with pieces of interaction but really a sandbox for everyone.
Melanie Dorey That determined the party format before anything else.
Anon17: Thank you so much, it was super-interesting!! 2 Questions: Was there a mechanism to step interaction up or down during runtime? Did you use safe-words or tap out to signal something is too much?
Michael Gyr Good question, thanks! Besides training with the actors (which was not enough, considering errors have been made), there were three levels of “human safety nets” for audience participants. All were on the production side.
The opener was the person to go to if you needed something during the show (they wandered around and checked up with people, in character), the bar was the place you go if there was any kind of problem or behaviour to report, and there was a saf(er), more quiet place where we would check up on the audience, or bring them if needed.
Anon18: What info did participants get beforehand? Did they get a 30 second rules brief at the door or a document with the ticket or website?
Michael Gyr Hi! By mail they got information on what was expected of them in terms of dressing up and more importantly, a quite short and explicit “accepted behaviour”. Thomas pointed out it looked inspired by SK/KP, which it was. There we mentioned, among other things, that racist or sexist historical (or not) talk will not be accepted by audience participants, with examples.
Michael Gyr The onboarding was quite thought of and showed the rules of interaction for the evening, to make the audience participant understand they can role play, talk to us, laugh with us and so on. The process could be another 30mn talk.
Anon18: Did you bring them in in groups you briefed or a short one-by-one thing?
Michael Gyr Haha as I said, a whole new talk. The briefing was short and simple, with a very small group (4-5 people). It was more of an in-character scene including practicalities, setting the tone and announcing the ending (like Thomas said about opening and closing the “magic circle”, the blurry boundaries of play).
Thomas Be Also, importantly the emails were sent well in advance, so you had time to prep, as opposed to most other immersive experiences that really send info last minute. I’m all for last-minute reminders, but the ground rules should be laid early on, a bit how we do in larps with design documents etc.
Anon18: What made you decide on theme? Location or story or something else?
I see both negative and positive aspects of the 20’s aesthetic as it has been done (at least in Sweden) as Great Gatsby parties that seem very directed to a non-interactive crowd.
Melanie Dorey A few things made us decide on the theme :
– We always create site-specific work, and we were inspired by this particular historical location.
– We used on purpose the 20’s aesthetic to go in the opposite direction that is generally portrayed in “Gatsby parties”, and therefore to write about : femininity, masculinity, post-war trauma, abusive relationships, closeted queerness… All these themes portrayed by the characters we chose.
– This “twist” (in the expectations) was something we wanted for participants experience, even though we did a lot of disclaimers about themes addressed in the experience.
– We didn’t notice any negative effects coming from the audience because the party format and the types of interaction were giving the choices to everyone of how they wanted to live the experience. So you could have a nice themed party with your friends or chose to dive in the heart of the story and influence it.
– Globally, we thinks that the Roaring Twenties are such an interesting period to write about because it can be layered so much in writing and is reflective in many ways of the times we live today.
Thomas Be Also stuff I had to cut down due to time: check out the binaural-audio-in-the-dark work of Darkfield http://www.darkfield.org/ , I attended “Play” in Edinburgh and “Flight” in Melbourne and both are super interesting. No agency, but amazing audio/installation work.
Thomas Be And for another immersive theatre play, this time set in a fictitious Parisian brothel with various design issues (pay to play, favouring the loud, and super uncomfortable masks) check out Close: https://www.bigdrama.fr/
Thomas Be For an immersive theatre version of Hamlet, clearly inspired by Sleep No More but with Shakespearean text (in French) instead of dancing, check out out Helsingor: https://chateauhamlet.jimdofree.com/
Thomas Be And thanks to Le Musée du Fake for the reminder, other things I cut out due to time: if you’re wondering about what an immersive poetry event could look like, check your local Poetry Brothel, or Le Bordel de la Poésie in Paris, by L’assaut des poètes: https://www.lassautdespoetes.com/
Anon19: I like this slider. Do/did you have in France what’s sometimes called “environmental theatre”? It’s perhaps a cousin of what is now usually described as “immersive”, and started in the 1960s with a movement to consciously minimise the role between actor and audience. In the 90s “environmental theatre” also sometimes referred to theatre where you as the audience walked around the space, like shows where you go from room to room to see different scenes and put it all together.
I’m just wondering because I suspect this slider has even more words between these ones.
Oh heck I just realised this is a talk that should be done.
Michael Gyr A talk that should be done, yes! Anna & I put together a spreadsheet to gather examples (but that can be improved)
Thomas Be There’s a lot of other types of participatory thingies “proper theatre” from theatre of the oppressed to I-cant-remember, no idea how much was done in France. I know a French larper who wrote a paper about it long time ago
Getting information about larps in the hands of players is an ongoing struggle for organizers. And finding out what larps are being run is equally challenging for players. I have a proposal — and a prototype — for a larp clearinghouse named Peacock. It includes standards for larp data and a website to share that information. This talk will show the basic features of the system, along with the design decisions, to be followed by a discussion about the remaining steps to reach a public beta.
Q&A from the original viewing at Solmukohta 2020 Online event
Anonymous 1: I suppose you just need a system like the escape rooms or the delievery-fooderies have (BOX, Escapeall, E-food, Walt, etc), with a small % if you get your players from there.
Problem is, do you want your larp to exist in a platform with another 100/200/500 “competitive” larps?
Anonymous 2: I would like is one very useful feature for producers and designers: A call for last minute participants, when there is people jumping off – with info on if it is paid for or not etc. And participants could have profiles where they list if they are “a last minute player”. This feature would maybe make larps wanna be on the site.
Anonymous 3: Are there many other services that work like this?
Chris Bergstresser: Federated services are fairly common in computing.
Anonymous 3: Uhm, I am not aware of any public service like this one. Everything I’ve used or seen requires logging into the central interface to modify data. This rocks.
Anonymous 4: Ah, automatic currency conversion, that’s convenient (and prevents using free-form text fields for prices, but I see that multiple prices are allowed). One suggestion though: Annotate prices with a description (e.g. “Player”, “NPC”, etc.) to make it a bit clearer?
Chris Bergstresser: Great ideas, but it’s part of the complexity of offering more than one price. The more complicated, the harder to understand. Fairly simple technical problem, somewhat less so UI/UX problem.
Anonymous 5: Looks really useful! One suggestion is to have the Location on the filter show the country instead of the address
Anonymous 6: What’s your code sharing model? Will this be a GitHub thing?
Chris Bergstresser It’s on GitHub. I’m willing to open source it, but we need to think through licensing.
Chris Bergstresser I’m more concerned the API is well-documented, so it can be replicated by others without needing the code.
Anonymous 7: Chris Bergstresser I am not sure how much and in which way I can contribute, but this looks interesting. How should I contact you to get involved?
Chris Bergstresser Chat on Facebook is probably easiest to get started.
Anonymous 8: I also have some ideas and feedback already based on the talk and the documentation online, what would be the best place for that? Here in the comments allows others to react, but it is easy to lose it, of course.
Sindre Punsvik Thank you! Sounds very interesting, in particular as an UX designer. Not sure if I will have capacity to help more than bouncing ideas
Anonymous 9: I saw the idea is to put YAML in `<script>` tags in webpages. I’m all for YAML, but I’m not sure a `<script>` tag is the right place. Doesn’t HTML have something more semantically applicable for this?
Also, it is nice to just put it into an event website (probably easy enough for novice webmasters too), but at first glance that would mean that each event must be registered in the system separately. It would be interesting to have just a single URL to be polled for an organization that can list all events (though I guess the current design could actually do that).
ALso, isn’t there some kind of existing annotation system (RDF springs into my mind) from the “semantic web” corner that could be used as a base for annotations?
Chris Bergstresser: The initial idea would be to register a root domain, and spider all the pages to gather all the larps for a given organization. That’s a little complicated, though, which is why it’s not in the initial prototype.
As for a better HTML container for this data, I’m not aware of one. <script> tags have the advantage there’s all sorts of special coding around them (since they have to be able to handle Javascript, which contains < and & characters) so they’re safe in all browsers for embedding the information.
I stole the idea from Mustache, which does things like:
<script id="template" type="x-tmpl-mustache">
Hello {{ name }}!
</script>
Anonymous 9: Spidering could indeed work, but does make things more complicated maybe. Thinking from our own organisation, we have a single registration system (which is *almost* ready) that knows about all our events and could easily export all needed into on a single URL. I guess both single-URL and spidering approaches could co-exist, of course.
As for the script tags, I’m slightly worried that browsers will try to execute javascript as a fallback if they do not know the type (not sure if that happens in practice, maybe only with ancient browsers) and that all kinds of systems might end up stripping script tags.
OTOH, I guess that stripping script tags can be a feature: If someone can publish script tags on a domain, they will have some authority on this domain (e.g. you will not be able to fake event data using a comment on a website since script tags will usually be stripped). Another approach could be to only look at the <head> tags and not the <body>, but that could complicate publishing data in typicaly CMS’s mayb e.
Anonymous 9: The proposed YAML format does not list a format version number, which is probably good to add to facilitate format changes in the future (and think a bit on how that would work as well).
Chris Bergstresser: There is one coded, but if it’s missing we assume it’s version “1”. I’m hoping most changes can be accomodated in a backwards-compatible fashion, but we’re safe if it can’t be.
Anonymous 9: In my experience, requiring (or at least encouraging) an explicit version number is always a good idea, since it leaves less room for interpretation. But indeed, a default of 1 could work as well.
Anonymous 9: One thing to think about is how to *remove* an event from the list. Removing it from the original webpage could work, but that means that normally events should be listed there indefinitely (which might not happen in practice as people clean up their websites or websites go offline, without any intention of being removed from the archive).
Chris Bergstresser: We need to think through how events age through the system. If events disappear before they happen we assume they were canceled (you took down the web page before it happened, must not be happening) but after that point I think we assume they ran.
But there’s weirdness there. What if people reuse the id? Do we allow people to remove events after the fact? What if people say they attended a canceled larp?
Anonymous 9: I also think that the list of URLs to scrape metadata from might be one of the biggest assets in this system and might need to be separately managed and published (e.g. a github repo with URL lists per country maybe?). Making this list separate makes i…See
Chris Bergstresser: One of the eventual things should be a way for federated systems to share routes to poll with each other, so you can register a route with any given aggregator and they’ll all learn about it. Seems overkill at this point in the design.
Google avoids the problem by just indexing every web page in the universe. Which must be nice.
Anonymous 9: Using Google to find these tags could be nice (maybe require including some unique string in the metadata), but that also opens up a lot of possibilities of dataset poisoning because it removes the step of explicitly adding routes to the dataset and thus also the implicit review process in that.
Chris Bergstresser: Oh, I wasn’t suggesting using Google to find them. Just that, if we were Google, this problem is solved through brute force.
Anonymous 9: I know, but your comment made me realize that Google *could* be used to find them, which is interesting in itself.
Anonymous 10: Is there a status field? For signup open, cloSed, waitlist, in design
Chris Bergstresser: Yes. By default it’s “active” which is why it’s left off many of the examples.
Josefin Westborg, Anders Berned, Kol Ford, Mike Pohjola
This programme item brings together the NGOs, companies and other entities that run magic schools for kids and youth. Each organisation will be presented with a focus on what they have in common, what they do differently and why, and how they can inspire each other. The aim is to create knowledge exchange and inspire others to start up magic schools. One goal in the programme is to agree on when we would like to have 500 magic schools for kids in Europe (and how to get the funds to start it up).
Q&A from the original viewing at Solmukohta 2020 Online event
Anon 1: I love the idea to create your own IP for the magic school based on the local culture, folk tales and myths. I’d love to know more about the Finnish magic school.
Anon 2: Agree! I run an ‘edularp’ for 4 Hungarian students weekly which is set in the HP universe and it uses the Hungarian Pálos rend (Order of Saint Paul the First Hermit) as a background
Anders Gredal Berner Anon 2: Sound awesome! What age group is the students?
Anon 2: 11-12yo. One of them already had tabletop RPG experience .
Mike Pohjola We’ve used local customs and beliefs when applicable. Like using an Easter tradition to create monsters (trulli) and a way to defeat them (Easter whips) for a larp played in Easter.
The school Houses are loosely inspired by different parts of heritage of this area, but that’s not something we’ve explained to the kids yet. Mostly they’re based on different personality traits.
Then many of the words we’ve created based on really old Finnish words, like marto (=dead) for a non-wizard. (Just to be different than Potterverse.)
Anon 4: Would be interesting to do a magic school intirely based on folklore
Anon 5: In magic school you can play out your wildest fantasy of going to school where the classes aren’t boring
Anon 6: I just listened to some of the interviews from last autumn about Finnish Velhokoulu, and some of the kids love stealing candy while invisible and teasing the teachers, so basically making things happen with “magic” in a very simple way
Anon 7: I would love to throw on (I work in a non profit association as game facilitator and children educator) but truly I don’t know where to begin. I have children from 6 to 15
Anders Gredal Berner Anon 7: Sound awesome. We had a long discussion after the recording, also touching on how to help others to starting up. Im sure the rest of the panel is also up for helping -And your very welcome to get our materiales, guides ect.
Anon 7: I would love that if it’s ok with you. :O
:
Anon 3: Anders I would like that very much.
Anon 6: And kids love adults reacting to the magic the students perform
Anon 2: Do you think its ‘just’ the power of empowerment or is there something else in it?
Anon 6: I think it’s both: it’s also immersion, and having adults play with them in this imaginary world that to some feels very real and they keep playing their characters even at home with friends and family
Anon 2: They keep playing at home? THAT sounds interesting!
Mike Pohjola Essentially we teach them new children’s games. Like if you put your hands like this you’re invisible. Or this is a new version of catch-me-if-you-can that is the magical effect of the monster.
Anon 6: Velhokoulu.fi is the Finnish website, it’s all in Finnish at the moment but you can find a description and pictures of our houses there. Also video links and Instagram was recently added
Anon 5: magic schools have no homework
Anon 8: A side note, Josefin’s outfit is a blast <3
Anon 9: also yay for gender-neutral terms!
Anon 6: In general I like to use the work “taikoja” so a “magic user”, since I feel velho is more a boy term still but that’s mainly because in the books Harry Potter is a velho/wizard and Hermione is a noita/witch.
Mike Pohjola Yeah, that’s an Anglicism. In Finnish tradition they’re both gender neutral.
Anon 10: The adults keeps the world more real for the children, being a part of the immersion and magic. It’s easier for the children to be a part and take a part of the game as their characters when the adults encourages them in their characters. The younger the player, the more important it is.
Anon 7: It’s cool that things happen in the magic world. Like it’s not just a background and can be played anywhere
Anon 6: We have 40min class then 20min break where they can invade the teachers’ lounge, talk to creatures and explore.
Anon 6: Classes usually have handcrafts or taming magical creatures or spell tag
Anon 10: Not sure if I missed this, but (about) how many players you have in one game? Since we have about 50players a game in Velhokoulu.
Anon 6: Good question!
Anders Gredal Berner Our magic school is up to 50 participant + teachers, helpers, monsters.
Josefin Westborg In the library larp we have they meet famous children story characters from books that they need to help. One of them are Loki the Norse god. Last time we had a child that asked who I was when I showed up as Loki. I didn’t answer but mumbled something about that I needed to get back at my brother Thor. Then he looked at me and got wide eyes and said: Oh, no. I know who you are. You are Loki! I’m not gonna help you, I’m on your brothers side”. And then he walked away.
Anon 6: I like this test idea :OOO we could have that too in Ropecon etc!
Mike Pohjola Totally stealing it! 😀
Anon 5: does anyone ever fail anything in schools of magic?
Anon 6: If I understood correctly, I’d say the characters are not perfect in what they do, so the teacher will assist them during class and they will get better during the class
Anders Gredal Berner Anon 5: Yes 🙂 both on a personal level and plotlines – you can fail at our magic schools. But its a kids activities for 8 to 13 years and with a visions about producing better humans – so there is somethimes the PC takes over 😉
Anon 11: I remember a kid from my latest Velhokoulu who had a character who failed all the spells they tried until the end when they finally suceeded, they seemed to enjoy it a great deal
Mike Pohjola The most common failure is being too shy to participate or scared of our monster. Then we try to help them overcome this.
But of course they can also fail in, for example, translating ancient runes into modern alphabet.
Josefin Westborg Anon 10:: In the shortest little drop in larp we can run it with just 1 player but max 12. For the libraries, we have 1-16 and for the school one we take around 30. We have made a special version where we do it as a pleasure larp and not an edularp and then we can have up to 40 players.
Anon 6: We raised the prices since our expenses have risen, storage and book keeper have come into the picture. Also the locations are tricky to find within a reasonable price range as we need to run two games in one weekend for it to be financially smarter.
Anon 12: Hope you get City funding Mike. The entrance fee is a lot of money for many people. Not for what they get (a long, wonderful experience) but as a sum. The threshold for many people for applying for free admittance is high I think. Hope you reach that group of people, too. Perhaps channels/contacts with for example some children’s organisations might help in this?
Velhokoulu’s rock! <3
Anon 6: I’m envious of your cheap prices as I fear we’ll be unreachable for some players soon, even if we have the “discount ticket” of 10€ available as we can’t give it to everyone (so far we have managed to take everyone in who needs the discount ticket though)
Anon 2: Thats interesting because only 1 of my students from 4 wanted to have wizard parents!
Anon 2: I think you have a larger sample size, Josefin. I have to ask my students why do they like muggle parents 🙂
Josefin Westborg This is mainly in the school larps. It’s not as much with the slightly older students when we do it for leisure. The school larps are mandatory for the students. So that might be part of it. That the kids who come to magic school larps out of free will have another relation to it.
Anon 6: Our kids have an option to be part creature too. So far we’ve had one half-dragon, one son of Zeus (allegedly, he had no proof) and one half-Pigglet.
Mike Pohjola Oh yeah, I forgot to mention this! We added this option because so many wanted to be NPCs since then they could be magical creatures. But we didn’t want random 8-year olds as NPCs. 😀
Anon 6: We started a YouTube channel, we’re hoping to create content there that will amuse our players and will hopefully reach new players too.
Anon 3: Mike, is it possible to pool resources somehow?
Mike Pohjola I’m sure it would be!
Mike Pohjola I mean, yes! That’s one of the points of having this talk. In physical Solmukohta we would have had a bigger gathering after it.
Anon 6: I feel that after this presentation I’m actually feeling the real disappointment of not being able to see you all and discuss face to face :((((
Anon 6: Oh well, next time then!
Anders Gredal Berner We are creating a network of magic schools – both to inspire each others and especial to help others to start up their own magic schools for kids and youth.
Why to start a magic school for kids:
– Give the kids a good xp and change the world one step at the time
– Create stabel income for your larp NGO
– Create jobs for young larpers as instructors and larp runners
You can contact us at Orker@rollespilsfabrikken.dk or you can write here at FB :).
This is a talk about the larp/theatre crossover work currently emerging in NYC, based on the projects Lindsay has been a part of in the past year as a professional actor in New York. Productions include Sinking Ship Creations’ Off-Off Broadway show The Mortality Machine, Calculations by Caroline Murphy of Incantrix Productions, OASIS Travel Agency (an immersive theatre/nightlife/alternate reality game blend with participatory elements by Silver Dream Factory) and more! Discussion includes the experience of being a hired facilitator/actor in these pieces as well as the trend of commercial “immersive experiences” in NYC.
Q&A from the original viewing at Solmukohta 2020 Online event
Q, Anon1: My question on all participatory theater is: How much agency do you think counts as agency? I’ve only been to something like three pieces, and none of them gave me any. (Sleep No More gave me the least.)
A, Lindsay Wolgel: So I wouldn’t consider Sleep No More participatory theatre! I would only call that Immersive theatre, but I agree, I felt the same way when I saw it!
Anon2: I think that’s evolving in a lot of different ways – some companies like PunchDrunk have their own audience literacy, but at the same time it’s no longer the only participatory company out there
Anon3: I would say punchdrunk is mostly interactive, while our pieces are more participative 🙂
Anon1: Whats… the difference, Anon3?
Lindsay Wolgel: In sleep no more, your choices don’t affect the show at all!
Anon4: And not even all that interactive honestly, at least based on Sleep no More and the Drowned Man
Anon5: Be Agreed, in SNM you move the camera and sometimes get easter egg, but you don’t create or influence anything
Anon6: The Camera Anon5 is talking is about – its to my understanding what the broader fin art scene – see as interaction and interactive art
Lindsay Wolgel: Reacting would be living in the given circumstances of your character – aka acting! Yes anding is more of an improv term- where you accept a piece of story someone is offering and you say okay and build on it!
Anon9: Yeah, if I remember, reacting is where you as the actor are able to behave as though this is happening for the first time, because you are attentive to the other actors around you, and the circumstances of the play. It’s a way to get actors to get out of the habit of pre-planning all of their feelings and how they will say things, to try to be reactive in the moment even though you know what the text is. Otherwise you’re just painting by numbers.
Yes and is more of a tool to prevent people from shutting down ideas, so instead of saying no, I don’t want to, you say yes, and I will add THIS to make it mine, too.
Ryan Hart: Anon9 really did a good job with it.
I don’t remember if Lindsay got into it, but when we talked for this piece, I mentioned we really go for a presentational style of acting and roleplay, as I think it’s very accessible to our audience. Which means we want people going through “as if” they were in that situation (usually with an “alibi” in the form of a character) and reacting as they would using their lifetime of experience.
What *I* (not speaking for anyone else here) is that people have to come in and co-create. These experiences are expensive, and run pretty quick, and need to accommodate all experience levels, so I don’t want people to get in there have to make up a story or context. They still have agency in how they deal with the situation, and they still have to take advantage of the opportunity to enjoy the experience, but I don’t want someone to come in and have to do the beginning of an improv class to enjoy the experience.
“Yes, and…” is a great technique, but there’s more to improv, and this particular technique tends to get heavy into content creation. We also lose sight of it’s purpose (again, as Anon9 pointed out) which is to get past the “no” response.
All of this ties into the difference between a facilitator and a participant.
Lindsay Wolgel: Ryan Hart I didn’t – I ran out of time to go into everything, so that was a piece that didn’t make it in! I love this extended response
Ryan Hart: So, i’m going to speak for how I use the terms, and I use them very specifically. It’s not like this carries any weight
First, I don’t use the term “player” in theatrical larp. I use the verb “to play” because a “player” can “play” a game, and an “actor” can “play” a role, but a player doesn’t really play a role and an actor doesn’t really play a game. This isn’t a statement about larp, it’s about how I, as a native English speaker, construct those sentences. “Player” implies “Game.” For a variety of reasons (focused mostly on win/lose) conditions, I don’t use the term player, I use the term “participant.” So if a person is playing in the larp, they’re a participant.
*SOME* participants are paid to be there, and involved in the design. They’re still playing a role, but they have to bring the design to the participants on whom the experience is focused. If some is a facilitator, they’re there exclusively for other people. I hope they have a good time, and I’m obligated to treat them well, but I’m not asking them “how did you like it.” I call those individuals “facilitators.”
From a design perspective, there’s two big things:
Not all participants are facilitators, but all facilitators are participants. So things like safety, code of conduct, and character design (see below) all apply to the facilitators.
Specific beats general. Certain things apply directly to facilitators that don’t apply directly to participants. So the design has to be parsed out with that in mind.
When you have that split: a group of people who are all playing characters, and some of those people are professionals who are there to express the design to the others, the facilitator / participant terminology works very well.
Ryan Hart: With all that said, we don’t have NPCs… because we don’t have “Non-Participants.” An NPC refers to a character, and all our character design has to be fundamentally similar… we can alter the method of delivery (a facilitator does not need the same materials as other participants) but the character played by a facilitator should be indistinguishable in interaction from other participants (this is part of our 360 design). For example, for Scapegoat, a 4 day, 120 participant larp that happened all over NYC, about 20 of those participants were facilitators, and with two exceptions, none of them changed characters.
So we don’t have “PCs” or “NPCs” in this design, we just have “characters.” The people who play them are participants, and some facilitators.
Anon10: It sounds like facilitator covers more or less the original intent of an NPC, i.e. a character in place to influence the experience of the non-facilitating participants, but that the updated nomenclature is more descriptive of the current situation.
Anon11: With a non-larper audience it’s really important how you name things for the participants, too. They take what they’re called and run with it, not having that much information to build on. So it’s a big difference if you call them players/participants/audience/characters/initiates/whatever. Usually – don’t let them know what you’re calling them behind the scenes!
Ryan Hart: Anon11 That’s exactly why we stopped using the term player.
We also had to, after our first review, explicitly tell people “this is not an escape room.”
Tommy Honton did a great design on TMM, and did exactly what we asked, but if I could make one change it would have been to remove the biggest “puzzle.” We were worried people wouldn’t have enough to do, and so we literally locked up elements of the narrative, and then prominently placed those locks in front of people. They always got the locks open, and generally loved the way they accessed the narrative, but it did put some people into problem solving mode.
Q, Anon12: But Lindsay Wolgel wasn’t the 1 on 2 expereince much less taxing? In my exp the 1 on 1 mean I’m included in everything, there’s no breaks.
Lindsay Wolgel: I couldn’t say! I’ve never done a 1 on 1 larp experience! It was hard in some ways to split my attention between the two participants but there were definitely times where they would be dealing with each other more than me. Two groups actually asked me to give them some privacy while they sussed out what to do 😅
Ryan Hart: I think the 1 on 2 is less taxing, except if one of the 2 is a child. Then it’s my personal version of hell.
It also depends on the phase. Something we’ve gotten really good at is onboarding in role (it’s why I want to take the smaller version of TMM to KP). It’s very hard, when you have a list of bullets in your head you have to hit, in order, with specific phrases, to manage that and a three or four way conversation. It’s much easier to onboard 1 person.
The conflict management and resolution? Easier with multiple people, because if you get a “fish” (a person who just isn’t doing anything, just flopping around) you have other people to play off of. Plus if you get someone who gets the design, it’s really pleasureable.
I actually instruct facilitators to avoid talking to one person for more than five minutes without a “reason.” That’s because actors love people who give them good responses, and if left to their own devices, facilitators will gravitate towards strong roleplayers and have amazing scenes. But I’m not paying for them to give amazing scenes to experienced people who can probably get there on their own… I need them to work with the entire group.
Q, Anon13: Hey, thanks again for this. I watched it again with better concentration. In the title you speak of “Larp/Theatre crossovers.”
Content-wise, these seem like 100% larps to me. Would that be correct?
(I understand that for marketing you might says they are “Participatory Theatre” or “Immersive Theatre” or something.)
Anon14: From what I’ve gathered, it’s rather low on roleplay component.
Lindsay Wolgel: Yes! Calculations was written as a larp where the only thing changed when it became a commercial theatre experience was the addition of one audience member and it being set in a hotel room. The content of the larp is exactly the same! And The Mortality Machine belongs in the genre which Ryan is naming Theatre Larp! So yes, I think participatory theatre is just a naming device that can place these in the theatre world. And to me, they are so much more than immersive theatre so I would never name them immersive theatre alone.. I’d probably add more descriptives to the title!
