Nordic Larp

Tag: Workshop

  • Chronicle: “Daddy, tell me a story?”

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    Chronicle: “Daddy, tell me a story?”

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    Editorial note: This article was originally published in the Knutepunkt 2025 book Anatomy of Larp Thoughts, a breathing corpus. It has been reprinted from there with the editors’ and authors’ permission. It has not been edited by Nordiclarp.org.

    “Daddy, tell me a story? But not that scary one!”

    My father kindly let my brothers and I lie down on his bed in the space between him and my mother. He liked to start by telling a short story about how things were in his and his father’s time, and then continue with the terrifying stories that we supposedly didn’t want to hear. All of them were told as if they were real stories, events that had actually taken place many years ago somewhere in the interior of São Paulo – and they usually involved fantastic creatures that stealthily tried to deceive the living and take their souls to the afterlife.

    This was part of my early childhood. It is known that the tradition of oral storytelling is one of the oldest and most powerful forms of cultural transmission, but curiously, until much later in my adult life, I had never realized how much this had manifested itself within my own history, and not only in what we learned in books.

    The years passed, and my father became harder and more bitter due to the traumas, fears and frustrations of life, and I followed my own distinct paths in life, trying not just to survive, but to find my place in the world. And these paths led me to a peculiar way of telling and experiencing stories, larp!

    “Father, I tell stories!”

    I don’t think he ever really understood what I was doing. Nor had I been able to see any kind of connection between my larp-making and listening to these stories when I was little.

    I had already spent about fifteen years doing larp. To be more precise, it happened in October 2015, a week before the opening of a larp of the group I am part of, and my father had to be rushed to the hospital. I took turns with my brothers to accompany him during his stay in the hospital.

    I remember most of all the day before he was discharged from the hospital. He was excited because he was going home soon, so he had put aside some of the bitterness of life. We talked a lot and I had the opportunity to talk a lot about what I had done in the larps.

    And at some point in the night I felt like I could ask again: “Dad, tell me those stories you used to tell when we were little?”

    And he told me not only one of the chilling stories, but also a new one, one that I didn’t know – or didn’t remember. And it was the best one of all! I listened intently, not just to each word, but to the way he told it, the dramatic pauses, the intonation of the words, the rhythm of the speech and the plot of the story.

    My father recovered and at that time he was able to return home.

    As for me, I went to the place where the larp would take place. And now I had a new story in my head, one that carried a lot of meaning. I had reconnected with my father. And on top of that, I had received a very valuable gift, one of those that cannot be bought.

    Self-portrait of the author and his father
    Self-portrait of the author and his father

    My father was discharged on Thursday and the larp had its first session on Saturday.

    It was a larp about national folklore. The theme spoke directly to the stories my father told. So I suggested to my partners in organizing the larp that I tell the story my father had taught me as part of the game’s immersion. But it ended up being much more than that, for that session and for all the following ones.

    The two forms of storytelling connected, perhaps in an encounter like the moment my father and I had. I began to tell the story as a character who, around the campfire, enchanted the participants just as parents enchant their children on unpretentious evenings, awakening their capacity to imagine. By the end of the story, all the characters had already been transported directly into the game setting and were experiencing the larp. Of course, the work on scenography, sound and the larp text itself also supported this immersion.

    The various stories of Brazilian folklore have already been portrayed in many books, films and plays, but there are many of them that have no record other than oral transmission that passes from generation to generation.

    The larp in question was “A Peleja dos Vivos na Noite dos Mortos” (The Fight of the Living on the Night of the Dead), in which the characters gather, in the 1920s, and camp in search of protection to survive the night of the dead, when the dead and other entities from beyond are said to walk among the living.

    And the stories my father told me had this same aspect, of fantastic beings walking among the living, testing them.

    “Guys, I’m going to tell you a chilling story.”

    By immersing the players and telling the newly learned story, I was able to express the oral tradition in the larp and enrich the experience, not only calibrating the game’s expectations, but also adding drama and resources for the characters’ interactions.

    Photo by Thomaz Barbeiro, from larp A Peleja dos Vivos, na Noite dos Mortos, by larp group Confraria das Ideias (Sesc Bauru, 2018)
    Photo by Thomaz Barbeiro, from larp A Peleja dos Vivos, na Noite dos Mortos, by larp group Confraria das Ideias (Sesc Bauru, 2018)

    After that moment, my father lived for another eight years, but his stories will live forever as long as someone tells them, whether around a campfire or during a larp.

    Oh, and what story did my father tell me? It’s a scary story with lots of twists and turns, but if you want to hear it, you will need to be lucky enough to find a storyteller who knows it in the interior of the State of São Paulo, or go and play this larp with the Confraria das Ideias, at some time and some place, because that is the tradition!

    Cover image: photo by Thomaz Barbeiro, from larp A Peleja dos Vivos, na Noite dos Mortos, by larp group Confraria das Ideias (Sesc Bauru, 2018).

  • Workshop Design: A Guide

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    Workshop Design: A Guide

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    Workshops are a staple of many Nordic larps, playing a crucial role in preparing participants to step into their roles, engage with the narrative, and collaborate effectively. While learning is a central aspect, workshops are more than just an educational prelude to the game; they are spaces where boundaries are negotiated, skills are honed, and the magic circle of the larp begins to take shape. 

    Designing a workshop, however, requires a different set of tools than those used in larp design. Here, the focus is on learning outcomes rather than narrative, and on facilitating participants’ transition into the fiction of the larp. 

    This article serves as a guide for designers, outlining a series of steps that will take you from the initial idea to the final plan for a learning design. While the focus is on workshops, a complete learning design often incorporates other formats, such as briefings and exercises (see “WEB: Workshop – Exercise – Briefing“). The steps described here can be applied to the entire learning design process. They are, however, particularly useful for workshops, which require more intensive design effort and work. In this context, a workshop is defined as: 

    “An interactive and co-creative session focused on participants’ hands-on interactions” 

     Step 1: Examining the participants’ needs 

    The first step in creating a learning design that aligns with your vision and the narrative framework of your larp is to consider what the participants need in order to play it.

    To guide the process of identifying these essential elements, there are three key aspects to focus on:

    • What participants need to know
    • What participants need to create
    • What participants need to do
    The key aspects
    The key aspects– diagram by Nór Hernø

    Knowing: 

    The knowledge you require the participants to have needs to match the learning outcome of your design. Is there any foundational knowledge they must have to engage meaningfully with the larp? This could include everything from safety mechanics to character memories, or the social dynamics of the setting. 

    Creating: 

    Consider what aspects of the larp you want the participants to contribute to and have ownership over. Creating together fosters co-ownership, and by allowing the participants to generate elements of the larp, there is a good chance they will be more personally invested and have an easier time remembering those design elements.  

    However, be mindful of the limitations: There are things that you may not want the participants to create. For example, they may design aspects of their characters and relationships, but you might want to ensure that the framework and key narrative elements remain under your control to maintain coherence with your larp design. 

    Doing: 

    You can facilitate how the participants start to larp, work together, act and interact with each other, and feel safe doing so, through your learning design. This can be both explicit and implied: 

    Explicit: You might need the participants to have specific skills or take certain actions. For example, if your larp includes tasks or jobs, you can create a learning design that explicitly teaches the participants to do it. 

    Implicit: You might want the participants to have a certain behavior, for example if your larp emphasizes a specific form of interaction or mood, you can model the participants’ behavior implicitly through your design, by having them do the workshops in a certain way or by implementing themed tools like music, photos, directed movement patterns, etc. 

     Create a list, mind map, or whatever feels right for you, of the elements necessary for the participants to play your larp. If you already have specific ideas you want to include in your learning design, add them to this brainstorm too. 

    Step 2: Sorting your ideas 

    The next step is to start sorting through the brainstorm and ideas, considering the relevancy of the elements, determining if they can be combined, and identifying which formats best support the learning outcome you want from your design. The article “WEB: Workshop – Exercise – Briefing” covers the three learning formats, as well as a model for visualizing the balance between them. 

    Do this sorting however you prefer. For example, if you have created a list, underline the most important elements and add their relevant learning formats. Alternatively, if you have done a mind map, grab some coloured pens and start circling. 

    Sorting your brainstorm, focusing on synergies and learning formats
    Sorting your brainstorm, focusing on synergies and learning formats– diagram by Nór Hernø

    “Know” might be better supported with a briefing, “do” may play a greater role in exercises and workshops, and “create” is often a central element of workshops. However, this is not always the case. You might be able to integrate several elements of knowing into a workshop – for example, knowing the social dynamics of the setting, a shared cultural action, and so on – if it overlaps with what the participants need to create and do. 

    When you have finished this sorting process, you will know what needs to be planned (briefings and exercises) and what needs to be designed (workshops). 

    Step 3: Finding inspiration 

    When you are aware of what kind of workshops you need to support your larp, you can start designing them. Luckily, you don’t have to start from scratch, as there are countless places you can draw inspiration from, including: 

    • Other workshops: Examine workshops, both for larps and not, you have experienced, which have been successful in similar contexts. Think about what they consisted of, how they facilitated learning, and what kind of atmosphere they created. 
    • Other people: Conversations with other larp designers, facilitators, or participants can be a valuable source of inspiration. Ask others how they design specific workshops, what their favorite workshops and -tools are, and what they have learned from experience. 
    • Educational materials and exercise books: Look to educational resources such as teaching guides and manuals, or the many books on physical and team-building exercises. While these might not be directly related to larping, they often offer valuable inspiration, you can build on. 
    • Online sources: The internet is an endless resource – Also when it comes to workshop ideas. From the specialized articles found at Nordic Larp to a simple Google search, type in keywords relating to your workshop needs and you get more ideas than you have time to read. 

    While inspiration can come from many sources, it’s crucial to tailor it to the specific needs of your larp. You should never attempt a 1:1 replication of a workshop. Every larp is unique in its narrative, setting, and participant dynamics, and your workshops need to reflect that uniqueness. What worked in one context may not be directly applicable in another. 

    Step 4: Adapting, designing, and describing 

    After gathering inspiration and ideas, you need to start adapting and designing the workshop, transforming your ideas into a concrete plan. Start describing the workshop step by step and let the following questions guide you in this process, adapting the workshop to the participants’ needs and your larp design: 

    • Does it align with the larp? Do not use a workshop just because it is fun or interesting. It needs to align with the required learning outcome, so be prepared to kill your darlings. 
    • Does it fit with the mood and setting of the larp? If your larp is light-hearted and fun, you want different workshops than if it is dark or emotionally intense. Aligning your workshops with the mood of the larp helps participants immerse themselves. 
    • Does it support the desired participant behavior? The workshop should foster behavior and interactions that align with your previously defined “doing” elements. If the participants’ behavior during the workshop can mimic how they are expected to behave during the larp, you can help facilitate their transition into the fiction of the larp. 
    • Can it be adjusted for practicality? Not all exercises are suitable for every group or available time and space. Ensure that the workshop is feasible for the available space, time, and the size and composition of the group. 

    Considering these questions when describing the workshop can help guide your design process. A well-designed workshop supports your game by guiding participants toward engagement with the narrative and their roles within it. By designing and adapting with that in mind, you can create a workshop that is both unique to your larp and effective in helping participants immerse themselves in the experience. 

    Step 5: Structuring your learning design 

    The final step to creating a learning plan is structuring all the learning formats and sessions. This includes both the briefings, exercises, and workshops you have planned. Establishing a structure helps you organize the content and further develop it by uncovering oversights or additional potentials. 

    To guide this step, use the 6W-Structure: 

    • When 
    • Where 
    • Who 
    • What 
    • How 
    • Why 
    The 6W-Structure to develop and organize your learning plan
    The 6W-Structure to develop and organize your learning plan– diagram by Nór Hernø

    The first three Ws cover the practical information you need for running the learning plan: When and where will the learning session be held, and who is involved (both facilitator and participant group). This will help you map out the plan and identify most logistical issues, such as whether the schedule works (remember everything takes more time than you think) or if the location fits the planned session. This is especially necessary for more complicated learning plans with several locations and facilitators but is also useful as a framework for simple plans. 

    The next three Ws cover the content, descriptions, and your design choices: What is the headline of the session and what materials are needed, how is the session is conducted (described step by step), and most importantly – why it is done. Asking why you are doing said learning session helps you reflect on your design choices and easily share these reflections with others. It also helps you discover if you have overlooked something in step 4, such as whether your chosen workshop aligns with the larp or if something in the workshop actively works against your design. 

    As a rule of thumb, always ask “why” 3 times to get from the surface descriptive level to the conscious design level. Through this process, you might discover a flaw in your design and fix it before the plan meets the participants, or realize that, by changing a few elements, you can achieve an even better outcome. An example could be the following workshop:

    Ask Why three times
    Ask Why three times– diagram by Nór Hernø

    This difference in the reason behind the workshop can help you design for that specific purpose. In the first example, you might want to instruct the participants to collaborate during the ritual, aiming for impressive and empowering aesthetics, whereas the second example might shift the workshop’s focus to clearly define the individual participants’ tasks and how they can fail.

    The final result can be presented in table as the following (short) example: 

    The finished learning plan
    The finished learning plan – diagram by Nór Hernø

    This table functions not just as your finished design overview, but also as a runtime plan ready to use.

    By following the steps outlined in this guide – examining participant needs, sorting ideas, finding inspiration, adapting designs, and structuring them – you have the tools to create a purposeful learning plan with workshops tailored to your specific larp. By aligning your learning design with not only the learning needs, but also the narrative, mood, and desired behavior, you ensure that every element of the workshop contributes meaningfully to the overall experience of workshop as well as larp.

    Cover image: Panopticon workshop, photo by Christian Kierans

  • WEB: Workshop – Exercise – Briefing

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    WEB: Workshop – Exercise – Briefing

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    “This workshop could have been an email” 

    This is a statement I have encountered in the larp community quite a few times by now, which is rather tragic to someone who has worked professionally with learning design for years and has a deep passion for it.  

    Designing and organizing a larp requires skill. The same applies to designing the learning experience required to play said larp: It necessitates a distinct focus on learning output and the methods required to achieve that goal. Creating a learning design equal to that of our larp design will help us facilitate the participants’ transition into the fiction of the larp, as well as better their recollection of important information.  

    The first step of creating a learning design is to consider what the participants require to play your larp. The next step is to take the available learning formats into account, figuring out what format will best allow that to happen. Often, everything we facilitate for the participants prior to the start of the larp (and sometimes during) is referred to as “workshops”. The problem with using “workshop” as a blanket term is that workshops are a specific kind of learning format, and this term does not encompass everything we do prior to a larp. This can cause a clash of expectations, making the participants feel like expressing the opening sentence of this article. After all, the worst workshops are those that aren’t actually workshops. 

    Instead of using “workshops” to describe the time before a larp set aside for the participants’ learning experience, I suggest using a more neutral term like “larp preparations” or, as I prefer appreciating alliteration, “pre-play-prep”. 

    The most common learning formats used for the pre-play-prep before a larp are: workshop, exercise, and briefing. The WEB model described below is a visual tool in two parts, created to define, distinguish, and summarize these three types of learning sessions. In this context, the three formats are defined as follows: 

    Workshop: An interactive and co-creative session focused on participants’ hands-on interactions. 

    Exercise: An activity where participants, individually or in groups, practice a given technique or skill. 

    Briefing: An orientation session that informs and instructs participants before they are to do something. 

    Each type is suited to specific learning goals and participant engagement levels, and understanding these differences can help create better experiences for the participants. 

    The WEB Model: Definitions
    The WEB Model: Definitions – diagram by Nór Hernø

    The WEB Model: Spectrum 

    The three types of learning sessions can be positioned on a spectrum indicating the participants’ level of activity, agency, and degree of co-creation.”

    The WEB Model: Spectrum
    The WEB Model: Spectrum – diagram by Nór Hernø

    The learning sessions have a shared purpose, which defines their focus and design – Learning – Although they approach learning in different ways, using different tools and techniques to facilitate the process. 

    It is important to note that the model is a spectrum and not a scale. The spectrum does not indicate value or learning output, as none of the learning sessions is inherently better than the others. Each one is best for different purposes: 

    • Workshops can give participants co-ownership of a given project, as participants co-create the content. They are ideal for creating shared narratives, culture, and routines, which are not previously defined by the larp designer.
      Examples: Creating (fully or in parts) characters and relationships, developing rituals, establishing the cultural customs of the group, etc.
    • Exercises give participants the opportunity to practice and train a given technique or skill, making them comfortable repeating and reproducing it in another context.
      Examples: Practicing meta-techniques and game mechanics, rehearsing a ritual, practicing specific interactions and behaviors, etc.
    • Briefings are good for clear and direct distribution of information, where every participant or participant group need the same instructions necessary to participate in the larp or a different activity.
      Examples: Giving the participants practical information, explaining setting, rules, meta-techniques, game mechanics, etc.

    In some cases, it can be impossible to distinguish clearly between the three types of learning sessions, as they might overlap or mix different approaches, e.g., when the participants rehearse the ritual they just created together, when the explanation of a meta-technique transitions to practicing it, or when participants practice specific interactions and behaviors by embodying their characters while co-creating the scene in which these interactions occur. 

    In other cases, the difference between the three types of learning sessions is clear to the point it can be comical to imagine using the wrong one: You would not workshop the location of the toilets or the schedule of the larp. 

    The reason why it is important to be aware of the type of learning session is two-fold: 

    1. It helps you be aware of your pre-play-prep design choices and what kind of learning output you might want for a given session. Do you want your participants to co-create something new? Do you want them to repeat something you have created? Or do you want them to listen to and understand a set of instructions?
    2. It helps you and the participants manage expectations, such as energy levels and the type of engagement required.

    The WEB Model: Pre-Play-Prep Sum 

    In a learning design consisting of multiple learning sessions, the sum of the sessions can be represented in the following figure:

    The WEB Model: Pre-Play-Prep Sum
    The WEB Model: Pre-Play-Prep Sum – diagram by Nór Hernø

    For example, if your learning design consists primarily of briefings combined with a few exercises, the sum of the sessions might be represented as follows in the figure:

    The WEB Model: Pre-Play-Prep Sum, example 1
    The WEB Model: Pre-Play-Prep Sum, example 1 – diagram by Nór Hernø

    The sum of learning sessions is again not an indication of value or learning output but solely a depiction of variation in the pre-play-prep. If there is a strong tendency toward placement in a corner of the triangle, as in this example, consider whether this aligns with the desired learning design or if more variation is needed. 

    For example, if greater participant activity and agency are required, one or more suitable workshops can be added to the pre-play-prep, altering the figure:  

    The WEB Model: Pre-Play-Prep Sum, example 2
    The WEB Model: Pre-Play-Prep Sum, example 2 – diagram by Nór Hernø

    This approach to pre-play-prep provides a structured framework for designing larp learning experiences and helps visualize the balance of learning sessions. This can support the designer in making informed choices about how to engage participants effectively and ensure the desired learning outcomes. A clear understanding of the different learning formats allows both designers and participants to manage expectations about the level of participation and the type of engagement required in each session, leading to a more enjoyable and cohesive experience – and fewer workshops that could have been an email. 

    Footnote/anecdote regarding the model: 

    The WEB Model was created on the final night of the 2023 Danish Larp Designers’ Summer School in response to participants repeatedly asking me about the difference between a workshop and an exercise – a situation prompted by a dare. The finishing touches and the English translation of the model (originally titled “BØW” in Danish) were completed in preparation for my 2024 Solmukohta talk and workshop on the subject. Subsequently, the model was reintroduced to the Danish Larp Designers’ Summer School as part of my workshop design class in 2024.

    Cover image: Panopticon workshop, photo by Christian Kierans

  • Building Player Chemistry

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    Building Player Chemistry

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    At Knudepunkt in 2019 I attended a panel discussion, You Look Like I Want To Play With You, hosted by Karijn van der Heij, where participants shared their experiences of co-players refusing to play on pre-written relations. According to the participants, the excuse often used by said co-players was them feeling “a lack of chemistry”. Disregarding the problematic nature of such a judgement, the argument inherently states that chemistry is something which either exists or doesn’t between people, even though we have multiple examples of the opposite being true. Just take something as common and widely discussed as relational bleed: You might never have met the person playing your best friend or one true love before, but after a larp weekend of holding hands and/or gazing into each other’s eyes, they seem awfully nice. Or look to Hollywood and the number of romantic leads ending up in real-life relationships after having starred in a movie together, no matter their relationship status going into it.

    All in all, chemistry is not something that either exists or doesn’t, it is something that can be built between people, doing certain things together. Which also means it can be workshopped.

    While it took a few years, some research and testing, I created a workshop method aimed to do exactly that: Building player chemistry.

    The goals for the method are:

    • Building trust and a feeling of safety between participants.
    • Having participants tune in on each other, becoming aware of their workshop partner.
    • Having participants model behavior that creates closeness, attention, and appreciation between them.

    The method is based on 6 steps, continuously adding degrees of interaction ranging from being distant to touching and from non-verbal to verbal. It can either be run as a workshop by organizers before a larp, to help support players with intimate relations, or used by players portraying intimate relations before the start of the larp (or during the larp if your relation play just doesn’t work out). In this context, intimate relations refer to relations where love, romance, or simply physical and emotional closeness is one of the primary forces. This includes romantic partners, lovers, close friends, and family members, as well as abusive relationships based on the perception of love or closeness.

    The method is based on, and inspired by, elements from:

    • Studies of the effects of eye gazing and related exercises
    • The Meisner and Lucid Body drama schools/techniques
    • Ars Rego (created by Maria and Jeppe Bergman Hamming for Spellbound, 2018)
    • Ars Amandi (created by Eliot Wieslander for Mellan Himmel och hav, 2003)

    Disclaimer: The workshop includes both extended eye contact and touch, which the participants must be comfortable with. 

    Running the workshop:

    Total runtime of the workshop is approximately 40 minutes, not including exercise instructions. Start by dividing the participants into pairs. Instruct them on all steps of the workshop, prior to starting the exercises, so that the workshop can be run as one continuous flow, facilitated only verbally by the organizer.

    Step 1: Eye contact

    Time: Approx. 5 minutes

    This step consists of four rounds. Participants sit in front of each other with some distance between them (1-1.5 meters), eyes closed. On cue, they look into each other’s eyes, for a set amount of time, then close their eyes again and rest for a moment. Every round has an extended duration of eye contact:

    1: 5 seconds

    2: 10 seconds

    3: 30 seconds

    4: 2.5 minutes

    Remember to give the participants breaks with their eyes closed, between the rounds, as this kind of prolonged eye contact can feel overwhelming at first.

    Step 2: Coordinated breathing

    Time: Approx. 5 minutes

    Participants stay seated and keep eye contact throughout this step. This step combines coordinated breathing and movement. One participant starts, stretches their arms out in front of them and draws in breath, simultaneously moving their arms towards their body (as if drawing in their breath with their arms), and then exhales while moving their arms back towards stretched (as if pushing out the air with their arms). The other participant continues this movement, drawing in their breath, while moving their arms towards their body, followed by exhaling, while stretching their arms out – returning the breath and movement to the first participant, who then continues.

    This will create a circular movement and breath, from one participant to the other and back.

    Let the pairs find a rhythm, without verbally communicating it.

    Throughout this exercise, create variation by asking the pairs to slow their coordinated breathing/movement down together, let them then go back to normal, ask them to speed it up, and end this exercise by letting them go back to normal again.

    Step 3: Ars Rego Movement

    Time: Approx. 15 minutes

    This exercise is based on the method Ars Rego by Maria and Jeppe Bergman Hamming.

    Short description of the mechanic: Ars Rego is a Nordic larp mechanic created for simulating magical physical control. With this mechanic a “leader” controls one or more “followers” by using hand signals. A connection between leader and follower is created by participants establishing eye contact and raising their hand(s). The follower must now follow the leader’s hand at a distance and be led around the room, while keeping their hand up and the connection intact. They are to mirror the leader’s hand movements (e.g. The leader “pushing” them down, “lifting” them up, making them move to the side, spin, etc. by using hand gestures). The leader is always responsible for the follower’s safety and comfort, while moving them around the room.

    Note: This exercise does not use touch at any point, and doesn’t include the hand movement to signal to your partner to get closer, as demonstrated in the link above.

    The pairs split up (momentarily) and all participants start moving around the room, walking amongst each other. Let the participants get comfortable moving around on their own, before asking them to start noticing their partner: Where they are in the room, how they are moving, their expression, etc.

    Ask participants to make eye contact with their partner and at their own pace establish the touch-free “connection” with their hand. The pairs should continue to keep some distance between themselves, moving around between other participants in the room.

    The participants are allowed to break off the contact and reestablish it, getting used to the “connection”, before they are encouraged to “lock in” and slowly get closer to each other, without ever touching. Let the participants play around with the connection for a while, trying out changing hands, using both hands, moving their partner around, both from side to side, down towards the floor and up again.

    Important note: The participants are responsible for their partner. It is their responsibility to make sure their partner doesn’t bump into furniture, walls, or other people. Make that responsibility very clear to the participants – It is necessary to keep eye contact during the exercise, but at the same time be aware of the other’s surroundings.

    Throughout the exercise, create some variation in the participants’ movements. Ask one person in the pair (e.g.: the person who started the breathing exercise) to take control of the other, then change the roles. It is also possible to add elements from your larp design, like asking participants to move as their character and interact with each other based on their ingame relation. Consider how this could potentially affect the building of chemistry – If the relation is not inherently positive, this could interfere with the result of the workshop itself.

    For the final approx. 5 minutes of the exercise, ask the pairs to get close to each other, if they haven’t already. Invite them to move together as if dancing in a ballroom setting (or if something else fits your larp better).

    As the final step, ask participants to use both hands in their movement together, so that the transition to the next exercise happens fluently.

    Step 4: Shared Moment

    Time: Approx. 3 minutes

    Ask the participants to stop in their movement, still with their hands held up “connected” to each other. The participants then move closer together, so close they can feel the heat from their partner’s hands, without touching. Ask them to close their eyes, take a deep breath and focus on the feeling they have in that moment. Ask them to visualize something, it could be an image, a thought or emotion, and keep their focus on what they are visualizing. Give them a few moments to get grounded, then ask them to open their eyes and at the same moment let their hands touch.

    The pairs now get a minute to share what they thought of and visualized.

    Step 5: Touch

    Time: Approx. 7 minutes

    This exercise is based on the method Ars Amandi by Eliot Wieslander.

    Short description of the mechanic: Ars Amandi is a Nordic larp mechanic used for simulating romance or sex in larp. The mechanic uses touch of permitted zones (often hands, arms, and shoulders) between two or multiple participants. The touch is often in the form of stroking, massaging, grabbing, or exploring with one’s fingers/hands.

    The pairs sit down in front of each other again, this time knee to knee. They establish eye contact and slowly start touching both of each other’s hands. The area of touch slowly increases, as the participants have time to get comfortable, by first moving the touch up to the lower part of the arms, stopping at the elbows, then the upper part of the arms, stopping at the shoulders. The participants should be allowed to tap out, if increasing the area of touch is not wanted, thereby keeping the touch to the previous level (e.g.: hands or lower arms).

    The participants can play around with this touch, either by expressing the kind of relation their characters have, or by the organizer creating variation in the types of touch (e.g.: asking participants to change their touch to portray siblings, parent-child, lovers, etc.)

    Again, be aware how portraying ingame relations can potentially affect the building of chemistry if the relation is not inherently positive.

    Step 6: Appreciation

    Time: Approx. 5 minutes

    Continuing the touch exercise from step 5, the participants simultaneously start verbal appreciation of each other. They take turns commenting on facts they appreciate about the other, using the following sentence form: “I like… XXX” (e.g.: “I like your curly hair”). The receiving participant continues with: “You like… XXX” (e.g.: “You like my curly hair”) and adds their own comment (e.g.: “I like your blue shirt”), returning the appreciation and continuing the exercise.

    Important note: No derogatory or hurtful comments are allowed. Clearly instruct participants to only state objective and neutral facts about each other (e.g.: colors of eyes, hair, etc.), chosen aspects of their appearance (e.g.: choice of clothes, jewelry, tattoos, etc.), or experienced behavior during the exercises (e.g.: their movement, smile, eye contact).

    Wrapping up

    The workshop can either end with step 6 or with a repeat of a moment of silent eye contact.

    Either way, it is encouraged to give participants a few minutes after the workshop to talk with their partner about the experience and how they are feeling.

    Final notes on the workshop design

    As mentioned, the workshop can be run either by organizers or used by players themselves. Especially in the case of organizers running the workshop, it is important to consider the impact it can have on the participating players. As the workshop aims at modelling participants’ behavior to create closeness and build player chemistry, the risk of relational bleed can increase. It is the responsibility of the organizers to consider the ethics of using this or similar methods, as well as making sure the participating players are consenting.

    The workshop was first run and tested in its entirety at Knutpunkt 2022 in Linköping, Sweden. Thank you to everyone who participated and gave their feedback, as well as everyone who checked the workshop description for read- and run-ability.

    Cover photo: Photo by Bjørn-Morten Vang Gundersen. Image has been cropped.

  • The Hated Children of Nordic Larp – Why We Need to Improve on Workshops and Debriefs

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    The Hated Children of Nordic Larp – Why We Need to Improve on Workshops and Debriefs

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    In Nordic and Nordic inspired larp, we do love our workshops. However, it feels like there’s a trend to workshop for the sake of workshopping. At the same time, there seems to be a lot less love and attention for debriefs. Both in workshops and debriefs, we tend to stick to the same exercises without giving it any further thought. Instead, we could come up with some specific exercises that fit the larp and the experience we want to create. Workshops and debriefs have the potential to become more valuable elements in our game and experience design than they currently often are.

    Workshops as building blocks

    Workshops are principally used as tools to familiarise our players with the techniques and playstyles of our larps. Because this is their main purpose, we tend to easily resort to known formulas and fixed ways of workshopping. However, I hope more of us would dare to step out of this almost traditional way of doing things and think about designing a flow of workshops that would also contribute to setting the mood of the game. Then, the workshops would become a seamless part of the larp experience and at the same time help the participants get into the right mindset for the larp. A good example of this is how the workshops for the larp Daemon (Denmark 2021) gradually build up the intensity and trust in the connection between the pair of players who would be playing two parts of the same character together. This was done through different exercises that varied in physicality and emotional and physical intimacy.

    Additionally, setting the mood like this can be an integral part of managing the expectations for a larp. Workshops have the advantage of offering a moment of direct dialogue between the facilitator(s) of a game and its participants, which is an opportunity for making sure expectations are set and mitigated. In addition to explaining the setting and the intentions of a game, workshops can be used to create a space where expectations are shared and negotiated, and where feedback is shared with an open mindset. 

    Finally, workshops can also be used to make a larp more accessible. The tendency to fall back on known formulas for workshops bears the risk of falling into the trap that we keep designing workshops for the same returning audiences. This raises the threshold for people from outside of that audience. For example, line-up exercises can seem easy to many larpers but they are not simple for people who do not know them. When I used them in coachings, I at times had to do more explaining than I expected. Moreover, it seems that they are sometimes added to larp workshops just because they are seen as one of the “standard” exercises, while they are also easily taken over by the participants and turned into overly long discussions instead of the planned five minute exercise. So, honestly, does your larp really benefit from yet another line-up exercise? 

    Simple and easy to understand workshops that contribute to the game and absorb the participants into the whole of the larp should be an aim, and not just an option. Moreover, accessibility for larps can easily be increased with simple measures, like having a moment of stating the agenda of the entire larp before starting the rest of the workshops, or by having a short moment to put people’s minds at ease if they are non-native speakers playing a larp in English or if they are playing a Nordic style larp for the very first time, etc.

    Debriefs as tools for closure

    To the same extent in which we overuse workshops and at times make them redundant by resorting to well-known workshops which don’t necessarily fit the intentions behind our larps, we tend to underuse and underdesign debriefs in our larp design. Debriefs have the potential to improve the experience as a whole, as they can become anything from a soft landing spot to a space for venting and leaving behind negativity, or a last resort for expectation calibration. 

    If we want to consider framework design an essential part of larp design, then it is a logical consequence to consider closing that framework in the form of a debrief as essential. This doesn’t mean that we should (re-)turn to extensive debriefs with a whole array of exercises, as that risks falling into the same trap as we do in our workshops. However, leaning on some basic exercises that are repeated and never questioned neglects giving the experience a sense of closure.

    In the same way workshops are the building blocks in shaping the larp experience, debriefs are the place where we give the experience a sense of closure, and hence, where we wrap up and tie everything together. It serves to look at debriefs as more than just an optional emotional safety tool. They can serve as a tool for making the flow of the larp end coherently and in a way that fits the whole of the experience, rather than leaving the participants hanging in a space of tension and unfinished business.

    If we neglect our debriefs, we not only neglect the emotional safety of the players but also fail to hold on to our engagement to design the entirety of an experience for them. We have brought our participants to a high point by bringing them to the end of the game and the story but we are not catching them after. We have to be there to offer them a way and a space to land, and to wrap up their experience and take home only the parts they wish to.

    For the chamber larp Equinox Retreat (United Kingdom 2021), I designed a slow visualisation and breathing exercise that gives players time to digest emotions and to remember a positive moment in the larp experience. Such an exercise can be a valuable last part of a debrief and help people get in an energy and mindset to step out of the larp and into the everyday world again. Hiding ourselves behind optional debriefs with the same exercises that are constantly repeated and never improved or designed specifically to fit the design and experience of the game does not serve our players and their experience.

    Workshops and debriefs as evolving toolboxes for designing the larp experience

    If we want to employ workshops and debriefs as elements that help building the larp experience as a whole, we need to rethink how we tackle them and put adequate care in designing the right workshop and debrief tools that fit our larp, instead of leaning on our current perceived traditions of doing things and instead of going for the hype of the moment. We shouldn’t just be maintaining our existing toolboxes, but we should strive to also make them more accessible and easy to find. Moreover, we have to dare to add to them and to experiment more with the format, and to be more open to new approaches. 

    If we want to attain this point of creating big workshop and debrief toolboxes for designers to roam in freely for the creation of their larps, we also need to be more open to share and exchange best practices and lessons learned. We need to have more willingness to share as well as to reflect about what worked and what didn’t, as well as an openness to take inspiration from each other and to offer this inspiration to others. Moreover, we need to accept that these tools can be tweaked in function of the designs that are being created instead of holding on too rigidly to already established formats.

    Workshops and debriefs shouldn’t become inert holy houses that we stick to for the comfort of it. They have the potential to be an engine of creativity, care and change in the larp design process. 

    Ludography

    Daemon (2021). Denmark. Katrine Wind.

    Equinox Retreat (2021). United Kingdom. Sandy Bailly.

    This article has been reprinted with permission from the Solmukohta 2024 book. Please cite as:

    Bailly, Sandy. 2024. “The Hated Children of Nordic Larp – Why We Need to Improve on Workshops and Debriefs.” In Liminal Encounters: Evolving Discourse in Nordic and Nordic Inspired Larp, edited by Kaisa Kangas, Jonne Arjoranta, and Ruska Kevätkoski. Helsinki, Finland: Ropecon ry.

    Cover photo: Photo by Priscilla Du Preez 🇨🇦 on Unsplash.

  • Larping Before the Larp: The Magic of Preparatory Scenes

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    Larping Before the Larp: The Magic of Preparatory Scenes

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    This article is going to discuss a workshop tool: the use of short in-character larped scenes. These are scenes involving larp participants, in which they play their character. They take place during the pre-larp workshop, as a structured activity designed-in by the organizers, before the actual larp has started. They are being referred to here as ‘preparatory scenes’.

    What are preparatory scenes like?

    • A small number of characters are in the scene, often just two.
    • A scene usually lasts for maybe five or ten minutes.
    • Each participant might play just one such scene, or a series of them.
      • (If a series of scenes, then those might be with the same other participant(s), or with a mix of different people.)
    • The other participants might be watching, or they might be involved in scenes of their own, in parallel.
    • Usually these scenes don’t involve the scenography, and other immersive material, that will be used during the larp itself: maybe not even costume.
    • Usually they will happen towards the end of the workshop, so that their factual and emotional content is fresh in the minds of the participants as they start the larp.

    Note, this is considered as separate from ‘preplay’ – which is in-character activity that participants undertake together without direct supervision from organizers, usually according to their own preferred structure or in an open-ended way, often quite some time before the larp. While preplay may have some of the same purposes and effects as preparatory scenes, it’s not being covered here: Kyhn((Mia Kyhn, “Preplay,” What Do We Do When We Play? (2020). )) has a discussion.

    What types of preparatory scenes can be used?

    • Backstory – participants can play out part of their characters’ shared backstory together. Perhaps a key point, such as ‘our first date’, or ‘the time A saved B’s life’ – to establish exactly what happened, and who said what to who.((For example, at On Location, character relationships are outlined in their briefings in terms of events from the past. During the workshop, the players will play through these scenes, to find out and agree together what exactly happened.))
    • Relationship – participants can establish the details of how their characters are when with each other – this can be illustrative, such as ‘this is how we spend a typical day/meal/mission/murder together’.((At Just a Little Lovin’, the in-character ‘social groups’ eat a meal together, during the workshop. This helps them explore how they relate to each other as a group during a regular day-to-day activity.)) Or it might be exploratory: the characters meet in a cafe – what might they start chatting about?
    • Group dynamics – how does a group of linked characters function together? What are their dynamics of communication, of sharing space, of hierarchy, etc?((At De la Bête, characters live together in social groups of mixed status. During the workshop each group of participants designed and played out, with the other participants as audience, an extended scene that showed the group’s internal hierarchy and social dynamics.))
    • Reaction – how do the characters react (individually, and together) when placed into a particular situation? For example: if the two characters were seated together in a bus that came under gunfire, what would they say/do? When one of them finds a letter that the other has received from an ex-lover, what might happen? (This would usually be an imaginary episode; not drawn from their actual backstory – because its purpose is to explore ‘what if?’.)

    And they could be:

    • Emotional – intended to get into the insides of the relationship: how these characters feel about each other, and how those feelings are expressed. ((At Dawnstone, participants were encouraged to together identify and play out a backstory scene that explored or established a key emotional dynamic between them: that set the tone for how they would relate to each other emotionally during the larp.))
    • Physical – getting the feeling of interactions within the relationship into the participants’ bodies. How do the characters use touch, distance, height, movement?
    • Factual – making sure that the characters’ memories of the details of the event being depicted match each other.
    • Different ways of doing things – trying out a scene a few times in succession, with variations in content or expression – or varying the character portrayal from one part of the scene to the next.

    What’s the point of this?

    Calibration! Preparatory scenes are a great tool for developing a shared understanding among participants. Nielsen((Martin Nielsen. “Culture Calibration.” In Pre-Larp Workshops (2014). )) explains why calibration is such an important task prior to larping together. And this can be a very effective way to help achieve it.

    Calibration via preparatory scenes can be particularly valuable when participants themselves have had some responsibility for character (and even, world) creation.((In Brudpris, during the workshop the players determine the details of the culture that their characters inhabit, around a skeleton design: its rituals, behaviours, and the key ways in which families interact. It’s then valuable to play through some of these in pre-larp scenes)) They can show each other what they have created/added; and they can explore together what they have jointly decided.

    What might participants get from it?

    • The chance to try out different ways of playing their character, before having to commit to it in the actual larp.
    • The chance to agree key details of backstory with the other participants who are involved.
    • Feeling the backstory as lived, rather than just as text that they’ve read.
    • The chance to explore relationship dynamics, and tweak them if necessary, in collaboration with the players of the counterpart characters.
      • (Potentially, the chance to discuss with those people how the relationship might evolve, and what might happen between the two characters, during the larp – if the larp design permits this, and time hasn’t been allocated for it elsewhere in the workshop.)
    • The chance to develop trust and shared understanding with fellow-participants – particularly important with those with whom they’ll be playing closely.
    • A step towards emotional safety – from having had a ‘dry run’ of the relationship, and having set and tested boundaries.

    What might organizers get from it?

    • Participants on the same page – ensuring that they have covered the key things that are needed to be covered.
    • Participants sharing in creation of material – giving them the chance to bring their own creativity to the larp preparations as well as the larp itself, even when the characters are fully predesigned.
    • Participants energized – larping a scene is the best way of preparing minds and bodies for larping a larp. If preparatory scenes take place shortly before the start of the larp proper, they can help participants hit the ground running. (This is good for the participants themselves, too, of course.)
    • Participants feeling safer and more able to trust – because they have been able to explore their behaviour together in a much lower-pressure and lower-stakes framework than within the larp itself.

    There might also be other reasons or functions to use preparatory scenes. For instance, some participants might value having a ‘lived experience’ of the backstory, rather than it just being written in the character sheet. Or they might find that it helps them to physically embed memories as though they were their characters’. These psychological angles are beyond the scope of this article, but might repay some study.

    How are they organized?

    Organizers may just leave a time window for participants to decide and run their own preparatory scenes, but more usually there will be some sort of plan. Most efficiently, this will be a rota arrangement, telling each participant with whom they are to play a scene, when, and also where to do it (to save time trying to find an empty room/corner while everyone else is doing so too). The idea will generally be to play at least one scene with each of your character’s most important relationships: what kind of scene will depend upon the details of the backstory and of the connection that they have together. The Spanish organization Not Only Larp call this ‘speed-larping’, by analogy with speed-dating. One of their larps that used it is No Middle Ground.

    A participant’s schedule might look something like this:

    Timeslot 1: with character A, in location X, play out the scene when you first met and became friends.

    Timeslot 2: with characters B and C, in location Y, play out your drinks together last night that decided you to join this mission.

    Timeslot 3: take a break.

    Timeslot 4: with character D, in location Y, play a typical family holiday from your childhood together.

    Timeslot 5: with characters A and D, and player Q acting as an NPC, play the scene of your parent dying in hospital.

    … with more details given for what’s expected to happen in each scene, as required.

    (Breaks are sometimes needed if it’s not possible to occupy everyone in every timeslot, because of some scenes involving different numbers of people.)

    The transitions between timeslots will usually be signalled by ringing a bell, or something like that. That tells everyone to end the current scene, and move to the location where their next one will be happening.

    One approach used in Harem Son Saat was to use preparatory scenes as a transition into play: as the very last phase of the pre-larp workshop. It started with one-on-one and small-group scenes (from backstory), then progressed into three large groups segregated by gender (this segregation was an important aspect of play in the larp) containing the whole set of participants – and then the larp itself started. The larp designer, Muriel Algayres,((Muriel Algayres. Personal communication with the author. (2020). )) explains that the intention is to progress throughout the workshops to being more and more in-character, and then to move from in-character scenes directly into play so as to have the participants as ‘warm’ as possible.

    Of course, for this to work, everyone had to already be in costume, and the usual final-briefing notes had to have already been given. It won’t be appropriate for all larps, or for all participant groups. But it was effective at supporting Harem Son Saat’s theme of a community whose present is overshadowed by its history (open and secret) and by its customs and patterns of behaviour.

    So where does the magic part come in?

    Think of the traditional ‘magic circle’ model of play.((Katie Salen and Eric Zimmerman, Rules of Play: Game Design Fundamentals. (2004). )) In this model, preparation for the larp and other para-larp((‘Para-larp’ is that activity around the larp that is not the larp itself. See Johanna Koljonen, ‘Designing Your Thing, Their Experience and Our Culture’ (2016).)) activities take place outside the circle: then at the start of the larp, participants cross into the circle, and start play under the different rules of reality, etc, that apply there.

    Preparatory scenes are a way of bringing some of the magic out of the circle, into the pre-larp. They allow calibration activities to take place in-character, with all the benefits for remembering and feeling that can bring. They allow participants to try out ways of relating their characters to one another, without the commitment to consistency that will be required in-play.

    By using preparatory scenes, you can make the magic of larp fresher, stronger, and just all-round generally magicker.

    References

    Algayres, Muriel. Personal communication with the author. 2020.

    Koljonen, Johanna. “Designing your thing, their experience and our culture.” Nordic Larp Talks 2016, Oslo. YouTube, https://youtu.be/yKZAeVAVfoE?t=422

    Kyhn, Mia. “Preplay.” In What Do We Do When We Play?, edited by Eleanor Saitta, Johanna Koljonen, Jukka Särkijärvi, Anne Serup Grove, Pauliina Männistö, and Mia Makkonen. Helsinki: Solmukohta, 2020. https://nordiclarp.org/2020/12/24/preplay/

    Nielsen, Martin. “Culture Calibration in Pre-larp Workshops“. Nordiclarp.org, 2014. https://nordiclarp.org/2014/04/23/culture-calibration-in-pre-larp-workshops/

    Salen, Katie, and Eric Zimmerman. Rules of Play: Game Design Fundamentals. Cambridge, MA: The MIT Press, 2004.

    Cover photo: Image by Natalia Y on Pixabay. Photo has been cropped.

    This article is published in the companion book Book of Magic: Vibrant Fragments of Larp Practices and is published here with permission. Please cite this text as:

    Holkar, Mo. “Larping Before the Larp: The Magic of Preparatory Scenes.” In Book of Magic: Vibrant Fragments of Larp Practices, edited by Kari Kvittingen Djukastein, Marcus Irgens, Nadja Lipsyc, and Lars Kristian Løveng Sunde. Oslo, Norway: Knutepunkt, 2021.

  • Overview of Edu-Larp Conference 2019

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    Overview of Edu-Larp Conference 2019

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    Edu-larp can be described as implementing live-action role-playing games in formal or informal educational contexts, “used to impart pre-determined pedagogical or didactic content” (Balzer & Kurz 2015). The aim of the Edu-larp Conference 2019 was to present and discuss recent international research as well as share best practice examples or innovative formats of edu-larp.The first edu-larp conference was held in 2014 in Sweden, organized by Carolina Dahlberg. From single workshops at the Nordic Larp Conferences Knudepunkt dealing with edu-larp, Carolina took to actually making a separate conference, taking place before the main event. In consecutive years, the edu-larp conference has been running every year since and will again in Finland 2020. Edu-larp conferences have also been hosted in the United States in a similar setup as the ones in the Nordic countries. They have taken place the day before the Living Games Conference, the US larpers’ version of Knudepunkt, and were hosted in 2016 (Austin, Texas) and 2018 (Boston, Massachussetts).

    The Edu-larp Conference 2019 was held at Ungdomshuset in Odense (Denmark) on 7 February 2019 from 9-17. The organizers (Muriel Algayres, Charles Bo Nielsen, and Katrin Geneuss) had sent out an open call for papers via social media and all proposals were accepted. There were eight presentations in total, spanning research and development projects, as well as reports on specific ways of facilitating edu-larps and of implementing future projects. Furthermore, three workshops were held (described below) and the program included an optional trip to Efterskolen Epos, a boarding school that uses edu-larp as one of its teaching tools.

    This article contains summaries of presentations, workshops, and the trip to Efterskolen Epos.

    Photo of Josefin Westborg
    Josefin Westborg

    Summary of the Eight Presentations

    Josefin Westborg presented results from her bachelor’s thesis in a talk entitled “Who Sees What? Perceived Learning Areas After Participating in an Edu-larp.” Applying the model of Hammer et al. (2018), she handed out an existing survey using the constructs 1) portraying a character, 2) Manipulation a fictional world, 3) Altered sense of reality, and 4) Shared imagination. Further, she conducted qualitative interviews with four edu-larp participants who had different functions in the games. Their perceptions about learning from edu-larps are similar, regardless if they were a student or a teacher. The important factor seems to be how immersed a participant is in the larp. Based on her work, Westborg suggests adding the constructs agency and personal growth to the model of Hammer et al. (2018).

    Carola Nebe from the German association Waldritter e.V. presented a short film which was produced to explain the method of edu-larp to an audience who might not be familiar with the technique. It can be found here.

    Photo of Carola Nebe
    Carola Nebe

    Olivia Fischer from the College of Teacher Education in Vienna (PH Wien) presented a format for how to introduce edu-larp as a teaching method in teacher education. In short, she first explains edu-larp as a concept and then lets students participate in edu-larps with different purposes and focuses relevant to education. She proposed among other things that edu-larps holds potential for raising student self-efficacy, which concerns “people’s beliefs in their ability to influence events that affect their lives” (Bandura, 2010, p. 1) and contributing to “Bildung,” which refers to a tradition of self-cultivation, personal maturation, and identity development, which only to a certain extent can be translated with “literacy.”

    Photo of Olivia Fischer
    Olivia Fischer

    Katrin Geneuss presented parts of results from her PhD thesis “Die waren ja mittendrin! Ganzheitliches Lernen im Rollenspiel EduLARP” (Geneuss 2019). She focused on difficulties associated with using edu-larps during regular lessons of German, History, and Philosophy in Bavaria. Through semi-narrative interviews, she found that pedagogues were concerned with the perceived effort/result-ratio, meaning that edu-larps take a lot of time to design and to facilitate, but the learning outcome is difficult to measure. This connects to another challenge, which is how to set grades on the student’s performance. To meet the teacher’s needs and to decrease the time of preparation, it would be of help to offer ready-to-play material, as can be found here. Despite those and other minor concerns, the thesis reported that due to the high degree of motivation and active involvement of the students, the STARS-project in Munich is appreciated by teachers and pupils alike.

    Photo of Katrin Geneuss
    Katrin Geneuss

    Muriel Algayres presented the results of the introduction of a role-playing game activity for secondary class students in History (Algayres 2019). She compared intrinsic and self determined motivation (see Ryan & Deci 2017) for a group of students involved in the activity with a control group. Though the quantitative levels of intrinsic and self-determined motivation were higher for the group of students involved in the activity, the sample of students was too small to establish statistical significance. However, based on the positive results, she highlighted the potential for educational role-playing games to increase intrinsic motivation in students.

    Photo of Andrea Castellani
    Andrea Castellani

    Andrea Castellani and Matteo Bisanti gave an overview over the Italian larp conference Edularp.it, which in its first year featured talks by 13 different speakers. Further, they presented Il Congegno di Leonardo, which is an edu-larp organization in Italy. Initially focusing on edu-larps for science education in secondary schools, they are currently expanding activities into other subjects and other target groups (primary school pupils, larpers, the general public, etc).

    Photo of Matteo Bisanti
    Matteo Bisanti

    Jannick Trolliet introduced the audience to how edu-larp is used in Swiss holiday camps with youths. He pointed out that the remote location invites children and young adults to explore the natural environment as well as physical interaction.

    Qla Zetterling from the Swedish company Lajvverkstaden summarized the project From Russia with Love in Belarus, where he facilitated edu-larps to teach sexual education in orphanages. Edu-larp can be a necessary vehicle to talk about topics that are socially not accepted or taboo otherwise.

    Photo of Qla Zetterling
    Qla Zetterling

    Workshops

    Between the sets of presentations, the participants were offered three mid-day workshops. On the workshop on research, which was led by Sarah Lynne Bowman and Katrin Geneuss, participants worked together on definitions and terminology, as well as on making a map of participant research intentions and methodologies. This workshop showed that from a research perspective, edu-larps as a field of research is diverse and fragmented both in terms of the topics and methods used, when applying edu-larp in formal or informal settings. Furthermore, qualitative research in edu-larp makes use of a variety of theoretical and methodological perspectives, for example, thematic analysis (see Braun & Clarke, 2006), grounded theory (see Strauss & Corbin 1997), action research (see Stringer 2008), ethnography (see Balsiger & Lambelet 2014), motivation theory (see Ryan & Deci 2017), and network analysis (see Bruun & Evans 2018). These are some of the perspectives in use to answer equally diverse research questions. Many participants were in the beginning of their research careers and/or had edu-larps as one of many research interests. As can be expected from a budding field, researchers seem to bring in the theories and methodologies they know from other more or less related fields.

    sticky notes on a whiteboard brainstorming the academic field of edu-larp

    Another workshop was lead by Olivia Fischer, and was concerned with implementing drama techniques and edu-larps in teacher education. This workshop featured many hands-on exercises for the participants, several of which were inspired by improvisational theatre. A third workshop on edu-larp design was lead by Charles Bo Nielsen. The workshop to the format of what can be called “a larp jam:” Starting with a brainstorm of ideas from common “idea points,” the workshop participants proceeded to team up and develop ideas further. As an end product, the developed ideas were narrowed down by participants to finalized pitches, which were presented to the overall audience of the conference.

    Visit to Efterskolen Epos

    The conference had an optional add-on: the audience was offered a trip to the Danish boarding school Efterskolen Epos. It is one of two secondary schools in Denmark using role-playing games as an integrated part of their teaching strategy. The trip was co-organized by Esben Wilstrup and Charles Bo Nielsen. At Efterskolen Epos, participants engaged in joint discussions with pupils as well as teachers from the school. This gave different perspectives on how the school utilizes both pupil and teacher resources when designing games from which students may acquire knowledge, skills, and competencies required by the Danish school system (grades 9 – 10). In Denmark, an “efterskole” (the literal translation from Danish is “after school”) is a government-funded institution that acts as a transitional boarding school to prepare lower secondary students (8th, 9th, and 10th graders in the Danish school system) for upper secondary school. An “efterskole” usually has a focus, often related to particular fields of interest, such as sports, music, outdoors, or larp. This focus is often accompanied by a pedagogical vision and practice. As a government funded school, Efterskolen Epos follows the standard educational regulations of 9-10th grade including regulations for exams and grades.

    participants brainstorming in the edu-larp workshop 2019
    Participants in a workshop at the Edu-Larp Conference 2019. Photo by Anders Berner

    Outlook

    The variation of the contributions to the edu-larp conference indicates that larp as an educational tool is applied in many different contexts, ranging from holiday camps to courses at colleges for teacher education. These formal and informal learning and teaching strategies demand well-trained teachers and facilitators, which is why multiple programs need to be developed. Research in edu-larps may be seen as a new bud in the young fields of game-based learning and gamification. As such, research in edu-larps is diverse both in terms of research questions and methods. Furthermore, research in edu-larps seems to be intimately tied to teacher practice and development of unique edu-larps, rather than investigations of standard materials. Finally and linked to the last point, the field has a great and diverse interdisciplinary potential, both in terms of research and design. As mentioned previously, this potential of edu-larp among others touches the fields of performative studies, drama education (Heathcote & Bolton 1995), and psychology, as well as interdisciplinary teaching, where edu-larps may help link, for example, the Humanities and the Sciences.

    References

    Algayres, Muriel. 2018. “A Study of Active Learning in Educational Roleplaying Games and Students’ Motivation.” Proceedings from the TAL2018 Conference, Syddansk University, 2018.

    Balsiger, Philip, and Alexandre Lambelet. 2014. “Participant Observation.” In Methodological Practices in Social Movement Research, edited by Donatella Della Porta, 144-172. Oxford: Oxford University Press.

    Balzer, Muriel, and Julia Kurz. 2015. “Learning by Playing. Larp as a Teaching Method.” Nordiclarp.org. Last modified March 4.

    Bandura, Albert. 2010. “Self‐efficacy.” In The Corsini Encyclopedia of Psychology 1-3.

    Braun, Virgina, and Victoria Clarke. 2006. “Using Thematic Analysis in Psychology.” Qualitative Research in Psychology 3, no. 2: 77-101.

    Bruun, Jesper, and Robert Evans. 2018. “Network Analysis as a Research Methodology in Science Education Research.” Pedagogika 68, no. 2: 201-217.

    Geneuss, Katrin. (2019). „Die waren ja mittendrin!“ Ganzheitliches Lernen im Rollenspiel EduLARP. Grundlagen – Wirkungen – Einsatz im Deutschunterricht. Elektronische Hochschulschriften: Ludwig-Maximilians-Universität München.

    Hammer, Jessica, To, Alexandra, Schrier, Karen, Bowman, Sarah Lynne, and Geoff Kaufman. 2018. “Learning and Role-Playing Games.” In Role-Playing Game Studies: Transmedia Foundations, edited by José P. Zagal and Sebastian Deterding, 283-299. New York: Routledge.

    Heathcote, Dorothy, and Gavin M. Bolton. 1995. Drama for Learning. Portsmouth, NH: Heinemann.

    Ryan, Richard M., and Edward L. Deci. 2017. Self-Determination Theory: Basic Psychological Needs in Motivation, Development, and Wellness. Guilford Publications.

    Strauss, Anselm, and Corbin, Juliet M. 1997. Grounded Theory in Practice. Sage.

    Stringer, Ernie T. 2008. Action Research in Education. Upper Saddle River, NJ: Pearson Prentice Hall.

    Cover photo: Muriel Algayres in the foreground, Katrin Geneuss and Charles Bo Nielsen presenting.

    Editor: Elina Gouliou

  • How to Take Care of Your Organizer

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    How to Take Care of Your Organizer

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    [This article is also available in Spanish, at: http://vivologia.es/como-cuidar-de-tus-organizadores/
    Thank you to Vivologia for translating it!]

    The term organizer burnout is once again making the rounds. In essence, it means that the demands on the people who organize larps, often in their free time as a hobby project, are so high that people are burning out and are being discouraged from organizing again. To prevent this, I have put together a handy list on how players can take care of their organizers and help to prevent burnout. This list doesn’t apply to all larps and organizers, but it can hopefully apply to several situations.

    Before the Larp

    1. When signing up for a larp, read through the information available. If you already know that there will be design decisions and policies you do not agree with, it doesn’t give you the right to criticize them after the fact and try to change the organizer’s mind about them. Often, an organizer has a reason for making a decision. You can inquire about the reason, but the organizer is not under any obligation to defend them-self to you. If the policy or decision really irks you, consider if you really want to attend this larp, or if you want to attend your own version of this larp. Respect that the organizer has their own vision for this larp.
    2. Leading up to the larp, use the official channels that the organizers of the larp have asked you to use. If they have asked you to email questions, don’t write to them through social media channels or personal messages.   Respect that some people need to compartmentalize information and that they don’t always have to be available.
    3. Read the information provided before asking questions, especially in the days leading up to the larp. If you struggle with finding information because it is spread out in different places, then you can point this out to the organizers in a nice, unpressurring way. This for example could be asking for a document with links or a thread that collects all information.
    4. If you stumble upon things you really like that the organizer is responsible for, tell them. Make them feel valued.
    5. Preparing for the larp, check the packing list and bring the things listed on it. Make sure that you bring snacks if you know you will need additional food. Read all the information once more.
    6. Consider bringing a present for your organizer if you know them well, like candy or their favorite drink. Otherwise bring hugs, but remember to ask if they want to be hugged first.

    During the Larp / Workshops

    1. Be on time.
    2. Don’t hog the organizer’s time. Remember, there are a thousand things to do just before a larp starts. Always give the organizer a way out of a situation and respect that they have things to do, even if you want to hang out with them.
    3. If you arrive at the event before the specified time, ask if you can help with anything and try to be mindful not to be in the way. The organizer has no obligation to keep you company if you’ve chosen to arrive before the set time.
    4. During the workshops, refrain from making jokes to lighten up the mood. If the organizer asks you to pose questions at the end of a segment instead of when you think of them, write down any questions and do that, instead of thinking that asking your question can’t hurt the flow or timing of the workshop.
    5. Don’t hog the organizer’s time during breaks or in workshops. They have a million things to do. If it is a dear friend, consider saying that you are there and ready to hang out and support them, but only if that’s what they want. Anything other than an enthusiastic yes is a no.
    6. Don’t ask the organizer for special privileges just because they’re your friend (unless they are for health and safety reasons).
    7. Listen during the workshops to understand what function the organizer will have during the game. If they say you can larp with them (for example if they have an NPC function), then you can, but remember to always give them an opportunity to opt out. If they are present only in an off-game capacity, then respect that.

    After the Larp

    1. After the game, thank the organizer either at the larp or afterwards online. Give them appreciation and tell them about things you enjoyed that they were responsible for.
    2. Allow the organizers some time to recover before providing negative comments about the larp. If you want to rant about the game in a way that includes criticism of some sort, check to see if the organizer is nearby. If they are, don’t do it. For an organizer, that sort of criticism is not what they need to hear in that moment. Your criticism during the larp may make it difficult for them to perform their other tasks effectively.
    3. Check in with the organizer after the game, repeat positive things, and wait for them to ask about constructive criticism before giving it. Some organizers request a Week of Stories, in which players should only share their positive stories from the event for the first week after the larp before issuing criticisms. Respect that wish.
    4. If there is a feedback form, fill it in. When filling in longer comments, remember to nuance your answers. Often organizers will clump together the data and the comments separately, which means that even if your data reflects that you have had a good larp, your comments may make it seem like a bad experience.
    5. Remember, you might not have all the information about a design decision. Even if something seems objectively bad to you, there might be reasons for it. Try not to word things as absolutes, but as things you perceived as flaws. Sometimes your own expectations or other outside influences are the reasons you haven’t had a good game. Sometimes it’s the design. Rarely is it because the organizer is a horrible human being.
    6. If you don’t organize on a regular basis, or if you have never organized a larp like the one you attended, have some humility. Remember that this is a person that has put themselves out there in trying to create something. Be nice.

    This is a living document that may be updated to include more tips. I don’t claim to have thought of everything, or that my tips work for everyone, but this is, in my opinion, a baseline with which to start. If you want to add something, including rewording, nuancing, or disagreeing, feel free to use the comment section and expand upon your suggestion.

    Cover photo: Pixabay

    Edited by: Elina Gouliou

  • Group Improvisation of Larp Rituals

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    Group Improvisation of Larp Rituals

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    The aim of this article is to equip you with all the practical knowledge you need to run good, impactful fake rituals for larps. We present a 30-minute workshop which will teach a group of larpers to on-the-spot improvise cool magicky-feeling rituals.

    This article does not aim to discuss larp rituals from a theoretical perspective – for a more theoretical take on larp rituals, see Bowman (2015).  The suggested workshop is based on workshops run in connection with several larps, including Coven (Häggström and Falk 2015) and Ekdahl 1995 (Fallsdalen and Holgersson 2017). The authors have run the workshop many times in several countries, and other larpers have run similar workshops for many years in the Nordic countries – see for example Fatland (2015).

    Larp rituals can create not only temporary psychological effects but also bleed. The human brain and its emotions are eminently hackable, and one way this can be done is through rituals, both everyday rituals and religious rituals (for more on human rituals, see Bell (2009). Even if we know that something is fake, the act of doing it can have a true impact on your psyche and your body (see Charlesworth et al 2017; Pierre 2017).

    Rituals are experience enhancers: they can take the emotional theme of the larp and dial up the impact factor. Think of them as dramatic loudspeakers, and use them carefully.

    Overall workshop structure

    The workshop is performed in seven (7) steps:

    Step 1: The anatomy of a ritual: explain the common core.

    Step 2: The ritual toolkit

    Step 3: Practice your first ritual

    Step 4: Roles in the ritual: ritual leaders and followers

    Step 5: Try another ritual

    Step 6: Post-ritual theory

    Step 7: (If there’s more time) More practice in small groups

    Step 1: The anatomy of a ritual: explain the common core.

    In order to make it easier to improvise rituals, this workshop works with one specific, set, core structure for all rituals. Explain this structure to the workshop participants. We suggest that you make this structure – diegetic: this is how all the rituals in the larp world in question works.

    A ritual consists of three main phases (in boldface below) and two optional phases (in italics).

    Make a circle((Why circles? This workshop relies strongly on the effect of circles. Standing in a circle makes us focus on the others in the circle. It creates a small, temporal world with special rules. We feel more connected and are able to easily play off of each other’s actions and reactions.))

    • E.g. with people holding hands, or salt, or rope, or draw it, or place bones in a circle around the participants. Whatever is most appropriate for the context, as long as it is a circle.
    • The ritual leader may state “The circle is now complete” to make certain that all participants are aware of this.
    • A circle protects those within from evil outside, and also protects the outside from evil inside.

    Summon forces (optional)

    • This is optional but usually adds a cool feel.
    • Summon appropriate forces for the scenario/larp. In one larp it might be the four elements, in another it might be an ancient Egyptian god, in another it might be a fantasy creature. These will aid you and you can play on receiving power from them in the Main Act.

    Main act

    • Before creating a ritual, it is important to know that the ritual is about. This should be clear in the main phase, which should bring the group together and create a cool experience by chanting, movement, light, but also acts and proclamations that make the narrative of the larp move forward. For example, you might be filling a protective amulet with forces or maybe you are summoning the dead to talk to them. Maybe you have a possessed person who you want to exorcise. Use props like incense, fake blood, candles, tarot cards, draw symbols on the floor (make sure you can remove them afterwards).

    Thank the summoned forces (optional)

    • If you summoned forces and forgot to thank them, then that is an excellent source for cool drama. What would the consequences be?

    Break the circle

    • Break the circle by removing a part of the salt, erase the pencil drawing, remove the rope etc. etc.
    • Again, this needs to be announced clearly so that all players are aware of this.
    • It is potentially very dangerous to leave a ritual before a circle is properly broken – use this as a potential source of drama.
    • Another good drama source is if the circle is broken incorrectly or too soon! Forces might be rushing in or out. Anything might happen.

    Step 2: The Ritual Toolkit

    There is a single basic rule in creating rituals: the more magic it feels, the more magic it is in the larp.

    We want to create the illusion that there is magic afoot.

    We want to create a joint experience of this magic

    We want to create something that looks cool and feels cool.

    We want to make all participants feel like they are involved.

    In step 2, introduce the tools below to your larpers. Tell them that things will become clearer in STEP 3, where you will practice making a ritual using these tools.

    • A foundational soundscape, created by the participants. Everyone in the circle mimics the ritual leader to create the basic soundscape. This soundscape can include:
      • A sustained tone that the group starts and maintains.
      • Whispers (maybe the dead are talking?), hushes, vibrating hummings (this can turn into words very easily).
      • Song (a simple and repetitive song works best)
      • Rhythmic clapping or finger snapping
    • A basic movement of the group / position in the room
      • Its simplest form is just people standing in a circle.
      • Or they could be moving in the circle, walking around.
      • They can also be repeating the same gesture (tearing power from the object in the center maybe?) over and over.
    • Supplementary sounds that illustrate the magic (and thereby create the magic) achieved by the ritual.
      • A single person sings a higher sustained note than everyone else, or moves up and down a scale.
      • A single person starts snapping their fingers
      • A single person starts talking in tongues
      • A single person blows air (maybe because they are channeling an air elemental?) or hisses (a water elemental?)
      • Supplementary movements that illustrates the magic and thereby creates the magic.
      • A single person claps their hands, stomp their feet, presses life force into someone else.
      • Use props! Stones, incense, bones, papers with words of power, wind chimes, bells etc. Remember – if it feels magical it is magical.

    Step 3: Practice your first ritual

    1. Put an object on the floor – tell the players that you are going to bless it.
    2. Tell them that this will feel ridiculous. That’s ok! Encourage them to let it be ridiculous. (You will do a more serious thing later)
    3. Tell everyone that once you start making sounds, they should mimic you to create the basic soundscape. That soundscape should then be kept going throughout the ritual.
    4. Tell them that when you point to a single person, they should add something of their own as a supplementary sound or movement atop the basic soundscape.
    5. The others don’t need to mimic them, but they MAY do so if it feels right.
    6. Tell them that you are doing a small ritual – only the three main stages (make circle, main act, break circle).
    7. Alright – now put them in a circle, make them hold hands. Stay inside the circle. Say “the circle is now complete”.
    8. Create the basic soundscape. E.g. a single buzzing tone and then a rhythmical clapping. The others will mimic you.
    9. Vary the basic soundscape, make the group feel the power and how fun it is to make noise together.
    10. Point to a single person, who starts doing a gesture or sound. Point to some others.
    11. Raise the intensity of the basic soundscape.
    12. Start pushing power (with gestures) into the object in the middle.
    13. Raise the intensity of the basic soundscape to a crescendo. Stop it with an abrupt shout and/or movement.
    14. Say “it is done”, and break the circle of hands.
    15. Alright – you’ve done your first ritual. It had three parts – repeat them for the participants. Ask them how that felt.
    Circles are core components of rituals.
    Circles are core components of rituals.

    Step 4: Roles in the ritual: Ritual leaders and followers

    In this step, you make your participants aware of two different roles in a ritual, and how those roles can be used to aid in improvising a ritual or make it more complex.

    Leader of the ritual

    • Has an out of game responsibility to help the ritual feel cool and magicky.
    • This responsibility can be shared among two or more people, but it’s usually easiest to do it alone.
    • Since the leader will be in control of what happens during the ritual, it might be necessary to go out of game to talk to participants out of character before the ritual is run. Depending on the larp tradition you come from, more or less transparency in this will be needed.
    • To determine (via game mechanics or pre-determined choice) if the ritual will succeed or not.
    • To determine if something particular is going to happen.
    • Is responsible for being clear during the ritual about what is happening so that the players can make their characters react accordingly. For example, the leader is very clear about making and breaking the circle, and informing participants about how to understand the ritual. For instance: “now, if she falls to the floor that means that we fail and the demon wins”.
    • May be a game master.
    • Has to be prepared to change the ritual on the spot if a participant adds something unexpected to the mix (“I sacrifice my life blood to do X…”). Roll with the punches – it’s fun!
    • Has to be able to defend the ritual from TOO MANY changes brought on by improvising participants (by saying “No!”, that usually works).
    • “Repeat after me” is a very good tool to make everyone feel connected and safe.

    Followers

    • Add to the ritual by sounds and movements and cool ideas that they interject
    • It’s both your right and your obligation to help create the ritual
    • Help make the narrative go forward through the ritual
    • Respect the decisions of the leader – there might be a grand plan that you’re not aware of.
    • If you get confused during the ritual, don’t hesitate. Ask! Either in character or out of character.

    Step 5: Try another ritual

    Practice making another ritual in which you are the leader. Tell the participants to look at you and to enhance what you are doing. This will be a ritual with the goal to create some particular magic that you have decided on in advance. The participant’s task is to illustrate the magic that you indicate with the way you roleplay. Then do this set exercise:

    1. Tell them that you are doing all five parts of the ritual (repeat them) to create a magic portal to another world.
    2. Remind them that first the group will create a soundscape, then you (as the leader) will point to individuals. They should add something to the sound or the movement.
    3. Make the circle with you inside it. Start the soundscape.
    4. Get four people to help you call on the four elements.
    5. Say “I call on EARTH”, point to one of them – they’ll improvise something. Do the other elements.
    6. Channel elements into a point in the circle. Let the chanting increase to a crescendo (indicate this with your own voice and with hand movements.
    7. Start sounding uncertain (oh no! I’m losing focus! No!) – the group will now, of its on, follow you and illustrate this with frantic sounds. (You should not need to tell them this, at this point, most larpers have the hang of this and will improvise beautifully in concert).
    8. Fall out of the circle, breaking it!
    9. Go “out of character” and remark that that wasn’t too good for these characters – you broke the circle. What are possible consequences – ask them!
    10. If you have some other magic you want to focus on, feel free to replace the portal with something else.

    Step 6: Post-ritual theory

    Talk to your players about Consequences!

    • What are some ways that characters can feel after a ritual? Tired, nauseous, giddy, high?
      • Did the ritual fail? Or succeed? How do I know?
      • The ritual leader can (often should) make this very clear. State it afterwards.
      • Or the ritual leader makes it clear that it is not clear what happened. The players can spend the next few hours worrying, and game masters can plan future events around this.
      • Usually if it FELT like the ritual succeeded, it succeeded. Other things to weigh:
    • Was the ritual interrupted? That might be bad.
      • Did you thank the summoned forces?
      • Did you make and break the circle correct?
      • What would give the most amount of cool play?
      • Did it feel magical? Then it was magical.
    • Clean up after yourself
      • Blow out any candles
      • Remove salt
      • Remove fake blood quickly
      • Use a plastic sheet if you know it’s going to get messy.
    • Summary. Remind your participants about what you’ve been doing the last half hour.
      • Make a circle
      • Summon forces
      • Main act
      • Thank forces
      • Break circle
      • Everyone contributes
      • The role of the leader of the ritual
      • Did you succeed?

    There is no absolute right or wrong in creating play pretend rituals. Go with your imagination! Use the dramatic power of consequences.

    Step 7: (If there’s more time) More practice in small groups

    Divide participants into small groups (around 5 in each group)

    Give them scenarios to improvise rituals around. Some suggestions:

    • Make an amulet that carries a blessing from each of you.
    • Let a ghost possess a character to reveal its murderer.

    Tell them that it’s better to OVERACT than UNDERACT. If they get that out of their system now, they’ll feel freer during the actual larp.

    If there is time, have them redo the ritual, but this time with less overacting and more serious.

    Some Final Thoughts

    Many typical rituals seen in larps mirror religious rituals. This might make some participants uncomfortable and might lead to unintentional bleed. Make sure your participants are aware that there will be rituals, and be prepared for the possibility that some of them will choose to opt out before or during the ritual. As in all other aspects of the larp, make sure that there are safety words and procedures that will let them leave discreetly and feel empowered enough to do so.

    Finally, let us reiterate that the goal of this workshop is to create fake rituals for theatre purposes. If you are reading this for any other purpose, this is not the text for you. For the rest of you, we wish to quote Granny Weatherwax from Pratchett’s books: “It doesn’t stop being magic just because you know how it works.”

    AcknowledgementsThe authors wish to thank all the wonderful organizers and participants who have had a hand in developing this workshop through the years. A special thank you to Annika Waern for very insightful editing and feedback on the final version of this article.

    Tarot cards can be good props.
    Tarot cards can be good props.

    References

    Bell, C. 2009. Ritual Theory, Ritual Practice. Oxford University Press: NY. Available at http://web.vu.lt/rstc/a.pazeraite/files/2014/09/Catherine-Bell-Ritual-Theory-Ritual-Practice-Oxford-University-Press-USA-2009.pdf  (Accessed December 8 2017)

    Bowman, S. L. Love, Sex, Death, and Liminality: Ritual in Just a Little Lovin’. Available at https://nordiclarp.org/2015/07/13/love-sex-death-and-liminality-ritual-in-just-a-little-lovin/ (Accessed December 8 2017)

    Charlesworth JEG et al. Effects of placebos without deception compared with no treatment: A systematic review and meta-analysis. J Evid Based Med. 2017;10:97–107. https://doi.org/10.1111/jebm.12251 (Accessed December 8 2017)

    Fallsdalen, E and C. Holgersson. 2017. Ekdahl 1995. Larp. http://ekdahl1995.wixsite.com/lajv (Accessed December 8 2017)

    Fatland, E. 2015. Notes on Ritual Improv. Available at: http://larpwright.efatland.com/?p=600 (Accessed December 8 2017)

    Häggström, E and S. Falk. 2015. Coven. Larp. https://www.coven.nu/ (Accessed December 8, 2017)

    Pierre, J. 2017. The Healing Power of Placebos: Fact of Fiction. In Psychology Today. Available at: https://www.psychologytoday.com/blog/psych-unseen/201705/the-healing-power-placebos-fact-or-fiction (Accessed December 8 2017)

    This article is part of Re-Shuffling the Deck, the companion journal for Knutepunkt 2018.

    All articles from the companion can be found on the Knutpunkt 2018 category.

     

  • Workshop Practice, in Practice – A Functional Workshop Structure Method

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    Workshop Practice, in Practice – A Functional Workshop Structure Method

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    The pre-game workshop tradition in Nordic larp is mostly oral, with little written material. People take part in workshops as players, then borrow and develop ideas from those experiences to construct workshops for their own larps. So I thought it might be useful to put together a method which looks at some of the different intentions and purposes that workshop activities can have, to help designers think about and plan their workshops more systematically.

    The table below lists and categorizes workshop activities that I use in my own practice, or that I will use if I run a larp that requires them. The sequence of the table is the sequence in which I use these activities: ie. first working on the players themselves, then working with them on their characters; start with warmup, move on to impro basics if required, and so on. There may be requirements to move back and forth (eg. perhaps a re-warmup will be needed partway through, or meta-techniques may be practised again in-character), but it’s this general direction.

    In practice you may use workshop activities that have more than one purpose: this may be desirable both for conciseness and for helping to reinforce the activity impact upon players. For example, flashback scenes can be used to calibrate players’ understanding of relationships with each other. Or the way to teach a particular technique could also serve as a trust exercise.

    I’ve given an example activity for each aim, but of course there are many different ways of achieving all of them: some will be more appropriate for some larps than for others; and you’ll have your own favourites. The useful Workshop Handbook site has a categorized collection of activities which give plenty more examples.

    A few of the items talk about ‘calibration’. This is a very important larp-preparation concept, introduced by Martin Nielsen (2014). The short definition is: “all participants adjust their interpretation of a phenomenon, so that all participants have more or less the same interpretation.” (Where I take “phenomenon” to mean something like: an aspect of the culture being portrayed/experienced in the larp.)

    (click to open PDF version of this table) (click to open PDF version of this table)

    * Safety exercises aren’t always included in workshops; indeed they’re quite rare in some larping cultures. But I personally feel that there should always be at least a minimum safety brief.

    Details

    Spelling each of these out in more detail:

    • Introduction– the frame through which players enter the workshop and the game. Welcome them, check off names if appropriate, tell everyone what the game is that they’re about to play, tell them that now they are in the pre-game workshop.
    • Practicalities – those useful things players need to know so they can be comfortable in the space. Where are the bathrooms, where are the exits, can they eat and drink, how long will the workshop and the game last, will there be breaks… etc.
    • Structure and purpose – explain why this game is preceded by a workshop, and what will be achieved during it. You may want to go into detail about the workshop activities – more likely, you’ll just give a general picture. (Or you may want to keep the activities secret for now, so the players aren’t expecting them.)
    • Warmup – important to get players relaxed, disinhibited, and moving freely. There are lots of great warmup exercises, such as Penguins and flamingos, Human knot, Jump in jump out, Shake hands… Choose exercises that are appropriate for your number of players and for the space that you’re using.
    • Impro basics – simple exercises to reinforce (or to introduce, if your players are new to this) the basic improvisation tools of Yes, and…, Not blocking, and so on.
    • Physicality – this may be important if the game requires physical contact, but your players are unaccustomed to it in their larp tradition, or are strangers to each other. The exercises should familiarize them with each other’s touch, proximity and presence. This doesn’t need to be any more intense than it will be in the larp itself.
    • Trust – particularly useful in emotionally intense games. If you can help players become comfortable entrusting themselves to each other’s care, it’ll make opening up emotionally that much easier.
    • Out-of-game – this won’t always be required, particularly if you’re going straight from the workshop into the game. But if you need to explain practicalities of travel, food, sleeping etc relating to the game, now is the time to do it.
    • Expectations of play – you may prefer to let these emerge naturally, of course, or to let players infer them from the material. But if you’re expecting a particular style or mode of play – for example, if the game’s intended as a farcical satire in which nothing makes sense; or if players are to act with grand, exaggerated gestures to communicate their emotions; or you expect them to act like hardened criminals who behave as if their every move is under watch – tell them so, and explain that you will be showing them how to do it later in the workshop.
    • Skills – some games may require the players to use out-of-game skills that they do not (yet) themselves have. If dancing is an important part of the game, you may need to teach them how to dance appropriately: and so on.
    • Safety – go through the safety policy and practice of the game, and act out examples where that’ll be helpful. Cut, Brake, ‘The door is open’, Traffic lights, Lines and veils – whatever you’re using. You need to make sure that the players are familiar and comfortable with the safety techniques, and (ideally) that they won’t hesitate to use them – or to interpret other players’ using them – during the course of the game.
    • Rules and system – where present. For example, in a combat larp, there may be rules about how many blows will cause injury or death. Or if there’s non-WYSIWYG magic, players may need to be told how to interpret its commands. Explain and practise until they are familiar.
    • Techniques – this covers unnatural things that players may have to do during the game for some (non-meta) purpose. So, for example, suppose your game features a fantasy culture who traditionally greet each other by clasping each others’ forearms between their backs. You want the players to learn this manoeuvre and to practice it until it comes as easily to them as it does to the characters that they’re playing.
    • Meta-techniques – techniques that are ‘meta’, ie. that operate outside the game reality and allow players to communicate directly (rather than as their characters) in some way. Maybe you want players to be able to deliver an internal monologue of their character’s current thoughts: they will need to learn the meta-technique that triggers it, such as standing in a designated part of the room, or having their glass pinged by another player.
    • Mutual understanding of game world — very important if the setting is not a familiar one. If players have differing internal assumptions about how the world works or of facts about it, that can cause problems in the game. This element of calibration is best carried out by discussion, followed by improvised scenes using the established knowledge. The GMs should provide guidance and suggestions.
    • Mutual understanding of relationships – if characters are already designed, the players need to make sure that they and the people with whom they have relationships (of any kind) have a shared understanding of what those relationships are and how they work. This is best done by discussion, and again can be followed by improvised scenes acting out the relationship (for the more important ones).
    • Creating characters from players’ own ideas – in some games, the players will invent their characters wholly, within the workshop. The GMs will have to explain how to do this, and facilitate the process.
    • Around a GM-designed skeleton – in other games, players may have been given a skeleton character that they fill out themselves. If you have time, one nice way of doing this is with a ‘prelude’ – a one-on-one GMed scene in which the player is led through decisions and statements about their character that combine to flesh it out fully and satisfyingly.
    • Practical – if there’s any system or rules (or numbers of any kind) applicable to character creation, GMs need to explain them and help players apply them.
    • Role exploration and definition – if the character is to play a particular narrative role in the game (eg. captain of the ship, mysterious stranger, disruptive toddler, Prussian spy) then GMs may need to brief the player on how to fulfil those duties.
    • Building character relationships – allow the players to mutually establish their characters’ attitudes towards, and history with, each other – where this is appropriate for the game. GMs might shape this strongly or leave it to the players: different activities will be appropriate.
    • Rehearsing those relationships – for newly-established material and also where characters have been designed in advance (by GMs or players) and players haven’t previously had the chance to explore them. A combination of discussion and playing out interpersonal scenes is generally effective.
    • Background filling-in – it may be desirable to add richness to players’ understanding of each other’s characters by the public provision of detail. Hot seat is a straightforward activity that allows players to question one another.
    • Take-off – you may wish to help the players get ‘into character’ so they don’t have to leap straight into the game (although that can work too: see Flying start). This might perhaps be a formal exercise where they assume their characters, or a quiet meditative space for them to do so privately or as a group.

    Reference

    Nielsen, M (2014). ‘Culture Calibration in Pre-larp Workshops’. http://nordiclarp.org/2014/04/23/culture-calibration-in-pre-larp-workshops/

    Acknowledgements

    Thanks to everyone who’s provided helpful suggestions and comments: particularly Steve Dempsey, Martin Nielsen and Cat Tobin.

    This article was initially published in The Knudepunkt 2015 Companion Book which was edited by Charles Bo Nielsen & Claus Raasted, published by Rollespilsakademiet and released as part of documentation for the Knudepunkt 2015 conference.

    Cover photo: Workshop at Metamorfozes 2014 larp festival in Vilnius, Lithuania. Photo by Johannes Axner.