Stringer

A selection of photo's of the rubbish negotiator, loveable, always left behind, and one of lifes loosers my Larp character, Blackthought Stringer

This is what happens if you forget to make Julie a cup of tea.

Its hard work ref-ing a Strangehaven event.

Dave the make up artist.

Aliens visit York for surfing Holiday

I had great weekend at York, helping run Strangehaven a live role play event.

After travelling through horrendous traffic Friday afternoon leaving my house just after 3 we arrived at York at 6.15pm a 3 hour trip, which is normally 1 ½ hours at the most, Still Julie and Dave spent 5 hours on the road, so I guess I was lucky.

Anyway despite the late start we managed to get playing and introduce Julie's plot and the LGM's (little green men), and with no major parts to play on Friday night I got to ref the encounters, do bead draws and answer OOC players questions which went well, I have learnt a lot since the 1 st event and that made it all far easier and gave me the skills necessary to give it a nice atmosphere prior to LGM's arrival.

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The LGM costume's (Bob the Hero, Flat Face & Technical One) where great, put together mainly by Dave and well received by players and crew alike, although I suspect those playing them may still be slightly green, since the pigment in the make up was quite hard to remove. (According to Facebook the LGM's are no longer sporting a green glow)

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Saturday I played Stringer a man beaten and tortured to death then later sent back as a paradox with bomb strapped to him. (Photo will follow hopefully), improvising plot as I went along. Then I did a bit of fighting along Commander Drusa played by Julie, who despite her knee got stuck in to combat and did well.

AndyL removed his shirts a sure sign of a major fight coming which everyone backed away from, since they knew what to expect, that's everyone bar the new player Nathan as Mallerkie who decided to challenge Andy with no shirt to a duel. He fought well but Andy let him off very lightly since he was new.

From then on mostly improvised strangeness which was fun ref'ing and playing the odd combat bunny, until Sunday.

By Sunday morning the player's had worked out the plot, between them they where a very good team and quite sharp, too sharp, we actually had to start throwing in false paths to slow them down a bit.

Overall a very enjoyable weekend, even if very, very tiring, I seem to have woke with bad back and aching limbs, I was fine yesterday.

My thanks goes to Julie for writing a great plot, although I do want to find a way of being more involved in the plotting the next time whenever that is, I may have to go back to writing side plot for Acendancy although when your not ref'ing it's almost impossible to get your plot out, unless you do it yourself and not half as satisfying.

Pot Watcher's Daughter

Old Arnkel

I have just come back from York having just done the 2nd Strangehaven event which was a great event.

Having found our way through the back roads to avoid M1 congestion during the Friday evening nightmare rush hour, we arrived on site around 7ish later than planned but traffic was horrendous not only getting from my house to York, but Julie getting from Coventry in the 1st place.

Friday night's story got underway with a party celebrating to upcoming death of my character Old Arnkel for the 3rd time, unfortunately the happy atmosphere was broken by foul mouthed pirates. After a bit of trouble Julie character Geruuih was kidnapped and brutally beaten as you can see from the photo, so Saturday she arrived back from her ordeal which was far from pleasant and that kicked off a great, well paced day, with plenty of plot and characters, and good feedback and interaction from the players.

I enjoyed myself, and while tirering unlike the 1st event it was not hard work, probably for several reasons, livelier villagers, more rounded plot, npc that delivered info and were not there to provide the solutions for the players, slightly cooler weather, and players that got stuck in and asked questions.

Geruuih................................................ Commander Drusa & Guards

By the end of play on Sunday all the pieces came together and some core plot handed over to both the players and crew to take with them to the next main event.

Packing as always is a pain, but we paced it around a late lunch and left site before 5pm, so it was good to arrive home not long after 6 making it a far pleasanter journey, even if I wasn't driving

I also managed to pin down a way forward with the Shards website, so me and Julie can get it ready for Andy's upcoming change.

The day I learned to talk to cows

Strangehaven the 1st event is over with, the 1st time as writer/ref for me, it was very different from playing where you really get into a character you know inside out, and you can do/say what and as much as you want giving you a both a very enjoyable and frustrating time, different from just crewing where you have no real idea what happening and can spend hours bored waiting for players or just being a combat bunny. The nearest concept I thought would be organising a medieval murder mystery, but there while you have the creativity everything is very organised and timed to happen and fixed even if the role play is free form, its basically a game where everyone is crew. The enjoyment you get from writing and ref'ing a Lrp game is from the initial creativity, seeing your idea's work, playing different characters and having to think on your feet.

Its now over and I can't wait for the next although interupted by the next event I'm playing also, so I thinking about that as well.

Strange weekend

I'm having a good weekend although my mind is well on truly on next weekends Strangehaven event. My partner in crime for Strangehaven is having to work this weekend, but I've had a lot more time and so dabbled here and there with a few extra ideas, and done a bit of kit sorting and sewing.

Today I visited my friends Andy and Linda who made me welcome as always, their lad Christopher is also a Larper and told me all his stories about his latest characters, while I melted on their patio in the sun, before leaving to visit my mother for tea. She fed me chocolate and caramel cheesecake with strawberries which was extremely more-ish, I thought I'd lost my sweet tooth, but all this cake recently is making me want even more cake, if I don't stop soon I will be reversing the weight loss of last year.

Finally here is a picture of Jasmine in her favorite position, i.e cradled in my arms.