fishstix wrote:I'm currently involved in running a LARP in southern Wisconsin at the moment. What experience this has given me brings about these answers.
1a. structure of an adventure: First and foremost you need incentive something that will get your characters to want to go on the adventure. Money is generally the old standby, but power, knowledge, allies, personal gain of any kind can work.
After that you need an obstacle. It's not much of an adventure without something to overcome. This need not just be a monster/ some monsters to kill. Depending on what system you're running (we run the Rampant system) it could be traps, locks, mazes, social interaction, or a search. a really good deep adventure may involve several of these things (motivations, obstacles)
1b. Time limit/ frame: This is entirely up to you. If you have players who can't physically or mentally stay on track for a long time you might want to shorten the adventure. On the other hand if it feels too short it probably is. Everything comes down to two questions for length. What will work for your players? How much have you prepared for?
2. Our group (10-12 hopefully growing) has 3 "marshals," this is overkill. I think you should easily be able to handle 4-6 with one, but that doesn't mean you can't have more. NPCs all told are a dime a dozen. If you need an NPC make one then toss it in the recycling. They might come up again they might not. (Hint: if you want an NPC to stick around give him something extra. Our two most popular recurring NPCs to date are Bowen the lord of the land who is stupid powerful and has helped the characters out of a couple tight spots, and a half crazed old man most often found heckling the characters from a tree.
3. Like i said, in game money is really the standard. if your game doesn't have a monetary system I suggest something else. A weapon or xp or anything else you think will get your heroes off their asses.
4. Not entirely sure what you mean by "incorporating role-playing elements" but if you mean getting your players to actually role-play we've had great success with an NPC plant. A lot of LARPers (new ones especially) just need someone else to go first. So have someone you know can hold a character join the party for a while and stay in character and react better to people who do the same.
Hope this helped.
Any more questions just ask I'll be around for a few hours.
Also everything here is only suggestion to be taken and twisted to your groups needs. No two groups are identical and therefore everything will require a bit of tweaking.
Yes, it helped a lot! Thanks, I'll be sure to put this to good use. I read it carefully. The NPC plant is an awesome idea- I had done this before on tabletop but the thought never came to me for LARP.
Thanks, I found that out (and already posted there and got replies). Also, I've checked NERO and seen monster camp- this is EXACTLY the kind of LARP that I DON'T want to play. I want a full-contact game with a few RP elements.
Sir Par wrote:Then the Darkon peeps know WAY less about our game then we know about theirs. And they're flat unhelpful.
Rocca wrote:*shrug* I don't think the Darkon guys were unhelpful - after reading it it looks like they sent him this way in addition to their own advice. They know that we use smaller group and those of use that do LARP have more "adventure" type scenarios rather than an ongoing war.
Sir Par wrote:Obviously you don't know Darkon guys like I do
Actually, I've got plenty of advice from Darkon people, and they did send me to other places to get additional opinions and tips from people who do this kind of LARP more often.
Trisseus wrote:Big difference between the two... NERO has some pay-to-play tendencies and not too much to it besides the fight/adventure theme, Amtgard has a rich non-combat culture.
As I said above, NERO is an example to avoid. Not to mention the stiff fees- I'm not looking to make money out of this, it's already unpopular at the cheap-dirt cost it has (to begin with, anyway).
SolidSam wrote:Have you tried looking at this?
http://geddon.org/index.php/Category:Scenario_battlesIt's not really an adventure as much as it is a scenario, but that may be what you're looking for. I know my brothers live and die for 'capture the flag', 'steal the sample', 'kill the king', etc. In belegarth and in video games. But if you mention rpg, campaign, or adventure, half of them drop out. It's the camaraderie of all of us as a team in a fast paced battle that's exciting for us, not necessarily the role playing aspect.
Anyway, you can try tying in a couple scenarios. Maybe you have two groups one one has to hold the ilne while another has to break through. If they manage to break through, they can try to kill the evil king. If not, they have to steal a map (capture the flag) to find the kings location.
Thanks, I'll be sure to check it out. Thing is, I want the first even to run as smoothly as possible, and that means preparing for pretty much everything. That's why I'm trying to get to know the other folks and what they want out of this, and also to design something that appeals to all. Bringing out a bunch of people in the middle of nowhere on a Saturday (considering that it'll take one hour for those with
cars to get to a spot we can play in- we live in the capital) and then say "Alright, let's try a few things to see what works" out of the blue is a recipe for disaster.