Diary of a Croatian larper

If you noticed this blog got a bit more active lately, it's because... well, everything's got a bit more active lately. Last evening was Elysium 8 - last Vampire larp for the month. 17 players took part in it - despite the fact most have already reached the XP cap for the month, and only 2 players got any XP from it. It was a nice social event which I forgot to take a photo of - but imagine a lot of people sitting in a bar as in other Elysium larps and that would be it :) The Elysium schedule for April has been published. Elysium 9 is on Tuesday, April 1st. Then it will be every 8 days, to fulfill the April schedule - so Elysium 10 will be on Wednesday, April 9th, Elysium 11 will be on Thursday, April 17th, and Elysium 12 will be on Friday, April 25th. Yeah, that will be the first Friday Elysium . So that would bring April to four Elysium events... plus a major Camarilla Agram event on April 12th. Five Vampire larps, just as it was this month :) But this month...

It's only yesterday when I published the news about Knutebooks . Do you know the only thing that could probably match The Foundation Stone of Nordic Larp ? It would be if they chose to release the epic, nicely illustrated and very accessible Nordic Larp book that's been sold-out. Oh wait. They totally did that today . In just a few days, the whole idea about Nordic larp has become... much more accessible than it used to be. There's no excuse not to read these two books. It's possible that your outlook on larp will be forever changed. Mine was. Which is why I'm making a Nordic-style larp of my own. U raljama zvijeri , or In jaws of the beast is a Nordic-style larp I'll run in about 10 days. It's about cults and the methods they use. Plenty of potential triggers there - I wonder how it will go? It's one-shot, one of the very few larps which have all characters pre-written (as self-writing them is considered the standard here) and probably the firs...

Several updates, folks. First of all, the books from this year's Knutpunkt are (more or less) out! They're probably the most important works on larp theory published every year (btw, the hashtag for this year is #knutpunkt2014). There are two books available: The Foundation Stone of Nordic Larp is an anthology. The download is not working at the time of writing, it should be re-enabled soon - the version that worked when it was originally uploaded had an article missing, so be sure to redownload it once it's up again - but from the bugged version I read this book is awesome if you're trying to understand Nordic Larp, especially for those new to the subject. Keep an eye on the above link, as it should get re-enabled soon. (Edit: it's enabled!) The Cutting Edge of Nordic Larp is full of, well, cutting edge larp articles. The thing you expect from Knutebooks. And it's available at the moment of writing :) Previously reviewed The Elder Scrolls Chronicles 1 ...

This June will bring Battle of the Nations - the world's biggest medieval tournament - to Trogir in Croatia. Due to that fact, Terra Nova 2014 - which was scheduled on the same date - has been rescheduled again, a week after. Since Thursday, June 19, is a non-working day in Croatia, there will be a possibility to arrive early to the event. Sign-ups have also been opened, and they're available here . The next larp in Croatia is Camarilla Agram Elysium 8  this Thursday. This weekend will also be interesting, as it will feature Istrakon 2014 , one of the biggest sci-fi conventions in Croatia. It's still unknown if there's any larping program, but there will certainly be some larpers there. Speaking of conventions, the society Zlati Goblin from Maribor, Slovenia is organizing GobliCon - the only Slovenian gaming convention - on April 18 and 19. It will be located in Maribor, and it will feature some larp content as presented by some of the Slovenian larpers I v...

This weekend the first chapter of The Elder Scrolls Chronicles larp (a fanmade, unofficial Elder Scrolls larp) was played. Although in reality it was the second larp of the series - the first one was the playtest that was organized last August, but which was also a fully-featured larp. This one was much bigger in terms of population though - 49 players plus 5 organizers - and also, from what I noticed, one of the most hyped larps ever. The hype and player excitement was the cause of really massive preparations for this larp - both by players and organizers. The event's entrance fee was 50 kn - which, I suspect, was nowhere nearly enough to cover its' cost, as it also included two meals (roast pig and a bean stew, and plenty of bread with it), and a lot of drinks, all available for in-game money. Under such circumstances, I imagine the realistic price of the event was at least 50% more of what we paid, purely to cover all the costs. Plus, the organizers put in a lot of ...

Yesterday afternoon, I met two journalists for an interview about larp for Radio Student. Having already interviewed several larpers and larp groups, I'm looking forward to listening to it once it broadcasts. However, as the best way to really understand larp is a hands-on experience, I brought them to the Elysium 7 event immediately afterwards. As larps go, Elysium is quite accessible and with low requirements, so it's easy to include new players. Together with them, Elysium 7 had 19 participants - same as Elysium 5  really, but also several new players or new characters. To the three people it was the first larp of any kind - and two more had some larp experience but in the distant past. Seeing the larp community grow is always awesome. Elysium 7 was a fully social larp - though this time some props entered the play as well. New players meant new introductions, and this was sometimes quite interesting. A new Sheriff was chosen, and there were two highly argumenta...

Please, reshare this post on your social networks to help spread awareness of what larp is! Thanks! :) Recently I've been asked "what's that thing that you do" by more than one person in my friend list. And I have to admit, the description on my blog is a bit lacking. It may be because I target my writing more towards the existing larpers than towards new, potential larpers? It might be so, but Wikipedia article is also not too helpful. Larping can sometimes be difficult to describe. Here's a recent video from Stephanie from USA talking about the very same thing. But back to the business: what is actually larp? Here's a video that I often link to people, simply because it's awesome. But it's in Czech, so you might need to open the full youtube screen to turn on the subtitles. Fantasy larp is probably the most popular around. Kristin from USA does a very detailed introduction to such larp styles: Soon you can also expect a web series...

As one follows any larp community for a longer amount of time, they will certainly notice some trends appearing. Like in any other hobby, people in larp communities tend to do stuff a certain way. So if you're starting a new larp in an area where there are already several established larps, you basically have two choices: to go with the trends or to go against them. These trends can be many things. Perhaps it's the themes of the larps covered, perhaps it's the structure used, perhaps it's how plot is written, and perhaps it's what is expected in larps in general. There are a lot of larps out there in the world, and many of them are vastly different from one another. Even if you wanted to limit it down narrowly to the most popular genre - fantasy larps featuring live combat with foam swords - you would be surprised by how much variety is out there. Where do players begin? What are the plots about? How is the plot delivered to players? Just a few of the examples o...

Natai Núrolaimo, my new character If you've been following the recent news about Ognjeni Mač association, there has been several downfalls and controversies last year, which resulted in fewer larps being organized and fewer people playing. During that process, Ognjeni Mač redefined itself and started this year with new rules and setting (both documents are in Croatian). Two weeks ago - same day that Camarilla Agram 2 was played - a short introductory battle scenario was played. It was not the first time that a larp using these rules has been played - there were two such test scenarios in last year, and I've been to one of them. And there was a bigger test game played in Letovanić. However, today's Put istine (The Way of Truth) was the first actual, non-test event in the series. Played in Maksimir park, it was first of such Ognjeni Mač events that had a specific name and was not simply called Maksimir XX (this one would actually be number 73 if we were counti...

Yesterday evening was Camarilla Agram Elysium 6 , which made me realize... damn, we're already in double digits. With three Embrace the Night intro events last year, six Elysium events and two main line events, it was the eleventh Vampire larp that we ran in the last half a year. A lot of players already being on the XP cap, a total of 14 players took part in Elysium 6 , making it a purely social event for its' duration. And there was a lot to discuss - Ventrue and Nosferatu clans have selected their new primogens, and there was a lot of online role-play action which was discussed during the evening. The event started lively, but slowed down a bit as Ventrue players - and there were five of them present yesterday - moved away for a Ventrue meeting, and came back just before event ended. But those last few minutes were some of the most tense ones of the event, as there was a tense staredown and several accusations thrown between Brujah and Ventrue over a drawing. It...

One of the most expected new projects in the English-speaking larp world has been the recently announced webseries, called simply "LARPs: The Series". It's not hard to understand why - the "Episode 0" they released has shown a pretty good portrayal of several fantasy larping elements. If you're wondering at the release date of the series, the answer is... today! Episodes 1 and 2 have been released a couple of hours ago, and you'll find them below in the article (and also on the project's website and youtube channel  - the entire first season will be released in the next couple of weeks). However, I had the opportunity to interview several cast and crew members of LARPs: The Series about their project - Jon Verrall, the series writer (who also plays Evan, the GM in the series), and the actors Scott Humphrey (Will), Elizabeth Neale (Shane), Jonathan Silver (Arthur) and Charlotte Rogers (Brittany). This is their story, of how this series came to b...