DARKON | June 2015 

Thank you!! The bell tent belonged to a player at Darkon who let me use it for the video!! It was a really great time so I want to edited this video to capture the essence of being apart of it all. ♡ that heart is for you Momo.

its sooooooooo gggooooooooooddddddddd love this video i need it in my collection

***** you were actually one of the only ones that looked decent... Why does american larp look so stupid! Now i get the stereotypes.

+Baardje_Joris I dunno, I'm watching UK Larp'ing and I'm seeing Nerf Guns, Camouflage Army outfits, Motorcycle helmets fighting orcs etc.

Hmm well i'm from holland and over here some larps are a bit bad but not that bad...

I am pretty lucky to be surrounded by amazing games. More videos to come!

Thank you Xander! This was a very different experience for me, but it was a lot of fun! ♡

Marcello Emiliani Day battles for Darkon are in fields under blazing hot suns or freezing cold snow depending on the time of year. Campouts are usually held in wooded areas.

Ivan Foldvik I'm just used to 110 weather and being aggressively attacked by members of Amtgard in Texas... and some of Dagorhir. Both of which are games like Darkon. But I always support battlegames. They're the strongest way to learn how to fight in a scenario... but I live in Buffalo, New York now. I'm trying to figure out the major game here so I can mount a go at it from time-to-time. Been ages since I could go out and fight.

yleineping That makes me so excited! :D

yay me too! are you thinking of going?

yleineping I'm going to Poland this year for COW5 - so excited :D (I'm from the uk though)

yleineping if my indiegogo reaches it's next stretch goal I might be able to attend this year. When are you going?? :)

StatusLARP maar terra x en kon zijn gewoon koel

+Bryce Barnhill I'm not Larp Girl, but I guess I've got quite some experience.. The answer is generally "no". Yes, you might be a bit more familiar with fantasy worlds and what kind of background you might expect, but nothing that reading and watching a few movies can't teach you also. Actually, Pen & Paper role playing games are seen as "Das Dunkle Erbe" (the dark heritage) hereabouts, because people tend to take over ideas from them that just don't work, or are at least detrimental to the enjoyment of the LARP. (like "one big plot" or "small party can solve everything" or "saving the world" or "I can play the same character as in the Pen&Paper" or "character levelling"). Of course, if the setting of a specific LARP is actually from D&D (or from Warhammer, as is probably more common), then it might be a good idea to get yourself familiarized with it by playing the specific Pen & Paper RPG.

Seegras Thanks! :)

+Seegras Given how different the way how (most) US LARPs work from the ones we play at, the "no" might not be so clear-cut. Reading the rules for them (which i've done with a few by now), it very much feels like someone took a game like D&D and re-created it to play live. While we have moved away from these roots, many US-based groups very much embrace them. Including "players are heroes" and typical rpg party dynamics. I'll visit two US LARPs this year, and if you're interested, I can tell you about my experiences at EE (Oh, and the Pulvergraben says hello ;) ) Still, I would agree that unless it's very rooted in the same rules and world, the most you'll get from learning about D&D is a general feel for the kind of fantasy setting that the games very often are played in. But I really wouldn't worry too much about this kind of preparation. Read the rules, of course, and any information about the setting that the organizers provide, and that's already more than most people would do. Apart from that, LARPing seems to be one of those things you just pick up by actually doing it.

DRSNova That's really cool and thanks for your answer. I would definitely be interested in hearing your experiences!

Bryce Barnhill I was actually talking to Seegras regarding sharing my experiences, but I might just as well post them here ;)

+Bush Channel Hello! I know you probably wanted an answer from Larp Girl but as someone who has been doing LARP for quite some time I can say that yes, people get injured or hurt almost every practice. Just last night I accidentally knee'd a girl in the face! Usually you apologize, make sure they're okay, and carry on with the battle. Hope I could help :)

Trollspunk thank you Madam! :)

+Trollspunk If that happens "almost every time", I'd say you (or your group) might be doing something wrong. Of course, depending on how you define "getting hurt or injured". I've been LARPing for 12 years now, and I think i can count the times I got hurt (let alone injured) on one of my hands. (I'm not counting things like scraping my hands while crossing through or crawling in woods, or light, accidental hits in sensitive areas, which aren't painful, and usually just a bit of a shock).

I've been hit in the crotch multiple times by errant shots, but since it's a valid target area, I just accept the shot and "die". I've seen people get hit in the throat, get pulled muscles, sprains, get hit in the face, and have heard personal stories of broken bones (leg and hand seem the most common). Sure it's just foam, but often being moved at a high rate of speed.

Mostly a sprained or broken finger is all

I was really interested in the role play of playing a dessert druid and found out that at a larp like Darkon, most people aren't interested in telling a story. At least in my experience at this event, the players were interested in battles. Once it had kind of washed over me that people weren't going to role play with me, I took on a different skill set to enjoy something that I found was unique about the larp. :)

Very true alot of people at Crowndlands can be very fight fight fight. But alot of our smaller realms and some countrys appreciate it more.

16 with parent permission and 18 without

Bow draw weights are restricted to 40# @ 28 inches, arrows must have a head of properly padded foam no less than 2.5 inches across and be capped with a penny above the shaft to prevent penetration, arrows must have three fletchings/vanes and crossbows are limited to a DW of 30# (40# for hand crossbows) and bolts have to be constructed the same way as arrows but need only 2 fletchings. No compound bows, only recurve or longbow styles are allowed.

+dipper pines try looking for SCA (society for creative anachronism) chapters in your area. they know stuff and help.

+Friar Hill I wouldn't count what the SCA does as LARPing...

+DRSNova Right, but it's close enaough and the only BIG and widespread association I know in the US. And they have usually a good network and know where to find stuff and people. I mean if your done typing "LARP + [hometown]" into google and not finding anything, they are good place to go to and find out more...

Friar Hill Yeah, I noticed that the whole LARing scene in the US doesn't seem to be connected in any way (on a national level), apart from some organizations that have chapters all over the country. But even those don't seem to be working together in any meaningful amount. Everyone seems to be doing their "own thing" and there's not a lot of cooperation or exchange of ideas. In fact, i've seen groups that forbid discussing anything relating to other groups in their forum. Of course, that's just an outsider's view. I don't know that many groups in the US, and I could be totally wrong.

same here, +DRSNova, I say that as a german onlooker, not an insider. Where are you from?

I can try... but it requires waking a dragon. ♡

+Larp Girl was this in Maryland?

Everyone respawned and killed us.. haha

haha, that sounds about how it goes. =)

16 with parent permission and18 without