How exactly do role-playing games work?

You're going to be wanting to ask about LARPing....live action role playing.

The sitting around in the dark (or not) and talking is what would be called table top gaming. I've done quite a bit of table top gaming, but have done exactly zero LARPing.

A lot of times you might find information about either type of role playing at a local gaming store, or if there's a convention near you. Gaming stores can generally tell you when and where there's a large gaming event going on in your area, and could probably put you in touch with the organizers.

There's a Lost Boys LARP-game in Santa Cruz. Crap, what's the name? I think it's Santa Carla by Night or Santa Cruz by Night, something like that. If you Google those combinations of words, you'll come up with their website and they have a huge amount of information on what they do, how they work and so on. From what I understand, they meet every Friday and it's pretty in depth.

I'm a member of a live action roleplaying group in the UK so may be able to help out here.

The group that I belong to is quite complex, as there is a whole world worked out, including a monetary system and politics. Games are run once every couple of weeks, but as a player you don't have to do every game. Every player has at least one character that is part of this world.

So, as a player you turn up to a game ready to play one of your characters. An average game will last from Friday night to Sunday lunch time. While you are playing the game, you are supposed to immerse yourself totally in the world and the character - no discussion of 'real life', no mobile phones, radios, MP3 players, torches etc. The games usually involve traipsing around in woods all weekend, and sleeping on bunks. The only concession to 'modern life' are modern toilets and if we're lucky, a shower (but not always!). The effect can be quite atmospheric, especially if it's late at night and you're creeping about in the woods, it's pitch black and you can't see a thing, and you know there are some undead beasties out there somewhere waiting to pounce on you.

I hope this helps, but if you want any more info on this, do let me know!

Shara

Remember to take a spare pair of knickers, just in case.

-Derek

As others have said what you are asking about is called LARPing although there are many different types, including ones that carry on in the normal world around 'non players'. Some are extremly organised and have whole towns built up in woodland areas, others are more sparse.

It would help if you gave a little more information as to the type of game your characters are wanting to play and the genre since that will change the answers to your questions.

Please feel free to message me if you would like an expansion or some more in depth connversation etc...

Most of the table top roleplayers I know consider LARPers to be canditates for "shoot on sight" treatment.

But they're a bunch of facists anyway. So, really, I have nothing to add but that LARPing is considered a bit...odd by some people. Table Top roleplaying, DND in particular, was crucfied by some right wing nutcases for being Satanic...but that's been over for a while.

I hope.

But the general atmosphere of the games depends on the players. Most of the games I've been too are quite fun and have lots and lots of junk food. Being a somewhat...story bound Gamemaster, I tend to ditch the rules for as much of the game as possible, and prefer games that have less rules, more backstory. Such as Broken Gears, and to a lesser extend, World of Darkness.

But the best way to roleplay, is to go and find out yourself. Head to your local satanic coven game shop and ask around. They're always looking for new cultists members.

I owned a game store for several years.

The big company for LARPing is White Wolf Publishing, publishers of the World of Darkness series of games (Vampire, Werewolf, Mage, etc). Nearly all of your LARP games take place in their fictional universe, although you do find groups of fantasy gamers, too. My store used to host a Vampire game with about 200 people on Friday nights, about 150 on Saturdays and maybe 50-70 on Sundays.

The best place for some basic background would be the White Wolf website. Once you pick up a little vocabulary and start to develop an image, look for a game near you and go check one out.

Not all table top role-players hate LARPers, I for one don't.

I got a mate who runs and games in LARP, he is always on the look out for the special item for his character, be it bowl, fork, or clothing.

If LARP use weapons, oft in fantasy genres, then they are safety weapons (foam covered). As for White Wolf being the main company for LARP I'm not so sure as I have not heard much about WW being run near me...

Sometimes they run weekends where a few different games are run each lasting a couple of hours.

I'm not into any kind of role-playing (relatively speaking) and I've heard of White Wolf. I think it's something that you'd have to be in the right circle to know where it's going on and when. Kind of like Renaissance Fairs. They're everywhere but you have to know the right people to know where it's taking place. And here is the vampire LARP I was talking about. From a personal stand point, I find LARP just a little odd but I guess you can compare them to an acting troupe or something, right?

I just sat here and typed an extremely detailed response, only to have my 1-year-old smack the keyboard and manage to make it all go bye-bye.

Here's the gist of what I said:

Amtgard is a huge organization that does LARP with foam padded weapons. It has a fantasy flavor, but the groups tend to see it more as a sport and less as real role-play...there's enough "out of character" banter that no one's going take it seriously.

Deliria is a RPG with a more modern, semi-occult feeling to it. It would be easier to get your characters wondering how far down the rabbit hole they were going to go...until it came to combat of any sort, which is resolved using a deck of playing cards.

White Wolf is good if you're looking for a werewolf or vampire story, but the LARPers I've known that did White Wolf used paper, rock, scissors to resolve combat, which would quickly resolve any doubts in the participants mind as to how "real" the game had become.

Every LARP group I've ever been involved with has had some "house rules" involved. Sometimes, these house rules end up making up the bulk of the game, creating, for all intents and purposes, an entirely new game system.

If you want your characters to begin to feel like the lines between game and reality are blurring, you can do it with virtually any system...play up the suspense, negotiations, intrigue, and atmosphere, but avoid actual combat. Combat in these games tend to be resolved in silly ways--paper, rock, scissors, foam padded weapons, or playing cards among them--and once the characters witness these, it'll be crystal clear that the game is just a game.

You can get around this with a combination of low light and house rules. If their foam padded weapons are suprisingly realistic and the characters in your story are unarmed (and especially if they aren't warned that others will have "weapons") then in low light, they could "witness" one person stabbing another. If the LARPers used to be in a karate class together, they could resolve combat with touch-sparring, which is where you fight, but you pull the power out of everything before it hits your opponent. Decent sparring in dim light could be pretty convincing, especially if the losers role-played injury or death afterwards.

Basically, it depends on the flavor you want, the amount of house rules you want to invent, and the tension you can create.

I don't have much to add here, but I did LARP gaming for a while in college, moved more to table-top and then internet-chat roleplaying. So if you have any specific questions I'm happy to help too

I run a roleplaying site and have LARPed, I prefer tabletopping, but hubby ran a group for LARP a few years back. We also have the book for LARP rules if you need some info still.

I did a LARP in '92, loved it.

We dressed up, had a unused boyscout camp in New Jersey to run amok in, had PVC/foam weapons.

A guide would have a rough story--ours was returning a sword to the grave of a dead dark elf--and on the way, npcs -non-player characters would be orcs, walking skeletons, a group of good elves etc. to intercept us.

The guide read aloud the 'where' and 'who' decided when the fighting was over, gave us time to heal, repair armor, and it was off to the next encounter til the end with most dead, the rest wounded and that damned dark elf had new ears on his necklace. :}