The Road Less Taken

Since this is my first blog post I feel like I should provide a little back story background on who I am and why you should care one fig about what I have to say.


Well... I am, as the title indicates, a librarian and a LARPer (live action role-player). Most of the documentaries, books, and anecdotes out there about larpers (I'm too lazy to capitalize the acronym every time..sue me!) would have you believe that we are all teen-aged, pasty white boys living in our mum's basement who hate our loser existences and desperately need escape, so it might surprise you to learn that the majority of larpers I have known over the years fit very few of those stereotypes. That is, I suppose, item number 1 on my blogger agenda: dispel the myth that all larpers are unemployed losers!


(In case anyone is wondering, I'm a pasty-white, middle-aged, professional WOMAN living in my own home with my soon-to-be-hubby, my two well-adjusted and awesome teen girls, two dogs, and three cats; and I've been larping for 14 or 15 years off and on.)


What is larping anyway?


That is a good question, me, thanks for asking!

Yes, some days it is THAT awesome.

But it is a question that has more than one answer. There are several types of larping that appeal to a wide range of larpers. In fact, some of you may be friends with larpers and not even know it...heck, you may be a larper and not even known it.


Dun duuun dunnnnnnnn....


Allow me to elaborate. 

One of the most common is theatrical larping. This is something you might have actually participated in without being aware that you were larping. Basically anytime people act out a story within a set framework of rules, with or without a guide or game master presiding over the event, you are participating in a type of live action role-play. You don't actually have to hit anyone with any kind of projectile or weapon. For example, the Vampire the Masquerade LARP involves heavy role-play and rock-paper-scissors to simulate combat (I am a horrible person who couldn't stop laughing whenever a tense situation erupted into heated rock-paper-scissors so they kicked me out after one night of trying this game lol). 


Another common type of theatrical larp are murder mystery weekends, and those are actually pretty mainstream and tremendously fun. The one that I participated in about five years ago involved about a dozen couples in a Victorian bed and breakfast for the weekend. We received a manilla envelope in the mail about two weeks before the event that told us who we were, who we knew, what our agenda was for the gathering, and what type of stats (ie, strengths, weaknesses, and skills) we had. I (or my character, rather) shot myself in the head at the end of the weekend but it was a blast! (no pun intended)


If you have ever acted out a character for the entertainment of your children, participated in a reenactment event, or gotten a bit too into a part you were playing at Halloween or at a weekend Ren faire, you were larping. It can be largely unstructured or very rules heavey, but all theatrical larping takes is a bit of imagination.

The other type of larping I am going to talk about is combat larping. This is generally what we see ridiculed in movies and on TV, which is a damn shame because it is indescribably fun. Yes, larpers know we look a bit silly to non-participants but so do people who play Rock Band or miniature golf but does it make it any less fun? Hell no!

Combat larping -- at least the original fantasy flavor -- is loosely based on D&D which draws its inspiration from fantasy worlds like that of Tolkien's Lord of the Rings. You create and role-play a character who lives within a fantasy world governed by a set of rules created by the game designers. One of the most popular in the U.S. and Canada is NERO LARP which was founded in 1988. The LARP that I have primarily played over the years, SOLAR, was originally a NERO chapter long, long ago in a galaxy far, far away. At the risk of sounding like an elitist, I think SOLAR is considerably more user-friendly and a higher quality game, but that's in part because they have a dedicated staff who run games as their full-time job, rather than a few guys and gals running a larp on the weekend. Make no mistake, running a larp is a HUGE amount of work but that's a topic for another blog.


...speaking of which, self, this is getting to be a loooooooong blog post. Wrap it up.


Oh yeah...what was a saying anyway? Larping comes in lots of different flavors. I like combat larping the best because I like to dress up in armor and do heroic things (how incredibly five year old did that sound? be honest...). I'm an artist and a writer and to me larping is an unmatched creative outlet. I love my job and my family. I'm a happy, well adjusted, largely successful person but I just happen to find living out another life on the weekends more satisfying that living vicariously through movie and prime time actors. Dark knight badass by night, academic librarian by day....what's not to like about that combination? In many ways, my weekend excursions have helped me in my professional life too. Going up against an army of undead makes getting up and presenting in front of a room full of peers look like a cake walk! Finally the camaraderie of the larping community is unparalleled.


I tell this story all the time but I started larping when I was about 9 and didn't even know it. I fell in love with the misunderstood, tomboyish character of Eowyn in Lord of the Rings and used to regularly reenact the scene in which Eowyn stands up to the king of the Nazgul. I still get shivers when I read it.

"But no living man am I! You look upon a women....You stand between me and my lord and king. Begone, if you be not deathless! For living or dark undead, I will smite you, if you touch him."

Or if you want a more modern interpretation...

I hope that you found this post informative and fun. Please feel free to comment, ask questions, or share your first introduction to the world of LARP.


Larping Librarian...over and out.