Annie

I definitely have clown issues. They really freak me out.....they're just so sinister and not good. Don't come anywhere near me in a clown suit.

I also hate porcelein dolls for similar reasons. They just look at you. Yuk.

*sits in a corner, rocking backwards and forwards*

Has anyone had experience of the Mind's Eye Theatre vampire system? What did you think of it? I've been meaning to go to a vamp game for a while now and I'm actually a bit apprehensive, cos it sounds a bit weird to me.

I mean, paper, scissors, stone? No phys-reps? And no body contact? Not sure how that would work.

Anyone care to comment? Does the system work at all? I guess I'm too used to fantasy LARP where we all twat each other with latex weapons a lot.

Sorry, Golgotha! Actually I'm not sorry at all, why should we stop having fun just because you're sad enough to live in Australia??

I hope you find something cool to play, anyway.

And nice to hear from you Doyle, glad you enjoyed yourself. I thought your deck was way cool, by the way.

And wow. People are actually replying to this! Cool. Keep it up.

Chaos!!! What a classic game.

Chaos!!! What a classic game.

October Part 2

I was expecting that in the smaller room the game would be much less violent, but that wasn't the case. There was plently of gunfire, and even a character death or two (messing with the wrong gang member ). I think that the restricted environment forced players to interact more with each other, it was impossible to sit at a table without being next to someone, so of course there was more friction, and dodgy dealing, and so on.

I even got caught up in plot slightly, despite the fact that I was trying to avoid it by doing my own little plot to explain why my character was there at all (basically it involved me sitting around all night doing nothing and waiting for someone who never turned up). I must admit at times it was pretty scary being the only character in the room without a gun, especially at one point when some gang members came in and got into a fight with some members of a different gang, and Security got involved, and the room was full of people holding guns to each other's heads and shouting "Point blank! Head!" (check out the rules at http://www.mirrorshades.co.uk if you want to see how nasty the point blank rule is).

In general I was pretty impressed with the game. I can't really speak for the other players but I think everyone was very enthusiastic and really got into the spirit of things.

I know most of the players quite well as I see them every Friday night, but even so I noticed that the atmosphere was very friendly, lots of jokes and piss-taking, and despite the fact that half (or most!) of the group seem to have developed a knee fetish over the weekend , I really enjoyed myself.

The one complaint I have really is that I was the only girl there. In a way it's pretty cool as I get lots of attention (!!) but I couldn't help feeling at times that I'd wandered into a gay bar......

Anyway, in summation, I thought Mirrorshades was cool. So if you live anywhere near, try to get to the next session which I believe is on the 17th of November at the Old Queen's Head near the bus station in Sheffield. Rain, correct me if I'm wrong, okay? Please come and buy me drinks cos my birthday is on the 13th.....

And last of all I want to say a big thanks to the refs, so thanks Rain, Nails and Tris, also thanks to all the players for just generally being cool. You know who you are.

And that's me done. Feel free to comment, question, give me money, whatever......

October Part 1

LARP of October 2001 was Mirrorshades, which was run in Sheffield on the 20th.

As you probably know, I've been playing Mirrorshades for quite a while now and I can probably safely say it's my pet system......this session however was pretty different to what I'm used to.

Mirrorshades is a Cyberpunk system, set in 2034 on the manmade island of Freeside. The actual in-character area is the interior of a nightclub and althought I forgot to do a head count (silly me!) I'd say there were around 20 players, including 3 newbies. This was the relaunch session, and I'd been looking forward to it for a while.

When I first saw the function room where the game was to be played I was a bit dubious....it's much smaller than the room we used to use, and it's decorated in dodgy Victorian style, and I wasn't sure if it would spoil the atmosphere, but I was pleasantly surprised. Black material was hung up to create separate rooms, coloured lightbulbs put in, a couple of plasma balls and some appropriately punky music and the place was transformed into a seedy nightclub.

To be continued.......later, when I'm not so busy.....

Right. Let's go for it then.....

Every month I will attempt to attend at least one LARP event and tell you what I think of it. Admittedly not all of them will be Cyberpunk, but I'm sure no-one will mind. Hell, no-one even reads this forum anyway!!

If anyone else wants to add their 2 pence worth, please feel free. Any LARPs you know of that are a) not stupidly expensive and somewhere near Chesterfield, please let me know and I'll try to review them too.

The things I do for LARP, honestly.....

Serves you right for living in such a silly spread-out country then!!

And 25 miles is a pretty far distance when you have no car and no money. I mean it would take me a while to walk that far!

Quote from Edgecrusher, posted on Oct. 12 2001,10:02

Actually I bought mine. Most big fantasy LARPs will have some traders who sell stuff like that.

That's a great idea, actually. I'll get something sorted out.

I'm going to officially review at least one LARP event every month (if I can find that many!!) - so people know what kind of stuff to expect. Must of it won't be cyberpunk unfortunately as it seems to be a bit thin on the ground, but I'm sure I can find enough MET Vampire and other "dark future" type stuff to keep me busy.

So if anyone knows of any LARPs in the Chesterfield/Sheffield/Nottingham/Derby type area, I'd love to hear about it so I can try to get to it.

Just a word of advice about latex.....check you're not allergic to it before you walk round all day with bits of stuff stuck to your skin.

I played a Seelie Fey character at several events and had pointy "elf ears" which i fixed to my own ears with liquid latex. After a few hours my ears used to swell up and hurl lots. Then I discovered water based spirit gum, which is excellent and doesn't make me swell up. Even after a weekend of severe alcohol abuse and no sleep!!!

As for cyberware in general, old microchips from stuff that doesn't work anymore look great embedded in latex and stuck to you. Similarly bits of wire, little twinkly LED's all add cool finishing touches. I've seen cyberarms made out of drainpipes too. My own cyber laser finger is just a laser pointer, some black material, and a few wires.

Hi Nite Wolf. I'd say it's nice to have you back, but I didn't even notice you were gone......

Quote from DragoonCav, posted on Oct. 09 2001,23:43

Because we're not terrorists. Or mass murderers.

At least I hope we're not.

More pots???

Hmmmm. Why???

General gittiness??

Oh, that sounds like fun.

Okay, before someone moans that this should be in the LARP section, I'd like to point out that I want the views of people who don't LARP as well, and of course these people don't read the LARP section.

I'd love to know what kinds people do, what they think of different systems and what they would like to see in a game.

Also if you're not interested in the live aspect, what do you dislike about it?

I'll try to get more. Just cos you have nothing better to do....

Let's get some Scots there too!!! And a few of the old Irish. Accents are cool. Welsh would be good too.

I can do a semi-decent Somerset accent......

Spud, I think you mean Vienna?? Pretty goddam 80's, I think.

There are so many songs which aren't really cp, but have cp style lyrics.......take Blur's The Universal for example.

If anyone knows any industrial style tunes which aren't easily recognisable, I'd love to hear names for LARP background music. The game's set in 2030ish, so no obviously year 2000 era stuff.......

Stop taking everything so seriously! You'll get grey hairs.

Wow, a player with a different accent would be way cool.....

Excellent. Sorry to be annoying and stupid and bug everyone.

I like whelks.