Choose Your Own Adventure: Tuesday, 3rd Period (5/10)

[drumsticksandd20s]

The class had been notified to meet at the Community Center today, and for the next five weeks. When they got there, they'd find several long tables set out with chairs and moddable snacks, because if you asked Steph the snacks were a vital part of any gaming experience.

They'd also find Steph there in her usual ensemble of boots, skinny jeans, and beanie, wearing a shirt with the silhouettes of five fantasy adventurers under a d20 sun, and the words "Let's get this party rolling" beneath them. She was perched atop one of the tables, leaning back on her hands and kicking her feet, grinning eagerly at everyone as they showed up.

"What's up, everybody?" she asked once she was fairly satisfied that everyone on the roster appeared to be present. "And welcome to Choose Your Own Adventure: The Fandom LARP Project 1.0. I'm Steph Gingrich, and I'm going to be your totally awesome game master for this quest. What quest is this, you ask? An excellent question, to which I answer: we're going to be creating and running our own mini LARP -- that's short for live action role play, by the way. You all are going to help me decide on what kind of story we're going to be telling together."

She hopped down off the table and started pacing back and forth like her enthusiasm couldn't be contained (it couldn't), gesturing with her hands for emphasis as she continued.

"Once we've got that nailed down, you get to start creating your characters and coming up with costumes for them -- and weapons. Foam weapons, because this is going to have a combat element to it, but it's still a game. There are rules for that, and it's not going to be anything super intense, just to make sure it's fair for everyone since I know not all of you have actual fight training, but we'll get to that in a couple of weeks. But this week?" Steph shrugged and gave them a wry, apologetic smile. "We're going to stick to the basics, just to give me an idea of what we'll be working with. That's right, it's the dreaded first week introduction session. Name, where you're from, whether you have any kind of experience with roleplaying games -- and that's not a requirement, so don't worry if you're a total newbie to this stuff."

There was going to be no gatekeeping bullshit on her watch, thanks.

"And finally?" She gestured toward a small wooden treasure chest with a stack of slips of paper and a jar of pens beside it. "Come up and vote on what setting you want for the game: I've got high fantasy, space western, nautical, cyberpunk, survival, and Earth historical, but I'm open to other suggestions if you have 'em, or questions if you're not sure what any of these mean. But first, let's get to the introductions: I'm Steph, I'm from a version of this world but about two years in the past, and I've been playing tabletop RPGs and LARPing for most of my life."

She pointed to someone at random. "Your turn. Let's go."

Comments

Introductions (LARP Project, Week 1)

[drumsticksandd20s]

Name, where you're from, experience with RPGs of any variety! Steph won't judge you if you don't have any previous experience, but if you give anyone else shit for not having any experience, there will be so much judgment. So much.

Re: Introductions (LARP Project, Week 1)

[giveittoyoursister]

"Well, I'm Vi, and I work at the game store, so you can probably guess." Anyone other than Steph would likely guess wrong, but Vi thought she was being clever.

Re: Introductions (LARP Project, Week 1)

[drumsticksandd20s]

"Yeah, I've got a pretty good guess," Steph said, grinning at her and very considerately playing along. "Are you saying that's where you're from, too?"

Being Steph's best friend wasn't going to get her out of skipping part of the introduction, but hey, at least Steph was letting her be a smartass about it?

Re: Introductions (LARP Project, Week 1)

[giveittoyoursister]

"Yeah, got found under one of the tables there." Vi? Not like to share too much information about herself in public? Noooo. not her.

Re: Introductions (LARP Project, Week 1)

[good_for_six]

Isabela grinned and bowed, deeply. "Captain Isabela of the Felicisima Armada at your service, originally of Rivian more recently the general Eastern Seas, and I was very fond of roleplaying and all sorts of games back when I was a student here."

Somehow she made that all sound incredibly dirty. It was a gift.

Re: Introductions (LARP Project, Week 1)

[drumsticksandd20s]

And Steph was impressed. Not sure how much of that she could take at face value just yet, but still, impressed. Also, bluescreening for just a second at the very deep bow. Ahem.

"A veteran in more ways than one, huh?"

Re: Introductions (LARP Project, Week 1)

[good_for_six]

None of it was a lie, exactly, she was just speaking of a very different kind of roleplay.

"Oh, I have plenty of stories that I'd love to share with the right person." People, really.

Re: Introductions (LARP Project, Week 1)

[guillermothegreat]

Guillermo was definitely in his element here, he was practically bouncing with how excited he was about getting to take this class, “hey I’m Guillermo de la Cruz,” he said with a wave, “I’m from New York City, the Bronx and it’s 2004 for me back home, I love LARPing, my friend Jeremy and I used to take part in one on the weekends when I was at home before I came here,” he explained.

Re: Introductions (LARP Project, Week 1)

[furrybluefreak]

Were there two furry ears peaking out of the pocket on Guillermo's jacket? Maybe. If you happened to be looking close enough. What? The pocket was so warm and cozy and comfortable, Kurt had fallen asleep quite easily.

Re: Introductions (LARP Project, Week 1)

[guillermothegreat]

Guillermo hadn’t noticed anything unusual about his jacket when he had put in on this morning but he happened to look down and that was when he spotted two furry ears sticking out of his pocket.

“Kurt?” he blinked, “how did you get there?”

Was he expecting an actual response, who knew but now he didn’t know if he should wait out the class before he tried to return Kurt to the dorm room or see if Kurt would stay in his pocket.

Re: Introductions (LARP Project, Week 1)

[drumsticksandd20s]

"Yeah, dude, I think I remember you coming into the store," Steph said with an easy smile. "Awesome to have a veteran on board. We're not doing a full-blown thing here, but depending on how things go I might make a whole weekend event out of it later on."

Re: Introductions (LARP Project, Week 1)

[outofthequiver]

"Hello!" Libby still wasn't entirely sure she was understanding all of this, but it sounded like a lot of fun, and it was hard not to get swept up in Steph's clear passion for it and the fact that she had a lot of friends here in this class with her. "My name's Liberty, but everyone just called me Libby, I'm from Tennessee, and I've never even heard of this sort of thing before, but it sounds like an...awful lot of fun!"

Re: Introductions (LARP Project, Week 1)

[drumsticksandd20s]

"It's totally cool if you're new to all of this," Steph told her. Yeah, she'd said it already, but she felt it always bore repeating. "I know I'm biased here, but it is a lot of fun, and the awesome part is? All of you get to have a say in how the story goes, and what kind of fun it's going to be. Which, if you ask me, is one of the best parts of roleplaying games. And I'm here any time if you have questions, okay?"

Re: Introductions (LARP Project, Week 1)

[outofthequiver]

It was kind of funny, wasn't it, how the encouragement almost seemed to make the nerves in Libby's stomach a little more obvious? But she figured it was mostly because the idea of having much of a say in anything was still a new and novel concept for her. It seemed to put just that little more pressure on her to not mess it up, even if she didn't think she would. But all of this was new to her, not just the roleplaying stuff.

But she nodded and her grin was still eager and easily overpowered any sort of nerves or uncertainty she had. "Okay," she said. "Definitely. I'm..." She laughed a little, mostly sheepish and a little humbly, "sure there will be plenty of those, but we'll just have to wait and see, I guess."

Re: Introductions (LARP Project, Week 1)

[ohvalleyofpenis]

"My actual name is Julian Alfred Pankratz, Viscount of Lettenhov--but I much prefer my stage name of Jaskier," he said with all the due drama of it all. "And I prefer to call myself a citizen of the world, really."

You brought this on yourself, Steph.

"I am a travelling bard by trade, so really this roleplaying thing ought to come naturally to me. I do love telling a good story."

Re: Introductions (LARP Project, Week 1)

[drumsticksandd20s]

"For real, an actual bard?" Don't mind Steph's speechless-with-geeker-joy face there for a few seconds, Jaskier. Because yes, she had absolutely brought it on herself, and she couldn't be more delighted about it. "We jammed together at the New Year's party, so I remember you're legit, musically."

Re: Introductions (LARP Project, Week 1)

[pun_king]

You had him at quest, Steph.

Graham's eyes were wide with excitement and wonder, even as he sort of stifled a bit of a yawn. The thrill of everything had made it very hard for him to get any decent sleep, and the poor boy was running on pure fumes and adrenaline, but he was clearly determined to make the most of out it! And, considering the nature of the class, he was ready to go all out, too.

"Greeeeeetings!" he drawled, the big, doofy grin on his face counteracting any attempts to seem like a very serious and important personage; the dramatic furl of his cloak behind him probably didn't help much, either. "I am Graham, future knight of Daventry, and I have traversed here to this fine school to expand my repertoire of useful skills from the far-distant land of Llewdor, with nothing but the cloak on my back and my mighty steed beneath me!"

He beamed a little proudly at that excellent introduction and then offered, "I've never really done anything like this with a group of other people before, but I've got plenty of practice playing out all sorts of adventures and quests with all my pets and some of the squirrels and the birds back home! I think it'll definitely be an interesting change of pace! Do we get to save tragic maidens? Are we going to have to defeat goblins and outsmart wizards? Will we be breaking curses?? Invade castles?!? Will we get to FIGHT DRAGONS???!!??"

If you couldn't tell by the increased intensity and enthusiastic gestures that got bigger and wilder until Graham himself had wound up somehow on his knees, hands clenched toward the sky as if appealing to some deity for such an occurrence....he was maybe a bit excited.

Kind of.

A touch.

Re: Introductions (LARP Project, Week 1)

[drumsticksandd20s]

"Okay, I like you already," Steph said with a big, doofy grin to match. How was she not going to appreciate someone whose enthusiasm might even dwarf hers? "A-plus introduction. I have a feeling you're going to rock this, and it's a totally different experience when you have other people to play with, trust me."

Say 'I was a lonely nerd kid who didn't really have any friends for a long time' without actually saying it, Gingrich, why don't you?

"And depending on what setting we end up going with? I will definitely see what we can do, but dragons miiiiiiiiight be a little outside the budget for this term."

Maybe she could do something with the Danger Shop that Jon had mentioned next summer session? Ooooh.

Re: Introductions (LARP Project, Week 1)

[sharp_man]

"Dr. Hannibal Lecter," he introduced himself, "I am from Earth in this time period; I moved to Fandom from Baltimore some years ago. And I'm beginning to wonder if I should bring a first-aid kit," he added, amused. "I have no experience in this type of roleplaying, but I am curious to see where it goes."

Re: Introductions (LARP Project, Week 1)

[drumsticksandd20s]

"There are safety rules for these things, and I am going to be an absolute hardass about enforcing those," Steph assured him, "but the first aid kit might not be a bad idea anyway. Given she wasn't quite sure yet what all the people in the class were capable of, powers-wise. "And to be honest, I'm also curious to see where it goes, but that's all part of the adventure anyway."

Re: Introductions (LARP Project, Week 1)

[myfifthrodeo]

"Rosa Ortecho," Rosa said, wiggling her fingers in a (slightly disconcerted) wave. "And, uh. I was one of those kinds of kids who smoked up under the bleachers and thought she was too cool for things, so the only 'role play' I'm familiar with is the sexy kind."

She noticed the actual teenagers in the class and gave a little sheepish shrug. "And smoking up under the bleachers is actually not at all cool, kids, and really only got me in deep shit, so this is a way better use of your time."

She was forgetting something, wasn't she. "Oh, and I'm from Roswell, New Mexico. And for those of you who have heard of it, yes. There are aliens. They are mostly giant nerds."

Re: Introductions (LARP Project, Week 1)

[drumsticksandd20s]

Steph glanced from Rosa to Isabela and back with an amused smirk. "A thoroughly valid form of role play, but we're sticking to the non-sexy kind for class purposes. Sorry. "

As much as possible, anyway, because Isabela.

"And... thanks for the drug disclaimer," she added a little more seriously, in a way she might not have a few weeks ago. Now that she knew more about how the Arcadia Bay drug scene had factored into what happened to Rachel, though...

Re: Introductions (LARP Project, Week 1)

[noonedecidesmyfate]

"I'm Belle, from the kingdom of Misthaven. I don't have any experience with this sort of thing, I'm afraid."

Unless pretending to be a hero from a favorite story as a small child counted. She'd almost certainly done that.

"But it sounded interesting and I thought I'd give it a try."

Re: Introductions (LARP Project, Week 1)

[drumsticksandd20s]

"The spirit of an adventurer already," Steph noted with a smile. "That's really all you need to start with."

Was she maybe vibrating with nerdy excitement over having people from what sure as hell sounded like fantasy kingdoms (yeah, they were real, she knew that, but they still sounded like it because she was too genre savvy for her own good) in her workshop? Absolutely.

Re: Introductions (LARP Project, Week 1)

[mylandmyrules]

"I'm Nell and I don't know what an RPG is, so I'm guessing I don't have any experience with it. Them. Whatever they are."