My First Quest: a LARP life, pt. 2

You may have read part one of this memoir, and maybe even 'My 2 Favorite Things on my Quest' over on sister blog, Integr8dFix.blogspot.com

<\br> Yes, we did find out what was going on with the ‘kidnapped twins’ and located the famous Robinhood-style thieves, The Cat and the Mirror. Thanks to a quickly-cast Inspire spell, Ochinnikov decided to trust these Questers. We partied! He slept in the next day, and we needed a puzzle solution to leave his cave. Fyre said he had a great riddle, which did indeed eat ten minutes’ time. What does Luke Skywalker say at Christmas?

<\br> The answer, actually, tied into Day Four’s quest through the Dream Essence Realm. The punchline can be found in the epic heroic ballad I created with ‘Dandelion’ and her ukele and harmonica, in the town square during Friday Bazaar. I'll tell you about that, today!

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The 'home base' for our very First Quest. So here I was, being employed to do a more-complicated version of what i used to do with my nephews, David and Austin, when I played we were "Louis" (my middle name) and "Clark" (their last names!), crossing the country with Sacagawea.
It was not really so precise, this LARPing, especially my first quest, as that was also the aspect I found most baffling, as someone who never LARPed, especially with a Character Sheet.
I might learn to game with more accuracy after a couple of weeks, but Roleplay itself is my focus. I’ll get better with the rest to reconcile with how we define that role playing using the game, for kids more interested in their sheets than these five guys.

Join in on OUR INTEGR8D SOUL game-story, which was also live-action role played at this camp, Wednesday morning!

Here's a link to our game which inspired me: https://t.co/hjxgyNYn72 Staggered amid the large stones beneath the bridge near the library, we formulated plans. Shadow wanted to shape-change and look like the big bad’s twin, whom we’d taken out before lunch. Fiery wanted to tap into Animal Form and go full-tiger, to be delivered by a disguised Rink. Axy would swim through the mote. Finally, one of the palace guards was our artisan, Snake Man. First, we had the Big Bad to take out. She lost her head to Shadow’s tactic. I wouldn’t go for a beheading, normally, yet, as a shape-changer myself, I told them I simply made my head into a bowling ball, which they had to dodge, and utilizing their attack in return, gave myself back my head. Snake Man was eventually more fascinated by the adventure music coming over my speaker. “Audio” by LSD was his favorite. They recognized the Young Indiana Jones theme I played as we victoriously crossed the bridge for the palace showdown.

How could I forget? We were asked to play the opponents, the Green Teeth Horde, and I, a healer named Johnny Rainbow. There I am with music blasting out of my fanny pack, fast-talking, healing, and watching my Questers attack Jeremy's group with gusto.



Suffice to say, in the showdown where The Cat and the Mirror stage a coup, Shadow used a water bottle on their mother, the feline Marchioness, as was his want to turn the game in a silly direction. I encouraged them to step their feet into cakes on tables and swing from chandeliers (ala classic Robin Hood w/ Errol Flynn), swing on drapery (like the Swordsman versus Valkyrie during the Avengers/Defenders War in ‘73). Before the coronation, Shadow ran off with the physical representation (phys rep) of the crown, chased up a tree by his comrades.


I sang about rather a lot of this the next day at Friday Bazaar. I accepted the role playing responsibility of the Armory merchant, allowing Questers to trade their imaginary Silver, as designated by their QL, for armor, weapons, and enchantments for said accouterments. I simply hit upon my Grandfather Dish and Uncle Roger’s middle name, “Homer,” and drawled with the accent I’d learned as a boy. I was, after all, pretty wiped by that morning, and realized an accent that comes naturally to me when tired was the way to go. I’d tell stories of certain weapons and armor, to increase story-telling and monetary value, and asked the warriors to share, when selling me a shield, what-have-you, tell me what battles the equipment’s seen- to pass on, upon re-sell, of course.



<\br> Since my buddy was Dandy Lion, ukelele and harmonica-playing itinerant musician in motley, I stepped over and asked if we might create a song. I began telling the story of Jim Dandy, how his eight-foot tall presence swaying there by the entrance of Ochinnikov’s cave evidenced ‘magic in the air.’ Dandy began calling back a lyrical response- “magic in the air”- and a heroic ballad emerged. We joined in again on several plot points, with a very good response from nearby CIT Knights (the teens training to assist we Quest Leaders) and kids. I had a chance to name check my Questers, and asked the crowd around our park bench if they knew what Luke Skywalker said at Christmas. I shared Fiery’s riddle as he smiled and hollered nearby: “Snoooooooow!!!”

The part about our director helping me unravel my tired, incomplete, confusing character sheets might be amusing to hear, but emotionally, it was the only part of the day that made me feel like I had a long ways to go. But he was great about it. I think I owed him an Excedrin afterwards, though.
I only had time to see the kids off, deal with any last questions, then make my way to the bus just in time to teach my online student in Korea. But I knew I’d have to write about it- before other quests came along to obscure what-was—in-the-beginning.



<\br> Shadow was the last kid picked up. He sat with me and asked me to put on “We Will Rock You.” Shadow said: “I like ‘We Are the Champions’ too- but I think that part about ‘no time for losers’ is a little mean.” I answered him about Wice, “Wormhole”: it’s Dark Wave Music, like for futuristic science fiction, shaped by synthesizer music and beats of the 1980s. As he left, Shadow simply said: “Thank you.” For what? I didn’t ask. That way, it could just be a pretty- grown-up way of saying ‘farewell.’