Given that they hyped the dragon so Much I'd consider a mention of what you felt wrong with it relevant to a review. Please.

Also... What was Timo's opening Speech.

And really.... No Mandolin but they bought flares to light the wicker-man... after all that talk about how 'real' they were going to make it... that sounds like twattery.

Has anyone got any pictures of Cinderhill that don't make it look like a plywood scout camp? I'd be interested.

- why did the witches have to start a day later? Surely with all the prep time the camp should have been ready, or was it the players that caused the delay?

- your mandolin was 'too shiny'? Sounds petty to me to be honest, especially considering the generator! Had any guidelines been issued about musical instruments before hand?

- how much input did you get into your character design?

- how attached to the 'world of yesterday' did you feel, having not played in it? For example, did you feel you could care about the friends who'd died if you'd never met them?

- what was the generator for? Was it concealed at all?

- how big was the site? It sounds huge if you could walk for 2 hours and not arrive at Cinderhill. Did the extra size help or hinder roleplaying?

- I'd be interested in knowing which LRPs you've done before, as this will help guage what you're comparing it to.

- In the run up I felt that the logistics of things like sanitation and management of medical conditions was not being well thought through, can you comment on this?

- How did the skills allocation work out in practice?

- Did any 'deaths' occur and how well were these handled?

- and finally, did IC underwear actually enhance your experience? :-)
 


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It is not a competition. It is a web forum.

My experience is that costume and roleplaying standards tend to be very high at small events, but a bit ropey at large scale events (which is probably attributable to 5% of the players), so trying to do something of such high quality at such a scale is perhaps pretty ambitious.

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It is not a competition. It is a web forum.

As the smallest group in game by quite a long margin, it did feel like they got left to the very last minute. We didn't actually have a camp when people started arriving at the 'boot camp' - just parts of very crude tents almost ready to put together. Unlike the tamer tents, the witch tents were extremely basic, but then that was the idea. 2 wooden triangles with a rope between them and a canvas thrown on top.

Unfortunately, not a strong enough design to withstand the freak rainstorm the night before the event was due to start - hence we lost a day rebuilding. Still, at least this time we did it right with some provided hand axes to cut new poles.

Another thing that was last minute was the witches' magic rules - but I have to admit, I liked their finally settled carte blanche approach. If we could think up a spell, and role play it convincingly, it was allowed. Only 3 restrictions. No Immortality, No Resurrections, No Astral Travel. Of course, we couldn't just throw magic around - we had to make potions (or dolls, spell tablets, whatever) by way of ritual. No refs meant no one was enforcing that, so if you wanted to cheat, opportunity was there - but then anyone doing that was cheating themselves out of some good RP opportunities.

Another side to the magic was the chemistry 101 training session. Witches actually were given some quick step-by-step sfx training. Not all of us used any of the chemical stuff, but it was there to be used - and by some of the witches to great effect. One group went so far as to scent their clothes to smell bad for example, or others used chemicals to make various colour smokes as part of their spells, another used a potion that glowed in lieu of a lantern.

The whole no refs approach does raise an interesting issue - it relies strongly on players really entering into the spirit of the game and not taking advantage. I'm not convinced the same approach would work here, but I'd love to be proven wrong. It does mean though that players really have to know what's going on or be able to convincingly improvise, since there isn't a handy ref to ask for reference material in a pinch. It does make managing things like deaths and such impossible, since it becomes the responsibility of the player to decide when they are injured or dead - and I know a number of players who won't accept that and continue playing anyway.

As for the off-game stuff, yes it was there. People make a big deal of it. Personally, it didn't bother me in the slightest - we put up with far more in UK events. All things considered, I was impressed that the off-game interventions were at least generally kept to a minimum, and that the worst offences were apparently due to a need to destroy some of the pyrotechnics that had gotten wet in either the aforementioned rainstorm, or a second one that poured down on the 2nd night.

On the village.. the atmosphere was incredible. Walking in as a witch to see this village really did feel like walking into the real thing. OK, so much of that was down to players in-character reactions, but the village itself did feel like an authentic working village for the brief time we were there. In fact, I ended up staying there with the villagers for half the event, witch or no and the illusion held for the duration. More so than the tamer camp perhaps felt little different from visiting a faction at one of our fests.

I did love the 24hr time in. The idea of going to bed and then waking up in character really did add to the atmosphere. I'm not sure it'll work so well in the UK between the out of character tentage and other equipment we all bring along that would end up being used and the idea that muggers would be given free reign to slaughter characters in their sleep.

The dragon wasn't all it was supposed to be - partly due to damage in transit and a lack of wings. The neck was 'twisted' on the journey from Finland, hence much of the dragon's facial movements didn't work and the head was lop-sided. The scary voice they so carefully constructed, initally was impressive, but lost a lot of its impact when you worked out that you really had to concentrate to understand it. I did think the player/organiser playing the dragon didn't do such a good job of being a dragon. He just wasn't scary enough - to easily pleased or placated. But even so.. it's still the best phys-rep for a dragon I've seen yet, and it doubled as the sound system for the after-game party.

Another thing that I liked was the concept of an after-game party. What better chance to socialise with players out of character, get drunk and froth over the event? But of course, at the end of our events most people are too busy packing up and racing home. I'd love to be able to adopt this (apparently Danish LRP) custom.

See above.

I still felt my character was my own. All the background was written and decided upon by me. The only restrictions imposed were game background related. The three factions were very tightly controlled in their nature. So, some character concepts simply wouldn't have worked and it was this that the