Shadowrealms drew in a new writing team this year to run Holdfast and provided an absolutely terrific 3-day fantasy adventure. The main story involved two feuding Lords and foreign army invasion. The players had to choose which side to back. Neatly and without seeming contrived, the story unfolded in such a way that everybody had to get involved. The story was sound enough to stand up to player scrutiny and get poked about a bit by us doing the unexpected. The plot was also refreshingly 'not end of the world stuff' and fitted nicely around the levels of the characters. 

Unlike, a lot of larp events these days where there is a lot of hot NPC on NPC action and long periods of nothing much except IC chat (which is fun but can get old after awhile). This years Holdfast gave me and the other players a real back to basics adventure, with lots of fighting, puzzle-solving and exploring. The event was written for beginning characters and it was refreshing to be able to play alongside low level characters and face upto low level monsters.

Overland linears provided the main content of the event and were varied enough to give everybody (whatever there class) something to do. The linears took us deep into the neighbouring Ashclyst Forest and for middle-aged wheezing fat bloke like me that would have normally been too much. However, the encounters were set so well that I hardly had time to think about how far I had come and got totally caught up in the action. The forest is truly huge and although I have been to events at Caddihoe many times before, I've never seen the forest used so well.

The quality of the roleplaying from players and crew alike was very good. The occasional slip out of character here and there but nothing that broke the moment if you know what I mean.

The costume and scene setting top-notch and the new shadowrealms coinage was great. Real metal coins is the way most clubs are going these days and Shadowrealms have caught up on this too. Each coin, be it Gold,Silver or Copper had been cast out of a suitable weighty metal and embossed with gameworld heraldry. The look and weight made them enjoyably clinky and realistic. For this event the Gold and Silver coins were purely for roleplay purchases only. The Copper coins were used as tokens (each worth 50p) for food and beer. This meant I didn't need to have to go out of character to buy beer at the in character tavern. I just handed over the price of the beer in coppers. At the end of the event, any unspent coppers were reimbursed.

The whole three days had the right mix of action, roleplay and puzzle-solving to keep everybody interested throughout. Timeout occurred around about 12.00-2.00ish and allowed those who wanted to get some well earned sleep to do so. Most stayed up and socialised with the crew & refs for a few hours. The crew & refs were as welcoming after-hours as there were throughout the event and that gave the whole thing a really friendly air.

The Shadowrealms system is very simple and is essentially location based combat and point based magic. Shadowrealms simplicity means that it avoids lots of stop-starts as players go and consult refs, which meant that Holdfast ran very smoothly from first time in to last time out without any real interruptions. When a ref was needed, they were always available and willing to help.Each day began with a player briefing for each player from a ref, where earned experience could be spent, treasure gained declared and healing crossed off. This was done fairly and efficiently and in good time.

All in all I'm glad to give this one a really good thumbs up and recommend Shadowrealms and Holdfast to others.

And this is how I spend my Lunchbreaks!

There you go folks, would be great to see some of you there next time

The older I grow, the less tolerant of idiots I become.