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What An Experience!
by
Storm Constantine
Well,
what an experience! That's the least I can say about
Jim's
and my visit to the Seven
Sins LARP in Germany. We had a great time,
made some new friends and generally had loads of fun.
Sven
(Pellaz) and I,
before the LARP began |
We
flew out on the Tuesday evening and were met at Bonn/Cologne
airport by Elly and Sven (who "play" Cobweb and Pellaz
respectively). Elly had been driving people around continuously for
two days and was absolutely exhausted. Castle Bilstein, where the
LARP was held, was pretty much out in the middle of nowhere so quite
a few folk needed ferrying to the venue, through thickly falling snow.
The castle overlooks a really picturesque small town, set high
on a mountain oozing with ancient vibes. Although the
castle has been renovated rather drastically (and sadly, in
my opinion) to accommodate a youth hostel, it still retains
a lot of its original features, (especially on the outside),
and was a very atmospheric venue for the gathering. Jim and
I were a bit disconcerted to discover we'd be sleeping in bunk
beds, but as we quickly found out, the beds were amazingly comfortable,
so that wasn't too much of a trial. Another thing that
shocked us to start with was that there were no locks on the
doors. We
come from a country where you'd be robbed blind in such circumstances,
but there was absolutely no problem with thieving at all — even
with 300 people or so at the event.
The
LARP wasn't due to start until the next day, so only a few
people were around that first night. Wendy had arrived
the previous day, so we met up with her and Marja, and the rest
of Wraeththu crew in attendance, for a few glasses of wine before
bedtime. Marja had a
special "corner" in the castle, on one of the landings, which she and
her crew had transformed into a kind of Gelaming boudoir, with
drapes and cushions and ornaments strewn around.
Wraeththu were to be presented to the LARPing world during the
event and — as with the role-playing game that Gab has
devised —
there was some advance mumblings about this. Some
people were intrigued, others somewhat scathing. As usual,
it was the gender aspect of Wraeththu that was ruffling a few
feathers. It was up to Marja and her crew to persuade everyone
that Wraeththu could be a viable part of this form of gaming. And
they did an excellent job.
My
husband Jim
as Hurel har Sulh |
As
for the cast, there was Sven (Pellaz), Gerrit (Cal), Elly (Cobweb),
Marja (Snake), Sabine (a Kamagrian called Amina), Venai, (Rarn
har Kakkahaar), David (Moon), Ronni (Terez), Till (Swift) and
Wendy's friend Caleb who very gamely played the Hegemon Cedony — but
more of that later. Jim,
Wendy and I were required to have cursory characters, since no one at
the LARP could be without one, so I decided to be Malakess har Sulh,
Jim was my assistant Huriel, and Wendy was Edrei, who was one of
the characters from Breeding Discontent. Not that we got much chance
to play because we can't speak German, (although Wendy can a bit), but
we sort of lurked around in wigs and make up and tried to understand
what we could.
The
Seven Sins began properly on the evening of the second day.
Everyone gathered in costume in the courtyard while Mercedes, who ran
the event, outlined the rules and so on. Everyone then had to
traipse into the dark snow-covered forest next to the castle for
the game to begin. It was absolutely freezing, but we all huddled
together for warmth, and I was able to share Sabine's thick woollen
cloak. (Without that, I think I might have succumbed to the
weather.) The game idea was that several factions, or races,
had been invited to the castle by the ruling family there, a
breed of French aristocrats. The language barrier was a
bit of problem for me as I tried to suss out the plot, but as
far as I could gather, the Seven Sins could affect any player,
and if they were caught "sinning," they were awarded a token
to indicate this.
Occasionally, throughout the game, sinister Shadows appeared, players
dressed in black, who attacked all and sundry and were generally to
be held at bay. There was more to it than this, and no doubt the
plot will be reported more competently elsewhere. Most of
the time, Jim and I were virtual spectators hoping that we blended
in sufficiently and didn't offend anybody!
Keeping warm outside waiting for the game to start
On the second day, Jim and I discovered the Tavern in the courtyard,
and spent most of our time there. It was the best place to meet
people and learn about what was going on. We made friends with a
knight named Leomer (hope that's the right spelling), who's called
Alex in RL, and he helped us a lot. He could speak perfectly
fluent English, which was fortunate.
There were some amazing costumes around, not least those created by
Sven for the Wraeththu. Sven was a very convincing Tigron —
Pellaz
at his most autocratic —
while Gerrit got into the role of Cal
so well, he offended people all over the place. This resulted
in his character eventually being unofficially poisoned to death. Gerrit
has a great love of the ladies in RL, and this was his undoing. More
than that I shall not say!
Caleb
as
Cedony har Gelaming |
Anyway,
to Caleb's "turn" as Cedony. Jim and I have decided Caleb
needs his own TV show. His rendition was fabulously witty and
bitchy, like French and Saunders when they did that spoof
of Dangerous Liaisons or aristocrats from an Oscar Wilde play. Most
of his speeches began with "I do say…" and the best bit for
me was when he went into a monologue about the Nectar of the Aghama. (Don't
ask!) I so wish I'd taped that. He cornered poor Elly at one point
and said (roughly, can't remember word for word): "Oh Cobweb, I
have been meaning to ask you for ages, but what is your opinion
of the Varrish atrocities? Of course, your erstwhile consort was
heavily involved in that dreadful breeding programme. You must
feel so distressed about that…" And so on. I don't
think Jim, Wendy and
I were supposed to be crying with laughter, as the role
playing is taken very seriously by the participants, but we just couldn't
help it.
There are too many little anecdotes to relate, but the big finale on
New Year's Eve deserves full description. In the afternoon, the
English-speaking contingent inadvertently wandered into a hideous
combat situation, when Shadows swarmed in from all sides
and started laying waste to everyone. Burly knights and musketeers
fought back and it was complete mayhem. I've never been so scared in my
life! It
was far too real for comfort. Fortunately, we were
protected by a kindly female mage who took pity on us
and defended us with her lilac feather fan. This
might not sound terribly protective, but seemed to work,
as the other players clearly respected her ability to command
the elements. However, some of the players decided
to test Wraeththu's mettle and thrust Cal and Cedony
out to the front line to fight. Both were vanquished
instantly of course, but I thought it was very game of
Caleb to have a go with a sword, considering he'd never
done anything like this in his life before. Wendy, Jim
and I cowered behind our protective mage and fled the
moment we got the chance.
After dinner, Wendy, Caleb, David, Jim and I strolled up into the
forest to perform a short ritual. This was partly
to honour the local site guardians at New Year, and
partly because Caleb had picked up some strange impressions
about a particular spot earlier in the day. David
spoke some impromptu words in English, and his accent
made it sound more magical somehow. He'd brought
his incense and charcoal supplies with him, so we burned
some as an offering. It was a nice moment we shared,
before heading back to the castle below for the evening's
festivities.
Later
that evening, Sven performed his now infamous fire dance in
the courtyard outside the tavern. The
dance involves the use of flaming "poi." These
are balls of fire on the end of long cords, which Sven
expertly swirls around himself. He also
ate some fire and ran flaming brands over his naked
torso. His
performance was augmented by two fire breathers, so
all in all it was a great spectacle. (See video
here, AVI format, 3.34 MB). I noticed that even some
of the more macho players, who earlier had seemed — at
the very least —
allergic to
the idea of Wraeththu, cheered him on with genuine
appreciation.
Sven (Pellaz) performs a firedance New Year's Eve
Video available (AVI format, 3.34 MB)
Shortly afterwards, at midnight, there was free champagne for
everyone and a great firework display. The
finale of that, with the music to Gladiator ringing
out over the mountain forests and the sky full of
fountains of light, made my skin prickle and brought
tears to my eyes. Just about everyone at the
event stayed up partying wildly for the rest of
the night, and Sven, Sabine and I were the last of
our group to go to bed, somewhere near 6 am. I've
a feeling the tavern was still open, even then!
It was certainly a great way to spend New Year. Jim
and I loved it, not least because we made new friends. We're
very grateful to Mercedes, and to Marja, for enabling
our visit. I've posted a few pics already,
but will sort out a few more. Ours weren't
that brilliant, unfortunately, but I know Wendy
and Marja have some excellent shots, so no doubt
those will appear somewhere on the web in due
course.
Oh, one other thing I'd like to mention. Sabine has made some really
nice pendants engraved with the symbols of the Wraeththu magical
caste system, and some of the dehara. These
will be available for sale, and we'll give more
details as and when Marja includes an area on
her web site for mail order. We'll also most
likely take some of Sabine's work with us when
we go to conventions to sell on the IP stall.
About the Author:
Storm Constantine... well, I think we all know who Storm Constantine is.
She lives in Stafford, England, with her husband Jim and nine cats. More info:
http://www.stormconstantine.com. |
