The Bay Area Masquerade

RIP Flamingo God

That works, thank you!

When I attempt to enter chat, it shows me a page of code instead. I am not sure if that's just me and I should clear my cache? Or is this already on the list of "things the hard drive failure messed up"?

Thank you so much for working on getting all this back to normal.

I have lots of answers to this, but first one that comes to mind: small talk. You get really, really good at small talk.

Because if you can idly chat about made-up characters in a made-up setting and the effects of next week's execution, you can idly chat and be interested in pretty much anything.

So, now I've got some time to sit down and write a bit. The first step, for me, is to determine how badly I have fucked up. Is it a minor point correctable with an apology? Is it big enough that I should have staff be a go-between because they don't want to talk to me at all? Is it contentious enoug...

A number of situations in the last year plus talking to some friends from a different LARP have had me reflecting on various poor RP choices I have seen, experienced directly, or committed myself over the years. So experienced LARPers here, let's talk about being uncomfortable. Let's talk about how ...

One way I've seen that helps make conversations more natural on introduction: Come in with something that you want from people. This! This helps a lot. Knowing what your character wants (even if your character doesn't) does a lot. That segues into ideas for getting integrated in the other threads w...

Probably best to coordinate with the other person running an event- having a clear idea of who the events might appeal to, etc can help design events that might appeal to different subsets of game. Or running them at overlapping times but not entirely. Lots of options! Becky, that's true! I feel lik...

Good idea! -Always be on the lookout for new people to give patronage to. Do they need help? A political appointment? Advice? Funding? A shoulder to cry on? Find out what they need, and find out how to give it to them, either for payment now or favors down the line. -Introduce them to other people. ...

I'm doing a series for first-time LARPers and new players. Older players may find something of value here too, but this is mostly a series based on information I wish had been available to me as a new, not very well socialized LARPer six and a half years ago. 80% of LARP is talking to people. 10% is...

I learned most of these via trial and error and NOT doing them and then wondering why things weren't going well. Big shout out to everyone who has given me advice and helped out over the years, and a disclaimer that I'm still working on a lot of these. 1. Communication. With staff, with other player...

Congratulations!

Melissa is Lesser Harpy.

I still have the chairs and tables in my car from the ball because I am an awful procrastinator, so we can have those, too.

It's back up for me, too.

I checked and it's not just me- chat is failing to connect. Can anyone else connect fine?

My take on how to resolve the conflict is that local subcultures vary, and it is most importantly acceptable for people to have different views on the matter, and that acting according to those views if you have the status to back it up is not really a problem. Maybe the pendulum of opinion is swing...

But what of the duke's personal secretary or seneschal, who he employs like the foot-washer? I think there is room for a broad range of ways to treat a retainer, depending on what their domitor uses them for, with the upper limit having them be treated like an extension of their domitor.

I am totally in agreement here, though I figured how the domitor treats the retainer also factors in to how others treat them- though only in regards to flavor, not overall respect. If the domitor treats them like a valet or lady's maid in public, they will likely be treated like that by others- wit...

I love both of these. To respond to Justin's point, a lot of what I do is pick who I talk to about secrets, and in general, don't tell people things that I'm not okay with being suddenly public knowledge. I theoretically shouldn't have to do either, but I understand humans are fallible and "remember...

I think feeding grounds can work, if we agree on an out of game level to do a couple of things to ensure that the various negative consequences people have experienced before don't happen. Ralph would like feeding grounds for plot reasons, and I think we as players can make this happen if we put som...

Thanks for the perspective, Ralph! :) For my two cents as a player, the game I played in prior to this did not have them, so I've never seen any of the plot/RP advantages/disadvantages before. I'm interested in seeing them in action for the first time (hence my IC participation in hammering them out...

That's very true, bans in general should be on the status page. I was just thinking about the physically obvious side of things (which would also include things like eerie presence effects that cannot be physrepped and appearance focuses, now that I think about it).

My thought is that it could be done with a forum thread easily enough. It's not like status, where you don't know unless you're told or you have Status Aware- it is readily obvious to anyone who looks at them, and there aren't that many of them.

I've clearly missed some stuff by being away for a few weeks, so I'm sorry if this has been covered elsewhere or is in the works already, but reading the status bans: If being on a Path is so blindingly obvious now that a status ban can be in effect, can we please add some sort of indicator to the ...