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On Location

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What makes this LARP different?  How will it work? 
What can I expect?

What are the rules?
 

Check here for answers and updates!

PRACTICAL INFORMATION


Next Event:  Relationship Meet-up #2
LIVE on Discord 
Friday, July 29th  8-10pm

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Information & Schedule

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On Location is set during the making of a fictional film, in 1932, at a hotel resort called Tarrington Manor. The events and personalities depicted are entirely fictional, and bear no relationship to the lives or attributes of any real-world individuals, living or dead.

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The fictional Tarrington Manor was once a private estate, but converted to a hotel just five years ago.  The cast and crew are all housed in the hotel, and filming was set to take place on the estate - although precise set locations have not been publicized.  Crates of set dressings and costume pieces were delivered in crates the day before the LARP begins, and are only just being opened. 

 

Gottfried, the director, has yet to arrive, to take charge of the set of 'Stolen Moments', and little direction has been given in his absence.  Still, the cast and crew are motivated to begin... somehow....  
 

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On Location is a one-off event, for up to 32 players, and is not linked to any other event or to any campaign. The game has been run twice, with more runs in the works.

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Characters are predesigned in skeleton, and players are helped to personalize them by building on and adding to the character information that they will be given.

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This is a larp about human drama and emotional exploration – there will be little action, there are no secret plots, and the rules and system are pretty much nonexistent.

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On Location is aimed at people who enjoy internal and interpersonal tension, who like to develop and express their characters’ emotions through play, and who are interested in using a low-key sandbox approach to find and build engaging story and satisfying resolution.

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Costuming & Props

Players are responsible for their own costuming and any props they'd like to use.  The style is "Hollywood glam" and does not need to be precisely 1930s.  Just do your best with something you feel happy about that will blend in. 

Prop guns are not allowed, nor any smoking props or devices that have a functioning component.  There will be no smoking or vaping allowed in the game, but you may have a fake or unlit cigarette/cigar as a prop if you so choose. 

There may be a box or rack of costuming odds and ends and props for use when rehearsing and filming scenes (TBD).  

For those of you who enjoy the costuming element, you may wish to consider purchasing or creating a facemask that will match your costume/persona/etc, in case we need to introduce a mask-mandate as part of our covid-safety policy.  

On Location has a Two-Act structure, with a passage of time between.  For Act Two,  players will be asked to distress their appearance in some way.  The idea is to visually represent the degeneration and lack of discipline that has come over the location during this long wait. Clothing might be unbuttoned, or torn, or mismatched; hair might be dishevelled; makeup smeared or exaggerated; and so on. What we want is a visible ‘before’ and ‘after’ kind of effect. 

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Registration

Registration opens June 1st.  To Register for the LARP, you'll need to Register for the convention - on that form you'll sign up for a LARP pass - link here.  You'll also need to pay (at least) your deposit - link here.  

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Casting

Once you've Registered & Paid for the convention, the GM Team will get in touch with a password for the Casting Form.  Casting begins June 7th, with all forms due back to us by June 23rd.  We'll announce casting on or before June 30th.  In addition to asking what roles interest you, we'll ask about contact information we can share with the other players, photo permissions, etc.  Update:  Characters are still available and will be cast on a 1-by-1 basis.  
 

Under 18s

The Wilmark Dynasty is a family-friendly group that aims to be very welcoming and inclusive.  We do find, however, that our "young" players thrive when there are other young players with whom they can buddy-up, at least some of the time.  The pre-written characters for this specific game do in general have relatively adult themes, but we may be able to adapt some or write something new.  So, if you have an under-18 player you'd like to bring along, please fill out a Reg for them to register their interest and we'll get in touch to talk options.  Please also read our policy about minors.

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Creative Input

Characters in this game only exist in a skeletal format.  After Casting you will have (over the coming months) creative input into the name, background, personality, and relationships that make the character playable and personalized just for you! 

(See our Section on PrePlay for more information.)

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Characters still available! 

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     Click here for our full schedule.

Design

The characters in On Location are actors and film crew, assembled to shoot what will surely be a technical and artistic masterpiece as well as a commercial triumph: 'Stolen Moments'

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Stolen Moments

'Stolen Moments' is a lavish ensemble piece, being made by leading studio Richmond Films. A stellar array of talent from all over Europe has been assembled, and all that is required to turn it into glittering reality is the presence of renowned director Gottfried Himmelhaus. As famous for his outrageous temper as for his artistic temperament, the German genius will surely create a picture for the ages. When he arrives…

The details of 'Stolen Moments' are not designed. Players can invent them as required, when they wish to discuss or rehearse lines and scenes together, to plan shots, to arrange scenery and props, and so on. The important thing is that, until Gottfried Himmelhaus arrives, no actual productive activity on the film can take place.

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Activities

The characters are professionals, here with a job to do: they are not being paid to just lounge around and drink cocktails. At least, that’s the studio’s way of thinking! While waiting for their director to arrive, the crew will be exercising their skills, preparing the sets and the actors for shooting; and the cast will be rehearsing and training.

Each character has tasks assigned to them, to add some structure to their day. it is anticipated that during the course of the larp, discipline may break down, and some may not be as dutiful as others: but to start with at least, having some pieces of preplanned activity as part of the day will help players settle in.

You needn’t worry about not having the skills that are associated with your character – of course, we aren’t expecting that. You don’t have to be a makeup expert to play THE MAKEUP ARTIST, for example. But you will be expected to spend some time ‘larping’ makeup – applying (empty) brushes to an actor’s face, and so on. Similarly for each of the other characters.

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So what is play actually going to be like?

Quite sandboxy really. Your characters are there together, in the setting: play is going to mostly revolve around them exploring their internal feelings and their interactions with each other, in a naturalistic way. There is a certain amount of structure to the day, so you needn’t worry about having nothing to do: but none of it will be forced on you. We aren’t imposing a direction of play on you - you’ll discover for yourself where you want to take the character.

Playing to lift

 

On Location is not intended for you to play to win, or play to lose. ‘Winning’ and ‘losing’ are not really possible, in any meaningful sense. Instead, you’re encouraged to play to lift - to lift up the other characters’ play, so that the responsibility for your drama and your character also rests on all your co-players. Let your character follow their own path, without too much steering and without too many expectations of what should be happening to them. Take action as it occurs to you, and react to other characters’ actions as you become aware of them - letting it flow naturally, building rather than blocking.

“Why is this so effective? Well, it is much easier for a particular individual to lose than to win. And it is much easier for me to give you a win (I happen to spill my secret in the middle of our heated argument) than for you to carve out a win (You must out-of-game-cleverly manipulate me into spilling my secret). The drama that we both want rests on the secret coming out, however – and the easiest way for us to ensure that to happen, is for me to lift you. So trust that the other players will lift you to wins, and you can focus on losing.

“Note that the win we are talking about is a win for the player, not for the character. It may very well be that I recognize that you clearly want your tragic character to fail horribly at the public speech she is giving. Well, then the way I would Play to Lift you is to throw a (verbal) rotten tomato at you and boo your character off the stage.

“Do not people sometimes read each other wrong, when it comes to what they want? Certainly. Just as in a dance, you can sometimes step on your partner’s toe or twirl him when he was really expecting something else. Just as in a dance, you get better at it with practice.”

(The concept of ‘play to lift’, and the quoted passage above, comes from this article by Susanne Vejdemo in the 2018 Knutepunkt book, which discusses it in more depth.)

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POLICIES

We do not anticipate any problematic behaviour at the larp: but we want to state clearly ahead of time what will not be acceptable, so prospective participants will be aware of our community standards.

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Authenticity and historicity (not)

On Location is not designed to strive for authenticity or for historical accuracy. The larp is not going to feature the minutiae of 1930s movie-making, nor will it pay detailed attention to the history of the period. The intention is to achieve a loose, glamorized, and dramaticized version of the period and of the industry – larger than life, and less fiddly.

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Prejudice

The 1930s was a time of overt prejudice: women, homosexual people, members of ethnic minorities, and other groups were often openly discriminated against and persecuted. As a default, players should not reproduce these attitudes in play. This is not because we want to whitewash or fluffify the period, it is because we don’t want players to have to experience prejudice, or to have to express it, unless they actively wish to do so. If you would like your character to have the experience of suffering prejudice,that’s absolutely fine: you can ask for this in advance of the larp during preplay, or during the workshops, or during an offgame moment in play itself. 

 

The in-game explanation is that the studio depends upon its workers being able to cooperate together, despite that they are in many cases quite unusual: so in general the workplace is expected to operate without prejudices being expressed. We want players to be able to concentrate on what they’re trying to explore with their characters within the larp that we have designed, without having the particular considerations of prejudice also weighing on them unless they wish that to be so.

(You should also look at the notes about gender and sexuality on the Characters section of this document.)

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Equity and diversity

We start from a position of absolute mutual respect among participants and organizers. We will not tolerate any form of discriminatory activity or speech, on the basis of gender identity, sexuality, ethnicity, disability, physical or mental health, religion, or any other characteristic.

On Location has been designed to allow in-character discriminatory behaviour only where both parties (the player of the character showing prejudice, and the player of the character who is the victim of it) have explicitly discussed and opted in. Other than in these opted-in cases, being in-character will not be an acceptable reason for displaying prejudice, or other intolerant behaviour.

Some characters may have backgrounds containing sexual violence or abuse these topics will not be role-played during the game.

Accessibility

We endeavour to the best of our ability to make On Location accessible for all would-be participants, whatever their needs may be. We will ask interested people to contact us (in confidence) with details of their requirements, so we can make sure we have them covered.

 

Anti-harassment , safety and reporting

The safety of participants at On Location is our absolute priority. We urge you to report any harassment, dangerous behaviour, or any other breach of our tolerance policy, as soon as you’re able. 

In all cases, we promise to treat your report seriously, and to treat you with respect.  

 

During the larp itself we will have a member of the organizing team on duty at all times to receive reports of any incidents, or of any concerns that you might have as a participant, either in person or via a dedicated phone number. Contact details will be made available nearer the time.

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Photography

We intend to have a specialist photographer for the larp, who is also playing THE STILLS PHOTOGRAPHER – so their character will be photographing your character, and also they will be photographing you. If you would prefer not to appear in photographs, you can perform the “look down” hand gesture (see techniques and metatechniques) to signal to TBD.

After the larp, Wilmark  will put the pictures up on Google Drive for you to check them over. You will then have the right of takedown over any picture in which you appear – if you request a takedown, that picture will be removed.  After a short time, we will then put the pictures up on Facebook for everyone there to enjoy. 

You may tag yourself, but we will require that you don’t tag anyone apart from yourself – unless you have that person’s permission to tag them.  You’re welcome to take photos yourself too, of course – but we will require that you follow the same privacy protocols around takedown and tagging.

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