Why my short Winter Haven experience was less than enjoyable

[Ufoseth]

First I will give some background. I had never attended a larp before, although I have been roleplaying since I hit my teens. My friend Shane (played Tony Ku at a previous event) had been trying to get me to come along for almost a year. So we started working on costumes and we finally had enough time to fully prepare for an event and thanks to some late night work finishing up, we were able to attend the November 10th Winter Haven

Well, to avoid beating around the bush too much, we didn’t stay for the duration of the event. We left late Friday night. Now I know the weather does play a factor in this, because it was abysmal that first night. I’ll start from the beginning of the game start and list the events from my/our perspective and then go over our reactions.

After the game start we decided to retreat from the weather after some exploring of the trails to meet up with our fifth group member at our cabin. We RPed a bit to get to know each others characters and get familiar with names and such as well as grab some leftovers from dinner to tide us over for the night. We situated our gear and continued to attempt to dry our soggy furs and change into some drier clothes.

Eventually, an npc approached our cabin to let us know a group was forming to meet with some dwarves further off. Now, with us being our traveling tribe, we approached the other pcs with caution. We listened to the situation and took the chance to converse with the pcs and allow for introductions. The trek, we determined, was not worth the effort. If the short stumpy people wish to talk with us that badly, they can come to us. Also, because we were still soaking wet and cold, we returned to our cabin.

We remained in our cabin, setting our defenses (a trap set on each door by our rogue) and posted watches. Eventually, another pc, who had arrived to the event later approached. After we startled him by not allowing him to enter (our rogue disarmed the trap so he could enter), he came in and it allowed for an interesting and fairly enjoyable rping opportunity. We conversed with him for a fairly long time both in character and out, and then he continued on to find more pcs.

We waited until approximately 2am (can’t remember the exact time) for a possible event to occur until we decided we were cold, wet, tired, and finally we determined that it would be unlikely anything more was going to occur (people were slowly beginning to file back). So we finally removed our soaked armor and costumes and changed into our warmer sleeping clothes. We armed the traps, and went to bed. Not long after we started to finally warm up. Two members of our group noticed some figures moving behind some trees. They moved closer and they were questioned with a “who are you.” When they failed to answer they were told “You do not want to open that door.”

Well, they did open the door. The trap went off for 10 lash, although they did not seem fazed. I sprung out of bed with my dagger in hand, our empath began tossing blasts, and our archer began firing. I moved to the back door after the second trap was triggered to block the door. Our rogue ended up getting hit with a magic sleep, I began to absorb hits and with no armor on I eventually had to use my hold ground just to survive. Our other warrior was hit with magic sleep and our rogue was drug off. Our healer healed the wounded while our other warrior waited for the sleep to wear off. We could not follow because our only member capable of leaving was our empath. After five minutes our other warrior left to search for our comrade but he was nowhere to be found. Our rogue returned approximately 30 minutes later with no memory of what had occurred while he was gone. Now I will get to the reactions.

I will honestly say, I think we did a superb job defending. Each group member performed their roles very well. The fact that we were attacked however, no more than 10 minutes after we had finally changed into our sleeping clothes was frustrating. After our friend returned, I was fairly agitated and asked our captured member what had happened, he said he couldn’t remember so I inquired out of game as to what had happened. Apparently he had been drug away and tortured for information. Here is where my complaints start to ramp up. Firstly, he was a tsunotaur being drug away extremely quickly by three people. Second, he was taken to an area we couldn’t search for him at, npc camp. Third, they were asking asinine questions such as “What do you know?” and “Who are your friends?” and “Where did you/they come from?” After which they had a short conversation out of game asking what they should do with him and actually proposed that maybe they should kill him. The event had barely started and they were already contemplating killing pcs?

A few other notes, they also mentioned that they had wanted to get the girl in our group, my girlfriend, instead. First of all, I will call that sexist to begin with. Just because someone is a girl doesn’t mean they want to play a damsel in distress, nor does it mean they don’t want to participate in combat or that they want to be rescued. The fact that they wanted to use her essentially as a plot device really made me angry. Secondly, both her and I are new to Larping and getting ripped out of bed and drug off through the cold is not something we would consider fun, nor would the threat of being killed the first night of the event. We both spent a lot of time working on our costumes and having that character killed would essentially amount to a lot of wasted time, money, and effort. Yes we could have simply remade the character as a 0 level again but I am very much so against cloning characters. Even if they had succeeded in grabbing her instead, she was not dressed warm enough to be drug off all the way to the npc camp.

Now, on to the npcs that attacked us; which admittedly could almost be described as ninjas. They attempted to sneak up, poorly I might add, because they were noticed fairly far out. Their continued approach was clearly visible and they even scratched the windows. We even alerted them that we were awake and even gave a warning not to open the door. When the trap was triggered, one of the npcs asked how to turn the buzzer off and our rogue went and turned it off and immediately after was hit with a magic sleep. That should have been considered a game stop. He had a knockout charged up and was going to use it before he was asked how to turn the buzzers off. Next, we dealt a fairly large amount of damage to them approximately 16 or so damage points to each from blasts, melee, and arrow packets. If they did take the trap damage (we assumed they didn’t and must have been master rogues) they would have absorbed approximately 26 damage total, each. Also, while being constantly attacked, one npc was able to cast another instant cast magic sleep. Two npcs were able to essentially, with very little effort, take out our entire 5 person group. The third npc never even entered the cabin. I find it fairly ridiculous that two npcs were able to absorb a large amount of damage, ignore our one and only defense allowed, able to cast instant magic sleep, and be able to carry off a tsunotaur. It essentially felt like I was being ganked for no real reason. If I wanted that, I would go play world of warcraft and make a character on a pvp server.

A large portion of our anger was brought about due to seemingly no real reason plot-wise for the attack. If they wanted information on our characters they could simply have sent an npc to ask, a la, a spy. We had a pc come talk to us for over an hour. We told him our names, where we’re from, as well as gave him some insight into personalities and the attitudes of the entire tribe. They had the entire time we were at the camp while the majority of the others had been off to talk to the dwarves and explore the caves, and yet they waited until we were finally fed up with our soaking wet armor and retired to our beds, hopefully to get a fresh, warm start for the next day. Instead, they send an elite task force with abilities that rival that of fairly high level pcs, to take on a group of 4 levels 0s, two of them entirely new players, and one level 8. We went over the entire short combat in our minds and we pretty much figured there was nothing else we could have done that we didn’t do. Without out armor on we were fairly limited in our ability to defend ourselves and the npcs had the abilities to essentially roll over anyone who wasn’t magic immune. And to what ends was this conflict? They didn’t even know what they wanted to do with the character they captured and almost killed him on a whim. Instead they gave him a little piece of paper with a poem on it he supposedly had to read at of all things, a poetry competition? We were all pretty much new characters with no real connection to any current plots. We hadn’t made anyone angry. I almost felt like we were being used to make all the other players aware of some story hook. We did what any other wandering tribe of barbarians would have done after they were attacked for no reason and discovered an area to be unsafe, we packed up and left.

This was not a good experience to be my first larping experience. Yes the weather did have an effect. The gms don’t have control over the weather, but they do have control over how they run their event and should react to inclement weather accordingly. We simply wanted to turn in and get a fresh start the next day but we weren’t really given that chance. Instead it felt like gms on a power trip decided to haze the new players. I felt really bad when my one friend who had paid was denied a refund despite the fact that we had barely even participated. He had even been courteous and paid the second he got there, as opposed to a lot of the other players who still had not even paid. It kind of seemed to be a bit of a double standard. In the end, I will give Final Haven and larping in general another go, but it essentially mounted up to feeling like a wasted month of preparation, and a wasted weekend.

[cole45]

Everyone has a right to their opinions. You didn't have a good time and I'm sorry about.

About the Refund. There are no refunds. We went to concinderable trouble and expence to provide a fun game. It says in the book that there are no refunds. He could have stayed, and he chose to leave.

About him paying...We allow people to go and fetch their money. That's the honor system. I don't know how letting them go back to the cabin to get theitr money constitutes a double standard.

Two. The Dwarf cave was our attempt to get 20 players out of the rain. It has a fireplace, and is under shelter.

Three. The NPC fighting you in the cabin were not just powered for you. They were powered for all twenty PCs.

Four. The plot. When we did send a plot. Just because you don't know what the plot is currently about does not mean it doesn't involve you. In fact, I would say it was the plot getting involved with you. If you didn' t want to come out and participate in a GM run event, I'm sorry you were misled. As a side note, When NPC correct your behavor during combat, they do not want you to be rude. One of you was PHYSICALLY pushing people off the steps, and there was some flak when he was talked to about it. We use the honor system, so when an NPC tells you something you are doing is illegal, people are just trying to help with safety, they are not being jerks.

Five: When NPC talk about talking a girl, you might want to think that it might, just MIGHT be plot related. It was inappropiate for you to assume that the NPCs were targeting her because she physically was a girl. Villians, can and often are sexist and racist.

six: useless torture.
NPCs do not know how many of you there are and who your friends. The PLAYERS do but the character does not. hense you have to be tortured for things they know. That's the way it is. And you have to be tortured for the plant to work.

seven: The Poetry...Yah..That was actually one of the most important plot points in the game. If you had stayed, you might have even found that out.

So, I can not fault your opinions, I think you came out in bad weather, and then didn't give the game enough of a chance. You ignored every plot sent at you and then left since "you didn't get to participate." I have no words.

I do however find the idea of it being a HAZING or GM power trip to be the most insulting thing I have ever heard. You admitted you have no idea of the plots, the characters or the area and you assume we are hazing you on a power trip. Not the case.

As far as the PC being dragged off, One person can drag him, why would three not be able? Weight of a Character has no bearing on any of that. Also, the reason you couldn't track them is That there exists NO TRACKING skill. It's a Scout hint, and even then it's IF and ONLY if the plot calls for it. We have to use the tools at our disposal.

[Onimaster]

Like Travis said, I am very sorry that your first experience at Winter Haven was negative. It certainly wasn’t our intent, and if you had concerns like this about my staff I wish you would have come and talked with me in person. I think that your group jumped to a lot of conclusions about what happened and why. Let me address some of your comments.

I will honestly say, I think we did a superb job defending. Each group member performed their roles very well. The fact that we were attacked however, no more than 10 minutes after we had finally changed into our sleeping clothes was frustrating. After our friend returned, I was fairly agitated and asked our captured member what had happened, he said he couldn’t remember so I inquired out of game as to what had happened. Apparently he had been drug away and tortured for information. Here is where my complaints start to ramp up. Firstly, he was a tsunotaur being drug away extremely quickly by three people. Second, he was taken to an area we couldn’t search for him at, npc camp. Third, they were asking asinine questions such as “What do you know?” and “Who are your friends?” and “Where did you/they come from?” After which they had a short conversation out of game asking what they should do with him and actually proposed that maybe they should kill him. The event had barely started and they were already contemplating killing pcs?

The reason the attack came when it did was because we had set up the cave plot as a means to get players in out of the rain where there was dry wood for a fire (which we started for the players benefit) and the plot went very very long partly due to the caution level the players were using in their clearing the dwarven mine of the threat inside. When it was done I looked around the gathered players and specifically asked where you were fearing that you all were feeling left out and wanting to make sure you were not feeling excluded. I’m sorry you had just gotten changed, and I wish I had noticed not everyone was there sooner. In all honesty I was shocked to find out what time it was when that plot was done.

At the larps (both) you are in character from game on to game break(s) all night long. This means there is no safe time no safe place, unless you’re a scout with the ‘Haven’ skill. 2am on a Friday night is not late by FH Larp standards as plots often run till 4 or 5 am before the npcs quit for the night. People have commonly set watches and guards just like their characters would have to do for as long as anyone I know have been playing. In fact that element of risk and danger is appealing to most.

Any character can be drug away, and his size doesn’t enter into that. Would you like it if we told players that they couldn’t drag their friends out of a fight because he’s a tsunotaur? I wasn’t there and don’t know how fast they drug him away, but I’ve seen many players do the same thing. Adrenaline starts going and people rush.

He was taken to NPC camp for that scene because it was warm and we wanted him to be comfortable while they were role-playing with him. Did your group go looking for him after you regained consciousness and your armor? The same thing happened to Egon and four other PCs, and they were all rescued from NPC camp later that night by the PCs so it certainly wasn’t impossible.

Why is it surprising that they discussed about killing a character? They obviously didn’t, and they are playing very bad people who do very bad things. They defiantly didn’t mean killing him without the chance of resurrection by the PCs which if done soon after death is risky, but not overly so.

A few other notes, they also mentioned that they had wanted to get the girl in our group, my girlfriend, instead. First of all, I will call that sexist to begin with. Just because someone is a girl doesn’t mean they want to play a damsel in distress, nor does it mean they don’t want to participate in combat or that they want to be rescued. The fact that they wanted to use her essentially as a plot device really made me angry. Secondly, both her and I are new to Larping and getting ripped out of bed and drug off through the cold is not something we would consider fun, nor would the threat of being killed the first night of the event. We both spent a lot of time working on our costumes and having that character killed would essentially amount to a lot of wasted time, money, and effort. Yes we could have simply remade the character as a 0 level again but I am very much so against cloning characters. Even if they had succeeded in grabbing her instead, she was not dressed warm enough to be drug off all the way to the npc camp.

Sexist? I know you obviously care for her, but wouldn’t it be more sexist not to consider her and exclude her from the activity she came to partake in? Didn’t they take a man first? Shouldn’t she be in just as much danger as everyone else? Isn’t everyone in the game, pc and npc, a plot device?

Now, on to the npcs that attacked us; which admittedly could almost be described as ninjas. They attempted to sneak up, poorly I might add, because they were noticed fairly far out. Their continued approach was clearly visible and they even scratched the windows. We even alerted them that we were awake and even gave a warning not to open the door. When the trap was triggered, one of the npcs asked how to turn the buzzer off and our rogue went and turned it off and immediately after was hit with a magic sleep. That should have been considered a game stop. He had a knockout charged up and was going to use it before he was asked how to turn the buzzers off. Next, we dealt a fairly large amount of damage to them approximately 16 or so damage points to each from blasts, melee, and arrow packets. If they did take the trap damage (we assumed they didn’t and must have been master rogues) they would have absorbed approximately 26 damage total, each. Also, while being constantly attacked, one npc was able to cast another instant cast magic sleep. Two npcs were able to essentially, with very little effort, take out our entire 5 person group. The third npc never even entered the cabin. I find it fairly ridiculous that two npcs were able to absorb a large amount of damage, ignore our one and only defense allowed, able to cast instant magic sleep, and be able to carry off a tsunotaur. It essentially felt like I was being ganked for no real reason. If I wanted that, I would go play world of warcraft and make a character on a pvp server.

Yes, in fact they were ninjas.

Now, I was not there to see what happened myself and there are conflicting interpretations of the events. As far as game stops go, I admit that the npc should have let him move back if he asked for help and he came close to show him how and I’ll speak to him about that, but if “game stop” wasn’t called there was no game stop.

One of the attackers might have been special with the magic sleeps, villains often are special in some way(s). But your assuming a lot here about what their abilities/stats were and how much damage they took. I talked to 2/3 of the group and I know one was far enough from the trap it didn’t hit him and the other was a warrior who may have held ground, parried blows, defensive matrix, etc. The villain with the sleeps may have had a special item that let him do that, or maybe a mistake. One of the PCs at the cave battle who has played a while herself had thought that Magic Sleep for an empath was a Life Point skill and was throwing them too quickly. And she told me that several had people had said earlier it was. These rule snafus have a history of spreading like wildfire. If you were that concerned you could have called game stop and asked the npcs what was up. They may not have been able to give important things away, but I would rather that than players thinking something is rigged against them.

A large portion of our anger was brought about due to seemingly no real reason plot-wise for the attack. If they wanted information on our characters they could simply have sent an npc to ask, a la, a spy. We had a pc come talk to us for over an hour. We told him our names, where we’re from, as well as gave him some insight into personalities and the attitudes of the entire tribe. They had the entire time we were at the camp while the majority of the others had been off to talk to the dwarves and explore the caves, and yet they waited until we were finally fed up with our soaking wet armor and retired to our beds, hopefully to get a fresh, warm start for the next day. Instead, they send an elite task force with abilities that rival that of fairly high level pcs, to take on a group of 4 levels 0s, two of them entirely new players, and one level 8. We went over the entire short combat in our minds and we pretty much figured there was nothing else we could have done that we didn’t do. Without out armor on we were fairly limited in our ability to defend ourselves and the npcs had the abilities to essentially roll over anyone who wasn’t magic immune. And to what ends was this conflict? They didn’t even know what they wanted to do with the character they captured and almost killed him on a whim. Instead they gave him a little piece of paper with a poem on it he supposedly had to read at of all things, a poetry competition? We were all pretty much new characters with no real connection to any current plots. We hadn’t made anyone angry. I almost felt like we were being used to make all the other players aware of some story hook. We did what any other wandering tribe of barbarians would have done after they were attacked for no reason and discovered an area to be unsafe, we packed up and left.

No real reason for the attack??? Aside from the fact we were trying to get all of your characters involved in the story you had no idea who the villains were, their motivations for their tactics, or the plot arc for the game. A kidnaper in the night is just as plausible as a spy and under interrogation they could ask questions with guaranteed truthful answers. It happens all the time in the real world and fantasy. Not every dramatic situation is a spy’s smiling face that just wants to lie to you; sometimes the faces are vicious and speak the truth; people don’t need to be angry to you to do you harm. Phantara is a wild and deadly place with numerous people that do harm to others just because it may get them some food. We weren’t trying to use you to make the others aware of a story hook we wanted your group hooked in the story so you would seek out what was going on and hopefully get you and the other PCs together for a common goal.

There were many things you could have done… You could have sought out new allies of the people you met upon arriving, investigated the people who needed and asked for your help, slept in your armor, gone looking for answers rather than running away, and more. We put in a threat, but it was not an insurmountable one, and certainly not built to take on every player at once. You had numbers, which is always an advantage even at level 0. The ninjas were what they were created to be, but we didn’t amp them up just to attack you, to make an example of you, to bully you, nor were you the only ones they went after.

This was not a good experience to be my first larping experience. Yes the weather did have an effect. The gms don’t have control over the weather, but they do have control over how they run their event and should react to inclement weather accordingly. We simply wanted to turn in and get a fresh start the next day but we weren’t really given that chance. Instead it felt like gms on a power trip decided to haze the new players. I felt really bad when my one friend who had paid was denied a refund despite the fact that we had barely even participated. He had even been courteous and paid the second he got there, as opposed to a lot of the other players who still had not even paid. It kind of seemed to be a bit of a double standard. In the end, I will give Final Haven and larping in general another go, but it essentially mounted up to feeling like a wasted month of preparation, and a wasted weekend.

Again I am sorry you had a bad experience for your first time, and I wish you had given it more of a chance rather than just leaving.

Yes, the weather sucked. The first night especially, but thankfully the rain mostly cleared up after your group left, and it warmed up a bit Saturday.

I’m sorry you were not given your fresh start. Again there is no out of game at the larp for characters, and attacks can come at any time night or day. If you wanted a special consideration to be left alone till morning you should have talked to a GM about it.

We were certainly not on a power trip or trying to haze anyone.

Aside from anything the book mentions about no refunds we felt that we had done nothing wrong enough to warrant the negative reaction your group gave us. We are not greedy, and we might have agreed to it if we felt we had actually done something to warrant it.

Yes, I know all about months and months of preparation, hardship, and expense to get ready for larps. Running these things is all that work times five, and times twenty for expense to us. You should have been in my shoes when the rain hit with a troup of girl scouts unexpectedly occupying our plan B. I thought everything we had prepared was ruined, but I pressed on and aside from our disagreement it went on to be rather great. The only thing we got out of doing it is making players happy, and I still say you guys all looked great in your props and costumes. I was so looking forward to finding out more about your group and role-playing with them. When I found out you all left it truly broke my heart (and I’m not mocking you or trying to be sarcastic with any of this).

[Skal Tathar]

I woud like to say a few things also if I may....

Generally all new characters entering a new area for the first time, meeting new people are treated with suspicion and wary observation. This is standard not only in larping but also in the real world. As a figure of some little importance in this chapter of Final Haven, I personally welcomed your tribe in and offered you security in our town. I was excited to find new players and was very happy to have the tribes strong arms and diverse capabilities as another buffer against the evils that onsets the Winter Haven Lands.

The weather was atrocious Friday night, I will be the first to admit it. Most people wanted to try and wait the weather out, and I feel the Gm's advanced that plot in the timeline just to try and get people out of there segregated cabins and into a dry area where we could larp and learn of each other and begin to form a basis for trust and comraderie. I had explained to the Tribe the importance of our mission and asked you to assist us in the quest. You indicated agreement and a willingness to help.
When we finally we formed up a person was sent to you to inform you of our departure. I must admit I was really dissapointed when I was informed that the Tribe wouldn't be joining us after all.
I accepted your choice and figured we would be able to converse either later that night or the following day. Your Tribe was not the only ones to be attacked, captured, and interrogated this way. By morning we had found out that no less than 5 to 6 others had been treated the same. Even our more powerful Pc's didn't satnd a chance .... this went according to the Gm's plot as it was supposed to I believe. This raised alot of questions amoung our town and helped draw us together as you all would have found out if you had bothered to stay.
Personally, after the crummy weather we had on Friday night , I ended up having one of my top favorite larping experiences ever. I am really sorry that you all weren't willing to give it a true chance and experience the fun that I believe the rest of us had. I personally hope that next summer when the weather is more pleasant , you will be willing to give the Winter Haven chapter another try and see it for how it truly is. No one here is the type to hold grudges and single people out for their feelings and beliefs... we seriously would like to have the Tribe back for another try.

Short of Stature, but Huge in Heart.
Kahl Tatahar

[cole45]

On a side note, I was inocrrect in my reading of the no refund rule. Those are listed for forcable ejection. None of you were subject to that.

Still, I believe the refund was inappropriate. There were plenty of plots, and you only suck around for 5.5 hours.

[Zyth]

Having been completely new to the Final Haven world myself this weekend, I wanted to comment on your situation.

When I came in, I knew 4 or 5 people who play in either Final Haven or Winterhaven. I knew the basics of gameplay, and I had read the rulebook quite a bit so I would be prepared with how to play my character (mechanically). What I was not, and could not, be prepared for was how the world itself interacted with PC's, and how we shape the world with our actions.

When we were asked to go off to help the dwarves, I was less than pumped about walking a long distance in cold rains through thick clay/mud. I knew nothing about the plot or how anyone fit within it. What I did know was that the only way to learn to fit in, and more importantly to mutually gain trust with other PC's, was to get out and do as much as I possibly could.

I understand your reasoning for not going with us. I also understand your frustration with nothing happening for a long time, followed by being attacked shortly after you decided to sleep. I was active until the last of the plot events around 6AM that night, and promptly between 7:30 and 8:00 we were attacked by two undead, just when I really needed sleep the most. But we got up, and narrowly defeated them.

I am somewhat surprised, speaking with my out-of-game friends, that your level-8 friend would not have warned you that these types of attacks might happen. Throughout the weekend, we encountered 2-3 attacks that we were unable to properly defeat, one of which was attacking basically the entire PC group. Twice the character Egon was taken off for torture, and one of those times 5 people (Egon's entire cabin) were taken. We, without any knowledge of where Egon had gone, decided we would not give up until Egon was rescued. We were not even aware the others had been taken until we found them.

I am sad that your first experience with the Final Haven system was negative. The weather was atrocious Friday night, and it was very cold the rest of the weekend. Those that stayed throughout the weekend had made up their minds that weather was just a part of the hardships to endure, and role-played through the cold and rain like any GM-made plot. The smaller the group of PC's got, the harder we were forced to fight, and the more our characters bonded as they fought to protect each other.

All I am trying to say is that, in a LARP like this, your experience is what you make it. What happens in-game should only affect your character. In-game, nothing that happens in the world should make you personally feel uncomfortable or unhappy. The GM's, as best I can tell from my experiences with them, only want the PC's to have fun. Of course, sometimes the fun comes from losing battles and saving captured comrades, while sometimes fun is achieved by winning seemingly unwinnable battles. If something about how you were attacked bothered you enough to want to leave, all you needed to do was speak with a GM and explain your feelings, or even call a Game Stop mid-fight to discuss it. I have no doubt that the ninjas were not out simply to demoralize you as out-of-game newbies...they were just advancing one particular plotline as they saw fit.

I apologize for my long post. From reading your post, I got a much different impression than I did in-game. I believe many PC's simply thought you were being shy, and not role-playing distrust for unknown companions as you were.

At one point, The Bard and I headed over toward your cabin to introduce ourselves, but the lights were turned off as we approached, and then turned back on after we walked away. We in-game joked the reaction off, but I found it odd that other PC's would try to keep others away the way you did. If you really want to have a fun, enjoyable experience, you have to get to know those around you. As you talked about in your post, you obviously befriended one PC during the night, but doing what you did to the Bard and I is really counter-productive. To be completely honest, in-game my character was mystified, but out-of-game I was taken aback at your apparent rudeness toward us.

All that said, I do truly hope you come back so you can experience the positive, fun experience that WinterHaven can be. I look forward to seeing you next season sometime.

Mike (Zyth)

[GM-Mike]

Since I was the player that interacted with your group, I thought I would chime in a bit. I had a great time role playing with you guys and getting to chat with you out of game as well. You guys put in a lot of time and money preparing for the event with your costuming and that was much appreciated. I thought your wariness of outsiders was great and was grateful that you allowed me entrance (I'm sure you would have allowed others as well--the turning on and off the lights was simply to see who was coming, if the visitor was a threat or not).

I understand your frustration with the apparent power level of the NPC force that sieged your cabin, a frustration I believe that was enhanced dramatically by the inclement weather. You guys were cold, tired, and wet (and in one case steaming!).

Now, I do not believe that any of your members would have been actually killed, especially after seeing more of the plot unfold. That said, the possibility of death and the discussion of death is essential to the feel and the drama of the game. By being on the brink of death and coming out the other side, it is the hope that you will feel accomplished. It also gives you motivation to engage in plot.

So, I'm sorry it ended with a bad taste in your mouth. I hope you try it again when the weather is better. As you said at the event, it can only get better from here.

I'll post about the blast that I had on the Winter Haven site, but I wanted to chime in with my two cents here

Mike (Larius)
GM Final Haven

[GM_Chris]

Since I was the player that interacted with your group

So um your saying it is all your fault? I knew it!

Also anyone ho would like to speak with the GM's directly. This would be those of Final Haven and the Gm's at WinterHaven

Please feel free to email finalhavenlarp@gmail.com and

winterhavenlarp@gmail.com

Thanks!

[Torakhan]

After the game start we decided to retreat from the weather after some exploring of the trails to meet up with our fifth group member at our cabin. We RPed a bit to get to know each others characters and get familiar with names and such....

How considerate of you to create chacracters that only felt comfortable interacting with your own group of OOC friends. It sounds like you created characters difficult to integrate into the game to begin with. You'll find that many GMs want everyone to participate in the whole event... and when they see characters holding themselves away from the rest of the game, either they'll want to get everyone mixed together, or they think that those players are waiting for something to grab them and toss them into the plots. I commend you for RPing your "meeting" of each other, but if you wanted to play alone, why even go to the event?

Eventually, an npc approached our cabin to let us know a group was forming to meet with some dwarves further off.

Ah,hah.. so you expressed interest in interacting, but wouldn't interact because your characters didn't feel it was worth their time and effort. This too could have been a clue to the GMs that you just needed an "in" to get involved.

We remained in our cabin, setting our defenses (a trap set on each door by our rogue) and posted watches. Eventually, another pc, who had arrived to the event later approached... We conversed with him for a fairly long time both in character and out, and then he continued on to find more pcs.

So others had to come to you? Maybe you should have followed?

We waited until approximately 2am (can’t remember the exact time) for a possible event to occur until we decided we were cold, wet, tired, and finally we determined that it would be unlikely anything more was going to occur (people were slowly beginning to file back). So we finally removed our soaked armor and costumes and changed into our warmer sleeping clothes. We armed the traps, and went to bed. Not long after we started to finally warm up.

This might be where your "newness" to LARPing comes in... there is no "out of game", until the game is called off. If you disarm, disrobe and "settle in", understand that you may still be attacked. If you think you're the first to be attacked at 3am when you're settled in, just talk to some of the players who've played a long time... they'll tell you stories about tying themselves to doors, or sleeping in cold armor and waking up to people hitting them for damage... Also, being that your group may not have been a part of the "major RP", they might have also been trying to involve you in the game still, being that the GMs and their helpers were involved in creating a fun environment for the rest of the players. It might have been their attempt to make you feel "welcomed" to the game, and not feel like outcasts.

...they were asking asinine questions such as “What do you know?” and “Who are your friends?” and “Where did you/they come from?” After which they had a short conversation out of game asking what they should do with him and actually proposed that maybe they should kill him. The event had barely started and they were already contemplating killing pcs?

Ummm.. yeah. Welcome to Roleplaying. The NPCs were trying to learn info from the character. Where's the fun in just having an OOC conversation about your character?

also mentioned that they had wanted to get the girl in our group, my girlfriend, instead. First of all, I will call that sexist to begin with. Just because someone is a girl doesn’t mean they want to play a damsel in distress, nor does it mean they don’t want to participate in combat or that they want to be rescued.

Um.. okay. And bad guys can't be bad guys why? And just because someone's kidnapped, doesn't mean it's just for you guys. When your friend was kidnapped, did you run to anyone outside of your social group for help? (if so, I didn't see it in your post) And regarding her being "killed", was that IC or OOC? Also, just because you're killed doesn't mean you can't come back in a few hours... darn Healers and Empaths anyways.

I felt really bad when my one friend who had paid was denied a refund despite the fact that we had barely even participated.

Well, it was your choice to leave...

In the end, if you were uncomfortable with being attacked, you should have called out "Apple" or even "Orange" if you were uncomfortable with the situation.

The thing about LARPing is that you're not in control of what's going on outside of your own body (and even controlling yourself at times). You commit to joining a game with many players, many NPCs and GMs who are running a story which may or may not involve you. Sometimes you're directly choosen, other times you're just convenient or in the line of fire. Sorry if you're used to a more "intimate" interaction with the game, but this is something different. Hopefully you experience more of LARPing to appreciate that often (like the real world) everything is out of your control, and reacting to that is what makes LARP enjoyable to many.

[Asa]

As a member of the Pack I would first like to apologize to the PC who went past our cabin and felt we were rude for turning out the lights and turning them back on after they passed by. We did this essentially to have a better view of the outdoors, it was not intended to by rude in anyway... if you had come to the door we would have welcomed you in.

I am new to RPing completely, this was to be my very first association to the world of RP... due to the rain I did not feel very much like running around in the woods for extended periods of time... I had also been told about what to expect but nothing fully prepared me for the real thing. My friends felt that since this was a new thing for me and they wanted me to enjoy it...the last thing they wanted to do was put us in plots/situations which were designed to be difficult and almost like being hit by a bus.... I was still having doubts about RPing because it was so new... I have come to the conclusion that the weather, my apparent lack of knowledge, were key factors in my/our lack of initial participation. But we will be coming back for the Final Haven event not in January but the one following that...Thank you all for an enlightening experience... and we shall return.

[Kalphoenix]

Also, please visit our forums at: http://www.winterhavenlarp.com

Edit: To remove redundant information, thanks Chris!

[Shea Stonebrook]

Yea!!! I am so glad to hear that you are giving it another chance!!!

It is soooo much fun! but you are totally Immersed in Role play....You have lots of time to role play with your tribe and be comfortable with it....

I know when I started I felt a little awkward but now it's something I really really look forward to... late night attacks and all (I was at -2 at 8:30am Sat)

See you in the Spring/Summer

[Tony Ku]

Sorry I took so long to reply.

I want to preface this with the fact that I wanted to let my friends express their views first so that you could see the opinion of the first time players I had there before I said my piece as I felt it was important that you knew what they had thought and felt their first time out. I'm a little disappointed that many have an instinctive need to admonish them for playing as they did. There was a great confluence of circumstance in how things turned out: had it been only me there, or just me and Eric, the complaints would have been minimal. Had the weather been better, our moods far less sour. However, the two new people I had brought there had quickly become so unhappy that they wished to leave the very night we arrived.

I could have stayed, stranding myself there for a weekend unable to return as my friends returned home, feeling bitter and betrayed that I preferred a game to their company, and spent most of Saturday and Sunday begging for a ride that’s two hours away and unlikely for anyone to make or alternately forcing them to stay and feeling like a dick. As it happens, that seemed quite illogical. I came to Winterhaven to show them how fun LARP can be and it wasn’t really about me.

I understood that the attack was plot related, but it seemed to be a bad judgment to pursue it. In other words, after being quite cold, wet, and agitated, kidnapping and torturing a character in the middle of the night as soon as he tried to get to sleep with what seemed to be a nigh invincible assassin didn’t equate to fun. Joe was NPCing so its not like he didn’t know who was in the cabin. I understand we could be attacked at anytime, but it sounds as if these things ran over all opposition with ease. Perhaps a case of GM fiat, using overwhelming force to ensure your will was done for the sake of the plot… but a device to be used sparingly. It was quickly demonstrated that we were utterly helpless to this threat in a well defended area working at full capacity, so we couldn’t see how a rescue mission could possibly work. And I fully expected it to happen again several times throughout the night and if it had made my friends that angry the first time it was only going to get worse the second or third.

As far as flack being given to an NPC after being told to back off…my friend (Ufoseth) backed off as soon as he was instructed to and didn't complain about it. He was agitated that we were attacked, but it was because of the cold and the fact things only came to bother us when were ready to try and sleep. This is certainly a case of he said/she said, but we've tested the knife used repeatedly- it would be almost physically impossible to use it to push someone backward with anything less than sustained force, and he was machine gunning. It appeared as if after being stabbed the individual being stabbed backed towards the stairs after being surprised by his assault, but in the heat of the moment it may have seemed like he was being pushed off. That’s understandable.

When sexism is brought up… this wasn't IG banter and was quoted to be something about a 'damsel in distress' scenario-which is sexist. It is assuming this girl’s fun and our fun is best served in trying to threaten the female specifically. Yes, she should be in just as much danger as everyone else, but not a priority as some flag to be captured. Equal danger. If Star Wars was a LARP, its like saying Leiea was supposed to have fun for the first half of the movie while waiting on the other players to get their shit together and rescue her.

As far as useless torture session commentary…the bad guys captured a guy for what was, essentially, information they could learn from any joe schmoe on the street or by posing as one. It was like using a hammer to crack eggs. I suppose if the bad guys were less than bright, this strong arm tactic was excusable, but a bit stupid. Ninjas can use disguises you know and a little bit of talking and not stabbing can get that information far faster.

There seems be a lot of statements floating around that seem to say ‘it’s your fault you didn’t have fun’ or that we didn’t give things a proper chance since we left early and didn’t go to the cavern. We had IC reasons for not going to the cave as the motivation to do so for our characters was fairly weak- "Fight very scary monsters because someone wants to talk to us". Now had I been playing Tony Ku, he would have been out there in a heart beat to help out his guild leader, show off fighting monsters in heroic style, and definitely willing to hunt down ninjas.

Still, as an impression (Not the truth or the intent you guys had, an IMPRESSION) my group had felt shat on and wanted to leave. You can’t shit on someone’s face and tell them “No wait, it gets better if you stick around!”- not that that’s what you were trying to do, its just how things happened and how they felt at the time.

So the quick summation of this is that the people I brought felt bad enough between events and weather that staying seemed a pretty bad idea and it would have been selfish to force them to stay for me. Please take any comments here as impressions, not insults or accusations. It’s likely we’ll take another shot at this some time, and I’m grateful for the sympathy shown by staff and others.

[Kalphoenix]

We are quite sorry that you did not have a good time and I realize the weather was a big turn-off for everyone, myself included. Hopefully that will not be the case in the future very often, as our last Winterhaven event for next year will be in October instead of November. I am glad that you plan on giving the events another shot. If you EVER have questions out-of-character regarding our motives, I really encourage you to speak up as soon as you can about it so we can be aware of issues right away. I know personally if I am not able to address things right away, they tend to seem worse the longer I think about them. I encourage you to email our lead GM Matt at winterhavenlarp@gmail.com and give him as detailed of a description of the events that occured as soon as possible for you, so we can discuss it. We would really like to help you with your characters and any questions you have about the rulebook or in-game scenarios.

I would like to clear up a couple misconceptions for you without completely giving away things, in the hopes that you have a better understanding of the events that occured. I encourage you to visit our forums or mail us and I will be happy to send them to you or post them, whichever you prefer.
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On a side note, completely from a PC perspective. I was one of five people kidnapped my very 1st LARP event. We were jumped in the woods, very close to the inn on our way to meet a caravan. Most of the characters were 1st timers, one was someone who had played before and we didn't stand a chance. We wound up in the woods for about four hours while everyone tried to figure out where we were and what they would do. We wound up being hostages and were traded for some items that the people who kidnapped us got. It was a pretty much inescapable situation from the begginning. I chose to handle in in an IC way instead of letting it sour me on the LARP experience. My character chose instead to wonder why these people would bother to trade back for people they hardly knew? Sometimes, things happen that seem unfair. Talk to one of our fellow players Ravinal. He met an ingnonimous end by friendly fire (30 magic to the back). There were several events where players got their paths or discipines temporarily messed with, or were made to do strange things because of an enchantment. It may not have been something their characters would do, but they played it to the hilt anyway, because it was the IC thing to do. I've never been a part of something where the GMs were just screwing with people out of mean-ness or a power-trip, it's generally plot and is not always apparent to the players.

I was, out-of-character, entertained by being kidnapped. I am not always entertained. Sometimes it's because of the weather, sometimes it's because I don't enjoy the plots, sometimes it's because I'm spending too much time thinking about something in an out-of-character way, I'm not feeling good, or questioning why the GMs decided to run something a certain way. For example, so you don't think I'm only trying to be sympathetic: I was on a plot at the last Final Haven game I played that I really didn't enjoy and I thought was too over the top, but I'm sure made sense to the GMs, especially considering the reason for the cave. There was some sort of fog wall represented by string that the players had to cross through without bumping or touching any of the lines. If they did so: "BOOM" instant death, too bad. Later in that same cave, the boss monster possessed people, again, "BOOM" too bad and there was a trick to defeating him. I didn't enjoy any part of the cave, and it was a long plot, so it took up most of the night. I really felt like going home after that, it was really cold, I was tired and I couldn't feel my fingers or toes, but I decided to stick it out. There was also a plot that same weekend where there was a "treasure" cave, where I knew, out-of-character, there wouldn't be any real treasure because the ruleset is low-powered and one doesn't usually come by treasure that frequently (IE: Resources, Commodoties or Magic Items). But my character went anyway, because she knew people would get hurt and they would need her. I also didn't manage to further a plot I was involved in, which OOC was frustrating and, in-character was devastating. On the plus side, I got to speak with an NPC that my character wanted to talk with and I got through a lot of interesting interaction with PCs, so I got to do things I wanted and didn't go home thinking I didn't enjoy anything that weekend. I have a 20+ character from my two years of LARPing these events and I frequently get "steamrolled" and see other people get "steamrolled." It generally has more to do with the situation than the powers the NPCs have. I am sorry that your first event was the one for you that was dissapointing right off and that there were so many contributing factors that led to your dissapointment.
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It's great that you do feel like discussing this. I know, from personal experience, that every single event isn't always the best for me, but I always want to walk away feeling like I got at least one good moment out of the weekend. I always feel comfortable sharing my critisism with the people running the event and I hope you feel the same, no matter what happens.

[cole45]

Also, Please, Please go to

www.winterhavenlarp.com

The forums hold much information there.

I'm glad to hear giving it another chance. The FH april event will be at Roto-kwan and they assure it it's cool as hell.