Humming to herself as she browsed the shelves of the local Comics and Gaming shops, Faye heaved a sigh of pure contentment. Granted, she wasn’t much for comics, but the shop carried some anime that she hadn’t seen yet. And there was always the gaming books. And on weekends, the store was pretty good about opening its doors to the local gaming community.

Not that she had much interest in tabletop, but it was fun to watch and listen. And besides, when she eavesdropped, she sometimes learned about upcoming LARPs or people who were interested in trying out a live action game. Such as the small pack of people in the back, feverishly leafing through rule books. Casually edging closer, Faye smothered a smile. It was a little more difficult, however, to not charge over and start shaking people by the shoulders and demanding to be allowed to play.

“I’m telling you, there’s a way to run a game that mixes up D and D and White Wolf. Maybe if we use Gurps? Does Gurps even have a set of live action rules?”

For a moment, Faye was tempted to turn around and leave at the mere mention of Gurps. But the idea of of sword and sorcery werewolves and vampires intrigued her. And frankly, if these guys wanted to run that kind of game, she wanted in. Smiling, she closed the distance between herself and her new bestest buds and gently interuppted.

“Pardon me, but I couldn’t help listenin’ in,” she began, her southern accent lending her speech a slight lilt. “But if you’re plannin’ on mixing up games like this, y’all are really better off making up your own rules systems. What is it y’all wanna do? Exactly? I do regular and Boffer LARP all the time, so maybe i can help?”

She’d expected the moment of shocked silence, that was normal when you walked in on someone else’s conversation. She hadn’t expected the swelling of eager voices peppering her with questions and explanations. After a moment, she took a seat on the floor with them and was rifling through the books they’d already pulled down. Apparently what they wanted was a game that combined a little bit of everything.

“Okay, simmer down, friends. First off, it sounds more like y’want the Dark Ages world of darkness stuff, yeah? That’s easy enough to do using what we got here. So where’s the D and D come into this? I don’t get why you’re having trouble.”

The group’s apparent spokesperson grinned a little sheepishly at the question and offered up the notebook he’d been scribbling furiously in.

“We want to do something like a traditional LARP with goblins and orcs and the like. None of this Rock Paper scissors stuff for determining victories. Though I guess we’d have to still use it for things in place of save and observation rolls, huh.”

Faye nodded. She was suspecting that what they wanted to do wasn’t that difficult, but in their excitement, they’d just made it harder on themselves by overthinking.

“Okay, so use boffer rules for combats and RPS for the other stuff, easy. And if it stops being easy, you just improvise. Or you could do what they do at ren faires for combat. Just let people whale on each other and have a dedicated person there to watch and call damages and winners. Gonna suggest just forgetting sourcebooks and s**t and just let people play what they want. Make a clear goal, but do this over like… a single weekend. But don’t confine it to vamps and weres. Because the mage and changeling crowd is gonna be all over this s**t given half a chance.”

For a moment, Faye wondered if she’d overstepped herself. The blank stares aimed her way were more than a little uncomfortable. Then, just as suddenly the blank stares became smiles.

“Christ, Faye, I hadn’t thought of that, but you’re right. If we’re doing something more Dark Ages, there’d be mages and fairies and things all over. I do think we need to draw the line at Revenants and Mummies though. There’s fun and then there’s stupid.”

Nodding in agreement, Faye seized on a blank piece and paper and swiped a loose pen.

“Okay, how about this. You wanted a more fantasy-ish setting, yeah? Well, you’re not going to be able to keep some things out because there’s no reason why a Simba or chinese vampire couldn’t be in the game. Make your limits things that people in a dark ages fantasy setting wouldn’t have access too. Revenants require electricity and tech. So they’re out. And for your monsters, use a little of everything. Just find WoD analogs for the D and D stuff.”

It didn’t take long to write out a simple enough list of Yeses and Nos. After a moment, she thrust the paper at the ringleader and waited for him to read it over. He frowned slightly as he read, but Faye suspected the frown was more due to organizational challenges than her ideas.

“This could work, but it is going to take a lot of planning. And we’d need a big enough space. The Park would work, but I don’t know if we even have enough people to pull off something like this.”

“What if you talked to the folks who run the Ren Faire,” Faye asked, not willing to lose out on a chance to play. “They get tons of people in and most of them might be willing to be NPCs or supply your battle warden needs. And you’d have your world already set up with the tents and all. And if you advertise a little, you’d likely get more players in. Maybe set up a website for character creation and approval? Or have a booth at the Faire… no, that wouldn’t work. Not if the game is running during Faire.”

She would have rambled on had it not been for the laugh and gentle hand that covered her mouth.

“Faye. We’ll figure it out. And by we, I am including you in this circus as well. Feel like being one of the organizers?”

He paused, seeing the look on her face before laughing again and finally removing his hand.

“Yes. You can still play.”

“Honey, in that case, I’m in. You’d have a fight on your hands if you tried to keep me away at this point.”


Word Count: 1072