Last weekend I had this awesome LARP event, Keeper of Dreams: Lands of the Pharaoh 4. Do note that the word awesome is only a substitute for when I find a better, more fitting, word for it.
I have not experienced many LARPs, but compared with the other ones, this one is in it’s own league. it’s that awesome.

So hereby a short wrap of the whole thing:

On Friday we arrived rather early(earlier then previous times) and we set on to build up our Trade guild of the Four Winds and took our sweet time to do so(we even had to hurry up for Time In was on hand!)
On Time In we split up in several groups(viewing all from the Guild point of view unless told otherwise), one with Yabir and his 2 guards, the other the Smithies and 2 guards in the camp. These were the new rules you see, always 2 guards on Yabir(our (local) Leader) and one for the camp and one for Bram, our Master-smith. Faithful readers may have noticed that this should be impossible with the group as previously mentioned, we now have one more guard(a Tin Can, aka Plate-monkey named Erik) to be able to do this.
It worked, the Yabir group went on experimenting with Herbs(Alchemy was heavily adapted, with some sweet new effects, but more on that later) and Trading, and the Smithy/camp group crafting various new tools and/or upgrading existing ones. After a few hours the Smiths were done and moved to the Tavern to join the other group and talk up. I was the guard to stay behind and watch camp, a thankless and somewhat boring job, but hey, someone had to watch the Lyrium and other expensive components, right?
Anyhow, I wasn’t alone in our small outpost, some of the other groups were there, so I could have a small chat with various folks, and so I did. At one point there was some noise coming from the far end of the outpost, as if a big animal was scuffling along the tree line, but whenever we came close it moved away. Some short while afterwards it sped over the outpost place being chased in a black clad person with a white mask. We asked the person to stop, and so the person did, immediately showing that the person had no ‘bad’ intention towards us(the person held the knife it wielded in it’s hands in a non-threatening way) and so we let it go. I found it strange, but it proved no threat or anything so I didn’t think much of it. Later on I heard that the person(a woman apparently) killed the animal(a bear) and was trialled for.
Not soon afterwards 3 more black clad persons with white masks came visiting the camp, searching for their companion who passed by earlier. There was some conversation with multiple folk, who then moved back to the Tavern for reasons not known to me, but I answered them truthfully, I looked, while talking, away from the persons to some other point, I was finished and I looked back, only to receive a Critical Wound(5 damage) to my chest, sending me do the ground dying.
Thank the Gods I let out a cry out of sheer surprise at that time, the person who moved away heard it and saw the thing apparently and sped towards the Tavern(where just about everyone was). I spent some time on the ground(side note, the monster inflicting the damage returned OC to apologise for the wound, but it was fun :D) and soon after our Guilders Amé and Asha arrived with a short pose in between, Amé was the first to arrive and she stabilised me, Asha arrived and magically(yaaay! no screaming and shouting from the coarse, coarse ‘healing’ way Dimitri and other healers use!) healed me back to my full strength, by this time the same NPCs where battling the folks at the Tavern(I suspect, there was fighting going on, but no clue who it was). This was my first time I was wounded.
After this ‘event’ the rest of the evening was quiet, with a few Howlers(think Werewolf) and a circus to be visiting the outpost. The Howlers were stricken down rather quick, but, I do want to keep this as an important note, I only hit them when they attacked, I didn’t provoke them at all. Unlike certain other Priests, Templars and fellow outpostians who outright killed them when they had the chance.

The saturday began as most others, waking up in a (for you) way too cold tent, making morning jokes to your fellow tent-mates, some chitchat amongst them about what to do that day and finally dragging your warm ass out of the warm bed into the cold tent and the equally cold world beyond. Then we got breakfast and finally we embarked on the usual herb-looking ritual which involves walking behind the Herbalist(Yabir in this case) while looking around and chatting about nothing with the other guard. But the latter was interrupted before it could begin by a few Returned. A nice start of the morning, and for me indeed. I had taken a skill called ‘Shield Mastery’ which let me use my shield as a blunt weapon, the monsters knew about it, but they were still very much surprised when I first used it against them *grins* the looks on their faces was more then worth the cost of the skill and the exhaustion(it was that kind of endless/mindless wave of Returned). After this we were well on our way into the morning(we started at sometime after 10, so by the end of the battle it was about 11 or later I guess, no time for me though) and we could finally continue our herb searching, even though another group was in front of us we still got plenty of herbs for Yabir too play with.
After this I got wounded again(I can’t remember for the life of me by what >< more Returned, I had to choose between a spellcasting one and one with an Axe, I picked the first as he was casting. couldn’t avoid the latter one) but I got wounded again for the second time, I had one hit-point left, I was healed for one and I thought(later it turned out wrongly, sorry for that!) I had one left to heal, so I returned to camp to get healed by Dimitri, who was busy so my non-critical wound had to wait. By the time he was getting ready I hauled myself towards the camp-fire in front of the trade-post and I had only barely sat down when the Smithy exploded resulting in me catching Damage and getting knocked down. While gaining my feet I noticed that the Mastersmith, Bram, was gone, literally, gone. I later heard the more far off folks saw an enormous beam of light coming from the Heavens(turned out he tried to hit an object made by Draecon(the Elemental God) who no doubt smote back). Results: one heavily damaged Tradepost(all glass had been pulverized, everything thrown about and various close-by objects vaporized), one missing Smith and one now very depressed Elven wife of the aforementioned Smith. At least he went out with a bang 😛
After this the noon went by without much too report(or I can’t because of IC restrictions and the like 😉 ) and so evening(and food!) came and went by(it is rather hard to put things in time, as you don’t see a clock or anything) and Darkness came. I found myself guarding the camp once more with the depressed Elf(Amé) when some Templars of the Pharaoh came and ordered us to the Tavern. I spoke back(rather rudely) that I just couldn’t let the camp be, with all the valuables in it. The head Templar assured me that if anything went missing it would be paid for. So off to the Tavern we went. Inside there was a lot of chatting why we where hurdled inside the Tavern once more(happened the night before so we could receive new laws). When the Templars entered there was a discussion between the head Templar and the Ambassador of our village when it was revealed that the head Templar was in fact a Godchild, and not just anyone, oh no, he was the 20th son of the Farao, a prince! Within second(s) everyone(after an outburst of him) in the Tavern was on his knees for him, and my character nearly got a heart attack when he learned to just whom he talked back to(fyi, Godchild are the ruling race of the Empire and they don’t like being spoken back to, even a noble will get lashings I guess). After this there was discussion about us not following the rules set by our Divine Emperor, his father. I swear I was never this impressed, and I have never seen LARPers be so quiet. you could literally hear a pin drop. So I want to once again thank and compliment Ronald for his acting skills! It was awesome!
After this me, Lynx(our former studentsmith) and Amé returned to the outpost and went to sit by the fire. It was not for long that a group of men came by, this time with not so peaceful intentions. We were the only ones in the camp, so we were outnumbered by 5 to 1 or so, even more as Amé couldn’t leave the fire alone OC(firehazard and such) so only me and Lynx could fight. and fight we did. I got 2 against me where Lynx took the rest on(he has a polearm, 2 meter range, bastard). I was exchanging blows(and I might even have won against them!) when I was attacked in the back by the rest of the group which had chased Lynx around the campfire. Needless to say, you should replace the aforementioned fighting with slaughter. Lynx got away, I got beaten to a pulp, I stopped counting after the 3rd Double hit I got on my back and arms(and that was within 2 seconds or so) and so I was wounded for the third time. Again Asha came rushing to heal me(just in the nick I might add, one minute or so to go), she couldn’t heal me magically more then 1 time, so I got to distribute 3 healing points to 3 locations within my body(my left arm and leg were not hit, thanks to my shield) and I was dragged to the Tavern, first to be healed by Dimitri, but he was busy reviving folks(and I wasn’t critically anymore) and I was dragged inside, where I was healed by potions(experimental ones at that!).
Amé played out that she ICly fought along with us(or was knocked down rather) so she was wounded as well, albeit far less. Turns out Yabir had found the lovepotions… that proved to be fun as I was the first she saw, and as such she crawled on my lap(IC I very dislike Elves, so that was fun)for 10 minutes and, unfortunately, I too did get one. A longer one. And for various OC reasons* I had some trouble acting it out, so I made the duration longer(even so as we were called to duty)
in hindsight it was rather fun.

The sunday was the last day of the event, but a filled one nonetheless. I believe we had one small attack by monsters before we had a big attack from a Clan Fear commander and his mage. I was one of the first to attack(I was being rushed by a Templar of Luthos) which I didn’t like at all, I was vouching for talking first(one of the new rules, All Clan Fear MUST be attacked on sight(and killed of course)) but I didn’t have much choice, so I mostly responded to attacks and tried to drive them into a corner. The Commander finally spoke out(he was the first of Clan Fear to actually do so in a language we could understand), and we learned a great deal about what was going on in their world. I really hated it that we had to kill them. Like so many others I’d rather would have tried to talk with them rather then attack them on sight.
After this we all went back to camp, where we discussed a few things(and send the Gamemasters into another ‘Players are doing WHAT?!?!!’ moment :P).
Then, we had our end battle against followers of Bofang, it is where I got gravely wounded. Very early in the battle me and Shay(Yabir’s bodyguard) ended up chasing a mage, we then saw the enemy warband and we turned around. I proved too slow and the mage gained on me, I turned around to face him but before I could finish my second blow I received another Critical Wound on my chest and was then dragged off to the enemy ritual circle. I was joined soon afterwards by one of the mages of the Brethren of Malice. and a few minutes after that by Amé(who turned out not so wounded). When she tried to move to bandage my chest so I wouldn’t bleed to dead she was found out and finished off.
Then the battle went chaotic(even the GMs went slightly into panic :P) but the outpost prevailed. Unfortunately by this time I had passed on but the others could be saved. I did survive as well, ‘thanks’ to Dimitri(he can revive fresh corpses). I don’t want to talk about it, for various reasons, but let’s leave it at that the GMs had to answer to which part of the body the male genitals belonged >< I swear I still can’t figure out whether to be thankful towards Dimitri or hate his guts. I only know I am NEVER going to live this one down.
And after this the worst part of the weekend happened, the event was over 🙁

Reading back I see this was a long text, I probably went out of my way by saying too much, but I still have left so many awesome things left unsaid. And this is the reason why this event is so great. There is never a moment REALLY dull, and both the Players as well as the NPCs are very good players of this game. I just hope I can match the kind of play they do for they are masters at this thing, and thus I bow to them.

*This is of note, Ashley broke up with me last wednesday 🙁 so I was very busy with that in my head. And romancing(even IC) was just too much for me too cope with. Other then this the weekend proved more then capable of distracting my mind out of it and making sure I had an awesome time 🙂