Weekly Update: October 30, 2019

Halloween Party

This past weekend I attended my friends Katie and Jerry’s Halloween party. It was my first time attending their party, as well as my first time seeing their new house!

I can’t say I did anything fancy, costuming-wise; I wore my spooky skull leggings and a witch’s hat (which I forgot there, because, well, me).

Unsurprisingly, because I know Katie and Jerry from NPCing Mad3, I saw a lot of people I know from larping — especially the Brown University crowd. There was also an impromptu Vassar reunion, since it turned out that in addition to Matt and me, Caitlin F and Beth F were also there!

I really appreciated how the party had different spaces for different kinds of socializing — the standard couches-in-living-room setup, a dance floor in the basement, a “cuddle room” (in which no actual cuddling happened, but it was very cozy and good for small conversations), and a quiet room.

I spent most of my time in the “cuddle room,” talking about all kinds of topics with all kinds of people. I had a long conversation with Matt M and Santo about Doctor Who, since I had just started watching it, and they were interested in my newbie impressions. I learned that Matt M is a big fan of Nabokov, and somehow we also ended up discussing what a jerk David Foster Wallace was (my impressions formed primarily from reading Mary Karr’s memoir of addiction, Lit, in which she not-so-secretly talks about dating him).

I spent a while talking to Sue B about Shadowvale, of course, and unsuccessfully tried to convince her to run SV for five more years 😉 We also talked about ESO, in particular Elsweyr (apparently her SV NPC Roz is partially inspired by Razum-dar!) and the Witches’ Festival (the Halloween event currently going on, which is great fun). I also was tipsy enough to inform her husband, Eric vR, that my first impression of him was pretty negative. (Which has since been remedied!)

I spoke to Sarah N about what she does in one of her day jobs — she’s a massage therapist! — and I conveyed my appreciation for what hard work that is, and how important it is to me!

This isn’t entirely an Intercon-going crowd, but we did talk about what we were running or wanting to play at Intercon T. Keri G told me about her small, intense larp set in the world of the Vorkosigan novels, and I tried to convince people to play The Drinklings.

And of course, there was much talk of What (Boffer) Larp Next. A few people are planning to play Cottington 2 with me, but many folks agreed that there was a serious lack of fantasy Accelerant larps starting up soon. I did make it clear that when these folks are putting together larp teams, I would very much like to be considered.

Overall, it was a great party, and I didn’t want to leave — I think we finally left at 3am, and got home at 4.

This was pretty close to the ideal of social connection for me — smart people having great nerdy conversations, lightly facilitated by alcohol. I didn’t feel as much of the “outside looking in” that I get at a good number of larp social events, although there is still some. As I wrote in a poem once, I am all “walls of skin and reservation.”

I also spent most of the next day mentally replaying all my interactions in my head, looking for signs of approval or disapproval, and that’s just exhausting. Maybe some day I will actually believe that people like me and want to be around me 😉

Nocturnal’s Labyrinth

In ESO, I have completed (more or less) my Overly Ambitious Housing Project! I transformed Coldharbour Surreal Estate — a house costing 1mil gold, which is basically just a large empty plateau floating above the Hollow City in Coldharbour — into Nocturnal’s Labyrinth, a maze themed around the daedric prince Nocturnal, whose sphere is night and darkness, and is often patrons to thieves in the TES universe.

As my first step in this project, I ran through the two public dungeons/delves that are Nocturnal-themed in the game — Crow’s Wood, in Stonefalls, and the Shadow Cleft, in Clockwork City. This gave me a lot of ideas… many of which I could not really carry out with the time and space I have.

Because, while Coldharbour Surreal Estate is a large home, with 700 item slots, I guarantee that 200+ of those are used on boulders. I wanted to use mossy, natural-looking boulders for the walls of my maze, instead of the large purplish boulders the house comes with, but there are literally no mossy boulders in the game that big. Instead I ended up using three mossy boulders for every one Coldharbour Fan boulder.

Otherwise, the house is full of the glowing thistle plants that are everywhere in Crow’s Wood, though, as well as lots of dead trees. There is a dilapidated tower, crowned with a gargoyle (gargoyles are definitely a thing in both Crow’s Wood/Shadow Cleft), and guarded by a Wraith of Crows target dummy. There’s a garden around it, in the autumnal colors of the Shadow Cleft. There’s the Skeleton Key, floating in a beam of light (i.e. the light from the replica skyshard). There are chests hidden in nooks and crannies everywhere. There are pockets of mushrooms with spooky lights. There’s a Nocturnal banner over the entrance, too, just in case it’s not obvious what I’m trying to do.

I wish I had more time to work on it, and I wish I had a few items that would have made it better — a Nocturnal statue, for example, (but I’m pretty sure that only comes out of loot crates), or the stone path markers with glowing green lights which appear in Shadow Cleft (which I think come from the luxury vendor — and going to larps makes it dang hard to hit the luxury vendor every weekend!)

Just like writing a book, a house is never fully decorated; it’s just abandoned.

Here, enjoy some pictures!

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Now, for the part I didn’t budget time for: the judging. There were 36? 38? houses submitted for the contest, and since I am one of the contestants, I feel it’s only appropriate that I actually take the time to judge them. I have to select my top three houses, and let me just say, I’ve only looked at like ten and already the competition is steep!

I’m also not sure I should select my own house — that seems unfair, and I really don’t think mine is one of the best, but at the same time I’m a terrible judge of myself, and I’m also sure some people with less well-designed houses than mine will vote for themselves.

Intercon T Schedule

The Intercon T schedule has been released! (And the first round of signups is Thursday, November 7th).

As I’ve mentioned elsewhere, I’m running The Drinklings on Thursday evening. I also know my first pick will be Alison and Kristin P’s game Wicked Hearts, aka a semi-historical, semi-fantastical larp very inspired by things I not only have read, but have turned Alison onto. (Seriously, I recommended both the Holly Black and Melissa’s books).

After that? I have no idea what will be open! I’m potentially interested in Persona L, Omega Expedition, Memories of Falkonia, and Tis No Deceit (which I still haven’t played… but have been assured I will like, even if it does involve singing)… but I may also decide I only have the spoons for one deep political game with lots of before-game prep.

But that’s all for now, folks! Enjoy pretty pictures of imaginary worlds, and I’ll see you in a week.