Some thoughts on Writing a Larp.

Thinking about and working on the 4x larp rules set is interesting to me. Unfortunately it seems like it's not very interesting to many other folks. It is beginning to feel like too much work for too little audience. But it would be a shame to abandon the project completely. In the parlance of Entrepreneurship, time to pivot.




On the bright side, there has been some international interest lately in Hit Location style of larp. The folks over at LarpBook are searching for an easier, faster, and more visceral combat foundation for role playing. Something that breaks immersion less than number crunching in combat, and provides a very good quality emotional experience. Hit Location larp can definitely provide that. And act as a great foundation for storytelling.

There might be some benefit to writing a handbook of Hit Location larp rules without the setting and theme of a full game system. The idea would be to benefit anyone who wants to get into larp without the overhead associated with Hit Point systems. From a personal project standpoint it might be a good idea to complete a smaller project, before jumping in to building a whole system.

Game mechanics cannot be protected by copyright nor trademarked. Only adding a setting, theme, plot, characters, etc would make it a unique property. The concepts and mechanics that I would be writing about, are not something I created. They are a tradition, which is for all intents and purposes public domain at this point. The point of writing the rules down would be to share them as a foundation. For these reasons it makes sense to release the work as a Creative Commons piece, and give it away in ebook format.

The beginnings already started in my Core Hit Location Mechanics post. They don't cover much, but for anyone who wants to hit friends with plumbing supplies in the back yard, they're perfect. An expansion of this material into a basic Handbook makes the most sense. Maybe if there's interest it could actually be made into a physical book.

A first draft is currently being worked on; an index, already created (well expanded really from the blog post, really). A rough draft is in the works. There is a tremendous amount to learn about publishing an ebook. But it's fun, forging ahead, trying something that is both old and new at the same time. We'll see how it goes. Come along for the ride.