Go back in time with LARP

 
Put on a Medieval costume, pick up a foam sword and get ready to LARP.
 
It's called Live Action Role Play (LARP, for short), and it's how a lot of people in the Ozarks spend their weekends.
 
If you drive down South National by Phelps Grove Park, you're bound to have seen larping. The people who do it say it may look a little strange, but it's a safe sport the whole family can enjoy. 
 
Take a swig from your Medieval canteen and get ready to larp.
 
"You hit somebody as hard as you need to hit somebody," Jordan Hickey says.
 
The goal is to be the last person standing.
 
"It's not any worse than a football game," Christine Nielsen says.
 
A foam sword is your only weapon.
 
"It's completely padded," Nielsen says. "I'm an older woman, and I can take hits from these guys and not be hurt."
 
This may look like a free-for-all, but there are rules.
 
Here's how it works: if a player is hit in the arm, that player cannot use the arm the rest of the game. If the same arm is hit again, the player is dead.
 
Some fighters take on the roles of Medieval characters as they fight historic battles.
 
"It's a good cardio workout," Hickey says.
 
This group is just in it to win it.
 
"Me? I'm not as much of a role-player," Hickey says. "I'm here for the fighting."
 
Plus, some old-fashioned group exercise.
 
"We like to offer today's youth a safe, drug-free alternative to video games," Hickey says. "Most kids these days, they want to sit, play World of Warcraft, exercise these muscles," he says while flexing his fingers.
 
"Just seemed like a fun thing to come to and figure out what it was all about," newcomer Lydia McAllister says.
 
She walked onto the field and got a quick lesson.
 
"It's really fun," McAllister says. "Like, I just jousted or whatever."
 
And to the naysayers, these knights and maidens want to dispel a myth.
 
"That we're nuts. We're not," Nielsen says. "We're just a group of people drawn here that feel like sword fighting is the thing we need to do."
 
There are several groups in the Springfield area and they participate in battles around the country.
 
The two groups featured in the KOLR/KSFX story practice Saturday and Sunday afternoons around 3 p.m. at Phelps Grove Park.
For the video visit http://ozarksfirst.com/content/video/?cid=156111

A Tip for Newbie GMs of LARP Events

LARP as a hobby is based on trust. You cannot play with people who's only goal is to win, because they will either cheat or are so into winning that they don't realize they got a hit by a huge axe.
One thing that should be made clear to them is that there is no winning. There is living and dying, but no winning or losing.
In order to win you have to be a part of the whole event.
Their goal should be to give the best experience to your fellow players trough role-play and actions.

Having a character that is a great fighter but is ultimately silent all the time may not be considered as fun as they might think.
There is almost no role-play involved, which demotivates other players to act their part. However if the person is shy to go into character or just really loves the silent type characters, they could probably make a “Batman: Dark Knight” character.
But of course they should lose the costume and the overly forced deep voice. But a deep voice to some level could prove useful if it fits them.

Another way to enforce fair game play, if all else fails, is to use the token system, made up by a psychologist named Watson. Note that Watson used the system in schools.

In LARP, the token system enforces people for all the actions they take for the benefit of the event. These tokens can give the person an experience point or maybe be exchanged for an item and so on.

Negative tokens should not be introduced as they could demotivate people to come to the event at all.

Hope this tip helps all you newbie GMs. Have a great game!