Never done any of this LARP or Empire stuff before but a friend of mine has gotten me very interested in the whole thing (it sounds like it could be a lot of fun and i do like to dress up in costumes ^^; ).
Am planning on going to an Empire event in Easter next year (would love to do this year but this year has been a shockingly expensive year so far…).
However i do like to plan things in advance and i figured that if i’m going to do this i want to do it properly.
I am not good at making costumes though (no experience whatsoever etc). While in the future i would like to give making costumes a try, for the time being i would like to make a costume out of ordinary clothes that when put together look like a good costume (this way too i also hopefully won’t end up with an ensemble whose pieces can only be worn on very specific occasions etc). My styles/tastes in clothes are very diverse.
(For various reasons) i will definitely not be doing any camping though (what are the odds of getting a hotel in the area?).
So these past couple of days i have been looking up as much stuff as i can about the world of Empire…But TBH i feel very out of my depth (and so swamped with information its hard to know where even to start on a lot of stuff). At first i liked the Varushka look but now i think a Brass Coast people look might be better for me. I like both styles of costume but obviously there is a lot more to this thing than simply image. So i was wondering, what factors made you chose what nation you ultimately decided to join?
(PS: Making apology in advance, i might swamp these boards a bit with my questions…While my friend has been doing this Empire thing for some time now he is also very busy in life at the moment and i don’t want to badger him with too many questions etc)
Empire is a much better game as part of a group, in my opinion. When we first started, a bunch of us sat down together who wanted to team up and we talked about each of the nations and what we might do if we hypothetically joined each of them. Thus rather than just ‘maybe we would join Varushka’, we started saying ‘if we joined Varushka we might play a group of monster hunters’ or ‘if we joined Highguard we might be Unconquered skirmishers’. That helped us narrow it down to a series of competing group concepts and we picked the one which appealed most.
If you are coming next Easter, that might give you some time to think about two or three ideas that really stand out as favourites then talk to representatives of the relevant nations and ask, for example, ‘are there any groups of Urizen refugees from Spiral who want an extra sentinel?’ or ‘are there any acting troupes in the League who want a playwright?’ or whatever concept you fancy. Based on those answers you’ll probably have a few choices to pick from, not just of concepts, but of the people you would be playing with. They may well also be able to help you with tips for costume.
I play a Steinr in Wintermark and I picked it after reading the key bits of the wiki on what each of the nations are and are not.
Wintermark just felt “right” for me. It was one of the only ones I read that made me think “yep, that’s me”.
Before E1 this year I’d never larped and knew no one. I found a group in play and now I’m well and truly hooked!
Costume making isn’t as intimidating as it first looks. Definitely have a look in the costume section of the wiki. Stuff like t-tunics are easy to make. And you can get some good cheap fabric on eBay.
[ul]]Which brief do I like the look of? Which immediately suggests concepts to me, and don’t sound like I’d struggle to understand their mindset?
/:m] ]Which Nations have people I know out of character in, and which are people I know are interested in attending but haven’t yet looking at playing (so I can nudge them towards joining me)?
/:m] ]Which ones can I use kit I already own / can make quickly, easily and cheaply for?/:m][/ul]
I chose my first nation by looking through the intro page and five-things sections, deciding which one would be most fun to play for me (Freeborn - ‘Life is short, let it never be dull!’ sounded like a good match for my LARPing philosophy) and then influenced the group that was forming that I was part of in that direction.
I chose my second nation by default because I wanted to play with a particular group already established there.
Has your friend got a group that you might want to join / contacts in various groups that you might want to be part of? While some people are successfully playing solo games at Empire / show up and find a group in play, I think most people benefit from finding a group they want to play with - which rather answers the ‘nation’ question by default.
We don’t yet know where the site will be next year. The current site in Studley is not intended to be a permenant home, so we’re all rather hoping it does change as that will mean a new permenant site has been found.
That said, for our last 2 sites it has been possible to find a hotel providing that you can drive, and there are a small group of players who do stay offsite. Just let the crew know when you arrive and they’ll let you park for easy exit from site. Our sites tend to fairly remote so not ideal if you don’t drive, a b&b in walking distance is unlikely, and it’s sometimes hard to get a taxi out there.
If the reason is you need access to overnight power for health reasons then PD can supply a very small number of tents with power in the disabled camping area, but hotels are definitely a viable choice.
As with Tim, myself and a group of chums got together (figuratively… via the internet) and decided what we wanted to be. I sold them on the concept of “Wizards!”* and the logical nation to follow from there was Urizen… the reserved and logical (and slightly snobbish on those who aren’t) nature of the Urizen make them a great place to play Wizards.
While many LARPs let you play Magic-Users or many varieties of Spellcasters, they don’t tend to replicate the living-in-towers, researching-odd-spells, esoteric-arguments-about-magical-theory, big-scale-magic aspects of being a Wizard when not on adventures. I sold my friends on Empire’s potential to play the kind of wizards who would grumpily interdict the Empress’s Rod of Gold Dragon Control.
A few other things added flavour for the group and we kind of shifted from that base idea, but at the core, we are Wizards.
… on the other hand, that was before the game had started, so it might not be very helpful to someone who is coming in fresh to the current game. At this point there are two main ways in:
Find someone you like and play what they’re playing… accepting that you might decide to leave your first character after an event or two for an idea or nation that has grabbed you. By then you’ll know more about what you enjoy and you’ll know more people to go hang out with. Or,
Look at pictures and read the “Things they are/things they aren’t” bit of each nation. Don’t go too far into the details, just see if a nations ideas mesh with yours or you think that peeps in that nation look cool in the photos you’ve seen. At that point, you can use the Nation forums here and/or the inevitable Nation Facebook group to find people from that nation with advice on costume, how to get involved and stuff like that. There will inevitably be people trying to get you to join their group (and people who’ll leave information about how awesome their group is, just in case you’re interested ), but there’s no pressure in it.
Hope that helps, and that you find Nation that appeals to you.
In terms of making an outfit, the Costume page for each Nation should give you to a how-to guide for that Nation, with simple instructions and minimal cost. One of the aims of Empire was to good thematic Nations without excluding people with a modest investment in (and/or budget for) LARP.
My initial idea didn’t fit with my friends’ plans (or, y’know, with the setting at all), so I dropped it in favour of something a friend said about Urizen.
I looked them up, saw ‘wizards in ivory towers’, thought ‘Ars Magica without the boring bits’ and was immediately sold. The spire history was someone else’s idea - we had a brainstorming session in a mediocre pub - but I took it and ran with it and filled it with fiction (like requiem-17-23.livejournal.com/102134.html).
My first Nation choice was based completely on the music (I was playing a bard, so musical choice was important). Dawn fits with a lot of my musical loves (madrigals and Elizabethan stuff) and the rest of the brief obviously came along as a package deal.
For my second character I joined an existing group, so my Nation was chosen for me. While I wasn’t quite as sold on Varushka as I was on Dawn, I read up on lineages and decided that if I played Naga I could have the relaxed style of character I wanted within the Nation, and it’s worked out quite well. The deeper I’ve got into the Varushkan brief the more I like it (and possibly you could say the same for any Nation; they all have hidden depths that make them cool that may not be apparent on a first reading or even a first event playing them).
Kit is possible without making it yourself. Some nations are easier than others, so perhaps have a picture or two of each on your phone or printed out and do a charity shop run to see what you can find that suits, and then make a character based on what you could pick up most easily!
If you have OC cash you can buy costume from LARP makers (depending on your financial circumstances, of course).
If you have a sewing machine (or even if you don’t but you have a lot of time) a lot of the basic kit, such as tunics, can be made quite cheaply from home, and there’s usually some patterns indicated at the bottom of each of the Wiki kit sections. Bomul fabric from Ikea is £2 a metre and is plain unbleached cotton. We always keep a few metres lying around just in case we need it for anything, and we often do!
It’s often little things, like a Varushkan or a Dawnish hat, that will be the iconic piece of your kit that makes you clearly from one Nation or another. I’ve been known to build a character based on a bit of kit or tent dressing that I found in a charity shop…
Hey firstly don’t worry about asking lots of questions, it’s what the forum is for and also any answers you get are going to be useful to other people in the future. Also we love talking about the game .
On choice of nations, I’d echo what people have already said, have a read of the intro page for each one and see if any jump out at you as cool. Also see if the nation your friend is playing in appeals. Once you’ve got an idea of a few nations that look cool, it might be a good idea to ask around about gaps you could fill, things in the nation brief that people aren’t playing yet on the field as that gives you an easy in to your nation of choice.
Costume wise there are some simple options which can be bought off the peg for most nations relatively cheaply and then you can accessorise to taste. A long tunic with trim in your nations colours would work in Wintermark, Highguard, The Marches, for Dawnish Yeoman (with a patch for your house symbol) plus add in some embroidery and you’ve got something for Varushka and Navarr as well. Simple robes would also work in Highguard and Urizen depending on colours. Likewise simple costume plus a tabbard works for Highguard, Dawn and The Marches. Brass Coast can also be done well with second hand clothes depending on which local communities charity shops you have access to.
Start a thread in the costume section on how to costume using second hand from charity shops and ebay and you’ll get some good advice.
Once PD announce where the site for next year you should be able to find a B&B or a Hotel nearby, there’s normally something there but you might need to get a booking in quickly as like minded people usually book out any hotels nearby.
If you want to do things with your friend, it will be a lot easier if you are in the same nation as them.
You can’t cast magic together with people from a different nation, fighting is generally organised by nation, elections for Senators and Generals are done by nation, and so on.
TimB: Will definitely hopefully be going as part of a group. Apart from me, my guy & my friend, my friend said he knows a lot of other people into this sort of stuff (and will introduce me to them in the near future) ^_^v .
Kargur: Yeah the Wintermark look definitely looks very cool…I get the impression that Wintermark is quite dominated by guys though?
CogGirl: I haven’t yet finished reading up about all the different philosophies of the different nations etc yet but when i saw the Brass Coast Freeborn quote “Life is short — let it never be dull!”, it definitely felt very “me” (i actually live by that philosophy in real life and very much believe in grabbing life & its opportunities by the hojo’s lol).
ChessyPig: Been meaning to ask him this (sorry he is moving places at the moment so i haven’t had much chance to catch up with him lately) but he seems more into the Medieval inspired side of things (so maybe Wintermark or something like that?). He said he knows a lot of people into Empire though. What i was wondering though…Can people from different nations hang out together (or are you somewhat expected to just socialize within your own nation)?
Ariadne: Aha…How come the site has been moving about lately? I would much prefer to get a hotel as i have back problems (slipped disk & a damaged vertebrae) and the last time i did camping (many years ago when my back was in better shape too) it did a number on my back (so i generally prefer places where there is a good mattress to sleep on and if worst comes to worst, a freezer i put my cold pack in in case i need it to reduce any inflammation in my back etc). I hate to be a burden on people and so i don’t want to take any risks with my back.
Vaan: Thank you for the advice ! Yeah I want to make a decent costume but so many people’s outfits look so awesome I was a little bit worried about the investment side of things…Over the course of an event do people change clothes much (or is it common for people to wear the same costume throughout the event)?
Iulian: Ninja Pirate Wizards sound awesome !! (Will check out that link in a mo)
LauraH: Is it fairly common for people to have more than one identity in Empire? Very interesting…I can sew (do not have a sewing machine yet) but i am painfully slow at sewing…I do however make lots of jewelry out of beads & wire and stuff though and so i figured that i could maybe spruce some more ordinary pieces up by sewing beads onto them (and that might be good for a Brass Coast look?).
Mark_Wilkin: Thanks ^_^v (I just didn’t want to take over your board with all my newb questions or something like that). I was wondering though, how long has Empire been going on now? Is it based on a computer game? How long have the nations been around- were they all created at once (or were some added later)?
LauraH: Is it fairly common for people to have more than one identity in Empire? [/quote]
Ah, sorry, nope. The first character has been retired and I’ve started a new one. You can’t play more than one person at a time, and you can’t go back to a previous character once they’ve been retired/killed.
LauraH: Is it fairly common for people to have more than one identity in Empire? [/quote]
Ah, sorry, nope. The first character has been retired and I’ve started a new one. You can’t play more than one person at a time, and you can’t go back to a previous character once they’ve been retired/killed.[/quote]
Aha…So once you’ve left an identity/character you’ve created there is no going back to it. But what if say…You created a Varushka character and then decided to join the Brass Coast people (and so killed off your old Varushka character) but then later decided that you wanted to go back to the Varushka; could you get back into the Varushka as long as your new Varushka character was completely new (and you retired your previous Brass Coast character etc)?
Which nation would you say has the most people in it (I’m guessing the Imperial Orcs are a bit of a minority group)?
Biggest nation is Wintermark, Smallest is Imperial Orcs. Between that The Brass Coast and Urizen are also on the smaller side, Navarr are still pretty big, followed by Marches, Highguard, Varushka and The League. Dawn was small but has expanded a lot over the last two years so I think it’s pretty much in the middle for nation size now. Those are some rough guesses, what do other folk think?
Having spent a lot of time in both camps, I’d say Urizen was larger than the Brass Coast last event (although we suffered badly from non-attendance - we were completely missing a couple of large groups, and those that did turn up were all down a few players).
Nation size is not necessarily the best indicator of how much is going on within a camp, though. The brass coast is a numerically small nation, but because we are set up around multiple small family groups there is a LOT of internal politicking going on which may be missed in a larger, more homogenous nation.
People from different nations can definitely hang out together - it’s just easier to come up with excuses to do so if you’re in the same one .
Site has been moving about because we haven’t managed to get a permanent site - we came very close at the start of this year but were driven off by the dread forces of a local councillor worrying about property values in the immediate vicinity . The UK countryside is a difficult place to establish even something as low-impact as LARP in, alas.
I always sleep off-site at hotels and have never had a problem getting one within half an hour’s drive, usually less, even when we were up near Silverstone and sometimes clashed with events there (although I’d have been in trouble for E3 one year there if I hadn’t booked in advance at the start of the year). We should know the next site by reasonably early next year.
Probably most people wear approximately the same costume throughout the event; people don’t tend to go around in full armour the whole time so will change that layer, but otherwise having full changes of kit is a super-keen thing rather than a normal thing - especially if you have a hotel room and can therefore dry things overnight .
. The UK countryside is a difficult place to establish even something as low-impact as LARP in, alas.