Hi all! This will be mine and Pavel’s second Empire, and the first where we are hiring a bell tent from PD (damn they went fast!), and I have a couple of questions. Firstly, does anyone know if they are 4m or 5m? What’s the groundsheet situation (tied in, sewn in or zipped in)? Do we just pick it up from God when we arrive and pack up and hand it in at the end?
And, I guess, is there anything else we should know about tenting IC (we already know about keeping OC stuff hidden, styles, don’t set it on fire, etc.)?
In general, your fee covers the red caps pitching and taking down your tent for you, although this may not happen until late on Friday (the worse the weather, the more things get delayed as they have to cope with poorer ground conditions - sometimes ours has been up on Thursday, sometimes around Time in on Friday).
This is for one of the larger white square tents for our group though, so if someone who has hired a bell from PD comes along and says differently, trust them. It’s possible they only pitch the larger tents which are harder to put up without experience.
If in doubt, email PD and ask, they will get you a correct response.
My plan is to email if I don’t get much here - also here I can get some good little pieces of advice from people who have camped before! I’m not sure we’d mind pitching it ourselves - would give us some good practice for if we decide to buy one in the future.
If they do pitch them, how does that work with the camp plans? Does the camp organiser from each nation submit the details to PD, then they follow it? Does it ever get difficult if people are bringing their own and trying to pitch around the ones already up?
Each nation has someone who has volunteered to try to plan the camp. I’m not sure how they know if everyone is accounted for. They will post here on their Nation’s bit, and on the Facebook group for the Nation. That gets most people.
Hi, camp planner for Varushka here waves.
I’m afraid it’s simply not possible to make sure everyone is accounted for but as Laura says we camp planners do what we can to spread the word when we’re starting to gather details from the players. I have to trust group organisers to let everyone in their group who doesn’t have access to the various forums know that I’m starting to make the plan for our camp and if necessary get the details to me.
Other nation’s planners may do things differently but for Varushka I make a shared Google spreadsheet and get people to fill in their requirements for space online (size of tent, special needs, position in camp) emphasising that this is very much a wishlist with no guarantees. Anyone who can’t access the spreadsheet can email, text or PM me and I’ll fill it in for them. In the couple of weeks before the event the camp planners start adding their layouts to the PD master site plan, marking the requested positions of any hire tents. This master plan is then made available to the Red Caps to refer to when pitching.
Of course, on the day ground conditions and other factors may mean the layout needs to be jiggled but you will generally be in approximately the planned location.
(PS - we haven’t started planning for E1 yet as we’re waiting on PD to give us the site layout. Hopefully soon…)
Thanks for all the info Sarah - I remember seeing your name come up in the last planning round! It’s interesting to see exactly how it’s all done, at least in our nation.
Laura thought the red caps might pitch all PD provided tents or might just pitch the large ones, is this something you’d know by any chance?
Previously red hats have pitched all hired tents so I imagine situation will be similar for coming event.
I can confidently say an offer by the inhabitants of the tent to pitch it themselves will be warmly welcomed.
The size depends on what you have ordered, groundsheets are usually separate instead of zipped/sewn in.
[quote=“busbyldn”]Previously red hats have pitched all hired tents so I imagine situation will be similar for coming event.
I can confidently say an offer by the inhabitants of the tent to pitch it themselves will be warmly welcomed.
The size depends on what you have ordered, groundsheets are usually separate instead of zipped/sewn in.[/quote]
Pavel and I will be glad to set it up (we are hoping to come up Thursday evening), though we may need a bit of guidance as we haven’t done it before! There was only one type of bell tent listed when the tent hire opened, so we just went for it.
Bell tents are relatively easy with two people and if you ask around people in your camp there should be people there who can help you out if needed. Along with lending mallets and the like.
For those who are interested, the response I got from PD was as follows:
Firstly, is it 4m or 5m?
5m.
What’s the groundsheet situation (tied in, sewn in or zipped in)?
A sheet of plastic that lays on the ground.
Do we just pick it up from God when we arrive and pack it up and hand it in at the end?
The tent is errected for you by our site team and taken down by them at the end of the event.
Do the redcaps pitch all the tents? If we get there and it’s not up (we’re hoping to come up Thursday evening) can we come get it and pitch it ourselves (perhaps with some guidance, as we’ve never put one up before!)?
Basically we aim to have the tents up by 6pm Friday - but sometimes things do not always go to plan so if you can put your own tent up (with guidence) then that is great.
If the redcaps do pitch them, do they take them down as well or is that up to us?
They will take them but again any help that you can give is greatly appreciated.
Good to have definitive answers! So if any of you see a couple of Varushkans struggling with a bell tent on Thursday evening, it’s probably us - come say hello
Bell tents are one of the most straightforward kinds of tent to put up, hence the guidance above saying it’d be great if you can pitch it yourself.
On the other hand, I believe that the redcaps won’t usually allow players to deal with certain of the bigger more complicated tents with heavier parts and greater dangers (though even then they’ll welcome help if you can follow instructions like “pull on that rope…”)
[quote=“Canashir”]Bell tents are one of the most straightforward kinds of tent to put up, hence the guidance above saying it’d be great if you can pitch it yourself.
On the other hand, I believe that the redcaps won’t usually allow players to deal with certain of the bigger more complicated tents with heavier parts and greater dangers (though even then they’ll welcome help if you can follow instructions like “pull on that rope…”)[/quote]
If we do decide to get our own tent at some point we’re going to need to know how to pitch it, so we’re happy to practice. And following instructions is definitely something I can do!
Safe to say, anyone wandering in Varushka near the Regio who sees a short-arsed girl and a tall guy struggling with a bell tent, that will be us so feel free to come say hello
