The nice thing with the Live version, is that the game is so much bigger and to a degree much more realistic. More realistic on the basis that all teh other players (which can range from anything from 15 to over 4,000!) are all dressed in costumes acting out their character, in an environment that has been "dressed" to give the right atmosphere.
My Live roleplaying started years ago while still at uni, and started with 2 different societies, the Live Role Playing society, and the Arthurian Society - the latter being more of a banqueting and debauchery society in medieval garb! Very much fun to say the least.
LRP, as its usually abbreviated too, has got its own restrictions ... for example a 5'10 fat man cant pretend to be a 7' slender elf, cos he's still a 5'10 fat man. Likewise, if you cant fight, you cant really blag it that your character can. So your restricted by your own capabilities.
The best bit though is the whole playing your character and enjoying being someone else, running around forests and fields in costume, with fake latex weapons (well you dont really think we would use real weapons do you!) being heroic or dastardly depending on how you want to act. Its a much more social version.
I guess it could be described as half way between table top role play and full-on re-inactment.
This huge amount of people are broken down into different "factions" which are the various different lands in the game world.
At the moment I'm playing a member of the crew of the "Naval Volunteers", who arent pirates, with the Lion Faction, but more info on that in the character section below, where a run down of various characters that I still play or have played can be found.
Its based around the Forgotten Realms TSR table top game and is very much High Fantasy.
One of ther best systems and games that I've ever played in, partly because it is high fantasy, partly because its a progressive system, which means that with every adventure, your character gets harder and proficient, but also because unlike the Lorien Trust, its a more intimate game, with fortnightly day adventures for around 4-8 players, and the big event of the year, Holdfast, has around 40-50 players and just as many people being the monsters.
Because its so much more intimate, its a lot easier to get involved and to make a difference.
