Q: Can I play a worshipper of the Devourer in the Light Alliance? Or a Sitha in the Dark?
A: Unfortunately not, no. You can develop your character towards that direction, certainly - but you must do it during IC. Player Characters are not considered to have any background of direct consequence in the game system so developments must ne IC. Bear in mind two things, however: 1. You might well be found out and killed - we allow PvP and 2. You might be required to actually swap to the other Alliance or forced to become Twilight Neutral.
Q: Player characters have no background of direct consequence? What does that mean?
A: It means that all Player Characters effectively start at Rank 0 - Player Characters are the ones sent on dangerous missions, not because they're any good at anything, but because they are expendable. All Player Characters must therefore start at the bare basics of their race, with nothing overtly different about them as it's considered that they've never really been anywhere to have anything strange happen to them.
Q: What are Alliances? I thought they were just armies or factions?
A: 'Alliance' is an OOC term, as is 'Light' and 'Dark' in reference to Alliances. It is indeed a form of factions, but with it comes a particular mind-set and view on life. Alliances are also in geography - all those land south of the Wall are Light lands and all those north plus Ithaca-Under-Shadow are Dark. This can chnage as the game develops.
Q: I keep hearing about ‘Self-Activated Abilities’. What are they?
A: A Self-activating ability is one where the character that wishes to use it can use it, and it only affects them. In terms of game-play, other characters are only affected at best indirectly. This means if you don’t want to know what the skill does, you don’t really need to. Other players will generally know what the skill does, and there are refs to judge the use of skill for you - the games system mechanics are simple and therefore it’s relatively easy for refs to judge right and wrong without too much effort. Most of these skills are role-play based, and you’ll generally pick up which ones will affect your character and you’ll pick up how it’s used too.
Basically, only the person using the skill needs to know what it does, and will inform others of changes. But even if you don’t know, you will pick up signs which inform you if the using character is cheating.
Example skills: Camouflage, Stealth, spells like ‘The Beast’s Anger’, Crafting
Q: There are so many rules - Help! What do I do?
A: Actually, there are very few rules you need to know for playing the game. Once you know the following basic things, the rest is easy:
The rest of the rules become a ‘need-to-know’ basis. They’re mostly Self-Activated abilities or effects, or just very obvious “...I BEFRIEND THEE!” a spell-caster calls. What do you do? Well, go over and shake his hand is a good start...
Q: How do I generate my character? What’s a ‘Predilection’?
A: A Predilection rule means that these are the basic things that the race you’re looking at is generally good at. You don’t have to take these skills. But if you do, you get them cheaper. A skill costing 4 would only cost 3 with a Predilection. Remember, you have 20 points to spend, plus any bonuses (Humans start with 25). Spend wisely!
Q: Wait! I don’t want to role-play, I just want to hit things and get drunk! Do I have to join in?
A: No, not really. If you want to sit in the corner getting drunk, then that’s fine. You’ll miss out, but that’s up to you... there’s always time to get drunk during Time Out, after all...
Q: Is there a way to learn In Character?
A: Yes. Generally speaking, ask a ref to record your progress (preferably and In-Camp ref). Sometimes you’ll get bonus experience by playing special Monsters or taking on a special role. Sometimes you’ll get bonus experience by performing some role-play.
But, you have to remember - that experience can ONLY be spent on the skill you gained the experience in.
Q: Crafting (or any other such ability) - there’s no additional rules for it! Where are they? What types of thing can I do?
A: Take your Crafting plans to a ref (preferably the head of the Crafting Guild or your Alliance) and ask them. Most of the system has ‘Hidden Rules’ and the only way for players to find them is to explore and experiment - it’s half the fun! There are rules not covered in the rulebook, rules that don’t ‘officially’ exist.
Alchemy is an example - some refs might even give you different results. This is important as doing the same thing in different places in the system might lead to different results - and in all depends on the Fae. The best thing to do is give it a go - if it works - great! If it doesn’t, then it’s back to the drawing board...
Q: My friends are playing in the Dark Alliance but I want to play a priest of the Church of Six. Am I allowed to change groups?
A: YES! Please feel free to change groups, character, Alliance (even without generating a new character!) as much as you like! All this must be performed IC however, and you need a good reason...
Q: I’ve been urged to play in the Light Alliance, but I like nasty characters. Can’t I remain Dark?
A: Of course. But why not join the Light Alliance? You can still play nasty there too - ‘Light’ doesn’t mean ‘goody-goody-two-shoes’ in any way at all!
Q: I’ve heard somewhere that Light characters can’t use Shadow or Death Arts, and Dark characters can’t use Life or Light. Is this true?
A: NO! We’re not sure where you heard that - but it certainly doesn’t apply to Thracia LARP at all.
Q: I don’t like combat - is there anything for me in Thracia LARP?
A: Most certainly. In fact, most of our players prefer to take non-combatant skills as the system has a LOT of plot and storyline. There’s a list of recommended skills on the Resources page - you’ll see that there’s over 80 non-combatant skills in the system!
Q: How does the Experience system work?
A: You gain experience (EXP) for you character whether you play or monster. You can then uses the EXP to buy more skills at a rate of double the cost of a skill. There may be times when this might change and you might be able to buy a new skill for its normal price, or sometimes even triple or quadruple!
More importantly, you gain a number of stickers on your character card at the end of an event - when you come to the next event, bring your card and you can then spend your points on a new skill - where, at the end, you will gain yet more stickers… forget your card, though, and you can forget spending those points!
Q: I keep hearing about the ‘Laws of Game-play’ but can’t seem to find them anywhere. What are they?
A: They’re the Laws which govern the running, plot and storyline scripting in games of Thracia LARP. These Laws are the Universal Constants of the game, things which cannot be broken. In the same way the Gene Roddenberry had his Laws of Star Trek, so too do we have Laws of Game-play. One of Gene Roddenberry’s Laws was, for example:
"1. There’s no such things as an evil Human..."
And if you look in Star Trek there is no such thing as an evil human. Evil robots, aliens, genetically enhanced super-humans all posing as human, but no evil humans. Our Laws work like this - they begin:
"1. There never was, never has been and never will be anything like a dragon in Thracia LARP...
