Political LARPs are games where the focus is on characters championing their goals against other character’s opposing goals. This could involve attempts to increase one’s own status and power, reduce another’s status and power, actual governance activities to change the world at large and convincing others to agree with your preferred course of action.
Political LARPs can primarily involve individuals working against each other’s interests and forming short-term alliances (suitable for small to mid-sized groups) or factions that each have their own goals to achieve (suitable for mid-sized to large groups). Size matters because as the numbers rise, it becomes increasingly difficult to make an impact without substantial allies, meaning that even if the game doesn’t start with factions, it will need to develop them to get any stability.
Games with a focus on individual politics are improved by court or organisation positions that are achievable through political striving. This could include appointed positions such as a CEO appointed by a board of directors or elected positions such as a sheriff chosen by villagers. These positions give people something to strive for and often provide a degree of power within their sphere of influence.
When creating factions, it’s important to think of the average number of characters you want in each faction and the amount of stability and predictability you want in the game. A two-faction political game will more quickly end with one side or the other winning completely or they will be forced to ally to achieve their goals which causes stagnation. A third faction will help stabilize matters as the factions can each ally and oppose each other as the situation changes.
Remember if you want at least 5 players per faction, and you only have 20 players, it’s unwise to have seven factions. And games that have 15 factions of 10 – 20 players each are likely to end up forming mega-factions as they group together to form power blocs to achieve their goals.
When creating factions, or accepting applications for factions, it’s wise to ensure each faction has some sort of theme that creates a set of overarching goals and style of interacting. A faction that contains too many oppositional goals within itself is unlikely to be very successful in its goals and might even become frustrating to those who spend more time politicking within faction than between factions. To an extent, within-faction politicking can add complexity and interest, however, too much of it will prevent the factions from being a real force of nature.
Finally ensure there is a solid social contract with strong guidelines on what is, and is not, fair play, otherwise you may get players annoyed at each other for what they perceive to be either cheating or bad sportsmanship. Is it appropriate to negotiate rivalries, nemesis arrangements and allies partially out-of-character and then play it out in-character? Or should such arrangements arise completely organically in play? Should I check in with you to see how intense you want in-character aggression or is that actually cheating because I may then be more attuned to my friend’s preference and therefore won’t play as strongly with others?
Setting standards and guidelines really helps people come together to play the game with a shared understanding of what to expect.
So what advice do you have for creating a political LARP? What have you done, or seen done, before?
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