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Message: <blockquote data-quote="Seule" data-source="post: 325644" data-attributes="member: 407">I am a confirmed tabletop player, I have been playing D&D since 1981 and have tried many other systems as well.I am also a LARPer.  I played in my first Vampire LARP in 1995, have assisted in the development of rules for several cyberpunk-themed LARPs.  I have run both Mind's Eye Theatre (yuck) and homebrew Cyberpunk.I like both.In tabletop play, I pick my tablemates carefully.  Who will be playing a game means far more to me than what the setting is, or what the rules are.  Likewise in LARPs, I attend a few times to see if it is worth my energy to become a dedicated player.  I have found that the LARPs I have actually enjoyed have been run by older people, that come into LARPing with tabletop experience.  LARPs that are overrun with younger players generally do not appeal to me, as do LARPs with numbers of players that I wouldn't want to know outside of that setting.  I try hard to actually get to know the people in my games, particularly when I am involved in running them, and I find that that makes the experience far better.  I don't tabletop with people I don't like, why would I LARP with them?I think by the end of the Vampire LARP that wrapped up for good last weekend, we had no Goths in the game at all, out of 30-40 players.  People were there for the play experience and the roleplay, not to live out some twisted fantasy of being a vampire.Oh, and the Mind's Eye Theatre system (Vampire, Werewolf, and so on)?  I hated it as a player, I hated it even more as an ST.  I'll never use it again if I can possibly avoid it.  It's clunky, oversimplified and overcomplicated at the same time, and almost impossible to avoid cheating in any reasonable game.  Almost nobody can actually properly keep track of depleting traits, and only having three trait categories means that if someone is better at you in one physical area (strength), they are also better than you in all physical areas (speed, stamina...).  Stupid.  But that's another rant for another thread.Basically, in my area, most LARPers have at least tried (and liked) tabletop play, and most tabletoppers have tried LARPs, and sometimes liked them.  Unfortunately, in the bigger games that LARPs need, any problems with the game get magnified many times, along with the good parts.  --Seule</blockquote>

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