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Epics of Fate – The LARP I Loved 5 Minutes in…

Today, I proudly introduce EPICS OF FATE: a stellar new medium fantasy boffer LARP in northeastern Ohio. The game’s grand opening weekend was Friday, March 6, 2020, at Camp McKinley. I am here to gush about not just this game, but its creators.



If you can’t wait to see more specific details, check out the links below. Pre-registration is generally opened a few weeks prior to events, and ticket pricing details can be found on their Upcoming Events page. The rules for the game are live on their site and categorized for easier navigation.

If you’d prefer an in-depth description before you make up your mind, check out the rundown and highlights of the game below. I’ve also included a special message from the creators themselves, kindly provided by Ryan.

The Rundown

Photo by Joanna Kosinska on Unsplash

Combat Style: Lightest-Touch Boffer

Epics of Fate has a lightest-touch boffer combat system, which means you pull your blows and use very light foam weapons to engage in combat. You don’t follow through when you strike someone, instead drawing back as soon as you feel contact. Ranged attacks and spells are represented by throwing cloth packets filled with parakeet seed.

Genre: Medium Fantasy With a Dash of Steampunk

The world is fleshed out with an established history and open-ended present. It has guns and bows, magic and mystery, extraplanar and domestic threats, as well as disease and madness. A number of unique in-game faiths have also been created for characters to explore.

Playable Species: Old & New

EoF is full of a diverse spectrum of species. These playable character types are deliberately not referred to as “races” to promote inclusion. They range from the mechanical Animachia, to the peculiar Planetouched, to the undead Tultek. This game has analogs to elves, dwarves, pixies, goblins, and some things I’ve not seen before. The list of species creates a refreshing blend of familiarity and novelty.

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The Highlights

Photo by Mat Reding on Unsplash

Transparency

From the first, Epics of Fate has been open and honest with its players about design choices and intent. They respond politely to commentary and actively facilitate the submission of feedback via convenient links. They are clearly committed to integrity and clarity when it comes to their game and their purpose.

No Raceface

Epics of Fate does not lean on the tired excuse that they have too many species available to avoid raceface. They simply got more creative. Exactly zero playable species require red, yellow, brown, or black body paint. Each costuming description section explicitly forbids such makeup.



As further demonstration of integrity, EoF game runners held fast–and with impressive cordiality–when some nay-sayers criticized the lack of raceface in the game. The reply to what amounted to: “why no blackface for elves?” was a calm “This is probably not the game for you“.

Pronoun Acceptance

During the opening announcements of the public playtest, game runners clarified the requirement of the use of every player’s correct pronouns. Among the examples of unacceptable behavior, “someone is repeatedly misgendering me” was explicitly included. That’s the exact moment I became absolutely certain that I would be coming back to this LARP.



Related: Pronouns & Practice: Why Pronouns Are Hard, But Also Valid

No Sexual Assault Content

As laid out in their code of conduct, there will be no topics of sexual assault as part of the game. No plot of Epics of Fate will include or allude to this or related topics. Further, player characters are not to suggest this role-play, claim it as backstory, or involve it in the game in any fashion.

Consent & Physical Role-Play

Epics of Fate’s policy on physical role-play is quite clear: No player may engage in physical role-play with another player without express consent. You can revoke consent at any time, without a requirement for explanation. Player safety at their events is a clear priority for these folx.

THE FOOD

I have never had a dinner so delicious and filling at any LARP as I had the great fortune to consume at the public playtest of this game. Oh my gods, you guys. It was amazing. The spread was incredible, varied, and delicious. They also request dietary restriction info when you order the meal plan! I highly recommend it.

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The Game Runners

Photo by Amaury Salas on Unsplash

I asked the organizers of this amazing new game to send me some of their thoughts on Epics of Fate. Ryan graciously obliged on behalf of the busy team as they ramp up for the opener:

“Epics of Fate represents the culmination of a lot of independent and shared goals. We all love creating, whether that be physical creations, art, ideational creations, stories, or world-building. Each one of us has distinctly different specialties, and together we’re able to leverage those specialties into something truly wonderful.



Dan is seriously gifted in his ability to crank out mechanics, flavor text, and a lot of quality raw concepts that we’re able to refine together into a solid foundation with future-proofing, balance, and so on. Not to mention, the guy is great at running NPC ops.



Lexi is a superb settings guru. They’re able to get a whole mod-full of people through entire Species makeup and out the door for their mod in no time at all. They’ve worked hard with their crafting background and they’re responsible for quite a lot of the props we’ve got, including most of the boffers. Lexi also handles a lot of the behind-the-scenes logistics work. There’s a couple other things that I’d like to give them a shout-out for, but for now that’s going to have to be an upcoming surprise.



It’s hard to find an apt descriptor for Kali. ‘Techie’ sounds a bit outdated, and ‘doer’/ ‘support’ doesn’t really encapsulate what she does. Kali fills a lot of very different niche roles and is the type of person to see a thing, run a cost-benefit on if it’s worth it, and then actually go and do the thing. What that means in real terms is that Kali’s the mastermind behind the creation of the coins (and the 3-4 very different processes we’ve tried to get the coins exactly how we want them).



She’s the one running the website and the meal plan, and she’s the expert when it comes to a lot of the business and tech ends of things. Essentially, Kali is very much like the ‘tech person’ in those crime shows, that usually is actually a team of people IRL.



As for myself, I’ve got an academic background in political science and economics, so I generally handle most of the reactive political, research, and economic systems we’ve implemented in game. I play a bit of a support role in a lot of ways; the biggest is helping Dan with refining and operationalizing the mechanics and factions, as well as stepping in whenever we need the effort of more than one person in the behind-the-scenes activities.



One of our biggest strengths is the fact that we’re a multiple-person team. Having a small but dedicated group of people gives us a wide latitude of competencies, and it allows us to get a very large amount of work done in a short time (almost like an adventuring party). That helps us facilitate being able to both specialize and cover for each other if someone has something IRL that would otherwise cause a delay.



We only started up the mechanics/setting mid-July, got really going in the beginning of August, had a mechanics playtest at the End of August, and had the Beta Rules and Beta Game out by mid-November. The finalized 1.0 ruleset had been released in mid-January, and we had released event dates for the entire year before even then. Having these 4 highly-competent, dedicated people working together is a big part of why we’re able to put such attention to all of the little things: the public changelog, the line-by-line responses to the ruleset feedback, and so on.



We’re trying to run the LARP that we ourselves want to play. That means doing our best, and trying to get all of the small things right. That’s why our meal plan comes with vegan and gluten-free options (as well as a before-game text-box so we can adapt to other dietary restrictions), why our NPC cycling is high-quality makeup from an airbrush, so we can get the NPCs looking great and out the door quickly (even for find-able quests), and why our rules/mechanics have clarifications and examples on how they work with other skills/abilities.



All of this culminates in an end-product that we’re proud of. We’re all LARPers, we’re all nerds, and being able to put our best foot forward is important to us. We’re able to share a creation we’re proud of. What’s more than that, it’s a creation that others can contribute to as well, and it’s that particular part–the fact that it’s an ever-evolving project that will change as the playerbase interacts with it–is what makes it truly special.”

Well, what are you all waiting for? Register for their next event!

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