The Devil's Brood

For a while I’ve been interested in historical larps, so I’ve decided to write one: The Devil’s Brood, based on The Lion in Winter, about the intrigues between Henry II of England, his wife Eleanor of Aquitaine, and their children.

The obvious problem is that the core cast is too male - 5 male parts vs 2 females, utterly unacceptable in the kiwi larp commuity. So I’m adding characters. Several of the characters have wives (Constance of Brittany, Isabella of Hainault), and they suggest plots. I can also add in Margaret of France, the widow of the dead Young King (whose death is really the spur for this setup), which would give a 5:5 gender ratio (or 6:5 if I add William Marshal, who was also part of the Young King’s court). But I’m wondering if there’s anyone else obvious who could be added (I’d like it small, but obviously I don’t want to miss out anyone who should be there).

If this works out, it will be my Chimera game for this year.

So, any suggestions?

We’ve all got knives. It’s 1183 and we’re barbarians.

Going through that quote file makes me realise I’m not getting the relationship between Henry and Eleanor “right” (in that I’m not putting in enough about it). But how to sum it up? “It’s complicated” is a start…

I’m using larpwriter, and its model is forcing a different style of writing than I am used to. In Middenburg, we wrote plots - all the stuff about a particular plot (and all the stuff that would end up on each character sheet) went on a page, from where it was pasted to the character sheets. Larpwriter instead works in terms of relationships. Its a good model for a larp, but I think it gives a greater risk of inconsistencies if you don’t edit properly.

Three characters down, seven or eight to go. My aim at this stage is simply to get words on a screen; I can edit and polish later. Kindof like NaNoWriMo, but shorter, and for larps.

That’s actually not a bad idea … a NZLarps NaLaWriMo initiative next November? Or maybe in April to coincide with Script Frenzy? (Script Frenzy is run by the NaNoWriMo people, but for movie scripts and the like).

Anyhow, back on topic …

Will there be practical usage of aforementioned knives, or merely the hanging threat of them?

That’s actually not a bad idea … a NZLarps NaLaWriMo initiative next November? Or maybe in April to coincide with Script Frenzy? (Script Frenzy is run by the NaNoWriMo people, but for movie scripts and the like).[/quote]

April fits in better with the con schedule, and allows polishing and playtesting for Chimera. November would distract people when they really should be writing games for KapCon :slight_smile:

For even madder madness, Peaky Games writes their stuff in a weekend. Though they have a team, rather than a solo effort.

I was thinking of using Ryan’s “Camelot” ruleset, allowing live combat. But I’m not sure if it would ever come up, especially as patricide means instant disinheriting (and probably excommunication).

That’s actually not a bad idea … a NZLarps NaLaWriMo initiative next November? Or maybe in April to coincide with Script Frenzy? (Script Frenzy is run by the NaNoWriMo people, but for movie scripts and the like).[/quote]

April fits in better with the con schedule, and allows polishing and playtesting for Chimera. November would distract people when they really should be writing games for KapCon :slight_smile:[/quote]

We have sort of developed a three month game writing frenzy between June and August as people frantically write for Chimera. If folk wanted to organise a one month larp-write-a-thon for pre-Chimera, that’d be awesome, but it should happen in its own thread and be far enough out from Chimera that the very necessary editing process can take place. Also, I recommend against May, because that’s when we’re all freaking out about our costume for Teonn.

Going through that quote file makes me realise I’m not getting the relationship between Henry and Eleanor “right” (in that I’m not putting in enough about it). But how to sum it up? “It’s complicated” is a start…[/quote]

Complicated, indeed. Good luck with that one. :wink: Love, but superseded by political convenience, and not a little bit of ego clashing.

I’d be up for a write a Larp in a month challenge! Seems a great motivator to get all those ideas for ‘stuff’ down in one place.

I’ve made a thread for the larp-in-a-month challenge idea, so we can stop cluttering up Idiot’s thread: viewtopic.php?f=12&t=5420

“The love of your life, and your bitterest enemy”.

I can tidy it all up in second-pass editing anyway.

Two hours distilling John’s neuroses into a single page. And he’s still not whiny enough.

6 characters done. One more and I’ve got the whole core cast. Then I have the fun of weaving in the additional characters.

How well will players need to know the source material?

My aim is that people won’t need to. Which means I’m going to need someone who knows nothing about the source to do a readthrough eventually.

8 characters done. I’ve dropped William Marshall, and decided against Isabella of Hainault, so only Constance of Brittany to go.

I’m an ignorant American AND suffer from ‘don’t understand mechanics easily’ syndrome. So feel free to run it past me if you want. I’ll be able to tell you if my brain goes “bwuah?”

[quote=“IdiotSavant”]For a while I’ve been interested in historical larps, so I’ve decided to write one: The Devil’s Brood, based on The Lion in Winter, about the intrigues between Henry II of England, his wife Eleanor of Aquitaine, and their children.

If this works out, it will be my Chimera game for this year[/quote]

But hopefully with a Wellington playtest before then? This sounds great!

Absolutely.

I finished the first draft yesterday, which is the hard bit. Once KapCon is over, I’ll do some polishing, and then set up a Wellington run sometime in May-Juneish.

“The Devil’s Brood” is now live on DriveThruRPG:

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