I know that that doesn't exactly descry them as "larpers", but bear with me; I have further evidence.
First, all members must create a second identity to fight under, complete with race, class, alignment, and history.
Okay, so I was kidding on the alignment part. But they do have to specify skills and carried items and what. You see where I start to get nervous.
Second, each member must have their own outfit specific to their new identity. This includes whether or not they wear armor, a point I will touch on shortly. But in my experience with the live-steelers (heh, steelers), that group focused only on learning the methods of fighting. They didn't discourage role-taking (or role-playing, to me), but they didn't focus on it, either. With the group up here, you seriously either had to have your own character or your own forged weapon(s) within the first two weeks of meetings, and both within four, or else you were "side-lined".
Also, I was just listening to my hallmate this evening talk about his new piece of armor. He ingeniously made himself a bracer with a piece of studded leather and a sock. (Not sarcasm; I was impressed.) However, he mentioned two things that bothered me.
First, he called it a "+1 bracer". Oh Frick.
Second, when we got into the subject of the off-limit zones (head, groin, and hands; pommel and not-blade), he said that the reason was to keep players from cheap-shotting other players, and because it is frikkin' annoying getting repeatedly smacked on the back of the hand.
Both of these are valid reasons. But he then went on to say that most players will still whack your hand on purpose, and while you're shaking it around and going "Gah! Frikkin'....nnnnn!!!", they nicely tell you "oh, hand; don't take it"—or they'll hit you with the hilt and say "oh, hilt; don't take it", which to me seem downright idiotic.
Further, when a person is attacking another person, they have to call their attack strength: Red means one-hand, Green means two. A Red strike will not go through armor (unless the armor has been Red-hit already...heh), but a Green strike will.
But they maintain quite openly that they are not larpers, and that they in fact follow Beltane regulations (although I think they take them overboard a bit much). So this series of information has lead me to believe that our campus foam-fighters are, in fact,....
...closet larpers.
You know, like refusing to admit you're gay?
Except worse. Because the next obvious step is for someone to run around yelling "Two Magic!". And I want to be there, so I can point and laugh and write an article for whatever publication will have me.
A man can dream....
