On the Broken Council

From: Shannon Appel <sappel_at_netcom.com>
Date: Thu, 9 Jan 1997 13:11:55 -0800


I've seen a bit of commentary in the last few days on the cancellation of the Broken Council LARP. I speak here as somewhat of a bystander because I've never had any plans to attend Chicago, and my participation in the LARP was solely limited to reworking the layout and editing of the guidebook.

The main problem is that the con is woefully under attended. I don't know if this is due to the frozen January Chicago climate, the limited advertising, or the promise of a sunny British Columbia convention in just six months. In any case, registration is low, and registration for the Broken Council is even lower.

The last I heard, the Broken Council could just barely have been pulled off if every single person registered (including guests) agreed to play. And, the number of who did agree to play was even lower. So, with about a month still before the convention there was no guarantee that there EVER would be enough people to play in the LARP. Even worse, a large number of the people who had said they would play had played before. Although that's usually fine for a small number of people in a LARP, it causes problems when there are lots.

Andrew Joelson tried heroically to find new participants, even posting to this list a week or so ago, letting people know that they had to let him know if they wanted in. But, it still wasn't enough. Should or could he have done more? I don't know, but I won't try and second guess his methods.

Now, Andrew could have continued scheduling the LARP for the convention, continuing to work to get more people interested. But, there was a non-zero possibility that either the LARP would not run, or would only run in a degenerate form due to the number of repeats. For that reason it was Andrew's RESPONSIBILITY to cancel the LARP even though there are still a few weeks left before the con. This way, people will not expend money on costuming and other costs. In addition, they can decide whether or not to actually attend Chicago based upon this fact. It would have been vastly irresponsible to allow people to actually attend the convention thinking that the Broken Council would run if it might not.

That's pretty much my interpretation of the matter. It's a pity that the Broken Council won't run. It's also a pity more people aren't attending the convention as a whole. But now, you can make your decision knowing the correct facts without being led on by mirages and phantasms.

If you do attend, you'll find a new second edition of the BC guidebook. I've fixed a few mistakes on the original maps, and cleaned up all the text. In addition, Greg and many other guests will be attending, so it should still be a fun con. If you prefer not to attend without the Council, be aware that there are plans to run it at GenCon this Summer.

Shannon


End of Glorantha Digest V4 #59


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