Wednesday, September 19, 2012

IC/OOC Talks Part 1: The Healing Power of Make Believe



I had thought of this paper a few months back during a particularly heated game of Changeling The Lost. The scene was the funeral and wake of one of the more influential Player Characters in play at the time, meanwhile, the Sovereigns of the City had a plan going on during the time (details Withheld to prevent spoilers). This would be my first game as a character in Lost, a Wizened Author brought in as a friend and worker for The Spring Sovereign escorting in a new Character played by the same person whose PC had died.


Still with me? I'll give you a moment...moving on.


The proceedings were held as much like a funeral as could be possible, up to and including the player of the deceased lying dead for display at a wake and being eulogized over. This was a character who had ingrained herself deeply into the fabric of the game, and when she died, the entire game stopped for her. This is probably the highest compliment one can be paid when a Character Dies. When you can stop plot and people thank you for it, it's an accomplishment.


But that's not all. For those of you just tuning in who don't know what Changeling the Lost is based on (how you're reading this is beyond me, seriously) I will described. CtL is the story of those who were abducted by the Faeries (aka, The True Fae, aka The Gentry, aka The Others, aka Oh God It's Them Run!!), were subsequently altered to whatever purpose the Fae wanted, and then subsequently escaped back into the Mortal world. Too strange to live, to weird to die. These are survivors of abuse, Post Traumatic Stress sufferers, with the horrors of their imprisonment etch in their minds indelibly.

Now, put them all in a funeral where one of their best is killed. Better yet, make it not about the expected cause of Death/Re-Capture by the Gentry but something as Pedestrian as a Car accident. Add alcohol, old grudges, and a lot of suspicion.


Emotions weren't running high that night, so much as they were sprinting up a sharp incline like it was an Olympic Event. By the end of the night, people were legitimately crying.


It remains one of my favorite games I've played.


The reason for this was the fact that, for the most part, people remained in character. Let's be real, we're a bunch of people running around a studio rehearsal room playing pretend. However, because of the way people reacted, the reality of the situation was reinforced, people became emotionally invested. Many people spoke on how emotionally Cathartic it was and how better they felt afterwards.


For years now, I had been talking about the transformative powers acting and theater have on people. I have known friends who have used their time on stage and in the creative process to explore, delve, confront and assimilate their problems and come out better for it.

Case in point: My friend "A" had Asperger's Syndrome, which gave him a difficult time in understand social cues, boundaries, etc. He joined New York Jedi, a stage combat group, the exact same time I did. As time grew, and he collaborated with others he learned to work through his disadvantages. Now he's happily engaged and the father of a beautiful baby girl.


My love of theater and it's ability to help people heal was reinforced by my internship. My supervisor was a Drama Therapist, using many theater techniques to help explore and contemplate internal processes we weren't sure about. The main goal was, as far as I was concerned, to draw out insight, that ability to go "a ha!" within ourselves. It was amazing, there was very little changed from what I experienced in theater class and what I experienced in the group therapy session.

And it worked.

This is one of the reasons I'm a proponent for seeing LARPing as Role Play over playing a game, and one of the reasons I've decided to write this blog. This will be a discussion I'll be going back to a lot in this. I'll be looking at topics such as (in no particular order)

- "When RP goes too far"-The Darkside of Too Much RP

- "Hating the Game"- Wherein My Reflexive Resistance Against Sheet Use is Explained
- "It's ain't called the World of Darkness for nuthin'" Tips and Notes about Role Playing in WoD 


To close off this section, let me end with this point. We are, all of us, just kids playing make believe in a sandbox. I think it's a great sign that many of us still have that aspect in us. It means that the world is not too cynical, and some Innocence has prevailed



See ya
C

2 comments:

  1. That funeral was also one of my favorite games as well. You'll have to post about DR as well. I'll see you there in October... My sister (IG) as well. And my Baseball Bat. I think I'll name it "Babe"...

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    1. I'll do a right up either Sunday night/Monday morning when I get home. I won't be able to do October though between NYCC and GKE in November :(

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