Carpe Fatum is a live-action roleplay group based in Orby, Lincolnshire, with a site handbuilt over the past two decades on an acre of field, including a tavern, mead hall, half a dozen huts, a shrine, ritual circle, burial mound and lake. We run regular events through the year, generally on a Saturday 4pm-midnight, at a low price, with all money going back into developing the site further: we're not a business, we're just a bunch of friends, one of whom is mad enough to have built a medieval village in his back field. There is a bar with a variety of drinks available, hot food, a toilet and changing room, and on-site parking.
Although some of us have been roleplaying together for 30 years, we're always welcoming to newcomers—either new to our group, or new to LARP outright. We use a Facebook group to chat and organise events, so if you're at all interested you should join the group and see what we're up to (and even better, join in).
You can see more about the site, including a map, gallery of photos and driving directions, on the Site page. There's some information about the setting roleplay in, that's built up steadily over these many years, on the Setting page, but you'll get told the important bits before your first event and pick most of it up as you go along.
Live action roleplaying is... well, it's sort of tabletop roleplaying (D&D etc.) without the table, and sort of improv theater without the audience, and something inbetween and something else entirely. Put another way: you remember being a kid, and playing make believe on the playground, such as cops and robbers? It's that, but for grown ups. For a given value of grown up.
It's usually a fantasy setting—certainly all ours are—and will have a greater or lesser degree of rules involved (where we tend towards the lesser). One or two of the players will be a ref, someone who is running the event and makes the decision as to how things will pan out when needed (for example, "is this wound lethal?", "what effect does this poison have?") and they, and others, may also play non-player characters (NPCs), brief roles who come in to deliver information, prompt decisions, or even combat. It's then up to the players how they react to these decisions and NPCs, and the great joy of LARP is that any plot you expect an event to follow is, at best, a mild suggestion that will inevitably be wildly dragged off course by the players making decisions you never anticipated—and the freedom to do just that is at the heart of LARPing.
↑ Back to topSome systems will have full points-based character design, then hitpoints for combat, different calls you can make to stun enemies etc... but ours, generally, are not much more than "choose what knowledge/skills your character has", such as knowing how to make poisons or potions, or being able to charm people, or having unusual strength.
Sometimes we don't even have that: your character knows what they would reasonably know from their background (e.g. a priest may know about the undead, but probably doesn't know a whole lot about forging armour), and combat is run on principles of honour-based reactions—so if your character takes a sword blow to the leg, you can no longer put weight on it, and are at a disadvantage. Take a heavy blow to the chest and you'll go down, then a ref can decide how grievous your wounds are. Get your throat slit and, well, unless a healer gets to you very quickly, you should probably spend your time on the ground thinking about your next character's background.
Generally speaking we'll let you know what rules to know about before your first event, but you're not going to have homework in having to revise a manual before your first time, and it's mostly common sense (e.g. if someone says they've hypnotised you after roleplaying it, just go along with it). And, of course, if you're ever unsure: just ask a ref. We'll make sure you know who they are before you start.
↑ Back to topIt is great! We wouldn't have put the effort in for the past 30 years otherwise. If you want to know more and ask about the next event, join our public Facebook group and ask away--someone will definitely get back to you before too long.
↑ Back to topThere's a few key calls you might hear from a ref:
You might also see people with their finger in the air, by their head: this means "I'm not really here" and you should not react to them in-character in any way, because it's probably a ref coming to get something from the back room, or an NPC getting into position. A player-character should never use this, because that'd basically be cheating, right?
↑ Back to topAll you really need is some appropriate costume. Something that would fit anywhere between the 8th and the 18th century, more or less. Folk can probably lend you odd bits of costume, but generally speaking:
If you want to buy some costume, you can get bits cheap off eBay or the various Chinese shopping sites by searching for "medieval" or "LARP". For men, "Thai fishing pants" for trousers and lace up tops are a good starting point; for women, dresses, blouses and skirts, and wearing corsets on the outside of blouses can work well. A few accessories can go a long way, too: costume jewellry, hair clips, belts and pouches etc. all add detail and make a costume more convincing.
Don't spend too much until you're happy with a character, though, and have a feel for what you'd be comfortable in. Those of us who've been doing this long enough have all gone through the pain of spending a few hundred quid to kit a character out looking their best, only for them to die next event. Sometimes it feels like nothing tempts fate more for a character than an investment in their costume.
↑ Back to topLARP uses weapons made of foam and coated with latex, for safety. You should still pull your blows—that is, pull back a little at the moment of contact, so you're not hitting with your full strength—and never aim for the head, but you shouldn't even come away with bruises, ideally.
For your first time, you can just borrow one of the old weapons from the monster hut. As you get into the hobby, though, you too will fall prey to the allure of owning your own pretty things; one of our group members has been making weapons as his full-time job for years, now, and making props for the film industry, so when you want to buy your own then he's your man--they'll be much better quality, and more importantly much safer, than anything you'll find online (which are likely to be factory made imports). And honestly? The price isn't any different.
↑ Back to topWe're located in Orby, Lincolnshire, not far from Skegness. Here's a Google Maps link to the parking field entrance; the site itself is the other side of the farm track. If you prefer what3words, it's ///digestion.padding.pays.
↑ Back to topIn all honesty: by car, and there's a field for parking. You can get the train into Skegness from a lot of places, but from there it's either one bus a day into Orby (the Brylaine 83 at 15:20; yes, literally that one time) or a taxi (at about £35 each way). You can always try and arrange a lift with anyone else coming from Skeg, if you ask in the Facebook group, but ultimately arriving any way that isn't a car leaves you a little stuck at 11pm at night when we finish and all the public transport is done. You might consider camping, though.
If you are driving, directions with photos of the approach, then a description of how to get to the actual site from the parking field, are on the site page.
↑ Back to topThere is a proper flush toilet in a lockable hut, with toilet roll and a sink with hand-soap (albeit only cold water). There's also a monster hut, basically a brick garage full of costume and weapons, where you can get changed if you need.
↑ Back to topThere's a bar in the tavern throughout every event, with a random selection of soft drinks, beer & cider cans, homebrew wine of varying repute, and spirits of questionable provenance. We do ask that if you bring your own (e.g. to make sure your drink of preference is available) that you pay some corkage to the bar, as money made on the bar is a big part of what goes back into funding the upkeep and development of the site; alternatively, you can bring your own and allow it to be sold as well e.g. if you bring some Kraken rum, let other people buy shots of it, and that money goes to the bar.
For food: on some events there may be a meal included in the price, and we'll advertise what that is beforehand e.g. a stew, or roast pork baps. Otherwise there's generally sausage rolls, cheese & onion rolls, and pasties; things we can microwave quickly, basically. If you have particular dietary requirements, such as gluten free, then please bring your own food. We're limited in what we can do by virtue of also trying to run the bar, run the plot/event, and actually join in ourselves, too.
If you do bring your own food, for any reason, then please try not to eat out of plastic containers/packaging in the tavern, just because it can be a bit immersion breaking: either eat it in your car or at the monster hut, or take it out of the plastic wrapper and have it something more inkeeping.
↑ Back to topPretty cheap all round—we're not trying to make profit, we're just a bunch of mates running a hobby for each other.
Firstly, we do have in-character money that you can change up at the bar, just to add to the immersion. It's pretty simple, made up of tinnies, silver and gold:
Then in general, prices are:
In terms of physical mobility: it is a flat site, mostly a grassy field (so a little uneven) with brick-paved floors in the tavern and huts. If you need a walking stick, or even crutches, you'll be fine, and you won't be the only one--and no, crutches do not look particularly medieval, but real life physical needs should come first so please don't sacrifice your comfort and actual needs, and don't apologise for needing them. If you need a mobility scooter then you can certainly get up to the tavern on one, but it's probably a little crowded inside and you'll need to transfer to a chair inside, if you can walk those few steps; a wheelchair may be a little easier inside.
In terms of neurodivergence: honestly, join the club. There's more than a few of us with diagnoses of autism, ADHD, EUPD, Tourette's... it's the kind of hobby that tends to attract those who've never fit in with the rest of the world. Your social anxiety will not only be accommodated, but also empathised with, agreed with, accepted and—hopefully—minimised by being among people who know just what it's like.
↑ Back to topYes, probably, if you ask Chris Inkley nicely on the Facebook group (it's his site, his field, and his home). You can camp on the parking field overnight, then just make sure you vanish Sunday morning. The parking field is an out of character area so you don't need a medieval-looking bell tent, any old Eurohike will do.
The huts on site are also available for sleeping in, on a first-come-first-served basis: a number of them do have beds in, but we'd recommend you bring a rollmat or air-mattress to go on the wooden slats, and obviously you'll need a sleeping bag still.
↑ Back to topWe've also had wedding receptions and filming take place on-site: if you fancied doing something similar, or any other ideas you might have, drop a message on the group for Chris Inkley to discuss renting the site out.
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