The Space Between Stories: A Blog About Stories, How We Tell Them, and Designing for the Best Narrative Possible

  • Playing a Doctor, Consent Negotiations and Medical Roleplay

    Playing a Doctor, Consent Negotiations and Medical Roleplay

    By Michelle Stagnitta (Editor’s Note: This guest post started as a comment in response to yesterday’s blog, but it was big enough and, I thought, important enough that it received it’s own post. While this seems to apply to more stats-based LARPing, there are healers, medics, and dangerous fight scenes in all ranges of LARP…

  • Negotiating for Drama: Consent Driven Narrative Roleplay

    Negotiating for Drama: Consent Driven Narrative Roleplay

    (Featured photo by Miguel Espino.) Nearly every event I play these days has some form of consent negotiations built into the system. Whether they are mandatory or a way for players to check in on the emotional safety of other players, the American LARP world at large is waking up to the fact that high…

  • The Power of Positive Bleed

    The Power of Positive Bleed

    I’ve spent a lot of time on this blog discussing the negative bleed and how players can cope with it (the most prominent blog here); I suggest giving it a read in conjunction with this blog. However, I believe one of the most powerful, wonderful things about LARP is the changes it can create in…

  • Never Look Back (An Epilogue)

    Never Look Back (An Epilogue)

    (Cover photo by Elias Gubbles. I don’t put a lot of character fiction on the blog, as I save it for important design writings, between game thoughts, and more professional things. However, when there is a piece which I find important to both character and game development, I like to share it here. This epilogue…

  • Storyteller Guidelines and Recommendations

    Storyteller Guidelines and Recommendations

    As most of you know, I was hired as the Head Writer for Dead Legends LARP earlier this summer. We’re going into our third season and, while head writer means that I’m handling a lot of plot work, it also means that I’m doing most of our story staff management and training. Therefore, I put…

  • The Positive-Spin Challenge

    The Positive-Spin Challenge

    The amount of negativity I see in our gaming spaces is staggering. Last week, someone asked me what my pet peeves were. After a lot of self-examination, I realized that the negativity and toxic attitudes about gaming were really starting to get on my nerves. This is supposed to be a hobby. This is supposed…

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