Empire Player Event: "The Little Mother's Ball"

Photography stuff

Very last minute, but on Wednesday, I received an invitation to attend the Little Mother's Ball ("LMB") as a photographer. There were openings where people had to cancel or whatever, so I was delighted to attend in general, but also to challenge me and my fourteen-year old camera kit with indoor, low-light shooting. Note, I don't have the 50mm fixed/prime lens, so extra challenges there, as the lowest f-stop my lenses allow is f5.6. I'm also grateful that my hands are relatively steady, and I can hold a 1/30 second shutter opening with almost no shake.

Thankfully, there was a second photographer with photographer kit almost as limited as mine (I think theirs was better), which means I now have a few clearer images of Skywise Seppa.

Role play stuff

I got to play up some of the shaman aspects as I handed over Ieri's red canvas herb bandolier to Florina, with me shouting back at my ancestors who were telling me to not hand over the bandolier. I also had a couple of fellow orcs to interact with and Seppa didn't have to feel quite so anxious and isolated. Redhand Gezzar and Stormcrow Rork were my fellow Imperial Orcs.

The ball itself consisted of a buffet feast, bards of various nations, dancing, trading, and an auction of various goods to raise funds for the Empire's orphans. The location: Sarvos, the League.

I showed my nails, which had the pinkies done in sparkly varnish, the rest were plain, I said that it was the Freeborn children doing my nails. My use of gold eyeliner also provoked a little bit of attention from the Freeborn in attendance. Seppa's earrings also drew some attention, as one of them has a tiny tassel on it.

Oh, and I rode in the taxi in my mask; the driver asked to take my picture. No idea what he ended up doing with it...

The location that I listed for this post is where on Earth the event took place.

Some pictures

A selfie taken before the taxi arrived.

I'm slowly figuring out Seppa's appearance.

I'm grateful to Samantha Carrington for their pictures of Skywise Seppa. I did trim their photos to exclude other participants, partly because I was trying to focus on Seppa's kit, and also to minimise me accidentally sharing someone's face who might object to being on my blog.

Photographer: Samantha Carrington
I did trim the original photo to focus upon my character.

I usually don't mind sitting on floors, it challenges my flexibility and works my body. I put up my hood because the neck gap was bugging me. I really need to come up with a better neck cover that won't overheat me.

Photographer: Samantha Carrington
I did trim the original photo to focus upon my character.

I confess, I like seeing my characters from the back and sides, because I always wonder how those areas appear.

Photographer: Samantha Carrington
I did trim the original photo to focus upon my character.

Conclusions

I lasted well with my mask, but I did need a face time about 3/4 of the way through the five hour event. I am struggling to keep my hair from peeking out of the eye holes. Yes, I'm growing my top-scalp hair so that I can pin/braid it back, but it's too short for either restraint. I saw Redhand Gezzar using a wig sock/cap, so I might have to look for one for myself. Also, I physically struggle to get the mask back on when I've taken it off for a face time; it's like the neck shrinks or my head swells, I need to discover why this is so.

I'm starting to think that I need to redo my coven symbol, to a smaller size, and also stitch the panel to the coat. The current one is too large for me.

Also, I went with two layers again, the tunic and the coat; I started with the scapular and skirt as well, but quickly discarded it, as the hall was so warm.

I'll do another post about costume, but I wanted to make a post and include pictures of me in costume. I'm also kinda pleased that my glasses disappeared in these photos.

"What's Your Game" kit fair haul & Night Before the Storm

This past weekend was interesting; I spent some time trying to help at Eversley and getting used to the site. Then there was the player event, "Night Before the Storm" set in either Segura or Kahraman (I will have to enquire to clarify which, I'm hoping it's Kahraman) of the Brass Coast.

Going with the notion that Seppa's spending time down in the Brass Coast, I mentioned this in an FB post, and was delighted to find that some of Seppa's legion and banner, the Winter Sun, is in Kahraman this season, helping the Freeborn with... something, I'm not sure, but we apparently have orcish troops there, so I'll incorporate that into Seppa's recent history. It also explains why I have no idea what other Skywise are up to, as we're apart until Winter Solstice (aka 'E1).

Related, was someone else's discussion about magic and mage armour, and how casting magic by orcs is tied to ancestors and objects-of-worth. So now I need to have a think.

As it is, I kinda enjoyed myself at the player event, and early the next morning, decided to go to the What's Your Game kit fair in Gloucester.

Fox, rabbit, horse...

In the above image is most of my haul from the kit fair. It includes a vintage fox stole from Amber Wolf Workshop; the fox is a Virtue animal for Ambition. I intend to fix it onto the bandoleer so the fox drapes over my left shoulder.

Metal armour pieces

The metal scales in the above, plus the Winter Sun medallion, came from Armchair Armoury. One of them is a fellow Skywise coven member, so talking to them helped me a fair bit with understanding some of orc costume a little bit better.

It's actually made of resin.

Now I need to decide where to locate the Winter Sun banner medallion and the metal scales on Seppa's kit.

The horse tooth gave me ideas.

The rabbit furs and wooden spoon came from Chow's Emporium. The crown pin is from PD as an IC (in-character) pin for Empire. The horse's tooth came from Amber Wolf Workshop.

Going back to ancestor items as magical foci, I'm wondering if I can incorporate the horse's tooth into it somehow.

The bone knife is a LARP-safe coreless weapon for throwing or roleplay from Epic Armoury sold by LarpInn. I'll need to get a sheath for it.

I also found Seppa's weapon from Eldritch; I like this style of mace, and the blue wrapping fits within the coven's colour scheme.

Also known as "Listen to the Ancestors!"

Overall, a good haul. Roll on LARPCon and the next player event, the Symposium of the Drowned.

Distracted other bits...

Oh and the embroidered mirror eye I put on Seppa's hooded coat sleeve? It glows greenish in the dark!

I worked in some stains on the coat by chopping rhododendrons, carrying pieces of lumber, and trying to maintain a frontier stove, whilst at Eversley.

Here're the patches all together; well, except for the white pillowcase one. Need to add more.

Inspired by Japanese boro patchwork and stitching, not sashiko.

Empire Day, the result

Now that I've had a little bit of time to think about it; it went all right. I didn't have the new glasses, and the mask needed more trimming around the eyes to make wearing any glasses comfortable.

Four layers were two layers too many. I regularly had to step outside to cool down, even after shedding the raw silk coat and the scapular shortly after arrival.

One of my Santeria necklaces died; I'm not sure if the spirit they were dedicated to was annoyed with me, or if the twenty-years+ thread they were strung on just had enough and broke. Either way, I think I salvaged most of the beads.

Overall, the clothes worked. Though I felt very fat and my trousers and the skirt kept either riding up to my bra, or trying to fall down to my arse. I have no waistline worthy of the name. Meh.

Tweaks, more tweaks. I need to stop having squirrel moments and actually fix the things that're bugging me about Seppa's kit.

Anyway, photos ahead, by Paul Wilder of Violet Illuminations, who hosted the Empire Day player event. Due to no flash and low lighting, some of the images aren't well-focused; this is not a criticism. I have trimmed them to exclude others as much as possible, in part to protect their privacy, and to focus upon Seppa's costume with fewer distractions.

These were chosen strictly for me to see Seppa's costume in ways that I otherwise couldn't know.

Rear view, because it's good to see how stuff worked out.

I do like the dog in the next picture, though I think she had difficulty recognising me with the mask on, because she wasn't sure about me at first. I like to think that she recognised my voice and scent. She wasn't so happy with some others and barked and growled at them.

Gotta pet those who want to be petted.

The satchel definitely needs some work, from shortening the strap by almost a foot, to adding some patches and stains to it, because it's very dull at the moment.

Curiously, as it currently stands, Seppa isn't much into leather, all of my efforts to bring in more leather into eir overall look has ended in failure. Pouches, belts, sure. But nope on the warskirt at this time. Maybe it'll change once I'm at Anvil and with other orcs.

Empire Day was hard, because orcs don't do things solo, and Seppa was all alone amongst the humans.

Where's my home?

I was going to write about the Tibetan Panel Coat, but I've gotten distracted by reading PD's Empire wiki. Specifically, the one land of the Imperial Orcs: Skarsind.

I'm playing at player events as my Imperial Orc, and I am most familiar with the Brass Coast because that's where I spent two years. So a bit of bleed from the player means that Skywise Seppa is spending at least part of the winter in the warm lands of the Freeborn. It also means that I can use some demurer sari scraps for fabric patches on Seppa's clothes.

I'm not familiar with Skarsind, so I've been reading, and rereading, and rereading again, about that region of the Empire. Partly due to dodgy memory, and also because I'm trying to grow familiar enough that I don't sound (and feel) like a clueless twit when someone asks me about Skarsind. I also feel that I need to decide where Seppa spends the majority of eir time, ie 'where's my home?' Something caught my eye in the Estermark area of Skarsind: The Weavers' Market("TWM").

I posted in the Imperial Orcs group about a potential player event set at TWM; and one of the persons who came up with TWM said that they had considered a player event, but they're too busy to make it happen. I was thinking 'it needs to be up north, where it's rocky and forested' and it happened to coincide with their thinking, which was they wanted to do it in the Lake District. I was thinking of the Peak District, simply because I've been there. Maybe a trip to the Lake District will take place sometime this year to help me better visualise TWM.

Regardless, the idea of a player event set in TWM will have to remain unfulfilled for now. I don't have the knowledge or skills to organise a player event; and the creators' ideas was a little bit different to my idea. They wanted a social with monster hunting and pit fighting (which is perfectly orcish). I was in the mind of 'invite players who are sewers and costume makers who have brought their wares up to TWM to IC-trade' but also socialise and maybe acquire, trade, or sell, lengths of fabric (which might be my Freeborn bleed).

For me, writing turns over ideas in my head. I just had another thought: since TWM also involves the trade of mana crystals and mana sites, could there not also be a discussion or a series of discussions about orcs and magic? Maybe a small delegation of Urizeni mages and magicians from other nations of the Empire to come and teach how magic could be done?

Perhaps too ambitious, perhaps it would need to run from Friday evening until Sunday afternoon, if I wanted the magical discussions, alongside the trading market and craft-doing, and the monster hunting and pit fight and the social, with its thundering drums...

A person can dream, no?