Reaching Out To The Brell Community

[Turaylon Soulshadow]

After having gotten permission from Ddrak to reach out to the Brell community to help with a project myself and some friends have been working on for quite some time, I'd like to first share with you a story (yea, it's boring and about me and my life, so skip through the next paragraph if you want to get down to brass tacks), though a few of you have more than likely seen this posted on my personal facebook.

I've been a member of the New England Live Action Roleplaying community for the better part of my adult life, and for the past 14 years, this hobby has given me incredible friendships, relationships, and has taught me a lot about myself. I have learned several talents that I never knew I had, and have figured out who I am as a person and have made the decision of what it is I want to do with my life. When first starting out as a LARPer, despite what I thought, same as every teenager who plays things like Dungeons & Dragons and EverQuest, I was a socially awkward kid afraid of my own shadow with awful anxiety problems. The LARP community opened up a world that allowed me to be who I was really comfortable being, which, ironically, was pretty much anything but me at the time. I began staffing for a local game after my second event, and have been doing so pretty much ever since, every month, for the past 14 years. Though writing for other games has been a great outlet for creativity, it has always been a dream, quite literally, as I have had dreams of it, to own my own LARP, and now have the mental and emotional means to do so. That decision, mentioned before, is to create an environment that will present those same opportunities to others.

I have over a decade of experience in regards to staffing a LARP, have done so at multiple games, and have been a core staff member of a local game for nearly a solid decade until a medical issue caused me to have to step down from my staffing duties, as it prevented me from taking part in combat roles. Thankfully, this will not affect owning my own game at all, as I will be handling al things administrative and monetary, and will not need to do much physical interaction, save maybe a stroll down to the tavern to meet and greet people as a local farmer or whatever.

Our campaign contains a rough business plan because 1) we don't know exactly what we are going to need or be able to buy (there was a specific mask I REALLY wanted to get a few of, but the company went out of business several months ago and they have none sitting in their warehouse). 2) The things we do know we need to buy are things like packages of computer paper, pens, storage totes, X yards of this type of fabric, Y yards of another type of fabric, X rolls of gray duct tape, Y rolls of green duct tape, things that would just make a reader lost interest halfway through reading what we are doing.

We've done our best to explain as much as possible what we are doing on the campaign page, but if anyone has any questions, they can be posted here, sent as a private message, or emailed directly to me at

CaelorasLiveActionRoleplaying@gmail.com

On facebook...

facebook.com/Caeloras.Larp

or on Twitter (we admittedly do not check twitter often)...

@Caeloras

Even if you aren't able to donate to our campaign, spreading the word on your facebook, through emails, or even to friends or coworkers is a huge help. For allowing us to reach out to the BrellRants.Net community for support, Ddrak and BrellRants will be credited in our rulebook as benefactors to Caeloras Live Action Roleplaying.

Below is a link to our IndieGoGo.com campaign. I will be checking back here daily unless a serious issue prevents me from doing so (like a power outage, since I live in New England and it's winter). Thank you in advance from the bottom of my heart to any of you who do help support us.

http://igg.me/at/Caeloras/x/5374307

-Ryan Cahill/Turaylon Soulshadow

[Turaylon Soulshadow]

Thanks Ddrak for stickying this! We've gotten a few donations so far, and I know crowdfunding projects usually get the bulk of their donations at the end of their run, but spreading the word about what we're trying to do is now a full time job for me.

Caeloras Live Action Roleplaying will be taking part in a LARP forum in Watertown, Massachusetts on January 25! If you're in the area, the preregistration fee is $9, or $10 at the door. There will be food, drinks, and a lot of people from the LARP community.

https://www.facebook.com/events/724761470885445/

This event looks like it could be a lot of fun. I've personally never been to anything like it, as it is a first of its kind for this area, so I am incredibly excited!

[Turaylon Soulshadow]

We passed the $300 mark!

[Turaylon Soulshadow]

Just 1 week into our campaign and we've hit the 3% mark!

[Turaylon Soulshadow]

The campaign is still going, and we've gotten a lot of people saying they want to donate when the time is right (including our very own Garrdor...ya got singled out brah <3). Even just sharing our link is a great help to us. Not a lot of people even know about the LARP community, let alone would be willing to donate to a game after seeing a movie like Role Models. We are far beyond that. We are very professional and have put a lot of effort into our rulebook and atmosphere.

[Turaylon Soulshadow]

Almost at the halfway mark in our campaign! Things have slowed down a bit, but we're hoping that donations pick up again in the coming weeks.

[Turaylon Soulshadow]

We have officially reached the halfway point of our Indiegogo.com fundraiser campaign for our soon to come live action roleplaying game, Caeloras Live Action Roleplaying. As explained in the campaign, these funds will be used to help with purchasing much needed props such as masks and costuming, as well as supplies to create boffer-safe weaponry, and our initial business, site, and other fees.

While we are well aware that our goal may look like an exorbitant amount of money to an individual, it becomes less and less of a dream and more of a reality with each new person who helps support us. That is what this is for us - a dream, a dream we have been putting in countless hours of effort towards breathing life into it for the past several years. LARPing is something that our staff is incredibly passionate about - it's our center stage, our Super Bowl, our Mona Lisa.

Our own game gives us a chance to bring to others not only our creative thoughts as far as what we present as the game itself for them to experience as a player in the world of Caeloras, but it also lets us give others the same opportunities to create incredible memories and friendships as we all have over the years of being involved in the LARP community.

We are ever so grateful to those who have thus far been so supportive of our efforts. I know several people were interested in helping out by donating, but even if you can't help with money, even just sharing this link so others can see it is a huge step forward..

Please help us make our dream come to life. This is the final step in an already incredible journey we have been traveling over the past few years.

[Turaylon Soulshadow]

With just 2 weeks left in our campaign, we're still pulling for as many donations as we can get. Despite numbers looking low, the project will go on with whatever donations we are able to muster, but the more we get, the easier things become. We spent all of last night plastering patch.com with our campaign information, but as I suspected, no one actually reads anything on patch.com.

We're still hopeful that we'll somehow at least get enough to cover the expenses of our first event, and we'll just have to bank on our own talents from there to make sure everything else falls into place.