To foster a more open, transparent, and accessible roleplay environment, we have created the following open-door policy with regard to LARPing within Backbeat Ballad spaces. As part of this policy, doorways to access all play areas should remain open at all times. We hope that this policy will create a more dynamic and inclusive play experience for all.
In order to carry out this policy, as well as attempting to reimagine our space as something more expansive and sprawling than it actually is, the following protocols have been designed.
“Isolated” rooms will have a tag designating their special status. Generally speaking, there will be between two and five spaces marked in this way. Usually bedrooms and other smaller, satellite areas. Players entering such a zone that already contains players must pause in the door for a “Three-Mississippi” count, after which time they may enter freely. This simulates a player knocking on the door, walking down a long hallway, fiddling with the knob and finding it locked, or any other sort of brief but clear signal to the people in the room that an interloper is coming.
Disciplines, powers, skills, and abilities can be used in and through these spaces. This is a difficult policy to fully annotate, so instead consider the examples below.
Example 1:
Alice has heightened senses. She can stand outside the doorway and gives a signal that she is “listening in” from an innocuous space outside the room. Bob and Carol are inside having a secretive meeting. Since they do not know she is there, they continue having a conversation and Alice listens in from outside without ever entering the room.
Example 2:
Alice is lurking outside eavesdropping with Heightened Senses. Bob, always tight on matters of secrecy, issues a perception challenge to Alice to notice her lurking, which he wins easily. Bob and Carol, now suspicious, lower their voices to a whisper. Alice can either go away, or else begin her “three Mississippi” count.
Example 3:
Bob and Carol are at it again. Alice asks Dave to go spy using his powers of invisibility. Dave throws up his “I am invisible” signal and walks right in the doorway, without the need for a three-count. Under any “invisibility-type” power, Dave does not need to announce his presence or count off. The pilots of Bob and Carol, being strong role-players, continue their conversation as if Dave was not there.