This years Fastaval was awesome. The weather was great, and a lot of time was spend outdoors in the sun. There was great gaming – I ran Leaves of Fate, Scrapbook, Ikea and A Heart of Metal, besides It’s Complicated, and I played 15 Men. I won the Jury’s Special Award for The Children of Playing Field 7, got nominated for The Honorary Otto for my work for the Danish roleplaying culture, and got a second place at the beer brewing contest (only two points behind the winner, not bad). Also got famous for being a character in the scenario Brabrand – five of us from planB appears in the scenario as the PC’s.
We got to give away the newly published Scenariebogen/The Scenario Book (400+ pages, 2½ kilo – the black one in the pics) to a lot of eager roleplayes for free, and the Anniversary Magazine for Fastaval is awesome. For the photo-shoot contest we gave away a copy of Nordic Larp. I came home with a lot of goodies and weird stuff (including an Ikea-doll (or a spider-shaped glove) as a gift for game mastering Ikea).
Awesome Guests
A bunch of people from Norway, Sweden and Finland dropped by, I played with Nathan Hook from England and Marlene from France, and I got to meet Luke Crane and Jared Sørensen, who brought along copies of FreeMarket. Not only did I get a copy for myself, but also a copy for Viking-Con’s remake-competition, where that copy will be a part of prize for winning: Who ever makes the best remake of Sort/Hvid (Black/White) wins. I also picked up a copy of InSpectres, and a lot of Fastaval Merchandise.
Also I finally saw what Jared’s Parsley game was all about, and I saw Mind Control is Game Design, though there was not really anything new.
A Bit More on the Games
A Heart of Metal – a metal-interpretation of the opera Tannhäuser about a young artist struggling with his art and his need to reach his audience. He is caught between his love and his muse, and his rival. These four roles rotate between the players, and the scenes are played as structured freeform. As a part of the game, the scenes are played multiple times from different angles. Quite fun. Unfortunately we had to play in a rather small room, so we could not use the floor for a few crucial scenes, which lessened the impact.
Scrapbook – a story of a woman breaking down as she struggles to fit her role as mother. She ends up with kidnapping an infant, but before that we chart her break down by playing the scenes shifting between Grey Reality and Rosy Romance. The scenario is played as structured freeform and the story shifts between grey reality and rosy delusions. It became a quite strong experience to play. Also you play it with an actual scrapbook, when you play, and scenes are set by opening the book on a page.
Leaves of Fate – a omnious story of four rather unpleasant persons, who are given a chance to change their ways from beyond the grave. By using a ouija-board the players pretends that the spirit of a woman brings answers to the characters, giving them space to reveal their characters’ nefarious secrets. Also played as structured freeform.
Ikea – a short comedy scenario of about 1½ hour about couples shopping in Ikea. The players choose between 11 different pairs of characters. Once a player has chosen a pair, he chooses a fellow player to play the other half, and thus you have four pairs of people shopping in Ikea, and the players takes turns playing the couples and playing observers trying to guess the true errands of the couples by reading the subtext. As the others it is played as structured freeform.
The Children of Playing Field 7 – a story of four children growing up in societies plagued by warfare. We see the consequences of the war, as the individual stories are played (with the other players having roles of NPCs). Another structured freeform story.
15 Men – a pirate-story about 15 men trying to bring back a treasure. There are 15 characters, and when one is killed, you pick the next one and keep playing, until a single pirate is left standing. It is sort of like a story game, but with the GM handling the general flow.
Roles, Dice and Fun 
Ikea and 15 Men sound like nifty games indeed. I assume that these only exist in Danish?
I’ve been hearing a lot about Fastaval these past few years. Some day, I’ll probably have to come over and check it out.
It would be cool, if you dropped by 🙂
Not much is in English … yet, but some material can be found here: http://alexandria.dk/english
I think there is an English version of 15 Men somewhere, since Luke Crane brought a copy of the game home. I’ll ask the authors to see, if they have got a copy.