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Sag mir wo die Blumen sind
Wo sind sie geblieben?
Sag mir wo die Blumen sind
kde mohou být.
Dívky je tu během dne
otrhaly do jedné
When will they ever learn?
When will they ever learn?

Pete Seeger - Where Have All the Flowers Gone?

Zusammen/ Sami/ Sudetenland tells the story of a village torn apart by grand history and petty conflict, by national struggle and personal differences. Our stage will be a small village in the Sudetenland during the critical years of 1933 to 1945. The cast will comprise twenty German/ Austrian characters played by Czechs/ Slovaks and twenty Czech/ Slovak characters played by Germans/ Austrians. The organisers will provide the framing and the basic structure of the game, while all participants will create content and detail for the game together, in collaborative workshops prepared by the organisers.

 

The common language for the whole game, all its documents and workshops is always English.

 

Sag mir wo die Männer sind
Wo sind sie geblieben?
Sag mir wo die Männer sind
kde mohou být.
Muži v plné polní jdou
do války zas je zvou
When will they ever learn, when will they ever learn?

Pete Seeger - Where Have All the Flowers Gone?

How?

How is ZSS created?

We are going to provide the basic set up for the game, as well as food, location, documents (e.g. about the historical basics of the game), and host the workshops. During the workshops, characters and foundations plotlines and relationships are created by the players.

Okay, so what do I have to do before the game?

Sign up, read the documents we will send you (around 20 pages at max), and arrive well rested and in a good mood on time. That´s it. :)

And what will happen on site?

We are going to lead you through a series of workshops that are specifically created to build the game. We will start with the players’ own ideas and preferences and first design the individual characters, then the families and other groups and in the end we will build plotlines. The process is inspired by the game spolu/ sami. After the workshops a game co-created by the players is going to take place.

We understand that all of this may seem like a lot and that you have many questions like: How on earth will I be able to remember all those names? And shall how am I supposed to establish relationships with other characters I don't know anything about yet? Don't worry! We are going to release a more detailed design document in March/ April. And until then, we can give you an example:

The Gallery is a location at the game site filled with notice boards, photos and spare paper. The Gallery is going to be a central element of the workshops. We will be working there from the very beginning and we will use it as a place of reference throughout the preparations and even during the game. Every player will have their own notice board there, starting with a photo and the player’s name, and then filling in more details step by step: player preferences for style of game and interaction, the character’s name and age, their place in a family, their profession etc. And with each step, we will add sticky notes with more and more options for relationships that other players can pick up and then quickly negotiate the details. In the end the complete, detailed, and beautiful Gallery will be open during the whole game, so you can always go back and check out more information about other characters and be able to direct the game the way you want to.

Do I have to be a history expert?

Not at all. We will make a few documents to describe the common historical background of the game and at the same time set the basic, small scale stage of the village we play in. Participating doesn’t require tons of knowledge: a lot will be clarified during the workshops, and if there is anything you want to know or feel unsure about, there will be friendly people around to ask.

Also, we are going to prepare some inspirational sources, like books and movies to watch, but nothing compulsory.

All in all, our approach to history is quite simple: we want to describe the situation and explore it dramatically, but we don’t want to get bogged down by details.

Sag wo die Soldaten sind
Wo sind sie geblieben?
Sag wo die Soldaten sind
kde mohou být.
Řady hrobů v zákrytu
meluzína kvílí tu
When will they ever learn
when will they ever learn?

Pete Seeger - Where Have All the Flowers Gone?

Why?

We believe that dialogue between Czechs and Germans is still a bit problematic. The topic of the Sudetenland was surprisingly sparked to life again and we want to get to know each other better, to live through that situation.

We believe that larp can work like that. First inspiration came to us on the first international run of Legion, where after the stress and drama of the game people started to talk really openly. And we found out that the larp helped them talk, helped them understand and served as an important tool to explore national memory.

We want to make a game that will address new questions and that will help to facilitate understanding.

Also, we just want to make an experimental, but still fun and entertaining larp. If that is enough for you, great :).

Sag mir wo die Gräber sind
Wo sind sie geblieben?
Sag mir wo die Gräber sind
kdo to kdy pochopí
kdo to kdy pochopí.
Řekni kde ty hroby jsou
When will they ever learn
when will they ever learn?

Pete Seeger - Where Have All the Flowers Gone?

Who?

The game is designed and organized by collaboration of Czech, German and Austrian authors.

DAVID FRANTIŠEK WAGNER

He has been doing larp for a long time and will do so for some more. Same goes for education (especially regarding history, philosophy and other social sciences) in its various forms - he has been doing it for a long time and will keep at it. His historian work is focused mainly on the history of the Czech Old Catholic Church, which was predominantly German and has been close to completely depopulated by the expulsion. He is the author of several larps (Legion: The Siberian story, De la Bête..) and in his work he emphasizes authenticity, originality and strong stories. He is one of the founders of Rolling.

LUCIE CHLUMSKÁ

She graduated from psychology and she has been working as a human resources specialist for a few years. She has only been into larping since 2010, but that just makes her even more enthusiastic. Each year she writes one chamber larp and she was also involved in the making of the epic games called De la Bête and Legion: The Siberian Story. She is one of the designers of spolu/sami larp and with Kamil Buchtík is responsible for its workshops´methodics. She is a member of Rolling association.

SEVERIN RAST

Severin has passed the point in his life, when he lived longer doing larp than not doing larp. Obviously there is no turning back now. He studied biology, English and German language and literature and wrote a couple of novels. Obviously he is making his living as an IT specialist now. Writing for larps is his passion, though, and he regularly writes chamber larps and is involved in the making of Der Pandora Effekt.

ELIŠKA ČERNÁ

She studied History of European Culture with specialization on monument care - and she does that as her day job, along with trying to preserve as much oral history as possible. In personal life she dances, rides horses, takes care of her dog, reads fairy tales and tries to see some culture in the evenings. She is quite new to larping, being usually the participant. Despite this she cooperated on Cave Canem larp, dark Balkan fairy tale. She was quite confused and hopeless while producing her own art - larp being the first thing to change it.

(... and more...)

Practical

Sag mir wo die Mädchen sind
Wo sind sie geblieben?
Sag mir wo die Mädchen sind
kde mohou být.
Muži si je vyhlédli
s sebou domů odvedli
When will they ever learn
when will they ever learn?

Pete Seeger - Where Have All the Flowers Gone?

We will provide most of the props (e.g. money, guns, and more), extra costumes (including some uniforms etc.), food and lodging. Every player is expected to bring their own basic costume - in case that is a problem for someone, we can arrange costume rental.

We are not aiming for a complete illusion; in fact, on some occasions we are going to use tape larp techniques and will create aesthetics not unlike those of the movie Dogville, for example.

 

Where and when will the game happen?

The game will take place in southern Bohemia in Chválkov near Kamenice nad Lipou from the 14th of September to the 18th of September 2022. You can check the location here (websites are sadly only in Czech).

 

When will the sign up happen?

You can sign up here.

There will be the same sign up periods for all players.
All registrations made during this time will be treated equally; if we receive more applications than there are spaces, we will cast lots. If we don't receive enough registrations during the first sign up period, we will announce another one.

Who can sign up?

The game is specifically tailored for 20 German / Austrian players and 20 Czech / Slovak players. In the first sign-up interval, we decided not to include other player nationalities, but we might do so on future intervals.

Of course, we are not going to verify your nationality in any way. We would just like to point out that the project works with many cultural references and national traumas, which may seem alien or uninteresting to people with a different cultural framing.

If you are unsure about anything, just contact us at zusammen@rolling.cz

Is there any participation fee?

Yes, there will be. The basic fee will be set to 125 € with the option to sponsor the project by paying more.

Contact

Rolling: an association for the development of role-playing and educational games
Fučíkova 283; 411 55 Terezín, Identify number: 02296802
Bank account: IBAN: CZ6020100000002900910885 BIC/SWIFT: FIOBCZPPXXX

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