Which is nerdier: LARPing or MMORPGs?

LARPING.

Brief anecdote: My dad, stepbrother, and best friend were playing airsoft on some public land, all decked out in our tactical gear and masks with our hyper-realistic bb-firing assault rifles in tow when we stumbled upon a large group of LARPers in the woods. We all froze and just stared at each other for a while, before turning the other way.

LARPing. I’ve been playing Dungeons and Dragons since I was 11. I’ve read some Star Wars novels. These are very nerdy things. And even I won’t LARP.

LARPing is definitely nerdier. I play WoW and there are RP servers where people get into character, but the vast majority of players don’t.

One could reason that LARPing is more social, but then one could say the same for MMORPGs. I play WoW in a guild with a lot of real life friends, including a friend who lives in Sweden and one who lives in Japan. It’s an incredibly social experience for me.

I think LARPing is, by far, nerdier. My reason ..almost all LARPers are “nerdy”; but MMORPG is extremely diverse in its players.
I’m not a fan of LARPing and find it quite silly. But whatever makes you happy ..lol.
I play WoW and actually get somewhat more of a rich social experience there than I do in “real life”...so I guess I’m into MMORPG.

Also, our weekly D&D game is mostly couples. One couple even has a kid, thus disproving that nerds don’t reproduce by breeding. Not that it’s particularly common, mind you, what with the common diet high in Mountain Dew and the usual social awkwardness.

Good point some WoW people are actually awesome, like Leroy Jenkins.

Leeeeeeeeeeroy!

Don’t forget the more DOTs guy.

LARPing by far.

@cockswain LARPing has its leroy too :P

Ooooh, I can’t wait for KatawaGrey to weigh in on this!

At least LARPers get out of the house and socialize with other people in the (relatively) real world.

GA, @SuperMouse !

@Seelix Holy crap that DOTS thing was funny. What was that? Just the recorded vocals of some guy playing a mmorpg? Hilarious.

What’s wrong with being nerdy?

I think they are equal.

@uberbatman Coincidentally, I watched that moments before you posted it for the first time. That was awesome. I actually did that playing paintball once, just got sick of sitting in one spot for too long and decided to sacrifice myself to get things moving again. Ended up with like 18 welts on my ass.

@cockswain – Yeah, it was a raid leader trying to explain what his raid should do… I’m not sure if you play WoW, but it was back in the day when Onyxia was a really difficult raid (pre-Burning Crusade).

@JilltheTooth – I may be only speaking for myself, but I don’t mean to put down LARPing as nerdy. I wear my nerd badge proudly!

@SuperMouse the point was raised already, but how many non-super nerdy LARPers do you know? Cause I know quite a few people who play mmorpgs that are completely nerdy

@TheOnlyNeffie nothin, I fully embrace my nerdiness. Its just a different kind than larp/mmorpg nerd :P

@TheOnlyNeffie Check my disclaimer in the details.

For the record, both larping and mmorpgs look fun. I do think that larping is nerdier, but there is nothing inherently wrong with nerdiness. I mean, fuck… I play minecraft for christsakes.

@cockswain that was aimed at your disclaimer. ;)

I am not saying “nerdy” is bad either…just answering the question :)

let’s just assume nerdiness is cool

A thought: LARPers get some exercise, which could make them more attractive.

Just for the record, I’m not trying to be difficult. I don’t play either of these types of games. I just really don’t understand why “nerdy” is taken as an insult.

I think in cases like these, one has to ask oneself: What Would Moss Do?

@cockswain, one of the larping chicks that my dad, stepbro, friend, and I bumped into when we were playing airsoft had a pretty killer body. She was playing the part of the “princess” apparently.

@Fiddle_Playing_Creole_Bastard My brother was in Baltimore at his wife’s house, and he saw a bunch of LARPers in the field behind her house. Some time later, I saw Darkon and recommended it to him. That was the field where Darkon was filmed.

so I’m not coming off like I think I’m not nerdy, my father was the VP of the gaming division before Wizards of the Coast became TSR. I owned all of it. Even met Gary Gygax, which is like meeting Gandalf for a nerd.

@uberbatman I know some pretty nerdy MMO etc. players and some pretty nerdy LARPers. In my mind it is a nerdy draw between the two. To break the tie I turn to the fact that LARPers get out of their parents’ basement at some point – even if it is to chase each other around with swords made of foam pool noodles.

Hello, my name is WillWorkForChocolate. I play World of Warcraft, and I’m a nerd.

Seriously though, I think LARPing is much more “nerdy”, unless you’re role playing with a partner/spouse in a Naughty Nurse outfit or something. That’s just hot.

Which one is D&D, and does battle re-enactments count as LARP? (Think Civil War reenactments, WWII reenactments, etc)

Well, I suppose you could consider my Lewis & Clark reenactments to be LARPing.

@WestRiverrat @papayalily You guys are taking this discussion in an interesting new direction I hadn’t considered. First, D&D is a game where people sit at a table and roll dice to see how their characters fare in an imaginary world of monsters, dragons, warriors, and wizards, that sort of thing. LARP is to take that further to actually making chainmail and fake weapons, meeting others of like mind, and doing the D&D style stuff together in a park somewhere.

But I only thought of LARPing in the high fantasy sense before, not historical re-enactments. So by definition, I would have to say those are also part of LARPing. Since they are historical, they seem a little cooler IMO, but still nerdy as it is still LARPing. It is definitely cooler than Renaissance Fair.

@cockswain I have been a D&D DM for longer than I can remember. You won’t be using rules out of 3.0 or 3.5 if you sit in on one of my sessions. And you won’t find all of my monsters in the manuals.

When I was in school, my cub scout troop and another one down the street each made medieval weapons and armor and had a joust. We won…we used cardboard and wood to make our weapons and armour while the other troop used paper.

@cockswain Dude, almost nothing is cooler than the Ren. Faire. Except maybe Star Wars, Star Trek, and the Ren. Faire with nice weather.

@WestRiverrat Awesome. I only somewhat recently took my copy of Unearthed Arcana to a used book store.

@Seelix : Katawagrey and I are both also prideful of our nerditude!

Lightning Bolt!

That really is all I have to say.

LARPING FUCKING RULES.

They are both equally nerdier but in different ways, I think. LARPing takes more work and more money but it is predicated on social interaction and it is not an all consuming thing. MMORPG’s take much less money and work, but you have no face-to-face interaction when playing one and it can be all consuming.

Edit to add: @dverhey: Those LARPers are lazy! Where I LARPed, we had to say a whole phrase in order for the spell to hit I call forth magic missile five, with mystic force I pin you.

@Fiddle_Playing_Creole_Bastard: BEST. STORY. EVER.

I’ve done both and I think Larping is way more nerdy than MMOs.

Larping is the Nerdiest thing you could ever do. It is just as nerdy as dressing in charactor at Star Wars events. It is the epitome of all that is geeky.

@KatawaGrey, it would be even cooler if we got into an epic battle… 21st century vs. the 15th. Lances and swords vs. guns and smoke grenades. Would have been freaking badass.

@Mikewlf337 You make me wonder, is there anything nerdier than LARPing, or is it the nerdiest thing in the world? What if you were a grown man and your mother wouldn’t allow you to LARP because she felt it was “too dangerous”? Wouldn’t that be nerdier?

Despite the overwhelming suggestions that LARPing is nerdier, I’m still on the fence. The LARPer has a chance to meet women, gets exercise, and actually builds something sometimes. Plus, to be that big of a geek in public takes a certain confidence and boldness. The gamer may sit in his parent’s basement, becoming morbidly obese and acne-ridden on a diet of Mountain Dew and Krispy Kremes, rarely to even see the light of day, let alone ever touch a breast.

This is tricky.

@cockswain: Nerdier than LARPing? Three words: Star Trek Wedding.

@Fiddle_Playing_Creole_Bastard: That would have been pretty awesome. Don’t forget, though, they would have mages who can heal and throw magical shit at you. ;)

Interesting note: “mages” is not in my computer’s vocabulary.

that is extreme nerdery, but don’t you think it is still just a form of LARPing? Maybe the most extreme form possible?

LARPing by far, imho.

Though many mmorpgs take place in a fantasy setting, it’s still in the end just a game and isn’t any more “nerdy” than playing Black Ops would be. And many mmorpgs aren’t even set in that kind of magic fantasy world either. EVE online is an mmoprg and it’s basically all about being a cuthroat capitalist asshat.

But LARPing requires a certain kind of person, one with a wild imagination, creativity, and a total lack of shame or an IDGAF what people think attitude.

I kind of envy them. I’d be too self conscious to do that, and I’m a WoW player.

@cockswain I’ve got to disagree with the general assumption of MMORPG players overdosing on Krispy Kremes and Mountain Dew in a basement. I tend to overdose on homemade tacos, spaghetti, chinese food and chocolate.

I hate Mountain Dew and prefer Dr Pepper or Barq’s Root Beer. I WoW from my bedroom, as we don’t have basements in Texas.

I’m happily married to a totally hot guy and I have two adorable daughters. I see the light of day frequently and I have my own breasts that my hubby likes to play with.

Actually, all the people in my guild, except two, are married with children and play during their downtime. This doesn’t mean that we’re not nerds lol, just that we’re not as nerdy as the stereotypical teenage gamer boy. :P

Which is why I carefully chose to say ”The gamer may sit in his parent’s basement…”. Obviously there are always exceptions to stereotypes. But have you seen the episode of South Park where they play WoW? A classic.

I’ve watched the clips of it on Youtube. It’s funny in a “icky” sort of way, LOL.

See, while I think its possible to have the cases of the morbidly obese social recluse MMORPG player, there is very often cases where you see not so nerdy people playing these games. I havent met anyone who LARPs who isnt a complete nerd, out door activities or anything else you can say about them, theyre still very nerdy.

again, i dont think nerdy is per say a bad thing.

LARPing (something I’ve never done) is far geekier, but at least it provides real world contact for the participants. MMORPG’s on the other hand, do not. In fact, they have the potential to be extremely detrimental/destructive in many, many ways. I should know, I played EverQuest (think WoW, but geared more towards serious power gamers rather than casual players) for 7 years. Seven years! It was fun as hell, and I don’t regret any of it – I made a lot of good friends and had a fuckin’ blast the entire time (Nameless server in the house, bitches!). Additionally, I was an officer in my guild, something I found to be incredibly rewarding. I learned a lot about running an organization, and even more about personal integrity.

But…

When I look back on my life, am I going to feel good about the 500+ days played I racked up? Five hundred days. Over 12k hours of actual play time. What’s up with that shit? That is totally insane – but unfortunately, not uncommon. I have friends that have been playing EQ for ten years now, with close to 1000 days played.

Imagine going to a friend’s house, and they show you their LARPing room. An entire room in their house full of costumes and weapons and whatever else is involved. I admit, a part of me would think “man, what a complete dork you are”. After that initial thought though, I would be reminded of the friend I have that had a special table constructed to hold six computers, so he could play six different characters at the same time (much of the ‘adventuring’ in EQ is designed for a party of 6 people). Which is geekier? Which activity is deserving of derision? At least the nerds prancing around in funny costumes are interacting with real life, flesh and blood people – many of whom are the opposite sex, I might add ;)

LARPing is humorous to watch, but watching someone sit in front of a computer for years on end killing monsters is just pathetic. Something tells me I won’t gain 50 pounds LARPing like I did playing EQ, either.

@cockswain You met Gary Gygax? Can I kiss your feet, sir? ;)

I was 9. Even then I could sense the powerful rays of nerdery emanating from his handshake.

When I was 9 I regularly hauled around that fuckin fat Dungeon Masters Guide everywhere I went…along with the Players Handbook, Fiend Folio, etc. Good times.