Basics

Tales of Pendragon is a different kind of game. In most LARPs you play a single character throughout the game. Here, you start the game in the role of a single character, your home character, a person living in Britain during some indeterminate time of the middle ages. Your character is part of a community of others, with all the ordinary joys and woes that someone in those times might have. But you also have a dilemma, an important choice to make, that you have been unable to resolve. Your dilemma centers around a choice of virtues: should you do the wise thing, or the compassionate thing? Should you choose a soldier's life, or that of a monk? To help you make this difficult and vital decision, you have turned to the old stories that comprise Britain's mythic past. You hope that the conflicts between virtues embodied in these stark, dramatic, and romantic tales will help you determine what virtue should prevail in your case.

But this isn't a game of sitting around while someone else talks! When you "hear a tale", you set aside your home character and take on the role of someone in the story! You then play out the story, and when you are done you return to your home character. The story you just played out is now a story your home character has heard.

It works like this: whenever you want to become involved in a story, find a Bard. Having found one, ask him or her for a tale that you have not heard, in such fashion: “Oh, teller of tales, tell me a story,” or the like. The Bard will name a tale and give you a character from that tale to play. Others will be recruited to play other characters as needed. All those involved put aside their home identities and play the characters from the tale until it has resolved.

Once you and any others have brought the tale to a conclusion (of any sort), you return to the Bard who gave you the tale. You then get to tell the Bard what happened. All participants are welcome to tell the story as they wish, and anyone may listen. This need not be a bald retelling of facts; you should feel free to embellish, exaggerate, and dramatize the events that took place.

The Bard will then reward you and your fellow participants for your tale. You may gain a point in one of the virtues, or you may gain a boon, some valuable item or piece of information. You now return to your home characters, and the tale you have just played becomes a story your home character has just heard or told.

Characters from different tales can and will freely interact. This may lead some tales off in directions no one anticipated. Have fun!