Uptime and Sessions

Sessions of Transference will be held at St John's College (the Larkin Room) on Tuesday evenings every week, during Trinity Term Weeks 1-6, with Debrief in Week 7. We will be starting at 19:00, with a short briefing before time in. For more information about timings and locations, see When and Where.

During sessions you will be live-action roleplaying your character in real time. What this means is that, for the most part, everything that you act out is something that your character is actually doing – that could be chatting, dancing, plotting in a corner or making a proposal.

Props and costume are completely optional, though we encourage you to dress up if you want.

If you know that you're likely to miss a session, please let the GMs know in advance so that we can plan around your absence and let other players know that you won't be there (though please don't use mailing lists for this). You'll still be able to write a turnsheet if you miss a session.

Calls are when you say a word or make a small gesture action that has some kind of effect on the game. You may have played games where calls have a mechanical effect – we won't be introducing any of those in Transference, though we will be using some OC calls which are there to ensure that everyone is on the same page.

Time In: This is used by the GMs to let everyone know that it's now time to drop into character because the session has begun, or to resume after a time freeze.

Time Freeze: This is used by the GMs to interrupt roleplaying so we can describe something going on that we wouldn't be able to adequately act out.

Time Out: This is used by the GMs to let everyone know that it's now time to drop out of character again because the session has ended.

The OC gesture: Pointing upwards with the index and middle fingers, this is used by players and GMs to show that they are temporarily dropping out of character for whatever reason. This might be, for example, to ask something OC (“Is it alright if I hold your hand?”), to pass through the playing space unimpeded or even for GMs to listen in on secret conversations (though players shouldn't do this!). When someone is doing this, it may indicate that their character is not there, or is there but not doing anything noteworthy, depending on context.

Physical contact IC should always be negotiated OC first (e.g. “Is it alright if I hold your hand?”). Any fighting should not take place in uptime.

GMs will be more than happy to answer any questions you might have for them in uptime, but please be aware that we may be busy with other players or even need to consult our notes/the other GMs before we can give you an answer.