Category:Theater Style Game

According to the Focus of Interaction theory of Live Action Roleplaying, a Theater-Style game is denoted by the focus of interaction being player to player (as opposed to player-environment, player-GM, or player-audience). The player characters are not a solidified party, but rather a group of factions or even each player out for him or her self. Theater style LARPs tend to focus on politics, negotiations, power struggles, and social interactions.

GMs are usually needed when the players wish to do something that affects the world outside of the player set (for example, making a phone call to an ally not in the game, or exploring a nearby haunted house). Non-player characters (NPCs; sometimes called cast) are fewer and there are usually fewer adventurish plots. The heroes and villains (if any) are all portrayed by players, not by NPCs or GMs.

Theater-Style games usually a stylized mechanic, such as rock-paper-scissors, comparing scores or negotiating the outcome. This is called Simulated Combat (as opposed to Live Combat (Boffer) games. Many one-shot games, especially those run at conventions, make use of Theater-Style mechanics.

The most popular ongoing form of Theater-Style play is the Mind's Eye Theatre ruleset, used by [White Wolf Publishing].