The ancient sword of Allpowerfuldonia was used to defeat the unseen evil years ago, but in doing so, it was shattered into 5 pieces. In order to defeat the unseen evil again, you must hand me all 5 pieces so I can reforge the sword for you to use. I see four here, who has the fifth? No...seriously guys, who has the fifth piece? This isn’t cool. Anyone? Um...I need to talk to the EH about this. I’ll be right back.
Gathering things together is one of the quintessential quests of LARPing. Keys, swords, godly power, dragon eggs and more can be collected in a wide variety of different ways, but every now and then, a piece of something goes missing. How it went missing doesn’t matter. Sometimes someone hid it for their own personal reasons. Sometimes it gets put into a person’s bag and forgotten about. Sometimes the prop gets physically lost, physically broken, never obtained or even left at home by the PCs. If you plan for these eventualities ahead of time, a quest can avoid having an awkward gap while your staff is trying to figure out how to handle it.
The easiest time to deal with missing props is well before they vanish, never to be seen again. The first solution can, in fact, be that the quest ends if all 5 pieces are not gathered. If what was being gathered together is not essential, this is fine. After all, not every boon needs to be earned, and not every weapon needs to brought to a fight. This may make things harder for the PCs, but that is fine as long as the PCs still have options to move forward.
The next option during planning is to simply release more of a prop than is required for the PCs to succeed, and have the story reflect this. If instead of the story above, the PCs were told “The ancient sword was shattered into many pieces. Bring at least 5 of these pieces here and I will forge a new weapon.” then the exact number of pieces is unknown by the PCs, and if several got lost or stolen, there can always be more to find. If there are 10 props that can be obtained, the quest changes from having a single point of failure, to having 6 points which must fail before the quest has any problems. (As an aside, if you have fragile props and can make an extra or two, it will allow the item to be repaired by magic if it physically breaks)
Another option is ‘variable success’. In such a situation, as soon as a predetermined number of pieces are recovered, the quest is a success and anything beyond that improves upon the result. The first piece of the ancient sword crafts a dagger which will stay enchanted for the event. Each additional piece will add 6 inches to the length of the weapon. After the mythical weapon is a full single short, it starts gaining extra powers. And if all the pieces are forged, the sword becomes one again, transforming it into the magic item for the event (which could be granted to the person who turned in the most pieces of sword). If the PCs do not get all of the pieces, they will not know they missed out on the chance to get a magic item, only that things could have been a little bit cooler. In this encounter, it will be easier to defeat the unseen evil with the full sword than the dagger, but it can still be done.
A different way to work within the framework of variable success is to make things harder for each missing item. In the original sword example, if the briefing informed the PCs that if all five pieces aren’t brought together, the sword can still be reforged, but it will be harder. The quest can now lead to an alternate section for building the sword if only some of the pieces are gathered together. Perhaps sacrifices need to be made to fill the remaining piece of magic. Perhaps other ingredients need to be found to build the remaining parts into an inferior sword. There are unlimited options, and if the person the PCs are interacting with knows this from the start, when pieces are missing, the situation can be handled seamlessly and the PCs can decide if it is worth the effort to find the missing scrap of metal.
Inevitably when something breaks or goes missing, someone will cast Intervention to make up for the missing part. If you already had a plan for a missing piece, this can be a great way for the PCs to learn about how a mix of elder stones and magic can replicate a shattered hilt, which the NPC may have told them anyways. I do caution against letting an Intervention simply provide the missing piece though, mostly because a single spell shouldn’t make a section of a quest irrelevant. My rule of thumb (which i’ll admit gets bent from time to time) is to think about the Intervention, and if cast before the quest what would it have done. Then I would give the spellcaster something similar. If the piece is necessary for the good of the event though, perhaps come up with a way to have the ritual be a link to the object PCs need, allowing another object to fill in for the missing object. Part of the requirement of the spell Intervention is that a quest may be required. You can use this to provide an alternate method for obtaining the item. This should not be trivial, but will allow the event to move forward. The exception to this is if the prop was broken or forgotten by an NPC by accident. In that case, be lenient in marshalling Intervention.
All in all, it takes extra planning to prepare for the eventual loss of props. Regardless of the method you choose, keeping these tips in mind may help you smoothly recover from the unexpected loss of props. Just follow the same tips and don't panic. Actually, don't panic regardless! The PCs don't know what went wrong if you don't tell them.
How do you avoid letting a missing prop ruin your events? How have you handled this in the past? Do you just disagree with me? Please let us know in the comments!
