Crewing
Overview
We need a large crew to put on the Empire events, so we are dependent on people to volunteer to take part as crew. Crewing is hard work and may mean that you miss out on the fun of playing but crewing is great fun for those that enjoy it; you'll be part of an elite team of people helping to create a fantastic LRP event for over a thousand players. It's a huge responsibility and very rewarding when you see what you've helped to create.
We operate a permanent crew system, we encourage people to become a full time member of the crew team rather than play some events and crew others. However, you are welcome to resume playing in the future if you choose to do so. Please let us know if you’re not enjoying what you are doing as crew and equally we’ll be honest with you if we feel it’s not working out.
Crewing Logistics
Crewing the event is free and includes free meals from Feast, the out-of-character caterers. You will need to bring your own tent, a sleeping bag and something to sleep on. Hot drinks and snacks are provided in the crew area.
We organise our crew into teams. Each department has a head who confirms crew spaces for their department. We use departments to organise the logistics of looking after crew, they’re not used to define or limit what jobs you can do at an event.
Some departments, like the red hats (site crew), comprise multiple specialist teams such as set-dressing, tent-erection and sparkies. If you want to help out on any team, just talk to the head of the team involved.
Set-up/Take-down Crewing
The set-up and take-down crew help us get the event ready by putting up tents, setting up the electrics, etc. Members of this group are informally known as red-hats, due to the red-hats issued to team members when we have them. Those who are helping with set-up need to be on site roughly two days before time-in. Those who are helping with take-down need to be on site until roughly one day after time-out. We aim to complete take-down by nightfall the day after the event.
If you are part of the red hat team then you are encouraged to get involved and take part in crewing the rest of the event, but if you prefer to play then you are welcome to do that instead. Bear in mind though that you might be called on during the event to help with the set-up for the battles and so on.
Event Crewing
The event crew help us to run the event, filling a wide variety of roles. Crew write and run plot, they play NPC roles throughout the weekend and man areas like GOD and the tavern. Event crew are allocated to a single department, based on their primary role at the event, but you can be a member of more than one team and help out in different areas if you want to do so.