Getting Ready to Enroll in Witcher School Again

You might remember reading about how I went to a castle in Poland to get my ass kicked back in April.

Well, I will be going back next week, so lots of preparations are underway.

To the fortunate ones who haven’t been forced to listen to me gush endlessly about this: Witcher School is a three-day LARP held in Poland with participants from all over the world. It’s held at Moszna Castle and, as the name might suggest, it’s based on the Witcher games and books. It’s also quite unlike anything I have ever experienced before, which is why I’m going back to hunt monsters in the forest in the middle of goddamn night and get yelled at by men with swords around dawn.

This is an entirely new storyline, meaning I will also be playing an entirely new character.

Last time, I got in a little over my head when I played a hot-headed Skellige warrior and Witcher adept, because, while I might have the attitude, you’re unlikely to find anyone less “warrior”-like than me.

(Seriously, I kept trying to pick fights, but no grown man can bring himself to even yell at a petite 5’6″ baby-faced woman. They kept being all diplomatic and patient, and it was infuriating.)

Which is why I was thrilled when I received my new character.

This time I will be playing Stella, a Nilfgaardian woman who ran away from home, because all she could expect from life was to be married off to some man her parents chose for her. She was eventually kidnapped by bandits who were going to sell her as a slave, but ended up losing her in a game of Gwent to the Grand Master of the School of Cat.

Since I went through the whole adept-thing last time, I decided to play a full-fledged Witcher this time around, which means that my character has already gone through the Trial of the Grasses. And here’s where it gets good: My character survived the Trial, but is suffering from far more after effects than normal.

(Apparently, the School of the Cat isn’t too good at doing genetic experiments.)

Yes yes, I know it’s weird to be excited about playing a sick character, but I was no good as a Viking princess, so I’m totally embracing this. Which is also why I’m going to take things a bit further.

My character sheet doesn’t mention any visible signs of the after effects of the mutagens, but I thought it would be much more interesting if everyone immediately can see that Stella isn’t well. So I went makeup shopping (a horror in itself) and tried out a new look based on how Geralt looks in Witcher 3 when he overdoses on toxic potions.

The bonus is that if I perfect the look, I’ll be all set for Halloween as well!