SC - Newcomers and encouragement

[Phil Anderson]

Balthazar writes:

> > My experience is that newcomers are quite often keen to be 
> >  authentic, and that they can lose this enthusiasm if too many people 
> >  tell them they "don't need to bother".
> 
> My experience, oddly enough, is to the contrary.  I have seen many
> newcomers enter the society wrapped up in a swaddling cloth of
> enthusiasm, only to have it ripped away by too many people saying
> things like "swaddling cloths aren't period..." :) 

Regional differences, perhaps: I rather suspect that, despite the 
ardent desires of our brass hats, Southron Gaard is quite different 
to the groups in Central Caid...

We pay a reasonable degree of attention to authenticity; I think we 
tend to attract people who _want_ to do mediaeval stuff (and expect 
not to get modern food at a mediaeval feast) rather than simply to 
find a social group. (For those ones, there is KAOS.) And while 
we're hardly perfect in our handling of newcomers, I don't recall 
seeing anyone bounced on with cries of "That's not period!"

> >  [...]; I 
> >  _do_ want to see newcomers consistently encouraged to put some 
> >  effort towards doing things they are interested in authentically.
> 
> Gently, tactfully encouraged??

Yes, though I'm not entirely sure we concur precisely on what that 
might involve :-)

Edward Long-hair
Southron Gaard, Caid