Hi Travis!
Alliance is a live-action game placed in a medieval-ish society with special rules governing how to safely simulate combat with padded weapons and bean bags. For our weekend events, we rent out group camps and play all hours of the day and night, usually from Friday to Sunday. "PCs" (the people that play a character of their own design) are expected to provide their own costuming and props, whereas "NPCs" (the people who help run the game and create the world for the PCs to participate in) are provided costuming and props by the chapter's staff. For Oregon, we require that participants below the age of 14 to "page" - which means no carrying weapons and avoiding combat. If a page has shown themselves to have a strong command of the rules, they may be permitted to participate as "Advanced pages", allowed to carry and use the bean bag packets.
A good place to start would be the rulebook. You can get it as a downloadable electronic version
here for under seven bucks, and peruse through it (all of the Alliance chapters use the same core rulebook). You can also purchase a hardcopy through
our site. The rulebook has a good introduction to what a game might be like, tips on costuming and designing your character, as well as the nuts and bolts of how to play. Mike V (the owner of the whole shebang) has even posted up some sample pages in
this post.
Once you've given that a looksy, let us know when you think you might like to come out. We have a weekend-long event scheduled for the end of January, and will probably have a fighter practice out in Corvallis some weekend before that.
If you have any other questions, feel free to ask.
Welcome aboard!
-JP
