Even though most of the off game communication is going to be in English the actual larp is going to be played in the Nordic languages.
You will be able to tell us what kind of languages you are comfortable speaking and understanding in the sign up and the characters will be adapted to match your own language skills.
The majority of the characters will be Swedish or Danish, with a smaller group that can be played as either Norwegian, Swedish and Danish depending on interest.
There will also be 5 Finnish characters, these can be played by either Finnish- or Fenno-Swedish-speaking players, and bilingual characters will act as interpreters in-game.
Scandi languages:
Swedish/Danish characters:
The larp revolves between two Swedish brothers, their family, and their staff. One of the two brothers has married into a Danish family and the children in this family can speak either Swedish, Danish, or a combination.
The staff in these families can also be played as either Danish or Swedish based on casting.
Norwegian characters:
If there is enough interest the third family and their staff who are visiting the Steinwalls can be played as a Norwegian family. If there isn’t enough interest they will also be played as either Danish, Swedish or the mixture of the two.
The Finnish experience
The five Finnish characters are all working class employed in the household of the two brothers.
As a Finnish character you will be playing the people with the lowest social status at the whole larp. In 1913 the work immigration to Sweden was not big but existent and there was a lot of prejudice against Finnish people. This means that racism will be a theme for these characters, as well as exotification and alienation.
You as a player need to be comfortable with these themes and with the language barrier being a part of your experience in order to have a good time at this larp.
Fenno-Swedish characters, or Finnish characters who have learned Swedish as a second language will be higher on the status chain than the purely Finnish-speaking ones, and act as interpeters in game. As mentioned before, the off game communication will be in English.
If you are a Finnish player but speak Swedish you are of course welcome to apply for Swedish characters if you prefer that experience.
EDIT: There have been some questions about how we ensure that the Finnish experience does not become too alienating, and how in-game racism is being handled to make sure it does not bleed into off game, so here is some additional information about the thoughts around the Finnish speaking characters:
When making the original larp that 1913 is heavily based upon, 1912 that ran in 2019, the experience of the Finnish players was a big passion behind the project. We wanted to adress some uncomfortable truths about prejudices between Swedes and Finns, that are unfortunately still present today, by confronting Swedish players with the root of these prejudices in a historical context.
We also wanted to find a way to integrate the Finnish and Swedish larp scenes that are seldom intermingled, despite some of us sharing a language and all of us sharing borders.
We believe that by adressing these things in a larp setting we might explore unconscious toxic thoughts, and get a greater understanding of anothers’ lived experiences and historical contexts. The larp is based on historical research and the Finnish characters are either written or edited by Finnish volunteers so that we make sure that they aren’t written from an outside perspective.
We understand that this experience is not for everyone, but we hope some will find it interesting to play in a high resolution, realistic way on these uglier parts of the relationship between Finland and Sweden that is all but simple or one dimensional. No stereotypical slurs or jokes will be accepted in an off-game context, whether it is about Finns, Swedes, Danes or Norwegians.
This aims to be a larp about the nordic history, social roles and the budding nationality between the Nordic countries and the way it grinds against the other nationalities present in game. Off game it strives to be an experience trying to unite us around a shared past and a shared experience.