A Day in the Life

Here we turn the focus to our day to day at camp and try to give our readers an idea of what we have going on each week throughout the summer.

July 31 – August 4th

Day In The Life:

HVSS Adv Camp and High Meadow July 31 – August 4th

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Week two of Wayfinder at the Hudson Valley Sudbury School was a week of advanced day camp. That means that we run a game that is slightly more advanced and tailor our programming to participants who have been to enough events to have a basis of knowledge in our game systems and daily programming.

This led to some very advanced improv work during a game of Why Were You Late as the game took place on a broadway production of Spongebob Squarepants. Participants were able to perform what looked to be choreographed dance routines on the spot and improvise dramatic lines in order to make it appear they had been doing their improvised jobs. The underwater theme continued into a game of Shark Week themed Mafia.

20645188_1620896344596582_840565192538906846_oThe Adventure Game, Til Your Legs Give Out, was run by the illustrious Kate Muste. In this alien filled science fiction scenario, a human military base fought against a spreading forest full of alien monsters, relying on small teams of runners entering the woods and dodging attacks to retrieve fuel to hold back the monsters. When they discovered a threat coming from inside their ranks they had to race against the clock to figure out who they could trust, and how they wanted to make their last stand.

Meanwhile at the High Meadow School, our director put one of our campers to work as his assistant (by the camper’s request). Near the end of each workshop it was this camper’s job to let the workshop teachers know they had 5 mintues left. This little addition to the staff pool for the week brought many a smile to the workshop teachers.

20626442_1764628856899755_5288784478999051710_oThe Adventure Game, “The Order of the Archons,” by Dylan Scott, was a tale of seasoned adventurers heading to a retirement celebration in their honor. But lo and behold, the King had been kidnapped and the adventurers had to go on one more epic quest to rescue him from a lich queen (who was once part of their adventurers guild). In the end they slew the lich and brought the king home. It was a delightful and classic adventure.

July 24th-28th

Day In The Life:

HVSS July 24th-28th

20464800_10155506512378698_1326248697_oWe love to play here at Wayfinder. At Sudbury we showed this a couple different ways. First in the way we interacted with the weather. Almost everyday (we caught some sunshine on Friday) we were outside in the rain. While many activities may be cancelled due to rain, we tend to view it as more of a set dressing. This was on full display all week as campers left smiling each day despite having run around outisde in rainfall.

The other place we displayed our penchant for play this week was through the fun things the staff make up on the spot at camp. One of our SIT’s taught the Mage casting class (the class where we teach our young wizards how to use their magical abilities) entirely in character. He chose the name Jango Shizard the Cowboy Wizard which the other staff (and the camp at large) could not stop laughing about. He left quite the impression, so much so that many participants wanted to use some part of his name in their own characters’ names.

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We also like to provide mental challenges for our campers. For this Adventure our production staff made an amazing 10 piece Omega cannon that the participants had to assemble in Game. They had to learn how to put it together quickly and under pressure like they would have to in Game.
The Adventure, tiled The Great War, was written by two Wayfinder veterans Henry White and Thomas Gordanier who are master crafters of adventures having over 20 years of combined camp experience. To prep for this Adventure they played a new game called Infiltrate the Flag. As the name would suggest the game is built around capture the flag. In this version we play on the full land and each team spends time strategizing and building tactics for themselves before the game begins. Strategy was an important thing to practice for this Game, as the summary of it reads “The Great War is a war story set in a fantasy world full of elves, with endless years of pointless bloodshed in the trenches. An isolated group of soldiers is ordered to hold a point crucial to a major offensive against escalating enemy forces.”

Written by Trine Boode-Petersen
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July 17th-21st

Woodstock Day School & Unison Arts Center

Week 2

20232196_1602652399754310_5840791133403237278_o Have you ever wanted to be a sneak thief? Or a highly trained master of disguise? How about a crafter of special potions or purveyor of magicks? Well in Assassin Town at week 2 of Wayfinder at the Unison Arts Center participants got to do just that. Assassin Town is an Adventure Game written by long time staff member JJ Muste in which there lives a town full of assassins. When the king stops in for a surprise visit the assassins must attempt to hide the truth of their village and pretend to be simple townsfolk. Needless to say after many mind wipes and goofy adventures the king, the very same one who banned magic, figured out what was going on. It was up to the assassins (participants) to figure out what to do with the king. In a beautiful twist they convinced the king that magic isn’t evil and started to train him in their ways. 20157501_1602652799754270_4352019888076173512_o

Over at WDS the war between order and chaos raged on. Lord Subtle (portrayed by our very own Wes Chaplin) called on beings from all over the dimensions to help aid in saving the world. From velociraptors to disco witches this rag tag team of heros defended the realm. Written by Jay Dragon, Debts Collected was quite the adventuros romp.

During the day, while not playing unlikely, interdimensional heroes our campers had a blast playing sword games, improv games and more: such as endless rounds of Prince a Paris (a focus game) and Combat Roleplaying (it’s like mixing serious improv in to sword games, it’s wonderful).

We also made a new wayfinder record for the longest round of capture the flag at Unison when 45 people played a continuous round for over an hour and forty five minutes which ended in a sudden death. It was amazing to see these campers and staff working so hard and planning each wave just to be so equally matched.

That’s a wrap on day camps at these two lands. Two weeks of play, two weeks of community, and two weeks of adventure in the books!

Written by Trine Boode-Petersen
Photos by various staff at camp