IN PURSUIT OF THE WITCH KING

HOW WARP COMBINES ACADEMICS, IMAGINATION, AND FUN

BY SHAUN KITTLE

The clash of foam swords on shields reverberates throughout the forest amidst pronouncements of triumph and glory. The Witch King is determined, and his band of monsters are willing to fight tooth and claw for victory. A flash of red means Invincible is once again on the move, a weapon in each hand. The creature sneers at any attempt to vanquish him as the wisps do damage control, healing injured warriors so they can continue the fight.

Things are beginning to look dire, with no clear path to victory. That is, until a red gem appears from behind a warrior’s cloak…

There is nothing quite like Wilderness Action Role Play (WARP) at North Country School, but to truly understand it one must first don a cloak and choose a shield for protection. Battle and glory are a small part of what WARP is, though. As students travel through the WARP—WARP is both the name of the activity and the world in which it takes place—they must work together to solve riddles, protect each other from monsters, and figure out where to go next.

In this year’s iteration, the quest began with a nervous guide named Chimney the Fire Sweep, played by teacher and WARP enthusiast Larry Robjent, leading the group to a pile of shields. Chimney then entrusted them with a wooden box adorned with strange markings on its lid. Wonder and fascination did the rest. The students gathered closely around the mysterious, prized object, and carefully opened it to reveal an amulet and other items whose purpose was unknown.

Chimney explained that the WARP is dangerous, and that working together was the only way to get through it safely. He then showed them the honeycomb, a co-operative move in which the students spread out with arms extended and fingertips touching their neighbors’ fingertips. The honeycomb, he explained, would allow them to communicate with some of the WARP’s characters and make them invisible to the land’s more villainous monsters.

And monsters there would be. It turned out, the Troll King from last year’s adventure had been seen associating with a bad lot—the Witch King and the crimson-cloaked Invincible. The Wisps of the Woods were frozen and a spell had befallen Digitor. The root of these problems was anybody’s guess.

“The Troll King used to be good, but this year we’re not sure. He’s been hanging out with the Witch King, so is he evil? We’re not sure. Is he poisoned? We don’t know,” said Larry. “The groups may end up destroying the Witch King, we’ll just have to see where the story goes.”

WARP started about 10 years ago, after a Live Action Role Play group visited the school. NCS Director of Teaching and Learning Dave Steckler said the event was fun, but he thought faculty could make it more personalized.

“I always thought LARP was cool, but theirs was very much about the story,” Dave said. “I felt like we could do something that knows our property and its special features. I wanted it to be a game that encouraged students to explore the campus, something tailored to NCS.”

The first WARP was comprised of a loosely formulated story, complete with characters to meet and challenges to complete, then students and faculty were decked out in costumes befitting of a fantasy realm and set loose to meet the denizens of the land and resolve any nefarious plots that were brewing. Dave admits it was a bit chaotic, but it was also a blast.

“WARP is a playful time that encourages everybody to get in the mode of developing this community and this story,” Dave said. “There’s an opportunity here, where every time you interact with someone you can have a memorable moment. There are those heroic moments of rescuing a friend, chasing something off, or discovering a treasure together. It’s just childlike fun.”

WARP is traditionally an all-day event that happens on the weekend, a sort of rite-of-passage in the NCS experience that brings the community together under one big, ridiculous tent of magic and make-believe. It is such a tradition that elements of WARP have become part of the NCS landscape, like Rebel Ridge, Spider’s Web, and Dagobah.

This fall, because of restrictions imposed by COVID-19, WARP looked different. Instead of the full-blown event, smaller groups of students participated by grade during out-times. There were 10 total sessions and each group played twice, with the story wrapping up on the second play-through.

The brains behind the re-thinking of WARP was 9th-grader Ella, whose first foray with the event was playing the Healing Fairy at four years old. Ella has played many characters since her inaugural performance as a healer of injured characters, but this year she collaborated with her father, Larry, and academic intern and WARP veteran Marcos Fernandez (NCS 08-12, current staff, CTT 05-08, staff 15-17) on how to maintain the WARP tradition while adhering to COVID guidelines.

Besides hatching the plan to spread the event out, Ella also wrote the main storyline and worked with teachers to add an academic element to the quest, with many of the puzzles touching on classroom lessons. Haikuman demanded onthe-spot haikus before the group could pass; a large shrimplike creature named Digitor was the victim of a spell which could only be broken by answering math problems scrawled on the sap-bucket chitin that comprises the poor creature’s tail. Digitor was created last year by then-9th-grader Sky (NCS 20), who made the costume as his final love letter to WARP.

“It’s kind of like we do a theatrical show every week,” Larry said. “We’re in character with the kids; we’re in character with each other. Ella has written a show that we’re performing.”

Ella didn’t just work behind the scenes. She also played one of the two Wisps of the Woods, characters integral to the storyline. A clue instructing the adventurers to gather stones that don’t belong in the landscape—a little nod to geology lessons—sets the children on a treasure hunt that ends in the freeing of the wisps. The wisps then helped the adventurers by leading them to Rotunda, a WARP-dweller who trained them in the ways of safe combat using pool-noodle swords.

“We knew there needed to be some magical creature that was good that could guide the group if it got stuck,” Ella said. “It was just a way to keep the story moving."

Speaking of rocks, things in the WARP are never etched in stone. The participants are just as much a part of the story’s evolution as those who created it behind the scenes, and that can lead to unexpected twists in the plot. It’s all a big, glorious experiment.

Now, a decade after the first WARP warriors took to the forests, Walter Breeman Performing Arts Center is home to a whole collection of student-made WARP costumes and the world’s storyline is just as malleable as it ever was. The plot isn’t what’s important; there is no pressure to make it from point A to point B. WARP is about creativity, it’s about collaborating to solve a set of mysteries occurring in a land where there is no homework or due dates or alarm clocks. At its core, WARP is a form of play capable of breaking the spell of mediocrity to engage the mind and set the imagination free.