The Lantern Hall
Painting: an ancient lexicon open on a carved lectern in a dark chapel of books, glowing runes and symbols lifting off its pages like fireflies.
TermGeneral term

Boffer

A padded foam weapon used for safe, full-contact combat in live-action games. American battle games such as Dagorhir and Amtgard built whole combat systems on boffers, with hits counted by body location.

A padded foam weapon used for safe, full-contact combat in live-action games. American battle games such as Dagorhir and Amtgard built whole combat systems on boffers, with hits counted by body location.

Quick answers

What does "Boffer" mean?
A padded foam weapon used for safe, full-contact combat in live-action games. American battle games such as Dagorhir and Amtgard built whole combat systems on boffers, with hits counted by body location.

Nearby in the archive

Live-Action Roleplay (LARP)

Screen & live genre1977

Roleplaying on your feet: players in costume become their characters in a real place and real time, swinging foam swords in a forest or negotiating vampire politics in a hotel ballroom.

Dagorhir

Community1977

In 1977 a Washington, D.C., Tolkien fan who had never heard of D&D or medieval reenactment took Tolkien and a Robin Hood film to a park with foam swords, founding the oldest recorded LARP group and the American boffer battle game.

Society for Creative Anachronism

Organization1966

A May Day 1966 backyard tournament in Berkeley, fought with plywood swords and fencing masks, grew into a worldwide kingdom of knights, heralds and scribes: the Middle Ages "as they ought to have been."

Bleed

General term

Emotional spillover between player and character: feelings from the game carried into real life, or real feelings shaping play. Bleed can be powerful and deliberate, especially in Nordic larp, but it is also a reason for Safety tools.