So Forkbeard.

This guy kept popping up everywhere I looked, with bits of advice here and there and reasonable pimping of his well-crafted wares.  Like Gamhain, he also listed Belegarth as his game of choice.  I think images of some of the stuff he made finally encouraged me to search for the Belegarth site proper.

I skimmed over most of the site and learned it was very much in the vein of Dagorhir. (Which I later learned was the organization it split from after some differences in managerial opinion)  Less heavy on the role-playing, more heavy on the sport and combat aspect.  Which seemed to scratch the itch I didn't know I had.

I had started looking into LARP at roughly the same time I began planning a swordfight for my wedding. (Pirate wedding, wife suggested it and I had no problem with that.)  I'd watched a few videos on fencing basics and had even started looking into local clubs just as I found Belegarth.  I realized I wanted flourishes of fantasy but I was more interested in learning how to fight as well as exercising in a fun way while learning.

So I dove into the forums and lurked, and read about weapon construction, garb creation, armor, politics with other groups, units, training methods, pretty much anything and everything on the first two or three pages of every subforum.  It gave me a good idea of the overall state of the game, where to get or make gear, who were the leading voices (at least on the boards) and who was playing in my area.

These were the guys playing in my realm?  How could you not want to swing swords with guys dressed like that?  Fork looks like a goddamn modern day viking.  I finally decided to create an account on the board and get in touch with Cedric and Magnus to express my interest in joining Acheron.  Of course I did this right in the middle of planning the previously mentioned pirate wedding, when I had absolutely no free time.  I also happened to join the board about a week before Chaos Wars 15 so it was pretty dead while people were making preparations.

A funny thing happened during the swordfight practices with my wife for the wedding, though.  She discovered she enjoyed fighting just as much as I do.