Olympic relay & team events favor large nations, shouldn't small nations be able to group?

You have hit the hardest part of running LARP events, the user-base wall. As much fun as LARP is, it comes with a certain stigma, even within the gaming hobby itself. How to get people into it?

You take a gamble. Many years ago a friend of mine who worked for the college newspaper got talking with the owner of an indoor LARP facility in a nearby town. Anyway, my friend was invited over for a game on the understanding that he would give an unbiased write-up in the newspaper.

It was a deal. My rather skeptical friend went along with only the most basic of costume (literally an old woolen blanket fashioned into a poncho/tabard type piece of kit) and went for an overnight adventure. Two weeks later he got the write-up into the college paper.

Now, it didn't drag along hundreds, but a good few went to try it and a handful stayed. I was one of the ones who tried and although I only visited a coupel of times, it was my first experience in a long and varied LARP career. This is one approach.

Contact the local newspaper and see if you can drag one of them along. Heck, see if you can get someone from the local TV station along while you're at it. Admittedly, it is always a gamble as you never know how they will "paint" the experience (note, local newspapers will, unless they have a specific agenda, nearly always praise a local event as it is a way of selling papers.

You and your twenty friends buy the paper, then your families etc - so they are more likely to be positive). Any gaming bloggers or podcasters nearby, invite them along. Offer "day passes" as prizes if there is a local fundraiser etc (You and a group of friends can experience an adventure in mythic lands... kinda thing - your players monster for a single adventure, but you might get a pickup or two).

It can be done. I regularly pulled in good numbers for a Sci-Fi/Cyberpunk event that I used to run with our university society and our fantasy game, even though we were only a small group, pulled in people from a wide area, including a coupel of pro prop-builders who played primarily at high-profile (and high cost) events.

Put the message out to others, and wait, all you can do.

I cant really gove you an answer,but what I can give you is a way to a solution, that is you have to find the anglde that you relate to or peaks your interest. A good paper is one that people get drawn into because it reaches them ln some way.As for me WW11 to me, I think of the holocaust and the effect it had on the survivors, their families and those who stood by and did nothing until it was too late.