As a non-profit LARP organiser, we believe in showing you where your ticket money goes. Those of us behind the Modern Mythic name never pocket any money from the events we run; everything is put 100% towards the game you play. Since we have had to make some pricing changes for our 2026 events, we have understandably had some questions from players as to why these changes have occurred. The following information is intended to provide honest, transparent context for this - using real Q&A chats that we have recently had on our Discord server. 

1. WHY IS THERE A £5 INCREASE IN THE ARENA BASE TICKET COST THIS YEAR?
The Arena site we have hired costs £1400 a day - and this was with them being very kind and cutting us a deal. This is... the lower end of average by today's site cost standards. Over the last few events, we've found we're increasingly putting our own money into site costs, resources, props, etc, because we refuse to compromise on the quality of the game. However, we are two dumb, broke nerds and we unfortunately have had to make the difficult decision to increase the ticket costs this year to ensure we cover site and as much of the other running costs as possible. 

2. CAN I HAVE A DISCOUNT ON MY TICKET?
Due to the same reasons listed above, we are sadly unable to provide support in the way of ticket cost reductions moving forward. This absolutely kills us because we have always, always wanted to make sure that anyone who wanted to play our game, no matter what their circumstances, could do so. However, we are now at the point where providing that support means taking on personal debt, even with additional ticket top-ups by several generous players, and in the current economy we simply cannot justify that trade-off, however much we would like to.

3. WHY IS THERE A £2 PROCESSING FEE PER TRANSACTION?
We have set up an automated online payment system which allows players to purchase tickets via our website, which will be processed through a 3rd party provider. They deduct a set percentage of the fee from every transaction they process - hence the £2 processing fee.
 
What this new system means for us and you:
 

• Tickets can be purchased in one simple process; no more faffing about with manual bank transfers.​

• Our admin time is drastically reduced as we won't need to check the bank account every day to see who's paid what; nor will we need to create a full player-base payment tracker which needs manually maintaining and updating almost daily.

• Tickets purchased on a payment plan will be set up with automatic instalments so you won't need to remember to pay us - and we won't need to spend hours trying to work out who we need to chase for missed payments, how much we're chasing them for, and then trying every which way from emailing to smoke signals in an attempt to make contact.

Essentially, it will massively make our lives a million times easier and give us more time to spend on creating really cool events (as well as just having some free time in general!)
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3. WHY CAN'T MODERN MYTHIC ABSORB THE PROCESSING FEE?
By adding the £2 onto the ticket cost, it means that we as a game don't lose those couple of pounds from your ticket payment. Whilst it doesn't necessarily sound like a lot, here's a quick hypothetical breakdown:
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•  Arena base ticket costs £100

•  3rd party provider takes £2 processing fee

•  Arena IC T-shirt cost is (on average) around £10 (but has been up to £20 in the past)

•  Leaving us with £88 per ticket - but we haven't yet factored in site cost or additional game expenses

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When we work out ticket costs, we always try to work on the basis of selling a minimum of 30 tickets just to cover the site. So, with the above breakdown, if we're left with £88 per ticket and we multiply that by 30, we get £2640. Our T29 site is £2800 to hire - meaning if we sold just 30 tickets in this fashion, we would be short by £160 for the site.
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If we charge £102 (base price + processing fee), we receive the full £100. Though we'd still be losing around £10/ticket on a t-shirt, we'd then have £90 x 30 which gives us £2700. Still £100 short for site, but it's the difference of retaining an extra £60 - and then we just have to pray that we sell more than 30 tickets (or find cheaper t-shirts!)
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And that is all before we even get to any additional game expenses for props and monster kit, etc...
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4. WHY IS IT MORE EXPENSIVE TO PAY VIA INSTALMENTS?
Unfortunately, the 3rd party provider will take their processing fee from each separate instalment. So, for these ticket payments, if we didn't add on the additional £2 for each instalment (split into 3 payments) then we'd be losing £6 per ticket for every person who paid via this method. Again, this might not sound like a lot, but when you crunch the numbers on a larger scale it really does start to add up.
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We're absolutely not trying to punish or penalise anyone who might need to split their ticket cost up; this automated option is just one way to do it. If you want to only pay the processing fee once, then it might be worth looking at setting up a standing order to a personal savings account, or manually setting aside instalments across whatever time period works for you, so that you can save up until you're able to pay the ticket in one lump sum.
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5. WHY HAVE YOU DECIDED TO DO THIS NOW?
We've tried really hard so far to avoid doing things like raising ticket prices and other costs, but sadly everything for running a LARP event has been getting increasingly more expensive over the last couple of years. Site costs are ridiculous - we were incredibly lucky to get this one for £2800, as the majority of sites gave us quotes that were upwards of £5000.
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In an ideal world, we would have kept our prices the same, and wouldn't be throwing anything extra in the mix. But sadly we just can't afford to do it anymore; we've been paying more than we've let on from our own pocket - which granted has been our choice - but the events so far wouldn't have been able to run if we hadn't, and our own funds are now swiftly depleting. To be super clear, we're not telling you this for sympathy or to guilt you into paying more! Everything we've personally put in financially has been because we wanted to make the best game for everyone, and to see our vision for the game come to life. It's now just plain old, boring, everyday reality getting in the way, unfortunately.
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We hope this helps to give some context to the changes; we really love and appreciate all of you, and the support and love that you've shown for our games over the years. We're just trying to find ways now to keep making those games viable for us all to enjoy!
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