Oh, it was definitely how that world worked, and she played that role really well.

But, the experience (especially in multi-day nonstop LARPs, where you immerse into the world and your character really extensively) is pretty indistinguishable from real-life. At least in how you perceive it. For the few days, your life has these problems now. And you just accept it and get into it, and don't even consider a difference between real and "imaginary" problems. It's hard to describe, tbh.

I was not trying to imply that any of the involved people were grifters, I was mostly talking about the experience of being in a situation like that, where you have to actually talk to someone like that. I'm pretty sure that there wouldn't be much of a difference between talking to someone who can roleplay well and has spend two days in their character, vs. talking to someone who spent most of their life being indoctrinated like this.

Or rather, the problem-solving part of it. I had literal days in that world to figure out how to approach this, what to say so it would work in that situation, how to argue with her. I didn't come up with anything that would work, and things that I came up with were swiftly rebated by fanatic religious speeches. Just like she had a pretty easy time of coming up with arguments I couldn't say much against, that would still be perfectly in-character, as she told me after the LARP.

EDIT: I may have misunderstood your comment, sorry :D. Yes, you are right, it was how the world worked - we did eventually all died because some kind of evil has been awakened, lol. But that doesn't change anything about the experience of having to argue with someone who's indoctrinated in a cult vs. you, who don't believe in stuff like that. It's difficult. From my point of view, they were grifters, because I had no indication of proof of what they are saying, so I did my best to figure out what to do or say, and I couldn't come up with anything.