I just bought a nice-looking smoking pipe for use as a character prop for LARPing. It's a working pipe and so I could use it for actually smoking tobacco in character, but I choose not to smoke, primarily for health reasons but also because (based on my experience of cigarettes) I don't like the smell or taste of burning tobacco (I am lacking experience of pipe tobacco, I am aware it is different).
The pipe is made of wood with a metal-lined bowl. It comes apart into two pieces – the mouthpiece and the bowl piece. Here are some images of the particular pipe I have, though I'm open to using other equipment if this one can't work:
(Click for larger images.)
Is there a way I could modify the pipe to make it seem like I'm really smoking it, rather than constantly walking around with an unfilled, unlit pipe?
The LARP venue allows smoking. There are already several players who smoke hand-rolled cigarettes to satisfy their RL addiction to nicotine, so second-hand smoke isn't an (additional) concern.
Best Answer
Gently blow into your pipe instead of pulling smoke in
Meaning that you fill and prepare your pipe as you would for actual smoking and then light it.
Discounting 2nd-hand inhalation there should be no ill side effects except for the smell. But as you're doing this only rarely at LARPs there should be no issues.
I normally just properly smoke a pipe on LARPs but I used the above technique successfully on occasion when I was not in the mood for doing so (I'm a non smoker outside LARPs).
Non-tobacco alternative
For people averse to tobaccos second hand effects (or the tobacco industry in general which they might not want to support) an alternative can be burning tea leaves - i.e. regular black or green tea that you could buy in any shop. I know people who mixed this into their cigarettes and it seemed to work out ok. You might have to pay attention not to buy the cheapest finest ground tea, as this will likely clog up your pipe, though.
Note that this will still produce smoke and second hand smoking effects - simply without the nicotine.
Small note, as this might be unclear: when actually smoking a pipe the smoke is not normally inhaled, but simply drawn into the mouth for the taste. This arguably makes it less _unhealthy than smoking cigarettes/shisha/... as it at least doesn't affect your lungs. You'll still get some nicotine effects (through absorption in your mouth), but not as much as when inhaling nicotine smoke.