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Arashin Kujqai · **07-23-2017, 09:37 AM**

(07-23-2017, 09:29 AM)AishaHeartfield Wrote:
For me personally, so much character development occurs through the complex interactions between my character and those written by other people. To skip all the experiences and interactions that may lead to an organic connection between them is to deny my character what I feel to be genuine development and progression within the world. A large part of the creative appeal of roleplay for me, as opposed to writing on my own, is to watch my character develop through unpredictable situations and engagements with others.

I feel that a prior arranged romantic roleplay would rob that creative process of its organic value and in turn, result in a character that feels forced or unnatural. It would affect my immersion.

While I certainly don't judge others for pre-arranging romances, or seeking out that kind of writing specifically; I feel that the relationships my character forms with others is part of the greater whole of who she is. Romance is never the central theme to the story of any of my characters, only a supporting plot that may or may not enhance her story and development.

From my experiences, I find that the more forceful someone appears OOClyÂ for their character to be involved with my own, the less receptive I become to the idea even if it may have been a natural step my character could have taken. I distinctly recall, my character becoming involved with another (a different game) and when I in a friendly way said I 'missed them' meaning the writing during a very busy period of my life the person's response was, "You don't miss them. You miss me."

Needless to say, I did not continue to roleplay with that person because they had begun to blur the lines and since have grown cautious of roleplay with too heavy a romantic component.

My condolences for that happening :/, I guess at some point we all learn one way or another how to handle these sort of interactions to prevent the same mistake. I still to this day don't know how some people handle having IC and OOC relationships and both sides being perfectly fine. I'm sure someone will say again "your characters aren't you" but immersion is still a concept and some people can't separate emotion from idea. It's personally why I'm straying from it so much atm, the most I handle would be innocent/light hinted flirtation that implies a small crush between the two characters. To feel enveloped in the character you write is something that gives writers motivation and the fun they desire(just look at my journal entries, they're inspiration for me to RP with). When the line gets blurred though, that's the moment when it's time to realize the other person may think differently or goes about RP differently, or maybe even the person themselves have secretly been creating something they didn't originally mean to. Either way, it stems off too much immersion to some degrees varying and always will depend on the players you trust to RP with or clarifying OOCly that there's nothing beyond that.

SicketySix · **07-23-2017, 09:46 AM**

I've done both types of RP, and honestly I've both had success/failure for both. Pre-planned skips the whole "Does the character like mine?" or "Is the player themselves even interested in romance RP." However to me it takes most of the fun out of it.

Either way, success or failure comes down to the individuals behind the characters, and not whether it was pre-planned or not.

Kaiverta · **07-23-2017, 09:51 AM**

(07-23-2017, 09:46 AM)SicketySix Wrote: I've done both types of RP, and honestly I've both had success/failure for both. Pre-planned skips the whole "Does the character like mine?" or "Is the player themselves even interested in romance RP." However to me it takes most of the fun out of it.

Either way, success or failure comes down to the individuals behind the characters, and not whether it was pre-planned or not.

Definitely player-related. A couple of my failed IC relationships were not because of the other person's character, or mine, but because of the other person OOCly. I understand being busy, but if you have enough time to send messages elsewhere or be online in a public setting so I know you are online (I don't stalk xD), then surely you can spare two minutes? So for the most part, it has been OOCly nonsense from the other person (way more detailed than that but I won't go into it) that causes the IC relationships to fail.

The pre-planned thing failed because the characters didn't develop together before they were PUT together. It just didn't work - it wasn't ever going to since it wasn't a 'pre arranged marriage RP', like someone mentioned before. That is a good way that a pre-arranged thing might work, but where characters are supposed to have known each other for a period before the RPing even started, that's more complicated and less likely to succeed.

Kaiverta · **07-23-2017, 09:52 AM**

(07-23-2017, 09:29 AM)AishaHeartfield Wrote:
For me personally, so much character development occurs through the complex interactions between my character and those written by other people. To skip all the experiences and interactions that may lead to an organic connection between them is to deny my character what I feel to be genuine development and progression within the world. A large part of the creative appeal of roleplay for me, as opposed to writing on my own, is to watch my character develop through unpredictable situations and engagements with others.

I feel that a prior arranged romantic roleplay would rob that creative process of its organic value and in turn, result in a character that feels forced or unnatural. It would affect my immersion.

While I certainly don't judge others for pre-arranging romances, or seeking out that kind of writing specifically; I feel that the relationships my character forms with others is part of the greater whole of who she is. Romance is never the central theme to the story of any of my characters, only a supporting plot that may or may not enhance her story and development.

From my experiences, I find that the more forceful someone appears OOClyÂ for their character to be involved with my own, the less receptive I become to the idea even if it may have been a natural step my character could have taken. I distinctly recall, my character becoming involved with another (a different game) and when I in a friendly way said I 'missed them' meaning the writing during a very busy period of my life the person's response was, "You don't miss them. You miss me."

Needless to say, I did not continue to roleplay with that person because they had begun to blur the lines and since have grown cautious of roleplay with too heavy a romantic component.

Sorry you had that issue, but at least you recognized a potential problem and removed yourself from the situation. Really, RP should be fun and even dramatic, but the drama should never spill into OOCly relations. It's ICly. It's separate.

Hopefully you can build strong, safe RP relationships (ICly ones and trustworthy OOC friendships) in the future. Smile

Erah'sae · **07-23-2017, 09:55 AM**

About the only pre-arranged romatic RP I've done was with my OOC SO with one exception and that was still a RL friend. Â We designed characters that worked well together, and worked romantically, but never really made that the focus of their RP. Â Romance was just something that kind of was implied / expected most of the time.. Â

It freed us up from dealing with others focused on relationship based RP because our characters were already committed. It also gave a brilliant excuse to duck out of scenes.

It also helped when that we were both the type to look at our characters and going "What can we do to these poor sods now!" and then when said atrocity was surmounted, we had that close partnership between them to play out the coping and resolution.

Now, allow me to turn towards a more 'beardy' discussion on this for a moment. Â (It's a technical term)

In the end we all play for a more or less similar reasons. Â To change the way we feel, either through accomplishment, to avoid something, to indulge ourselves in something. Â Maybe to make sense of things on a small scale when we can't do that with the rest of the world. Â

We achieve this in so many ways it's beyond counting. Â Each of us through different things. Â We all change how we feel in different ways. Â Some by climbing an infuriating tower; by punching things in savage raids; perhaps by weaving an intriguing storyline or getting that perfect screenshot. Â Maybe even something as simple as derailing Kugane shout into puns about tea.
Maybe even in exploring romance in a virtual setting.

How we all change how we feel based on what desires and needs. Â I'm not going to go into analyzing what might be the case with these posts. Â It may be something as simple as not wanting to deal with that sort of situation coming up on the fly in their RP and dealing with anxiety and drama there? Â Maybe the satisfaction of coming home, logging in and knowing that they have someone there to RP with? Â There are as many causes and answers as there are grains of sand.

In the end it's no more or less valid then shaping a character to fit a particular concept or FC nor then logging in to grind a craft skill to 70 or what have you.

Kaiverta · **07-23-2017, 10:05 AM**

(07-23-2017, 09:55 AM)Erah Wrote: About the only pre-arranged romatic RP I've done was with my OOC SO with one exception and that was still a RL friend. Â We designed characters that worked well together, and worked romantically, but never really made that the focus of their RP. Â Romance was just something that kind of was implied / expected most of the time.. Â

It freed us up from dealing with others focused on relationship based RP because our characters were already committed. It also gave a brilliant excuse to duck out of scenes.

It also helped when that we were both the type to look at our characters and going "What can we do to these poor sods now!" and then when said atrocity was surmounted, we had that close partnership between them to play out the coping and resolution.

Now, allow me to turn towards a more 'beardy' discussion on this for a moment. Â (It's a technical term)

In the end we all play for a more or less similar reasons. Â To change the way we feel, either through accomplishment, to avoid something, to indulge ourselves in something. Â Maybe to make sense of things on a small scale when we can't do that with the rest of the world. Â

We achieve this in so many ways it's beyond counting. Â Each of us through different things. Â We all change how we feel in different ways. Â Some by climbing an infuriating tower; by punching things in savage raids; perhaps by weaving an intriguing storyline or getting that perfect screenshot. Â Maybe even something as simple as derailing Kugane shout into puns about tea.
Maybe even in exploring romance in a virtual setting.

How we all change how we feel based on what desires and needs. Â I'm not going to go into analyzing what might be the case with these posts. Â It may be something as simple as not wanting to deal with that sort of situation coming up on the fly in their RP and dealing with anxiety and drama there? Â Maybe the satisfaction of coming home, logging in and knowing that they have someone there to RP with? Â There are as many causes and answers as there are grains of sand.

In the end it's no more or less valid then shaping a character to fit a particular concept or FC nor then logging in to grind a craft skill to 70 or what have you.

Well said. Smile

There are pros and cons to pre-arranged and developing relationships for different people.

Rosekitten · **07-23-2017, 11:08 AM**

Personally in my experience it's easier to set up the idea that the characters may get together without stepping on toes because my word.. some people are hurt by the smallest of things. In the past some of my more entertaining character relations were with a friend who would brainstorm with me as to what hells to run the pair through after the previous plot was finished.. While fun I have had amazing interactions in the past with random relationships. Pretty few and far between but it did happen.

Now a days I only have relationship rps with my husband and his characters. Granted they are all prearranged .. or I guess you could say they are. We still go about the bases of actually making a story and not just writing that characters are married just because. I'm happy with how our characters and stories turn out so I see nothing wrong with setting up ideas for a story.

Also seeing as it was mentioned.. I've run into some of those who use rp as a dating service... More then a few times. Even when saying I was married it didn't seem to deter them in the least. (yay for blacklist)

Kilieit · **07-23-2017, 11:09 AM**

It's really down to personal preferences. So I'm gonna talk about mine, hahaha.

I've done it both ways, and like others had both success and failure with both - failures including a spontaneous character relationship that fizzled out and got stale after the initial IC fuzzies but the other player wasn't willing to "let go of something we'd worked hard on" despite the fact it was boring us both to tears so I had to go over their head on it and have my character break up with theirs; and a planned character relationship where the characters didn't get along as well as we'd thought they would (one character was refusing to open up about their common ground with the other, the other was refusing to comprehend that the first could understand their life enough to share in it) and we decided to leave the IC failed romance attempt as an IC failed romance attempt instead of taking it further. (Which, I mean, is still good roleplay! Just not romance RP.)

Both of my character's current relationships were sorta planned, but it was - you know - planned, in that we made a plan, we didn't just say "that's gonna happen now" and smush our characters together. We had the mutual "our characters would be cute together", went over discussing OOC some of their themes and personality traits and seeing if we thought they would like each other, did a few litmus roleplays, agreed it was probably going to work, and went more spontaneously from there - using the mental list of common character themes to guide the relationship's development over time (e.g. both characters have a fear of abandonment? How would they handle it if they were separated by circumstances for a bit?).

I don't think I've ever done this with a total stranger, but I don't imagine the process would differ very much... OOC (for want of a better word) ""interviews"" and platonic litmus roleplays to see if things were going to be interesting, discussing common character traits and themes, before launching into it IC and seeing how things go.

There are a few other characters that mine has spontaneously developed a crush on at the moment, but as someone with anxiety I've found it difficult to do the "my character likes your character, what should we do" conversation. At the end of the day, it doesn't hurt my character too much for the crushes to be apparently unrequited - it's quite IC for him in some respects - so at least there's no harm in me letting it hang like that while I sort out my confidence...

QalliFlower · **07-23-2017, 11:31 AM**

People want what people want. Â Trite or profound, it just seems more fair for them to be upfront about their priorities.

I tend to write characters who fall somewhere outside the "cute singles in your area" genre, and while it's still entirely plausible for someone to find them dateable, they just aren't built with romance in mind. Â And while most folks looking for contacts who say "romance is nice if it happens" mean it sincerely, it's pretty clear that others really reallyÂ want romance that also ties into their larger story. Â And that's fine - I'd just really rather they were more forthcoming about it so I'd know they didn't want what I was offering.

T'ahlia Chelewae · **07-23-2017, 12:01 PM**

I'm guessing there are a couple reasons why people pursue this. One might be they have limited time for gaming, and this type of rp is important to them, so they want to make sure they are using their time well. Another might be that the most important aspect of rp for them is this type, so they want to cut to the chase and find someone on the same page.

For me personally, it holds no interest. However, that is simply because of how I choose to play T'ahlia. My background is theatrical and literary, so what interests me are stories. I look at rp as a type of improvisation. So I know who T'ahlia is, her background, and what motivates her, and all of her personal challenges. Quite honestly, it could be that it never comes up for her, because of how broken she is behind her smil. But if it did, it would be the same as I approach any storyline with her--moment to moment, and what makes sense based on what just happened. I have several plotlines in my head for her (none romantic), but no idea how they will turn out. That's the way I want it, because I don't want to know the ending of a story before I get to it. But not everyone is like that.

SapphireSkylines · **07-23-2017, 12:02 PM**

Like a lot of people who posted before, I've done both as well and I've had great experiences with both. Another reason for prearranged romance is that it does take some trust OOCly to get a romance RP going. Like a lot of people mix IC with OOC and it causes a big drama explosion, especially with romance RP so to avoid drama, I sometimes like to pre plan things with RP partners who I trust. On the other hand, it's fun to also have romance develop between two characters with a player you may not know as well.

I have two examples of both that are successful. I had pre planned a romance RP with Liara's husband's player and they have a very beautiful story. Liara and Jaja are probably one of the most compatible couples I've RPed. We did hit a rough patch when we had some OOC problems happening between us that had nothing to do with the RP so we took a hiatus from Liara and Jaja for awhile, but we did get back into it and the couple's just as happy as ever.Â

The other, which wasn't pre planned was Zhara's relationship with Chachan. A few scenes in of them RPing as friends, I wasn't sure where they were going to end up, but they ended up in a pretty good spot. They have their differences from each other but I think they compliment each other very well. Both couples have been active (minus Liara and Jaja's OOC hiatus) for about a year.

Lydia Lightfoot · **07-23-2017, 12:18 PM**

Yay, my topic got a lot of replies while I slept! Big Grin

I think a lot of the uncertainty element, at least as a player, can be mitigated by communication. Whenever a character I've played over the years has seemed to be potentially making a romance-possible connection with someone's character, I like to chat with the player of the other character and make sure I'm not misreading their OOC intention. Sometimes a player will just want their character to be flirty or something but not actually have it go anywhere, so a discussion like that assures me that it wasn't, like... the player ended up not liking my writing, or something like that.Â

If it is something they player is interested in, then the OOC discussion ends up shifting to pragmatic topics. Are our schedules reasonably compatible as players? If the characters did get romantically involved they needn't be attached at the hip, of course, but if we'd only be likely to even get to RP once a week, that may make it difficult for them to have enough face time to actually form that connection. Do we have similarities in our ideals as players? Some players tend to be collaborative with storytelling while others prefer to be very independent; some play a lot of alts and others mostly focus on a main character only or maybe one lone alt; some have an active schedule of activities their character is involved in and so the potential romance interest might have to chase them around a bit, whereas others may be hoping said romantic interest will lead the way to RP events; some may have a stronger separation between IC and OOC than others (and as others have mentioned they may even be hoping their RP will lead to an OOC interest, which is a good thing to be informed about up front, to avoid hurt feelings on their part later when the other person is like "wait what?"); and of course the "adult stuff talk" - do they prefer FTB or not, and if not, to what extent to they prefer it be a focal point of their romantic RP.

I've had plenty of situations where after having the OOC chat, the other player and I realize that our interests as players just don't line up enough that this promising thing our characters have led themselves to is just probably not going to be a happy time for us as players - and that's okay to realize that. It's the same in any hobby. You can run a D&D group and enjoy the company of this person from the game store who's just a real hoot, but, the guy just has a hectic and oddball schedule and it's impossible to get him around a table on a consistent basis, so he's not a good fit for your D&D group even if he's a cool dude.Â

Sometimes, that result means I don't ever really see that player's character around again, and other times I do, but the characters have a fairly organic evolution of their original "hmm, maybe?" thoughts into "mm, friends is good" instead. Or, sometimes other fun results happen, wherein one of the characters ends up harboring a crush or something like that, and as happens in real life, it just doesn't lead anywhere.Â

I've often thought to myself - is this OOC chat technically a form of pre-arrangement? I don't really feel like it is, because we're not deciding the characters will become involved, we're just determining whether or not if they became involved it would actually be a workable situation for us as players.

Kaiverta · **07-23-2017, 12:21 PM**

(07-23-2017, 11:08 AM)Rosekitten Wrote: Personally in my experience it's easier to set up the idea that the characters may get together without stepping on toes because my word.. some people are hurt by the smallest of things. In the past some of my more entertaining character relations were with a friend who would brainstorm with me as to what hells to run the pair through after the previous plot was finished.. While fun I have had amazing interactions in the past with random relationships. Pretty few and far between but it did happen.

Now a days I only have relationship rps with my husband and his characters. Granted they are all prearranged .. or I guess you could say they are. We still go about the bases of actually making a story and not just writing that characters are married just because. I'm happy with how our characters and stories turn out so I see nothing wrong with setting up ideas for a story.

Also seeing as it was mentioned.. I've run into some of those who use rp as a dating service... More then a few times. Even when saying I was married it didn't seem to deter them in the least. (yay for blacklist)

Ah yep, see? In this case, you're RPing with your husband, so that would totally work, and it's one hundred percent safe. Smile

If I had a significant other who RPed, I might consider pre-arranging at least in PART, but for me personally, without a significant other, I'm completely happy with things unfolding as they will. I don't plan for my characters to fall for the characters of others, so it happens naturally - or it doesn't. :3

That person ignored the fact that you were married? That's pretty bad. >.>

Kaiverta · **07-23-2017, 12:29 PM**

(07-23-2017, 12:18 PM)Lydia Lightfoot Wrote: Yay, my topic got a lot of replies while I slept!

I think a lot of the uncertainty element, at least as a player, can be mitigated by communication. Whenever a character I've played over the years has seemed to be potentially making a romance-possible connection with someone's character, I like to chat with the player of the other character and make sure I'm not misreading their OOC intention. Sometimes a player will just want their character to be flirty or something but not actually have it go anywhere, so a discussion like that assures me that it wasn't, like... the player ended up not liking my writing, or something like that.Â

If it is something they player is interested in, then the OOC discussion ends up shifting to pragmatic topics. Are our schedules reasonably compatible as players? If the characters did get romantically involved they needn't be attached at the hip, of course, but if we'd only be likely to even get to RP once a week, that may make it difficult for them to have enough face time to actually form that connection. Do we have similarities in our ideals as players? Some players tend to be collaborative with storytelling while others prefer to be very independent; some play a lot of alts and others mostly focus on a main character only or maybe one lone alt; some have an active schedule of activities their character is involved in and so the potential romance interest might have to chase them around a bit, whereas others may be hoping said romantic interest will lead the way to RP events; some may have a stronger separation between IC and OOC than others (and as others have mentioned they may even be hoping their RP will lead to an OOC interest, which is a good thing to be informed about up front, to avoid hurt feelings on their part later when the other person is like "wait what?"); and of course the "adult stuff talk" - do they prefer FTB or not, and if not, to what extent to they prefer it be a focal point of their romantic RP.

I've had plenty of situations where after having the OOC chat, the other player and I realize that our interests as players just don't line up enough that this promising thing our characters have led themselves to is just probably not going to be a happy time for us as players - and that's okay to realize that. It's the same in any hobby. You can run a D&D group and enjoy the company of this person from the game store who's just a real hoot, but, the guy just has a hectic and oddball schedule and it's impossible to get him around a table on a consistent basis, so he's not a good fit for your D&D group even if he's a cool dude.Â

Sometimes, that result means I don't ever really see that player's character around again, and other times I do, but the characters have a fairly organic evolution of their original "hmm, maybe?" thoughts into "mm, friends is good" instead. Or, sometimes other fun results happen, wherein one of the characters ends up harboring a crush or something like that, and as happens in real life, it just doesn't lead anywhere.Â

I've often thought to myself - is this OOC chat technically a form of pre-arrangement? I don't really feel like it is, because we're not deciding the characters will become involved, we're just determining whether or not if they became involved it would actually be a workable situation for us as players.

Yep, pretty much everything you said there is sensible.

The big thing for me is communication. OOCly communication. So many relationships and friendships fizzled out because the other person didn't keep up communication. One person didn't play her character (the girlfriend of mine) for a whole year but was on every single day playing another romantic couple, for that whole year! But she never once had my character's girlfriend write a letter, or talk to me about maybe what they were doing while we weren't actually RPing them.

That wasn't a pre-planned romance on my part, but she was pushing hard to get my character to like hers (ICly mostly, with subtle hints OOCly that I can see now as I look back on it), and -eventually-, after months of almost constant interaction between the characters, they got together. Then the stuff above, etc.

Eses Fafa · **07-23-2017, 01:22 PM**

Personally don't endorse it myself, but it can be interesting for establishing partners that have been together for extensive periods of time, that no normal player would have been able to at that time. I'd say the longest I've held is at year 7 after doing it naturally, but a friend and I did plan for a couple that's been together for a few centuries on another game.

Suffice it to say, that's about the extent of its usefulness, and mainly serves as an excuse to interact with just the one person instead of getting to know others outside of that roleplay.

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Why pre-arrange romantic RP?

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