Membership RP Things that scare you a bit

[Jaz 1]

What things in an RP make you curl your toes in anxiety?  For me, it would have to be sandbox games.  I like things to be orderly and structured.  I like rules that are clear and logical.  This might just be me being anal, but I get nervous when the dates of threads aren't clearly stated, or even the chronological setting of the forum.  How am I supposed to know what to include in my posts as fodder if I don't know when the thread takes place in relation to anything else? And sandbox games are just...too chaotic for my liking.  If you like them, that's brilliant.  I'm sure I would if they didn't intimidate me so much.  They do allow for a great deal of creativity, but I feel like they are pretty quick to fizzle out.  It's like when you're getting ice cream, and you're trying to decide on a flavor, but your brain blanks so you're just left sitting there staring at the tubs.  It's kind of like that, I think.  

 

Anywho, what scares you away from an RP? Discuss. 

[mystical 8]

Man I'm a neurotic rper as it is LOL, so this is gonna be a heck of a topic to reply to. 

 

Vague rulesets. I need very clear rules, I don't want to be constantly second guessing what I can and can't do on a site, so sites with wishy washy/uncertain rules just don't gel with me. Give me concrete rather than jello. If I'm constantly second guessing my actions, I'm going to be a huge ball of anxiety and probably end up leaving sooner rather than later cause I ain't got time for that. 

 

Overly complicated or demanding activity. Can I be a very active rper? Yes. Am I able to churn out posts knowing I have to meet (insert deadline/post date/post count number)? NOPE. My brain freezes up when I have arbitrary deadlines(especially word counts, U G H) and it just kills all desire I have to actually complete the things I need to. 

 

Clear setting. I need to know where I am, what's going on, how my characters relate to the plot and what I can include in their writing to make them fit in with their setting/surroundings. Sandboxes are great in theory(and I love them for private rp with friends to get some of the extraneous muse urges out), but I have never been able to commit to one. I'm just an organized rper and have to know the specifics of everything. 

 

Cohesive world workings. Like, tell me how things work in your setting. If there's magic or superpowers, I want to know what you can get away with. Don't handwave it and say ANYTHING GOES, that cripples my brain. I don't need scientific 'this is how it works exactly with this scientific principle behind it and these rules of nature', but I do need at least a baseline to know how to proceed. Otherwise I waffle and just end up not writing anything at all. 

[StormWolfe 557]

Massive numbers of IC forums. Makes it too hard for this ancient brain to keep up with all the threads everywhere. It tends to reduce my activity to reading and keeping up with just the people I RP with. I don't like that - I RP to read others' work as well as to write.

 

Too many forums on a board = intimidating.

[Athena 6]

I also like having a structure and clearly defined rules and such on boards that I join. I'm not sure I'd do very well on a sandbox RP for that reason.

 

Having too much information to read through before I can even start an app is also really intimidating for me. I've been on boards with a lot of original lore but I'm still paranoid that I may have missed something so if there's too much thrown at me, it just becomes really overwhelming.

 

I'm also weird in that something as simple as a board layout will make me second guess joining. If i can't find anything, it just frustrates me and I give up.

[Hysteria 56]

On 7/5/2018 at 10:20 AM, Jaz said:

For me, it would have to be sandbox games.  I like things to be orderly and structured.  I like rules that are clear and logical.  

 

 

I'm exactly the same. I am a very organized person but I also lack a lot of direction due to ADHD and my non-stop plot ideas. Having clear goals is what helps me through the scary world that is roleplay, so when those are taken away and I'm dumped into a world and told, "Do whatever you want! We don't care!"

 

I actually see it at best, as a lack of care when it comes to what members do and at worst, a lack of creativity from the staff team. This overall lacking can really scare me off an rp site fast because if you people don't know what you're doing how the heck do you expect me to be invested in it? You could easily change it up in two days and there would be no repercussions whatsoever. This is madness! Madness I tell you!

 

Another thing that scares me from RP's would be things that are restricted. I understand working for a goal and I encourage things like site badges, shops, character upgrades, etc. but restricting something off the bat (that isn't a specific event related thing) is just mean. For example let's say I joined the site, looked over all the species and I wanted to create a vampire. Well, you can create one...once you have 100,000 points and have already created two characters. Wonderful! I just have to invest time into something I don't want to invest time into in order to create the character I initially joined with the idea of. Perfect, guess I'll just be on my way ~

 

Again, I understand certain things; event races/etc should be limited because they're "special" but putting different limits on every race or power just because you want your members to work for it seems a little much. If it's a very powerful ability or a very rare thing then sure, make it worth the effort, but a vampire? I can play my character on another site. I came for the setting, and you're locking me behind a theoretical point-currency paywall just to test how long I'll stay on the site and at the end of the day, the thing that is supposed to build a member's motivation winds up killing it. I believe earning something should be fun and keep you motivated and fired up to roleplay, not crush you enough to leave as soon as you walked in.

 

Maybe I'm just sensitive.

[Elena 546]

I agree with @Jaz and @mystical. It seems we are similar. But I like as much information as possible about the setting, to incorporate it in my story. What if I invent something in contradiction with the existent, if that existent isn't specifically mentioned in resource, but only in threads?

[Dragon 673]

Running into those assholes that primarily want sex based role play. 

 

I don't want to write smut. I get laid in real life, writing sex is boring and repetitive. There is nothing I hate more than finding a great role play only to have some asshole ruin it because they initiate some tedious sex scene with any vague opportunity they get. Just find a damn erotic site to join and stop ruining my experience because your bored with your marriage or what the hell ever. 

 

It's a concern I have to deal with all the time and the reason I rarely join new sites anymore. 

 

Edited July 6, 2018 by Dragon

[CovertSphinx 710]

Too many rules give me an anxiety attack. Especially the little Nitpicky ones that would leave an Administrator going "Omg can't this person read or are they just an asshole?". Yeah sure, it's simple enough on paper, and great if it's ONLY your site I have to worry about but your 15 rules are on top of Site 2's 15 rules, and other 10 for site 3. I constantly worry that I'm going to screw up simple stuff and the staff is going to hate me as a "problem member". 


Real-Time threads, and rigid time progression. I flee like a cockroach when the lights come on when I see "All threads must be dated xyz order", "new threads started HAVE to take place in the current month", "First start is first occurring, no matter what" - often irregardless to the speed of the threads postings, thereby usually making it close to impossible to have the same character in multiple threads unless all threads are rigidly pre-determined of the events/outcome. As a Sub-category anxiety, I also nervously freak out if staff adds a rule that when the text "time change" occurs (say summer to fall for example), all threads left uncompleted get closed out and stay unfinished because "plot/time must keep moving".  I NEED to retain the flexibility of bending time a little to keep everything tailored nicely with the needs of the Plots. 

[Nixie 13]

Hard to find documentation (particularly when all the board names are song lyrics *sigh*), how do you expect me to join when I can't even find your rules?

 

All white playbys and face claims just make me uncomfortable, add some POC, please! (see also: only heterosexual cisgender characters)

[clipsed 231]

9 hours ago, Nixie said:

All white playbys and face claims just make me uncomfortable, add some POC, please! (see also: only heterosexual cisgender characters)

 

For me, when a board's idea of "adding some POC" is a handful of 'token' characters, usually a caricature more than a character. >.>

[Nixie 13]

6 minutes ago, clipsed said:

 

For me, when a board's idea of "adding some POC" is a handful of 'token' characters, usually a caricature more than a character. >.>

 

Absolutely.

[Huskerdust 625]

Too much lore scares me. Too many unspoken rules scares me. Being reprimanded through ic posts scares me. I’d rather get a pm nudging me that I did something wrong than have a character react to mine over a mistake. 

 

I prefer sandboxish settings as long as the setting is clear. I do not need an over arching plot for the whole site. I prefer many small plots connected by the characters in them. So stuff other than that tends to push me away. I’m get too anxious about breaking setting or lore or something.

 

im scared of members who want all my details a week into knowing me. I don’t tell the world all about deeply personal things. And I don’t have much to say to

strangers. I’m not good at making friends although I’d like to. So I need to learn to get over some fears. 😕 

[Sadrienne 242]

On 7/7/2018 at 4:12 AM, Dragon said:

Running into those assholes that primarily want sex based role play. 

 

I don't want to write smut. I get laid in real life, writing sex is boring and repetitive.

 

I was going to reply here, but... this is basically what I wanted to say. Mostly this applies to MMO based RP, and I'm not adverse to writing the odd sex scene, but it has to be... more interesting than "woohoo time!".

 

Otherwise, I just don't need to sit here and write the exact mechanics. :yawn:

[Rune 1,099]

Dates. I don't know what date it is today half the time, nevermind a fake date in a fake world that changes far more rapidly than real life. I cannot keep track and will avoid them at all costs.

 

Mandatory posting. I got shit to do.

 

Admin that are in "admin mode" all the time. Where you kind of feel like you're talking to your boss instead of someone with the potential to be a friend? It's uncomfortable and makes me live in fear of fucking up because they're RIGHT THERE immediately.

[Rune 1,099]

On 7/7/2018 at 8:39 PM, Nixie said:

 

 

All white playbys and face claims just make me uncomfortable, add some POC, please! (see also: only heterosexual cisgender characters)

 

I think this is mostly because they're minorities for a reason. White women make up a large amount of RPers (though, I'd really like to see a survey on this...) and a lot of people don't venture out of what they are familiar with. Or worry about being offensive. 

 

White actors make up a ton of faceclaims because, well, people don't venture outside of Hollywood. I've noticed this changing slowly, though. 

 

Similarly, any site that is "PoC only" weirds me out because that isn't how the world works. (I'd be similarly weirded out if it was "Caucasian people only!") Or if you have to advertise that you are "PoC friendly!" and "LGBTQ friendly!" makes me cringe. Those shouldn't be things you have to advertise. It should just be how it is.