Viewpoint "I don't get it." What's an RP Fandom/Theme/Idea you could never understand?

[Trektek]

The thing about NRPs is tht I have a really hard time not playing as an actual, personal character. Like, it's weird to me. I don't want to be 200,000 troops and 50 tanks, and 5 Dreadnaughts. I just wanna be my own lil' Gobbo in the mix of it all. I don't want to be staring down a field of an entire platoon and summarizing their actions. I want to enjoy the personal drama of my one personal character. Regarding roleplay, I just can't see the appeal of taking the role of an entire army/nation.

I actually have rules for that. In my previous Act, I had a player whose faction was wiped out and he made a singular character following the rules laid out as the start of an adventuring party. He had made a mage that was taking classes at the Mage Academy which was run by another player faction. As his turns went on, he collected additional characters. I think by the end, he had about 6 characters in his adventuring party. It was a fun time.

Plus, I always encourage as much fluff as a person is willing to write and include their characters or character so that it can be a fun experience for everyone.

 

[BackSet]

• Real People, it just feels creepy. I am okay with them appearing as NPCs, like maybe the characters are meeting the President of the United States or something but even then I'd rather make up a President or leave the President unnamed.
• Canon fandom characters. I feel like I could never do them justice. And yes, I realize the irony in that statement given my largest fanfiction is nothing but canon characters.
• Speaking of, any sort of fandom ship, especially OC x Canon. Ignoring the fact that I dislike shipping most of the time and don't like playing canon characters, as mentioned above, OC x Canon just feels like you want somebody to roleplay your personal fanfiction at which point you might as well just write on your own.
• Just romance rps in general. Like, I have nothing against them, I just don't like the romance genre.
• Post length requirements. There's nothing wrong with them, I just see roleplaying as a casual hobby and am happy with anything that isn't a one liner. Word counts especially get me because, like, how am I supposed to keep track of all the words.

 

[Jannah]

• Real People, it just feels creepy. I am okay with them appearing as NPCs, like maybe the characters are meeting the President of the United States or something but even then I'd rather make up a President or leave the President unnamed.
• Canon fandom characters. I feel like I could never do them justice. And yes, I realize the irony in that statement given my largest fanfiction is nothing but canon characters.
• Speaking of, any sort of fandom ship, especially OC x Canon. Ignoring the fact that I dislike shipping most of the time and don't like playing canon characters, as mentioned above, OC x Canon just feels like you want somebody to roleplay your personal fanfiction at which point you might as well just write on your own.
• Just romance rps in general. Like, I have nothing against them, I just don't like the romance genre.
• Post length requirements. There's nothing wrong with them, I just see roleplaying as a casual hobby and am happy with anything that isn't a one liner. Word counts especially get me because, like, how am I supposed to keep track of all the words.

There's probably exceptions, but for the most part Canon x OC stuff just seems like fantasy wish fulfillment type stories. I mean, notice how those wanting to play Canon x OC almost never want to play the canon character. They always want to play their OC. Every. Time. I already don't write canon characters, but that is a huge red flag for me.

Also, regarding word counts: there's so many tools online to keep track of those. It's super easy.

 

[nerdy tangents]

Also word counts are rarely literal. I have been roleplaying for over a decade and have never once

1. Put my partners post into a word counter

2. Put my own post in a word counter

It is always essentially just paragraph counts.

So if your post is X number of paragraphs that’s good enough. No one actually cares how many words it is exactly.

 

[Inno]

Toxic relationships. Seriously, why? What's the purpose of having two characters antagonize one another or one character is being emotionally and verbally abusive? Where's the like in that? I just don't understand. I'll never understand. I don't want to.

 

[Melpomene]

Toxic relationships. Seriously, why? What's the purpose of having two characters antagonize one another or one character is being emotionally and verbally abusive? Where's the like in that? I just don't understand. I'll never understand. I don't want to.

See, I've only every used them as an obstacle. Like something a character needs to get out of or showcasing parts of their behavior that needs to improve. For the longest time I didn't know people actually liked it as a relationship dynamic and actively romanticized it.

I don't get it either. I think it is a "through thick and thin" thing? Perhaps even an: "I can fix them!" thing. Which are... Quite dangerous pieces of rhetoric, so I still don't get it.

 

[Idea]

To be fair, those three categories are so vague

how am I supposed to keep track of all the words

Copy paste into a word counter.

 

[Inno]

The whole everyday family thing. One person plays a parent while the other plays the kid.

I guess this is fandom related but taking the irredeemable villain to romance them in hopes that flowers, sunshine, and candy above all love will make them change their ways.

 

[Jannah]

Toxic relationships. Seriously, why? What's the purpose of having two characters antagonize one another or one character is being emotionally and verbally abusive? Where's the like in that? I just don't understand. I'll never understand. I don't want to.

In a similar vein I don't like the fandom RP's that have players shipping two characters who are supposed to be enemies. A good example to use here is the Hermione x Draco pairing. Yuck. Draco was so cruel to her so whhhhhhhy?!

 

[nerdy tangents]

In a similar vein I don't like the fandom RP's that have players shipping two characters who are supposed to be enemies. A good example to use here is the Hermione x Draco pairing. Yuck. Draco was so cruel to her so whhhhhhhy?!

So I can actually see that if you track it in two ways ::

Canonically James was an irredeemable POS to Lily and they ended up getting together

Draco is clearly from a bigoted household and eventually learns to question that.

So both those being true I can see that pairing working within the universe that JKR created.

Now in real life would I be comfortable with a Nazi getting it on with a minority? No. But that is because IRL the foundation hasn’t been set and the fall out is significantly more severe.

 

[Jannah]

So I can actually see that if you track it in two ways ::

Canonically James was an irredeemable POS to Lily and they ended up getting together

Draco is clearly from a bigoted household and eventually learns to question that.

So both those being true I can see that pairing working within the universe that JKR created.

Now in real life would I be comfortable with a Nazi getting it on with a minority? No. But that is because IRL the foundation hasn’t been set and the fall out is significantly more severe.

I think people like the Nazi x minority pairing simply because of the forbidden aspect of it. Plus I've seen some play it from the angle of the relationship teaching the Nazi to eventually question their beliefs.

 

[nerdy tangents]

The whole everyday family thing. One person plays a parent while the other plays the kid.

I guess this is fandom related but taking the irredeemable villain to romance them in hopes that flowers, sunshine, and candy above all love will make them change their ways.

So I would say the second isn't a fandom thing but actually a genre trope. As a bit of a romance novel fan the whole "magical vagina/magical dick" is legit a prominent trope.

It's basically the idea that you can "fix" your love interest through either sexy times or true love (depending on the explicit rating of the material).

It's infuriating but to be fair not something fandoms came up with. It's more of a societal expectation that women have been taught via cultural osmosis.

 

[nerdy tangents]

I think people like the Nazi x minority pairing simply because of the forbidden aspect of it. Plus I've seen some play it from the angle of the relationship teaching the Nazi to eventually question their beliefs.

my point is Draco and Hermione exist in a fictional universe where the author has already told us that "fixing a man through romance" is a legit aspect of the universe.

So if I am gonna suspend my disbelief through canon plot points then it's not a big stretch to also suspend my disbelief through the same trope in fanon ships.

it helps that they are not realistic scenarios too. Like wizards aren't real, Hogwarts doesn't exist, so it's all just metaphor or allegory.

Whereas someone saying "my minority character can fix Nazism via the power of their love" is just distasteful romanticizing of real world bigotry, and it places the responsibility of the minority to "fix" their oppressor

So what is maybe a bit tropey in a fantasy setting just becomes gross in a realistic one.

 

[Inno]

So I would say the second isn't a fandom thing but actually a genre trope. As a bit of a romance novel fan the whole "magical vagina/magical dick" is legit a prominent trope.

It's basically the idea that you can "fix" your love interest through either sexy times or true love (depending on the explicit rating of the material).

It's infuriating but to be fair not something fandoms came up with. It's more of a societal expectation that women have been taught via cultural osmosis.

Well yeah it can be a fandom thing. Especially if someone wants to play in the universe against characters such as Freddy Krueger, Michael Myers and have romance be the thing to change them. Regardless, I stand by what I said.

 

[Inno]

In a similar vein I don't like the fandom RP's that have players shipping two characters who are supposed to be enemies. A good example to use here is the Hermione x Draco pairing. Yuck. Draco was so cruel to her so whhhhhhhy?!

Yeah, that doesn't make any sense to me. In some cases, I've seen people change the personalities of such characters to make them fit whatever thing they're trying to do in order to make the romance work. To each his own but I just don't understand it.

 

[Murdergurl]

RPing as Gods/descendants of Gods/people inheriting Godlike powers/etc. I've seen em pop up every ow and again so I know its a trope derived from something. There's gotta be a movie or series that keeps prompting this notion. But the theme is completely unappealing to me

 

[Jannah]

RPing as Gods/descendants of Gods/people inheriting Godlike powers/etc. I've seen em pop up every ow and again so I know its a trope derived from something. There's gotta be a movie or series that keeps prompting this notion. But the theme is completely unappealing to me

I'm not really into superpower type stuff at all anymore unless it's X-Men-esque mutants. I rarely get to RP that, however, as most players either want to play canon characters in the actual Marvel-verse or want to do some school/academy type setting. No thanks.

 

[Murdergurl]

I'm not really into superpower type stuff at all anymore unless it's X-Men-esque mutants. I rarely get to RP that, however, as most players either want to play canon characters in the actual Marvel-verse or want to do some school/academy type setting. No thanks.

Whatever even happened to the X-men, anyway? Like, the first one came out when I was in Highschool. And then they made a few more over the years, but then they had all these Avengers Marvel-verse movies (and I'm guessing shows, too) and the X-men are conveniently absent from everything. Aren't they all supposed to be in the same world or something?

 

[Jannah]

Whatever even happened to the X-men, anyway? Like, the first one came out when I was in Highschool. And then they made a few more over the years, but then they had all these Avengers Marvel-verse movies (and I'm guessing shows, too) and the X-men are conveniently absent from everything. Aren't they all supposed to be in the same world or something?

I would guess copyright issues or something, if you're referring to the MCU.

 

[Jannah]

School settings. I suppose I can understand the appeal in that it's a universal experience, thus easy to use for RP's, but I'm quite burnt out on it. It's one of those things, much like England in historical RP's, that is just way overdone. The plot has to be pretty innovative these days to pique my interest.

 

[Inno]

Whatever even happened to the X-men, anyway? Like, the first one came out when I was in Highschool. And then they made a few more over the years, but then they had all these Avengers Marvel-verse movies (and I'm guessing shows, too) and the X-men are conveniently absent from everything. Aren't they all supposed to be in the same world or something?

Disney didn't have the rights to X-Men until they purchased 20th Century Fox. I'm sure it won't be long before they get all the characters recast and introduced into the MCU.

 

[Murdergurl]

I would guess copyright issues or something, if you're referring to the MCU.

Disney didn't have the rights to X-Men until they purchased 20th Century Fox. I'm sure it won't be long before they get all the characters recast and introduced into the MCU.

Yeah, that thing. The MCU. Sorry, I'm not much of a Marvel fan. Or DC, for that matter. Both of these fandoms have been done to hell and I'm just waiting for the whole thing to die down

 

[Inno]

School settings. I suppose I can understand the appeal in that it's a universal experience, thus easy to use for RP's, but I'm quite burnt out on it. It's one of those things, much like England in historical RP's, that is just way overdone. The plot has to be pretty innovative these days to pique my interest.

I dislike school settings with a passion mainly because they always involve over the top teenage characters that are caricatures of real people or it involves magical powers that constantly change to fit the needs of the plot to move it along. I'm not even a fan of college settings either. Just a hard pass for me.

 

[Kaiju Cat]

I dislike school settings with a passion mainly because they always involve over the top teenage characters that are caricatures of real people or it involves magical powers that constantly change to fit the needs of the plot to move it along. I'm not even a fan of college settings either. Just a hard pass for me.

I am with you here I dislike college settings myself.

 

[Melpomene]

RPing as Gods/descendants of Gods/people inheriting Godlike powers/etc. I've seen em pop up every ow and again so I know its a trope derived from something. There's gotta be a movie or series that keeps prompting this notion. But the theme is completely unappealing to me

It's probably due to the popular YA series Percy Jackson. It is about children of Greek Gods saving the world and stuff. Not really my vibe, but I think that is where the idea comes from for some of these RPs.

Though "Greek Gods" in themselves are a popular story telling trope. Especially pertaining to romance, the Hades x Persephone trope is popular.