Advice/Help Why are underage roleplayers so scare?

[nerdy tangents]

Murdergurl I think it might just be different genre interests and maybe even different site experience.

As on my old site they did actually stress relationships in roleplays. There was a pretty popular genre (they called it Harvest Moon on the site but it was basically slice of life in a town setting) which was literally built around relationships.

The whole point was you joined the town settings and made relationships with your neighbors.

There were also a fair number of school roleplays which also had a heavy relationship focus.

So it really is reliant on setting. Groups are not inherently plot driven roleplays. Now I can’t speak to the dynamic on this site specifically (I don’t bother with groups on here).

But I think it’s like anything else. It’s what your looking for and how you search.

 

[Idea]

In regards to the original question of this thread, regarding the reasons for one to encounter more rarely younger RPers, there's a number of reasons I can think of:

1. Although a lot of new people come to RPN every day, if we assume a relatively proportional number of newcomers of young vs older (which considering "older" here is anything over 18 is pretty unrealistic anyway) you'll still get that simply by those people remaining on the site, over time the concentration of people over 18 would increase, as people age over time, so even if new entries are proportionally the existing pool ages.

2. As others have pointed out, there has been an overall shift where people gather for this kind of thing. Many younger people just are more used to using other apps or chat platforms even. I would furthermore add that those were popular enough to get RPN to make a whole separate part of the site dedicated for advertisements searching RPN to roleplay outside of it, specifically in chat platforms not other sites like it. So there is a major movement from younger people that you just don't see in older people.

3. Experience: While it's not necessarily the case that just because someone is younger they are a worse roleplayer or lack experience, in statistical terms and by what one would reasonably expect, younger players are just less experienced than older ones in roleplay. Skill takes practice and learning, and mistakes need to be made to properly learn from them. 3 years of experience at 20 means you would have to have roleplayed from 17. 3 years of experience at 13 would mean roleplaying since 10. Which of these is more likely goes without saying.
So it can be reasonably inferred that under 18 implies a much lower level of experience in general, than 18+. This has a number of consequences that can affect your search:

3.1- People who never tried RPing are more likely to decide they don't like it than someone who has been doing it for a long time.

3.2.- Your criteria of "good" may be at odds with the expected level of experience of a younger roleplayer. Less experience can both imply less skills, and less knowledge of how to display one has said skill.

3.3.- A lot of people have anxiety, depression or just poor social skills or lack of confidence in RPN. If you also lack experience on top of that, you are likely to simply not put yourself out there with as much ease. With experience and age you may get more comfortable with that sort of thing, but someone new to the game will be far more hesitant. Not just my speculation either here, this is something several people I've talked to here have told me, that they are afraid of how their interest check might turn out, or that people will think poorly of them for it.

3.4.- Conversely, the opposite can also be true. Inexperience can also be a focal cause of arrogance or undue expectations of things "just working themselves out", thus feeling no need to actually put in the work of making their own interest check, and are more likely to be the type that doesn't try reading the rules and ends up making an interest check in a status or something.



4. Because of things like age restrictions and bias, younger roleplayers have a big incentive to just lie or hide their age.



So, what can you do to improve your chances?

Well, I think demographic targeting is probably your best shot. While it's not a 100% guarantee, there are things which younger and less experienced roleplayers tend to gravitate towards, in statistical terms (note that this doesn't mean there is a problem with any of these things or that only those roleplayers do these):

---> Fandoms, particularly those using cannon character pairings.
---> School Roleplays
---> Very Low Content Requirements, if any (usually expressed in sentences or lines)
---> The Off-Site Section of RPN

There are a lot of interest checks on RPN. Hopefully criteria like this will help you narrow down on those who have a bigger concentration of younger people.

If someone doesn't mention their age, and you feel they would be a great partner, feel free to ask them. Maybe not directly "how old are you?" but something more along the lines of "I'm a minor, and I feel I would be more comfortable playing with another minor. May I ask how old you are, or if you are a minor as well? Feel free to send me a PM if you'd rather answer privately. Thank you."


Anyways, hope this helps. Best of luck and happy RPing!

 

[Merciless Medic]

Well, everybody else seem to have made the point, so I won't expand on it as there is nothing to expand.

However, I do like to say this. I have been in a similar experience with what you were talking about, being 13 and being manipulated to do not-so good things. I am a mother now and goodness does it boil my blood when I hear about it. You might not trust anyone who say they've been through the same thing you have due to the trauma you have received, but people have gone through what you have gone through, so you are not alone. If you ever need to talk to someone but are too afraid to go to a conversation about it, go on my profile and just talk on there. I may not get notifications from that spot all the time, but I will help you if you need anything.

That reminds me, I should probably make my own interest check. XD

 

[CookieGalaxy]

Well, everybody else seem to have made the point, so I won't expand on it as there is nothing to expand.

However, I do like to say this. I have been in a similar experience with what you were talking about, being 13 and being manipulated to do not-so good things. I am a mother now and goodness does it boil my blood when I hear about it. You might not trust anyone who say they've been through the same thing you have due to the trauma you have received, but people have gone through what you have gone through, so you are not alone. If you ever need to talk to someone but are too afraid to go to a conversation about it, go on my profile and just talk on there. I may not get notifications from that spot all the time, but I will help you if you need anything.

That reminds me, I should probably make my own interest check. XD

Thanks for the advice on that. I only fell into their trap because of depression and having no friends and being sad all the time with a unhealthy cooping tool.