I think I have done this sometimes. Not consciously and intentionally. If you reference some of the threads here about "good roleplay partners" and such, you'll see a lot of people mention they want to "vibe" with their roleplay partner.

So I'm autistic. I express my excitement differently from most people: either it's my hyper-focus and you'll see me talk for hours on end, or it's just something I'm keen on and you'd probably find it difficult to tell I'm excited. I collect music boxes, and for Christmas my brothers all got me a music box. Surrounded by beloved music boxes, I was in bliss.

My brothers couldn't tell if I liked it or was extremely disappointed.

Why am I telling you this? Well, partially ADHD so I get distracted easily, but also to illustrate my point. So when I match with a roleplayer, and I know most like enthusiastic, cheerful writers, I tend to "roleplay" being such a writer in order to establish that first contact. But it takes quite some energy out of me, and it's not sustainable in the long term, so once I've, uh, hooked you in, I tend to rely on that first burst of enthusiastic exchange to coast us through to the end, while personally remaining enthusiastic even if I don't express it with the same intensity as before.

I used to have a friend in League of Legends who would talk to me every day about all sorts of things, and at first I reciprocated enthusiastically...but after a while, that wasn't sustainable, he found me reticent, and we wound up drifting apart because he felt I didn't want to be friends and I couldn't keep it up that long. Sometimes I'm just out of spoons to spend.

Uh, basically, sometimes you can believe people at their word when they say they're still enthusiastic even if they don't express it emotionally in the way you expect. Some of us are wired differently, and I suspect neurodivergence is overrepresented in this hobby to begin with. Can't speak for everyone, though. I think the best preparation you can do is work out for yourself what makes you excited to continue roleplaying. I don't think it's necessarily wrong if you break off a contact because it's making you miserable or anxious, even if the other party can't help it.


I'm not sure if I should share this because I am not entirely comfortable putting a target on myself like this, but I guess you also can't expect understanding without opening up a bit.

"I haven't revisited that character in years!"

"No, sir."

"My last app condemned him to be a sweetheart."

"Yes."

"I wrote, 'This character has finally found its rightful place in society: a kind character who always smiles.'"

"Yes."

"That is where I left it. That was my last word--the last word."

"Yes."

"Then tell me, Ambrister, how could it be GRUMPY?"

Heretofore

Grey

Quite

Simmer

Chief

Chiefly

Chef

Non-English:

Esprit

Maksud

Ame

Kebab

Inshallah

Deus

Parterretrap

Einzelgänger

I like when characters have flaws that obstruct them in obtaining their goals. I see apps that ask you to balance negative and positive traits, but I find that difficult because, in my view, those are context-based, sometimes even in the eye of the beholder. An insanely stubborn character would be annoying as a younger sister; they'd probably make for a great heroine intent on revealing the evils of the empire. Stingy people might hate spending money on themselves, but delight in spending on others. Kind people can still unleash of a fury of which hell hath no.

My favourite sort of characters (I admit, not "good" necessarily) embrace that, and respect that not all traits are black-and-white. A baseline "good" roleplay character is, in my opinion, is one that is equally good at playing a protagonist's role as they are at playing the supporting character or antagonist.

And I adore characters that challenge themselves, or whose entire story is about changing. If I write Neil, the straight A student who never strays from the "right" path, I'd be thrilled to write him taking the teacher's wallet in a moment of weakness...and ecstatic thrill. Come join me as we find the boundaries of the rules and escalate into bigger and bigger crimes until the entire house of cards comes falling down.



I'll also be first to admit that I don't always feel like writing (and reading) something high-class. Sometimes I just want something stupid saccharine with the developmental depth of a penny; brain off, just write fluff, and give me a fluff character to go with it.

Sett from League of Legends is a big, muscular lad with red hair.

Red Riot from My Hero Academia is younger, but also built.

If you look for humanoid Ganondorf fanart, he's often depicted as a big, muscular lad as well.

Homing in on this sentiment a bit, I wonder how many share this feel. I've known some people who absolutely disliked it when I would want to plot out (in broad lines) what's going to happen in the thread. Let's say we've got our opener:

Our characters are classmates. It's the rainy season, and it's coming down hard. My character did not bring an umbrella. Yours did. We're both at the school entrance, and my character is definitely going to guilt trip yours into sharing the umbrella. (We go the same way, after all.)

People are often fine with this, because it gives us a good starting point, and we both know what we're in for. But it's been on and off for whether people actually want the rest of the thread to be "a surprise", or if they want to plan it out in the broadest of terms. 

When you say "know the next plot", what do you mean exactly? Like, discuss the entire rest of the thread beforehand? Our characters are in awkward silence, mine breaks the ice by blabbering about random things, she accidentally talks about something they both like, the characters get hyped and decide to go to a concert of their favourite oshi together, but then get into an argument whose oshi is best? Or do you mean less detailed/more detailed?

I'd like to get better at all this! I love writing, but I'm having a rough time sharing that love so that others can also indulge in it. :sadface:

Mostly curious on what, if anything, helps you write your replies to other people, and what makes posts compelling to follow up on. Basically, I'm looking for posting strategies to help my thread partners have an easier time writing with me; I don't know that the post contents are specifically a problem (I'm guessing my stoic personality is at least part of it), but I do wish to increase the retention rate of writing partners, so any advice in that regard is welcome and appreciated.

On a Fire Emblem site, I had a bunch of interesting story threads running with two other people, involving a kingdom on the brink of ruin and the prince who stepped forward to take charge and lead the nation to glory.

Sadly, the site died before we could finish the story, and I've since lost touch with both roleplay partners. I can't even remember the site name.

Wouldn't it be nice if we ditched that culture for forum RPs and started posting more too? I kinda miss The Good Old Days when internet connections were metered and disappeared when your aunt rang--wait, no, I don't miss that.

But I do miss when many forum RPs had an expectation of checking in multiple times a day, if not just sitting down for an hour and continuously just posting, posting, posting, because things were done "in real time". We didn't have these expectations of penning literary works for an RP post, and everything was nice. Till the word counts invaded and suddenly, lengthy posts were good posts, despite meandering on for ages and being a chore to read, a part-time job to process, and a pain in the ass to reply to

I've seen some solid Discord RPs, but haven't joined them because newfangled things scare me. I'd moreso take issue with everything being on Discord, though; centralising everything to one place just results in the same debacle that surrounds Twitter and Reddit now.

Oh-hoh. How do these flags (or emblems?) function with regards to mobile suit performance?

You know those fish who see you dangling bait before them and they just know it ain't good for them, but they get it anyway?

Das me. You've got me hook, line, and sinker.

But will there be battleships?!? I'm a weird Gundam fan. Come at me with the Argamma, or White Base, and I'm all ears. Xeku Eins? Pezun Dwadge? Not so much.

Very interested to see your take on an original setting Gundam RP.

It wasn't that long ago I posted about how I was looking for exactly this type of plot. Very looking forward to it; maybe I should look into Honkai Star Rail too.