Advice/Help Discouragement with Group RPs

[Rogue-47]

Hey everyone hope you are doing well. To be honest I am discouraged with group rps. I been trying to host a group rp, initially things seemed to be going well but delays keep happening for most of a month. I mean I get it people lose interest and real life has to come first. It’s just it makes me question the whole point of even trying to host a group RP, I blame myself for this.

Part of me feels like it’s better to roleplay one on one stories soley.

 

[Onmyoji]

There is no real answer to that. It's pretty much the nature of rp hobby. Ghosting and lack of interest happens in 1x1 as much as in groups. In most cases a rp dying is not your fault, but as you said, real life comes first and you have no control over it, no matter how amazing your rp organization and story is.

You can try to make "drop-in" group roleplays where it's easy to accept and replace players.
You can try to reboot an older group rp and see if you can attract different players who will stay.
You can ask around your friends in case someone wants to rp with you and maybe you can co-gm something together and see what happens.

I'm doing exclusively 1x1 roleplays for the past X years and I dislike group roleplays with passion lol so my opinion will be very biased, but I think 1x1 are easier to manage precisely because there are less people involved. So you can definitely give it a try and focus on them for a bit to see if you enjoy any. but don't expect miracles there because all issues of group roleplays will be there too, just maybe on a smaller scale since it's between two people.

 

[Chordling]

Group roleplaying can be difficult to manage for many reasons. One x One roleplays will also come with their own challenges. The best you can do is learn from each experience. Try to make the next one better than the last. Observe long lasting roleplays, and ask yourself, what are they doing to achieve this level of success. Remember, success for a roleplay is subjective, so find what is is that you value for your roleplays. Don’t let someone else set the standard for you.

It can seem easy to get discouraged. What matters most is that you are having fun. Don’t let it stress you out. It’s just a hobby.

 

[Mr. Cowboy]

Why don't you try Quest RPs? You get to do the writing and the audience will help you decide where the story goes. And cheer up, I may have left your RP a while back, but you did get me interested in the Great War. So don't get down, you've left something good to work with.

And if people tend to lose interest fast, why not try posting a few discussions in an attempt to find like-minded people? If you find people that like the military or like history, show some weapons of the Great War! In fact, I have thoughts of asking the people here who is Catholic, and one that follows the traditions at that.

 

[Rogue-47]

I appreciate the advice and honest points. Right now I am starting to wonder if it‘s okay to be passionate about a group story idea when it’s just a hobby as reminded?

 

[Onmyoji]

Of course it's okay to be passionate! It is a hobby but aren't all hobbies something people are passionate about, otherwise it wouldn't be their hobby.
The point is to simply be prepared that your ideas may not find the audience right away. Which doesn't mean they won't in a month, with different people or with slightly different implementation. It's also a part of the hobby to adjust and try to make your story work

 

[Mr. Cowboy]

As long as it is worth your time and effort. You will get better at writing, you will know more about the subject you are writing about, but the story itself is not guaranteed to succeed. I myself am having trouble with researching my story. It is not due to loss of interest, it is because I keep encountering sinful material and it is maddening! Imagine trying to be a good Christian, trying to live out a life of faith, trying to keep your promises and boom there is temptation everywhere. It happens. If you have problems, so do I and so does everyone. Sometimes, the writing is too difficult or maybe the research is, or maybe you don't want to risk producing a story that will not succeed.

Remember, stories come and go, as do feelings. Just say what you have to say, do good work and leave. We have to work with what we're given. And that isn't a shameful thing to admit.

If stories take too long, why not try shortening it? When one fails, you just get discouraged. And when one fails repeatedly, well, it's surprising you're still around and kicking. What's keeping you here? Not everything has to be so fantastic. Maybe someone wants to play the part of a father going home after work on his birthday. And the rest of the family wants to throw a party when he never celebrates his own birthday. So, now he rambles on about how unnecessary everything is while everybody wants to have fun.

You don't have to go to battlefields, or to a fantasy, you could simply go to a museum and act as a new tour guide that's trying to survive his first day on the job.

Maybe you don't even have to write a story at all. All you have to do is simply react to events as they unfold. Like in real life.

You don't have to go along with how most stories are written these days. Just go and do your own thing. The point of writing here with people is not to get so frustrated but to have fun. And what a great waste of your time if you aren't having any fun at all.

We do not know how such things will go here, so if you do try it you'll be first to test the waters (as far as I know)! And since I suggested these things in the first place, if you are the first to produce such a simple short story (and even if you aren't), I'll be sure to join one. Why not give you some advice and a show of support at the same time?

EDIT: When working on such a story, my advice is to try to end things on a good note. Let everyone know they've done a good job. Also, I must mention it is frustrating to start stories only not to see the end of it. We barely get to see any action. I must say, I haven't started to write only to learn an anti-climax only of all things!

EDIT: I have a question, if you like writing that much, why not try writing in your spare time? Just solo writing. Not every writing activity has to have a partner. It's just a thought that came to mind, what do you think of it? Might give you time to relax alone.

 

[Malphaestus]

Truthfully, calling it anything but chance is a bit dishonest; the potentialities of GMing can never be prepared for fully, and peoples' minds and reality are not something you can micromanage. Group roleplaying is some of the most rewarding things I know of in the roleplaying sphere, but it is also equally demanding. The only advice I can give is to not feel bad if something does not end up working, it is no one's fault, it is simply the way of the cosmos.

 

[GojiBean]

Hopefully this doesn't sound too pretentious, and it's going to turn into a bit of a lecture so I apologize about that going into this. But I would highly recommend that you take a brief step back and re-examine what you know about role-playing before making the suggestion, if even only to yourself, that it's better to focus on 1x1's over group role-plays.

The fact of the matter is that 1x1 role-plays fail just as often as group role-plays do. And almost every reason that a role-play will fail, regardless of how many participants are in it, has to do with how well the GM put the RP together and whether or not they kept their promises and fulfilled their responsibilities and obligations to their participants as it progresses.

In short, the single greatest determining factor for whether or not a role-play fails is not up to the participants, but the GM. AKA, you.

If you're the host/GM, it's your responsibility to work hard and actively do more than just play along once it gets started in order to keep the interest and desire to play alive in your fellow role-players. At the risk of sounding presumptuous you can't just create an RP, start it, and then play along as if you're any other participant. It doesn't work that way. The host/GM has an active duty to maintain the interest of the other participants. Keyword, "active." If you don't step up and put in the work as the GM to keep the attention and interest of your participants, they're going to leave. And it will be your fault. Not theirs.

Also, you cannot blame them for saying they're leaving because "life got in the way." And yes, you're blaming them. Your phrase "I get it people lose interest and real life has to come first" is a form of blame which is implying that the responsibility of staying with the role-play rests solely on their shoulders.

It does not.

Remember that nobody owes you their time, attention, or participation. They're gifting it to you. Nobody owes you the satisfaction of sticking around until the RP sees itself through to a successful conclusion. If they do stick around that long, it was a gift. Not an obligation they had to fulfil.

Nobody owes you anything.

If you're finding that your group RP's are failing at a rate you're not comfortable with, the problem isn't the participants. It's something you're either doing or not doing that's causing them to lose interest or actively want to just get away from what's happening.

As a host/GM you have several responsibilities and obligations to fulfil if you don't want the RP to fail or your players to leave. And the most important of these responsibilities and obligations are as follows:

* By far the most important responsibility you have is to make a clear and easily understood promise in your premise, and keep it
* Make certain that all elements of your role-play flow and do not contradict one another
* Pay attention and very strictly adhere to your own worldbuilding before trying to hold anyone else accountable for the same
* Be flexible and open minded with your participants, but also be willing to draw a line and not let them cross it for any reason

If you fail to fulfil any of these responsibilities and obligations, particularly the first one, your RP is destined to go down in flames.

As a hypothetical example, let's say you're the GM of a new roleplay about medieval magic and dragons. And let's say the following is your RP premise which you use to entice others to join the RP in your interest check: "This is a medieval fantasy RP featuring magic, mythical creatures, and a host of otherworldly dangers. Dragons especially will play a pivotal role in the RP's story. So grab your best armor, your sharpest sword, and let's get ready for the adventure of a lifetime!"

Sounds like a perfectly reasonable premise, right? Well, it's close. It sets the time period. It says there's magic and mythical creatures. And hey! Dragons are a thing! But there's one major flaw to it which runs the risk of the RP failing before it even gets off the ground: A lack of detail about what the Dragon's role actually is.

By introducing Dragons to the RP, which is by far the most sought after and popular mythical creature of all time in fiction, you've made a vague and easily broken promise in your premise because the premise, as presently worded, doesn't properly set the expectation or describe what the Dragon's role is. And no, telling everyone what the Dragon's role is isn't "spoilers." So nobody should be afraid of giving the info up front about what such an important element actually means for the RP.

But Dragons playing a "pivotal role" could mean anything. It could mean they're purely historical and cultural, but no longer exist in the flesh. It could mean they're only antagonistic and creatures the group will fight and slay for awesome Dragon armor and weapons. It could mean they're benevolent and highly intelligent creatures which will be ridable. It could mean they're also playable, either in fully draconic form or as a Dragon which can and does take to human form to conserve energy. The list goes on, but you get the point.

More often than not, when Dragons are involved, people expect to be able to either play as or at least ride them. It's the ultimate fantasy lover's dream, after all. And if your RP is intended for Dragons to be historical and cultural rather than playable or ridable, you've just lost whichever players were expecting that from your RP's premise. And if they only find out after making a character and putting in their background that they once met and rode a Dragon, but you come along and say "Nope. Dragons are only historical and don't exist in the present day so your character can't have done that," they're going to leave immediately and they'll never want to interact with you again because they will feel cheated and lied to. And all because you forgot or felt you shouldn't put down the detail about what the Dragons are here for. And if they tell their friends about it and share your username, that's a few more people who will never join your RP's because their friend doesn't like you or how you went about things.

When you make your premise unclear or too open to interpretation, you run the risk of the RP dying before it even has the chance to begin. Even those whom your premise speaks to might end up leaving because you didn't fulfil this basic obligation up front. After all if you can't keep this promise or fulfil this obligation when the RP hasn't even started, why should they trust you to do better once things have actually begun and the story is underway?

On the other end of the spectrum, let's say you did make the premise clear and said Dragons would eventually be ridable. How quickly you introduce the Dragons and how well you maintain the promise that they'll be ridable will determine how long your players stick with you.

For example: Let's say that you start your RP and about 20 posts in you let a Dragon show up and do some cool stuff, but then it leaves. This is perfectly fine. You gave your players the chance to see what Dragons are like in your world and that's whetted their appetite. They'll have a reason to trust you and stick around. But if you spend too much time building up the world and story and don't ever give them another opportunity to at least talk about, hear stories about, or see a Dragon again for another 100+ posts... They're going to leave. It's just a matter of time. You made the promise of Dragons being ridable, and over 100 posts in they still can't do that. They're going to leave.

Managing these kinds of promises can be a tricky thing to navigate. You have to balance your worldbuilding and presentation of lore with the promise you made and find tiny and indirect ways to keep it going. A good example is to constantly reference the destination for where the Dragons are and give hints as to how soon they'll be interactable and ridable. Having your character talk about the "Land of Dragons" so everyone can enjoy conversations about them and maybe learn something new about the Dragons in each one moving forward is one way. Having them hear stories from random NPC's talking about, "Did you hear? Another Dragon showed up at (insert location) the other day" is another.

Whatever you can do to keep Dragons alive in the world even if they're not present and interactable will be a step towards ensuring your players don't abandon you or the role-play. But you have to be consistent with it. You have to work at it. And this goes for any element you introduce to a role-play regardless of genre. When you make a promise, it's your job to work to keep it alive and in the forefront of your players' minds so they have a reason to stick around. If you don't do that, they're going to leave. Sometimes life truly does get in the way. But there's an almost equal chance that they'll use that as an excuse to get away from your RP because you didn't work hard enough to maintain their attention or satisfy the promise you made to them with the RP's presmise.

For the next obligation on that list, when it comes to the elements of your role-play such as the magic system you need to make sure it doesn't contradict or render anything else null and void. For example if you make Gold the currency of the realm, but you allow some sort of transmutation or alchemy magic system which turns anything into any form of matter, you'll break your economy once someone figures out they can turn anything they get their hands on into Gold. The entire stability of your world's economy will collapse and the world will start making less and less sense as more and more consequences and problems arise from this oversight. Once the economy collapses, society collapses. If society collapses, an entire part of your world collapses. One little oversight like this can literally break your world. So be cautious.

For the third obligation, when you engage in worldbuilding you have to stick to it before anyone else. If you make a "rule" within your worldbuilding and then break it, nobody's going to trust you anymore. Trust me. I know this from experience when I was younger and just starting out as a GM. If you make the rules and you design the worldbuilding, stick to it religiously. Don't slip up even for a moment. If you do, you're opening the flood gates for others to abuse whatever loopholes they can find and start doing things their way. And if that happens, they'll turn on you if you call them out saying "You did it first! I found a gap here and there's no reason not to use it!" I know this from experience as well. So please learn from my mistakes and always stick to your rules and worldbuilding. If you don't, it's going to end poorly. And you'll have no right to try and force anyone else to stick to it if you don't stick to it first as the role model and leader of the RP.

And lastly, you need to be flexible and keep an open mind with your participants. If you're always stone cold and drop the hammer on any and every idea they have, you're going to drive them away. Rather than shut them down, suggest a collaborative discussion about how the idea could be implemented into your world and be honest about not making any promises about whether or not it'll actually happen. "It'll depend on how the discussion goes. We might use something you come up with later on if this one doesn't work." A simple phrase. But it goes a long way to making your players feel wanted and appreciated for their creativity.

Role-playing is, first and foremost, art. And if you let your participants exercise their creativity and don't be too rigid with them about "Oh, this doesn't fit my lore!" or "Blegh! I don't like that idea, so that's a no!" then they'll be more likely to stick around. Nobody likes a GM who's too uptight. And nobody wants to be around a GM who only ever shuts their ideas down or is always breathing down their neck and "correcting" them whenever they make a tiny mistake. Be calm, but assertive. Be flexible and compromising, but don't let go of your vision. It's a bit of a balancing act. But if you get it right your players will want to stick around if nothing else to keep interacting with you. And who knows? You may even have made some new friends out of the experience which is always a worthwhile trade off even if the RP idea fails. They'll be more likely to keep talking with you and participate in other RP ideas you have because they enjoy interacting with you in and out of the RP's pages.

That's about all I have for the lecture.

In brief summary: It's 100% your responsibility as the host/GM to keep the promises you make and actively maintain the interest of your participants. If you don't put in the work after the RP begins, it's going to fail.

Hopefully this has been insightful. And again I apologize for the sometimes harsh nature that this tip post (turned lecture) may have conveyed.

Cheers!

 

[Rogue-47]

Since my earlier messages did implied that I was blaming others, I am truly sorry for that. I acknowledge that I’m not fit to be a GM on this site for any group roleplay due to my personal failures as it has been just pointed out. Thank you all for your honesty and I apologize for being a terrible person by writing the starter post of this thread in the first place.

 

[Mr. Cowboy]

You're being too hard on yourself, man. Relax, look out there, it rarely works out. As I said before, the important thing is to have fun with it all and not to get bogged down with all the frustrations. If you don't have fun then what's the point? You might just be taking it too seriously. It is easy to forget this, so I suppose this can't be said enough.

EDIT: I will also like to mention that you seem to favor realistic RPs, it is the kind of story that is particularly focused on attention to detail. You must get the time period right with all the people and events, the circumstances surrounding the events and so on. These things take time, so why not try finding like-minded people in the forums while you're at it? It seems daunting with all the people here producing fantasy stories of different kinds. But there is a hint of such a community of people you can find here.

 

[Murdergurl]

I often bitch about this a lot, and I'm going to sound like a broken record here to anyone that has already heard my spiel. But it's relevant here to the OP, so here I go again...

I love group RP. I prefer it almost exclusively to my roleplaying endeavors. As someone who has been doing this for upwards of twenty years, I can tell you that you simply aren't alone. This problem is not unique. And while my realm of experience lies mostly in group stuff, I have tried to venture into the 1x1 aspect as well. It's just as fickle. In fact, I'd go as far as to say that 1x1 dynamics tend to make people even MORE choosey than a group.

I used to think my problems lay in my subject matter. I used to run a whole bunch of original ideas before I got burnt out on trying. I figured it was because people were more interested in fandoms. But I've tried fandoms as well, to the same end. And it's the same or worse in 1x1. I also used to think it was maybe the premise of the RP. But I even went as far as to put out a request for some romance stuff. Even that, romance, an element I really don't care for but seems SUPER popular, didn't get me anywhere. Surmise it to say, it's just a matter of tossing out that line over and over and hoping you snag the right fish (plural and singular). Sure there are steps you can take to make your RPs more appealing. But in the end, you're still waiting and hoping the right people see your requests and take it upon themselves to make the effort to join. And that's just to get started.

I applaud GojiBean for laying all that out. I feel like a lot of people that try to GM a setting don't actually have what it takes to undertake such a task. It would do a lot of aspiring GMs some good to read that post, imo. That being said, I often feel like I don't have it in me to undertake such a task as GMing a group. But I'm pretty sure the reason we have so many underperforming GMs is because we all simply can't find a setting we want to participate in, or have found them but don't like the premise set up within them. I know that's what has spurred me to GM once again, despite my disinterest in the role. No one is putting out what I want, so I have been relegated to doing it myself. I'm pretty sure this sentiment is shared by many, many others.

 

[GojiBean]

Since my earlier messages did implied that I was blaming others, I am truly sorry for that. I acknowledge that I’m not fit to be a GM on this site for any group roleplay due to my personal failures as it has been just pointed out. Thank you all for your honesty and I apologize for being a terrible person by writing the starter post of this thread in the first place.

Hey there.

Let me be 100% clear: You aren't a terrible person for reaching out for help and advice. And you have my apologies if my comment sounded harsh. It was not meant to come off that way. I was simply trying to be as informative as possible about the implications of your choice of words.

An interesting fact about human communication: Human beings communicate almost 93% of the time through tone of voice, body language, and facial expressions. Only 7% of our communication is through the words we use. That's why we can joke with our friends and curse them out, and they curse us out, but we all laugh like hyenas and enjoy our time.

However, in an online environment where tone of voice, body language, and facial expressions are not present, it's 100% based on the words we use. So we have to be careful with our wording.

I'll reiterate just to drive it home: You're not a terrible person for reaching out for help and advice.

My hope is that you (and anyone else reading who may be having a similar struggle) will be able to use my comment more as motivation to simply up your GM game rather than shy away from the idea of being one. Because once you understand your responsibilities as a GM, being one becomes easy as long as you're willing to put in the work for the sake of your story and your role-player companions.

Literally anyone can be a GM. But the hard work and attention to the details I outlined is what separates the good GM's from the note so good ones.

And we've all dealt with the worst of the worst in GM's before, I'm sure. You know. The ones who just try and act like they own the world and that if you're participating they're doing you a favor by letting you in? And if you do anything they don't like, whether or not you actually did anything truly wrong, they just bark at you like you're an idiot?

Yeah. As long as that's not you then you're doing fine.

So don't give up, and don't think of yourself as a terrible person. Everyone needs help, and sometimes when we ask for it our choice of words could have been better. It happens. Believe me. Lol.

Anyway, keep your chin up and hang tough.

Cheers!

 

[Murdergurl]

Literally anyone can be a GM. But the hard work and attention to the details I outlined is what separates the good GM's from the note so good ones.

So in the event that you find yourself not quite up to par of being a good GM, should you still keep trying at it?

For some of us it isn't a simple matter of working on our content or including players' ideas, keeping the players in line, constantly improvising the plot while still keeping to the worldbuilding lore, etc. Some of us just get burnt out on trying to accomplish all this. We might not have the time/patience for it. I have no illusions that GMing is easy. It's a LOT of work to do the right way well. So for those of us who can't find a group setting they like and have come to the point of trying to do it ourselves, but simply aren't equipped to do it justice... what do we do? I've tried the whole co-GM thing, and it's just a big ol' mess in and of itself. So that's definitely not in the cards. Ideally, having a co-Gm is supposed to relieve some of the burden of GMing. But I've found that it just complicates things and causes more problems than it fixes. This, especially if you don't know/trust anyone on the site to be your co-GM.

 

[GojiBean]

So in the event that you find yourself not quite up to par of being a good GM, should you still keep trying at it?

For some of us it isn't a simple matter of working on our content or including players' ideas, keeping the players in line, constantly improvising the plot while still keeping to the worldbuilding lore, etc. Some of us just get burnt out on trying to accomplish all this. We might not have the time/patience for it. I have no illusions that GMing is easy. It's a LOT of work to do the right way well. So for those of us who can't find a group setting they like and have come to the point of trying to do it ourselves, but simply aren't equipped to do it justice... what do we do? I've tried the whole co-GM thing, and it's just a big ol' mess in and of itself. So that's definitely not in the cards. Ideally, having a co-Gm is supposed to relieve some of the burden of GMing. But I've found that it just complicates things and causes more problems than it fixes. This, especially if you don't know/trust anyone on the site to be your co-GM.

You bring up some good points!

I'll start with the question about whether or not one should keep trying at being a GM if they don't feel up to the task. To quote Imperfect Cell from DBZ Abridged: "Let's answer your question with another question": "Does being a GM bring you more joy and positive feelings than negative feelings?"

If you want to take some time before answering then feel free to take all that you need. It's for your benefit, and there's no rush.

If you find that the honest answer is "yes, GMing brings me more joy than not," then I would argue it's absolutely more beneficial to fight through any feelings of inadequacy than it would be to give up on it. As well it would be very beneficial to learn as much about the demands of being a GM as you can either by talking to mods who've been GMing for a while, finding a Mentor if such a role exists on this site or others that you frequent, reading up on it online, watching youtube tutorials and video essays on storytelling, etc. The more you learn about and understand the demands of being a GM, the easier it is to mentally and emotionally prepare yourself for them before starting a new RP. The less prepared you are, the more swiftly and easily burnout can happen. But we'll get to burnout later.

Staying with the "more joy than not" thing for now, though. Inevitably there will still be stressful, aggravating, and disheartening times ahead of you each and every time you start a new RP. The pain of losing players. The stress of maybe not knowing exactly where you want to take the next leg of the adventure and scrambling to come up with something. The fear of whether or not everyone will appreciate the direction you're taking the story. Worrying about the worldbuilding and dynamics between the characters involved.

The list of things that can weigh you down go on and on and on. But at the end of the day there's one thing they have in common: They don't matter.

As a GM, you do have your responsibilities. But what's not among those responsibilities is pleasing everyone or bending over backwards to be perfect at what you do.

You have to keep the promise of your premise, yes. You have to maintain the expectations of the other participants, yes. You have to guide them faithfully through your world without breaking any of your own rules, yes. You have to keep in communication with each of them to make sure they're okay and able to keep up, yes.

But as for everything else? It's kind of inevitable.

You're going to lose players. It happens. You're going to reach certain points where you can't decide where to take the story. No big deal. You can get around this by creating some filler mini stories or side quests. Nobody will notice, and it gives you time to come up with something substantial while still enjoying spending time in the world with everyone else. Not everyone will appreciate your story's direction at every turn. They're not the one driving the boat, so it's not their call. Sometimes the worldbuilding might seem flimsy or the dynamics between some characters gets awkward or even volatile. As long as the worldbuilding element is holding fast and not presenting a danger to anything else from a conceptual or practical standpoint, don't worry about it. And as for the characters, the drama is part of the fun of watching them grow. So as sadistic as it may sound, enjoy the juicy conflict! The only exception to this last one is if it drives the players to go at each other's throats in which case you need to intervene ASAP.

What does matter for you as the GM is that you're here to tell a story, and you're sharing the experience of telling that story with other people. But nowhere is it in your job description to please everyone or stress yourself out about things beyond your control. What really matters is your happiness with what you do and the story you're telling, and whether or not you're able to share in that happiness with the other participants more often than you feel any sort of negative weight from the burdens that come with it.

Having said all that, if the answer to the question of whether or not you get more joy than not from being a GM is "no," then as painful as it sounds or as scary as it feels my honest recommendation is to put the GM role away on a shelf somewhere and let it sit while you enjoy being a participant in the RP worlds created by others in genres and fandoms and settings you enjoy. That, or just walk away from role-playing entirely for a while so you can focus on other things in life until you feel ready to return. It won't feel the same at first to not have those responsibilities. But you'll get used to it.

I think I spent about a year away from RP'ing (not saying how long ago, good lord) and another year or two just as a participant (still not saying how long ago, lol) because I needed a break from being a GM. And I think I turned out okay when I came back... Mostly... I mean, minus the sadism towards my own characters and the suffering I can inflict upon them through story drama. MUWAHAHAHA-... Ahem. Sorry about that. Yeah, I'm totally fine!

Anyway, your mental and emotional health are paramount. And if they are at all in jeopardy by the burdens of being a GM then there's nothing wrong with walking away from it, be it temporarily or permanently. Whatever decisions you have to make for yourself which improve your quality of life are the ones which are in your best interest to make.

Now... Let's talk about burnout.

Burnout, as we all know, is the result of mental, emotional, and creative exhaustion. And this can result from any number of things. But from my own experience burnout is most commonly the result of one, some, or all of these four things (not in any particular order, and obviously there are other things that will contribute, but for me these are the big ones):

1) Frequent negative interactions with other role-players leading to one or multiple people dropping from the RP's you're in (or GMing)
2) Dissatisfaction with your own story, worldbuilding, or underlying concepts throughout the life cycle of an RP
3) Successive rapid death of RP's as a GM
4) A frequent lack of interest in your RP ideas from others in the RP communities you're a part of (nobody responds to Interest Checks)

Each one of these points will generate a pretty significant amount of mental, emotional, and creative stress on their own. And what's worse is that if any or all of them come in rapid succession to one another they can very lead to negative thoughts and feelings about oneself, one's story ideas, or one's role-playing skills. The following are some of the thoughts I personally struggled with for years before I was finally able to push past them (admittedly only recently):

- "Nobody even looks at my Interest Checks... Am I doing something wrong, or do my ideas just suck?"

- "Why can't I get along with anyone? It always starts out fine. But as soon as we start and get a few posts in I start arguing with everyone about the lore and how we're going to move forward. And then everyone leaves and I'm left with another dead RP. What's wrong with me?!"

- "Great... Another one dropped out without warning. Guess it's just (insert however many are left) of us now."

- "That's another RP dead in less than a month... Why can't I keep a damn RP alive and get more than 20 posts in?"

- "When we started it seemed like a good idea. But now that we're here, I don't know what to do anymore. Am I this bad at storytelling?"

- "What was I thinking when I made this part? It makes no sense... But we're already going now. I can't change it. Would the others care if I changed it? No. One of them used it already. They'd be pissed. What do I do?"

- "How many times can I fail at role-playing before I just give up already? God, I suck."

- "I didn't even realize it until someone pointed it out, but I've ruined my own story and characters by changing these details about the story... I killed my own idea."

Every time a negative thought anywhere along the lines of the above enters your head you are whittling down your own mental, emotional, and creative support pillars. And eventually it's going to reach a breaking point and come crumbling down. As human beings we can only handle so much disappointment, regret, shame, embarrassment, or dissatisfaction with something before we inevitably snap and just feel like walking away entirely.

And if you have to walk away, walk away. Nobody will judge you for it. And there's nothing wrong with it.

Burnout affects everyone differently. But the way to deal with it always comes back to what I said at the beginning: Do what's honestly best for you.

If you know you can power through the burnout, then power through it. Just don't forget to be open to reaching out for advice, an ear to vent to, etc. Everyone needs a support group in life. And you have one in the community here and on other sites who will listen to and give you whatever advice you need (even if some of it, lookin' at me and my long ass responses, isn't always exactly how you pictured getting it). But if you don't know for sure that you can handle the burnout, don't force anything. Just go ahead and step away and take all the time you need to rest and let all the stresses and exhaustion leave. Then, when you're ready, you can make an informed decision about whether or not you want to go back and try one more time or just be a participant player again.

Cheers!

 

[Murdergurl]

GojiBean
To start I'm going to say NO, I do not actually enjoy the role of a GM. I am undertaking the task again as a necessity to RP in the settings I like. But on a whole, I do not like GMing. I don't like all the responsibilities that come with it. I don't like having to lead a story and focus on all the individual players. I'd rather focus on my own little contribution to someone else's RP, and that's it. But at the same time, if I wait for other people to come up with settings and character roles that I want to participate in, I'm just left perpetually waiting. I do sometimes see ideas that I hope might have some potential, but usually after a read-through I become disinterested. OR I actually do find the premise interesting enough to want to join, and then it fizzles out shortly after for a variety of reasons. So if I don't take it upon myself to be GM, I wouldn't get any roleplaying done at all.

I've taken leaves of absence many times. I've taken three since I've been here on RPN; from as short as a few weeks to as long as a few months. And when I come back it's still the same ball game. And it isn't the site. I've RP'd across a dozen sites over the years, and it really doesn't really matter. There are mild differences from one to another. But generally speaking, it's the same issues across the board. I think I had maybe a good 10 years of mediocre roleplaying experiences. But that might just be a golden-age nostalgia speaking. Regardless, the latter 10 have been nothing but a pain in the ass to get anything going. Taking a hiatus and coming back later on has proffered no difference. I think the longest I ever was gone was something like two years. Since then, I can't say that I've done any better even with the shorter leaves in between.

1) Frequent negative interactions with other role-players leading to one or multiple people dropping from the RP's you're in (or GMing)
2) Dissatisfaction with your own story, worldbuilding, or underlying concepts throughout the life cycle of an RP
3) Successive rapid death of RP's as a GM
4) A frequent lack of interest in your RP ideas from others in the RP communities you're a part of (nobody responds to Interest Checks)

For the most part, I get along with people pretty okay. I'm not saying I'm a reciprocating ray of sunshine to any and everyone I meet. But I generally get along all right. So I don't think the falling out is on account of personal social interaction.

Usually, I'm pretty happy with my settings. I actually work on them a lot before I even consider putting them up for others to see. So it's a lot of investment that has gone into my wordlbuilding or at the very least the premise. I never go into an RP idea half-cocked.

But #3 and #4 are definitely my killers. IF I can get passed my RPs not gathering enough interest, then I always expect it to die off not long after it starts. Why do I feel this way? Because it has invariably happened to me over and over and over. And I honestly don't know what to do about this. As I said in my previous comment, I don't have the time or patience to properly deal with the issues that can stem from running an RP. And this isn't something that can be remedied by taking time off and coming back.

Sometimes I think that I wouldn't even know what to do if I had a successfully launched Group RP in may hands, because it has been so long (if ever) since it has happened. I honestly can't think back and remember any group RP I've been in that reached some kind of successful end (whether I ran it or not).

I remain stubbornly hopeful, otherwise I wouldn't still be here. But it's still frustrating to be met with the same issues over and over again, regardless. I've done a lot to compromise in order to better my chances. But for the most part, I just seem to be giving up what I want for nothing. And it seems like I'm not the only one in this position.

 

[GojiBean]

Murdergurl

I must confess you're the first person I've encountered with your particular circumstances. Then again, it was bound to happen eventually. Everyone's interests are different. And sometimes you like things that nobody else (or very, VERY few other people) also enjoy and want to RP or ever take it upon themselves to start up in an RP themselves.

So hey! I'm learning as I talk to you and it's got the wheels in the ol' noggin turnin'!

As far as finding a way to deal with this, at present I'm left scratching my head. Your predicament puts you in a position you don't want to be in. But if you don't put yourself there, you'd (almost) never have the chance to RP the settings you like with the character roles you want. So it's a catch-22. No doubt about it. And those are always hard to overcome. Especially when you've been to so many sites and experienced the same thing across numerous communities.

Still, it'd be best if I knew more about your RP interests so I can really sink my teeth into why you've had so much trouble. Mind sharing your favorite settings, character roles, genres, etc?

But before you do, just to put it out there, about the only thing I know of which you have almost certainly tried (but I'll say it anyway) is to go all-in with your idea and word the Interest Check in a way that likens the biggest aspects which excite you specifically to other popular genres, settings, and fandoms which are well known and have a lot of interest. Sometimes those likenesses might be hard to see. But there's always something you can connect it to in order to help ease people into the idea by giving them that carrot to latch onto which says "Hey, I know what this means." Makes them want to keep reading. Ya know?

It's still a long shot to go this route. But it's always easier for someone to take a risk joining an RP with an overall package they're unfamiliar with if they know that there's at least some similarities between it and something else they love and understand. And if you can find ways to liken literally everything about your RP idea to something commonly understood by other genres, settings, and fandoms, then your chances of getting more players drastically increases.

Again, given that you've done this for so long you've probably already tried this and been frustrated by failure with it as well. But still, I felt it was worth a mention to anyone else who might be reading this conversation.

But back to the request. Mind sharing your favorite settings, character roles, and genres?

 

[Murdergurl]

GojiBean
Sure thing!
First and foremost, my favorite genre is Space Opera! This would fall under the "Futuristic" tag in the forums. And as at least one of the mods had already informed me in a convo, the Futuristic tag is the least popular out of the lot. Anyhow, regarding Space Opera, I'm not really inclined to do colonist/explorer settings. I also like a couple fandoms within Space Opera. These are pretty popular things like star Wars and Warhammer 40k. But in regards to Star Wars, I don't like a lot of the settings around the movies or series. I'm actually currently recruiting for a group Star Wars RP on the forums. I'd much rather NOT have to run it. But I know I will pretty much never see this setting if I don't make it, myself.

Other fandoms I'm into include:

• Cadillacs and Dinosaurs
• Dinotopia
• Redwall or Mouseguard
• Mad Max
• Warhammer 40k
• Conan the Barbarian

Some of these are kind of obscure. And just because they are listed doesn't mean I'm always in the mood for it. I pretty much cycle between a singluar interest, and focus on just that until I get tired/bored/frustrated and move on to another.

Warhammer 40k I know is actually pretty popular. But a lot of how people want to run their 40k RPs doesn't allow for an easy insert of a character I've been wanting to play. Also, I've joined a LOT of WH40K RPs and they all die off very quickly. My knowledge of 40k lore is narrow, and I definitely don't know enough about it on the whole to be able to host an RP of it.

I do like other genres. Sword and Sorcery, Steam/Diesel punk, post-apocalypse, Fantasy Horror, etc. But I look for them in specific ways that I don't see come up very often (or at all). Like, sword and sorcery (or even High Fantasy) for instance. It's easily one of the most popular genres. But for the life of me, I can't find one that doesn't involve rival kingdoms and political intrigue, or mage wars and demons, etc. as the focal point of the story. I have been trying off and on to play as a Goblin Barbarian in a fantasy setting for a while, but I never really see a setting I can fit her into. And quite frankly, I don't feel like playing as something else. I don't care about epic, save the world quests.

You had mentioned the dragon thing in one of your previous comment, so I felt this was a pertinent mention: One setting that I wish would come up, but I' haven't seen for... I wanna say... 12 or 13 years? is a dragonslayer roleplay. All I ever see is dragon rider roleplays or even more off-base, Dragon roleplays. But again, I'm not interested in those. I wanna kill the damn things. With the dragons being purely bestial and antagonistic (but not some world-ending gargantuan monster on par with the gods themselves). I consider this to be a classic setting, but I guess it's one that has outlived its popularity.

Post Apocalypse has been done with zombies to high-hell. I'm not down with that, as it's major yawnsville. Steam and diesel punk are pretty obscure to begin with, and with dieselpunk at least, it's always some kind of war/soldier thing going on. meh. Fantasy Horror I pretty much only ever see with vampires and werewolves. and there's nothing wrong with vampires and werewolves... I'd just rather be on the "slayer" end of it. But everyone wants to play AS them instead.

It's gotten to the point where I could make a list of the things that deter me from joining other people's RPs.

Spoiler: The NO List

Genres and themes I am not interested in, or elements of the setting I do not like being a hard focus on in an RP are:

• Furries
• Nation Rivalries
• Multi-verse settings
• Slice-of-life
• Modern settings
• Heavy Magic Focus
• Anime
• School/Academy
• Romance
• Demons/Angels/Deities
• DC/Marvel comicverse
• Werewolves/Wolfpack
• Vampires Vs. Werewolves
• Zombies
• System-run Roleplays: Dice, stats, etc.

Edit: I forgot character roles.
I try to avoid the role of a hero at all costs. Anti-hero at worst, villain at best is where I'm comfortable.
I don't really go for military/para-military roles.
I do flawed characters, underdogs, deplorables. Definitely NOT the ones who's deeds get sung around campfires or is a role like a action hero protagonist. Hell, I don't even like being front and center. One of the things I LOVE about group RPs, is that I can effectively have my character on the sidelines. They could be doing some kind of congruent side-thing to the main plot, or just adding flavor here and there but not having to be in the spotlight all the time (or ANY of the time).

 

[Murdergurl]

GojiBean
Here's a LINK to one of my favorite OCs in the Space Opera genre.
Here's that GOBLIN I mentioned in the comment above.
And the Star Wars character I hope to play in my current request.
...aaand my WH40K character. Just so you can get some examples of what I like to play as.

 

[GojiBean]

Murdergurl

(blinks as he's not a morning person and woke up too early)

Okie dokie. I think I definitely understand your predicament a bit better now.

In my personal opinion, having read your post and taken the last 10 minutes to ponder it, popular culture is to blame for a lot of the difficulty you're having. Pop culture, as you know, has a major impact on the popularity of literally everything else around it from films to video games to tv series, etc. When Dragon riding is in on TV/Film, it's in on RPing sites. When Epic and Save The World adventures are in on TV/Film, it's in on RPing sides. When Marvel/DC take over the film scene, everyone wants to do Marvel/DC stuff. Etc, etc. Repeat ad nauseum.

Star Wars is a huge franchise. But a lot of people want to copy the films and do "Save The Universe From The Sith" plotlines, or just relive the actual story by playing the characters from the source material through the adventures that are in the films, and adding their own twists in between those major story points for flavor and filler. I've seen a few Star Wars RP's pop up here and there with original storylines separate from the source material, but they're rare. And most of them crumble under the weight of the Star Wars lore because the GM only knows enough to get the idea together, but not enough to drive the damn boat for the long haul without the roadmap in front of themselves. And once they venture off the beaten path to lands unknown, that map flies away in the wind.

As for the Dragon Slayer idea, that's definitely blamable on pop culture. Game of Thrones. How To Train Your Dragon. Eragon (not that it's that popular). Dragonheart. And basically every Disney/Pixar film featuring a Dragon in it are all rider based or simply have the Dragon as a central protagonist character. The only film I've seen that focuses on Dragon Slaying in recent memory is Reign of Fire. But that film didn't do very well. And it's most likely because everyone's far more enamored with riding, taming, or being Dragons than killing them thanks to all the popular culture around them which focuses on those very aspects. Lol.

I'm actually a casual fan of Dinotopia myself. I haven't had the chance to read the books, but I became a fan of the concept from the TV miniseries which came out a while back. I always wondered why it never got more love given that it ticks a lot of boxes for pop culture. Dinosaurs, check. Family-friendly presentation (at least in the tv miniseries), check. Easy to understand premise, check. Dinos learning to speak or at least communicate in a language known both to them and humans, check. Dinosaurs, check... Wait... Ahem!... We don't talk about me repeating myself, okay? Deal? Deal. Awesome. Moving on!!

Anyway, that's about as many times as I'll beat the dead horse that is the fact that Pop Culture drives a lot of what's considered "popular" in the world of role-playing. It's an odd but inescapable parallel.

It also doesn't help that there's not much going on in the futuristic/space opera realm these days other than Star Wars which has dropped in popularity with the most recent trilogy. It's all Marvel/DC, Disney/Pixar animated stuffs, Action/Fighting/Revenge movies, Tolkein-esque Fantasy Adventure epics, etc. And this popularity in films and other popular media steals the focus of a lot of people and makes them only want to RP these kinds of ideas.

For example, when Halo first came out you couldn't get anyone to RP anything "futuristic" online without some element of Halo being present like the AI being Cortana rip offs, armored suits ripped right from the SPARTANs, augmentations which were basically the same as the SPARTAN augmentations, the Halo Ring worlds or other similarly designed shapes or world types, etc. Everyone was stealing from Halo. But now that Halo's popularity in the public eye has waned to almost nil following the disappointment from 343 Industries' acquisition of the franchise and how it's really only relevant now to the dedicated fan base, you don't see many, if any Halo RP's going on anymore. Nor is anyone even really talking about it despite the fact that Halo Infinite is still on the horizon but was a disappointment when it was first demo'd for everyone.

So yeah. Pop Culture is killing you right now.

As for how to deal with it, I'll reiterate what I said before. I would just go all-in on your current ideas and create an Interest Check which both shows how much you're in love with the idea, but also goes out of its way to highlight how certain elements are very much in the same vein, if not identical in many ways, to other popular franchises, settings, genres, etc.

For example, let's use the Dragon Slayer concept (and this is just one example off the top of my sleepy head):

Premise: In a world where humans live with mythical creatures great and small, few creatures inspire more fear, awe, and majesty than the Dragons. Yet for all their might and legendary status, they remain creatures of the Earth who bleed red as any other. Though their numbers are few, there exists a faction which hunts the creatures for sport. Where does your heart lie? Do you revere the Dragons, live and let live? Or do you yearn to see their heads mounted above your fireplace and their teeth lining your necklace?

Admittedly, this idea is a bit of a tough pill to swallow for the GM because right off the bat it presents two clashing ideals which is always tricky to navegate.

If I were to GM such a concept, I would create three distinct posting pages: One for those who revere the Dragons, one for those who hunt them, and one for whenever the two sides clash. And my reasoning is because, logically, these two sides of the coin would not begin the RP face to face.

They two sides would each begin with a storyline focused on their particular ways of life to set the tone and build tension as we move towards the point of intersection when the two sides inevitably clash. Once the clash is over, they return to their respective posting pages and continue with their lives until the next intersection point.

And while this would be a bit of a logistical nightmare for any GM to have to monitor the two sides, as well as moderate whenever they clash to make sure nobody oversteps, it would still check almost every box for those who love the Fantasy/Dragon setting regardless of which side of the proposed coin they're on:

* Dragons -
* Dragon Slaying -
* Combat -
* Adventure -
* Cool Fantasy Setting -
* Mythical Creatures other than Dragons -
* Chance to experience cool lore about said Mythical Creatures -
* Possible Romance -
* Possible Individual/Unique Rivalries between characters -

The only check mark it really doesn't tick is taming/riding which would need to be stated right up front so nobody gets all excited, reads through till the end, but then asks "can I ride/tame them?" and then receive the answer "No." Then they wonder why it wasn't stated earlier and the get all upset and try to lecture you about how you failed to address that as if it's some kind of sin you just committed against their preferences. I'm sure you've encountered that attitude before. Yeah?

From my experience most people aren't ready to fully commit to joining an RP until they know for sure their favorite draws are involved. So if you state right up front at the top of the Interest Check (potentially even before you state the premise) that there's no taming/riding of the damn things (obviously worded more nicely than I just did), you'll filter out those who are wannabe Dragon Riders/Whisperers from those who are more interested in the setting, genre, and the rest of the idea that you're presenting. Some people will only play Dragon Rider RP's which is kinda... Blegh, to me. But hey. To each their own. There's more to Dragons than riding. But whatever.

I think I said it before, but this is still a hard sell. So if you want it to gain traction you'll need to make sure in the Interest Check that you could liken the experience to something awesome and popular to give people a reason to keep reading and consider the idea a bit more thoroughly than they otherwise would if you just left it at "no riding, but you can kill them."

Shadow of the Colossus and the Monster Hunter franchise both come to mind here. If you advertise the experience for the Dragon Hunter side of the coin as being a mix of Shadow of the Colossus (cause Dragons are BIG) and Monster Hunter complete with cool and unique weaponry and tools designed specifically to give humans an advantage when hunting them, I think it'd help A LOT of people forgive the lack of taming/riding. Both SOTC and MH are popular franchises with large and dedicated fan bases. So even if this isn't exactly either of those, it ticks many of the most important boxes for them too. Especially if Dragons aren't the only mythical creatures they can hunt. For instance the Hydra, the Griffon, Ogres (BIG ones), Chimeras, Cocatrice's, etc.

Dragon's Dogma wasn't hugely popular. But it's a great example of this exact concept.

For the side which reveres Dragons, several Dragon species could be advertised not really as "benevolent," but "amiable." AKA humans can approach them (with caution and respect) and get close enough to get a good look before the Dragon either flies away, or decides to come a closer look by sniffing everyone and then flying away or going about whatever business it was before. Even if riding/taming isn't involved, the promise of still getting to come close to and maybe touch or interact with them on the Dragon's terms would still be a major draw for a lot of people. Especially if it's stated that in this world the number of people Dragons have chosen to get close to of their own accord has been so small it's not even a statistic in human history. And most accounts of people having done so were dismissed as lies and desperate bids for attention. Being "among the selected few" who get to live that dream in the world would really resonate with people. A lot of people love "the chosen one" role, after all. And even if this isn't exactly that, it comes close.

So that's just one idea I could come up with in my still waking up state for how you could potentially interest for that concept. So long as the Interest Check is put together the right way and the proper links to popular ideas and franchises for comparison or inspiration are stated, I think this idea of having Dragon slayers who are looked at as villains within the context of the lore and who clash with those who revere them would get some good attention.

Also designing it in this way allows you to fulfil that kind of "villain" role without compromising the rest of the experience either for yourself or for anyone else. And if you really want to push that, you could make it so everyone else plays the ones who revere the Dragons while you're the sole Dragon Hunter of the RP. In that case you could actually ignore the idea I had of two (or three) posting sections and let everyone else do their thing while you post whenever you want with your stuff.

Cheers!

 

[Murdergurl]

GojiBean
I'm going to PM you, so as not to further hijack this topic.