Experiences Healthy communication and negotiations of role play

[Bachelor Snakeskin]

So I always loved meeting people and finding new partners, and I admit that I am a terrible example of a person in communication outside of role-play. Nonetheless, I have aged and matured over the last few years as I turn toward my late twenties. I always believe that it is the best option to communicate well with my partner, and I always wonder if we are so bad at communicating truthfully on the internet. When I make my threads here requesting to role play with new people, it usually just ends on a ghosting note which is fair enough however, as the years go one I much rather like to have someone say if they don't like something in a role play, or if I should edit something in my post to make it better or if just want to stop. I hold no hard feelings towards people who want to stop role-playing; all I personally want to know is the reason behind it, as I am not gonna get angry. I am mature enough to deal with the emotion of losing a role play, and it is almost always the act of ghosting that makes it a whole lot worse because I never get any feedback on what I could have done better.

With this in mind I would love to hear some good constructive reasons for why someone ghosts out instead of just being honest.

The second part of this post is another tiresome topic I have also experienced a lot lately, negotiations of role play and execution. Earlier today I was contacted about something I had a long, hard look for, but it ended up leading to nothing when the other party wasn't willing to negotiate the amount of posting, they wanted daily posts and I am someone who can give posts that within a few days to a week at best. Because I have a life outside of role play, but this person was either daily post or I will not role play, how can you explain to someone in a good way that not all of us have the muse, time or energy to do daily posting and maybe we could settle for something that makes us both happy instead of being pulled apart because one part only agrees with on thing and not what the other suggests?

Thank you for coming to my ted talk, I will be hanging out here and look forward to hearing about some experiences.

 

[nerdy tangents]

1. So it helps to define ghosting. Do you think it’s when someone stops posting or do you think it’s when someone is posting just not in your specific roleplay?

2. Set clear expectations and stick to them. If you can only post once a week just say “hey I can only post once a week.” If that isn’t enough for your partner then it’s fine.

The problem isn’t that they don’t understand why you need to take more time. It’s that they want daily posts and you don’t. It’s like some people like to write heterosexual romance and some people write LGBTQ+ romance.

It’s a simple preference and you can’t really change peoples preferences through explanation.

 

[Bachelor Snakeskin]

Ghosting to me is when someone completely cuts all communication without warning, and it is bad to say just pretend you don't exist to them anymore; I should have clarified that one out better. The problem I have with ghosting is that when you have open communication at a specific point in time, and then the person just vanishes and ignores you, like the thing we did never happened. I am fine with someone who wants a break or wants to stop; in fact, I will be glad to hear both instead of being left out without any answers to what I did wrong on my end.

I always write in my threads when I post for plots that I look for less daily posting and more on a 3-7 day posting schedule, I suppose the thing that happened here was that the person had not noticed that I wrote I was looking for partners who are more able to accept that a post is not something I can do every day.

I might not be able to change someone, but I always ask if we can't reach some other agreement if something isn't working out, and it is when the "my way or the highway" way of thinking comes in that I give up. I am very much for the idea of a reach some middle ground that makes both of us happy when it comes to executing a role play because it does take a lot of tangoes to make a role play ideal for both ends.

 

[nerdy tangents]

Okay so the reason I asked for the distinction is in my experience there is a big difference between :: someone has literally not been on this site for a week because they’re in the hospital and someone hasn’t replied to our specific conversation/roleplay but is online and active on the site.

1. For the option (they are literally not on the site at all for some unknown reason) I would just be patient. I guarantee it has nothing to do with you and it’s probably something IRL that requires their attention.

2. For the second option (they are active on the site just not responding specifically to our conversation/roleplay) I employee a system of check ins.

If it’s been three days with no response I send a quick message “hey are you okay?” typically speaking I will get a reply fairly quickly if they’re just busy or forgot to reply.

If I don’t get a reply within a few days the roleplay goes on hiatus for a month. As there is still the option that they might not have a muse for the roleplay at the moment or be overwhelmed with other roleplays.


As to negotiations I think there is difference between a requirement and a suggestion.

Some things people aren’t going to be willing to budge on because doing so would negatively affect their enjoyment.

Presumably someone making you reply daily would negatively affect your enjoyment of the roleplay. Well the reverse is also true, some people are going to need a daily reply or else the roleplay isn’t enjoyable for them.

So I think sometimes you kinda have to acknowledge that something you might would consider a suggestion (say the length of each post) is gonna be a requirement to someone else.

 

[Edric Blight]

I share your same exact views OP. I’d rather be told why I’m being ghosted and what I did wrong so I can actually learn from the situation and move on. I’m not gonna freak out if you tell me you’re ghosting and why. I can deal with that, I’d just prefer to know why.

 

[nerdy tangents]

I feel like taking things personally is the wrong mindset to get into when it comes to ghosting.

A good way to approach it is like a dog bite. My sister was bitten by a dog as a young kid (around 10). She had a fear of similar types of dogs (small and hyper) for years afterward.

Does that mean that all the dogs she came into contact were going to bite her? No.

Does it mean that those dogs were doing something to make her scared? No.

Was there anything those dogs could do to lessen her fear? No.

Because at the end of the day the issue wasn’t the dogs in front of her it was the negative association caused by the dog that bit her.

Which is why saying stuff like “it’s okay I’m not one of those mean people who get offended.” isn't super helpful. Because that’s like someone saying “oh it’s fine my dog doesn’t bite.”

That isn’t the point. Avoidance has nothing to do with whether or not you are a mean person. It has to do with people being afraid of mean people they met in the past.

*** I mean it’s not always literally about mean people but it’s easier to make the comparison then trying to go into the various types of anxieties people have around roleplay. ***

 

[Bachelor Snakeskin]

Oh yes, it is a huge difference; I would never bother someone if I knew they were going off because of some major health issue; that is private life and who you tell that to is up to you.

I am honestly very fair with my approach to people who don't reply, usual I assume life is busy and that fair. Like I will never go into you have something profoundly personal reason for going off for a while, but a heads up like "I am not feeling well, or something up" is a nice thing to hear instead of just "alright, I left the face of the internet without reason".

It is also totally valid to forget to reply; as I said I do that on a weekly base; if I need longer, I will always try to mention it to others.

I am old enough to understand that life is not easy; hell, it is not easy for me, but I am always on the small heads up if I can't reply or if my interest/muse gets in the way.

I always post that I understand life happens, and a heads-up is friendly instead of being left in the dark. People can even lie to me, and I will not take offense.


---

It is not that I could not do daily posting, I could, but it would very much come down to word count. If someone asks me for let's say 1000+ words that is hard to do on a daily level if it is something smaller i can be talked into it lets say 150/300 is a fair game to manage for daily posts.

I won't call myself the rapid-fire type of player, because I find it very stressful to post more than 3 times in a day, sometimes even less.

In fairness balancing life, hobbies and everything in between is an art and sometimes life outside of my role play life just doesn't allow me to have an active role play life. I wish it was different but, that would mean winning a few billion and then I could settle down and never raise a finger in life again. But at the same time, it would not be to my liking, I need to balance again between having a busy normal adult life, but also having a joy in coming back to my hobby which RP is.

 

[AtomBombBaby]

An answer to your questions from a serial ghoster Totally not proud of it, but since you're calling us out, I feel like I have a responsibility to share This is probably going to be way too specific, and not at all other peoples' experiences, but here we go nonetheless:

I would love to hear some good constructive reasons for why someone ghosts out instead of just being honest.

1. When It's Me: I love writing; it's literally my favorite thing. But I'm not a "casual" RPer, even though I'm very laid back in OOC chat. (I'm ghost friendly, collaborative, open to compromise, and understanding if you can't get a response out for a while.) For me, I put a lot of time and energy into my writing: I can't just crank out a 500-word response -- it has to be perfect, acceptable word choice, enough action for my partner to respond to, is there enough dialogue, did I include enough hints/references to backstory, are there any typos, I need to replace a few of those overused dashes with different punctuation, pop that baby into wordcounter.net (gotta be somewhere between 800 to 2,000 words before I'm happy) --

Sometimes I Just get stressed out. Writing shouldn't be stressful, I know. I tell myself that all the time, and I know my writing partners don't want it to be stressful either. It's just something I do to myself. Life gets in the way, I get busy, I don't feel like writing a masterpiece after working or dealing with interpersonal stress in my day-to-day. Before I know it, it's been a week, I'm getting messages from my partner asking if I'm okay, and I'm embarrassed because I did it again. I let another potentially-awesome story fall apart because I got distracted.

TLDR; I feel really bad and embarrassed and don't really want to explain the above Yeah, it's definitely nice to have a reason why your partner fell off the face of the earth, even if it's short and sweet, that's the mature thing to do...but well, sometimes I can't bring myself to do it. This is honestly the most likely scenario, and it has absolutely nothing to do with my partner or their worth as a person/writer.

2. When It's You: Sometimes, I end up writing with someone who just isn't..."up to par" in the way I was expecting. That doesn't make them a bad writer necessarily; everyone has different writing styles, people are at different levels in their writing journey, and that's perfectly fine. It's totally not fair of me, but I hate confrontation, even anonymous confrontation. It's a personality trait of mine -- I just can't handle it. I just don't feel comfortable telling someone that I'm a neurotic writer and that it's necessary for me to write with someone who puts a lot of care and thought into the story we're creating. I'm afraid that I'll offend my partner because I've insinuated they're a bad writer, or that they'll think I'm calling myself a better writer than them, when that's not at all the case. So I put off writing until it's been a week and I'm getting messages from my partner asking if I'm okay, and I'm embarrassed because I did it again.

What I should do is say, "Hey, it's Atom -- sorry I disappeared! I was just having trouble writing for our RP because our writing styles are little too different for me to work with. I think I'm going to move on and search for a partner who matches my style a little bit better. Best of luck to you in your search, and thanks for giving it a shot with me!"

I think I'll try that next time

How can you explain to someone in a good way that not all of us have the muse, time or energy to do daily posting and maybe we could settle for something that makes us both happy instead of being pulled apart because one part only agrees with on thing and not what the other suggests?

Honestly, I think the way you put it is perfect. If someone demands daily posts, you have the exact same right to say you can't reply every day, it's not feasible, and writing together is not going to work. Honestly, if someone makes those demands upfront, you're probably dodging a bullet -- one that isn't able to compromise, evidently. And it's hard to write with people who won't compromise. Just gotta move forward and try to find someone who's more aligned with your writing preferences

 

[Marzopup]

Honestly I'm just really picky when it comes to writing, and if the person's writing doesn't vibe with me I just can't get into the thread. And I just feel too awkward to tell them 'sorry, it's not anything you did specifically, your writing just sucks in my opinion' xD Because a lot of times it's not so much about the writing being objectively bad as it is not my cuppa, but I don't think you can really explain that's the case without making them feel like there was something wrong with it. I've been trying to fix myself lately by only starting threads with people whose writing I see first.

But honestly, asking for writing samples? Also awkward for me. I personally feel weird asking for one. It makes it feel like I'm saying you need to audition to do a thread with me? Which to be clear, I know isn't true, and I don't look at other people who ask for one and judge them that way, but I'm weird.

 

[Jannah]

I share your same exact views OP. I’d rather be told why I’m being ghosted and what I did wrong so I can actually learn from the situation and move on. I’m not gonna freak out if you tell me you’re ghosting and why. I can deal with that, I’d just prefer to know why.

Likewise. I think it just doesn't happen, though, because of social anxiety.

 

[nerdy tangents]

Well that and people lie. Just because someone says they won’t get mad doesn’t mean they will honor that if you upset them.

It’s why I made the dog bite analsysis earlier. Because it’s really hard to take complete strangers at their word when you have negative experiences in the past.

No roleplayer is ever gonna say outright “if you leave I’m gonna scream obscenities at you or harass you until you take me back.”

They will all say some variation of “it’s okay you can tell me I won’t get mad.”

It’s just some of them are lying and some of them mean it. And it’s incredibly difficult to tell the two apart.