Other Roleplay Pet peeves

[Cresion Breezes]

World building wide as an ocean but deep as a puddle, like having 20+ places or races or factions listed in lore but each of them has like 2 sentences and 3 descriptor words that is of semi-substance describing them.

 

[Steve Jobs]

My ideas only come when I'm trying to sleep.

 

[findingnemos]

I really don't like when people are no longer open in a group roleplay but they give no indication on what is closed and what is open still.

 

[GrumpySwallow]

Post 1: NPC tells the party to meet them at the bus stop.

Me: *struggling to make a decent post when all I can do is go to a bus stop*

Post 2: The bus appears at the bus stop. The doors open and the NPC gestures for the party to get on.

Me: *struggling to make a decent post when all I can do is get on the bus*

Post 3: The bus driver greets the party then gestures toward the empty seats. "Please, take a seat, and let's get going."

Me: Can't you have just put all of that into one post??

Not only would I have more to react to, but it’d also get straight to the point!

Another one is when another player and myself are building up to a big event or confrontation, (or our posts imply such an event/confrontation coming up) only for the other person to suddenly change their mind and have their character do something else, leaving me wondering wtf to do with my character now.

 

[Goonfire]

I must see some variation of "X and Y and Z... Oh my!" in roleplay three times a month, and it's never a pleasant sight. For those who somehow don't know, this line originates from The Wizard of Oz and has seen frequent use for 84 years. It is used to list three things and express shock, usually as part of some tagline in articles, advertisements, and the like, but it's so exhausted.

There is a certain rhythm to this saying: the first two things listed have two syllables, while the third has only one syllable. The emphasis is always on the first syllable in each list item. "1-2 and 1-2 and 1... Oh my!" Few who write it seem to understand or even care about this rhythm, which makes the gross overuse of it even more egregious and adds to the growing sentiment, "Oh my, this cliché needs to die."

Long story short, the 1930s called. They want their cliché back, NOW.

 

[Hral]

The only thing that really chafes for me is when people try to join RPs that they clearly cannot meet the expectations of, or RPs that they have no genuine long-term interest in pursuing.
Years ago, when I last did forum roleplay, I was always amazed when I would post an RP requesting that participants have a good basic grasp of grammar, punctuation and etiquette, and that they really self-analyzed whether they liked the concept enough to dedicate a few hours each month for months to years, and invariably a 3 day old account with a memespeak signature quote would pop up saying "hay i like this can i be a super strng guy with a sword who can fly 100000mph?".

And the thing is, that person probably WILL find an RP where someone lets them be a super strong flying sword guy and their poor grammar isn't an issue. That's the level I started at when I started roleplaying when I was virtually still a child, so I don't begrudge them for it in the slightest. But that some people have either the extreme confidence or extreme lack of understanding to not realize that not EVERY RP is for you is always grating. A little bit of self analysis goes a long way.

 

[SnowStorm42]

People seem to just..not read the rules?
The last several rps I made, no matter how many or how few, I'd get a bunch of people who just ignore the rules.

I'd have people post characters in the rp without sending it beforehand for approval.

Another one is when I have a concise outline...example: here is side A versus side B, and someone joins and creates side C with a whole plot that derails the original plot altogether

 

[sevyn]

physically scarred male characters who are seen as more attractive or rugged because of their scars, but i rarely see people do the same with women characters. booooringggg.

or if they do have scars then it’s something minor or very easy to hide, probably on their torso or back so they can just hide it under their clothes, meanwhile males might have something a bit more drastic like a glasgow smile or one across his throat, or the classic vertical eye scar, and if he hides it, it’s with some badass mask or something. i like the trope but so boring that i rarely see it with women, lol.

 

[Kylesar1]

ONLY Personality Weaknesses in Fantasy Settings

Almost always is this disregarded when danger strikes. It's why I've been having my players put actual exploitable weaknesses. You're a vampire? Weakness to Holy. That way there is no ambiguity or way out of it. Whether they are the bravest vampire on the planet or the biggest coward, they are at risk of being smited. It's an actual tangible weakness that can be exploited. Yes I will allow personality weaknesses, but not ONLY those weaknesses

I'm not gonna have a player play the honor system in making them make their character act a certain way in terms of personality. Too often, it's not adhered to. Oh your strict pacifist suddenly wants to fight and has stalwart bravery in the face of watching people die in front of them? Fine, they lack technique and is about to lose to the common bandit due to their history as a pacifist

I am a GM who exploits the weaknesses of my player's characters. A reasonable person would assume that a bird made of fire is weak to water, so that common bandit is going to act like it. Hope your character packed a way to work around said weakness

 

[Alex34]

when no one even interacts

 

[Chained Echoes]

I think it's rather annoying to be contacted by people who have no intention of collaborating on a roleplay. They just want someone to play out their ideas, their fandoms and canon characters in those fandoms. For example, I don't even get asked what I may like to do or interests and if I say while those may not be what I'm looking for, perhaps we can come up with something together, they end the conversation. Even if I approach someone about a roleplay, I always want to know what their interests are too, what those possible common interests we can create from. Even if we don't write together, I still like to give some common courtesy. Not everyone has to/does but darn if it's not... annoying.

 

[Yunalescaa]

I don't believe in posting orders and deadlines, but I do think there should be some respect in regards to the other players. I started up a group RP with the friends I usually do groups with. It started around the time I had contracted the vid and was not able to do any work on my characters or plotting. The DM decided that week they were going to start the RP and they're several posts deep in their thread, and everyone already has relationships, plot threads, you name it. I'm not saying to hold the RP up for those who haven't finished, but everything moves so fast in the discord and the threads and there's no possible way I can keep up. I genuinely think if not everyone is ready to start the story, why start it? Why leave players who were interested in the dark like that?

Trust me when I say, I do not thing a post order or deadline is the most efficient way to solve this. I did one RP with it and because I couldn't post until one other person did (who took a 2 month hiatus without warning), I got left behind. But a general respect for the other players should be somewhat necessary. Nothing was more frustrating back in ye old days of forum RP where you would go to bed with your post, and wake up to a whole page of conversation between 3 characters and have no idea what was happening.

 

[socasm]

Controlling partners. The ones that tell you what your character should be, and gets annoyed when you don't do what's expected. Also, when they won't let you add or even know the plot. You're just an NPC to a story that's supposed to be shared.

On a side note as a plotter: having everything be "let's go with it". Which is fine. I only need to know the general direction.

 

[LeapOfFool]

I hate when people try to get around restrictions on the number of powers a character can have in an roleplay by slapping vauge theme on their characters' abilities.

For example, I've seen plenty of people join a roleplay that restricts characters to a single power, only for them to then make characters with seven distinct abilities and justify it by claiming that all those abilities are actually based on the seven deadly sins and that means that it's actually a single power somehow.

At least when people pull the usual bullshit of giving, say, a character with electrokinesis the ability to also manipulate technology that makes a little bit of sense. That is after all a (somewhat) believable extension of the core power

 

[Autumn Leaf]

I second the notion; when no one interacts, or even shows signs of reading previous posts.

 

[GrumpySwallow]

If you need to leave the RP for an extended period of time, please just tell us so! You don't even have to give us a reason! Just let us know you'll be gone and an estimation of how long you'll be gone, or that we can skip you if we're waiting for a post from you. I'm just asking for a bit of courtesy! Folks shouldn't have to wait 2+ weeks for a post then ask in OOC if other players are okay, just for the missing player to immediately respond that, oh, they actually had (____) going on so they had to take a break.

I don't put strict posting times or post order rules when I'm the GM because I don't want to put pressure on people. RP is a hobby and RL comes first. That said, if you decide to vanish for a month without warning, don't be upset if the other players have decided they're not going to wait anymore and press on without you. They were already being more than generous by waiting that long!

 

[AudreyII]

When folks reach out asking to build worlds and plots together, but it becomes obvious within a few messages that they already have a storyline they want to follow and won't deviate from it—nothing wrong with that, I just wish they'd be more honest about it

 

[Silverwings]

My rp pet peeve is overly Neurospicy characters. Like yea it happens but please... don't make them have everything under the moon- it's so frustrating- I lose interest SO FAST.

That being said, I am neurodivergent and understand people are but... come on...

 

[Orm]

Competitiveness, to a degree. I've never had much of a competitive spirit, in role-play or life. I get the drive. And I participate in some competitive activities like chess. But I just don't understand its place in role-playing. Even when IC conflict is involved, like a fight or a battle of wits. I regularly play characters who are either more physically fit than me or smarter, if not both. So, if I'm playing the role of a detective looking for the PC serial killer, I'm already out of my depth, no matter how much writerly research I do.

I prefer collaboration over competition. I'd rather work together to tell a compelling story than compete for something like MC status. Even if my detective fails and the killer gets away, that's fine. But let it be because we worked together to tell a fun and entertaining story and not because of my own incompetence in homicide investigations.

 

[saniachan]

When there's a suitable idiom in your native language that you wanna use in an RP. Should be a fun thing to throw in weren't it for the real hassle of having to translate it to the RP's language. Like, bro, how tf should I translate this?

 

[TaperedNightjar]

When boundaries have been made clear but they get disrespected anyway. One member of my old RP (offsite) tried shipping their 16 year old (and extremely childish/younger than her years) character with my 28 year old one. I set a clear boundary, but others in the RP even tried defending the ship? Ew?

"It would have been normal back then."

No. I said no. That character is a minor. NO!

 

[ChamomileHasWords]

"It would have been normal back then."

This is a bad excuse even if it were true, and I can't say for sure without knowing what time period we're talking about, but this very probably isn't even a true statement. Marriages were usually between people who were both in late teens to early twenties for the vast majority of people in the vast majority of times and places, including medieval Europe. Aristocratic arranged marriages sometimes had massive age discrepancies, but that was because it was considered totally normal and fine for aristocratic houses to go to war with each other no matter what the church or the king said about it, but much more of a boundary to go to war against your own family, so someone from this family had to marry someone from that family and have a child to tie the two together by blood as fast as possible because no peace treaty is actually real until the two feuding sides have a grandson in common. And not only can a marriage alliance seal a peace treaty, it can also preserve an existing, informal alliance, turning it from something that might explode after a single argument between hot-headed aristocrats into something which can be relied upon to endure for at least a few decades. Which means aristocrats tended to view their daughters as a finite supply of alliance guarantors and tended to expend those guarantors pretty soon after they were old enough to produce children. And since that's true of every level of medieval lordship from kings down to baronets, there are lots of examples of thirteen-year old girls marrying forty-year old widowers.

But that's the product of a specific set of incentives created as an accidental consequence of aristocratic traditions. It's not like some ancient king decreed "underage marriages are great and we should have more of them" and that became tradition. Some ancient king decreed "killing your own family is bad and you should do less of it" and that became tradition and an unintended consequence of that was that underage marriages became an effective way to cement peace treaties and alliances. That's a very specific set of circumstances that won't be relevant in the overwhelming majority of RPs, marriage attitudes didn't just flip from "fucked up" to "modern" becuase we invented trains.

 

[Chained Echoes]

I just have to say I don't find it at all appealing, helpful, or pleasant to have first and foremost not been told that I have characters playing against racist characters and second just make the whole atmosphere just one cluster of racism. It's not even cool and makes me wonder a lot of things.

 

[Yunalescaa]

I just have to say I don't find it at all appealing, helpful, or pleasant to have first and foremost not been told that I have characters playing against racist characters and second just make the whole atmosphere just one cluster of racism. It's not even cool and makes me wonder a lot of things.

I'm sorry I know we aren't supposed to quote things but my jaw is on the damn floor and I can't pick it up. You entered a roleplay and the character you were playing against just...came out the gate racist? No warning at all whatsoever? Not even hinted at? I trust that's true I'm just like...how did this person think this was going to go well? Hello?

 

[nerdy tangents]

Yunalescaa they probably didn’t realize they were being racist.

It happens a lot, especially for people who have no real world context for bigotry. So they assume that it’s this very specific thing (ex. Killing someone or using a slur) but they don’t understand the many more subtle forms of bigotry that exist in the world beyond those specific instances.

In addition a lot of people have a hard time contextualizing their own actions as racist because “oh I don’t mean anything bad.”

My mom is like that. She’s extremely racist against people of Indian-descent (the country not Indigenous people).

And no matter how many times my siblings and I call her out she just gets defensive and insists that she’s “only asking questions, I’m not saying anything bad.”


Now this is by no means an excuse for having a racist atmosphere out of character. But it does explain how it could have happened with no prior warning.