Viewpoint Something you think is over/underdone?

[Yuel]

Too many fandoms.

"What do you like about RPing?" things like that.

To be honest, I don't even remember.

 

[The Dark Wizard]

To be honest, I don't even remember.

Meeting new people is always nice !

 

[nerdy tangents]

To be honest, I don't even remember.

Lol I feel that. It is genuinely easier to remember the negative experiences than the positive ones.

I remember one email exchange I had something like ten years ago. Maybe not word for word but the general context of everything that happened, mostly because the other person was a giant red flag.

I can not give you a positive example from that far back. Heck I probably couldn’t give you a positive experience from a year ago. Not to say I haven’t had any, just that they’re not particularly memorable.

—-

Also something I personally think is under-used is non-European folklore in fantasy.

 

[Walliver]

Also something I personally think is under-used is non-European folklore in fantasy.

Fr!
Stories from Egypt, India, and other non-European countries are incredibly interesting and should be used more

 

[Yuel]

Too many fandoms.

That's the negative overdone.
Dice rps seem to be underdone but I can get why.

Meeting new people is always nice !

Depends on if they aren't walking red flags or incompatible with you.

It is genuinely easier to remember the negative experiences than the positive ones.

This is true. So many bad experiences that the well almost poisoned. Good experiences feel so brief I can't even count on two hands what good things happened this year.

 

[Lorsh]

Something that is overdone on the site are these negative opinion threads, but never anything positive. "What do you like about RPing?" things like that.

slander to OP

this thread also includes things that are underdone, i.e. things people like

 

[Jannah]

Also something I personally think is under-used is non-European folklore in fantasy.

Really just non-European stuff in general, whether fantasy or realistic. It's very under-represented. I try to branch out a bit myself but even I tend to stick to what I'm most familiar with, which is middle eastern/central Asian culture. If I want something a little more familiar to most RPers then I'll often opt for eastern European, typically Russian or Ukrainian since, again it's what I'm familiar with.

 

[The Dark Wizard]

slander to OP

this thread also includes things that are underdone, i.e. things people like

Ah,

I apologize if is I slandered the OP, allow me to correct my statement, since in reality we haven't had too many negative opinion threads over all and the bad experiences in them are not the fault of the OP that made them.

We have thousands of active users on RpN and for the most part, everything is pretty smooth day to day, but when one of these is created, it seems to attract a certain kind of negativity which includes but not limited to LGBTphobia and other problematic issues, and collectively we've had dozens if not 100+ reports, comments and other things to do.

This thread alone had an entire page of comments hidden because it was starting to derail rather quickly, and the reports were coming in.

One of the things we do on the site staff is not publicly mark or bring attention to the fact that we moderated a thread or hid something except with those whose content was moderated, and finish any conversations involved with the people who have sent in reports. We can definitely consider marking threads and leaving notices in discussions more publicly, like other communities do with things like

• Who was warned (eh?)
• How many comments were removed

We've also had considered if things like pet peeves, unpopular opinions and such if they even belong on the site, and that definitely has been stated very public by us, but we haven't acted any more on it or done anything to the thread since the last explosion in those threads. Then there are things to consider like: If it's isolated incidents, it's usually the same people, and they can be counted on both hands, vs the amount of active people on the site who don't participate in any of the discussion areas.

There's also the idea that using the school RPs as an example: Why constantly rail against such things? Should we allow it? Is it causing issues? I mean ultimately you can just go to the filter and exclude the school tag and like 95 percent of them are now gone. Same thing with LGBT members who want to exclude mxf or members who don't want to see queer content, can exclude those tags.

We've made the site incredibly inclusive and people don't have to view what they don't want. Then we received reports that even if they block it, they can't morally agree with X.

Ultimately, I think we are still doing a good job, even though we can improve tools to make them simpler, release easy to digest guides and so forth. We've been at this since 2008, and we are only around today because we've earned the community's trust in the way we handle things, and we as always are open to feedback, whether publicly or privately, and do please that people do frequently take us up on that offer. We get plenty of feedback tickets every week on how to improve some facet of the site. Maybe it's just as simple as moderating the threads more, we try to be really patient with people because at the end of the day, the whole point of the site is to be a place one can go to and have a nice distraction from the day's hardships and bs even if it's just for a few minutes.

 

[nerdy tangents]

The Dark Wizard wait we can exclude tags? How do we do that?

Speaking personally I would call that underused. I think most people (myself included) just kinda scroll through active search threads. I might occasionally search a specific tag or sub-genre. But if I could exclude specific tags that would make searching even easier.

Cuz a lot of times people don’t tag things properly so searching via tag alone isn’t always helpful. But excluding tags would at least narrow down the volume of things I have to search through.

 

[The Dark Wizard]

The Dark Wizard wait we can exclude tags? How do we do that?

Speaking personally I would call that underused. I think most people (myself included) just kinda scroll through active search threads. I might occasionally search a specific tag or sub-genre. But if I could exclude specific tags that would make searching even easier.

Cuz a lot of times people don’t tag things properly so searching via tag alone isn’t always helpful. But excluding tags would at least narrow down the volume of things I have to search through.

On the advanced search page, I thought there was a place to do it from the threadlist inside the forum, but it may have run away during an minor software update.

Search

www.rpnation.com

 

[A Sparkling Zombie]

We've also had considered if things like pet peeves, unpopular opinions and such if they even belong on the site

Understanding that you might not have been looking for feedback on this particular matter, I personally would support the staff taking a stance on negativity threads, especially those that open the possibility of badmouthing other members of the site while falling short of not mentioning names. I think tearing down other players or constant complaining, perhaps especially when combined with a reaction feature, doesn't do much good for a community. I agree with the idea that such threads are overdone.

 

[Luscinioide]

I personally would support the staff taking a stance on negativity threads, especially those that open the possibility of badmouthing other members of the site while falling short of not mentioning names. I think tearing down other players or constant complaining, perhaps especially when combined with a reaction feature, doesn't do much good for a community. I agree with the idea that such threads are overdone.

yeah, that's how i feel on the matter. doesn't really seem like they have much purpose, considering 99% of them are just the same things being regurgitated in varying degrees of hostility. 'school/superhero rp bad, ghosting bad, script bad, novella bad, fast reply bad, slow reply bad'. that, and they always inevitably end in a knockout brawl because the same few people love to come in with 'hot takes' which...are usually thinly veiled racism or homophobia. like, do we really need the fifth thread of the week about ghosting?

i'm under the impression that such threads don't provide anything constructive to the community and only result in extra work for the mod team.

 

[Pretty Little Creature]

Something that is overdone on the site are these negative opinion threads, but never anything positive. "What do you like about RPing?" things like that.

Oh.my.goodness. So true!!

 

[Jannah]

I haven't really seen this thread as particularly negative tbh. It's just users expressing what they'd like to see more of in RP's. Maybe reading this thread might even inspire somebody to incorporate some of the themes mentioned here into their own RP's. If there's any thread filled with negativity then it would be the ones about pet peeves, ghosting, etc. This one, though? Yea, pretty harmless imo.

 

[Pretty Little Creature]

I agree this thread isn't negative but I do agree that negative opinion threads are very common.
This thread is just a typical conversation starter. Super relaxed


Also yes sci-fi role-plays are super under done. That is a very good point.

 

[nerdy tangents]

Something that I got reminded of recently that is underdone ;; plus sized characters.

I dunno I kinda like a short plump character who isn’t the sidekick or the butt of a joke.

 

[Jannah]

Something that I got reminded of recently that is underdone ;; plus sized characters.

I dunno I kinda like a short plump character who isn’t the sidekick or the butt of a joke.

I have written a few myself, but there definitely seems to be that assumption that for a character to be attractive they need to be slim. I guess no different from real life beauty standards I suppose.

 

[Yuel]

Something that I got reminded of recently that is underdone ;; plus sized characters.

I dunno I kinda like a short plump character who isn’t the sidekick or the butt of a joke.

I prefer short characters with plump chests. Probably not a problem?

 

[nerdy tangents]

I prefer short characters with plump chests. Probably not a problem?

As long as you’re realistic about it. Larger breasts actually cause a lot of problems for women which is something people like to forget.

It’s like well my dude bigger = heavier. So hello back pain. Also they typically lead to body issues and over sexualization.

Despite what gross men like to believe women don’t actually want to have larger breasts. There are very much no net positives for us in the long term.

Now yes some women will get breast enlargements but again there is a downside and you do very much have to take that into account.

Anyway as a lady it’s always kinda funny to me when people are like “my character is Barbie” and I’m like “your character has an eating disorder and massive back pain so good luck with that.”

Edit ;; actually that is one of the funnier overdones, where it’s clear the person just picked numbers out of a hat when it comes to body shape/size.

Like so much of the time they have made their characters unhealthy because it’s like “if you are this tall and only weigh this much you are in desperate need of intervention because that is a problem.”

 

[Murdergurl]

Something that I got reminded of recently that is underdone ;; plus sized characters.

I dunno I kinda like a short plump character who isn’t the sidekick or the butt of a joke.

I actually make a lot of characters that are on the heavier side. short as well.

---

That being said, here is Murdergurl's list of stuff she thinks are way-super-overdone:

• Vampire RPs

• Vampire/Werewolf RPs (though I've been seeing less of these as of late)

• Military/Para-military characters

• Academy/School RPs

• Anime Fandoms

• Cyberpunk (lately)

• Superhero RPs

• Zombie RPs

• "Horror" / Cosmic Horror RP

• Multi-fandom RP

---

And stuff I feel we definitely need MORE of is SPACE OPERA roleplays. Not just sci-fi, because that's a pretty big umbrella. But specifically, space-travelling futuristic settings with alien worlds and species.

Wild West Fantasy would be pretty cool to see more of, too.
(Essentially the whole Cowboys and Indians theme but with fantasy races instead of just humans)

Prehistoric Group RPs would be interesting to see pitched, as well.

 

[Yuel]

SPACE OPERA roleplays. Not just sci-fi, because that's a pretty big umbrella. But specifically, space-travelling futuristic settings with alien worlds and species

You mean like classic Star Trek? I figure that's your best bet nowadays as Star Wars is basically dead, and no other scifi series seems to be strong enough to take it's place.
Yeah, lots of humans with makeup dumbing around, but that's life.

 

[Murdergurl]

You mean like classic Star Trek? I figure that's your best bet nowadays as Star Wars is basically dead, and no other scifi series seems to be strong enough to take it's place.
Yeah, lots of humans with makeup dumbing around, but that's life.

Star Trek... but without all the stiff federation stuff. A little more wild.

Think more like Star Wars, but without the Jedi and Sith.

Or Firefly, but with aliens

Or Starfinder, without the gods and magic

 

[Yuel]

Star Trek... but without all the stiff federation stuff. A little more wild. Think more like Star Wars, but without the Jedi and Sith. Or Firefly, but with more planets and aliens

So Phantasy Star Universe/Online, with actual star travel and yadda yadda.

 

[Murdergurl]

So Phantasy Star Universe/Online, with actual star travel and yadda yadda.

Umm... no, not really. I played Phantasy Star 1&2 on the Gamecube. Still have it somewhere, actually. But if Universe/Online is anything like that version, then no, not that at all. I mean something with a great span of intelligent aliens hailing from across the cosmos. Not just space elves with tech-magic and androids. Also, Phantasy Star is WAY too anime inspired.

 

[WhiskeyMarten]

There are plenty of RP genres that I see more of than I'd like due to my disinterest in them, but there's clearly a demand requiring a supply so I hesitate to call anything "overdone".

Underdone on the other hand... I gotta agree with the people above saying sci-fi, clearly a demand not being met here by the sounds of it (don't look at me for help though!). I'd love to see more historical roleplays (except for ones just about (European) royalty, not a fan), alternate history roleplays, and roleplays that focus on a variety of cultures (be they real or fictional)