Forums » RP Discussion » Etiquette of give and take

I'm subscribed to a few looking-for-RP blogs, and it's alarming (to me) how many of the personal ads are long lists of fairly strict requirements. Stop me if you've heard these before: "You must give me a minimum of three paragraphs", "You must reply at least once a day and tell me in advance if you're going to be away or I'm dropping you", "You must be willing to RP canon characters against my OCs", "Submit a writing sample along with a thoughtful opening e-mail if you want me to consider you"... "Don't be shy, I'm looking for a friend!" Certainly everyone deserves to enjoy their free time exactly how they want to, but does that give one the right to expect their would-be partners behave like staff?

Since I make and take almost no demands of my RP partners (why add stress to a hobby or allow it?) I have no clue if this is a thing or not, so I'd welcome the opinions of people who do. How sort of expectations do you feel are reasonable? How demanding a partner are you willing to tolerate?

I've seen some of the same lists and they do get pretty restrictive to where I wonder how many takers/regular RP people those individuals are able to find. For my part, I usually do ask for at least a paragraph per post, though they don't need to be screen eating half-novels. Three to five sentences at a minimum I don't think is too much to ask, understanding that sometimes a one liner may pop up here and there, but without at least a few sentences even if some of it's 'fluff' I have a hard time playing off of it. I prefer reasonable grammar as well; it need not be perfect, heavens knows mine isn't, but at a bare minimum I like actions separated from words with the " " otherwise it can be hard to decipher a wall of text and people get upset that I took an action to be a statement if the meaning wasn't clear.

My own schedule is hardly one that allows me to be on every single day so I personally don't make any time requests; if it's going to be more than a few days I'll let my partners know out of courtesy so they don't think I've dropped them but that's about as far as it goes. My life is what it is and the real world for me takes precedence over 'pretendy fun times'.

As for submitting writing samples, having to play canon characters... the more it begins to feel like a job interview the less interested I am. Like many, I'm looking for a fun time in a casual environment pretending to be a dragon, or a knight, or a whatever, and I don't feel like I should have to 'audition' for the 'honor' of playing with another. If someone wants to play with me, I welcome it! If I have to spend hours proving my worth, then I'd rather pass and let them find partners more fitting their style while saving myself the aggravation.

In my experience, these are people who put a lot of love, time and effort into their roleplaying and take it very seriously, but are met too often with really poor writers who make it difficult to RP with (short posts with nothing to reply to are very common). They also most likely belong to a certain clique where everyone RPs the same way, and that happens to be x paragraphs, certain themes etc. They're so used to this setup that anything that deviates from it instantly ruins their fun. Hence the strict filtering.

In some cases they firmly believe that quantity equals quality (which is not true considering 4 paragraphs describing the same thing in different ways isn't exactly quality writing) but they insist even when told otherwise. Sometimes it's just force of habit, they've been doing it for so long it's hard to stop. This is particularly true when they were introduced to communities where applications and strict rules of not just what but how to play are normal, and they move away to some new place.

I used to have a lot of strict rules myself because I kept running into people who put no effort into their writing, made no effort to further the plot or come up with ideas or who were such atrocious spellers that I couldn't make out what they were trying to say. I learned from the community I ended up in (Furcadia) and at the time purple prose was 'in', so I was taught early on to write like that despite my broken English. It wasn't until much later that I started to understand what is important in roleplaying, and what expectations give the best results. I still get burned occasionally by thinking "Let's give this person a chance", only to have a lot of plotting and communicating go to waste because that person isn't compatible with me.

If they are willing to adhere to their own rules as well, and consider adding some rules that their partner deems important, I see no issue. If someone publishes rules that I don't agree with (length requirements being chief among them), I am thankful that we found out about our incompatibility in advance and were both able to move along to greener, less clash-inducing pastures.

There are absolutely some behaviors or styles of RP I won't put up with, participate in, or find fun, and I feel no need to subject myself to them. If my style of RP would make someone else unhappy for whatever reason, I'd like to know before subjecting them to it as well.

Although hobbies are fun, they can also be taken very seriously, and that is okay.

Moreover -- many LFRP ads are written in the hopes of attracting one perfect-match partner with whom much RP frolicking of the pair's chosen type can be done. If a thousand people read it and go, "Ew, no," it's unlikely the OP minds so long as they get that single person that agrees with them on what's fun. It can work in reverse, too. I'd rather read a hundred ads I don't want to play in to find the one that's going to be an uber-fun perfect fit. It is a huge time and effort saver.

Additionally, I also often find that those requirements relax after the first few weeks if everyone gets along.

EDIT: I think, upon reflection, that this is basically the text-based version of deciding on what rule system to play in. For example, if I'm going to play a tabletop game and I think I'm playing D&D and my friend thinks we're playing GURPs, it's going to be a complete disaster.

Games are created by sets of agreed upon artificial restrictions and artificial goals. This goes for text as well. The key words being "agreed upon"!

I certainly can attest that quantity does not equal quality through example: The Mysteries of Udolpho, one of the earliest Gothic novels written (by Anne Radcliffe) is an absolute brick of a book in which there are points where upwards of two pages are used to describe a scene. The story is good, characters believable enough (for an archetypal Gothic) and otherwise well thought out; however, the problem is the length. I read half of this book as part of a university English class on the Gothic genre and found myself unable to finish it due to how it dragged itself out. As a key note my professor apologized ahead of time as it was the first book on our list and possibly the hardest to finish... mind you, one of the other novels was a Scottish Gothic with a title so long he told us he never expected us to actually remember it.

My point is, other than The Mysteries of Udolpho I had no trouble following the style of all the other authors as they knew when not to linger on a scene. A short story can instill more dread and horror than a lengthy novel if done right: pacing is key.

This is not to say long posts are bad. Not at all... but there is also merits to shorter works and posts.

Gang, let's not wander too far from the original topic! I don't think this is a debate about whether quantity is good, bad, or necessary. The OP is about whether it is rude to ask potential RP partners to adhere to too many requirements or not, length or otherwise. We've already had many debates about whether length is good or necessary in other threads.

Whole-heartedly this. There is nothing like having a partner who is not compatible but an amazing partner. Most of my poor partner have to deal with me spacing and sometimes having to wait months for a post. In return I will wait months for a post. This also means I will be viciously honest about the fact that I can't take the grammar/spelling issues that some players have. I have told many people we're not compatible despite them having amazing looking characters. It's just another way of being honest and if that means turning off the majority for a select few that I can love and cherish, I'd rather do that.

I have some Dead strict rules and preferances mostly there things for my own personal health and well being. I want to have fun not have a panic attack. I rped in text for almost 20 years now when and I seen allot of fads and rp it used to be anything more then a paragraph was Spamming. use to make action posts like :She runs into a wall: ow. instead of she runs into a wall "ow" I seen rp almost look it was going to vanish forever. but I still have lots of Flexibility as well, I have 4 serious rp partners right now. I am not gonna rp with them because or grammar issues or posts length. I do look For maturity level, communication, and creativity. lets be honest I am almost 35 I dont have the same role play interests as I did when I was 15. that said I want some one that can look past my bad sentence structure and spelling errors and see my creativity, complex characters and my ability to tell a story even with my flaws.

Well said, everyone. I think it's alright to have rules of one's own so long as you're willing to be equally conscious of the other guy -- something I typically find is respected on RPR, but not elsewhere. I found these without trying:



I just can't believe people don't like it when I completely vanish, but it's not me, it's them.




Hi, I've become what I hate. Roleplay with me!


I'm 100% on board with someone spending their free time however they want, but I think it leads to a tragedy of the commons-esque roleplaying culture where lot of roleplayers don't care to do unto others, and selfishness prevails.

I seen that allot only recently though in the last 3 years I seen people get upset about it. but people dont like confertration usally when for me it is either one of three things ... 1. Got busy with life some times another rp not that I dont want to rp with you but some times things get fast and furious and then it may take a few days to get back to you. (This is why I only have a few rp partner at a time) 2. I lost the email (sorry sometimes get get buried under other emails.) 3. Planning my next move usallyh my rper partners just poke me... and I like OH!.. there you are! lol

Those seem less like a case of too many rules and is instead a case of giving up on rules entirely. Ouch!

I have to admit that I worry I've done this a bit in my group, and I can definitely understand the mentality of overly strict players. When you create a world with its own lore and its own species, and someone wants to introduce a new alien race to it, you have to adjust a lot of things, fix a lot of consistency errors. It can get a little crowded in the verse, and finding a happy medium between your world and theirs can be difficult, to say the least.

Sometimes this isn't a problem. I had a great RPer come in with their own race that was mostly compatible with the existing lore, but another player tried to join with a race that was logically inconsistent with both itself and the universe, and got very aggressive when I asked them to make changes.

I guess if either partner is forcing the other to bend over backwards to accommodate them, they probably wouldn't work well together anyway.

@sland

Wow, that's an impressive amount of cognitive dissonance there. I've had the fortune not to run into many players overtly toxic to an RP, but those people sound a little bit like a-holes.

I will admit. I have some limits on what I can and can't do. I have some comfort zones, such as a No Fetish Rule. Considering some fetishes make me uneasy.

I do have to slap a rule on about God modding and Meta Gaming, though.