So I play regularly with a group of friends across several games that we rotate around weekly, but last night and the week before both there's been a "Confession" scene in the party of love and devotion between party members.
I personally, find this shit absolutely un-listenable and from past experiences know that inter-party romance stuff never EVER works out well. Let alone 10+ minute diatribes that just go on and on about it. Thing is, both of these love confession things have come from the same guy towards different people in the two different campaigns.
Can I get some fricking advice on how to bring this up to the group/DM to where maybe this won't be a three for three NEXT week when we play? I get that people need to have their fun and all, but it A. Is exceptionally cringe and uncomfortable and B. Goes on forever with no brevity.
>Player in question is also Autistic and doesn't pick up on cues like AT ALL unless you're direct and blunt as a brick.
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Just take a moment to speak at game night and say romance stuff makes you uncomfortable, and you'd like it to be kept to a minimum. You're here to [game premise] not to experience a romance. Then hit it home by saying "You've done this twice before Anon and it went bad both times."
It's alright. You're allowed to just state things plainly. No complexity necessary.
>romance stuff makes you uncomfortable
That just makes him sound really weird when the problem is the other player making it weird. Like if someone said that to me I'd be polite about it but I'd also assume they were a gigavirgin.
Maybe couch it in terms of a spotlighting issue.
"Hey, I like my character moments as much as the next person, but the romance stuff has taken up a good chunk of our last couple sessions, and I'd like to have my, and other people's, moments too"
Its a bit indirect but might have the same effect.
Just stating that this is a concern has made me think you are in fact a gigavirgin because only virgins care about their virginity. If you're a highschooler maybe this social capital matters to you, if you're not you should consider
Well, then you need to take into consideration that this might be one the reasons he plays RPGs. This doesn't change that you can simply state it makes you uncomfortable. That's enough. Then they'll adjust or you'll adjust. What else are you supposed to say?
>Anon, about your romancing Bnon..? You'll have to know that in 1923 an alien space ship landed in South America and spawned a short-lived religion that said that if you do interparty romance then you'll be cursed for all eternity by virtue of their strange otherwordly science, so I wouldn't recommend going ahead with this.
Romance hasn't gone bad with this guy before, its just the general thing of it ALWAYS in every game gets real fricking weird and boundaries get cross y'know?
OP you are suffering from what we generally call a "skill issue". You being "uncomfy" is not a community issue that you need to tattle to mommy about.
Never had any of my PCs do anything more than lightly flirt with a party-mate.
Just use the safety tools that you and your group set up at the beginning of the campaign to more helpfully and articulately start a conversation about what your problems are, and what changes people can make in order to make the game more enjoyable to you. Making PC-on-PC romance a Line will stop others in your group from having heavy scenes based around these topics, or you could make it a Veil so that they can still have romance if it interests them but keeping it out of the spotlight, more referenced than seen.
You're shitposting but formal systems like that would help a lot with wrangling unreasonable autists like OP.
>you're shitposting
>this is exactly the type of solution OP needs and would improve his game
>but it's shitposting because safety tools are used by people I don't like
Ngl I've been pretty anti-safety tools, feeling like they are awkward and unnecessary if you aren't playing with either edgelords or snowflakes, but this unironically is a convincing example of a use case.
Well done anon, you actually changed someone's mind on Ganker. Never thought I'd see the day.
Glad to hear it. Here are some broader thoughts I have on them - feel free to disagree.
Unless you're pretty clearly playing with the wrong type of people for whatever you're doing, good safety tools are almost always invisible. Having a list of things people don't want in the game before you start playing makes it easy to avoid getting into situations where someone would stop play. Discussing limits and establishing a safe word is good, even though you don't intend to do anything that would make someone use the safe word. Not every game is the right fit for all the things you want to do, but that just means you need to save those ideas for a different game, with different people - who will be not just open, but excited to explore those themes.
As an example of this, I once ran a Monster Hearts game set in a Midwestern Americana town that had been left behind - the old factory closed down decades ago, main street's shops are mostly dead, etc. I put in an npc hooked on painkillers because I wanted to add in that detailing of the opioid crisis in small towns; one of my players instantly got very uncomfortable, and after maybe another 30 seconds she spoke up about it. She didn't do some cringy shit like holding up a card with X written on it, she just spoke like an adult and said she was uncomfortable with characters abusing prescription pills, can we change it. We talked very briefly about what I was after with it, and another player spoke up asking if we could switch it to the NPC being an alcoholic, preserving some of my theming about addiction, while respecting the new Line. It was good for all of us, we were able to jump right back into play, she didn't have to deal with content she didn't want, and I got to keep having a full table of interested, invested players. Maybe a month later she told me privately that she'd very recently had a roommate try and OD on pills, so when it came up in play she was immediately thinking about that instead of the game.
I hear you op, that's what you get playing with play-acting theater kids. I find it amazing how supposedly extroverted/histrionic-leaning people are so autisticly blind about context and yet you end being the weirdo in pointing it out.
Don't get me wrong, i like character development even within party dynamics, i just think that sometimes being poignant and paraphrasing most of it is more effective in game/mood terms than going full thespian and crossing the line of being weird/cringe.
Anyway my advice is to be upfront about with the dm privately about and then leave the table, there's no fixings with that situation. Next time apply for something super crunchy like rolemaster, gurps, mythras and the likes, it's a nice filter for that kind of people although you risk ending to tackle with the other end of the autistic spectrum but raising the minimum players age past 35 fix this.
Try again without the thought-terminating buzzwords and we'll see if there's anything of substance left to your whining.
What sort of fricking fruitcake wants to play pretend romance over a fricking tabletop rpg?
An actual autist, like OP said.
w*men
Nah.
OP clearly said it was some guy.
In my game it was also some guy who spent a lot of time flirting with an NPC, although thankfully that was more comedic than annoying.
Different strokes for different folks.
Romance and inter-character connections like that can be a really fun and interesting part of character growth and motivations between you and another (CONSENTING) player, and I can speak from personal experience that it can result in some truly wonderful roleplay moments and storybeats.
The problem nore in lies with the fact that 99% of idiots in this hobby do not know how to write, play, or properly express romance in a healthy way, so it just comes out as cringey ass magical realm wish fulfillment that makes other people uncomfortable.
Literally happening in my current campaign and, its actually hilarious how me and the other guy have alot of literary experience and will hook the table during downtime writing sessions, while the two females at the table are doing cringey My Immortal tier wish fulfillment fujo shit and nobody cares but them.
Like I said; it can be fun when everything lines up, but they so seldom do that it leads to situations like OP where somebodys being a weirdo and it makes people uncomfortable.
meh, imho it's more fun to just have other sort of relationships with fellow players
Once, I played a grandma and another PC was my grandson, and yet another PC was a cult leader and I was a follower of his cult.
In another game, I play a priest and another PC is a priest of a deity connected to mine.
These all led to cool moments
It all boils down to context and consent. I wouldn't say any of the ones you listed are any better or worse than a traditional romance, but for sure "romance" between two PCs is extremely easy to frick up and requires ALOT of communication and finesse, something your average tabletop autist just DOES NOT fricking have
This. I indulged in romance at the table and I'm married now. Fricked up but true. If you want to stay single never do in-character flirting.
I'm married too, but not to someone in my TTRPG group.
Flirting while roleplaying is cringe and annoying.
Nice trips. I also married someone where the relationship started out as flirty/romantic RP.
Everyone in the thread is wrong. The only correct course of action is to have your character become an absolute killjoy who obliterates sexual tension wherever he goes by acting like a sperg.
I like doing something like this.
One of my latest characters was a nosy and crazy grandma, she was great at ruining sexual tension.
Another was a very young male priest who would pretty much panic (in a comedic way) with certain topics.
lmao maybe you should hold up your X card you homosexual
Before you follow any advice in this thread consider the following:
- Is anyone else apart from you bothered by this?
>"Hey, <player> could you dial back/chill with the romance stuff? I know it's part of your character development but I don't really want it to become a central part of the game. I don't mind it being a background thing, but it's not really something I want taking up table time."
>they say something
Then you say
>"Thanks man, I appreciate you being flexible about this."
or
>"Well, I'm the DM and it's my decision. No more romance at the table."
I'm this guy in campaigns and I realize this. It's kind of reached the point though where if people are uncomfortable with romance I just refuse to play and that's fine. I don't need to be in every game and if people want to have normal D&D fun going on the adventure and slaying the dragon I totally understand. For me all those character goals and adventures are nested in chasing waifus and actually playing through romance and seduction. Though I don't really prefer confession shit like this anon says. I enjoy actually breaking down pcs and NPCs and trying to enact a proper seduction.
"Inter" implies a romance between people from two different parties.
The prefix you're looking for is "Intra".
Put some effort into your fake stories.
Never once had Inter-Party romance in any game I've played. I've been playing TTRPGs consistently for 13 years.