Bad luck or the norm?

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Bad luck or the norm?

Postby HeinousSaurus » Sun Sep 05, 2021 8:34 pm

Hello there. I'm a newish RPer with a question about the chat room. You see, I've made 8 attempts to RP in the chatroom so far. All of them have been whisper/PUB communications attempting to set up and play a one on one private roleplay. I have a grammatically/structurally sound profile with image and fully fleshed out pref list. I read profiles and sliders before I reach out to people, and incorporate that information in my proposals. I maintain grammatically and structurally sound posts when speaking with other users. Additionally, I have offered primarily to play pred, which is apparently the role in greater demand.

In spite of this, 5/8 attempts have failed completely (partner dropped off the face of the Earth mid conversation, or was impossible to reach to schedule the next session), and of the three that succeeded in some capacity, two began with my partner missing or being egregiously late to (hour plus) the session with no warning. Out of eight attempts, I've had one RP experience where things proceeded smoothly.

Additionally, the quality of writing has been pretty abysmal. One person didn't understand what perspective was, necessitating a twenty minute back-and-forth explanation of the difference between first, second, and third person. The others have been better, but it's still overwhelmingly a mess of run-on sentences and random tense-switching (spelling is, surprisingly, generally strong). This occurs even when it seems clear that the other person was not rushing (ex: four line post that took fifteen minutes written in this way.) I hesitate to actually copy some examples over, as I'm not sure if that constitutes a breach of etiquette/privacy, but...it's pretty bad.

In light of this disappointing and frustrating introduction, I've taken a step back and come over to the forum to ask if this kind of stuff is the norm. Is this just the level of expected behavior in the chatroom, or have I simply had a run of bad luck?
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Re: Bad luck or the norm?

Postby Aces » Sun Sep 05, 2021 10:37 pm

While I feel the RP chatroom has fallen a long ways from its glory days of old, it's not hopeless. Hell, maybe it was always like this and I never noticed because I had a lower skill level back then so I was one of the low-quality dopes without ever realizing it.

I think your best bet is to just hang out in the Vore Room and make friends with casual discussion and light RP before attempting to do more serious RP. Or just do light RP in the vore room and see where it ends up. Often a low-effort light RP snowballs into something more heavy as it progresses.

Most of my scenes in the RP chat have been in the vore room or started in the vore room in that way; a casual scene that gradually became more in-depth. Before that it was called the IC/OOC room but it was the same atmosphere. Casual RP that sometimes gets more serious. It's where all the good players who aren't pricks tend to hang out the most.

I've had extremely little luck with the dedicated RP room. Everyone is either bad, an asshole, or too scared to approach or be approached. I fall into at least the third category when I attempt to play in the dedicated RP room. Hopefully not the other two, but who knows?
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Re: Bad luck or the norm?

Postby Softkitty » Sun Sep 05, 2021 11:02 pm

Hi there! ^_-_^ I'm a bit of a goober who has been in the chatroom now for a long while, and I have seen folks come and go of all sorts of varying lengths, quality, and styles. I myself can be rather wordy and detailed, or just derp and kick it with the best of them. I would like to simply state before I give my opinion, take it with a grain of salt. I tend to mean my writing tone to be a bit more on the humored or playful side, and anything that might come off as disrespect is totally unintentional.

Folks play like they like to play.
You can come with higher expectations but the simple truth is, sometimes folks just want to relax after a hard day of work, and get into some mischief. I do agree that some posts drive me nuts... but honestly, the mere fact that someone wants to spend a little time and back and forth with you in private is a godsend in its own regard. If you are chasing too lofty of expectations, you are never gonna have any fun. And sure... I get that you prolly are just asking for like three or four lines of competent quality posting... but not everyone wants to do that.
Now as for folks dropping off the face of the earth after talking with you... Poofing happens. Real life, folks come and go. Pub them and ask if they are okay, internet issues, or what is up. If they respond, might find out that someone snuck in on them or whatnot. Happens to me, sometime it will happen to you, most likely. But playing the devil's advocate... If they are poofing after starting a scene with you, you might be intimidating them with your writing style or expectations. No offense, if I honestly did not understand perspective, while I like to learn, the last thing I am looking for when trying to get into some vorish shenanigans is a 20 minute explanation why my writing style is not 'right'.
Again... No offense!
But in the end of the day, is a run-on sentence and tense switching REALLY that big of a deal breaker? If it is... I'm afraid you might deprive yourself of something that I have gained over my 9+ years on here. Lasting friendships with random derpballs. You might have to wade hour upon hour of inactivity, but there are gems here. There are good people here. Some type well, some do not. But '/me nibbles on you and gives a great big hug,' will always get a chuckle, and a hug right back out of me... just as much as a version of Voracious Shakespeare in the Park.
See? I prolly got a little too wordy with this.
The only expected behavior in the chat rooms, in my opinion... is to have fun, be respectful, and gobble/get gobbled.
I do hope your luck turns around and you find something that can strike your fancy! Either way, peace, love, and applesauce! Good luck, and good noms!
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Re: Bad luck or the norm?

Postby nicktaken » Sun Sep 05, 2021 11:28 pm

By my observation, this is the norm. Do remember that you're talking about a public chat room. These problems you have run into? They're basically what chat rooms are made of. Being dedicated to a rather specific topic, or intersection of topics (RP and vore) doesn't stop it from being a chat room first, no more than an apple being green or red stops it from being an apple.

I would even say that 3/8 is even a fairly good result. But even outside the chat room, when you get in touch with someone via PM after seeing their forum post about seeking RP, most people won't even write back saying they're not interested. That number is definitely above 80%, perhaps even 90%. Which fits fairly well with the standard bell curve (also known as 80/20 or 50/10 rule).

My advice is to lower your expectations, but definitely not your standards. Stick to your guns, trust me. The fun you feel like you might be missing out on due to being too demanding? You're not. The only things you're missing out on is disappointment. And perhaps seek more reliable methods of communication than a chat room.

Myself, I prefer Discord these days. It can work as both a chat room and a forum but more personal. And if someone starts ghosting you, don't even waste your time.
I write stuff, sometimes: GALLERY
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Re: Bad luck or the norm?

Postby KnightleyPaine » Mon Sep 06, 2021 3:22 am

HeinousSaurus wrote:Hello there. I'm a newish RPer with a question about the chat room. You see, I've made 8 attempts to RP in the chatroom so far. All of them have been whisper/PUB communications attempting to set up and play a one on one private roleplay. I have a grammatically/structurally sound profile with image and fully fleshed out pref list. I read profiles and sliders before I reach out to people, and incorporate that information in my proposals. I maintain grammatically and structurally sound posts when speaking with other users. Additionally, I have offered primarily to play pred, which is apparently the role in greater demand.

Man, I wished more new people were like this. Welcome to a toxic hellpit that barely functions as advertised, it's not much but it's our toxic hellpit that barely functions as advertised. You'll just have to stick it out and find your place.


HeinousSaurus wrote:In spite of this, 5/8 attempts have failed completely

Norm, or a good record depending on who you are. This isn't your fault per se because statistically spoken, the chances of any two people having exact reciprocal kinks while also finding what the other represents attractive is low in and by itself.

HeinousSaurus wrote:(partner dropped off the face of the Earth mid conversation, or was impossible to reach to schedule the next session) and of the three that succeeded in some capacity, two began with my partner missing or being egregiously late to (hour plus) the session with no warning. Out of eight attempts, I've had one RP experience where things proceeded smoothly.

Norm, this chat is disposable timesink time. It is the lowest possible priority of most people's days, so the slightest bit of thing that gets in the way of anyone's plans will cause a delay.

HeinousSaurus wrote:Additionally, the quality of writing has been pretty abysmal. One person didn't understand what perspective was, necessitating a twenty minute back-and-forth explanation of the difference between first, second, and third person.

Bad luck. Overall, most chat regulars are literate to some extent (but you will remember the bad ones). You usually have to catch one of the low effort people, and while profile is not an end-all judge on that, the conversation you have beforehand is usually a good hint at what you're getting. If the person is asked two questions in one sentence, answers one with a single word and then forgets about the other one entirely, you're not dealing with someone with any will or interest to actually write.

HeinousSaurus wrote:The others have been better, but it's still overwhelmingly a mess of run-on sentences and random tense-switching (spelling is, surprisingly, generally strong). This occurs even when it seems clear that the other person was not rushing (ex: four line post that took fifteen minutes written in this way.)

Depending on post sizes and time of day, it's not uncommon for 5 minutes of dawdling on another tab, 5 minutes of studying the post and then 5 minutes of writing. As a new user, you're probably very excited for every person willing to spend time with you, but when someone's been there and done that, they stop staring at the screen with anticipation. Run-on sentences happen to good people as well, I literally have that problem sometimes - pretty sure you've found one in this post somewhere. This is because chat posts aren't super conductive to being reviewed, and I'm not going to review this post a lot, or return to this thread tomorrow. But yes, the quality can be bad at times because everyone has to be the good roleplay person but everyone wants to do the fetish stuff, and the demands for the good roleplay produces stilted volume-based writers who then perpetuate snobbery. Depending on who you are, you could just see if they were just there for the fetish stuff, and not hold any pretenses in the scene itself. But again, you'll usually notice from how people talk to you.

Here's a quick rundown depending on if you approach or are approached:

Approachers:
Hi: "Hi - how are you? - wanna play?" Don't judge the 'hi', not everyone wants to write a giant paragraph to an AFK person or get ghosted, but 'how are you' is received as well as a hatecrime and people who don't understand that probably haven't learned enough to not drag that round of redundant smalltalk. They made someone turn their head and tab over on the 'hi', and haven't learned yet that the longer they drag on a potentially unwanted conversation, the more annoying they are. To not be terrible to this person, but if talking to them after the 'wanna play' comes off like with a real life NPC, you're going to get what you let yourself into.
Zero patience: "Hi - hello? - u there? - bitch" Spams you if you take longer than 1 minute to reply to anything. Usually new players who stare at the screen, take a moment to explain them you might take 10 minutes a reply and see from there.
IC Approacher: *Does things in your proximity* If creepy asterisks exists outside of fetish chats, it damn well exists in chats. This person thinks social norms can be sidestepped by invoking the assumption that everyone is horny like they are and they do not care who is creeped out by it. If you have not noted in your profile that IC approaches are welcome, then courtesy of their lack of empathy they function like a Nigerian Prince scam: The egregiousness guarantees that only pushovers they can manipulate into sating their base desires will get into things. Like a Nigerian Prince scam, they are spam to everyone else and make the world a little worse. No beef with IC approachers who stick to IC approach welcome profiles, you guys do your thing. Only indulge them if you're into it, but please don't enable them and actually mark your profile.
Seductive wannabe: "Hi there hon~" Bleeds virgin energy from the very first sentence by throwing verbal sexual harassment as their first contact method, because due to having zero experience in actual flirting, they think it actually starts like that. These people aren't usually terrible though, just socially awkward, so most of them will return to talking like human beings if you talk to them like human beings, at which point they might even be workable. Sadly, if they play female characters, they're often enabled by the desperate because guys on a whole often don't receive enough positive attention.
Catcaller: "Nice char" All the charm of a construction worker doing the cartoon wolf whistle. Thank them and watch as their brain melts trying to come up with the step after unsolicited compliment. If they revert to human speech, they might be workable if you're lucky.
But I'm horny NOW!: "Are you willing to X and Y me?" nevermind the things they asked are explicitly stated as unwanted in your profile. This person's blood is just not in their brain in the moment, so no, they have not read your profile at all, or even considered the logistics of roleplay. Chances are they only have like 15 minutes of time. Politely decline, and report them if you're on multiple characters and that phrase is just copy and pasted because that's the next category:
Spammer: The above message, but all of your alts receive that exact message in short order copy and pasted. Just report them, because that's against TOS.
Sales pitch: So you turn your head, and there's a ginormous paragraph detailing their idea. They mean well, because bad approachees more or less project as if this was the ideal approach. Realistically, if I can tell within 2 seconds I don't want someone, I don't want 2 more minutes of reading just to be sure. Regardless of how you feel in the moment, this is at the very least a person who has gone through some effort. If their first line is 'hi' but their second is this, that's still this. If all works out these people have a good shot at being decent partners.
Testing waters: Doesn't bring a scene, instead starts asking about you and your preferences. There's two types of these people, those who read profiles and those who don't. The former have a methodology to determine if they think you're a match, the latter just wants to preemptively cut off ways for you to reject them. The former can turn out great if you have the patience, the latter might just lead to no end of arguing why you should give them a chance, in which case be clear why you don't want to, don't be wishy washy and conjure up fake reasons. All persistence beyond that is a reportable offense.
Negotiator: Needs to know the reason behind every doubt, negotiates everything. You're not obliged to accept every argument. Realistically, if you were honest with your reasons why not, there will be no true way around it.
Alt char: Clearly the person you rejected but on another alt. Be honest for the reason of your rejection, if they don't know why they can feel like it was situational. If they're doing it to sidestep rejection tell them in no uncertain terms you do not want to play with them. After that it's a report.
Absolute chad: Polite and short open serving mostly to make the chat sound => why they approached you and what they're hoping to get. Pretty much the ideal approacher in most circumstances, even if you don't want them, you know immediately because they told you what they want. If this person doesn't further screw things up by being bitter about rejection, bless them. But this person will be a rarity and the reason is in the sequence I just named. "Why they approached you and what they're hoping to get" is kryptonite because that would actually reveal something about them that can be rejected, so most people's psychology instead replaces that line and they become the next thing:
Normie: Polite and short open serving mostly to make the chat sound => some weird question about a specific form of a specific kink. This person is basically just the virgin side of the virgin vs chad meme, they're just a bit socially awkward and try to be more polite by using questions instead of what might come off as demands. Talk with them and they'll probably lose the awkwardness.


Approachees:
AFK person: Will eventually respond to you, don't spam them, try another day, or at least within some hours.
Ignore: Unfortunately indistinguishable from AFK person, but as they are technically on some border of the TOS (though it's not policed) there's no reason to treat them differently. Wouldn't that mean you'd repeatedly message someone ignoring you without ever knowing they don't want you, and that would annoy them? Wow, you've arrived at the logical conclusion of why a dumb inconsiderate action might not work out perfectly. Any irritation from this on their end is just karma, be considerate to good people, not bad people, but do not do anything that would harass the AFK person.
Asshole: "Fuck off" Unless you've egregiously gone against their preferences with your approach, this behavior is not welcome. Just report this person.
Asshat: "Your character is strange" This person is an asshole but entertains some delusion they aren't, so regardless of what you're saying or asking, they don't start by talking with you, but rather about you to setup some sort of conflict. Even if you can skillfully navigate around it, the real asshat never was in good faith and usually just gets more belligerent or trails off. Asshattery comes from a form of cowardice where they want to preserve a moral basis for their own arguments on approach and tell themselves at the end of the day that they were friendly, they can't tell you off because that would legitimize themselves being told off, so instead they're just hostile. Basically, brace yourself for the worst.
Ok: "ok" The approachee version of "hi". If you manage to put two questions into the same sentence, they'll manage to only answer one, and a second word in their reply is something of a rarity. No, they don't roleplay better than this.
Diva: "If you approach me with anything less than a fully written idea guessed from my profile alone without any input from me I will ignore you immediately" Burned by 'hi', but essentially equally inconsiderate. Produces sales pitchers when people follow their instructions. This is the true spiritual counterpart to 'hi' because both require you to do all the work at next to no usable input, but the diva is marginally better if their profile actually has enough workable information. It's worth probing if this person actually has the decency to work with you rather than just be a demands list sometimes.
PTSD: Large amounts of profile dedicated to rants about pet peeves and how other people have mistreated them. Their profile might read like the list you're reading probably, so maybe that says things about me. If talking to them is like you're paying for the misdeeds that other people have committed and they throw eggshells to walk around at every step, take this advice: Abuse perpetuates, if what they relay is real, this person is on the track to become a different version of what has created them and it's not your responsibility. Though a lot of the time, they're not actually traumatized or anything, but are well-informed in all the approacher stereotypes I've listed but never considered not being a toxic reactionary themselves - essentially a version of "I can't be gay because of how much I hate performatively hate gay" from high school kids. The ones who have managed to be well-adjusted will speak to you like a person without insinuating you're about to do bad things at every corner. If they aren't paranoid wrecks they can be great people underneath, so brace a bit but give a chance.
No: No reason, just no thanks. Chances are you screwed up somewhere, check prefs or whatever. But if you don't find anything, the absolute lack of information from that rejection can leave you dissatisfied or outright puzzled what the deal was. You can just ask, but if they don't reply after that leave them alone and at most try with another alt on another day. Yes, this makes you another alt from the approacher side, this is how they get produced. You know what to do if you don't want them.
Irregular schedule: Discusses with you every time, then just doesn't show up. At first, 90% of the time, IRL took precedent. Just see if you meet them again. They'll often tell you if it's chronic, for example, I might be this person to some people right now but I make it clear why. If someone doesn't show up it's usually not because of you, or out of some moral failing, they might have issues actually knowing how much they can play. Ask for a certain date or time, and understand not everyone can just have time when you do.
Absolute chad: Answers you if they're not AFK or busy => Works things out or lets you know immediately why they have to reject you in an honest fashion and names the reason so you don't linger with a feeling that it was situational. Again, rare, because most people are wishy washy and have to keep the doors open, so you get...
Ghost: Doesn't say no, works out a scene they don't really want, loses interest without saying anything, vanishes or stops replying so they can pretend they didn't just leave you hanging. They're why the testing waters players exist. Not malicious, again, usually just socially awkward, but you have every right to be upset. Not to be confused with irregular schedule, which are up-front about why and accept if you don't want to play with them based on that.

A lot of the time, socially lazy people who can't maintain normal connections IRL don't stop being socially lazy people online. They're only interested when fired up and obsessing over something. RP is like an internet argument to them, in one moment irrationally highly attention-occupying, forgotten about in the next. That's not just Eka's, you'll find a smattering and variations of the above anywhere.
Last edited by KnightleyPaine on Mon Sep 06, 2021 4:03 am, edited 2 times in total.
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Re: Bad luck or the norm?

Postby Softkitty » Mon Sep 06, 2021 3:58 am

A small part of me wants to refute what Knightlypaine has said... but truth is, they hit it right on the mark with a lot of what they wrote. I have literally encountered every single type of person that is up there on that list. But darn it! Half of those types of folks can still be fun, just like they suggested. In all things I suppose, glass half empty vs half full? Still... I gotta say, bravo sir, bravo!
I would like to say from above that Nicktaken is absolutely right... stick to your guns if you know what you want. But remember, roleplay is a dance! You might wanna salsa, and I might wanna waltz! We gotta figure out how to meet in the middle and Tango!

I got to admit! Reading that, I am wondering where I fall. X3 I'm always polite, I hope! But darn, some of those bad habits are mine! Ahhhh the mirror burns me!!!
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Re: Bad luck or the norm?

Postby HeinousSaurus » Mon Sep 06, 2021 7:10 pm

Aces wrote:I've had extremely little luck with the dedicated RP room. Everyone is either bad, an asshole, or too scared to approach or be approached.


nicktaken wrote:By my observation, this is the norm...I would even say that 3/8 is even a fairly good result.


KnightleyPaine wrote:Norm, or a good record depending on who you are. This isn't your fault per se because statistically spoken, the chances of any two people having exact reciprocal kinks while also finding what the other represents attractive is low in and by itself.


Dang. That's disappointing to hear. In light of this, is it generally considered taboo to have multiple outstanding RP requests out? I've been worried it'd be rude, but if the expected fail rate is like 70%+, it seems only logical...

KnightleyPaine wrote:Depending on post sizes and time of day, it's not uncommon for 5 minutes of dawdling on another tab, 5 minutes of studying the post and then 5 minutes of writing. As a new user, you're probably very excited for every person willing to spend time with you, but when someone's been there and done that, they stop staring at the screen with anticipation. Run-on sentences happen to good people as well, I literally have that problem sometimes - pretty sure you've found one in this post somewhere. This is because chat posts aren't super conductive to being reviewed, and I'm not going to review this post a lot, or return to this thread tomorrow.


I think you may have hit the nail on the head with that. I wasn't expecting RP to be this...relaxed, shall we say? I decided to get into it after reading a couple RPs that had been cleaned up and published as stories by other people, and they seemed pretty interesting, so my expectation was more "this is going to be like joint storytelling" rather than what I got. I guess that's probably on me, and I know now at least that I should plan for people missing sessions or not writing as well as I had hoped.

Softkitty wrote:But in the end of the day, is a run-on sentence and tense switching REALLY that big of a deal breaker? If it is... I'm afraid you might deprive yourself of something that I have gained over my 9+ years on here. Lasting friendships with random derpballs. You might have to wade hour upon hour of inactivity, but there are gems here. There are good people here.


nicktaken wrote:My advice is to lower your expectations, but definitely not your standards. Stick to your guns, trust me. The fun you feel like you might be missing out on due to being too demanding? You're not. The only things you're missing out on is disappointment.


I appreciate getting answers with different perspectives, but I think I'll go with nick on this one. It's easily possible that my standards are unreasonable, but if I'm not getting much out of what the accepted norm is, I don't think continuing to slog through it would offer much anyways. Like, I just couldn't get anything out of it because I had to read each post 2-3 times to comprehend it. Perhaps RP just isn't my thing, and I suppose that's fine if it's the case. I hope I can find some people who share my interest, though, and I think I'll try at that a little longer before I throw in the towel. Do either of you have some advice for how to indicate the quality of writing I'm looking for without being intimidating/rude or very long winded?

KnightleyPaine wrote:Here's a quick rundown depending on if you approach or are approached:


Wow. I really appreciate you taking the time to write all that out. I absolutely feel like I've met people who match some of those descriptions word for word...but the distinctions between a couple of them revolve largely around the length of the approach post, and now I'm wondering if I'm falling into the Sales Pitch group (especially given some other people have said I'm probably intimidating people). What would you say the length of a good RP request whisper/PUB should be, in general?
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Re: Bad luck or the norm?

Postby KnightleyPaine » Mon Sep 06, 2021 8:33 pm

Softkitty wrote:But darn, some of those bad habits are mine! Ahhhh the mirror burns me!!!

HeinousSaurus wrote:Dang. That's disappointing to hear. In light of this, is it generally considered taboo to have multiple outstanding RP requests out? I've been worried it'd be rude, but if the expected fail rate is like 70%+, it seems only logical...

HeinousSaurus wrote:Wow. I really appreciate you taking the time to write all that out. I absolutely feel like I've met people who match some of those descriptions word for word...but the distinctions between a couple of them revolve largely around the length of the approach post, and now I'm wondering if I'm falling into the Sales Pitch group (especially given some other people have said I'm probably intimidating people). What would you say the length of a good RP request whisper/PUB should be, in general?

I make spicy posts but if you can comprehend that people will people you might even grow empathy which is probably the best thing that can happen because we just don't have enough of that here. If you put yourselves in the shoes of a common approachee, they're not glaring at a screen when nothing's happening. That's not how you pass time. They're at work or gaming something casual, or maybe even something they're invested in but logged into Eka's out of habit rather than any genuine want. And when they do get their attention dragged around if they have the actual decency to respond to direct messaging, there's still supply and demand. Everyone who gets play has had 'not quite what they wanted' times like a million and probably know how many hours a scene can be. The best profiles aren't the ones that make you read 3 formatted paragraphs about a coming of age story in dystopia but the ones that make it clear what they're after. Also, because people are wishy washy about not excluding others they'll have things like half sliders which is like limp tolerance so whenever it is in direct competition with a full slider, just assume they don't want it. It's like if you could only have either watching paint dry or ice cream, but never both, an offer of paintwatching pretty much excludes the ice cream and will be about as well received despite the fact that in a vacuum watching paint dry is inoffensive, but if the next 4 hours of their lives is going to be devoted to that, they'll not exactly be motivated partners. The secret is really just letting time pass and getting to know more people, eventually someone might just click.

HeinousSaurus wrote:I think you may have hit the nail on the head with that. I wasn't expecting RP to be this...relaxed, shall we say? I decided to get into it after reading a couple RPs that had been cleaned up and published as stories by other people, and they seemed pretty interesting, so my expectation was more "this is going to be like joint storytelling" rather than what I got. I guess that's probably on me, and I know now at least that I should plan for people missing sessions or not writing as well as I had hoped.

Again, you're new here, this is exciting. You're putting actual time into trying to find roleplay. I got out of bed planning for finally getting some progress on a video game or something in my free time but like if someone neat comes around I'll give it a try I guess? The attitude dissonance makes new players feel unwanted if other people aren't empathetic, they sometimes grow bitter and sometimes fester in toxicity producing a manipulative assgoblin in the eternal war between jaded assholes with no fucks to give and manipulative asshats who try to get what they want at any cost, and there's too many people falling on either side of that front, and too many who somehow embody both because they were born with a talent at being terrible and it was not squandered in any way.

Instead, if you're going to hustle, see it as scouting. Just assume nobody will play with you for a week, spend that week building an informative profile, study up on who exists and try being more discriminatory in taking your mind off the possibilities, but rather watch what happens if you only look for someone who wants the exact thing you want, but in reverse as the opposite party unambiguously. You'll notice the number shrinks by a lot, and unknown factors will further diminish the true pool. But you have to get to know people to find people. It's like when we say 'you have to put yourself out there' when finding a date. Will you fuck something up? Count on it, because heaven preserve us when people get into deep connections with no checks on their faults.

HeinousSaurus wrote:I appreciate getting answers with different perspectives, but I think I'll go with nick on this one. It's easily possible that my standards are unreasonable, but if I'm not getting much out of what the accepted norm is, I don't think continuing to slog through it would offer much anyways. Like, I just couldn't get anything out of it because I had to read each post 2-3 times to comprehend it. Perhaps RP just isn't my thing, and I suppose that's fine if it's the case. I hope I can find some people who share my interest, though, and I think I'll try at that a little longer before I throw in the towel. Do either of you have some advice for how to indicate the quality of writing I'm looking for without being intimidating/rude or very long winded?

In my personal experience, intimidation does happen. People don't expect it and don't even entertain the possibility until it happens to them, everyone thinks they can come up with something in a vacuum. But realistically, you're at some place in writing and if someone exceeds it and is also faster, the part of you responsible for empathy will feel like you're being inadequate right now and the part of you responsible for the Dunning Kruger effect will tell you that actually, their writing is bad for using excess adjectives or something.

There's always a culture shock, and it's never the way you envisioned it. That's the difference between theory and practice.

If you want to get along on here, you have to throw yourself into the muck and roll in it. Sit in the vore room for a week on the same character and force the highschool cliques that have formed (usually around simping someone) to understand you are just a reality now and ignoring you won't bully you out of the room. Read through profiles for a few hours in the library, and notice recurring patterns to a point where you can recognize alts without labels just from how the profiles are designed and kinks are handled. Sit in the Out-of-chat-world and talk with other people who aren't getting play and don't want to play with you either but they have nothing better to do. Ignore the RP Room's existence because everyone except the new people who don't read rules ignore its existence. Meet the artists you've seen works of and let them disappoint you.

Each room has its own subculture of terribleness, and it takes navigating that to get along with the chat. But once you're able to, you can find those precious little gems that are people who fit you almost like a damn glove and it might have been worth it, or not, I don't know your mileage on worth it but it will have been something and I personally feel getting at least that far at least once is like a worthwhile goal to shoot for in terms of seeing if you fit in.
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Re: Bad luck or the norm?

Postby nicktaken » Tue Sep 07, 2021 1:20 am

HeinousSaurus wrote:It's easily possible that my standards are unreasonable, but if I'm not getting much out of what the accepted norm is, I don't think continuing to slog through it would offer much anyways.

Personally I don't think the words "accepted norm" are applicable here. There is a far too great a range of skill levels and preferences present. But even if it were, I would strongly advise against conformism in hobbies. That will just turn it into a chore. To put it more simply, don't worry about public perception, just do what feels right. This is supposed to be fun, not stressful.

HeinousSaurus wrote:Perhaps RP just isn't my thing, and I suppose that's fine if it's the case.

I am not familiar with you, but I would instead say, RP isn't the thing of most people on the site. What happens more commonly is what I'd describe as cybering via self-insert avatars. Which is fine, to each their own, but it's not what I would call role play, as there is no role or playing a character involved. However there are also people who do that (myself included), so whichever option suits you better, it's possible to find like-minded people. Not easy, but possible.

HeinousSaurus wrote:I hope I can find some people who share my interest, though, and I think I'll try at that a little longer before I throw in the towel.

Absolutely. Personally I've been around for a few years, and in that time there were only a handful of RPs that I really liked. But they were well worth the attempts and time spent looking, I'd say.
At the end of the day it doesn't even take much to keep looking. Chat rooms are more involved, but so far my impression is that chat rooms might not be the place for you, since the average standard of writing is pretty low (because they're chat rooms).

HeinousSaurus wrote:Do either of you have some advice for how to indicate the quality of writing I'm looking for without being intimidating/rude or very long winded?

I've seen different methods. Asking for literate partners (God, I hate people misusing that word so often) is a common method. Another one is asking for detailed/descriptive posts. A slightly more straightforward option is to specify a hypothetical average length of posts (paragraph, multi-paragraph etc).

The last one tends to have a bad reputation because *pushes up large round glasses* "well akshually post length is not akshually related to quality", except it kind of is. Verbosity is just annoying but there is never a situation where you can't produce at least a decent paragraph in response if you're even trying. And for me that's the biggest thing: trying. I've had more enjoyable RPs with novice writers who tried than those who got complacent in their certainty they were too good to bother.

Unfortunately, none of that is a guarantee. Again, from personal experience, you can specifically state desired length, and that people give you a rundown of what they're looking for when they contact you. That does nothing to deter people from just sending you "hi wanna rp", and they often get pissy if you tell them that no, you don't want to RP. It's like that old comedy skit, "this sign can't stop me because I can't read". Except in this case it's "refuse even that basic courtesy to this person I expect to reply to me".

So in summary, it's a mess out there. But so it is everywhere on this mortal coil. You should stick it out for a while, it may turn out to be well worth it.
I write stuff, sometimes: GALLERY
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Re: Bad luck or the norm?

Postby Nalzindar » Tue Sep 07, 2021 1:27 pm

It seems you have gotten quite a few advises above, and not a few of them seems rather negative. KnigtleyPaine did a remarkable job in summarizing what people do in the RP room and what different approaches means, and true, he got a point in what he lists, but that doesn't necessary means that the different approaches always are bad. Some people appreciate one kind of approach, other people, a different approach. But the most important is of course how their RP is conducted, and for finding a partner that match your interests, the best way to start is reading profiles, likes/dislikes and the character's profile (Tips: go for one that has a moderate length of description, then you will have a better idea of what to work with).

My experience with RP seems rather good compared to what the comments above may suggest, but maybe it is just I who have been on the lucky end of it!
The method that usually works for me is to look through the profiles, find one I think looks interesting and matches my preferences and then see if he/she is busy or not. It is nothing wrong in being polite upon first approaching someone you don't know. Send a simple, yet informative post about what you want (or maybe make a positive comment on something you read on the character's profile and show that you find it interesting).
Most people I have met will either politely tell you they are busy, look at your character before answering positive or negative, telling you they are looking for something else, or greet you back with a similar reply or ask what kind of idea/scene you have in mind.

As a general rule, I always have approach a potential partner with one or two ideas in mind. I ask if one of those sounds interesting or if he wish to discuss one of them further, or if he rather want something else. Works 8 out of 10 times for me. The importance is not to get too detailed, steer away from partners who wants (demands) too many details and specifications, these people can be difficult to please, no matter how hard you try and it is never worth the effort since they don't repay the favor >.>

Once you have found one or two RP partners that you like, and that likes you back, then keep up the contact every now and then, and you will get some nice RP stories. Just keep in mind that your preferences doesn't need to mach 100%, be kind to each other and respect the other's kinks. Sometimes it is better to go along with a few kinks that not necessary lays within your preferences and keep a good RP partner that also respects yours kinks, than try to look for a less good one that (seemingly) match yours 100%.
Trust me on this, I think I have met some of the best RP players in here, who has a decent writing, a good imagination and informs you if something comes up or doesn't work out - in a constructive way. But to find these people, you have to be patient and be accepting of some (not everything) your partner's special preferences, then they will do the same for you :)
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Re: Bad luck or the norm?

Postby HeinousSaurus » Tue Sep 07, 2021 6:08 pm

KnightleyPaine wrote:
Each room has its own subculture of terribleness, and it takes navigating that to get along with the chat. But once you're able to, you can find those precious little gems that are people who fit you almost like a damn glove and it might have been worth it, or not, I don't know your mileage on worth it but it will have been something and I personally feel getting at least that far at least once is like a worthwhile goal to shoot for in terms of seeing if you fit in.


Thank you for all the advice; I greatly appreciate it. I agree that I'd like to try getting that far at least once before I give up.

nicktaken wrote:
HeinousSaurus wrote:I've seen different methods. Asking for literate partners (God, I hate people misusing that word so often) is a common method. Another one is asking for detailed/descriptive posts. A slightly more straightforward option is to specify a hypothetical average length of posts (paragraph, multi-paragraph etc).

The last one tends to have a bad reputation because *pushes up large round glasses* "well akshually post length is not akshually related to quality", except it kind of is. Verbosity is just annoying but there is never a situation where you can't produce at least a decent paragraph in response if you're even trying. And for me that's the biggest thing: trying. I've had more enjoyable RPs with novice writers who tried than those who got complacent in their certainty they were too good to bother.

Unfortunately, none of that is a guarantee. Again, from personal experience, you can specifically state desired length, and that people give you a rundown of what they're looking for when they contact you. That does nothing to deter people from just sending you "hi wanna rp", and they often get pissy if you tell them that no, you don't want to RP. It's like that old comedy skit, "this sign can't stop me because I can't read". Except in this case it's "refuse even that basic courtesy to this person I expect to reply to me".

So in summary, it's a mess out there. But so it is everywhere on this mortal coil. You should stick it out for a while, it may turn out to be well worth it.


Got it. Will probably try the literate option; I've had a couple instances where I got something long and detailed that was still totally unreadable.

Nalzindar wrote:As a general rule, I always have approach a potential partner with one or two ideas in mind. I ask if one of those sounds interesting or if he wish to discuss one of them further, or if he rather want something else. Works 8 out of 10 times for me. The importance is not to get too detailed, steer away from partners who wants (demands) too many details and specifications, these people can be difficult to please, no matter how hard you try and it is never worth the effort since they don't repay the favor >.>

Once you have found one or two RP partners that you like, and that likes you back, then keep up the contact every now and then, and you will get some nice RP stories. Just keep in mind that your preferences doesn't need to mach 100%, be kind to each other and respect the other's kinks. Sometimes it is better to go along with a few kinks that not necessary lays within your preferences and keep a good RP partner that also respects yours kinks, than try to look for a less good one that (seemingly) match yours 100%.
Trust me on this, I think I have met some of the best RP players in here, who has a decent writing, a good imagination and informs you if something comes up or doesn't work out - in a constructive way. But to find these people, you have to be patient and be accepting of some (not everything) your partner's special preferences, then they will do the same for you :)


I see. A lot of agreement in here that I'll just need to slug it out in the mudpit to find the gems; I suppose I had better get started. I appreciate the warning and the approach advice.
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Re: Bad luck or the norm?

Postby Rumor » Tue Sep 07, 2021 8:19 pm

Probably the biggest key to roleplaying is patience. Finding good partners takes time and there's a lot of luck involved. I have had in the past where I'd be on nearly nightly and actively looking for scenes and come up empty, or maybe just nothing finished, for like a month straight. I've also had nights where I shrugged, opened chat, threw a LFRP tag up in the Library, alt-tabbed to a game, then suddenly got five pings and went "AAAAAAAAHHHHH TOO MANY APPROACHES!" It's just the nature of the beast. And even then, gotta sift through the approaches I get and the approaches I make to figure out which ones will work out. On the latter, I think I'm pretty good at finding the right matches, although follow-ups with people is pretty iffy because of Real Life™ and stuff.

But yeah, don't put too much energy into looking for a scene. Have something else to do or work on in the mean time while occasionally checking fresh log-ins to see if any of them match-up. The feeling of mostly staring at a chatroom for hours on end with nothing to show is a terrible one, so don't waste your time in the mean time if you don't have anything active going on. But when you actually do get a scene, do try to pay attention to it in a timely manner, especially during the initial chatter. If someone's taking ~15-20 minutes to respond to short discussion posts before a scene without any prior warning, it's usually a bad sign. For an actual RP post, meanwhile, 10-20 is probably about the norm, but longer posts can easily take ~30. However, 30 is also when I usually poke someone to see if they still exist.

Speaking of, ghosting. Try not to do it unless someone really deserves it, like guilt tripping you. And for being ghosted, well, I've kinda adopted a soft rule for newer people of "If they ghost me once, it could be something came up. Ghost me twice and they gotta approach me if they want to continue." Most of the people who ghost twice never do the latter, so... that was probably destined to never go anywhere anyway. And that's a darn shame sometimes too because everything else just clicked. (Seriously, please be the awesome person and tell people no or you're not interested or whatever. Ghosting sucks.)

Another thing to keep in mind is the less open you are for different things then the harder it is to get a scene. Like, don't compromise your preferences. If you do a thing you don't enjoy just to play a scene then, chances are, you won't enjoy the scene.

Also worth considering is your characters. In my experience, Eka's chat has a preference for female and herm characters. Male human characters tend to be a bit shunned. Especially male human prey characters and ESPECIALLY male human prey who are high school/college students and/or micros. The prey variants have a high tendency of being played by the needy, low effort players who just want to get their jollies with your sexy female alt and then ghost once they've had their fun, assuming the scene manages to last longer than they do. So, if you're playing a male or, worse, a human male, understand that, at no fault of your own, you have some cards stacked against you due to bad apples and experiences.

Good male characters are great though and vet RPers will usually understand that, so don't give up!

Oh, and uh, if you find someone you work well with, definitely try to play with them and be a regular with them. But like, don't force it, some people are unfathomably popular and get swarmed (lucky from the perspective of people watching tumbleweeds on their typing bar, unlucky in their perspective that they have to sift a crowd whenever they log in) and some people don't want regulars. You can make some really good friends (I have!), but don't get too attached either. If you don't get contact info for off-site chatter then there's always the risk of them just no longer showing up with no explanation to ever be received. It sucks, but it happens and they might not be able to help it. But, either way, I find a lot of my best RPs tend to come from regular partners who we mutually know how to play off one another.

Anyway, uh, that was longer than expected! But hopefully it helps!
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Re: Bad luck or the norm?

Postby Tassie » Thu Sep 09, 2021 11:51 pm

I tried the chat rooms a few times, but nothing interesting happened.
I don't know if people just aren't into what I'm into or if I'm supposed to play my own opposite role or what the problem was, but I found it very disappointing. I wish I had something better to say or some useful advice or something, I'm sorry.

I guess this is why I started writing stories instead. I don't know.
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Re: Bad luck or the norm?

Postby HeinousSaurus » Sat Sep 11, 2021 11:16 am

Rumor wrote:But yeah, don't put too much energy into looking for a scene. Have something else to do or work on in the mean time while occasionally checking fresh log-ins to see if any of them match-up. The feeling of mostly staring at a chatroom for hours on end with nothing to show is a terrible one, so don't waste your time in the mean time if you don't have anything active going on. But when you actually do get a scene, do try to pay attention to it in a timely manner, especially during the initial chatter. If someone's taking ~15-20 minutes to respond to short discussion posts before a scene without any prior warning, it's usually a bad sign. For an actual RP post, meanwhile, 10-20 is probably about the norm, but longer posts can easily take ~30. However, 30 is also when I usually poke someone to see if they still exist.


Yeah, this is the big one that I've noticed. I've started writing while waiting around, and it's worked pretty well so far.

Rumor wrote:Anyway, uh, that was longer than expected! But hopefully it helps!


It absolutely does. TY.
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