Roleplay Pet Peeves

[Grindingsucks]

I-dialect is fine.  If well done, it adds a lot of personality to a character.  I'm speaking of lazy grammar and unwillingness to use a spellchecker, of course.  It's generally easy to discern between the two, as long as the dialect is skillfully done.

 

I wouldn't say your examples are skillfully done, but perhaps you're being tongue-in-cheek.  Such things are subjective though, I'll grant you.  🤷‍♂️

 

 

[Tigraine]

I'm not above adding a little accent or dialect to my characters at times, but the trick is to keep it a light touch.  If players have to mentally sound out what they're reading to parse it and translate it, that's too much, especially when they're trying to catch what's being said during a mission where players are focused on not dying.  They can't just briefly glance at the chat window and capture what was said; they have to put their attention on it long enough to process it, and during combat that's not always easy.

The actor Brian Blessed commented on this idea in reference to his playing Boss Nass in The Phantom Menace:  "If you're playing a character like that... I always  make sure that my noises didn't interfere with dialog," and he continued to explain that he felt at times Jar Jar would make "noises" over his lines, which made it difficult for the audience to follow the character's plot exposition.  This is the same sort of issue; if you deliberately make it harder to read your RP,  you lose your audience.

 

 

[johua]

"organic rp"

or people who refuse to have any OOC communication. miss me with that shit, especially since almost everyone I've seen describe themselves as an "organic rper" has been pretty awful.

[Grindingsucks]

@Tigraine  OMG!  I had no idea he was the voice actor that played Boss Nass.  He looks like Voltan, even without the costume!  😂

Edited February 2, 2021 by Grindingsucks

[Tigraine]

16 hours ago, Grindingsucks said:

@Tigraine  OMG!  I had no idea he was the voice actor that played Boss Nass.  He looks like Voltan, even without the costume!  😂

The man is a legend; practically a force of nature.

[Calamity Cain]

Lemme add my two cents by adding a not-so-serious pet peeve and a sort-of-serious one:

 

• pls learn to type it srsly helps rp

I really appreciate the effort in making the text readable and as close to proper English as one can manage. Obviously the odd typo, occasional grammar/syntax misstep, ESL, etc. are gonna happen, but otherwise crummy typing sticks in my craw. If someone is new to RP and there used 2 typing like dis bcuz its faster? I usually won't abort an RP just because of it, but it's always something in the background that grates on me, even if a character is otherwise interesting and consistent. Presentation matters.

• Take the Threat (A Little) Seriously

This might apply more to random RP or RP teams than SGs, but I can't stand it when a group doesn't give the devil his due and take the enemy with at least a little seriousness. It deflates any semblance of tension, even if things are silly out of context. Even just the pretense of danger goes a long way in making any given encounter feel more real. It also makes me feel like the asshole for trying to tackle a story or mission in good faith while others are pointing and laughing at the same material. I dunno, in too great a dosage that preoccupation with taking the piss just seems lazy to me. It's easy to lampoon a comic book universe. It seems far more interesting to me to try and take it seriously and run with it, play by its rules and see what happens. I love it when a group works together against a common threat they acknowledge to be dangerous and yet worth taking on. With some solid RPers you can really create a sense of accomplishment, even if you've done the mission a million times before or your uberslotted megabuild one-shotted everything in actuality.

 

I'm not asking for The Dark Knight levels of seriousness here either. Just enough to avoid feeling like I'm walking into a farce with no real consequences besides some cheap yuks. If the likes of Ben 10 or Danny Phantom are more concerned about their villains than a given character? It's not my bag, baby.

Obviously the corollary to this is that you can also take things too seriously, and that should be avoided too. We aren't in the 40K universe, after all. Somewhere in between is what I'm looking for. I dunno, maybe I just keep running into people who I'm not compatible with, but it seems like a pretty common thing, at least outside of most SGs I've been a part of, and it grinds my gears.

Edited February 7, 2021 by Calamity Cain
Removing superfluous text

[TemporalVileTerror]

Something to bear in mind is the ludonarrative context.  It can be a real challenge for some players to elevate the stakes in terms of fighting enemies in a mission because the game rules demonstrate it's really not an issue to be defeated.  Ending up in an instant teleport Hospital or a weak enemy prison is the worst that can happen, and that's assuming that one of the dozen means of self- or team-resuscitation don't get utilized first.

The game has taught us NOT to take things seriously.

 

At least not for personal stakes.

Perhaps you can encourage your teammates (either in-character or out) to consider the ramifications of failure.

"What happens to the civilians if one of these demons makes it through that portal and gets set loose in Kings Row?"

 

Of course, even then, the game tells us "they stand around waiting to be foiled by a hero."

It's an upward climb to inject weight in to the proceedings for someone who's already seen the worst the game has to offer.

 

It's a very casual game, and that's a good thing.  But it does also have the added complication that it doesn't teach the players to consider anything a real threat, or offer any real stakes.

Maybe something new could be added by the Devs to help in that regard . . . 

[Calamity Cain]

6 hours ago, TemporalVileTerror said:

Something to bear in mind is the ludonarrative context.  It can be a real challenge for some players to elevate the stakes in terms of fighting enemies in a mission because the game rules demonstrate it's really not an issue to be defeated.  Ending up in an instant teleport Hospital or a weak enemy prison is the worst that can happen, and that's assuming that one of the dozen means of self- or team-resuscitation don't get utilized first.

The game has taught us NOT to take things seriously.

 

At least not for personal stakes.

Perhaps you can encourage your teammates (either in-character or out) to consider the ramifications of failure.

"What happens to the civilians if one of these demons makes it through that portal and gets set loose in Kings Row?"

 

Of course, even then, the game tells us "they stand around waiting to be foiled by a hero."

It's an upward climb to inject weight in to the proceedings for someone who's already seen the worst the game has to offer.

 

It's a very casual game, and that's a good thing.  But it does also have the added complication that it doesn't teach the players to consider anything a real threat, or offer any real stakes.

Maybe something new could be added by the Devs to help in that regard . . . 

Oh yeah, the game is absolutely responsible for this. It's hell bent on building up the player as a demigod and creating an experience that's easy to enjoy with few consequences. Which, as you said, is a good thing overall. The game probably 80%-90% non-RPers to begin with, then most RPers are probably casual on top of that.

 

The takeaway is probably that me, being in a minority, should just avoid pickup teams for these reasons, since it is, as you said, an uphill battle for most to ignore what the gameplay is communicating.

[johua]

faceclaims.

faceclaims are really, really gross and people should stop using them.

stop claiming people's faces. stop trawling people's social media for pics and then posting them as something your character did.

🤮

it's one thing, by the way, to use a face reference for commissioned art. it's another (disgusting) thing entirely to rp someone's actual life.

[TheCorvus]

1 hour ago, johua said:

faceclaims.

faceclaims are really, really gross and people should stop using them.

stop claiming people's faces. stop trawling people's social media for pics and then posting them as something your character did.

🤮

it's one thing, by the way, to use a face reference for commissioned art. it's another (disgusting) thing entirely to rp someone's actual life.

Wait...that's a thing?

 

That's so creepy weird.

[TwoDee]

As someone who doesn't do faceclaims myself, I think that 'you're stealing someone's face and RPing their life' is absolutely a mischaracterization of the practice in the vast majority of cases.  Faceclaiming isn't 'I'm Tom Holland and I want to be treated as Tom Holland,' it's 'In the movie version, my character would be played by this actor, and you should use their persona and mannerisms as a touchstone'.  Which is something that I dare anyone who's GM'd a D&D campaign to tell me didn't at minimum come up as a topic of conversation amongst your players at least once.

 

Do I still find the practice in bad taste?  A bit, particularly when it's done in an objectifying context e.g. "my character is super sexy, so they look like this actor/actress who is super sexy."  But otherwise, it can be a useful shorthand that's largely just a lower-effort version of commissioning character art.

 

On the topic of characters not taking the threat du jour particularly seriously during content, I'd call that a consequence of what the game is telling you mechanically, but it's also a necessary concession to large groups, especially.  If you're blasting through a RP task force on a group of 8, and all of you are chattering constantly, you'll totally get lost in the scroll.  Paying attention to content - while also standing out in a crowd of roleplayers all trying to showcase their characters just as much as you - necessitates a quippy, 'easy dunk' format of communication that is in many ways anathema to good RP.

 

Mind you, I love me some RP content.  But you wouldn't run a D&D group where 8+ people show up to every session and expect quality discourse and immaculate 'turn order' respect.  The ideal number is in the 3-5 range, and so it is with mission RP.

 

Edited February 8, 2021 by TwoDee
typo

[Coyotedancer]

5 hours ago, johua said:

faceclaims.

faceclaims are really, really gross and people should stop using them.

stop claiming people's faces. stop trawling people's social media for pics and then posting them as something your character did.

🤮

it's one thing, by the way, to use a face reference for commissioned art. it's another (disgusting) thing entirely to rp someone's actual life.

 

Allow me to introduce you guys to this:

This Person Does Not Exist

 

That's an excellent resource for faces (I've used it to generate NPCs for my tabletop games-) that doesn't involve nabbing a real person's likeness. 

[BarterGuns]

Probably my biggest RP pet peeve is when someone steals my costume. It's like, this is my hero's look. I've spent time making it. It's my unique look, and while I understand that the CC is limited, and that we won't be getting (probably) any more pieces, I think that it you steal someone's look, you could at least attempt to hide it. Or give them credit.

[Azari]

In my experience in everlasting the roleplaying community has NOT been very friendly or accepting to newcomers (or perhaps specifically me?).  They don’t like to laugh.  They’re very uptight.  They often seem annoyed by my presence.   Perhaps my punctuation and spelling isnt perfect enough.  Maybe they dont care for my characters backstory or something.  Idk but i’ve never had any luck with roleplaying, as i tend to just get driven off or ignored by the clique nature of it.  RP’ers can be overly serious and my characters trickster personality with a sense of humor maybe rubs people the wrong way.     Excuse me for not wanting to use [walk] everywhere.  I’m a freakin’ super hero.   I fight bad guys.   You’d think the RP community was a weaboo furry emo angst club by my experiences. 

Edited February 20, 2021 by Azari

[Grindingsucks]

2 hours ago, Azari said:

In my experience in everlasting the roleplaying community has NOT been very friendly or accepting to newcomers (or perhaps specifically me?).  They don’t like to laugh.  They’re very uptight.  They often seem annoyed by my presence.   Perhaps my punctuation and spelling isnt perfect enough.  Maybe they dont care for my characters backstory or something.  Idk but i’ve never had any luck with roleplaying, as i tend to just get driven off or ignored by the clique nature of it.  RP’ers can be overly serious and my characters trickster personality with a sense of humor maybe rubs people the wrong way.     Excuse me for not wanting to use [walk] everywhere.  I’m a freakin’ super hero.   I fight bad guys.   You’d think the RP community was a weaboo furry emo angst club by my experiences. 

Rp-style compatibility can be a major issue, no doubt about it.  Everyone has their own expectations about what they want to see in role play, so I'd recommend posting in lfg on discord with a short bio and pic of your character, along with a short description of your rp style and what you're looking for from an rp group.  It makes it easier to connect with players that have a similar style and to avoid ones that have radically different ideas about what sort of RP they enjoy.

 

But, yes- it can be challenging to find players that don't conform to the human with animal ears/tail trope or the angsty anime character trope.  Let us also not forget the legion of succubus's, vampires, and characters of various types that either are- or were- some flavor of porn star.

 

Not that there's anything inherently wrong with playing any of the above.  It's just discouraging when you have so much trouble finding people focused on classic, superhero roleplaying tropes, in a game about classic superhero roleplaying tropes.  😛

[Azari]

8 minutes ago, Grindingsucks said:

Rp-style compatibility can be a major issue, no doubt about it.  Everyone has their own expectations about what they want to see in role play, so I'd recommend posting in lfg on discord with a short bio and pic of your character, along with a short description of your rp style and what you're looking for from an rp group.  It makes it easier to connect with players that have a similar style and to avoid ones that have radically different ideas about what sort of RP they enjoy.

 

But, yes- it can be challenging to find players that don't conform to the human with animal ears/tail trope or the angsty anime character trope.  Let us also not forget the legion of succubus's, vampires, and characters of various types that either are- or were- some flavor of porn star.

 

Not that there's anything inherently wrong with playing any of the above.  It's just discouraging when you have so much trouble finding people focused on classic, superhero roleplaying tropes, in a game about classic superhero roleplaying tropes.  😛

When was the last time you saw someone that actually looked like a super hero win a costume contest?   I try to do classy comic book style costumes and they get almost completely ignored in CC’s.
 
what is my RP style? I mostly focus on just being myself, as if i lived in paragon city.     It’s hard to define.  I don’t like taking it too seriously..  

[Grindingsucks]

Quote

When was the last time you saw someone that actually looked like a super hero win a costume contest?   I try to do classy comic book style costumes and they get almost completely ignored in CC’s.

Well, CC's are highly subjective and are often themed.  The chosen themes are rarely classic superhero stuff, so there's that.  But it really comes down primarily to the judges opinions.  What looks cool to someone will look silly to someone else.  I've won exactly one CC in the year I've been playing, and it was not with the costume that was my favorite or (IMO) "best" work.

Quote

what is my RP style? I mostly focus on just being myself, as if i lived in paragon city.     It’s hard to define.  I don’t like taking it too seriously.. 

That's fair.  Not everyone is super serious about roleplay.  Also, it's possible to be a super serious roleplayer and play a character that is light-hearted, or made to be comedy relief.  Nothing wrong with either one of those things.  Basically, you'll just have to keep trying until you find a group you click with.  Maybe try SG's that describe themselves as light to moderate roleplay, as opposed to heavy role play.

 

Beyond that, it's just luck, really.  Or possibly persistence.  I haven't had any trouble finding RP, myself, and I play a lot of different characters, but I do have more time to play than your average player, so that may weigh into it, as well.

Edited February 20, 2021 by Grindingsucks

[TemporalVileTerror]

"in a game about classic superhero roleplaying tropes."
What?

Since when!?

 

It might have some representation of those trope, but I deign to hold that the whole game is -about- them.  By all means, if those tropes are the ones you enjoy, explore them with consenting partners.  Though I think one does a disservice to reduce the depths and breadth of this setting to such a scope as that.

[Grindingsucks]

12 minutes ago, TemporalVileTerror said:

"in a game about classic superhero roleplaying tropes."
What?

Since when!?

 

It might have some representation of those trope, but I deign to hold that the whole game is -about- them.  By all means, if those tropes are the ones you enjoy, explore them with consenting partners.  Though I think one does a disservice to reduce the depths and breadth of this setting to such a scope as that.

I did not mean to impugn the game or the setting with that comment, although I stand by my statement that the game is intended to model the classic superhero genre.  From my perspective, this a feature, not a flaw.

 

Apologies if you took my comment as criticism of the setting.  That was surely not my intention.

[America's Angel]

8 hours ago, Azari said:

In my experience in everlasting the roleplaying community has NOT been very friendly or accepting to newcomers (or perhaps specifically me?).  They don’t like to laugh.  They’re very uptight.  They often seem annoyed by my presence.   Perhaps my punctuation and spelling isnt perfect enough.  Maybe they dont care for my characters backstory or something.  Idk but i’ve never had any luck with roleplaying, as i tend to just get driven off or ignored by the clique nature of it.  RP’ers can be overly serious and my characters trickster personality with a sense of humor maybe rubs people the wrong way.     Excuse me for not wanting to use [walk] everywhere.  I’m a freakin’ super hero.   I fight bad guys.   You’d think the RP community was a weaboo furry emo angst club by my experiences. 

Sorry to hear you're having a hard time. Here's some suggestions that might help you:
-Join an RP supergroup and tell them you want to get to know them in RP and are up for collaborating on stories.
-Run an RP event of some kind so that people will have to interact with you.

-Run RP teams. (And advertise them in LFG/ETFs/etc)
-Sign up at the City of Roleplay RP discord and look for people to RP with: https://discord.gg/hthZHrA4

-Go to the various player-run nightclubs and talk to the staff. Tell them you're new. Ask if they can introduce you to people.

-Go to various RP events (such as the Hero Corps mixer thingie). Talk to the organisers. Say you are new and want to meet people.

-Wallflower in Pocket D for a while. Listen to others talk. React to people rather than expect them to react to you. (The absolute worst thing you can do is just walk up to random people you don't know, who might be busy with others, and start talking about yourself/your backstory. They'll usually just ignore you and that doesn't feel good.)

 

Also, you mentioned that you have a sense of humor that you worry might rub people the wrong way. One thing I've noticed is a lot of people RP characters with a Deadpool/Joss Whedon/Geeky sense of humour where they make jokes/sassy comments with the intention of making themselves look smarter than the people around them. I don't know if this applies to you, but it's something to be mindful of, I think. There is nothing more annoying that someone constantly self-aggrandizing with humour at the expense of everyone around them. When in doubt - make yourself the butt of the joke.

 

Good luck. :-)

[Darmian]

On 2/7/2021 at 1:40 PM, TemporalVileTerror said:

 Ending up in an instant teleport Hospital or a weak enemy prison is the worst that can happen, and that's assuming that one of the dozen means of self- or team-resuscitation don't get utilized first.

Perhaps a suggested handicap you can opt in to for RPers then as part of your difficulty ratings. No base or hospital rez (unless the map has a prison I suppose).  You need Awaken, a self rez or one of the team to do it.  

[TheCorvus]

1 hour ago, Darmian said:

Perhaps a suggested handicap you can opt in to for RPers then as part of your difficulty ratings. No base or hospital rez (unless the map has a prison I suppose).  You need Awaken, a self rez or one of the team to do it.  

That makes a lot of sense.

[TwoDee]

14 hours ago, America's Angel said:

Also, you mentioned that you have a sense of humor that you worry might rub people the wrong way. One thing I've noticed is a lot of people RP characters with a Deadpool/Joss Whedon/Geeky sense of humour where they make jokes/sassy comments with the intention of making themselves look smarter than the people around them. I don't know if this applies to you, but it's something to be mindful of, I think. There is nothing more annoying that someone constantly self-aggrandizing with humour at the expense of everyone around them. When in doubt - make yourself the butt of the joke.

 

Good luck. 🙂

I'd echo this, and note that if your 'trickster' persona involves calling other characters a "weaboo furry emo angst club," to paraphrase, then you're establishing an adversarial dialectic to your razzing and it's no wonder that people don't want to play with you.

 

I get by very well by focusing my 'humor' characters on being near-failures with very easy flaws for other roleplayers to latch onto and kick them for.  It's an invitation to engage by poking fun at me, rather than an unsolicited razzing/hazing, the latter of which not everybody is going to be receptive to.

 

Regarding 'classic capes' and how they never win Costume Contests, I've won precisely two costume contests, one generic and one with an explicit 'classic' theme, and both times were with a character in a single-piece skin-tight pattern jumpsuit with a cape (though one is a lot more 'classic' than the other).  There are people out there who like to play superheroes, and you'll get a very stilted impression of that looking at the people hanging around Pocket D, because it's hard to reconcile 'classic capes' hanging out in a nightclub.

 

Incidentally, I do wholeheartedly recommend the Hero Corps Information Exchange if you want a good excuse to RP your superhero, as a superhero.

Edited February 21, 2021 by TwoDee
added punctuation

[the1egend1ives]

I get annoyed by players who lazily RP their powers as something other than what they actually are in-game, particularly when they do it simply because they want to min/max their character. I've seen some truly bizarre attempts by players to pass of their builds as something ludicrous. Like a thugs MM who expects players to RP that their pets are animals. I swear, If I have to RP with ONE MORE blaster who took Tactical Arrow, but insists that they aren't actually using a bow. I can SEE your character using a bow. This is video game - a graphical emulator of superhero storytelling. Keyword: GRAPHICAL. If I wanted to use my imagination for everything, I'd stick to forum RP.

 

It's like playing Warhammer 40k with plastic green army men. It's more enjoyable for everyone playing to use the minis that are made for the game.

Edited February 22, 2021 by the1egend1ives

[the1egend1ives]

Another pet peeve I have is that I main a natural origin character and I frequently have to fight off demigods who constantly remind me that I'll die in five seconds to a gunshot wound,or that my arrows are totally ineffective against 99% of enemies.