rpanons | the masses thirst for the smallest drop of wank

the masses thirst for the smallest drop of wank

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when do you accept that there isn't a place for you in dwrp anymore?

i came back a little over a year ago and can't get anything started. everything feels like it's going great until suddenly it isn't. people have asked me for second threads only to ghost me a few tags into them. they've said such lovely things about my characterization and writing but my inbox is still empty. it feels like every time i get comfortable, i end up blindsided by how suddenly the other players lose interest.

i love rp so much but i don't think the feeling is mutual...

i feel you anon, sometimes it's hard out there. all you can do is keep trying until you find something that sticks, but in my experience it takes time and you're lucky to get two months of rp out of one person.

try playing more characters and looking into popular canons, you might have more success with them.

ty anon. if it's rare to find people that want something long-term then maybe it is time for me to go.

da but idk if it is that rare. i've happened across people on bakerstreet that i've ended up playing with for 12 months+ just because we vibe

like i wouldn't be able to tell you what the magical formula is, because the character i play is pretty rare (i've seen one other person play him in 2+ years), but it does happen

please don't give up! there are players out there who are interested in long-term things. i've lucked out on bakerstreet, rpanons and enablemeplz. if you're enjoying tagging someone, are you tagging into them again on another meme? are you pming players to let them know you're enjoying the thread/s? posting ads? i've had to put myself out there and initiate quite a bit to find the players who are interested in threading and building consistency across memes, but it's been worth it.

I feel this. I just wish I knew where to go. DWRP seems to have slowed to a crawl (but at the same time I have an illness that means I can't commit to a MG schedule) - I just want to RP where we write enough for things to actually happen!

the answer is sex games

I don't mind sex games, but they can be hit or miss. Some of them have active people but all the threads end up samey after a while/I start to feel like the characters are interchangable after a while in a way I don't in other RP settings.

Not all of them, though, and I don't know the current sex lay of the land. There's GP, Dup, and Sinfluencers? Anything else?

i think that's about it for public games

gp and sin opened up relatively recently and that's where a lot of active meme players went, ime

is gp still jam-packed at cap or is there actually apping room now

There's open spots

Amani according to the masterlist.

ugh same. i've been looking for somewhere else and nothing scratches the itch the way dwrp does. but it's changed a lot since i left. i never had this much trouble finding people who tag consistently and are interested in sticking around, and the sudden drop-offs in interest are so demoralizing that i'm not sure it's worth it to keep trying.

It almost feels like a parody of itself at this point or that we’re all RPing being RPers.

Imagine going to a ttrpg meetup where everyone constantly talked about what they wanted to play but would only play in 15 minute installments once a month and you have to drive 20 minutes each way to them every time. That’s kind of the vibe here now tbh: we want to talk about RP but not write.

But if you bring it up you’re the asshole for wanting to do the hobby. I’m willing to put in legwork, but checking everybody’s journals, doing all the starters, etc and constantly getting crickets is annoying.

Even in games, more and more toplevels are just ‘I’m at this location come bother me’ and more OOC plotting is ‘I’m down for anything!’ with no ideas.

IDK if it’s just people don’t want to play with new people anymore or if people want the validation of their characters being wanted but don’t actually enjoy brainstorming and writing.

It seems like a spiral at this point. It IS dispiriting and I want to tag out/do the work less when it never goes anywhere. It feels like Charlie Brown and the football after a certain point…

The paradox of dwrp is as follows:

If you want to engage with specific things in OOC plotting you are picky.
If you want to engage with the plot of a game you are trying too hard to be the main character.
If you are doing anything interesting in a top level, you are trying to attention grab.

And if you are anything more interesting than the same mush that I am comfy with, you are a threat and must be forced out.

People get so up in arms about being 'picky'. Yes, I am picky! We're all picky! If we're honest about it, then we can find people who are our kind of picky. Like people who say they're up for anything rarely are. If you tell me you want SOL, I'll only tag you if I'm feeling that. Likewise, if you only want positive CR/don't like delving into disagreements, I won't tag you if I'm playing someone who is very blunt and critical. (But I might if I'm playing someone sunshiny).

Likewise: Yes, I do want to grab attention with my top levels? I want them to be interesting so people will tag me?

I don't understand the point of bland/generic top levels. I know a lot of people do closed plotting on Plurk, but if you only want to write threads you've planned out with your friends beforehand, just do closed starters/threads? Most games I've been in have had players that only play in closed logs/inboxes and I've just taken note of their lack of desire for more CR and not tagged them? It's like the person below said: Stop acting like you want to play/hang out if you don't. I'm not offended if your plate is full or you don't want new CR, but saying you do and then dropping or giving everyone nothing gives off conflicting signals and that part is annoying.

this is only true if you hang around on anon memes too much and take everything that's said here personally though

exorcise these brainworms by remembering that all of that is crap and nobody in dwrp really cares as much about what you're doing as you do

to me it's like having a friend who tells you that they want to spend more time with you but turns you down every time you ask them if they want to do something. why say yes to things that you know you're never going to follow through on, you know? why gush about threads you don't want to write?

i joined a game with a person once who only apped because they wanted to be nice and i was gutted when i found out. why do that? being honest from the start causes less hurt feelings.

i wonder why i don't feel this way

anyway i have tags to do

Ah, and here comes the 'you're doing it wrong' brigade, who almost never offer any actual advice other than keep kicking that football. (I do find the advice to check who is tagging back by checking flat threads to be good advice, but outside of that the advice seems to be 'play/like different things' and that's not how it works really.)

Snark aside, it's probably because what you want matches very closely with what the average active DWRPer wants and/or you've cultivated a good social circle already. Which is awesome; happy for you. (no snark). This discussion started from someone who left for a while and came back and I'm in a similar boat, and starting from scratch is really discouraging at this point.

If you have any deviation in preferences from average, it's harder. As the population here has grown smaller and slower, there are fewer people in the long tail of DWRP. I know what I want/like isn't super super popular and that's why I wish I knew where more/faster people RP with some quality level. If 1 in 100 people like what you do and you're in a group of 3000, you can find 30 other people into your weird. If it's a room of 300, it's harder. Doesn't mean anyone is doing anything wrong.

FWIW, I don't have problems getting tags. I have problems getting tags that show up more than once every 7-14 days or, conversely, on the occasion someone is active, they only give 1-2 sentences per tag. I like variety in tags - I don't think everything needs multiple paragraphs, but once in a while I'd like the other player to give me something to work with.

I mean, people approach me for RP and then don't tag. I'm not sure that's me not doing it right. I'm open to changing my starters/tags, talking about what we want in a scene/thread, etc. If people don't talk to me, I can't fix whatever it is anyway.

listen i'm ngl i think you two(?) might be getting iced out for personality reasons

Re: RP WOES

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Re: RP WOES

(Anonymous) - 2024-10-18 21:02 (UTC) - Expand

This is very anecdotal, but for me, I have been a consistent rper for a few years. I do about 500-1000 tags a month across memes, psls, and a private game, usually for one character, sometimes two. Mostly longer tags with occasional text spam if I have a full day to mess around with rp. I can't tag every day but I manage at least 5 days a week.

However, I can't take on more threads. Over the time RPing I have already made some really strong friendships with really talented writers, I have canonmates and deeply developed crosscanon CR that I'm really invested in, and I want to be welcoming to the occasional new blood in the private game so I reserve a couple slots on my dance card for them. I don't want to have less time and attention for my long-term rp pals, so I don't really post top-levels on bakerstreet, I don't use EMP or roll call memes, I don't tag out, etc. I know how many threads I can handle a month because I know I won't magically double my tag pace so my existing threads/friends/ships will lose out. I'm satisfied, so I don't chase new shinies, and I don't feel the need to make promises I won't keep.

On the other hand, I know plenty of people who get their RP dopamine from people-pleasing behaviours like promising canonmates, taking on threads they don't really want to play or don't have time for, or attention-seeking behaviour like tossing dozens of blank top levels at memes or fishing on EMP every month - they don't really want to rp, they just want to be wanted.

I have a friend I have known for years who comes into my plurk memes to talk about an old psl ship, and I know it's because she likes chatting nostalgically with me - I also know I'm more likely to get her to stream an episode of a new netflix show with me than to actually tag our thread back, but she's my friend and if she wants to still feel like she's part of the hobby we shared by participating in my rp plurks as well as my irl ones that's no skin off my nose. sometimes in amateur theatre you get regulars who can't commit to learning a big part this season but they'll still show up to rehearsals to understudy and maybe make some tea. or the guys who are always a little too busy or sick to make dnd but still ask about the game and draw art of everyone's characters. hobbies form a community that is sometimes so valuable to a person they want to stay even if they don't have the capacity or passion for the hobby itself.

I know these are just my experiences but I hope by having a better understanding of what roadblocks might be coming from the other side allows you to work out better ways to find your own threads!

SA - my pain meds kicked in halfway through this comment and I ended up rambling off topic a lot more than I thought I had when I hit post, really sorry everyone.

Nah, no apologies! It was a good comment!

Being full up is understandable and I have no frustration with people in your shoes. You found a good group and you're hanging out with that group and having a blast! You're not hitting up people for more things or starting a bunch of things you know you don't want to do.

I get where people are coming from, but if a TTRPG group (to keep using the analogy) is 40 'hang out and chat' to 2 'want to actually play a TTRPG', is it actually a TTRPG group anymore? And if newbies show up to the group wanting to play a TTRPG, are they wrong? Especially if the group is advertised as a TTRPG group?

I think 'they don't really want to rp, they just want to be wanted' is part of the issue. I get that people want attention and social connection, but other people aren't dopamine machines.

If DWRP is mostly a 'hang out and not do the hobby' space, then it would make sense some of us don't belong here anymore. I'm just not sure where to go to actually do the hobby.

Re: RP WOES

(Anonymous) - 2024-10-18 18:16 (UTC) - Expand

same anon, same. this is probably my last time trying.

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