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Be Doing a Thing.
I think a lot of the reason people complain about non-action RP is that frequently people aren’t doing anything.
Fix a random household object. Be enthused about a piece of media. Lose something and rope other people into finding it. Make up a thing about a family NPC and talk about it. Gossip about A Thing That Happened IC. Don’t be purely passive, basically.
@Ashkuri said in Other People:
What do you do in your RP to make it fun for other people?
Well, in my RL / non-MU groups, I usually end up getting asked to run the thing, so for those, I do a lot.
On MUs, I try and make characters that aren’t spotlight hogs. Yeah, sometimes I might make a character that comes from a smaller faction in game or whatever, but I don’t make that the core conceit of the character, and I usually try and make my character act in supporting roles to the other characters.
More subjects I’m curious about in the MU RP community at large:
What do you do in your MU RP to make it fun for other people?
ETA “MU” rp specifically, as tabletop etc is another sort of craft I think
My work informed me today that they figured out how to deal with one of our major issues at work, and in doing so, are throwing work/life balance in the trash.
@MisterBoring said in Bad Stuff Happening IC:
@Yam said in Bad Stuff Happening IC:
I think negative bleed is less of a problem than someone just being a butt about things.
I sort of disagree with this, but I think it’s because different people and groups handle negative bleed differently.
Some circles take negative bleed and resolve it in a healthy manner, so it’s not a big problem.
Other groups (including a few major LARP organizations I can think of) seem to delight in using negative bleed to drive perceived rivals away to make sure their characters are dominant in all situations.
that’s literally what yam was saying though: the issue isn’t the feeling itself, it’s if people act like a butt because of the feeling. you could be feeling bleed like CRAZY, utterly miserable because of the stuff happening to your character, but also being self-aware enough to take a break and keep it off the game and away from the other players
“handling negative bleed differently” is the point
@Faraday said in Bad Stuff Happening IC:
“Bleed”, to me, is something else. It’s a crossing of boundaries that’s more than just the simple emotional response.
the part I meant specifically when I originally brought up insanely uncomfortable amounts of bleed is where the boundaries between someone’s understanding of events as happening to their character and happening to them have gotten so hazy that they start taking purely IC things intensely personally, and it changes the way they make their characters behave and affects their relationships with other players.
bleed itself by the definition people have been providing here is absolutely something that happens to everyone and isn’t that extreme on its own, I think, as long as you’re being self aware enough to recognize it and manage it, as already mentioned.
IDK, to me ‘bleed’ is letting your (the player’s) emotional read on situations to color your character’s actions. It’s not a problem if your character’s emotions bleed into you, that’s - as pointed out- the expected outcome. That’s what makes the hobby addicting.
The issue is when you are making things weird with your character reactions due to your ooc read on situations.
Look. I absolutely believe that there have been occasions where player/s decide to be mean on purpose in order to drive someone else away. I am SURE it has happened. I am also 100% sure that it doesn’t happen even half as often as people assume it is happening to them. The vast majority of people who step on your feelings are not doing it ‘on purpose’. They aren’t even thinking about you.
@Yam said in Bad Stuff Happening IC:
I do kinda’ think we’ve blurred the lines between positive bleed and negative bleed at this point.
Bleed is a complex topic, with a wide range of definitions depending on how deep into the research rabbit hole one goes. We should, probably, use a different term to ensure consistency but we’ve never really been about consistency…
As far as this discussion is concerned, I don’t view “having an emotional reaction” as being bleed. That’s the intended purpose. You’re supposed to have an emotional reaction to RP, that’s the whole point.
Bleed, for me, is always an extreme reaction—extreme as in sitting at the extreme ends of a spectrum, not necessarily extreme in terms of outlandishness. Too far in either direction is a problem, as extremes almost always are.
ETA: To emphasise: Bleed is the feeling and the reaction. Therefore it includes the “being a butt about things.”
@Yam said in Bad Stuff Happening IC:
I think negative bleed is less of a problem than someone just being a butt about things.
I sort of disagree with this, but I think it’s because different people and groups handle negative bleed differently.
Some circles take negative bleed and resolve it in a healthy manner, so it’s not a big problem.
Other groups (including a few major LARP organizations I can think of) seem to delight in using negative bleed to drive perceived rivals away to make sure their characters are dominant in all situations.
