Bad Stuff Happening IC
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@MisterBoring said in Bad Stuff Happening IC:
@somasatori said in Bad Stuff Happening IC:
Trophy tends towards the gritty fantasy
You forgot golf
I haven’t tried it, but that looks great
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Wow. This topic really made me think about some stuff (and got me to speak up on Brand MU Day for the first time!). I’ve only been MUSHing since 2013, but looking back over my decade+ of playing, it’s interesting to consider how I would have answered back then compared to how I’m able to answer now.
I answered the poll with the “Yes, but only if I have control over it” option. Beginner me understood that life for my characters couldn’t be perfect or else it’d be boring, but if bad things were going to happen, I either wanted to pick specifically what would happen in the moment or carefully plan with my scene partners what specifically would happen. Didn’t always work out well, as you might imagine.
Me with a few years of play under my belt loosened her hold on the reins and had become an actor IRL, who was learning in a very direct way how conflict propelled story and how valuable it was to respond in the moment rather than always pre-planning. During RP, I still wanted assurance that things would eventually turn out okay, but I was willing to play through the drama. I loved some of the stories I told with people during that time. However, two things started happening at once.
One was that the game I was on became very cliqueish, and communicating with people started to feel like pulling teeth – one, because there was some actual behind-the-scenes toxicity going on (that I ended up exposed to firsthand by becoming a staffer), and two, because I was afraid to “cause trouble” by trying to talk to people about what was going on. When communication breaks down…well. It just makes everything way more difficult than it should be, as I’m sure many of us have experienced.
The other thing was that I began to experience bleed. I didn’t know what it was or what was happening; I just knew that the bad things my characters were experiencing were becoming part of my own emotional state, and it wasn’t a good thing. Fortunately, since bleed is also something actors can experience if we’re not careful, some colleagues were able to tell me what was going on and helped me take some steps to deal with it. I’ll just come out and say that therapy was a big help during that time, too. (It can be pretty awesome, y’all; don’t skip it if you need a little guidance!)
At present, I’m a pretty different person than I was when I first started MUSHing. I’m still an actor, but I now have military, school, relationship, work experience, and an autism diagnosis that all shape how I play. I say I RP to escape the world’s BS and have a chance to be a hero in ways that I can’t in real life, but that doesn’t mean I’m averse to having bad things happen to my character for the sake of story. I don’t like bad things happening to my characters, but I do like the awesome stories I get to write with people that can come from those bad things happening, whether they’re physical or social. I also prefer that those things happen with plenty of communication involved. I don’t like being blindsided with bad stuff, and I prefer it not make up the majority of what I play. I really do love my friendships and romances and happy endings and such. But I don’t expect them to be handed to me, either.
I’m still also susceptible to bleed, but I can recognize it and do what I need to do to counter it. Sometimes I’m a little late in catching it and wind up apologizing profusely to anyone who ends up subjected to it, but I hope I’ve spared my scene partners pretty well thus far.
Anyway, that was kind of a ramble. Thanks for reading this far, if you did
I guess I’m just hoping that maybe someone who’s had similar experiences will see this and know they’re not alone! -
@Solastalgic said in Bad Stuff Happening IC:
I’m still also susceptible to bleed, but I can recognize it and do what I need to do to counter it.
It took me a long time to realize that the positive emotional stuff I get from RP I enjoy is also bleed. Bleed, in my opinion, regardless of what form it takes, is only bad if you don’t have a healthy way to manage it and the expectations it can create in a person. From what I’ve seen doing RP in various forms for 30 years, too much ‘positive’ bleed can also lead to some negative behaviors (usually in the form of someone going to deep into Mary Sue / Gary Stu territory).
When I have bleed, I usually don’t try to just stop it or counter it, I usually ask myself, “How can I take this and use it to inform the direction of the story going forward?” and “How can my bleed help me strengthen my RP?”
I put a lot of stock in using improv techniques to mitigate bleed in the middle of scenes too. If I play with a “Yes, And” mentality, I usually don’t feel as much bleed as I would if I’m trying to control more of the scene other than my character’s responses to the fiction the others create.
Proud Member of the Pro-Mummy Alliance
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@MisterBoring Improv is a fantastic tool for bleed management, I agree. Your point about positive emotional stuff also being bleed isn’t something I’d considered, but it makes total sense. The question of how to use it to strengthen my RP is something I’ll keep in mind, too.
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@MisterBoring said in Bad Stuff Happening IC:
It took me a long time to realize that the positive emotional stuff I get from RP I enjoy is also bleed
I might not use the same wording, but you’re absolutely right to associate even positive emotional stuff as potentially dangerous just as much as the negative. We so often hear of, or even feel, connections that are assumed to be stronger than they actually are simply due to the positive impact someone’s RP/storytelling has had on us.
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I do kinda’ think we’ve blurred the lines between positive bleed and negative bleed at this point. If you don’t bleed, you don’t have blood, and are an emotionless robot, though I gather some folk were using the term bleed in a different way where it meant more like bleeding out ON someone, bleeding outward in a way that’s perhaps unpleasant.
I think negative bleed is less of a problem than someone just being a butt about things. Someone venting to me in DMs about their IC problems with my pals, MAYBE they’re experiencing negative bleed, but it’s manifesting in them being a butt.
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@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.
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@MisterBoring said in Bad Stuff Happening IC:
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.
Sounds like they were being a butt about things!
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@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.”
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@Pavel said in Bad Stuff Happening IC:
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.
Yeah, that’s how I view it as well. Having an emotional reaction to fiction is perfectly normal. Even outsized reactions can be healthy if handled responsibly IMHO. “Bleed”, to me, is something else. It’s a crossing of boundaries that’s more than just the simple emotional response. That said, I acknowledge there is not one universal definition. But if we’re going to make proclamations about whether bleed is problematic, it’s helpful to know if we’re talking about the same thing.
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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.
