Also, this is not a peeve. I don’t actually have a MU peeve. This is a MU sad sorta. To me.

I have been playing in this hobby longer than some of you have been alive (that’s sad on a different level for me) and I think this year I’ve decided to step away from it.

There is no drama. There is no hard feelings. My life just doesn’t fit around it anymore. As well as play not being available to keep me invested. This is NOT a gripe. It’s my ADHD brain that wanders and fills my time if not occupied. I’m just a little sad to think my MU* time might be just done. I know it will always be there to come back to and I’m sure I’ll lurk on this site because I have a sick fascination with it. It’s just hard to put into words. Like … oh… but that oh holds so much.

That said. I got to spend the last year or so catching back up with people that I haven’t spoken to in years. I got to hear how their RL lives are going and see how their story telling (and mine) have changed. I got to get giddy running into people that do actually cross my mind from time to time. So I’m pretty excited about that and if I have RPed with you this last year. I have ENJOYED it. If I have paged you, I feel HONORED to catch up and I feel undeserving to those that got excited to meet back up with me.

No matter our differences and our opinions and sometimes our toxic rightness, I appreciate the people of this community.

I’m just in my feels about this realization and I’m just sharing to people who might understand (my RL people are not MU* people).

So in conclusion to my brain dump you all!

I feel like we need a 2026 one now.

I also think it’s important if it hasn’t been said, that YOU are having fun in the scene too. While it’s great to run things for other people, if it feels like work, you aren’t enjoying it. That’s going to come across in the writing dynamic. If you are also having fun and they are having fun, then we have chef kiss magic.

@junipersky

There was even a book series about it.

I figure that everyone is just settling back into their RL routines after the holidays, not to mention re-figuring out time for their hobbies too.

I normally ask a lot of questions. If you’ve ever played with me, most of my chars ask endless questions. It’s the best way to engage with others and to have them flesh out their characters.

I rarely feel the need to win and OOCly cackle madly when the dice do NOT favor me. I try to be funny, but temper it to match the tone of the RP. I don’t mind failing.

I’m also a pure minion of chaos. This means, I’ll randomly decide things. No one can come up with an idea. I draw them to an area and decide surprise whatever. This normally is a what the actual eff. example I’ll swoon on a person to bring them into the scene. I try to keep an eye out for who doesn’t seem to be as engaged as others and ask them specific questions or include them. (Side note: I do this in life too).

When someone is excited to try to do a thing, instead of saying ‘my character wouldn’t do that’, I either come up with a reason WHY my char would do that. If I cannot for some reason, I direct them to a player/character I know WOULD do the thing.

I view all my RP as coming in to write a story that I don’t even know the ending of and I’m here to see how it flows. However, if people aren’t engaging and having fun, well then, I wouldn’t have anything to write.

I put other.

I adore failing my dice rolls and I don’t need to be the main character all the time. However, I also am a real life person that (like most of us) have some trauma that I would like to avoid in my game play.

So I’m all for it, but if the theme is going to be really dark. Please check with me first, then we game on. Also, like others, I want it to make sense. Don’t do something just to do something. If it makes sense, I’m all in. If a random house falls on me and someone takes my shoes, it better further some cause or character development.

@SockMonkey Do we share a brain? Because all of this. I understand (and have done) all of this.

@SockMonkey said in Tough Calls:

My husband was still dealing with his brain tumor at the time. Did the person know that? No. Should I have to tell them or explain how “brain tumors aren’t comedic content” for them to have common sense? No.

In my very misguided youth, I thought I had to over explain every decision I made. I still over explain when I get in panic state that I think I’m offending someone but that’s a me thing. I stand very very very firmly in the thoughts that NO ONE is entitled to any of your RL information. They don’t get to know your story if you don’t want to tell it. They don’t get to have any of that. Also, no one is promised anyone’s time. I’m sorry that happened to you. There is nothing worse than a ‘surprise’ RP mechanic (good or bad) aligns with a RL event that there are feelings around. For me (as I can only speak to that) it’s like getting emotionally ambushed. Not intentional on the other person, but damn.

Also as a person that likes to inject comedy in serious, you have to learn to read the room. I think silly/comedy comes from doing things to lift a serious game as the brain can read it and put a person RL in that state, so a little light RP is good too. But, time and place.

My idea of humor (which may fail as humor is subjective) is falling over a stranger’s lap and ‘swooning’ for him. Luckily, the person that it happened to went with it.

Or playing a game of dares or something that leads to an end point that both people are laughing OOC and like WTF just happened.

Or making comments. Or taking the fall instead of being a hero but doing it humorously.

Or collecting a specific thing for no reason other than humor or seeing how many they can end up with.

Maybe I don’t understand silly, goofy. I don’t think it’s game disruptive though.

I mean I’ll ask someone to RP. Then when they don’t or it doesn’t work out; I get all rejection sensitive and never ask again. I just wait for others to ask me.

Spoiler: It doesn’t work well. Also, as much as I thought I was being annoying, I’ve been told I wasn’t annoying. So I just try to ask, but I only do it like twice and then I stop. They now have to engage if they want to.

I’m usually pretty nice and welcoming to people. I normally try to RP with as many people as I can. I sometimes overshare plot with people. I like to get people up and running and I like to connect people to other people that I think fosters their stories. That said…

No one but me gets to decide how I spend my energy and who I RP with or don’t RP with. That feels so toxic to me to tell another adult who they have to RP or how they have to RP. I’m sure that’s not the intend but…

Right now for a lot of people RL is severely fucked up. People are uncertain, scared, struggling, etc. Our hobby is meant to be a safe haven from that. One where we get to meet people and tell stories and write stories and hide in our escapism for a little bit before we go back to our RL demands. I don’t want to co-author a book with everyone, so why would I want to write a story with everyone?

Does this make me elitist? I don’t think I’ve ever been called that. Does that make me mean and rude and unwelcoming? Still don’t think I’ve been called that, but maybe. What it does make me is protective of my calm. Forcing anyone to interact with anyone is bad in my book. If people want to log in and hide in a fake online place with one other person writing a fake online storyline with them because it gives them a moment of peace in their chaotic real life? Let them.

I give you a server so you have to do what I say ranks right up there with the working spouse telling the homemaking spouse that they have no say to their identity. They can’t spend any money because they haven’t earned the money. It’s different, but it rings at the same level.

I don’t run games. I avoid staffing like I owe it money. I just think that with the world being as it is for a great many people right now, just let them find their peace where they can find it. You are free to ask them to leave your game if you want, but you do not get to tell a person who they must interact with like you own or control them.

Just my thoughts. Doesn’t make it right. Doesn’t make it wrong. Just makes it my opinion.

@Pavel

Lords and Ladies, magic and magical beings. I cannot remember the overarching plot as it was forever ago, but magic was in high theme and it was high fantasy.

I played Crossroads too, not my first game though. I played CDI (Castle D’Image - I think) too

I feel like my very first game was a Robotech one called Protoculture or something like that. There was a Heavy Gear one out there. I think my first WoD game was something like Haight Ashbury where I knew nothing and people had to explain a lot as I was trying to interact in it.

Not really what the conversation is about, but to find out if it’s AI, you post it to AI and basically say: Did you do this?

I don’t know why, but I find that both sad and completely hilarious.

I know that this is a minor thing with everything going on in the world. However, I started going back to school full-time (while working full-time) in January. I just got my letter that I got on the Dean’s List.

@kalakh

I feel all the words of your reply like I did the original posting. I think personally, it’s an insecurity of mine. So when it has been pointed out (again not in a loving way) it just makes me even more anxious. THEN add to it that I don’t have an RP community so I have to break into another one. Ugh. I mean. I have y’all but no one on the game that can be my designated RP person/companion cube/support page receiver until I figure out the vibe and flow. Also being blessed/cursed that I type at a fairly quick pace - I can get text blocks out like I invented them. It’s a thing.

It’s good/bad that someone else understands the ‘too much’ comment. Like yay for relation. Boo for the bad and anxiety that comes with it.

Salutations!

I know for me that I have in life been told I’m too much. If you know me, then you know what I mean. I get very VERY excited when I’m excited about things and I babble in pages or I want to RP. I’m just very excited to write a story with the other person or find out what happens next, etc. I am also very hyper and optimist IRL and it carries over to my paging. So, as someone who has been told that I need to calm down. I take that as a part of my personality to fix. I’ve been told it IRL and MU life. Thus, I don’t always know that line on how much is too much and get stuck in a paralysis pattern. Then in an overthinker pattern. Online is worse because I can’t see the other person’s non-verbal cues. I can’t see if you smiled when you saw me. If you frowned or hesitated, etc. Thus I’m left with words that I have to figure out and probably not well.

Then if you suddenly stop inviting me to RP (with the hopes I’ll reach out), I panic the other way. I feel like I’ve upset you. As I’ve been told in MU realm that if I upset someone, you shouldn’t contact them unless they contact you or it can look like inadvertent harassing; I’m again in decision paralysis. Do I reach out? Do I assume there is an issue and that makes it worse? Normally the second because the behaviors suddenly changed.

I know I’m not the person in question, because I’m not really playing anywhere, but that would be why I personally was doing or not doing what was happening. Although, now I try to lay out my crazy to people up front. Like, hey you are going to have to tell me if I’m paging too much or inviting too much - because I might get so hyper-fixated on writing the story - I don’t read the clues or misunderstand the ‘tone’ of the text.

@Snackness

All the love. I’ve been through this and even if it is expected, it isn’t easy. We are here if you want to talk.

My new desc:

Felt cute, might delete later.