The ethics of IC romance, TS, etc
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This is a very interesting conversation in which I do not have much to add. All of my IC romances have involved quite a bit of open OOC communication About Stuff and I have yet to really get burned by that in any significant way?? That's pretty much what I got.
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This topic makes me feel old, thanks for that @Arkandel!
With that said, I've been doing this hobby a LONG time and I've come to several personal observations when it comes to RPing the IC romances/TS/Etc. YMMV on these, of course.
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While I've played Poly characters before, it's actually rare and I kinda suck at it. In part because...
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I'm REALLY picky about just who I want to have my character in IC relationships with. If it's not someone I know, I tend to quietly "check references" because I've had some truly bad experiences with people failing to recognize that IC intimacy does not equal OOC intimacy and that makes me very uncomfortable very fast. (And in a couple cases led to RL stalking that had to be addressed to the NOT FUN of everyone.)
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Having been on the staff end of actually being called in to help mediate a situation of "we're gonna have a fun, if a little rough, kinky sex scene" that 2 days later turned into the female PC trying to start a super-war by telling Mages & her Changeling IC Boyfriend that her PC had been raped by a werewolf (Who didn't know she had an IC boyfriend, insert other complicating crap such as them spending time in her bed which probably would have smelled like said boyfriend who also lived with her.) - who was then being hunted down by those she reported it to, and she OOC several times lied and told players that it genuinely happened that way - and ultimately logs of both the scenes and OOC conversations involved between people had to be read by staff - I rapidly lost interest in paying any attention to who spends time with who situations and am a fan of OOC disclosure because that type of train wreck really does ruin the fun of many people.
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@silverfox that's really more the business of your friend to decide, you really cant control what they do, and if this other person is not bothering them as much it may be worth it to them to keep playing. You can, however tell the person bothering you that they are making you uncomfortable, you do not want any more contact asking about your friend, and if they persist you will consider it harassment.
You can tell your friend, but that is no guarantee they will solve the problem for you. I have cut loose from ic associations with people who had aggressive/obsessive oocly partners though. It is really simply not something I want to have to worry about dealing with.
I find that just making my own decision with no expectation that the other person is going to force someone else to stop/do something allows me to at least remain cordial with the person I actually enjoyed the company of, instead of resenting them or forcing them to choose. Once someone is at the point of keeping tabs on a play partner and then contacting others that they interact with to ask questions, frankly, I have not found anything great happens after that no matter what the person in between does or doesnt do.
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I do agree that, even though I don't care what happens behind closed doors in terms of TS - if people agree to roleplay shapeshifting into chickens and have rough sex who am I to judge - I do agree it can become an actual issue if their kinks are frowned upon in that setting yet leak out to become someone else's problem.
As for partner selection though... that's a rough one, for any kind of relationship. The easy and safe choice is to go with people you already know but that's not always an option, and the first scenes about anything, let alone sex...stuff can be hilarious and treacherous at the same time.
- He who takes offense when not intended is a fool. He who takes offense when intended is a greater fool.
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@SG I agree in part, not because every monogamous ic relationship I've had was a dumpster fire (because by and large they havent been) but because it's the nature of many players including me to go in cycles of activity, people can and do drop away, ect. I think it's better to have some sort of plan for how to move forward if this happens. I have found for me that helps me be less worried and more tolerant, and preserves the goodwill if and when that person returns.
I do not really engage in mushing purely for the RP story though, one of my favorite things has been making friends and getting to story craft with them over years. So admittedly I tend to try to make decisions that preserve friendships over the long haul rather than get super attached to the current setup.
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@Arkandel I generally feel if two adults are consenting to pretend times, whatever is clever, however that has to extend tot he fallout. Your IC Sister's Friends cousin probably doesnt wanna deal with your were-goose bondage party repercussions, so get their consent too if you wanna bring this to them.
Hi Ark, I want to have some dramatic 'perfect for mid day MTV content in 2003' Rp with you but it involves my weird kinks and internal bleeding, you in or nah?
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Posting here, although the quote is from the prior thread.
@Ghost said in Ithir Mush:
If these are only character relationships, I don't understand the level of OOC attachment and upset that comes along with them without having to assume that on some level they're not entirely IC. Which is a danger zone topic, probably not for this thread.
This whole thing reminds me of the NPC TS ethics argument a little while back (which saw people defending their NPC staff fuckery... not long before a blow up over NPC staff fuckery), and I will say it again:
I will never buy that people who engage in detailed TS (ie, when you are posing graphic imagery in excess of what is required to get across whatever broader-RP relevant sexposition about your characters and their relationship) are engaging in wholly IC behavior. It just isn't. The constant OOC spillover, in every direction, is proof that people are just not that zen and detached about this shit. This is one of those things we're both broadly guilty of and in total denial over as a hobby. And it makes sorting out the actual predatory OOC behavior from the, erm,.. just crazy but still problematic OOC behavior really fucking hard.
-- Anecdotal confessional time, and a little more directly on OP questions --
I've been wrapped up in this to stupid levels. I had a player who I was really close to, where our relationships (we had characters paired on several games) involved those quasi IC-quasi-OOC fidelity boundaries. Sometimes I broke them. She got super mad and chewed me out. I got super mad and defensive about her being so OOCly possessive. Then we reversed roles and did it all over again, with her cheating and my getting pissed and her firing back. After the last round of it, we stopped being so close, which is really fucking sad.
To actually answer the questions, I don't know, at least not universally. Because I believe there is always going to be some (but not equal amounts) of OOC bleed, it will change the expectations. I think me and the above player should have been more honest with each other. But I don't think your obligations are as high when the OOC bond is less. Judging the seriousness of the OOC friendship is probably the hardest part, and it's people who fail at it that are going to turn into creepers and 'crazies.'
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@silverfox said in The ethics of IC romance, TS, etc:
Okay. So. Here's a situation I found myself in. A character who was a friend of mine was sleeping/dating another character. NOT with my character. We'd still RP (friend and I) fairly often. I got PAGES upon PAGES of messages from their partner "weather checking" "So, you guys are just friends right?" "I'm worried he's cheating on her" "You aren't sleeping with him, right?"
is this who i think it is lol
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@bored I dunno what you're talking about it is super important to characterization that we hash out the details of every shuddering thrust.
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@insomniac7809 I'm using shuddering thrust next time.
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@bored Yeah. Human relationships are complicated and no matter how much we might want to stay mature at all times, stick everything into neat boxes to separate IC from OOC, communicate to avoid drama, makes up rules to keep things from getting out of line... sometimes they do.
It happens and those who get caught up in it are just... human. Sometimes the lines are super clear and it's easy to not cross them - that's when people get judgmental about others - but they aren't always like that. It's easy to look at drama when it's unfolding and go tsk-tsk about it or throw some popcorn memes around but the thing is... it can happen to almost everyone.
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@Jeshin said in The ethics of IC romance, TS, etc:
The ethics of IC Romance and TS is all about managing expectations. If you're going to be 100% IC, you need to be 100% IC. If this means you're cheating and you have crazy hawt seches and have some hickies, you need to RP covering them up or they get spotted. If you're going to have OOC collab you need to be upfront. OOC collab means that you are writing a story together and just like writers in a meeting you're pitching ideas and discussing story threads. This includes any negative drama you want to explore. If you want to go some IC/OOC hybrid because you're chatting and coordinating playtimes and you banter a bit. You just need to be honest. Don't mislead your RP partner. If honesty leads to hurt feelings that sucks but you're not a creeper or abuser if you don't try and obscure or manipulate. You might be an asshole, but I think there is a fundamental difference between being an ass and victimizing your RP partners.
Basically, I like this summary. I don't care if you want to cheat ICly, but then keep it IC. If you want to collab OOCly, then collab. But often, people want to build harems. So they tell everyone OOCly 'you're my one and only' whether or not the person they are RPing with asked, while ICly having a billion relationships.
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Probably!!
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No matter what MU you're on, RP is all consensual. Generally, a MU will advertise X, Y, and Z as their main themes or sources of roleplay. That's what you're consenting to by connecting and continuing to play. Anything outside of the base game expectations requires further information - that is to say OOC communication.
Set boundaries, establish priorities, and reach an understanding with the other player. It doesn't necessarily have to all happen in one long conversation, but it does have to happen. This is the same for super scary RP as it is for relationship RP as it is for combat-leading-to-maiming RP.
A person can't consent to something you want if you don't spell it out, so if you wilfully lie to them OOC and do something that goes against what you said, you've broken the unspoken rules of human interaction.
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To add: You don't get to decide how another person feels, ever. If a person feels betrayed, then they feel betrayed. If a person feels hurt, then they feel hurt. You don't get to decide that they're not hurt because you don't understand how an IC problem can affect them OOC.
"Oh but it's just writing..." Yes, and human culture is constructed around the idea that written words have meaning and can have impact. Just because you're unaffected doesn't mean another person isn't.
So assume, always, that a person talking about their feelings is being honest and do your best to ensure they have fun as well - even if it takes a bit of IC tap-dancing to make it happen.
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@Tinuviel I mean... not to play Devil's advocate here, and freely admitting that I've been a bit of a shit in my time (trying to do better as always), but I have had some cases where I feel like the other party was feeling betrayed or hurt because they were presuming something more than I (as far as I can tell) indicated.
So while I'm not trying to say that they didn't actually feel betrayed or hurt, if there was no OOC communication and the IC interaction was a single hook-up that they took to mean a committed relationship, there is a bit of "that's on them" to my read on the situation.
So yeah, definitely don't lie to people OOC, that's just shitty. (Including by omission.) But, y'know, communicate expectations and boundaries and whatnot.
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@insomniac7809 said in The ethics of IC romance, TS, etc:
But, y'know, communicate expectations and boundaries and whatnot.
That is literally what I said, yes.
He/Him
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I'll resurrect this thread by going over a point debated over in the Danger thread instead since it seems to fit here a bit better.
@bored said in TS - Danger zone:
You say you the out of band argument isn't yours part of yours but you're bringing it up again here, right? This stuff gets serious when it violates the game boundaries, but inside the game boundaries are the only place where a staffer can meaningfully act. So again, I empathize, but again, this stuff doesn't really factor into MU policy for me.
Let's go over this point a bit, I think it might be interesting. What is the scope of staff responsibility when it comes to TS?
For example is it liability? If for instance the argument is that "this sex act happened on my game so I could get into trouble" then if the players involved took that to Discord or whatever does that still enable staff to feel they can intervene for what was roleplayed over a different medium?
Is it done to protect staff? For instance the typical argument is "staff or not I don't want to read about violent sex acts so they are forbidden", which I can totally understand. However if the players involved keep it under wraps (perhaps by RPing it on Discord!) does it absolve them? And if through any other means the fact comes out - perhaps a third party hears about it OOC and tells staff - do they have the ethical high ground to step in and discipline those players for breaking the rules?
What are the lines here? Specifically:
- What should be permitted for player, always within the assumption they OOC consented to the RP?
- What limits should there be for staff's expectations from their players, if any, always with the understanding that of course they can ban a player at any time for any reason. But is there anything they'd be wrong to intervene over in the context of TS?
- He who takes offense when not intended is a fool. He who takes offense when intended is a greater fool.
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I think a staffer's power ends at their game. I don't think that there's a universal fits all policy when it comes to incorporating off site information/behavior into a decision on the game.
I would not expect as staff on a game to control what people play about in gdocs. They can transgressive fanfic RP it up to their heart's content.
To be honest, a third party tattling under most circumstances would have me eyeing that third party. The main exception I could think of is if a player had been sending unwelcome links or harassing them via other methods when blocked from doing so on game. I hope this isn't common but for awhile on a game I played I did have that happen to me when another player got my email from a group organizational site (not even a RP one) and then started sending me links to stories they'd written where their PC assaulted mine. When I tried to get help for this from staff I was told since this was off site they wouldn't do anything about it. So I would remove a player from my game if they had already been told to leave someone alone on the game, and might have abided it there but started harassing elsewhere. Is that fair, I suppose not, but just in my own preference since that's very abnormal behavior, I have no issues removing people like that.
But that is harassing ooc behavior. When it comes to just storytelling between consenting adults? I might decide that I do not want that RPed about in a public sense on my games or not to support it at all with staff attention or the like, but I don't really care what people do outside of it. Unless they MAKE it my problem via indiscretion or boundary pushing.
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@Arkandel Since I don't really have anything to add to your latter questions, given our regular debates on this subject being quite voluminous, the main 'liability' issue when it comes to staff power and scope is that of reputation. We have seen, regularly, the reputation of staff stifle a game. "Do you really want to be known as the staffer that let X play your game?" and so forth.
It's all, really, a reputation game. And people here have long memories. Or logs.
He/Him
