Forums » RP Discussion » Rp partner gender preference

First of all, thanks for doing this. Most of the time, guys tend to get defensive and angry about these situations and if they ask people about their preferences, will turn it around to try and convince people to believe and behave how they want versus actively listening and taking things into consideration in a calm and mature manner. This is awesome.

Now that I think about it, most of my partners tend to be women and women identifying. And I don't even think its a conscious decision on my part, but there may be an unconscious one.

I do however discriminate on gender of a player versus the genders of characters they play. For example a he/him identifying player with all male characters tends to steer me away and same as and she/her players with all women with all female characters. This does not say that I will outright refuse to rp with them but I just won't be expecting much to come of it. (but if it works out, awesome, I get delightfully surprised.)

I'm more likely to accept rp from women with all female characters but I find myself not expecting much from them.

I think this has a lot to do with play style and I am generally looking for a play style. I tend to do rps based on the emotional with some adventure thrown in. Like really emotional exploration in fantastical worlds and I tend to see more guy rpers with all male characters focus on the "cool" factor, not even exploring the real emotional human condition. They tend to have "problem solving characters" that will throw one simple solution out there and expect it to be fixed when simple solutions often do not work. I have also met many that really focus on combat and "domination" rp style. I mean like if there's a group of guys in the same rp, they all tend to have "cool" characters and try to out do each other. (double points if they all try to play characters that kind of resemble deadpool or wolverine in behavior.)

Some of these cool characters will also be jack of all trades and have personalities that fit every trope ever. I know a dude (who is not on the internet at all. dude operates in the stone age and still has a nokia.) who's character is supposed to be "honorable like a paladin" but is also a a "sneaky assassin that uses underhanded techniques" and also a "trickster and jokester character" and the "best fighter of the group" and none of those work because the character is not consistent except in his inconstancy. And I want to say this is unique but I have not experienced this. I've run into this kind of thing pretty frequently.

Also in my experience women with all female cast of characters have played more "hood ornament" characters, that may be snarky or mysterious, expecting rp with my male characters to fawn all over them and the plot essentially going no where. This is all based off of experience and personal anecdotes and not any actual facts. Also in my experience, they tend to just disappear rather than talk things out if the rp isn't going exactly how they want or what bothers them. (I guess, I get it. I have social anxiety too.)

When I find other non-binary players or players that keep their gender secret, I find myself feeling more "safe" with them. Especially if they play a relatively more diverse cast of characters. I feel like our rp styles will generally be more similar but are often busy and have their rp slots pretty full. (maybe its because its a much smaller world?)

Over all, I do have more bad experiences with heterosexual men that have their sex match their gender than anything. Especially back in my larping and table top days. And sometimes they would do things that are mildly sexist and homophobic with out even realizing it! Most of the time, I end up getting Manic-Pixie-Dream-Girl'ed for these guys and expected to do a lot of emotional labor and also be a romantic interest even when I have made it explicitly clear that I am only interested in women. It even leaked from IC into OOC and it got so bad that I started to play heterosexual men around these groups to avoid that. AND EVEN STILL I GOT THESE DUDES TRYING TO HOOK UP WITH ME. The stuff I had to put up with while larping and in table top groups because of my sex would haunt you into your very nightmares.

And yeah its not fair to generalize and its messed up that some of us got to be so paranoid about this, but creepy people like to turn the creepiness dial only bit by bit by bit making you unaware of it at first until you are boiling alive in creepiness. Some people really don't want to have to play creep wack a mole until they find that one special person. Some people just don't have the emotional and mental energy at the end of the day to wade through a bunch of crud, or get emotionally invested just to get that sting of betrayal again. some people just want to feel safe cause, its one false positive, and you regret it.

Most of my roleplay partners are female, but I think that's more of a coincidence than an intentional decision on my part. I've had people regardless of gender cross boundaries before, treating me like I was my character and wanting to have an OOC romantic relationship stem off of an IC one.

I perfer to play with men there easier for me then females there isnt anything a guy can throw at me that i cant handle but i also started when rp was dominated by males 50 males to one female so its become a norm plus i been ring for almost 25 years

I've bounced between both male and female dominated RP environments and I thoroughly enjoyed both, so I wouldn't say I have a preference. Sometimes it's a bit uncomfortable to RP with a stereotypical girl being played by a guy or vice versa, but that's just cause I don't like gender stereotypes and gender roles much. I just have to remind myself that stereotypical people do actually exist, lol.

I have only one rule when it comes to this topic:

Lesbian relationships are off the table if the other girl is being played by a dude. It's painfully obvious (and uncomfortable) when the lesbian thing is just a kink for someone, and that aint my cup of tea. I'd say the same for gay relationships, but I don't play male characters.

Edit: I should probably clarify that I mean negative stereotypes, not just girls who like pink or guys who like motorcycles.

I tend to RP with females, but I have RP'd with a guy or two. There's no certain reason, I'm just more drawn to women. The conversation seems to flow more easily.

i'm not an open roleplayer anymore, but i've found in, oh, maybe 13? years of roleplaying that any gender has the potential to be massively inappropriate, inconsiderate, and morally defunct in OOC. i have had a woman stalk me for two years (as a minor) because i did not reciprocate her IC to OOC feelings, had people be stinkers when denied for RP/RPs ended due to any varying reason, people make uncomfortable sexual comments to me in OOC, etc.

anyone can be shit, it's the nature of finding partners in any sense, i suppose. i never have felt the need to vet people based on things they can't help as gender does not correlate to quality of character.

just my onion though.

I shop for roleplay partners based on characters I like, so usually gender doesn't really factor in. After the fact though, I might check out their profile/chat with 'em OoC, and yeah, I notice I kind of skew towards other women or NB folks. Which isn't to say I won't RP with guys specifically-- I've had some really fun storylines with several dudes-- it just seems like female identifying or non-binary folks tend to write in a way that I connect with a little better, generally speaking.