Sounds fun
Wasn’t there a poll a while upthread? It might still be open.
That’d be Drew Hayes’ Spells, Swords and Stealth series. It’s pretty well done. The books purportedly start out being about NPCs in a ttrpg taking on the roles of a set of players’ dead PCs, but it grows from there. It’s pretty fun. It’s getting into the early history of the game, some of the players, and a former set of NPCs that took on a life of their own now.
Mainly mind checklist, but I was thinking about starting a physical one. It all started when I was a Kaidan fan in both sides of Mass Effect fandom, english and russian…
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I totally agree with this, for such a brilliant story, this is one of the things that takes me out of it a bit. I get it, plot reasons, but makes it hard for me to relate to the MC to an extent because if my boyfriend/one true love/even bff was voted out, I would leave with them no questions asked.
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The Florence/Frank from the latest Lies Under the Ice. They friggin cheat on you for no good reason. Has to be one of if not the worst RO I’ve ever read.
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The older I get, the further I stray from love to dislike with A from Wayhaven.
Their route gives me the same vibe as a distant parent trying to come back into your life after years of radio silence, but there’s a major gap between your generations and no good memories to fall back on, so every conversation is painfully awkward no matter how hard you try.
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No matter how many times I try, I can’t seem to get into the A romance route in any of the Wayhaven books. A’s interactions always have that distant feeling to them, and I tried to go for a love triangle route in book 2, but that just made me feel like I was stringing someone along which just made me feel uncomfortable.
I know there are readers who love the angst and slow burn that A gives them, but I don’t think they’re for me.
It feels less slow burn and more unmovable glacier.
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I don’t often hate a character. I very rarely passionately despise them. Often, it’s just usually a general feeling of dislike for them that eventually peters out into indifference.
But I’ve done it. I’ve finally found a character that fucking grinds my gears.
Submitted for the approval of the Midnight Society, I put forward Tyrian from Forbidden Magic.
The character itself, when they’re not being an absolute raging asshole for no reason, is passable. In any other story, they’d almost be forgettable.
And the whole ‘I hate you bc of something that happened in the past’ and ‘gotta work together even tho I don’t want to’ stuff? It’s whatever. That trope is old news by now. I’ve played other games that had either one of those or both of those tropes (Dragon Racer, Professor of Magical Studies, Wayhaven, Book 2 of the Evertree Saga,…) and I was fine with them then. They got an eyeroll out of me at worst, and investment to make the relationship better at best.
But what really drives me up the wall in this case? What makes me want to punch them in their face every time they act petty? It’s that their reasons for hating MC are incredibly, monumentally stupid. And yet both they and MC act like it was some monumental betrayal or some shit.
What, you had an unrequited crush on MC in high school? Boohoo, grow the fuck up. Shit happens, and my character doesn’t owe you a romantic relationship just because you were friends.
And all the other reasons are equally as dumb - and in half of them, if we go by the game’s logic, it should be MC who’s mad at Tyrian, not the other fucking way around.
So yeah, fuck them. I’m all about trying to mend relationships, but I’m not about to bust my ass, one-sidedly putting in all the work to fix this, for a childish prick that keeps acting petty and antagonistic all because of a high school spat, and who won’t give you the time of day unless you romance them. Go die in a fire.
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Honestly, this is a problem in nearly every IF that has characters mad at the MC. It’s always the MC that has to put in the effort and bend over backwards to make the relationship (of any kind, not just romantic ones) not one of hate. Heavens forbid an NPC ever makes a peaceful overture; these people hold grudges more tightly than Warhammer dwarfs, and those short bastards actually record them in a literal book!
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True, and it’s always MC getting fucked over too, and yet they act like they were the abused party.
Like if MC was the one fucking someone over, like in WIP Pushed (Thriller, Romance) | Full Gameplay Chapter 4 Released! |🥳, or if the person in question is just very professional and doesn’t want to waste time with niceties like in Evertree book 2, that would one thing.
But if you fuck me over, then you better have a damn good reason for doing so, and you better not act like I’m the one who did you wrong when that absolutely wasn’t the case.
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And now I want more RO’s with actual books of grudges 
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Thanks for mentioning Pushed, glad you played!!! 
But what when you say being -
Is wrong or good? I’m just wondering 
Oh no, don’t get me wrong, I don’t mind it
I’m just saying that in that case it, it makes sense for Cameron to not be happy with MC, unlike in some other games
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That’s because people hate active NPCs. No one wants proactive NPCs anymore because heaven forbid they might do anything an MC does not want.
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I never get to know what people think about Cameron, if anyone could go deeper on him. lol 
The problem to me is often that proactive NPCs tends to mean that you’re forced into reacting certain ways about whatever they do. If they do something, allow the PC to react as they want, and ideally take it into account. By that I mean, like if they come onto you hard and you rebuke, would be best if they fucked off. I know not always in character to respect that (though that itself tells me plenty about the character), but that shit is incredibly uncomfortable, and it’s like used as an excuse “oh that’s the character :)” to justify it. Perhaps allow that to be a setting at the beginning, like “allow RO to continue pursuing as their character dictates regardless of choice”.
But that’s an example I’ve seen of “proactive” characters and it bothers me intensely, when they clearly don’t respect the protagonist or their wishes. Them actually making a push to make up for being shitty, that’s more than welcome in my opinion. I hold grudges so I’m not gonna initiate it, which makes those characters just flat antagonists to me.
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So you would like a stunty RO
I personally agree with this. I always thought there should be some more assertive ROs, so the MC isn’t always forced to chase the ROs like they’re a dog in heat or something, practically begging for attention and for the LI to notice them, but I do believe there should be an option for the MC to tell them to piss off, with a variable set so it will mark that character as non-romanceable, non-flirtable, etc., so whoever is offended by it doesn’t have to deal with it again. Or, like you said, have a choice at the beginning for people to set it so that no LI can pursue them at all and will only “respond” to the MC chasing them. That said, I don’t think the NPCs should change their base behavior–if they are the types to do the chasing, then the MC is locked out of that romance when they make that choice. That way, those of us who actually like LIs to do something other than play hard to get or act like blushing virgins could have more fun, too.
Unfortunately, this is a largely a result of offending the people who demand NPCs that don’t never initiative with the MC. In other words, it appears we either get NPCs that take the initiative or NPCs that don’t–we don’t get to pick and choose the circumstances under which they actually take initiative.
Another reason for it–in my opinion–is that authors seem resistant to having their NPCs actually admit they did something wrong and would rather force the MC to either ignore the bad behavior/treatment or brush it off as unimportant after chasing the NPC down again, this time to “make up”, which is just the MC getting over it after the NPC acts slightly sheepish.
Exactly. We can tolerate having our MCs forced into situations that make no damned sense, but apparently everyone draws the line at a NPC that takes any initiative.
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I was under the impression that it was NPCs taking the initiative in romances, not otherwise (definitely not them apologizing - that really sounds to me more like the NPC not admitting they’ve done something wrong than NPCs not being allowed to do stuff on their own). At least it’s what I’ve seen settings about. If there’s really been discussions about whether or not NPCs should be allowed to have coffee without the MC telling them so, I’ve missed it, unless it was about robbing the MC’s agency.
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