Posts with tag love-stories-wow

Character roleplay tends to be rooted in fundamental human emotions. Rage, fear, friendship, curiousity, and hope are all well within the spectrum of your character's feelings. And without getting into a bunch of sophomore psychology, I'd argue that all these emotions are fairly key to hitting the difference between a believable character. Without acknowledging and displaying these emotions, your character is simply a cardboard cutout -- a silhouette moving through the game without any real motivation or gravitas.

I might be overstating that argument a tad, but a believable character can be a complex little critter. And the most complex emotion of all can be . . . love. (I had to take a moment here not to bust out in "What's love got to do with it?")

Love stories are hard. I think they're actually the hardest story to roleplay successfully. It's incredibly easy to take your roleplay in the direction of a sticky-sweet romance. And then, for everyone of those stories I've seen, I've equally seen a cold, hard, son-of-Illidan whose heart was torn asunder, and
he wil no longer be capable of love.

So, if these are the two ends of the love spectrum, how do you successfully hit the middle? What's the believable range? What's the viable, interesting roleplay stories, when the whole idea of a love story is so fraught with pits and traps?