Regarding the RT forum

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Should we have two separate spaces for different RTs?

  • Yes

    Votes: 71 83.5%
  • No

    Votes: 14 16.5%

  • Total voters
    85
  • Poll closed .
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I've been probing around a bit, doing Administrator things, and I have noticed a trend on the site that doesn't exactly thrill me. As you all doubtless know, Umbra is meant for adults. Nobody under the age of 18 is allowed to join our community, for plenty of reasons. Unfortunately, when you advertise as "Adult only" there are a lot of people who hear "because of pornography".

I don't want to discourage horny people. I have no desire to cause anyone to feel like "The Other" because of what they want to write about. That said, Umbra isn't intended as a place for purely sexual pursuits.

I've been pondering ways to address this for a while now (and if you have any ideas then do share them with me via DM), and one notion I've had is as follows. Two Request Thread forums; one for primarily plot purposes, and one for more sex-oriented things. Here's some notions for how it might work:
  • A "Plot" RT would have a plot/smut ratio from 100/0 to 70/30. Still some smut involved, but more story-centric smut, sex that happens for a reason other than 'they're both just SO aroused!'
  • A "Smut" RT would have a plot/smut ratio from 60/40 to 0/100. A lot more smut-for-the-sake-of-smut, because sometimes you just have that one kink and you gotta work it out.
  • This would not affect the Roleplay Haven, since if you don't want to read people's horny RPs you don't have to.
I realize, of course, this is far from perfect and very, very subjective. So I'm putting the question to the people it would affect the most. I'd like you to vote, if you could, for whether or not we should follow through on this notion. If you want to explain why, feel free in the replies below. If you have any questions about the idea itself, also feel free to ask. I'm certain there's something I've missed.

A tl;dr:
Umbra has a lot of very horny people. I want to give the people who just want to write stories a place to thrive. To do so, we'll start by dividing the RT forum into two separate spaces. Y/N? Vote in the poll.
 
I'd say yes and even go further. In some other sites I've seen it reflected as "taboo" areas or "sexual/non sexual RPs", but this works too. I'd even add a third section which focuses on fandom RP requests, since I find it easier if there's a clear difference between those who are more interested in original ideas and those who are only/mainly interested in fandoms. It's just easier to pick your partners that way. It could ever go like this: heavy smut requests, then divided into fandoms/originals and the same for the heavy plot requests. That was just a silly idea of mine though, I guess! :/

Anyways, I do like that idea a lot, indeed ^_^
 
I'd say yes. I (and many others, I've come to have found) tend to prefer and/or gravitate towards mainly plot-centered roleplays. It would make it far easier for others who feel the same way to find each other. I have also found that a good deal of request threads tend to refrain from mentioning what plot/smut ratio they expect or even the range they're willing to work in. The seperate, range-based forums would help us to look through the kinds of threads we are interested as well as limit the miscommunications with each other in regards to plot vs smut.
 
I totally agree! I'm not against erotic stuff happening IC either. But, it would be nice to have a space that's "pre-screened" so you can group with people wanting to rp similarly to you. Be it smut or plot.
I was told before coming here that 18+ sites are rife with erp and often devolve from rp with adult content to rping adult content only.
Maybe having different spaces for different people could let both groups have fun without driving out more wholesome roleplayers when they look through interest checks and see kink lists 50 terms long lol
That's not to say that kinksters are the bad guys, they're just the ones dominating the site rn.
 
tldr: I really like the idea!
So, I might be new here, but I have been on other roleplay sites and roleplayed through discord for a long time. One of the most consistent problems I tend to find is that when someone replies to my thread id say...7/10 they are looking for some more of smut heavy plot. Which im comfortable enough to write out some smut, but when I place erotic tags on post I really feel bad explaining to them I dont go all out on the sexual side of things. This isn't a rare issue for this site alone, as you had mentioned a lot of people see "Adult roleplay" as simply "Erotica" where as I typically only write with adults in order to cover more darker subject matters. It tend to give the story more of a spice and not keep it so happy go lucky. I have been to many sites before this one and never really found a filtered forum that exactly does what your describing. I think its a great idea!
 
I want to point out that request threads have tags for the purpose of filtering, although I acknowledge they aren't always used that way. Furthermore, the site only allows you to filter on the presence (not absence) of a single tag at a time. So I would suggest, if this is possible, to allow for filtering on combinations of tags, and include the option to filter for threads that don't contain a certain tag (for example, I prefer to play over threads, so I want to ignore RTs that have the 'PM only' tag, while also filtering for other tags like MxF and Seeking Male).

That said, splitting it up into different folders can still have value, since that way it's more immediately obvious to a new user what's what. Make it clear in the descriptions what they're for. Essentially it boils down to how much effort is expected to be spent on developing the story and context before the action happens.

- section 1: I want to write a story that sometimes involves sex (in other words, if you're going to message me about it, have some plot ideas ready)

- section 2: I want to get my rocks off, and sometimes there might be a story (if you're going to message me about it, just show me your character and tell me what kinks you're into)
 
Unfortunately the tagging system is what it is. As far as I know there's no add-on or method to make it more robust, though I fully admit I could be mistaken. I plan to re-examine the tagging within this entire process, to maybe add some additional clarity, or even a set of ratios for people to use. At the same time, there's a lot of tags as-is, so adding more is a tricky proposition.

The suggestion is appreciated, however! I like questions like that, where I have to think through the answer for any holes or issues.
 
I believe that separating RTs would help. I'm not sure if it will stop the trend of people randomly contacting others for roleplay though. My issue tends to be people looking for heavy smut that contact me without reading the RT I have. I've had to reject 8 people simply because they don't read the RT. However, that's a different issue. Can't really force people to read something. But this RT separation sounds like a great idea and I agree with what most people have said here.
 
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Suggestion here; how about relevant tags detailing the intending smut to story ratio? It wouldn't modify the set up of the site too much, but those particularly un/interested in a given percentage could screen for that given ratio. It would also allow for further tailoring without having to create or rename existing forums.

For example; "Story-Centric", "Story-Focused", "Story/Smut-Balanced", "Smut-Focused", and "Smut-Centric" Which would work out to a 90/10, 70/30, 50/50, 30/70, and 10/90 ratio respectively.

I assume simply creating additional tags is well within the realm of possibility, but if I'm wrong, we could always just make it a norm to detail our ratio expectation in our request threads...

For the sake of transparency however; I'm a newcomer to the site and the forum I used to moderate back in 2016 crashed because one of our administrators was embezzling donations, so ultimately I may not be the best to suggest ways of running a forum or circumventing an issue.
 
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For example; "Story-Centric", "Story-Focused", "Story/Smut-Balanced", "Smut-Focused", and "Smut-Centric" Which would work out to a 90/10, 70/30, 50/50, 30/70, and 10/90 ratio respectively.

I assume simply creating additional tags is well within the realm of possibility,
I've been pondering the same thing, but the problem is that it's dependent on people actually using the tags correctly. I could go through and manually add tags to each thread posted that doesn't have one, or insist on people doing the same thing, or make it a rule that you HAVE to add tags, or any one of a bunch of kinda power-trippy stuff. With a separate forum, though, it would be as simple as moving one thread between them if it's not the right place. I might still add the tags anyway under a "Plot/Smut ratio" section, but that alone won't change the issue I see.
 
I've been pondering the same thing, but the problem is that it's dependent on people actually using the tags correctly. I could go through and manually add tags to each thread posted that doesn't have one, or insist on people doing the same thing, or make it a rule that you HAVE to add tags, or any one of a bunch of kinda power-trippy stuff. With a separate forum, though, it would be as simple as moving one thread between them if it's not the right place. I might still add the tags anyway under a "Plot/Smut ratio" section, but that alone won't change the issue I see.

Ah, I understand the problem there. Personally, however - with the same caveat as my previous post - here's what I think on the matter from that angle; I'd have to say that if someone doesn't elect to use those tags then it's likely because they do not care all that much to do so.

I realize every RPer is different but here's my personal mindset in terms of request and suggestion threads when looking to join an RP; I like to slide into it, give it a read, which generally gives me what the other person wants out of the RP, and then contact them to further discuss what kind of RP we'll be getting into, which I find ideal especially in terms of a long-running RP, so we all have the same expectations by the first post...

...though I'll readily admit that on the given spectrum, I'm pretty much comfortable anywhere between the two extremes, and my suggestion comes more from the perspective of someone who thinks the site is fine the way it is, but wants to helps out those for whom this is a real issue since it seems to have reach the moderation team enough times to warrant a decision needing to be made at all.

I wish you and the rest of the staff luck, and for what little it is worth from a single member whose been here all of two days; you have my blessing for any decision you choose to make to resolve this issue.
 
On the topic of randos contacting people, one possible way of addressing it is to add an extra field to the user profile options. Currently there's one field for whether you're looking for new RP. You can split that into two fields, for whether a person is looking for smut or story or both. I don't know whether people actually look at user profiles when deciding to contact someone, but it might help, in case they do.

For adding new tags, I don't think it would be useful, because some people might want to be flexible on the percentage, depending on their mood and the specific idea. Plus if people can't understand the intended use of a tag at first glance, then they'll always misuse it. So my advice is to have a clear dividing line between two sections, which is based on what kind of messages you're expecting people to send you: whether they should take the form of brainstorming, or hook-up requests. And if you're cool with both you can just make a thread in each section, tailored to those two different audiences.
 
On the topic of randos contacting people, one possible way of addressing it is to add an extra field to the user profile options. Currently there's one field for whether you're looking for new RP. You can split that into two fields, for whether a person is looking for smut or story or both. I don't know whether people actually look at user profiles when deciding to contact someone, but it might help, in case they do.

For adding new tags, I don't think it would be useful, because some people might want to be flexible on the percentage, depending on their mood and the specific idea. Plus if people can't understand the intended use of a tag at first glance, then they'll always misuse it. So my advice is to have a clear dividing line between two sections, which is based on what kind of messages you're expecting people to send you: whether they should take the form of brainstorming, or hook-up requests. And if you're cool with both you can just make a thread in each section, tailored to those two different audiences.

I'd have to dive into the backend to figure out if another field could be added, but I could almost promise at least half of the people looking don't read the full profile when they fire off a message. Half the time it feels like information is only there for people to ignore it.

The tags, though, I'm still pondering. It's one of those ideas that would only work for the people who already add ratios to their posts, and as it is the tags can often bury the title of your thread. Adding more has a lot of problems, however much my monkey brain wants to organize everything as efficiently as possible.
 
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