Society for Aesthetic Deletions

Describe two romantic relationships involving a PC you've seen in a game. One should be a romance that worked for the participants and the other should be one that failed, died, or came to an end. What was good and bad about these relationships from the point of view of plot and character development? How did the GM make the romance appealing to the players?

Narrowing it down to two is very hard. Ingrid's and Moirin's relationship was doomed from the start, and Calypso's (one of Ingrid's other personalities) and Jordan's was similarly doomed. I could spend days talking about how it didn't work for them, but that's just not going to happen.

So, for the romance that worked, I am choosing Jerrym and Rhiannon.

Rhiannon was an NPC I designed for my WEF Amber game, specifically for my husband's PC. She was supposed to be his romantic interest, and there was a possibility that she might be interested in another PC. I was thinking of setting up a triangle. Of course, things never work out as you want them to.

Brennan (Lou's PC) took one look at Rhiannon and promptly called Jerrym and said something along the lines of - "Jerrym, I have a girl for you," handed her off to him, and never looked back.

I can't tell you how upsetting that was to me at the time. He wanted a romance subplot, damnit, and here he was passing the buck...or the girl, in this case.

However, it all turned out well in the end. Rhiannon and Jerrym were perfectly suited for each other. They meshed well together, and it gave me a great way to develop Jerrym's character. It also didn't help that Rhiannon was the daughter of the Evil Villain, but she had a Good Heart and Everything Worked Out Well in the End.

Except the part where she died. There was a potential love triangle developing before this happened with another PC (Ardath, female), and this PC accidentally killed the NPC (well, the NPC threw herself onto PC's sword to keep Daddy the Evil Villain from getting her back). It caused a lot of tension between Jerrym and Ardath.

However, Rhi ended up coming back through mysterious means, and she and Jerrym even produced a child. Rhi was integral to the plot at various points, including removing spells from another PC who had been spell-brainwashed by said Evil Villain.

As to the romance that failed, I am choosing Brianna and Collwyn, from Lou's original Sunday fantasy campaign. They were both PCs.

Bree and Coll were raised as brother and sister, though when Collwyn started to develop elven traits, we knew something was up. Our parents ended up confessing that we were both adopted. Bree was fully human, and Collwyn was a half-elf (obvious, at that point). Bree had hidden her unholy interest from her brother to this point, but when it was revealed that they were not related, she started to think maybe it'd work.

Oh, it so didn't.

As far as plot, the romance had little direct impact. Coll and Bree did not get along well prior to this (for various reasons), and this tension didn't help advance the plot, but it didn't directly hinder it either.

As for character development...this ended up being a Big Thing for Bree. They almost got back together at one point (not that they ever really were "together"), but they just get on each others nerves so quickly and easily that it just didn't work. Coll's player keeps mentioning that he'd come back for her sometime, but she's married now, with a kid, and would probably turn him down.

Probably. Damn Collwyn. She still loves him after all these years. (sigh)

[This week's was only tough in that it took me a while to whittle the list down!]