Post originally by Bhikku at 2005-04-17 00:50:41
Converted from Phorums BB System

"Which is actually more of a rule for having a character get his blood up and mow through anything in his path. It defines what happens when that love is threatened, not the relationship itself."

And in fact, Blue Rose has a feat that does this too - grants a bonus to resist effects (such as mental influence) that would turn a character against his/her beloved, among other things.

"Still, it's a d20 game, so it does seem a little incomplete without some kind of rules on the subject"

Technically, no. It's an OGL game, not a d20, and it's intentially designed to be a somewhat more rules-light game than d20, or even most other OGL products. It seems to be kind of angled toward inviting newcomers to the hobby, moreso than inviting newcomers to the genre even.

The book does have a section about handling romances in game play - handling PC-PC and PC-NPC romances, including keeping player comfort levels okay, as well as how to make NPC-NPC romances an active element of the game.

I think that romance (both in reality and in the genre) is a little too unpredictable to make for a simple-but-complete ruleset. Even when a relationship is going fantastically, sudden unexpected reversals, misunderstandings, heartbreaking secrets, and such things are fairly commonplace. I'm not saying it can't be done, but to do it justice would require more rules than Blue Rose seems to want, and would tend to turn romances away from somethign that gets the players emotionally involved, into a dry mechanic. I mean, it's one thing to watch your PC's sanity ebb and feel a real dread analogous to that which your character should be feeling; how would you get that mixture of joy, longing, worry, and everything else that romance carries?

The only way I can really imagine it would be a card game - the sort of thing Cheapass Games would make with a skewed angle, i suppose. Zombie Love?