ITT we talk to ourselves

Ever had to, as a gm, have a NPC talk to another NPC? How do you do it? do you have a player take up one PC? talk to yourself? Something else?

I make notes about each NPC's personality and motives and make sure to use different voices for each. That helps me move back and foth

Since I run a text game on roll 20 for one dude, I do a bunch of npcs, it's pretty fun

No experience myself, but that really sounds like something you should generally avoid having to do. Unless you've just arranged things wrong (DMPCs being the prime offender) there really shouldn't be many conversations the players are party to but not the ones being talked to, and most of those can be summarized instead of awkwardly acted out.

I only act out characters the party interacts with. If two NPCs interact separately then the conversation is summarized.

I simply insert descriptions of the events happening in-between bits of dialogue. Avoids the end result of looking like a one-man Broadway play and also helps the players keep track of who is saying and doing what.

You talk to yourself. I have NPCs interact all the time, but I try to keep it short. The switch-off between NPCs is a bit awkward, so having an extended dialogue between them is less than ideal. But having one NPC say something and another respond to it only contains 1 switch-off, and isn't that bad.

how about eavesdropping and playing on player's asumptions?
summarizing could kinda kill the mood

>Ever had to, as a gm, have a NPC talk to another NPC?
No, because that sort of masturbation is bad gming.

It is bad GMing when the players in question require constant direct stimulation and engaging with the setting is not in their nature.

what if your players actively want to see these two characters interact? e.g. the shippers in my group want their fucking OTP to get fucking

(please fucking help me I just want to make dungeons)

I don't see the problem.

Maybe sail the ship to the dungeon?

I started off running a survival horror campaign, and my players turned it into a weird npc dating simulator through sheer force of will

The only bait I have for them anymore is threatening their NPC's, at which point they make judge dredd seem weak willed

I've done it before as a PC once or twice, usually for when I changed characters or other weird contexts. What I usually ended up doing was using two different tones and voices and making the conversation quick and heated so you have a lot to improvise with.

sorry accidentally replied to myself, see

Well if they have built a secure status quo (I picture all of the NPC zoo sitting in a sort of base) you could dismantle that status quo. Maybe they all have to move, maybe the only way is through a dungeon. You can cull some on the trek if you don't fear to alienate players with that. And maybe you can split up that terrarium on the other side and bring in some new characters. Let the NPCs move apart, because they have lives.

I personally would have fun indulging the players, but I would also give the NPCs some drama, maybe the relationship turns unhealthy.

Point is don't let the objects of interest just sit there in a vacuum with the players as audience and your only move is to bring a threat of the weak in from outside. Advance the NPCs lives since your players are invested in them already.
Maybe they want out of that survival horror ravenloft town. 's no proper place for a family.

Of course I can only guess at your precise situation

No thats all top advice, it's just the entire situation is just really unusual for me. Never really had players like this before

Maybe your players have utilized a little magical encouragement bin the past, a love potion, charm spells...
Maybe that comes back to bite them in the ass and a confused disenfranchised lover flees into the darkest hole in the are, unable to cope with the fact that everything was a lie.

Maybe rescue arrives from outside to survival horror land. But there is someone who doesn't want to be saved. Here we can be together, forever.

fuck you're way better at this than I am.

But yeah, they kinda "solved" the survival horror stuff through a mix of playing like a swat team/having absolutely no moral restrictions beyond consent being necessary/making sure the pet NPC's are happy

Don't. Don't ever. Summarize conversations that don't involve the players...

in reality I gave up when I realized I couldn't really challenge them, and they had more fun with shipping wars

Maybe move to a finale then? Not all campaigns have to be stretched endlessly. Ideally it would involve the NPC relationship and the horror theme. But you have to be careful, they may not take it well if their perfect ship wasn't at all what it seemed. But I would be rather tempted myself to let the situation, the love turn sour. that maybe one was tainted by nightmare land, by an overarching problem the placers chose to not quite deal with.
Not advocating a gotcha moment here, more out of a conservation of detail and storytelling perspective. You need something established, else it is all asspull.

the placers...
damn I'm typing drunk today

Or you force a choice between NPCs, maybe not invalidate the main pair, but a reasonably beloved side character, maybe you can split the party into a climactic standoff. Ship vs Ship.

Know the group, only a Sith deals in absolutes.