Greetings, this may sound pretty strange but I was asked from my gf to dm her an erp game. I am a forever DM and it seems she loves how I dm, because she even got me a list of her "yes"es and "no"es for such kind of campaign. (Sadly, for the kinky users, pretty vanilla stuff overall)
However, she doesn't want shameless sexting, but full fledged rpg but with lots of sex sprinkled over it. So, I am adressing you, fellow fa/tg/uys, to ask you about tips and ideas to make possible such a campaign. Because, when "lay the dragon" becomes an option, it seems the dynamics change a lot and I don't want to make it too boring or too magical realm.
In addition, you have any story too to share, please, do it.
Don't do a sex campaign. Do a regular campaign with sex. Basically, don't overthink things. Just do things like normal, but seize on opportunities that can naturally lead to sexy times. Sexual tensions with NPC party members might lead to something more. A rescue prince or princess (or farmer's daughter / son) may be extra grateful. Rape is an easy thing to throw in, but you can stop short of that with a slave Leia sort of thing that never turns into overt sex or violation.
Tl;dr: just run a normal campaign and don't force things. They'll naturally get to where you want them to.
Connor Murphy
>Bikini armor is normal because the setting dosn't have western nudity taboos. >Monsters will rape attractive female adventurers if they catch them. >Prostitution is common among adventurer types because they don't raise families. >Nobles marry young, and use homosexual relationships as a way to sleep around without violating betrothals. Once the marrage is sealed, both partners are free to have as many mistresses/consorts as they want, as long as they pretend to like each other. >Peasants have lots of orgies and aren't as concerned about the sanctity of marriage as the aristocrats.
Keep those things in mind and then just run a regular fantasy game with less clothes. Everyone's into that game of thrones shit these days anyways.
Juan Wilson
I should add, while monsters might TRY to rape PCs. PC rape should be handled the same way PC death is. Unless the player is particularly submissive, it's a dick move to take agency away from the player without a fair fight first. Don't just say "The guards raped you and took your gear, now you have to escape naked." Most people want the danger more than actual submission. Don't be a creep.
Asher Jackson
>Don't do a sex campaign. Do a regular campaign with sex. This. Don't force it or go heavyhanded. Just let it arise naturally.
Just add extra doses of barbarians, bathhouses, brothels, barwenches, and maids. Depending on her tastes, add rapey brigands, succubus/incubi, orcs, satyrs, centaurs, and minotaurs. Contrast these with prince charming types, dashing rogues, burly Conans and Gastons, and evil slavers.
Lastly, remember there's always a distinction between what people say they want, and what they really want. Think long and hard on this.
Isaiah Hill
You should give us that list of yes/no so we have something to build off of
Brody Wilson
Thicc lizard men
Connor Martinez
>vanilla unless she is submissive as a tradwife dump her.
Jeremiah Thomas
>Putting all those bitches on one side of the cart that guy deserves to have me break free. time to flip the pool.
Ryan Turner
If she roles to seduce, knock a point or two from what she needs to beat.
Andrew Jones
commit seifuku, nerd
Jayden Garcia
So, a regular campaign and let the sex flows. It was something I was crispy about because enemy encounters ala Corruption of Champion was too much "in your face", even for my taste.
Is there some light rules system do you suggest me? I could use D&D somewhat distilled in rules but, maybe, there is some more interedting option.
>Lastly, remember there's always a distinction between what people say they want, and what they really want. Think long and hard on this.
Please, explain a little more.
Phone posting right now, so I cant give the list in details but, mainly, is something like this:
>YES Yuri Straight sex BDSM Master/Pet Relationship Exhibitionism Vouyerism Incest Fantasy Races in general (specially those draconians from D&D, she has tons of porn of them and any anthro dragon) Maids Yaoi Pegging Vanilla sex Forced sex (not sure if just meaning rough o rape) >NO Filthiness (sweat, excesive cum, blood, mud, urine, feces, and all that crap).
Big genitals (I guess she means she doesn't like macro stuff, I guess)
Receiving anal sex (which made me feel a little awkard because she let me have it in her butt a lot of times)
Sub males
Ambiguous gender people (traps and androginy). She wants manly males and feminine females. Shemales and herms are ok.
Landon Roberts
>Is there some light rules system do you suggest me? Barbarians of Lemuria would be great you're into swords & sorcery.
>Phone posting right now, so I cant give the list in details but, mainly, is something like this: Regardless of what system you use, consider giving her some kind of fate points she can use to either influence rolls (spend one and get a big bonus) or outright determine (or even retroactively change) the course of events (spend two to tell you how a fight turns out, how a person reactions, or to undo something that happened that she didn't like). Make sure she always has some points to spend, but make sure she's not drowning in them, or she may just start writing the story for you, which probably won't end up being as fun for either of you (there's no sense of tension and less sense of immersion if you're just deciding how shit goes as a player). These points can be a big help in zeroing in on what she enjoys.
Additionally, I'd recommend hand signals. Thumbs up if she's really enjoying what you're doing at the moment. A so-so shake of the hand to indicate that this isn't really the sort of thing she's into, or that you're close to going into something she definitely dislikes. Also, a time-out T (or she could just say "time out") to indicate she'd like you to pause things at the next convenient moment to discuss shit. And yes, she should definitely be able to put the game on pause and have a meta-talk with you about how things are going. If she starts getting a bit too pushy, just remind her that while you want to give her what she wants, you still need enough autonomy to run things, and that it's not going to be very fun for you if you're just following her orders all the time.
Henry Powell
That list makes it sound really easy, honestly. Just do an ordinary fantasy campaign with a lot of pervy villains and charmingly dominant heroes. When defeated in combat, her character isn't killed but rather taken captive, stripped down, tied up, and spanked and or tickled or whatever her preference is, maybe throw in some actual rape if she's ok with that. She may be taken to some evil baron's harem where she's subjected to even more of the same and then has to escape, and so on.
Blake Cox
>Yuri Noblewomen fuck their female servants when their husbands are off at war.
>Straight sex Christianity dosn't exist so having sex for pleasure isn't considered sinful. Instead the main religion revolves around the divine feminine and the divine masculine principles engaging in sacred marrage to create the universe. The priestly caste is doing all sorts of ritual sex magic. Literally just look up various eastern religions. Both the Taoists and the Hindus did shit like this before Christians Buddhists and Muslims pruded everything up.
>BDSM Slavery exists.
>Master/Pet Relationship Interspecies slavery exists, Elves and Dragons consider humans to be animals that somehow know how to talk rather than people, and will treat their slaves as such.
>Exhibitionism Adventurer types dress flamboyantly to prove they aren't cowards. Magical weapons and armor mean that heavy armor is more or less dead weight. Full plate won't protect you from spells, and enchanted plate dosn't have to cover your skin to work. Aristocrats wear jewelery instead of clothes to show off their wealth, and peasants wear loincloths or sarongs because they can't afford jewelery. The setting is tropical enough that pants never got invented.
>Vouyerism Wizards and rogues both spy on people.
>Incest Common among the peasant types because they don't have to worry about arranged marriages. People learn sex from their parents and marry their sisters. Some aristocrats also like to keep their bloodlines pure, but they always end up missing out on important alliances. In both cases the effect inbreeding is minimized by gene flow from prostitutes and slaves who "Don't count" when it comes to bloodlines.
...cont.
Jose Gray
Don't.
Jackson Moore
Ask for specifics on all the ones you have questions on. Better some awkwardness now than later in the midst of other fuckers.
Tyler King
>Fantasy Races in general (specially those draconians from D&D, she has tons of porn of them and any anthro dragon) See master/pet relationships. I could start a whole thread on this.
>Maids This is the most common job for an unmarried woman who dosn't want to work on a farm or on a street corner. It's a step above slavery, but involves lots of sex you can't say no too from the master or mistress of the house.
>Yaoi Manly warrior types like to engage in manly bonding. Because public schools do not exist, pederasty is the socially accepted way for young aristocrats to receive their education. Look up ancient Greece.
>Pegging Amazons wear carved wooden double ended didoes, and very little else.
>Vanilla sex
>Forced sex (not sure if just meaning rough o rape) The accepted reality of war is that any non combatants who are unable to escape will be taken as sex slaves by the victorious attackers.
>No Filthiness (sweat, excesive cum, blood, mud, urine, feces, and all that crap). The worshipers of the goddess of Hygiene operate bathouses which everyone uses at least once a week, if for no reason other than that the priestesses scrub you with their naked soapy bodies.
Thomas Wilson
ITT: The DM's girlfriend is That Guy. Without fail.
Dylan Taylor
>Please, explain a little more. What I mean is, certain things sound attractive and sexy in our heads and in reality or in the heat of the moment play out differently. Your gf might be into more extreme things than what she cares to admit to and puts on the list, or she may not actually find all those things on the list quite as hot as she claims. Some people are embarrassed by what they're into, but just remind her, taste is just a thing, and everyone's tastes are different.
So just play by ear, take things step by step and pay attention to what turns her on.
Charles Robinson
You need to figure out if the sex scenes are to be played as well or if it's just you narrating them. Example for the first: >okay, roll strength >17 >you're overpowered. BBEG pushes you back on the bed, lands on you and starts the tear at your blouse while holding you down. What do you do? >try to use [fill in the blanks] spell on him >alright, roll x + y
Or in option two: >You've found yourself alone with the BBEG, and the moment he locks the door you realise it's a bad idea. He walks up to you with a menacing sneer, you get up and look around panicked, but there is no way to flee. He pushes you and you fall, landing on the bed. In seconds he's on you and try to tear at your blouse, rummaging under your skirt. Desperate, you still try to use a spell but the moment he realizes what you're trying to do he punches you in the face (etc etc)
Benjamin Campbell
Seconding Barbarians of Lemuria. Actually considering it for the same reason OP is, funny enough. Just more for a friend than a gf.
Evan Nguyen
>minotaurs Thanks for reminding me of this
Asher Anderson
It wasn't intentional but the last ERP game I played ended settling into one session more of roleplay followed by one session more of rollplay (adjusted as needed of course) with the roleplaying split about 30/70-40/60 ERP/nonERP. Of course this needs to be adjusted to taste but it worked out pretty well in my opinion.
Lucas Roberts
>Receiving anal sex (which made me feel a little awkard because she let me have it in her butt a lot of times) What we write or read often has less to do with our personal and actual preferences during real sex than you might think.
Samuel Edwards
How about slimes that dissolved people's clothes and rape them?
Caleb Sanchez
Vouyerism is a good place to start IMO. You can do a stealth mission or something where she stumbles across some incestous boning or something. She's supposed to steal something for her dragonborn patron but ends up hiding in the closet while her mark makes love to his sister in the next room. It'll give her that thrill of watching plus the potential to blackmail any NPC involved if handled correctly. Rather than going right for rape it sets a sexual tone and leaves her character with agency and information to do with as she pleases.
Bentley Nguyen
Also you can't forget sexy hero outfits, most important. :^)
Brayden Wood
>NO >Sub males
B-but those are my favorite kinds!
Nolan Rogers
As ridiculous and cringeworthy as those outfits are, I'm not going to lie, those guys do look pretty hot.
Lucas Campbell
Is there actually a Barbarians of Lemuria thing going on right now? I really wouldn't mind joining, desu. Wanted to play for a while now.
Isaiah Johnson
If I ever make a paladin for an ERPG, I'm totally going to be guy on the right. If you are ERPG a paladin so fabulous to the point that make you question his sexuality, you are doing it wrong.
Andrew Hall
I can recognize MLP influences but what in the name of Slaanesh is this?
Logan Wright
I'd add one. >Rape isn't traumatizing the way it can be in IRL. It's, at worst, akin to an act of bullying in high school, and it's typically an inconvenience.
No need for unnecessary drama.
Sounds like a great time.
Aiden Scott
Did I say doing it wrong? I mean doing it right! Or maybe I am right if all doubts remove about his sexuality?
>No need for unnecessary drama. This is super important. If rape is ok then you don't make it to be a big deal either. Just leave additional violence out so that this fantastic discrepancy with actual rape isn't too jarring. Unless she's into ryona and shit, I guess.
Lucas Davis
Non-con games are one of my biggest kinks. A lot of people turn away from the things I want to do because of this one.
Having said that, I DO generally resist, but up a struggle, etc. There's no sitting in a shower crying for days afterwards though.
But to answer what you're asking OP, I'd start with finding out what she likes, and go with it. Explore a bit, offer opportunities, see what she's into.
Make a mechanic out of it, even. People might say one thing with their character, but want a different thing as a player. I certainly do, all the time. Give her two tokens. Perhaps a black stone and a white one, or red/blue, or whatever colors signify yes/no. Have her give you one colored stone when confirming something, and another when refuting this. Kinda like the thumbs up/down on Pandora. "Yes, I'd like more of this" and "no, I don't like this/please don't include it". If you need details, you can work them out, verbally. Otherwise, you can just put them forward.
Like, say that you've got a character who approaches her with a proposition towards anal sex. Maybe she'll give you a "yes" stone, or a "no" stone. Either way, be sure to take notes. Perhaps she'll give you a "yes" because she likes anal. Perhaps a character threatens to knock her up, and she'll give you a "no" stone, and they'll decide to pull out. She can give you both at the same time if she wants to have more of something, but has a caveat ("I like anal, but only if you're gentle when you do it." or "I like preg play, but not with non-human races").
Perhaps you can give her two of each. Double-yes means "oh god, please please please have more of this", where double-no means "do not bring this thing up ever again". In any case, have fun, and I hope you get righteously laid afterwards.
David Harris
Oh, and if she's like me, and she gives you a double-yes, she's gonna want this thing. Constantly. Give it to her, and give it good. Make it last. Colorful details. She'll appreciate you for it. Might even beg you for more, if you're really good at it.
Once again, I can't guarantee this is how she'll act, but something to consider.
Charles Roberts
Don't look at me. It's actually been a bit since I've been in a game. I'm used to playing in meatspace with friends and the opportunities for that seem to have dried up, so I'm probably going to have to transition to something different, but my previous (admittedly limited) online experience was less than thrilling (I found the format very confining), and I don't really see how grabbing a bunch of strangers for a meatspace game could go well.
Juan Davis
>Rape isn't traumatizing the way it can be in IRL. It's, at worst, akin to an act of bullying in high school, and it's typically an inconvenience. It really depends on what floats your boat, I think. I mean, sitting in the shower and crying for days afterwards (as brings up) doesn't really make for interesting play, so the after effects do naturally get downplayed so that PCs can remain engaged, but if rape is just shrugged off as no big deal, I think it loses something. From my perspective, it should definitely be more than an inconvenience. Then again, I quite like it when things get dark ( is my setting), so your mileage may vary. So just calibrate things as best you can to fit your player(s). Certainly, rape doesn't *need* to be a big deal.
Josiah Lopez
I think webcomic _I Roved Out_ is pretty much required reading here, OP. Basically it’s the story of two oversexed adventurers trying to not quest.
Oh, and you need a system that doesn’t get in the way.
Ian Reed
>GM/Player GM >System Preferred Agocal Burst 4.0 >Times Available (with timezone!) 11 AM to 11 PM central standard time >Voice/Text Text >Method of Play (Skype, IRC, roll20, etc) Discord >Contact Info Discord is NG00010 #1097 >Additional Notes No ERP blah blah you fuckers know the drill by now
Michael Rodriguez
*Magical burst
Owen Hall
Fuck wrong thread
Tyler Murphy
>I Roved Out Thnx for the tip, man - shit's great!
Easton Hernandez
>>Incest >Common among the peasant types because they don't have to worry about arranged marriages. People learn sex from their parents and marry their sisters. Some aristocrats also like to keep their bloodlines pure, but they always end up missing out on important alliances. In both cases the effect inbreeding is minimized by gene flow from prostitutes and slaves who "Don't count" when it comes to bloodlines.
I would say it would be more common with nobles rather than peasants. Humans at least in the real world mentally develop an aversion to incest, just look up the Westermarck effect (although that's technically just a hypothesis).
Plus, taking away the taboo kind makes it less hot (at least to me, an incestfag)
Blake Cruz
>yaoi and pegging desired >no anal or sub males
Christian Williams
>Plus, taking away the taboo kind makes it less hot (at least to me, an incestfag)
Tell me more about what you like.
Easton Butler
I can't tell if this is sarcasm or not
Liam Parker
It's not.
Nicholas Robinson
Ah well my favorite type of incest is between fraternal opposite-gender twins. Yandere is my favorite dere, in particular I'm fond of yandere boys. I also like rape and humiliation. I think the wildest thing I like is oviposition and bestiality, but only non-consensual bestiality. Monsters also fall under the bestiality umbrella to me.
My current character is a noble's daughter that's on the run from her yandere twin brother and talks of an arranged marriage with another noble's son. Her brother has convinced their father that if he can bring my character home, he can marry her instead. They're both very powerful magic users in a world where that is rare and the main reason my character is getting an arranged marriage is because her potential father-in-law is trying to breed a lineage of powerful casters. My GM has approved and encouraged this so I'm very excited.
Matthew Evans
Can I join in? I'd hate to rude, but this sounds like a lot of fun, and much of the supply for what I like is barren.
Xavier Scott
it's not an ERP campaign; it's normal, it just has mature themes in it. I'm also brand new to the campaign, my first session is this weekend.
Jeremiah Walker
Bummer. Have fun user.
Charles Campbell
>I would say it would be more common with nobles rather than peasants.
Well you don't pay much attention to history or anthropology do you. Aristocratic societies that don't develop incest taboos miss out on alliances and get inbred into oblivion. Peasants on the other hand don't really miss out on anything other than a lack of genetic diversity, which can easily be fixed by occasionally fucking somebody who isn't your sister.
As a result you'll see aristocrats getting into arranged marriages with people from other tribes, and peasants fucking their sisters because they never leave home and meet anybody who isn't related to them. Fun fact, in archaic Japanese the word for sister and wife was the same thing, hence why all the Kami are sister fuckers, just like Adam and Eve. Any isolated tribal society is going to be caught in genetic bottlenecks and the taboo around incest is ultimately socially constructed. We might have a innate bias towards people who look more "exotic" because on a biological level we want more gene flow, but if you grow up in some remove village and never get any travelers, your sister will be the most pretty woman you've ever met. People won't stop fucking just because the only available partners are related to them.
If you want to play with taboos, just play an aristocrat who has to chose between his childhood friend (who is his cousin) and his arranged marriage to some exotic princess who doesn't even speak the same language as him. If he or his cousin gets caught having sex out of wedlock they'll probably start a war.
Landon Hill
I should add that the other side of the peasants fucking their cousins coin is, if the peasants have no reason to fear outsiders, they are going to find any travelers very attractive.
Adventurers are going to be richer, more athletic, and possibly magical. They are also going to have exotic sounding accents and wear fancy bikini armor. Sister fucking peasants will probably try to pimp their daughters out to you in order to make you part of their tribe, thus increasing their social status.
Also keep in mind that gender roles are also socially constructed so if a tribe that isn't used to female warriors sees an amazon, they might decide that "Well she's basically a man with tits so we'll try pimping our daughter to her first, and then if that dosn't work see if she wants a husband instead."
Really most of our sexual taboos come from a Christian upper class, and everything goes out the door once you look at what kind of kinky shit non Christian peasants get up to when nobody is around to tell them to stop fucking their sisters.
Isaiah Parker
>Well you don't pay much attention to history or anthropology do you. I do not, thank you for enlightening me. That does make sense. I was thinking more along the lines of "keeping the bloodline pure" that someone another user mentioned.
Leo Turner
Well there have been plenty of aristocrats who did make that mistake. It tends to happen in societies that conquered other cultures and thus want to keep themselves distinct from the lower classes. It always ends in degeneracy as the increasingly ineffectual upper class is unable to defend itself from the next generation of foreign conquerers.
Look up the Polemic dynasty in Egypt. They were descended from Alexander the great, and were Greek speaking Pharaohs. Totally into incest, and completely useless by the time Cesar came around to conquer Egypt. Cleopatra was the last of their dynasty, and also the first Pharaoh in hundreds of years to even speak Egyptian. Naturally she was a huge nerd about it and cosplayed as the goddess Isis despite not even being Egyptian.
The Zorostrans are another example of incestuous aristocrats. They believed incest was a sacred responsibility, and as a result got raped into oblivion by Muslims who were encouraged to spread the new faith by having as many wives from as many different tribes as possible.
So if you want to play with kinky taboos, consider a member of an incestuous noble society who's sisterwife is getting really into "Impure barbarian cultures." and wants to "spice things up in the bedroom." by which she means having a slave fuck her while you watch. If the others found out about it, the dishonor would taint your entire bloodline, how will you ever get revenge on her for her stupid NRT fetish? Spoilers: It involves cheating on her with barbarian women while she watches.
Jaxon Taylor
>All this talk about getting some good D, and none of it actually going on. Why god?
Jacob Cox
Asanagi is a really good artist, wish he did some vanilla
Justin Howard
Veeky Forums is bad at history.
But you, user, you are good.
Eli Brooks
>YES >yaoi >Pegging
>NO >Receiving anal sex >Sub males
Is there something I don't know?
Jose Rodriguez
Asanagi and d something storu pretty much my favorite hentai artists.
OP needs to research hentai fantasy for some ideas. For example, make them discover that this elf village have a breeding program made by the humans that enslaved them. They send in humans to out-breed the elf out of the village. If the party ask why the elf village allow these humans to impregnated their young elf women, the elves would say "It's either that or death".
Nothing like a Dark Magical Realm to make players to do a full 180 and start killing baddies.
Liam Scott
>Is there something I don't know?
Clearly no men must sub for him, they must have angry fightsex where a man wins by cumming in the other man's face.
Tyler Long
bump
Grayson Miller
>Receiving anal sex (which made me feel a little awkard because she let me have it in her butt a lot of times)
Nolan Jackson
>You know what they say about Dwarven erotic literature: 30% penetration, 70% elaborate descriptions of submission holds
Isaiah Peterson
>yuri at the top of YES
Good luck dude
Owen Ward
>Polemic >Zorostrans It's Ptolemaic and Zoroastrian. Also, the former weren't descendant from Alexander, but from his general Ptolemy. They also didn't bring any incestious habits to Egypt, but merely adopted the incestious tradition of the Egyptian pharaos. See Akhenaten for an example of a much earlier, heavily inbred pharaoh.
Joshua Taylor
Yeah, I suck at spelling, but Egyptian History is a thousands of year old cycle of Inbred priest kings getting conquered/liberated by barbarians who eventually become a new generation of inbred priest kings cossplaying as gods who are also fucking their sister/mothers. Even Islam is just a tiny roadbump in the grand scheme of things, they'll be back to sister fucking in a few hundred years. Mohamed will be remembered as another monotheist Heretic like Akhenaten was. His hubris was thinking everyone on earth could possibly submit to the same god without introducing cultural peculiarities like jerking off into a river while the peasants watch in order to make sure it floods every year.
Carter Hall
>Rape isn't traumatizing the way it can be in IRL. It's, at worst, akin to an act of bullying in high school, and it's typically an inconvenience.
I agree with this. I dabble in this one campaign now and then where it's basically a power struggle in a city between various magical girls and often defeat leads to rape or some kind of sexual humiliation where once the fallen heroine escapes/recovers it's more of a balled up fist as she plots her revenge and not months or years of emotional trauma. The overall mood in the La Blue Girl hentai is pretty fitting.
Aiden Hall
I'm seeing something in horny dragon rules human kingdom where most of the better jobs are filled by its half-human descendents.
Josiah King
Glad you liked my advice. Any chance you're accepting new players?
Bentley Scott
Someone help me make sense of this strip. Are the men of the death-caps fighting because the death-cap women can't have sex with human males? Are the death-cap males implying they want to have sex with human males, but they look like women? Or are the death-cap women thinking the human females are going to try to take the death-cap men? Was that sentence the death-cap female aimed toward human males, females, or both?
I'm just not getting it.
Landon Hall
>wish he did some vanilla that's not how Asanagi operates - the best you can hope for are innocent pinups
Evan Scott
It's Oglaf, man - you're not supposed to 'get it' - you're only to laugh at all the 'wacky' dick jokes.
Nathaniel Ross
It's supposed to be a subversion of the dimorphism that exists in many fantasy races, the females being depicted as sexually appealing even when the males are monstrous.
Instead of asking why this is the case, the question is flipped; "why aren't human males monstrous? they're just women without tits and ass"
Nicholas Perry
>Fantasy Races in general (specially those draconians from D&D, she has tons of porn of them and any anthro dragon) remove cross breeding and this becomes a no-risk no brainer
Ayden Sanders
>Instead of asking why this is the case, the question is flipped; "why aren't human males monstrous? they're just women without tits and ass" This. With the added joke at the end that the humans, like you, , have no idea what the fuck is going on.
>Are the men of the death-caps fighting because the death-cap women can't have sex with human males? I think the idea is that humans--human men in particular--are viewed as perversions of nature. Just compare it to some people's reaction to transsexuals. But whatever their motivation, it's really not that important for the setup of the joke.
