Template:Romantic Knots

Romantic Knots
Romantic knots are complex dilemmas with very personal stakes. The consequences are less about physical danger and more about future happiness. Each participant in a romantic knot should have one person who will make them happy in a relationship. No two people in the knot should have each other as that person unless at least 2 more people would be unhappy without them. So the smallest knot would be 3, and complex knots routinely have 5 or more competing couples.

Unlike a regular dilemma a romantic knot seldom offers a direct choice. You might choose to help or harm certain participants, change who will make a participant happy, or introduce new participants that might alter the conditions. You may even become a participant yourself, selecting your favored romantic partner as the person who will make you happy. As the relationships become set, one tragic consequence will occur for each unhappy individual in the knot, and each tragedy will change the person who makes a different individual happy. Once every individual in the knot is either happy or has had their tragic consequence resolved then the knot is concluded, and may offer rewards.

Disputes are a common means of impressing or tarnishing individuals in a knot, which can make relationships resolve faster or more slowly to give you time to make changes. Commonly there is at least one investigation that will provide a change in who makes a participant happy or eliminate a tragic consequence as a reward. Especially passionate knots may cause intrigue based murder attempts and all out battles.