Obstacles to love

This is the Situations 28th and 29th of Polti. In the 29th, the Obstacle is a Hater who hates one Lover and has a positive relationship with the other. Elements

• two Lovers
• an Obstacle

Plot: Two Lovers face an Obstacle to their love (possibly) together.

Lovers

To the Lovers Element belong also all who help and support them.

PCs as Lovers

As stated, PCs don’t need to be the actual lovers, but helpers and supporters of the relationship. They may even do that for not-so-good reasons: take Romeo and Juliet and now create Betty, the little sister of Juliet. She knows about the love between Romeo and Juliet and the hate of their father against Romeo’s family. She thinks that, helping her sister run away with Romeo, their father will forsake her and Betty will inherit everything, so she helps the lovers in a way she can’t be blamed.

Obstacle

Anything can be an obstacle. It can be personal and indirect, like the hate between Montague and Capulet, personal and direct, like Juliet’s cousin hate for Romeo, but it need not be personal: a war, one of the lovers fighting in it, is an obstacle; another suitor taking advantage of the war to have a chance with one of the lovers is another part of that obstacle; poverty can be an obstacle; great differences in status, education… anything can be an obstacle to love.

PCs as Obstacle

They need a reason to oppose the relationship, either it affects them directly or indirectly. For instance, a knight PC is supposed to marry a Count’s daughter, but she loves a peasant boy. The marriage is important to the PC, not only because he loves the girl, but because that marriage means an army to pursue and defeat an enemy. Indirect consequences could be that, should the daughter run away with the boy, the Count will have nobody to inherit his lands, and then it will be his brother, a cruel person, who takes control of them.

Development

This kind of story may easily mix with Ambition, Fatal Imprudence, Obtaining or Daring Enterprise.

Once it takes place, it can be the seed for Rivalry, Crimes of Love or Loss of Loved Ones.

As with Obtaining, solving the Obstacle may require a Sacrifice for at least one of the lovers. Romeo and Juliet were willing to leave their families because of their love.