Roleplay Prompts by Genre: Fantasy, Romance, Horror, Sci-Fi and More

Need a roleplay prompt? Here are 60 starter ideas sorted by genre: fantasy, romance, horror, sci-fi, mystery and modern AU, each built around a problem two characters have to deal with together.

Every prompt has a situation and a pressure: something that forces your characters to act. Change names, swap genders, move the setting. They're starting points, not scripts. If you want help turning one into an opening post, read How To Write A Compelling RP Starter.

Fantasy

1. A healer is summoned to treat a prisoner the night before his execution. He isn't sick. He wants to tell someone where the crown is buried.
2. Two rival apprentices are locked in their dead master's tower until one of them can open the last sealed book.
3. A dragon has started paying the village tithe instead of collecting it. Nobody knows why, and the tax collector wants answers.
4. A knight returns from a quest everyone saw her fail, carrying the relic she supposedly never found.
5. The royal food taster falls ill after a meal the queen didn't eat.
6. A minor god's last worshipper is dying. The god takes a mortal form to bargain for one more.
7. A cartographer is hired to map a forest that rearranges itself every new moon.
8. Two thieves break into the same vault on the same night, for different objects in the same box.
9. A changeling, raised human, receives a polite letter from the fae court requesting their return by midsummer.
10. A mercenary is paid to escort a priest across a war zone. The priest keeps blessing the other side.

Romance

1. Two wedding planners are hired by opposite sides of the same feuding family.
2. A florist keeps delivering anonymous bouquets to the same apartment, and the recipient starts leaving notes for the sender.
3. Exes are the only two people who can identify a body at the morgue: their former best friend's.
4. A ghostwriter falls for the person whose love letters they've been writing for a client.
5. Two people meet every Tuesday in the same hospital waiting room, visiting different patients.
6. A chef and the food critic who closed her first restaurant are stuck judging the same cooking contest.
7. Someone answers a lonely hearts ad from 1987, found in a library book.
8. A bodyguard's new client is the one person who saw them at their worst, years ago.
9. Rival bakers share a kitchen after a fire takes out one of their shops.
10. Two strangers share an overnight train compartment after their flights are cancelled. By morning, one of them has missed their stop on purpose.

Horror

1. The new tenant finds the previous tenant's grocery list on the fridge. The items match what she just bought.
2. A night-shift nurse realises the patient in bed 12 has been admitted every year on the same date since 1961.
3. A family's smart speaker starts answering questions nobody asked.
4. Two hikers find a cabin stocked with food, with their names written on the cupboard labels.
5. A small town holds a festival every autumn. This year, the newcomer has been chosen to wear the mask.
6. A child's imaginary friend gives the babysitter very specific instructions about the basement.
7. Every photo developed from a second-hand camera shows the same woman, a little closer each time.
8. A lighthouse keeper receives a radio call from a ship that sank forty years ago, asking for permission to dock.
9. Two paranormal podcasters finally record something real, and it asks them to keep the show running.
10. An estate sale buyer opens a locked trunk and finds dozens of letters addressed to them, dated before they were born.

Science fiction

1. A generation ship's only doctor wakes up early from cryosleep and finds the captain's pod empty.
2. An android built to grieve on behalf of wealthy families starts refusing jobs.
3. Two salvagers board a derelict station. The life support is on, and someone has set the table for two.
4. A time-travel agency's newest employee keeps receiving memos written in their own handwriting.
5. First contact happens over a customer service chat.
6. A memory surgeon is asked to remove the same memory from both halves of a married couple, without the other knowing.
7. A colony's terraforming AI asks to be allowed to vote.
8. A smuggler's cargo turns out to be a person in stasis, and they're waking up.
9. Two soldiers on opposite sides of an interstellar war are stranded on the same moon with one working beacon.
10. A clone discovers the original is still alive, and has been paying for their upkeep.

Mystery and crime

1. A small-town sheriff and a big-city detective disagree about whether the death was an accident. They both have reasons to be wrong.
2. An art forger is hired to authenticate a painting she's sure she painted.
3. A dinner party guest dies, and every other guest admits to poisoning him. Only one is lying.
4. A retired cat burglar is asked to break into her own old home to retrieve something the new owners found.
5. A journalist's anonymous source turns out to be the person they're investigating.
6. A wedding photographer notices the same stranger in the background of three different weddings.
7. A defence lawyer's client confesses in private, then pleads not guilty, and insists they're protecting someone.
8. A crossword setter gets letters solving clues that haven't been published yet.
9. Two heirs must spend a month in their grandmother's house to inherit. The will mentions a third heir neither has heard of.
10. A hotel night porter is the only witness, and the only suspect.

Modern AU and slice of life

1. Two roommates assigned by the university have nothing in common except a cat that keeps choosing both of them.
2. A struggling bookshop owner and the coffee chain manager next door get trapped in the shared stockroom during a blackout.
3. A retired superhero runs a laundromat. A customer brings in a costume to be cleaned.
4. A single parent and their kid's new teacher keep running into each other at the worst moments.
5. Two contestants on a reality show realise the show is rigged, and decide whether to blow the whistle.
6. A funeral director and a party planner swap jobs for a week after a scheduling mix-up.
7. A small band's lead singer quits the night before their first big gig. The replacement is the person she quit because of.
8. An influencer's ghost-blogger accidentally posts their own opinion to two million followers.
9. Old school friends meet at a ten-year reunion and discover they've both been lying about their lives.
10. A night bus driver and a regular passenger have never spoken, until the night the bus breaks down.

Making a prompt your own

• Give each character a want. "The healer wants to leave before dawn" and "the prisoner wants to be heard" already creates tension.
• Leave space for your partner. Don't decide everything. A good starter ends with something for them to react to. See The Art of the Starter.
• Pick a tone together. The same prompt can be a comedy or a tragedy. Agree which before you start.

Want tropes instead of situations? Try Trope Prompts for Roleplay. Stuck in an existing thread? Plot Twist Ideas for a Stalled Roleplay can get it moving again.