[quote=Jannah]
I've been told I play excellent male characters(I'm female), but you do raise a good point. I think some people feel that some RPers just can't portray the opposite sex very well. However, without chances to practice there's no chance of improving.
[/quote]

Well. All males and females don't fall under universal rules of behavior. (Much as we, as people, want to generalize and say that they do.) So while I find many females writing males without much assertiveness to them and typically identify it as a negative, it's not like every guy I know is assertive. (Nor is it that females are never assertive.) Just so, I've found many a female character written by a male that seems to forget that females can be expressive and girly, and count that as a negative about their portrayal. (Not that all girls are expressive and/or enjoy something pink.)

Both those ARE two examples of generalized traits of the gender behind the character bleeding through into their opposite-gender character. And yeah, I imagine if you're focusing on romance that missing something you consider very much part of the opposite gender in your 1x1 game would be pretty damn disheartening and deflating.