Smut only gets boring fast and often I feel like it has been played out during the discussion phase.
From a narrative context I think sex scenes are not too dissimilar to jump-scares in a horror movie. If you don't get your audience invested in the character and context, and make no effort to establish a tense atmosphere no amount of CGI gore of screeching stings in the soundtrack is going to make the moment scary, and for that reason there is definitely a practical upper limit on the amount of fulfilling sexual content a story can contain. You need developed characters, character dynamics, and a robust narrative framework to give it some emotional context otherwise it's just a dull mechanical process. Each scene needs this sort of narrative logistical support. Without it one might as well fade-to-black. That said I do think a story can open with an erotic scene much as an action movie may open with an action scene, but that's more about establishing character, motives, etc, than the erotic content.
Or at least I have already imagined the whole story and see little point in playing it out. Rape is a good example of that so the character gets raped, ok and then? I mean really, what happens after that? Do I even have to be there to respond to anything if I am playing the victim?
I know a toxic relationship founded on abuse and exploitation is more, 'horror story,' than 'erotic thriller,' for many, but for those of us who can enjoy these themes responding in an organic and believable way to a non-con scene should not be game-breaking. It will take the story somewhere dark, and some people prefer to write non-con scenes as 'a-traumatic,' incidents so as to avoid this. That said regardless of what you're writing you as co-author should always retain just as much control over that story as your partner does and scenes where you cannot influence events directly through your characters actions or where your ability to do so is compromised (which are not unique to games with non-con themes) shouldn't be used as a pretext to hijack the narrative. That is a partner-problem not a story problem. Characters have agency, and what they think and say and do should always matter to your partner, and be of consequence to the development of the story, but more than that there should always be on-going communication about what you expect and enjoy, and where you want events to go or not go.
For me it doesn't have to be a "romance" but I do want story, like if an older Female teacher in a mid life crisis or whatever walks into a male strip club and finds a male student of hers dancing in there. So there is obviously smut options there but I see lots of element for story as well.
I have nothing against romance personally, hell I'm currently writing a fairly wholesome romantic relationship involving an older female teacher and a younger student.
When I saw the Porn DVD part of your comment for me that means avoiding the over the top scenarios like the woman who orders a pizza but can't pay for it so gives the pizza guy a blow job. I mean yeah, it's funny but what is there to write? I like some element of realism in terms of how characters think, react, feel etc even if the plot or basis for the whole thing might be a little over the top.
I think we see things in more or less the same way.