Interaction is better than any plot

Did the headline catch your attention? Good. Because I've noticed an unhealthy obsession with plot, and I'm here to try and defuse that ticking bomb now that I've had some time to think on it.

The strongest moments in a role play come from interaction. It is the driving force of a role play. It doesn't matter if the plot is full of holes, crap, non-functional or whatever else have you. The most important element is interactivity. Interactivity in this case being defined as two characters creating a cycle of action and reaction which leads to action and reaction which leads to action and reaction, and so on.

When characters commit actions towards one another, and then react to those actions and create another action to follow up, this creates a theoretical indefinite cycle, only stopped when two characters cease their interaction. This can come about through a battle scene, through romance, through introductions, whatever else suits your fancy really. Coincidentally scenes which begin, continue, or culminate a rivalry, a romance, a friendship or otherwise are typically the most memorable moments one can have in a role play--because they came about with other people, others whom you can directly infer to the moment in question and have a moment of pleasant nostalgia about.

To make a long argument short: Interactivity is better than any plot in a role play because role plays are dependent on characters forming relationships--be they hostile, neutral, or friendly--to help resolve conflicts, overcome obstacles, develop themselves and others around them, and to make players feel a sense of belonging and loyalty towards one another. You could have a shitty plot with plot holes, and so long as the characters could navigate around the plot hole, continuing to interact with one another, they could easily circumvent what would otherwise be a killing blow to a movie or a book. Complex plots are even worse criminals for this because the harder a plot is to create, the more likely it will have worse and more numerous problems with it, and thus the more likely it might incidentally slow down interaction with character by throwing muddled crap in their way.

If you need examples, you can find them in basically all the most successful role plays on this site. Legend of Renalta, an RP I made, well; the entire plot can be summarized as "a pissed off fire-wielding princess goes for revenge against egomaniac Gods after being frozen for a thousand years." The Gods are often incompetent, bumbling, aristocratic morons and the princess took a solid six months to get a real personality beyond either dry aristocracy, "why me", or "grr I want revenge." She was as painfully Mary Sue as Mary Sue gets, really.

Yet the thing that kept that RP going--something I didn't understand at the time and stumbled on by accident--was the interactions of the characters with one another and with the princess. The princess gained more depth to her personality when she started forming relationships with those around her through repeated actions and reactions... Interactivity. This is important to note because the plot was garbage, the antagonists were literally retarded and the "awesome protagonist" was a walking, talking Mary Sue. Yet the story survived because of interactions.

If you want a less egocentric example, Kadaeux makes fantastic role plays. One of his best was Stellar Empires. To be absolutely blunt for a nation RP it was cumbersome, overly complex, slow, there wasn't even a fucking plot, and the system wasn't very balanced. You know what saved it? Player interactions. The players never stopped, their empires continually moved towards one another, fighting and exploring and colonizing all with the intention of working with or against other players. Interaction is what kept this thing going, presenting a whole pile of entertaining moments and memes that live on to this day.

Wait, not successful enough? Okay. Lets bring up ANOTHER example! From ANOTHER user!

Fantasy Nations, a nation RP that was run by Sarzu. Again, there was no plot at all. The only "plot" you could infer would be a few loosely affiliated empires on two sides: "Good" and "Evil". That's it. There's nothing else. It had no grand schemes of anything, it was just two sides kicking the shit out of each other based on arbitrarily drawn lines of morality. That's it. Guess what? It's one of the most successful nation RP's ever made on this site. Hands down. End of debate.

Wait! Wait you say! Those are only nation RP's and one you made? Well then, let me go on to more present examples of MORE RP'S!

The Library is a role play made by Kestrel. It's been going on for almost a year. The players in it are extremely active, and constantly RPing. I can't think of a time that The Library ever really slowed down. By the way, this is a casual-level role play that is kicking the crap out of most of the "sophisticated" advanced RP's featuring overly cumbersome and complex plots.

BUT WAIT! THERE'S EVEN MORE!

Glomp! Is a role play created by Kagamine. The entire thing can be summarized as "anime characters such as Naruto and Ash and whomever else duke it out against some evil megalomaniacs who want to destroy/capture/etc them all! Grr! Also fan girls and fan boys (Otaku) come to have connections with these characters and try to save them! Grr!" And that's it! I guarantee you because it's anime-based and taking characters from animated shows and manga it's going to have plot holes in it the size of Texas! And guess what? A casual RP about anime, which a lot of people on this site (especially in advanced) disdain, IS KICKING THE CRAP OUT OF 99% OF ADVANCED. Do you SEE that activity? That is an INSANE amount of activity. That kicks that crap of mine! The only thing mine has really is how long it's been going on! And from the looks of it, Glomp! Is bloody well endless!

Guess why it survives. Take a wild guess.

Interactions.

The characters (especially between Otaku and Anime characters) have ENDLESS numbers of ways to interact--and they do, endlessly--which means that no matter how bad the plot may get by literary standards, the role play remains a golden example of excellence and refuses to die because they never stop interacting. Another notable thing is the players and their absolute love for the damn thing. Nobody would invest that much time and effort to create that sheer number of pages of OOC unless it was really worth writing home about. And you know what? IT IS. Because no matter how ridiculous or goofy it gets, IT'S FANTASTIC! It continually entertains and makes everyone in it happy! The RP's gone private just because they can't take anyone else onboard, and the current members aren't leaving. Not a single one.

How's that for an impressive example of "plot is meaningless compared to interactions between characters and players alike?"

...But don't worry, THERE'S EVEN MORE!

Tenshi Jigoku Academy 4 is a BLOODY FREE RP! Made by OverlordRoo! It's a school-RP, that genre that has a massive stigma attached to it. Or at least it was when it started, I have no bloody idea what it is now. Lets be absolutely honest. If we're going to rate an RP's success by the length it has lasted, the enjoyment of the players, and how active it is, this RP is taking the cake. It's kicking the crap out of its competition in advanced.

Bloody advanced is getting the crap kicked out of it by a Free RP. Just because... They never stop interacting. They never stop being active. It doesn't even matter that the plot is as flimsy as it can possible get and is replaced multiple times throughout the story (as if it even really has one), or that the characters are so insanely diverse in power levels and depth. None of that matters. They interact, they remain active. That's why it succeeds. On a literary level, this thing would be catastrophically bad. Yet it continues to survive, and the reason for this is that there is no need for any real plot or characters with depth or consistency or anything along those lines. They're tools, they can flavour an RP, but they don't carry it alone.

An RP's main goal is interactions between characters, moving towards a general goal. This general goal can change all the time. The path to that goal can change all the time. The only thing that cannot be sacrificed is players having the ability to interact with one another both OOC and IC, and then non-stop interacting. I'm willing to bet most of them share instant messengers of some type as well, but I'm not going to bet any actual money on that in case I'm wrong. I know it's the case with me and my role players, but I can't make that assumption for everyone else.

There. I've got a whole pile of examples for you, of success stories, the majority of RPG's success stories... And that majority have awful plots, unstable characters/nations, and focus exclusively on interaction. If they have good plots now, it's a result of interactions and player interest driving it in that direction. The same applies to characters--player interest. It was flavouring on the meal, it wasn't the food itself.

Now... Anyone want to debate this, or comment about not having seen it this way before? I'll gladly debate in a civil manner.

I could not agree more.

Story of my RPing, really. First RP I ever participated in (different site entirely), it was fun at first, but no one was interacting. Eventually, I got fed up with doing what was essentially just writing a story alongside a whole bunch of others on the same thread. It just felt like an empty existence, like I was working without pay (sure, I got complemented for my writing skills, but I didn't really want or care for that). Honestly, that experience was defining, cause I recognise many RPs where it ended up the same way. I was recently in one where not one character, in the short lifespan it had, ever interacted with another that wasn't either an NPC of the player's creation or a friend they 'started off' with in the RP. It felt just as hollow as my first one, and no amount of plot or setting could keep my interest in something like that (which is funny to say, cause neither of those RPs had a true central plot that everyone was supposed to follow. It just eventuated that no one took a step towards another).

Coming off the failures of my RPing experience, I'll move onto my first truly successful one. Anyone who read the site news recently might've noticed one "Naruto: Rise of the New Generation" featured there. It's funny, I've been in more than just a few RPs, maybe not as many as some, but enough to think I'd have a varied experience, but not one went as far or as well as RotNG. In terms of plot, I daresay it was sub-par (no offense intended, good friends, but it really isn't all that stellar), it certainly didn't capture my attention in any way. However, what I did love was the interactions. And I made those myself (others were of course involved, but I was a part of those moment's genesis rather than being a spectator). For instance, during one plot arc, the village was under attack by the Hachibi, or Eight Tailed Beast (Naruto canon, if you don't know it, look it up). Boring really, none of my characters could actually do anything to it, so all I could do in direct relation to the plot was to spectate. But it was during that arc that one of the funniest interactions was born. Doing our best to ignore the spectacularly uninvolving plot (the GM did his best to involve us, but I daresay that was out of sadism rather than an attempt to make us feel special (trying to crush us with a huge beast we couldn't even hurt, how is that not sadism?)), our team was running about far from the battlefield. In one of the GM's attempts to 'involve' us, an attack from the beast found it's way coming at us. Our teacher, who had been up to this time something of a complete bastard, actually ended up taking the blow for us and saving us from harm. Of course, my character is the type to trust absolutely no one, and can't fathom this development, especially from a man known to have tried to take her life on more than one occasion. Henceforth, rather than being grateful, she seeks revenge for him shaking her view of the world. She takes him to the hospital.....while dragging him through broken glass and rubble. Later, she sends him a recording of the most annoying member of the squad talking, which was enough to make him consider suicide last time he heard it. Soon after, she sings the loudest song possible to give him an awful headache, and also to dislodge the earplugs he was using to block out the sound of the annoying member's voice. And for every action she took to punish her sensei, sensei fought back, trying to get revenge for all her antics, everyday regretting he saved them. And that was the most fun I've ever had with an RP. I didn't care about the attacking Bijuu, or the threat of war with Sunagakure, I was more interested in messing around with my team. And it was for those interactions that I put my heart into that RP.

And that wasn't the extent of that which captured my interest, oh no. Another team I was in (I have a lot of characters), leading for that matter, the leader was a conceited bitch that believed she was perfect. Two of her students were monumentally retarded, and so hilarity was born. 'Endurance training' was a common task for the students of Team Mei, involving them pulling around carts to transport their sensei, being dragged along the ground, waterboarded while someone tries to smash their head in with a mallet every time they resurface, you name it, she did it to them. Plot? Who cares, I was having fun being a bitch while my students were so happy they got to participate in 'special training'. In fact, Team Mei was one of the most active and interactive teams in the RP. Made me proud, before one of our members left for reasons.

Then there was Team Kanajiro. Now in that team, it was less funny or sadistic, but we had fun nonetheless. Our character's gelled, they got along and made friends. No, we didn't have some fancy involvement in the plot or some huge dramatic story arc, we just had our characters talk and train together. It's funny I can't find the words to say anymore, there might not have been the same memorable moments as in the other two, but it was still a fun time we had. That one had a tragic end, as the team fell into inactivity, and there wasn't anything more that could really be done. There's a new Team Kanajiro now, one I'm not apart of, somewhat sad, but I felt that it had all slowed down anyways, so it wouldn't have helped to stay on.

And the biggest mention I have to give is to my (technical) sole teammate on Team Nobushige, the one I mentioned with the delightful master-student relationship before. This teammate was of course, the annoying girl that the sensei was desperate to avoid. Now that annoying little girl, she became something of a meme and a legend in the RP. At first, all she was was a talkative girl with a lot of energy, no one would think anything much of that now, would they? But as I over exaggerated my character's annoyance at her talkativeness, the joke grew and grew to the point that everyone feared the dreaded "Motormouth Jutsu", the technique that caused a hardened, merciless assassin to contemplate suicide and take therapy sessions to cope with the stress, and brought the dreaded Eight Tailed Beast to it's knees (sealed inside the little girl, not only for reasons of power balance, but also for the sheer hilarity of seeing a small child talk a fearsome beast's ears off). And that joke, my friends, was not born of some plot, it was the product of a bunch of silly interactions between some characters.

Gosh, I rambled quite a bit here. But perhaps that illustrates the point; You can clearly see I have a great deal of love for the interactions I got involved in in that roleplay, and how not one of these memorable stories really factored into the main story (the tailed beast in the girl was more or less and afterthought, and was produced from the hilarity of our interactions not because of a plot point). Long story short, I wholeheartedly agree with the point made in the OP, and I hope my ramblings might also help convince people that a truly successful roleplay is born on the back of meaningful interactions and not a plot or setting of any kind.

Despite this making great sense, despite interaction being a foundational requirement of Roleplay, I do believe the conversations about Plot and it's position lately are extremely valuable. It should not be the center of focus, nor the constantly stressed topic, but it should not be forgotten. A good plot would exist loosely, like an obscure figure on the horizon. The players and their interactions should be allowed to define that figure to create something of their own, but the GM, in all their foresight, still maintains this obscurity to things still to come. I believe speaking on the importance of a rich story, built by players and their interactions, is very important as we witness so many 90% ripped RPs.

A plot should allow for and encourage interactions whenever possible. It should give each participant the ability to evolve the story, personally, in an unique way. Plots should be liquid in our hands, clearly existing, but holding a certain meaning for every individual. Completely disregarding these is not so much dangerous, as it is dull. I feel we are compelled to dig deeper or into peculiar, interesting places when plots are introduced. Instead of simply playing off each others' greetings we speak quickly giving commands or responding to the situation expressively. A good roleplay uses a very powerful plot to offer incentives to manipulate the world with their characters. Its constant goal is to keep our interest, best done through compelling us to speak to one another and interact with one another for unique creations.

RPers need direction, yes. Direction =/= Plot, however.

Indeed. Dudel has hit the nail right on the head. In fact, most of my own RPs flat out have zero plot except that created in retrospect by my players. Hell ,honestly I don't even overdo the direction element. I give the players the tools. And then I give them random events to react to. Everything else is created by the players over time.

I bought agree and disagree with the OP. I think that interaction is extremely important. I have played very satisfying RPGs where the plot have been put on hold in favor of a long scene where the characters have just interacted, and it is possible to have roleplays without really a plot, just slice of life pieces which is nothing but character interaction. Scenes where the characters are not chasing down evil aliens or running from vampire hunters but just sitting and talking, having dinner or in other ways just interacting give life to the game, it explore the characters relationships with one another and can be very rewarding. However when all is said and done I do think that the plot is important as well. I ran a fairly successful Wheel of Time RPG on another site a while ago where some of the key to why it worked so well was that there was a balance between interaction and plot. In some scenes the characters where just talking, getting to know one another, or arguing, but the plot was always there in the background preventing things from getting to stale. It is the same as with movies, or books or for that matter anime, I love pieces with allot of character development and interaction. I love to see more than just the plot to give the impression that we are just seeing glimpses of real people's lives and not just paper cut outs made to tell a story, but at the same time I am not to fond of things that are just slice of life with no plot of driving elements either for it have a tendency to get stale. I like a balance between a RPG being plot driven and interaction driven.

Quote:

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Originally Posted by Shon Harris

Despite this making great sense, despite interaction being a foundational requirement of Roleplay, I do believe the conversations about Plot and it's position lately are extremely valuable. It should not be the center of focus, nor the constantly stressed topic, but it should not be forgotten. A good plot would exist loosely, like an obscure figure on the horizon. The players and their interactions should be allowed to define that figure to create something of their own, but the GM, in all their foresight, still maintains this obscurity to things still to come. I believe speaking on the importance of a rich story, built by players and their interactions, is very important as we witness so many 90% ripped RPs.

A plot should allow for and encourage interactions whenever possible. It should give each participant the ability to evolve the story, personally, in an unique way. Plots should be liquid in our hands, clearly existing, but holding a certain meaning for every individual. Completely disregarding these is not so much dangerous, as it is dull. I feel we are compelled to dig deeper or into peculiar, interesting places when plots are introduced. Instead of simply playing off each others' greetings we speak quickly giving commands or responding to the situation expressively. A good roleplay uses a very powerful plot to offer incentives to manipulate the world with their characters. Its constant goal is to keep our interest, best done through compelling us to speak to one another and interact with one another for unique creations.

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Plot is flavouring you add to a steak called "interaction" where it concerns role playing. It's best used to sprinkle some extra stuff on. Not to be the direction players use. The direction should be taken and driven by the players.

In plot terminology: You create the exposition, and then the players choose whether they want to pursue the rising action or abandon it to find a new thing to do.

In practical application: You have a zombie RP about hunkering down and surviving. Instead the players choose to go find fuel and a working plane/boat to cross the Pacific and get to an island. Maybe Hawaii. So they also start looking for naval charts and someone who has the knowledge of the seas, then partway through they find out fuel is useless so they choose to head far, far north instead, and start creating a convoy of farms in the south and housing in the north where most survivors go to hide, hoping that cold affects their joints, or...

See where I'm going with this? :p A plot can be used, it just doesn't have to be. In the same way you could use a plot for a video game, but you don't have to. You could just create a sandbox like Garrys Mod and let the modders and players create their own adventures, ideas, pursue their own goals... Last I checked GMod sold over 1,000,000 copies as an indie title. I'd say that formula works. And since RP's are more like games than literature... It works for RP's too.

Hell, pick up any copy of D&D. You could just simulate battles for no reason, or explore an open world with no plot, no conflicts no stories and go from there. Anything is possible. It's the one gem that truly puts it aside from literature or most gaming outlets; RPing is whatever you make of it, and the only thing you need to make RPing work is interaction with other people. Be it through nations, character, narrative... Anything. It's just that characters and nations are typically the most common way we express ourselves, or our imagination in role plays. So... :p

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Originally Posted by Hagazussa

I bought agree and disagree with the OP. I think that interaction is extremely important. I have played very satisfying RPGs where the plot have been put on hold in favor of a long scene where the characters have just interacted, and it is possible to have roleplays without really a plot, just slice of life pieces which is nothing but character interaction. Scenes where the characters are not chasing down evil aliens or running from vampire hunters but just sitting and talking, having dinner or in other ways just interacting give life to the game, it explore the characters relationships with one another and can be very rewarding. However when all is said and done I do think that the plot is important as well. I ran a fairly successful Wheel of Time RPG on another site a while ago where some of the key to why it worked so well was that there was a balance between interaction and plot. In some scenes the characters where just talking, getting to know one another, or arguing, but the plot was always there in the background preventing things from getting to stale. It is the same as with movies, or books or for that matter anime, I love pieces with allot of character development and interaction. I love to see more than just the plot to give the impression that we are just seeing glimpses of real people's lives and not just paper cut outs made to tell a story, but at the same time I am not to fond of things that are just slice of life with no plot of driving elements either for it have a tendency to get stale. I like a balance between a RPG being plot driven and interaction driven.

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#1: ...Okay, so you're arguing... For what? That's literally what I stated. Plot is not required.

#2: ...Okay, here is where I think you are confusing plot for continuity. You can have exciting action sequences and what not arranged in a series of events, and not have a plot. This is a plot. RP's can completely disregard it or throw it away at any time for a new one, or simply not have one. You can have battles... For no reason. And it's perfectly fine. Honest!

Now that we've clarified that you can do any scene or series of scenes without a plot, IE without a plan, IE without rigid structure, everything you've argued here... Can be applied... Without a plot.

A plot by literary standards is merely "everything acts for the greater narrative." That's it. Characters, scenes, relationships, everything is enslaved to the narrative. It's optional. You don't need a plot to save the world in an RP. The characters don't have to act within a narrative. Everything I've done has repeatedly, and demonstrable proven to me, over and over, that a greater narrative only enslaves characters. It railroads them. It forces them to do as you please, instead of doing what is natural.

Plots are not, in any manner of speaking, whatsoever necessary for an RP to succeed. If they were, in any manner whatsoever, then Nation RP's as they presently exist?... Couldn't.

End of story.

Interesting to know that plot is often a result of interactions. However it's other function is being one of the tools you have at your dismissal to promote interactivity and direction.

Let's look at something else that creates both of those; throwing in a threat that holds more power than any individual player. If I have a bunch of medieval knights in an advanced roleplay, just playing their own game, what I can do is throwing in a dragon, no individual lord can take on. No legendary swords and shields, no wizard with a long grey beard, just fucking you all up. The dragon, for no reason whatsoever, goes around destroying kingdoms indiscriminately, kidnapping princesses, destroying crops, etc. Players have two choices; either try to overcome impossible odds and... Have their characters awarded with a very crispy skin (by which I mean burn them alive, 'cause FUCKING DRAGON) or work together to share resources, help their people and hide away in a cave and plot a strategy to deal with the dragon.

What happened? You created an overarching plot. Something much bigger than individual storylines (it may even outright disrupt individual stories) by saying LOLDRAGON FU GAIZ. There is nothing complicated about loldragon. We don't need to know where it comes from. We don't need to know it's name and it doesn't even have to be intelligent. Because as is that loldragon makes people interact. Those interactions tie both characters and players together. The characters being together gives a roleplay direction. The players being together adds up to a game's survivability. How 'complex' the resulting plot is should depend on the characters involved and their relations and interactions.

tl;dr

Roleplaying creates plot all by itself, which is why you really shouldn't worry about it.

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Originally Posted by Kestrel

Interesting to know that plot is often a result of interactions. However it's other function is being one of the tools you have at your dismissal to promote interactivity and direction.

Let's look at something else that creates both of those; throwing in a threat that holds more power than any individual player. If I have a bunch of medieval knights in an advanced roleplay, just playing their own game, what I can do is throwing in a dragon, no individual lord can take on. No legendary swords and shields, no wizard with a long grey beard, just fucking you all up. The dragon, for no reason whatsoever, goes around destroying kingdoms indiscriminately, kidnapping princesses, destroying crops, etc. Players have two choices; either try to overcome impossible odds and... Have their characters awarded with a very crispy skin (by which I mean burn them alive, 'cause FUCKING DRAGON) or work together to share resources, help their people and hide away in a cave and plot a strategy to deal with the dragon.

What happened? You created an overarching plot. Something much bigger than individual storylines (it may even outright disrupt individual stories) by saying LOLDRAGON FU GAIZ. There is nothing complicated about loldragon. We don't need to know where it comes from. We don't need to know it's name and it doesn't even have to be intelligent. Because as is that loldragon makes people interact. Those interactions tie both characters and players together. The characters being together gives a roleplay direction. The players being together adds up to a game's survivability. How 'complex' the resulting plot is should depend on the characters involved and their relations and interactions.

tl;dr

Roleplaying creates plot all by itself, which is why you really shouldn't worry about it.

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Yes and no Kestrel. But what you propose isn't a plot. It's a random event. You, ultimately, (unless you turned into a railroading jerk in the past 24 hours which I doubt) have no control over how players react to that. The plot is what the players create, it exists in retrospect not in advance. Ultimately the loldragon, is just a tool to promote the story, but that story doesn't become plot until one of two things happen.

A: The players have done something. That "History" is the plot. or
B: You railroad the players into doing something you have pre-determined. Which is also plot, but has the consequence of making you a railroading motherfucker :p

A plot is the final result. And for a book planning it ahead of time is needed. For an RP, it is purely optional and a GM should be prepared to discard any notions he has of a pre-constructed plot, because players can royally change it and as a GM one should be ready to adapt the story to the players, not force the players onto a hidden set of tracks.

And one of those two things are, without a doubt, going to happen. I mean, let's just say that fighting the dragon solo in my example is your definition of naval line formations :P Railroad or not they don't really have a choice.

Also yes, all those arguments I covered, it's right there kad :P