Discord vs OOC

[ClocktowerEchos]

Ever since Discord took off, what purpose does the OOC section of a RP have? I still remember one of my first RPs where we basically used the OOC like a chatroom, blasting out OOC posts and filling pages a day. It was chaotic but fun in its own way. But now with the ability and prevalence of discord, what role does the OOC play now? What can the OOC do that Discord cannot?

[mickilennial]

I guess as a codex/tertiary information and formal announcements.

[Kenshi]

Ever since Discord took off, what purpose does the OOC section of a RP have? I still remember one of my first RPs where we basically used the OOC like a chatroom, blasting out OOC posts and filling pages a day. It was chaotic but fun in its own way. But now with the ability and prevalence of discord, what role does the OOC play now? What can the OOC do that Discord cannot?

@ClocktowerEchos

Not everyone can use discord, there are a few devices that discord seems to hate, but OOC works fine.

[Kassarock]

So whenever I GM an RP that uses a discord I have a specific rule when it comes to players planning and discussing stuff etc:

'Nothing is official until it gets posted in the OOC.'

Basically I don't think its fair to make players have to trawl through hundreds of discord messages to find the information that they need to play the game or roleplay with other characters. I've seen people decide stuff between them in discord, which they then haven't added to the World Compendium or their character sheet, and then gotten mad at people when they missed said details or got them wrong in an IC post. I also think discord can have a nasty tendency of making the people who just happen to be online at a particular time becoming the driving force in decision making that affects the whole party/roleplay.

Discord is good for chatting, spit balling, hanging out, and quickfire questions. But if its something important that people will need to know in character, or if it's game critical decisions and announcements, everyone should have a chance to be able to see and respond to those, not just whoever gets there first and monopolises discussion. Hence, my rule, nothing is official until it gets posted in the OOC.

[POOHEAD189]

Honestly I'm in so many discord chats, I don't want another. It takes a lot for me to ever join an RP now that doesn't have an active forum OOC. I've been in dozens if not hundreds of roleplays that have collapsed and I got tired of joining and leaving discords.

[mickilennial]

Honestly I'm in so many discord chats, I don't want another. It takes a lot for me to ever join an RP now that doesn't have an active forum OOC. I've been in dozens if not hundreds of roleplays that have collapsed and I got tired of joining and leaving discords.

@POOHEAD189

I see your point but I wanna ask you this--how is it all too different from when we used mIRC or Skype or Chatzys or Titanpads/Etherpads/etc?

[Hedgehawk]

I don't think that every RP needs a discord. It is very case by case. The larger group you have the easier I find Discord is to manage information and allow people to plot. The bug advantage I have is that when I come onto the Guild now and get a notification 90% of the time it is an IC thing for me to to read, so I keep closer tabs on my RPs.

Smaller groups I tend to find OOC is best. Or if there is a RP style where you want people to not plot too much.

[POOHEAD189]

<Snipped quote by POOHEAD189>
I see your point but I wanna ask you this--how is it all too different from when we used mIRC or Skype or Chatzys or Titanpads/Etherpads/etc?

@TGM

Well, I never used skype for roleplays. As for the others, they were for roleplays exclusively and only for posting collabs in my experience.

[BrokenPromise]

Discord often moves too fast for important updates to be posted. You can do an announcement tab, but it's just easier to keep up with stuff in the OOC. Can't tell you how many times I've come to an active discord with 400+ messages to read, only to see there's virtually nothing important going on and it's just memes and shitposting wall to wall.

And because I never tire of forcing my danganronpa RP awkwardly into every conversation, I found when the size of the cast shrunk down to 4 players, keeping the discord up was a fool's errand. No one used it, and it was much easier to type out long announcements without a 2000 character limit. Not only that, but OOC posts bump your RP. So randos can see your player's banter and don't have to wonder how active things are in the discord. It's better for getting more players.

[Ammokkx]

It shouldn't be a case of "Versus" at all. Discords and OOCs compliment each-other. OOCs are slow by nature due to having to refresh the page to see if someone has said something, leading to a lot less immediate feedback like you'd get from a chatroom. That said, the fact it is slower lends itself just that tiny bit better to thinking out what you say, as well as being a good place to store important discussion points. Any public questions should definitely go through the OOC, because then the GM's answer is also able to quickly be accessed again.

And also,

<Snipped quote by POOHEAD189>
I see your point but I wanna ask you this--how is it all too different from when we used mIRC or Skype or Chatzys or Titanpads/Etherpads/etc?

@TGM

What?

Skype is missing the easy tabs of discord as well as being more annoying to get people into a group chat to begin with. You need to go out of the way to exchange contact addresses and then add someone, while with Discord you can just toss out an invite link to anyone who's willing to spare the time to join it.

Chatzy is primarily a website, not an app, meaning you always have to have a tab open you need to check, as well as generally not having nearly the slick UI or QoL features Discord does.

Pads are even worse in that aspect. I literally never saw those used for OOC banter outside the context of the collab post that was trying to be created, so you have to question how OOC the banter truly is.

Discord has the perfect elements of a clean UI, easy to join, easy to moderate, easy to set-up and easy to separate program. While I'm sure a better chatroom app could be developed, Discord is currently the perfect storm to en-masse reroute discussion from OOCs into its own chat. It's almost an extension rather than a replacement; a "fourth tab" as you would. It has the benefit of being live, not based in a web browser and you can customize how many notifications you want to get from it.

The only downside to discord is that it is an app, and you do need an account, so some people are just not going to want to bother and that's fair. It's still a vastly superior experience to the mentioned three with features or elements to it they lacked and are crucial to the kind of shift we see now.

[Dark Cloud]

"Damn kids these days and their disc cords" - Something I overheard once.

[mickilennial]

What?

Skype is missing the easy tabs of discord as well as being more annoying to get people into a group chat to begin with. You need to go out of the way to exchange contact addresses and then add someone, while with Discord you can just toss out an invite link to anyone who's willing to spare the time to join it.

Chatzy is primarily a website, not an app, meaning you always have to have a tab open you need to check, as well as generally not having nearly the slick UI or QoL features Discord does.

Pads are even worse in that aspect. I literally never saw those used for OOC banter outside the context of the collab post that was trying to be created, so you have to question how OOC the banter truly is.

Discord has the perfect elements of a clean UI, easy to join, easy to moderate, easy to set-up and easy to separate program. While I'm sure a better chatroom app could be developed, Discord is currently the perfect storm to en-masse reroute discussion from OOCs into its own chat. It's almost an extension rather than a replacement; a "fourth tab" as you would. It has the benefit of being live, not based in a web browser and you can customize how many notifications you want to get from it.

The only downside to discord is that it is an app, and you do need an account, so some people are just not going to want to bother and that's fair. It's still a vastly superior experience to the mentioned three with features or elements to it they lacked and are crucial to the kind of shift we see now.

@Ammokkx

To clarify, my point is that we used all of these methods in some capacity similar to a discord and it did at times reduce OOC banter in threads though I won't deny Discord is more efficient due to how it has all capacities of a chatroom and instant messenger in one easy, accessible place. Back in 2013, before Guildfall, I was in a number of skype group chats for even insignificant RPs that went nowhere though sometimes people preferred Chatzy and were insistent on using it.

Wasn't saying they were mechanically or absolutely the same.

[Vatonage]

I guess as a codex/tertiary information and formal announcements.

@TGM

This. With the popularity of Discord, it is much easier to use the OOC for RP information and announcements/updates since the shitposting tends to be contained to Discord. I get that people like to shitpost--hell, I've done it myself here and there within the OOC in the past--but being blasted by constant post notifications or RPG telling you've missed like 25 posts that are in actuality just OOC nonsense can be quite a pain in the butt. Discord can contain all of it in one, singular channel (even one dedicated to shitposting/memes!) and allows you to mute notifications, whereas RPG doesn't unless you unsubscribe to the thread.

[Rapid Reader]

I think I'm pretty solidly in the camp of "Discord is for banter and quick discussion", while the OOC is where the GM or players make more official statements.

I personally don't mind being on Discord, but I have noticed that it has a tendency to leading to a sort of cliquey environment where it's we "the Discord users" in an RP as the driving force because we're regularly chatting with the GM and orbiting on the outside are the people who only post in the IC/OOC (which feels far from ideal, not everyone can or wants to be on Discord all the time or even some of the time).

There is also the downside that if you (the players/GM) spend much of your RP activity on Discord then it can also seem like the IC/OOC are pretty dead (which isn't maybe an issue if you have your core group of players, but if you're hoping to get more/new people it can seem strange when the IC/OOC are virtually dead for months at a time).

In an ideal world, I think it's good to try and balance your use of both OOC and Discord, leveraging the advantages that each can bring, and in turn reducing the disadvantages that relying solely on one or the other give rise to.

[SleepingSilence]

Discord often moves too fast for important updates to be posted. You can do an announcement tab, but it's just easier to keep up with stuff in the OOC. Can't tell you how many times I've come to an active discord with 400+ messages to read, only to see there's virtually nothing important going on.

Keeping the discord up was a fool's errand. No one used it, and it was much easier to type out long announcements without a 2000 character limit. Not only that, but OOC posts bump your RP. So randos can see your player's banter and don't have to wonder how active things are in the discord. It's better for getting more players.

@BrokenPromise

Frankly, this take is fairly similar to most of what I was planning to add. With the addition of, that you can't even guarantee that those you roleplay with will want to use Discord. Nor is it as easy to format potential OOC information, in anyway that isn't just big ole' blocks of text. (Why do a forum style roleplay at all, if you don't take advantage of it from time to time? Ya know?)

It shouldn't be a case of "Versus" at all. Discords and OOCs compliment each-other.

@Ammokkx

Though, if done correctly, I'd fully agree with this too. Say one half could be in service of what goes on in the roleplay. And the discord could serve as banter, brainstorming, and maybe even additional character building. (I.E I've heard about one roleplay that had a D&D-style campaign. With their 'home base' being a sub category on Discord that was used exclusively for IC chat.)

It also could be a less terrible way to tell those in your RP group that you aren't going to post. Instead of putting it somewhere like the status bar, where no one will read it. (I'm not even in a group. So directed at no one. But yeah, just saying.)

[BrokenPromise]

Joining and leaving discord servers is easy though. I tend to leave discord servers once the RP is finished (or dead) and usually have anyone I'd want to bother talking with again on my friends list.

It also could be a less terrible way to tell those in your RP group that you aren't going to post. Instead of putting it somewhere like the status bar, where no one will read it. (I'm not even in a group. So directed at no one. But yeah, just saying.)

@SleepingSilence

I tend to give people the benefit of the doubt when I can, but I can't fathom a good reason to use the status bar for status updates. Which is weird when you think about it. The status bar has become a sort of public space to meme, make vague comments on your life, sad post, share tired quotes, etc.

The only people I can see using it for actual statuses are A: took on way too many RPs and feel they only have enough time to write a status update or B: They simply can't be bothered to tell anyone they will be busy, so they write a note on their profile. It just comes across as a little vain.

Doing this in a discord is fine, but it feels like there's always someone who misses it.

[Andreyich]

Discord is an instant message it doesnt replace large static forum posts all that well