Other Winging it! RPing WITHOUT a predetermined plot?! :O

[Phadia]

It's come to my attention during my time here that many people seem to prefer to roleplay with a predetermined plot. For example, I would carry the brunt of the plots/world-building while you'd have a character in my world or vice versa. This appears to be the prefer method of choice in many of the RP's I've seen.
But my one RP partner and I tend to "wing it. We have a general setting and characters in mind, but the plot itself is open on both ends.
For example, I might start the plot during the day, with the intent of my character studying all day, when she'll add a plot twist by making a villain crash through the wall and attack my character! Or perhaps she will have planned to capture my character, but I'll have my character escape and discover the villain's weakness.
These are crappy examples, but I've found that by both of us actively working on the plot, it keeps it engaging and fresh.
Our RP has been successfully going for two-years now!
Occasionally we run into a few hitches, where plot-lines collide, or cancel each other out, but it's nothing we've been unable to work through.
I guess I just vastly prefer RPing like this as opposed to having a rigid plot-line and world already established.
I was just wondering if anyone else had experience with RPing like this?
Thoughts?

Because, if I'm being honest, I would really like to start roleplaying again, but I would prefer to do so in a more flexible pattern as outlined above.

 

[Zaltusinel]

I agree. Personally as a writer, predetermined plots to the level of a novel is unnecessary and unengaging for roleplay. I believe roleplaying is about discovery and improving your writing skills on the fly. What I like to call "Stand-up Writing". The ultimate reason for this lies in characters and their backstories, a predetermined plot restrains and implies characters for the plot. It forms a cookie cutter problem.

Not to mention the conventional problem of player choice. Predetermined plots dictate actions and at the best, an illusion of free choice.

However, I enjoy that the issue is being put in light. I never outline every detail as a Gm because I want to be surprised. Will the characters make it? What will they do if this happens? I like questions because true creativity lives in questions.

My thoughts
-Zalt

 

[Shuusuke]

This reminds me of the "character sheet, yes or no?" (or something to that effect) thread a while ago. To be blunt, I don't like "winging it". I stalk RPs and RPers to decide if the odds for the time and effort I'll spend on posting being reciprocated are high enough. It's not a charity for me, where I'd just write and not expect to like what I read from others. Not knowing what I'm in for is too much of a risk of wasting time and effort, and I already got enough of that.

Sure, if you have friends that you've known for a while and there's trust between you, that I can understand, relying on that trust to be the pillar of the RP if one of you ruins things for the others, for example with metagaming and other known things not to be done. But if you don't know the other player, which I'd wager happens way more often, then the best you can do is check their profiles and previous RPs, but forming a bond with them takes time and RPing.

So I think either extreme is bad, but the ideal leans more towards a predetermined plot. You need to give players some freedom obviously, but you also have to direct them. I know you said your example is crappy, but taking it as base, there's nothing I like about it. But I can't just insult your example without providing one myself, so let's see...

Background: Modern/noir genre RP. Two factions of a gang are fighting each other.

Good: The leader of the factions are brothers. They are fighting because each suspects the other of murdering their father, the former leader. The police become involved. The story will follow those 3 groups as they antagonize each other, with the factions trying to kill the leader of the other one, while the police tries to arrest every gang member alive.

Bad (too rigid): The leader of the factions are brothers. Their father was actually assassinated under orders of the police captain, but the plot was not discovered by the brothers and they blamed each other. The police captain believed that some members of the gang were suspecting him and as such focused all efforts on aprehending them, all the while using the chance to tie up loose ends. After one of the gang member traced the assassin, they tortured him and discovered that the captain was behind it all, and so, after the initial infighting, both factions eventually united to kill the captain. Despite the initial clash, the police eventually learned of the corruption of the captain and also began a hunt for him. The captain then hired a team of mercenaries to defend him. Your character can be a member of one of the gangs, or a police recruit, or a corrupt high-ranking police officer who was in cahoots with the captain, or a member of the mercenary team.

...See how it feels like I'm just spoiling the story here? What if the players had a better idea? Maybe the story would have been better off if it was never revealed the captain was behind it. If the GM saw the gang characters suspect the other faction was not behind it, then he could direct the story and start dropping hints that pointed at a common enemy, for example. Or what if it was actually a member of one of the factions who killed the former leader? That could make the story evolve to involve 3 factions, the new one being supporters of the assassin and people who really hated the former leader, for example. Also, what if a player wanted to RP as, say, a reporter? Or maybe a simple bystander who had a loved one killed in the crossed fire and turned to vigilantism? I could have gone ahead and said that one of the faction leaders got killed and the captain's plot was only discovered afterwards, but I felt like that was enough salt on the wound.

Bad (too loose): Just what was already on the background.

Now, you may think this is good because in the previous point, I said how limiting things can be bad. But what if the players throw the story off from what the GM wanted? Say they started adding a conspiracy that involved a neighboring country and weapons of mass destruction. That doesn't necessarily sound bad, does it? But the point is, chances are the GM did not want the story to head that way. If they complain and try to steer back the story to the factions, they're in the wrong because they never stated the story would stay there. If they don't complain, they'll have to cling to this story they don't want to run, and if the players notice that, they may also become disheartened.

But in short, examples generalize too many things, and I only gave one because I didn't want to just criticize yours and not come up with another. It depends on each case, but I'm more worried by too much flexibility than by having some things set in stone. At least in the latter, I can tell if what they decided is good or bad, but if I don't know what's coming, chances are I'll realize I wasted time and effort into something that had no guarantees, only after the RP is underway.

 

[rae2nerdy]

I roleplay primarily to flesh out worlds. So winging it just leaves me bored and I tend to get so side tracked with fleshing out settings that I just go on side tangents without ever engaging in the roleplay.

Because for me if it's just no structure than why am I replying? What am I getting out of it? I feel like it just becomes writing to write and that's dull.

But I love world building so I find like really fleshing out imaginary worlds interesting and fun. So for me that is what keeps me replying and engaged in the roleplay.

But some people are more interested in rapid back and forth. Which is fine.

I am not active enough to do that. And I think what your talking about works best if you are just rapidly responding to posts in quick succession. Because if you have long periods between posts than the lack of structure tends to make staying engaged harder.

And I have some roleplays where it might be a month between responses or even just a few days.

Plus again I just gravitate towards the world not the characters or even the plot.

So like that kind of roleplay just doesn't interest me.

 

[BackSet]

I wing it literally all the time. Unfourtanetly this winging it often results in my roleplay group never leaving the tavern we started in.

The only roleplay where I absolutely know where the plot is going to go is my pokemon roleplay. And even then I'm not sure where it's going sometimes.

 

[_em_]

It's not that I'm against winging it, I've just never found a decent enough rp partner. I never felt like who I was role playing with could match the level of dedication I was putting forth unless we had a plot.

 

[Elephantom]

A recipe for utmost disaster, I say.

 

[_Line 213]

It's hard to really respond to this without a more detailed explanation of what exactly you mean by "winging it."

Any successful tabletop campaign involves "winging it." It's a staple of GMing, and persists into text RP as well. Though I am sure that there are plenty of people that speak quite a bit about how much they enjoy planning their RP, and how they have pages upon pages of pre-rendered detail to throw at their players, unless they've basically got everyone eating out of the palm of their hand with every post, I am absolutely certain that there have been moments in which said planner has been forced to make something up, or change around some of their existing frameworks in order to account for something unexpected that a player did (unless they simply shut down the attempt without cause, which is generally considered to be bad GMing).

Do you mean not putting together any pre-determined elements at all? This makes it rather difficult to determine how a roleplay is supposed to start and who is supposed to be involved, let alone how it's actually going to play out. Things such as world-building and character-building automatically determine certain elements of the plot; the world determines what sorts of stories are actually possible (if this is a world with no magic, then anything involving the supernatural is automatically eliminated, for instance, and people have to work within physical means; if the characters are in high-school, then they have limited funds and mobility, and are bound to be in the same places five days out of the week). Believe it or not, there is almost always some amount of plot framing present, even in an "unplanned" roleplay.

I'm assuming that you mean something along the lines of setting the stage and the characters and then just letting "whatever" happen. I suppose that makes sense for roleplays that are supposed to be somewhat simple, or take place in means that are somewhat limited (i.e., normal kids in high school all day), but it becomes a little more difficult to explore specific themes and situations without at least some amount of forward thinking. This is where it becomes sort of difficult to pin down a description based on what you've given, because some people consider "winging it" to be planning things out a few steps forward (i.e., if the group encounters a monster, coming up with at least some base ideas for what's going to happen given a few different outcomes of the fight), while other people consider "winging it" to be doing absolutely no planning until you sit down to write the next post, and then giving things absolutely no further thought until it's time to write the next post.

So, what exactly do you mean?

 

[oblivious.shipping_hoe]

It's not that I'm against winging it, I've just never found a decent enough rp partner. I never felt like who I was role playing with could match the level of dedication I was putting forth unless we had a plot.

Literally. Also I have trouble coming up with things that would be interesting enough. I need to stretch my imagination further to be able to pull it off so I usually like a plan at first but love it when it changes frequently and the finished product is so different to what we thought was going to happen originally

 

[HeathertheGamer]

I have both winged it and came up with a structured plot. Personally, I prefer to find some sort of medium (and if we RP something that's dark, I'd like to know what bothers my partner so I don't do anything that makes them uncomfortable).

It makes me think of how I write my stories too. I have ideas of what will happen, but I don't structure it so strictly before I delve into the story and just write it. I find that that keeps me from/prolongs the writing process when I could just start writing.

 

[salty_ moustachio]

It's definitely more fun to wing it. I see some people on here post ideas for roleplays and it's like... four paragraphs of what the character you want me to plays' backstory is which turns me right off. They literally have a whole story written in their head and they expect you to play a character that they've made up in a world they've created. Why roleplay at all then?

Some people have it all planned and plotted out, and life isn't like that so neither should RPing be like that.

 

[PerditionCrisis]

I definitely prefer to "wing it" over having a long, predetermined plot. While I love to discuss our next steps OOC, generally the longer the explanation of the RP is, the more my eyes start to cross. I prefer my roleplaying to be more dynamic- to change and grow and evolve from a simple idea.

I can see the appeal of a strictly structured roleplay, but it just doesn't let my imagination roam loosely enough, you know? To each their own, though.

 

[Idea]

So it took me some time to properly come up with my answer to this. Technically the question on the opening post is about who does RP without a predetermined plot, or "winging it", but I'm still gonna have to comment that I do not wing it and absolutely hate such a pratice. I do want to note I don't hate people who wing it, I hate doing so myself or my particular partner winging it.

Part 1: Why I don't like "winging it"
The reasons why I don't like this pratice are extremely personal ones. They have partially to do with my nature and partially to do with my experiences as a roleplayer. I am a very controlling person, and someone who plays it safe, I don't like having too many risks. I like to have my expectations fulfilled and stable data to organize myself with. Thus, to me, it's nerve-wrecking to have such a wild variable of the plot not having so much as some form of set direction. However, it gets worse, because it feels like a knife twitching in me whenever the plot takes a direction I hate in my own RP or if hopes are shattered by something that was too unpredicatble or if some "plot twist" ruins something I was banking on doing. Surprises in writing take a lot of trust to just plain accept.
And unfortunately, the reason why I have a hard time giving away such a trust is because of the terrible experiences I've had in many RPs in the past. People basically changing the character's personality without explanation, abusing the fact this is an RP, certain character tendencies... I've come to realize people have little awareness of their actual writing ability, or give too little thought to their own OC's nature, thus having trouble later using it properly and trying to compensate with overconveniences.
As someone who does this as a hobby, but still prizes the quality and dignity of what I do here as well, such things are issues I believe run deep, yet in past they have even been plot-shattering.

Part 2: Misconceptions-what is NOT lost from winging to planning
Before I get into my preference towards planning, I want to firt clarify a few things about planning.

*Surprises are not gone when you plan- For starters, to MAKE the plan, it is necessary to actually see it. It may not be as intense as a surpise that reveals itself over a post, but you can still be hyped and surprised about ideas coming in your planning. But not just that. Planning is often done in plot-points, or long periods. Because of this, few planners go over every single little detail of every post, instead they opt to let the fleshing out of the process become the focus. In other words, the planning RPer prefers to keep surprises to the journey, and the destination certain.

*Only BAD planning feels entirely artifical/forced- It's not true that planned RPs are less immersive or natural. Yes, bad planning will lead to multiple instances of the characters having to be forced out of their normal behavior. But good planning implies taking into account such details as the character's personality into the plans. In fact, what it misses in immediate visceral responses, planning recovers by having a better sense of the larger picture. Like planting a seed by hand, and letting it grow on it's own, versus letting the wind do it all. In both cases, the seed might succeed and grow naturally, but one of them started with an artificial push.

*Interaction with your partner can actually improve due to planning- While in winging it you experiencing the roleplayer faster, so you cna start working with your partner right away, when you plan, you have to OOC interact with the partner to discuss your plans. You will often end up learning about them and they about you, and there will be plenty of opportunity to chat.

Part 3: Why I prefer planning

In my eyes, planning has it all when it comes to my enjoyment of a style of roleplay. To begin with, while winging it may use the hype right away, planning will, at least for a while , and longer for those that appreciate it, lead to an ever-increasing hype. You are fomlating all these awesome future events, and becoming more acquainted with your character, others and the player's behidn those other characters in the process. And the best part, is that planning delivers. Fulfilling the plan is one of the most wonderful sensations I've felt when completing a post, ever. In-between that, you usually will get a more well-structured, well-paced and overall better quality story.


Now just to wrap things up, because I'm getting really tired, ultimately these are preferences. It ain't right or wrong to like one of the other, and there are advantages and disadvantages to both. However, the reasons above are why I, personally, much prefer planning over winging it.

Hope this is useful to some, happy Rping!

 

[BackSet]

Planning is kind of hard in group roleplays though. More variables.

 

[Idea]

Planning is kind of hard in group roleplays though. More variables.

True, it's harder. Nobody ever said it was easy, planning produces more quality content, but that's at the expense of additional time and effort being used for the design.

 

[Thekikwidragon]

Oh dear... another heavily subjective concept? alrighty, I can give my two cents, (as much as it doesn't matter here.)

Loosely formed roleplays that don't have plots predetermined or fully written out are completely fine and can hold a sense of wonder and interest for a lot of people who are bored of the drag of constantly plotting through dozens of roleplays. Inversely this can also cause a lot of problems, as a lack of plot and predetermined concepts prevent you from having a concise narrative typically, and the story may end up being rather wishy-washy. Of course the narrative of real life stories isn't always so direct, so it is a more natural way of story telling. I mean, in real life you don't entirely focus only on one aspect and ignore every other aspect of life except getting promoted in your job right? (I mean, life isn't an anime, and if it was, it is 90 % filler.)

Though, a story that is predetermined can be more fun to people if they understand what they want, and how to prevent hitches. Creating an end goal really does help people, and creating characters that have an end goal is really the easiest way to just focus on plot and not divert or have a incoherent plot.

Though in my opinion creating an original end goal, will help IMMENSELY. The end goal of everything is just well, proven at this point. though when the characters go through conflict and etc and you can change them according to their life and such, it can really create a better narrative. As, think about it this way, someone wants to be a hero their entire life, but learns they must sacrifice a village to get the powers and reclaim. This can cause the plot goal for them to change from being a hero, to being a TRUE hero, or stopping the corrupted hero association or etc. Story isn't entirely to be held to either of these three, (nor the other billions of options.) As, you really should try to figure out what you enjoy the most.

 

[MechanicalSnake]

I find it largely depends on what it is you are playing.

If it is in an already predetermined world with canon characters, you can simply pick a point where you wish to start and have a go at it. If it is something entirely new, without plotting and discussing it back and forth, you and your partner would not be really writing in the same world, as there would be no guidelines.

 

[MechanicalSnake]

True, it's harder. Nobody ever said it was easy, planning produces more quality content, but that's at the expense of additional time and effort being used for the design.

In group RPs, I find it much better if there is one game master who controls the plot and everyone else just writes their character. Then it is not messy.

 

[Idea]

Well, I was pushing for something kind of a step beyond that MechanicalSnake , but point taken

 

[QuirkyAngel]

I do plenty of planning. Talking about ones' characters and ideas is part of the fun of rping. However, overall and IC-wise, I'd say I'm a winger. I like being surprised. I get bored if I know what I'm supposed to write and I know what my partner's going to write. The anticipation/suspense of waiting for my partner's post is gone. I like being in a setting where I'm free to be creative and match creativity with my partner(s). Planning is always necessary to maintain a certain degree of structure, of course. And it's important for moving froward. However, a perfectly built castle bores me. It's like having your character ask another's out while already knowing what the answer would be. Kills the fun of it.

It probably has to do with my personality that I think like that. I get easily bored. I'm flexible. I don't have high standards when it comes to plots. Most of the time, I just want to have fun. Being in control all the time tires me out. And, despite the fact that I'm an introvert, I'm fairly impulsive.

 

[Seventh Seal]

I've literally not even one single time played an RP where my partner and I hacked out the plot ahead of time.

 

[Typewriter]

Er, I'm kind of on mixed footing about this. On one hand, I understand the appeal of just 'winging it', since you're not limiting yourself to a box. I feel like that would be the sort of thing you can do 1x1 with a partner you generally know pretty well? Or at least a partner you're compatible with, because that would involve a lot of cues and bouncing off one another to come up with a coherent story without, y'know, planning it. I feel like in a group setting it could be pretty messy though... That's a lot of trust not to fly off the handle there.

I think it falls to what you're trying to write? A slice of life is more open to winging it than say, a roleplay with some level of conspiracy involved.

I'm personally the type who needs to plot at least little bit to make sense of what we're doing, but this is mostly because I have this hang up about needing to understand the purpose of something before doing it. If a story doesn't flow or make some semblance of sense to me, I won't enjoy it.

Still, I can kind of understand the appeal. It's just not for me.

If you haven't noticed, for me story is kind of important. It's what determines my interest/investment and if I have a concept that gets stomped on, I would get a little annoyed.

Not to mention, plotting means we're talking to each other and taking the time to figure out what we want from the roleplay. I am way more inclined to stick with something I've put time and heart into planning versus something where it's more of, excuse my modern slang here, but a 'YOLO' level of organization with twists and turns that may collide. There would be a lot of eye rolling in that situation.

But that's just me. Winging it isn't my cup of tea. I want need to know what I'm getting myself into.

Also, I'm sorry, but world-building before we start is my favourite part of roleplaying. Not having a set world? I can't really fathom it.

 

[QuirkyAngel]

Er, I'm kind of on mixed footing about this. On one hand, I understand the appeal of just 'winging it', since you're not limiting yourself to a box. I feel like that would be the sort of thing you can do 1x1 with a partner you generally know pretty well? Or at least a partner you're compatible with, because that would involve a lot of cues and bouncing off one another to come up with a coherent story without, y'know, planning it. I feel like in a group setting it could be pretty messy though... That's a lot of trust not to fly off the handle there.

I think it falls to what you're trying to write? A slice of life is more open to winging it than say, a roleplay with some level of conspiracy involved.

I'm personally the type who needs to plot at least little bit to make sense of what we're doing, but this is mostly because I have this hang up about needing to understand the purpose of something before doing it. If a story doesn't flow or make some semblance of sense to me, I won't enjoy it.

Still, I can kind of understand the appeal. It's just not for me.

If you haven't noticed, for me story is kind of important. It's what determines my interest/investment and if I have a concept that gets stomped on, I would get a little annoyed.

Not to mention, plotting means we're talking to each other and taking the time to figure out what we want from the roleplay. I am way more inclined to stick with something I've put time and heart into planning versus something where it's more of, excuse my modern slang here, but a 'YOLO' level of organization with twists and turns that may collide. There would be a lot of eye rolling in that situation.

But that's just me. Winging it isn't my cup of tea. I want need to know what I'm getting myself into.

Also, I'm sorry, but world-building before we start is my favourite part of roleplaying. Not having a set world? I can't really fathom it.

That's understandable. There's a spectrum to everything. No need to apologize over personal taste.

Planners make for the best gms. Also, planning things out tends to lend itself to more successful rps. Choosing to wing is like choosing to gamble. It may succeed. It may not. There's a certain appeal to it, but it's not what I'd call a wise rping decision by any stretch. It's just fun for some. In my case, I just enjoy the sense of 'realism' that comes from the unplotted interactions.

Underplanning burns. Overplanning burns. Where the line is drawn is different for every player and, to be honest, my lines are drawn fairly loosely. It depends on the players I'm with. So long as I'm enjoying myself, I'll stick with it regardless any messes. Not having a set world is pretty much like starting off on a blank canvas. Now imagine two painters each given a brush and told to take turn adding bits to the picture (without communicating) in an attempt to create a whole image. That's pretty much winging it =P Some will take the directions as a recipe for disaster. Others will see it as a challenge/fun game.

 

[Probably George]

Improv makes for the best RP's. As someone experienced with table top rpg's, the unexecpted and randomness really shines how good you are at acting on a character. Good players can think how their character would react in Any situation, while the worse players only think of an A or B scenario and flips or freezes in scenarios C-Z

 

[rae2nerdy]

Improv makes for the best RP's. As someone experienced with table top rpg's, the unexecpted and randomness really shines how good you are at acting on a character. Good players can think how their character would react in Any situation, while the worse players only think of an A or B scenario and flips or freezes in scenarios C-Z

Well that's a bit of a apples and oranges comparison. Table top gaming is a totally different medium to forum roleplaying.

I would say in this context "winging it" would be more like:

A random person comes to your house. You're not friends and you've never met. This person tells you they have a wizard character who does magic. They want you to create a story with said wizard character who does magic.

They give you zero further details.


There is no character sheet. So the wizard has no stats, no personality, no backstory, no weaknesses, no motivation.

There is no world. So you don't know where the wizard is from. What kind of people exist in his/her society. Heck you don't even know basic shit like - is there indoor plumbing? Are we in medieval psuedo europe or sci fi futuristic utopia?

There is no magic system. You don't know where magic comes from, how it can be used, what it's limitations are

There is no stakes. The wizard isn't trying to complete a task, learn a lesson, or even make a character connection.

If your super lucky this random person will feel bad and throw you a bone. Maybe a physical description of the character and "call to action."

Rando Joe - I have a wizard character who is five feet six inches tall, has black hair and piercing blue eyes. He is muscular but not like a body builder. Everyone says he's super powerful and super hot. He is going to marry your hot princess character.

I mean at least a task for the characters to complete.

But more than likely you'll end up with

Rando Joe - I have a wizard character. He does magic. Wanna rp?

-------------------------------------

I don't know what table top games are but I was under the impression there was a lot more to them than just random people coming to your house and asking you to play a game with their "wizard" characters.