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Post by Pool Boy on Feb 9, 2013 19:23:15 GMT -8
Group plots are plots that are not exactly site-wide, but do involve a whole bunch of people and make-up a prominent mini-plot. It seems like a really enchanting idea to lead or be a part of one because your characters can feel so interconnected.
WHAT WORKS THE BEST?
Because I have never seen it happen successfully in my own attempts or the attempts of others. Opening and running a site is one thing but leading a major group plot of 5+ characters is another. (One on one plots are infinitely easier to coordinate.) Let's assume one has the resources, ie, friends or an active site to draw interest and participation from. But how do you keep people interested, motivated, and willing to post? How do you keep the plot organized and everyone feeling like a protagonist within it. (Is it necessary for everyone to feel like a protagonist?) How do you make sure people are ending up in roles that suit them? And how do you make sure things happen if someone gets busy? Should it be run casually with trust that people will reach out to each other, or do you really have to push push push for things to happen? What have people done that works?
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Post by redox-kun on Feb 9, 2013 20:00:13 GMT -8
/terrible person, but
imo, i think group plots should be made with the intention of "oh yeah, we're gonna start rping this week", instead of a month later. bc we all get bursts of muse when we envision something, but then one month later of internet/life, it's like. "wrat. where was i and what was i doing"
i am a big proponent of the idea that rp should never make anyone feel obligated, since it's a hobby. so i think motivation, and not gentle prodding, is really the key
BUT if you really wanna do one, then i think group plots should be dynamic. be prepared for anyone to run into irl obligations. the group should have fresh ideas that can adapt to new situations.
i think it's also important for everyone to feel like a protag. they don't have to be the smartest or the richest or the strongest. they just have to be influential. preferably to as many members of the group plot as possible. i'm bringing in an idealized scenario, i realize, but i'm calling on PRE experience since, lbr, PRE was the closest that i got to something that was a clusterfuck of interconnectedness lol
as for rpers to chars, i think that motivations/personalities should be left up to the rpers as much as possible. i've found that rpers most easily rp personalities that reflect their own in ways. which is why redox forever fails at playing likeable extroverts orz putting them in positions/occupations/alliances are something that looks more attractive to me
butyeah i realize that i'm not the most qualified person in the world to talk about group plots, but that's just my two cents. ignore this if i sound like a doofus
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the greatest general under the heavens
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Post by Egao, Egao Everywhere on Feb 9, 2013 20:23:12 GMT -8
I TAKE OFFENSE TO THIS.
You take charge and just do it. Don't push any ideas but get the ideas of everyone and make them together. You give everyone the same trust you'd give to your friends. Since you'll be playing leader, you have to make sure that you yourself is enthusiastic about it.
You don't actually have to make everyone feel like they're central characters. I find that most people are okay to being "side characters" as long as the actual plot sounds interesting enough and their ideas are being taken into consideration. Roles are just standard procedures. It's the roleplaying that matters. Powerful dialogues and narration because execution > planning. Otherwise, I think asking directly would be fine. Just ask if they're fine with it and you're good.
Most important of all is you don't make it to complex. Stuffs like those have to develop with the discussion of the group, not the one in your head. So no, don't keep on pushing. Keep it casual. The thread will push by itself. Plots are just guides. They're not meant to dictate every script and events. You have to open yourself to other possible scenarios. You find that your character's action can be different than what you initially told the others during the plotting stage. Roleplayers need to accept changes and let things play on their own.
I think when setting up big plots for groups, it's no different than any group activities you find in school and work. When you have a plan, you need people in it. You want everyone to get involved because that's how good plans tend to work. Whether you be extremely serious and intense about it depends on the people and the kind of activity you have. For roleplaying, you should NEVER be too hold up with it because this is the Internet and rping is a hobby. A lot can go wrong, a lot of plans can never be followed. You shouldn't raise hopes too high up but go with the flow.
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Post by katya on Feb 9, 2013 20:25:10 GMT -8
In my experience, it's not so much what you can do, but what your entire group needs to do. Just one inactive or, worse yet, r00d player can stir up a lot of discontent.
My best experience with big group plots was at a site that legit had three big plots running in tandem, with huge group threads of about 10 characters in each. It should never have worked, but it did! Everyone just loved everyone else's stuff! Everyone was super active in our irc channel, which was our equivalent of cbox, and it was like we were a little close-knit fandom over our own site. Like the moment someone started a new thread, or replied to one, everyone would be all over that shit like a Homestuck upd8. I was pretty quiet there at first, and then people were just sending me tells/PMs/emails saying they liked my writing, or offering plots and threads, or even suggesting other characters for me to interact with because they'd love to see my chars meet up with so-and-so.
In short, I think the key is to give people the feeling that the rest of the community gives a shit about your character and your plots. I don't know what the secret to that is, unfortunately. Communication, maybe?
I think "protagonist" is a weird term to ascribe to rping btw. Obviously not every character is gonna shake up the world, but as long as they get plots and threads that they enjoy, they should be the main character of their own story.
If someone's busy and holds up the plot, you chill out and wait for them to come back, maybe all work on flashback threads or side character plots, whatever. If what you've got is good, no one's going to bail while everyone's waiting. No one left the Harry Potter fandom just because they had to wait for the next book to come out, after all. Some people are natural flakes, but I'm assuming that when you say you have the resources, you've got people that won't poof.
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Post by Pool Boy on Feb 9, 2013 21:22:31 GMT -8
OKAY I ADMIT I WAS EXAGGERATING AND BEING OVERDRAMATIC ;w; its just so rare and speshul y'know? redox -- yeah everyone should feel like a protag, and i just wonder how that kind of coordination can be built maybe its something that takes practise and everyone is so used to/practiced in one-on-one rp?
tanz -- yur the pro at this /glad i hooked your attention heh. is it better then to offer ideas on others? or is it better to umm just say you want a BIG group plot and let shizz go from there (I know, im like asking how to lead a large plot skype discussion in a way but now i think I know how difficult it is to lead guided discussions. OR i'm just being nitpicky and uncertain right now.) and yeah ofc i dont get worried when things get held up and i dont really care too much even when things die because ofc interest moves on, but it would be cool to just have things the most intense they can possibly be.
katya -- luckily, i am good at avoiding the r00d i do think when it comes to my bigger more organized plots. how that worked blows my mind? what was the thread about? becuase augh gosh too many times ive been in some large event threads like some festival or banquet where things just died and it was sad. (like the drag ball at pre. I know i could have gone on but no one else really did. bc fem!shameesxmale!mir FTW!!!) giving shits about other characters, thats the holy grail of rp. it takes friendship, i think.
yeah protagonist is a weird term. i really hope its possible for stories to proceed in group form like that. and yeah, i wish though that when people needed time off from a plot, it didnt mean auto death a site that had, like, rough activity requirements :c i'm still a noob. i haven't seen enough yet....
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Post by konya on Feb 9, 2013 21:33:29 GMT -8
I don't like group plots but ugh I wish you could tag people here because I know Elena runs a very very well managed site using group plots - she'd probably be able to give the best answer!
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Post by katya on Feb 9, 2013 21:45:55 GMT -8
Honestly, re: being a protagonist, I think that's up to the player. While other people can help by offering plots and such, there's not that much to be done if the player won't put themselves out there.
The thing about these big threads--and I've been in quite a few--is that I always had them on journal sites. The big difference there is COMMENT THREADS. For example, I was on a ball thread there as well (not drag though!), and the first step was for every character attending post a ROOT comment at the beginning, and then people that wanted to interact with that character would reply to that comment and there'd be a bajillion threads from there. For some people, just posting that first root comment and a few quick interactions was enough, and then they'd post another root comment with the character retiring for the night. Other people, whenever they had a plot idea, or wanted a mini time skip to later in the evening, would just start another root thread, and the comment threads just keep piling up. It ran for over 1,000 comments, I believe--we bitched about a captcha showing up, which journals only do if you hit an absurd number of comments, and got a part 2 post opened up for more comments. That sort of organization is obviously impossible on a forum.
That site I spoke of didn't do that though. It legit just had everyone posting when it was their turn, replying to everyone, and etc. Just enthusiasm kept it going, really. It helped, I think, that flashback threads were very common. The premise was that there were three traveling groups (armies, effectively) in the fantasy setting, and the massive groups all had one thread where the main plot inched along. On the side, everyone had their own personal threads. A knight would participate in the main group thread whenever their turn to reply came up, but otherwise they still had a lot of smaller threads to attend to; a night drinking with mercenary friends, an unfortunate encounter with a thief, teaching his little sister to wield a sword, a flashback thread with his inglorious ex, so on and so forth. The main thread, which had a mod-given task (ex: go forge an alliance with this dwarven kingdom and pick up these newly accepted characters along the way) moved like a snail, but that just gave time for everyone to further explore their character. It worked out.
The example of the ball was just an event. I'm actually not sure how to pull that off on forums, besides for maybe creating a temporary event forum for the entire event. (We've tried that though, and that didn't really work out either...) The latter example is a continuous site plot that involves a bajillion characters for the long haul, and that's what I figured out meant with this thread lol.
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Post by Poet on Feb 14, 2013 17:59:32 GMT -8
The thing about these big threads--and I've been in quite a few--is that I always had them on journal sites. The big difference there is COMMENT THREADS. For example, I was on a ball thread there as well (not drag though!), and the first step was for every character attending post a ROOT comment at the beginning, and then people that wanted to interact with that character would reply to that comment and there'd be a bajillion threads from there. For some people, just posting that first root comment and a few quick interactions was enough, and then they'd post another root comment with the character retiring for the night. Other people, whenever they had a plot idea, or wanted a mini time skip to later in the evening, would just start another root thread, and the comment threads just keep piling up. A Root Comment? A Comment thread? What are those? /lost
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Post by Pool Boy on Feb 14, 2013 18:25:33 GMT -8
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Post by katya on Feb 14, 2013 18:35:23 GMT -8
It's basically threads within a thread. When you reply, you can choose either to reply to a specific comment (and thus start a whole new thread), or just drop your comment at the very bottom like a normal reply. If you're curious, look here (don't judge the content, i just picked the first entry on ontd >.>). Scroll down for the comments, and you'll see that some of them branch out into comment threads of their own. They're all very short comment threads over there (it's not an rp comm, after all), but you can potentially have full length rp threads branching out from one comment. Obviously, this allows for much saner rp interaction in massive group threads than forums do. edit: ninja'd
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Post by Zozma on Feb 15, 2013 12:44:54 GMT -8
1. Make sure the people you're playing with are all reliable and are all 100% involved.
2. Make posts fairly short. Remember that all of those posts add up and nobody wants to read a combined post the size of a novel. (4 1k posts? SKIP.)
3. Everybody needs to know their role in the group. For example, in a group plot I've got running, we have the leader of the gang, his second-in-command, the quiet and dependable guy, the young and inexperienced guy, and the dude who comes around every now and again when he's bored. In the other gang, we've got another leader, the guy who wants to steal his position, the muscle, the charmer, the blind guy with common sense, and the traitor who's playing both sides. DON'T LET PEOPLE MAKE TWO OF THE SAME TYPE. IT'S BORING. And somebody inevitably feels like they're not needed because somebody else is already doing their character's work.
4. Don't be afraid to let the plots expand. You can still do one-on-ones to further development between two characters here, two characters there. Mini plots inside mini plots, guys.
5. COMMUNICATE. When making characters for an already established group, talk to the other members about how they met, what they act like together, etc. A very good way to do this, I've found, is through light, non-serious/non-canon RPing in the cbox and the GIF game. It really opened doors for me and my members on Somnia.
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Post by Poet on Feb 15, 2013 14:42:37 GMT -8
Ooh, I see, thank you, both of you! I've never roleplayed on Livejournal, so I wasn't sure what you were stating, I get it now~.
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A seadog looking for crewmates
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Post by Elena on May 14, 2013 1:08:48 GMT -8
Sorry that I missed this thread, but hopefully it is still useful for many people… And I wish I knew who Konya is on RPG-D, because this name sounds completely unknown to me.
There has been some good advice here, especially Watch Toward The Terra and Terms of Service. I might agree only partially with each of them, but it is not because “it wouldn’t work” how they said; it is simply a matter of preference. Zozma had given good advice too – except the “make sure all are reliable’ – because you can’t.
And yes, she saw and took part, on “Before the Mast”, in plots involving 10+ characters and NPCs… or sometimes even 30+ (altogether). Ship battles, balls and parties, are the most common ones… but there are other plots involving more than 6 characters too… Tavern scenes, for example, work scenes aboard the ships, storms, fights and duels…
How do you make sure people are ending up in roles that suit them?
They choose what suits them. They are the writers. First of all, they choose the characters they apply for, then the NPCs they want to write for, so… yes, they choose.
How do you make sure things happen if someone gets busy?
We have a rule saying: Abandoned characters will be NPC-ed by a staff member (or a predetermined person of your choosing) and disposed of as fits the storyline, though we prefer - and as a community, encourage - that threads are seen to completion. This is meant mainly for people who vanish meanwhile, because those who take a hiatus usually say it and let us NPC their characters in the thread from the start.
There are always ways of writing around a missing character. If the master gunner’s writer wasn’t around, the gunners wrote having heard his order and they fired upon it, as they should have. If a captain wasn’t around, the lieutenant took over, and so on. Those who are busier and slower posting will ultimately catch up with posts in their own time.
It also takes, in my opinion, the site’s culture. On mine, people finish threads, so yes, I don’t fear abandoned threads. In nearly 3 years, we have less than 6% abandoned threads, usually from people who had vanished and were involved only with one other writer.
How do you keep people interested, motivated, and willing to post?
In theory, by offering exciting events and coming with new twists. Also, by permanent communication with the members involved, by planning it together with them and listening to their proposals, incorporating them into the plot. And the fact that the main outcomes have been roughly agreed upon by all (I say roughly – a degree of flexibility is a must!) make a) everybody see the same thing and avoid inconsistencies and b) know what to do even if one or two writers disappear in the meanwhile.
Is it necessary for everyone to feel like a protagonist? How do you keep the plot organized?
Yes, it is necessary for everyone to feel like a protagonist… as long as they are willing to get involved. And the communication between writing partners, in a collective thread, where everybody sees which are the main things but is free to add his own little twists, is welcome. This, and the staff’s active involvement and determination make the event to succeed. If somebody disappears, if something happens, the staff should intervene, with characters and NPCs, and drive it forward.
Should it be run casually with trust that people will reach out to each other, or do you really have to push push push for things to happen?
The people wouldn’t reach out to each other if it is not a plotting thread organized by the staff, so everybody is on the same page and suggestions are taken into account. I believe in planning, not in “whimsical” and “casual” (but well, I am an economist, and as a writer I am an outliner, so I have learnt to think concrete and to tick results).
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Post by konya on May 14, 2013 1:14:26 GMT -8
I'm Columba on RPGD c: I also have chronic name changing disorder.
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A seadog looking for crewmates
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Post by Elena on May 14, 2013 3:48:24 GMT -8
Of course I know you! <3
I am Elena (or Elenitsa if Elena is taken) everywhere...
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