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Character First or Plot First?

sempai

sempai

Moon
Joined
Mar 3, 2020
It's a chicken/egg question regarding how you personally build your roleplays!

I find that it's a healthy mix of both for me, but I'm always surprising myself when I see a FC and decide to build a whole story around just the image of a character. Do you find you do one over the other?
 
A mix, very situational dependent. Sometimes I like to create a character to fit the scenario, other times a scenario to fit a given character.
 
I normally make a rough setting, then create characters that could fit in it, building both at the same time. One I have the setting though, it's a lot easier to make characters since their experiences and backstory can help shape your world. If you start thinking of the why and how, then you gotta give a reason for it in your world which forces you to make even more for it.
 
Once I have a broad setting (like "zombie apocalypse") I'm pretty exclusively character first. I'm quite particular about OC x OC, and what pushes me to create a pairing for it is that I either have a character in mind or there's a dynamic I want to explore. After that, the setting specifics are molded to fit the character or character dynamic I'm seeking.
 
I can do either, but I feel like most times I have a story first, then find the right character. If a character is so uniquely designed that you can build a story around them, that's interesting as well.
 
I mean, both, but if forced to chose, it would be Plot first. I mean when I'm brainstorming and thinking of ideas, it's the plot that comes first in my head and what I harp on first. The character comes second. Now, half the fun of RPing for me is torturing my characters so there is a large part of characters involved in telling the story. But if by a chronological order, it would be plot.
 
It’s characters for me. Imo, the most interesting part of an RP is character interactions. Their reactions in certain situations. I too come up with the plot first. But the fun part, for me, has always been exploring how the characters would handle what is thrown at them.
 
It's a combination in most instances for me. Certain ideas require you to build the plot around a character while other times you build the plot around the character.
 
Before I think about a plot and a chracter, I always start by creating the world, that will be used for the rp. Then comes the rough idea of a character where I start with her or his background story from which I create a plot.
Anything specific about the character like abilities or certain characteristics always come with the background story of the char and the idea, where I want the character to be at a certain time in the plot.
 
Imo, I think character is most important for roleplay, since the players more often than not are the characters themselves. You really need to get into your character's head so you know how they'll react to situations you aren't fabricating yourself.

However, if GMing for a bigger rp group, the world is definitely what matters most.
 
Plot first, then evolve both. I plan my characters into the story concept. There might be a 'type' or a kink I want to play, but I build it into someone who fits into the scenario. I get my very vague impression set, then we finish the plot details, and I put the finishing touches on my character.

I think fitting with the story is so important. Have you ever played in a group game where someone made something that didn't fit? I was recently in a BSDM scifi harem where someone made a wolf taur that needed to be taught how to speak. wtf No one was sexually into taurs, and half of the characters ended up playing teacher for that character. It ruined everything.

I'm currently in a dubcon forced marriage story where the other player made their character so introverted and stoic that I'm having to make my unwilling MC act secretly interested just so anything happens. The plot we agreed on isn't a Beauty & the Beast where MC has to awaken his husband's cold dead heart. But that's what their character design has turned it into, unless we're both going to describe their daily hobbies (alone) for eternity. This asexual, aromatic ice 'queen' does not work as a dom in a dubcon scenario at all. But that's apparently the rigid character concept they always envisioned.

Whether you start with story or character, the character must be malleable so they fit into a story in a meaningful way.
 
They need to be balanced for me. Plot keeps the thing alive on a meta level; we know what we want to do, we do it, and it goes more smoothly than taking shots into the wilderness. On the other hand, everything I do lives off the character dynamic and being able to try and feel what they feel. So I tend to bend the plot for/build it around their purposes, or have a character that fits the plot well since I don't handle breaking character well. Sheer preference? Character first. However, I find the plot essential for actually seeing things through.
 
Honestly I think most of these things just happen for me. I've never had one way of doing a roleplay. Sometimes a character idea hits me, and I figure out the setting and story bits later and other times I want a specific plot/setting and I build a character after the fact.
 
Like a few others here, I feel like I unconsciously work with a mix of both. Sometimes I'll be looking through face claims and latch onto one, coming up with a general backstory that can be further refined if/when I find a plot and partner for them. Other times, I'll start with a story concept and the character's personality and history follow closely behind.

Tldr; for me, it really just depends~
 
I would say neither in my case.
Though that could be a bit subjective, someone might call it plot for me.
What I do is I come up with a concept first, such as "Broken Space Pirates"
Then I'll take that and build up some sort of plot from there, coming up with specifics of where the plot can go or backstory for where the plot has been
Then I don't really come up with characters normally until I get an rp contact. But sometimes I'll create characters after coming up with plot.
 
Solo said:
Mm, for me it depends on the story itself, as well as the partner. Sometimes I get plot ideas first and sometimes I get an idea for a character but don't know what I want to do with them. I'd say for the most part, for original stories, I'm usually plot first. For fandom-based stories, I'm almost always character first.
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Pretty much the same for me. I cook up lots of plots and ideas, and have characters in mind and such but it all comes down to who I'm working with and if they are skilled enough to RP the character believably, for lack of a better word. You wouldn't want to see someone roleplaying as Jason Voorhees and talking in full sentences if you're going for realism haha.
 
I think characters always come first for me.

I see it similar to going out somewhere with your best friend. You don't really care where you go with your best friend, because the two of you work so well together(hopefully). If you could choose to go somewhere nice, but with someone you can't get along with, it would ruin almost any enjoyment.

It's not a perfect analogy.
 
For me, it's s a mix of both. Sometimes the plot defines the character. Other times, the characters define the plot. A perfect example is a story i'm writing on another site with a partner. We started with a basic plot and basic characters. As the story progressed, we added more details to our characters' backgrounds or skills. Well, that necessitated explaining how those changes fit into the plot. We now have a very complex world that includes theology, the world genesis, landscapes, multiple races, and politics.
 
Character first.

I am not a writer, I am solely a roleplayer. A plot is nice, something to work a play around, but I really couldn't do this whole world-bulding stuff. Whenever I react/reply to a RT I already have a character in mind. And if someone asks in their thread for extensive world building, I just stop reading. But that's my opinion and feel about things.
 
Look at your character. Why do they have the skills they do? What training or experiences gave them those things? Why does your character have no problem stealing from the nobles? That's just an example. Why did your character join the church? Why does your character hate loan sharks? That's how you build a world. You provide an explanation of why something exists.
 
I think both are very important, but you can string along a bad story with captivating characters. It’s a lot harder to have a good story when you have bad characters though.
 
I would say 80% plot first and 20% character first. In my experience, with a good plot in place, a good character subsequently comes to be. You lay out a good plot for me and b a m, a character comes to mind, I ravel their backstory in, start building their present - and it just works. On occasion, inspiration for a character blossoms, usually when I'm drooling to write a specific race, but it tends to be bumpier to then try and spin or insert said character into a plot.

Plot foremost is similar to a good foundation that RP partners can come and build on, making rooms and adding features where creativity takes them. Character foremost is like trying to find a good foundation that has some walls already erected and hoping said character fits the floorplan.
 
I love building characters, so I tend to end up with a bunch of characters with very barebones plots to go on.
 
It really is a matter of how the roleplay is being discussed. Sometimes it's a character you want to write, maybe a supernatural one, maybe just a personality type or body type you're looking for, and you build the plot around that. Other times, you have a story you want and you end up just fitting a character into it because you know they would add to it in a way that is just fantastic. Definitely no wrong answer here. My latest roleplay, we went story first, a lot of them have been because of a pairing we wanted to do.
 
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