Which element do you like the most in the story?

[BlackKnightX]

**I want the vote to be from the reader’s perspective, so if you’re an author, please vote as a reader.**

———

You know, when you read a story, there are usually a lot of elements that you like, right? Action, world-building, character development, character interaction, epic plot, smut, fluffs, etc.

But what if you have to choose one element that you really like and want the author to add a lot of it in the story? I’m doing some research here, so please help me out. Thanks in advance~

———

**Please forget about the theory and technical stuffs about storytelling. As I stated above, I want the vote to be from the reader’s perspective and not the author’s.**

 

[hauntedwritings]

Character interaction for sure. Not that a good story doesn't contain all those things (well, not all, depending on the story).

Plot is important, but you can already guess what the plot is going to be in most stories. And how it will end. Take Harry Potter. You get to find out about Voldemort pretty damn early, and sure enough, everthing thereafter is a slow staircase towards the big showdown. To a certain degree, there is no story without one. At least, not if you expect the story to have a proper ending, instead of dragging along for longer than what was good for the story (Not every case, but that's how it tends to be in my opinion).

Fluff, action and character building...sure, it's very nice to have. In moderation. But if that's all the story has, you're just reading something for stress release (not that there's anything wrong with that, but it tends to get boring after a while). Like I'm A Spider, So What? Sure enough, it's fun to read how the MC gets stronger over time. But after a while, I realized I was almost skipping ahead because I was itching to see how other characters, even mob characters, would react to her.

Details...they say the devil is in the details. And sure enough, that's true - it gives your story depth and draws the readers in. But if that's all you have, then...that's all its also going be. Details. Same as the previous one, you end up skipping along until you find those quotation marks.

 

[RepresentingWrath]

I like PLOT. But if you want a serious answer, I would say a well-balanced story. Instead of a story with. for example, godly characters but a shit plot, I would prefer a story with a good plot, good characters, a decent amount of details, and so forth. If I must pick one thing that attracts me to novels, it's the thing you didn't mention, uniqueness. I would prefer reading something moderately unique, with fresh ideas. I don't care about the quality of the things you mentioned if the story is unique enough.

 

[KoyukiMegumi]

I like the plot~ It is what drives the story! Everything else is an add-on for me. The plot has to be good before anything else imo.

 

[BlackKnightX]

Character interaction for sure. Not that a good story doesn't contain all those things (well, not all, depending on the story).

Plot is important, but you can already guess what the plot is going to be in most stories. And how it will end. Take Harry Potter. You get to find out about Voldemort pretty damn early, and sure enough, everthing thereafter is a slow staircase towards the big showdown. To a certain degree, there is no story without one. At least, not if you expect the story to have a proper ending, instead of dragging along for longer than what was good for the story (Not every case, but that's how it tends to be in my opinion).

Fluff, action and character building...sure, it's very nice to have. In moderation. But if that's all the story has, you're just reading something for stress release (not that there's anything wrong with that, but it tends to get boring after a while). Like I'm A Spider, So What? Sure enough, it's fun to read how the MC gets stronger over time. But after a while, I realized I was almost skipping ahead because I was itching to see how other characters, even mob characters, would react to her.

Details...they say the devil is in the details. And sure enough, that's true - it gives your story depth and draws the readers in. But if that's all you have, then...that's all its also going be. Details. Same as the previous one, you end up skipping along until you find those quotation marks.

I agree with you completely!

Thing is, I was conflicted about my reader’s and writer’s perspective. as a reader, I love to meet different interesting characters in a story and see how they interact with each other. I love watching sitcom just to see the character’s interaction. The joke, the witty-banter, the flirts, and stuffs like that.

But as a writer, I tend to lean more toward theories things and put all of my focus on the plot. It almost drives me mad when the characters have to act in a way that I don’t want them to because of the plot point.

I was conflicted, whether to let go of those plot points and focus more on character and their interaction. But deep down, there was a fear that my story will become boring if nothing exciting happened, so I kept pushing on.

But then I got burnt out. So I took a break.

It was until recently that I went to look at the statistics of my story and found out that one of my chapter had more likes than the others.

It was at that moment that I found out. In that chapter, there’s not much to the plot, but what really stuck out was the character interaction and a little bit of fluffs.

So just to be sure, I tried to research more by making this poll. And it becomes clear to me now…

Thanks for making things clear for me~

 

[gogo7966]

characters are the core of most stories and everything else in the story exists to support them and put them in situations that makes them stand out

 

[RepresentingCaution]

I like stories with a strong message or moral.

 

[SakeVision]

I like well thought out storylines with unreliable narration and multiple PoV where no one has plot armor and the genre is tragedy.

I've read visual novels "higurashi no naku koro ni" and "umineko" a decade ago and haven't found anything quite this good ever since; including the later works by the same author; which is quite tragic, indeed

 

[BlackKnightX]

I like well thought out storylines with unreliable narration and multiple PoV where no one has plot armor and the genre is tragedy.

I've read visual novels "higurashi no naku koro ni" and "umineko" a decade ago and haven't found anything quite this good ever since; including the later works by the same author; which is quite tragic, indeed

Visual novels, huh?

Have you ever read Clannad or The Fruit of Grisaia? I think they’re pretty good. Though The Fruit of Grisaia is a harem story, but the mc is very interesting and badass unlike the others’ harem protagonists.

 

[EternalSunset0]

I like characters.

I enjoy a story far more the more vividly I can visualize them and "read their lines voiced" in my head. If I can have a clear picture of what they look like and what they sound like, every piece of dialogue becomes a lot more immersive for me.

That's also why I lean more towards anime stories or Hollywood action/thriller movie ones. Being my two favorite mediums, it's those stories that I can visualize and "play in voiced motion" in my head more easily.

 

[BlackKnightX]

I like characters.

I enjoy a story far more the more vividly I can visualize them and "read their lines voiced" in my head. If I can have a clear picture of what they look like and what they sound like, every piece of dialogue becomes a lot more immersive for me.

That's also why I lean more towards anime stories or Hollywood action/thriller movie ones. Being my two favorite mediums, it's those stories that I can visualize and "play in voiced motion" in my head more easily.

Damn, we’re the same kind of reader!
I also like to visualize the scene and the character’s voice in my head. Though, It gets quite frustrating when I’m not sure whether the character is male or female. ?

 

[Vnator]

I like stories with a strong message or moral.

I've tried getting messages across via symbolism, but I feel like unless you beat your viewers on the head with it like a stick, they won't really realize. In the early chapters of my story, I have the main character essentially reject the "stereotypical isekai power fantasy" by being dismissive of the goals of the adventuring party he joins (rather just seeing them as a means to his end of finding and rescuing someone else),

Spoiler: Isekai Police chapter 14 spoiler

not getting with the girl who shows feelings for him, and outright ditching the party when he gets a better lead on his actual mission of rescuing a kid from Earth.

Even though this wasn't explicitly a moral or message, I like the idea of delivering them subtly via metaphor and symbolism in general, and have the readers pick that up for themselves. But I guess for your story, your message revolves around the plot so it's not too hard to ascertain (going by your posts about it around here)