the vampire diaries fanfic writing tips

✧ plot armour

plot armour.

as we all know so many characters have plot armour in this show.

if you aren't familiar with it, plot armour is basically when a character is protected for the sake of the plot.

so for example, the mikaelsons not being able to defeat anyone in the mystic falls crew even though they're described as being incredibly dangerous and unpredictable and will kill anyone who hurts their family. if the mikaelsons were written as described, all of the main tvd characters would probably be dead by now.

if it weren't for plot armour, i think a majority of the characters wouldn't have made it through season 2.

but do you remove that? or do you need to keep it?

well, there's a few different instances in which it could be removed.

for example, if the point of your fanfic is to remove it. i think that could be an interesting fic. i've seen people do one shots of it in specific scenes/episodes, but never rewrite the show without plot armour. could be interesting.

you also might remove it if your oc has changed something to the point where you think it's necessary.

for example, in my fanfic, my oc is with kol. damon has hurt my oc multiple times. it reached a point where i could no longer justify kol not reacting. so i had him kill damon after damon tried to kill my oc.

however, i would advice you to be careful.

if the point of your fanfic is to stay true to the show, then you probably don't want to remove everyone's plot armour. it might start to feel a bit off for your readers.

and you need to remember that removing certain characters will change the plot significantly. removing a salvatore or elena is going to alter the plot a lot. you need to be ready for that.

also, even though plot armour isn't considered realistic, your fanfic will be unrealistic if you remove too much of it because then your fanfic becomes so far off from the show that it doesn't have the same feel.

but you also need to consider what is plot armour?

i have somewhat of a definition at the top but i think it goes a little deeper than that.

to me, i think plot armour is putting your characters in situations they can't realistically survive but making them survive anyways.

for example, let's look at the scene of katherine and elena fighting. i've heard people say it's plot armour that elena won.

i disagree.

she didn't win because she was stronger than katherine. if she beat katherine in a fight directly then yes.

but elena has been known to win because she uses the element of surprise. it was quite literally what alaric taught her to do. she won because she had the cure and was smart enough to realize that she could use it to her advantage. if she didn't have the cure she would've died. and i don't think it's plot armour that she had it because the whole season was about stefan trying to get the cure for her so it shouldn't be a surprise that she ends the season with it.

now a scene that is plot armour? in my opinion, no mikaelson going after anyone after finn and kol were killed. because based on how their characters were written, klaus, rebekah, and elijah wouldn't sit there and not retaliate.

there was no reasonable explanation for why they didn't react.

klaus and elijah especially.

rebekah wanted the cure and if she hurt all of them she had no way of getting it. this was realistic for her character in my opinion.

but klaus said he didn't care about the cure anymore after kol was killed. and i understand that he was locked in that magic spell but he should've reacted when he got out.

because since when was klaus one to calm down with time? katherine's whole storyline is based on the fact that he can hold a grudge for a long long time. him getting put in a time out is not going to calm him down. i personally think it would make him more angry.

and elijah didn't even show up.

i think this is where the importance of justification comes in. if you can justify the situation, i don't think it counts as plot armour.

i don't think there's a single thing that could justify why the mikaelsons didn't react to kol's death. if let's say they hated kol, then maybe. but klaus' reaction afterwards did not indicate that he hated kol.

if you can't justify it , if your reader is going to look at this and say "wow i can't believe this happened" it's probably plot armour.