As far as "script" goes, I guess the problem comes from the use of the word. To me, a script is not necessarily the word for word dialogue of a play or TV show or whatever.
Well, sure, the word script does not necessarily mean only that. That is why if you will open a dictionary that you'll find four or six definitions for the word script depending on how it is used. The problem is that the way you are using it isn't any one of those.
After all, in, for example, Jackie Chan movies, the script would say, "they fight now" and nothing else.
Everything about that fight was then choreographed by the actors.
No, everything would then be choreographed by the fight director, the stage choreographer, the stunt choreographer, and the director. It just so happens that in your usual Jackie Chan movie, some or most of those hats are all worn by Jackie Chan.
Secondly, an actual movie script tends to say alot more than "They Fight Now". This is a real example:
Rush Hour 2 said:
Lee grabs one of the men's towels and pulls it off. The man
covers his naked body. Lee is grabbed by one of the other
henchmen, but he escapes and begins kicking ass, using the
towel and his own robe to block and wrap another man's arms --
blocking, kicking, and punching everything in sight -- all
the while managing to keep his privates covered with a towel,
his robe, or some other found object.
Carter, meanwhile, uses his quick hands to send several men
flying back -- grabbing a towel of one of them.
CARTER
(ref: his privates)
Damn! No wonder you're pissed off.
Carter uses the towel like Lee did to block and trap one of
the men's punches.
In the middle of fighting, Lee is suddenly exposed -- he
flinches to cover himself and is punched from behind.
Momentarily stunned, he's lifted from behind -- two men
throwing him out the front door.
Carter is also overpowered by two men, who lift him over
their shoulders.
This script contains features that are never found in modules, and which, if they were found in modules would generally make the module 'poorly written'. Conversely, the script - because it is a script - must contain this sort of detail if it is to be considered a well-written script. Once again, you can't take a module, hand it to a Holliwood producer and expect him to think that's a movie. A module is not a script.
A TV show like "Who's Line is it Anyway" is predicated on a very, very loose script. Other than the MC framing the challenge, it's up to the participants to actually produce something that makes some degree of sense and is entertaining.
And that's such a loose version of 'a script' that the word 'script' ceases to have any meaning in that and in fact becomes an impediment to understanding. A show like "Who's Line is it Anyway" (which, IYWR, I first brought into this discussion) is frequently described as being 'unscripted' precisely to differentiate it from the usual sort of television program. For most of the program, they are running without a script.
Heck, even improv acting usually has some sort of script at the very least to frame the scene.
Framing the scene is not providing a script. If you can't read it or perform it verbatim, then its not a script. Interestingly, in theater the scene framing you are talking about is generally referred to as a 'game'. A show like 'Whose Line is it Anyway' is a series of publicly performed theater games, which makes the fact that it is 'a game show' something of a pun.
I should say that the special case of the DM reading a portion of the text of a module is a script (a scripted section of the module), but that even then, the module is not a true script because the contents are not known to all the participants. The players parts are still unscripted even for the narrow case where the DM scripts his part. And even then, the DM does not necessarily know what 'his lines' are to be, or in what order they will be performed if at all. This makes a module very much not like a script and some of the worst examples of poor understanding of what a module is come to us from 2e adventure paths where the writer employed the sort of techniques you'd use to write a script.
I realize you, Celebrim, think I'm using "script" too loosely. I think you're using it too narrowly.
I'm a computer programmer. I believe that words should be used in very concrete ways in order to facillitate as much understanding as possible. I believe I'm using 'script' in a way that is justified by its definition and common usage. I believe you are using the word 'script' to mean 'anything which provides structure to a play even in things that are normally unscripted like improvisational theater and roleplaying games'.
But, word for word production is not a script, it's a transcript.
No, no, no. You are doing it again. You can't just arbitrarily assign a definition to soemthing. A transcript is an exact written
copy of some other thing, not just an exact script. To make a transcription is to turn an actual event, like a court case or a television program or a roleplaying session or the performance of a student over the school year, into a written document. My point was that you could only make an actual script of a role-playing session through transcription, after or during the fact. At that time, you could recreate the session using the script you created. In point of fact though, this is in fact rarely done so that a script for a roleplaying game almost never exists.