OpenClaw Production Setup Patterns with Plugins and Skills

OpenClaw looks simple in demos. In production, it becomes a system. The real complexity is not in prompts or models. It is in how plugins and skills interact to manage state, integrate systems, and execute workflows over time. A useful mental model: Plugins = capabilities APIs, memory, tools, integrations Skills = behavior How the agent uses those capabilities in structured ways Production systems fail when these two are mixed without boundaries. They become reliable when both are mapped to real