Crafting a Strong RPG Character Backstory - 5 Questions to Consider
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- Опубликовано: 3 июл 2024
- It can be tricky for RPG players to create an awesome backstory that works for you & helps you role-play better, but also allows your Game Master to create epic roleplaying campaigns and adventures. In today's video, I go into the questions you should consider to help you create backstories that your DM can use, both quickly and easily. Whether you're creating a backstory for a Dungeons & Dragons campaign, a Pathfinder adventure or a Call of Cthulhu expedition - these tips will guide you to creating a player character backstory that's worth your while.
Find each chapter of the video by clicking on the timestamps below:
00:00 Celebrate the player!
00:35 How to make a good backstory?
01:17 Where was the PC born?
02:52 How were you educated?
04:27 What was your first job?
06:31 Why did you become an adventurer?
09:37 Your Task - Create a backstory, or rewrite your existing one.
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*Thanks for watching* Let us know in the comments below your ideas on creating awesome backstories for your PC's.
Make sure to check out Ink & Lyre's Kickstarter for their Stargazers guide to Aroria! Find it here: bit.ly/greatgm
hi, guy, would love to see a vidoe on how to create a "journey" for a character.
when you have a "journey" in mind it is alot easier to flash out the character and add flaws. great vidoe and keep the good work!
Personally I start with backgrounds, because that tends to be the thing that my character was doing right before they became an adventurer. This in turn makes it easer to backtrack down your character's life.
La Vey is my tabaxi swashbuckler. I came up with the name for him and his background was going to be City Watch. This immediately made me ask, well why doesn't he have a typical tabaxi name and why would he join the city watch.
The quick answer was "he's adopted" the culture he's in now isn't his birth culture, but he grew up this way. That in turn got me to ask "Who adopted him?"
He's a Rogue, so I considered a rogue was probably one of his parents and this gave me his father. I then considered what gods he believes in and this in turn made me consider his mother as a cleric.
His parents existing now, I asked, "Why adopt a tabaxi kid?" The answer seemed obvious, "they wanted a child of their own".
This is what led to his final family member and the flavor of his character. He was going to worship Tymora, so his mother being a cleric of hers, his father being a rogue and valuing fortune. It came together rather well.
His last family member ended up being his brother. The child his parents actually got to have and after they'd adopted another child. He's their "miracle child" and also the one in the family that made the most outsider choices. One he becomes a paladin and two, its for the goddess of love. He's the blood son, but the one that goes most uniquely his own way. And it seemed a fun family with the parents being a bit disappointed in their blood son's choices, but them all still being rather loving to one another besides.
The dynamic basically wrote itself. The elder brother that always wanted to please his parents and his headstrong go his own direction younger brother. The brother's goddess being Sune at the expense of Tymora seemed to also lend itself to a certain flavor, especially the idea that he's always unucky at love and might have become a paladin because of a girl he was into.
As for the Adventurer part, I thought it best to keep it simple. Something happened during his time as a member of the Watch. It soured him on things and lead to him wanting to leave his home. So wanting to leave home, and being at least capable with skill and sword, being an adventurer doesn't seem at all out of character. So he's a character with a past and with family, it explains what he's cable of and why he might have some of the outlooks he has. That's what I'm usually shooting for in a backstory.
I’ve been keeping a journal in my characters voice of our sessions. It’s part notes , but mostly my characters thoughts , feelings and reactions to important events.
This is a brilliant idea!
I will try that on my next campaign that starts next week. thanks for the great idea
@@Kitsune_Enjoyer you’re welcome. I hope it works for you.
@@Kitsune_Enjoyer How did it go?
Guy: "I live in quite a nice town. I had quite a nice upbringing. I have a fairly decent job that pays well. I have a guardian. I have friends from school. I have, you know, a work colleague and we barbeque on the Saturdays. Give all of that up, to pick up a sword and go into some grimy old basement to till monsters. Why would I do that?"
Me: "And then the Fire Nation attacked."
They came to have a barbeque as well.
@@AmarothEng lmao
Ok, this was more then helpful. it involves everything, i nee dto feel the character i am playing, And playing is fun! However, as a dm, it seems also everything i need to place any player in an full fletched home brew world! & Without any trouble!
This is a good idea. My backstories are usually in a Google doc. I usually just update it with game notes but it'll be interesting to see what comes from writing in character responses to sessions
Same here
This week task is something my brain does by itself few times a week...it's both blessing and curse.
Most blessings are mixed.
Thanks again for great advice Guy! I love writing backstories. My latest one is a Minotaur who earned his freedom from the gladiatorial pits of an evil, hedonistic society (that's like a mix of Rome and Egypt). He and his friend were forced to fight each other to the death to see who received their freedom. He and his friend didn't want to kill each other but they would both be killed if they didn't. My character won, but is traumatized and doesn't want to use lethal force on anyone unless he absolutely has to. His ultimate goal is to make amends with his friend's family and then lead a slave rebellion against the evil society. After this, he will roam the world, looking for a place to fit in and lead a peaceful life.
I did not die from writing this down. Thank you Great GM.
What a great way to "follow" a Bard in his/her travels to know what is told in balad, prose, or song...
I tend to give the abbreviated version a characters backstory to my DM, while i keep the more lengthy one to myself, only to help me RP better, especially if I'm playing a character style that's a bit outside of what I'm used to
I envy you. My players act like it is a crime to ask the simplest questions, like:
Where did your character grow up?
*Player rolls eyes and exhales slowly*
"I don't know, some woods somewhere"
Who raised or cared for your character in their youth?
*Player visibly annoyed*
"He has never needed anybody, family is for the weak"
How did your character learn their skills?
"110% self taught. He doesn't like people."
Surely you have some family member, friend or mentor at some point? What terrible tragedy happened that left a child orphaned in the woods?
"Nothing as exciting as that. He just wandered out into the woods at age 8 because he was bored. There were plenty of berries, so he never had to go home. There he remained for ten years, in full isolation, and taught himself how to fend off wolves and bears, which berries and shrooms he could eat, discovered the mysteries of spellcasting, and taught himself (with no book or help from any creature, alive or dead) how to speak Elvish, Sylvan, Giant, Draconic, and the very secret Druidic languages."
@themarsh429 so he was orphaned at a young age, was never taught how to read and write, but somehow knew how to read several different languages because they came across some books randomly in the woods? I had a druid that had a similar backstory (though he was not orphaned, just left with a close family friend as his parents went into hiding, long story there lol) and this friend was a moon druid that taught him how to moon druid in the woods from the time he was 10 until adulthood
Gotta say, I love this guy and his videos. The advice he offers is just so nice and helpful, and always gets my ideas going whenever I give them a listen. If you're ever writing up things for a world, characters, or otherwise, I'd recommend just putting one of his guides on in the background and letting what ideas you have go onto the page, that's what I enjoy doing at least.
I'm going to keep a journal of what my character gets up to with the character sheet solely because it would be entertaining and you inspired
I'm having my first really transformative experience with a campaign as a player, and I think it's because the GM has implemented a similar set of questions for our backstories. It's become this fabulous back and forth between me and the GM where my PC and her experiences is being leveraged to bring the plot forward, rooting her deeper and deeper in the world's lore as we go on. As an example - my PC is poor, and the loot from the first quest we were on was several hundred GP. She realised she could use this money - from ONE QUEST - to buy back the land her family worked before The War, and she fainted on the spot. No other reaction would have sufficed! That has in turn helped cement how poverty, war, and her memories of her childhood on the farm is affecting her now. The DM has offered me the opportunity to see how buying back the farm might play out, and I am certain the cursed woods close by will make their appearance one way or another.
This video is even more amazing because of how organized it is. You can follow those tips on the exact order they are presented on the video and be able to create a backstory that works perfectly!
I must say, I remember watching your first video on the topic many years ago. I use those questions every time as an outline every single time I write a character for whatever system or world they are made for. Now I will admit that I have a tendency to write a roughly 1.5 - 2 pages long backstory and a few written out pieces to help expand on a moment and better understand my character. I am thankful for my DM to be able to enjoy the full read, but I do also have or ready to produce a bullet point list of the more important beats in the backstory in case a DM requests it and don’t require the written out pieces to be read. (But would offer a chance in case they do)
I have made many characters that I loved playing and I eagerly await to play in the future. I thank you very much for your help in writing characters for games, and if I could offer another tip for character creation that I figured out on my own, but rarely see. Include a “Guilty Pleasure” for your characters, something that they really enjoy doing. Example off the top of my head is a Wizard who in their spare time likes to perform, they may not be as good as a bard, but they enjoy the limelight as well as studying the spell book. Or with one of my characters, a drow from the underdark who, even though has to follow Lolth for appearances and the whole “not dying” thing, (she would convert to Eilistraee soon after the game begins) really enjoys cooking a good meal at the end of the day because that is just what brought them joy.
So glad to see you're still making videos! Currently working through all 708 Great GM videos!
This is great! Thank you! I love having easy tools like these shorter videos to share with my players. Thank you again!
Backstory and character journals! Love the idea of preserving the feeling of the game for years to come and look forward to it
I feel like you’ve really helped me with the first steps making a backstory thank you some much! I was having so much trouble thinking about this! Thank you thank you!❤
Great video, been struggling with a character for a while and this gave me some great ideas!
Amazing
This really adds depth to the character and the campaign
Love it
I'm preparing a massive campaign with 2 teams of 5 players each, this helped me find some holes and think of really important details! Thank you!
This was fantastic!
I'm not currently a player in anything, but I believe this a brilliantly succinct template for building characters in writing.
For far too long did I think I needed to write out each stage of their life and their relationships with every family member etc. up to the beginning of the main story before thinking they were actually ready to be used & written into the story. NO LONGER! I can build those extra bits when I need to now, because this is all the foundation I need.
Thanks a bunch!
I am now undead after trying to write. Who knew the path to lichdom was so easy?
I wrote a few paragraph a few years ago on my character's backstory... Then the GM came and cut through all of it to change what he wanted... then he never incorporated anything from it.... I'm still happy I did it, 'cause it helps me enforce the motivation of my character ^^
When creating my backstories, I always write out three segments; Birth and Growth, Establishment, and Departure. Each follows the early life of my character, exploring everything you spoke of and all in three small paragraphs each. I use them all the time to remind myself who my character is and how they would react to certain situations. I intentionally leave it filled with characters, locations, and events that hopefully the DM can sprinkle in here and there. Always give your DM plot daggers! They're fun and personalized!
Thank you. Thank you for giving an example of your own backstory.
This simplified how I structure my background writing, Thank you
Thank you so much ! I always have so much trouble creating new characters. I was looking for these kinds of keys to help me :)
I just rewrote my backstory using this and its so much better! thank you! i will try keeping an in character diary too!
A great video as always! Thanks Guy
Wow. I have just recently started playing DnD. Loving it. What a great video. I had used some of the points that you mentioned but what amazing info. Thank you!!!
I just recently found your page and hot damn, your advice not only helped me make my games better, I've been having so much more fun DMing (which is important, I'm a semi forever DM!)
I do the notes thing, sorta, i write my notes in carracter voice and purposly omit details the carracter doesnt care about.
So my current carracter doesnt care about people, she is in adventuring becouse she is collecting the souls of evil creatures. As such all the names in my notes are people that she wants dead, people in authority or people that can give her jobs.
Its also full of swearing and insults.
In contrast an earlyer carracter was noble trained and wrote extensive, detailed and dayly reports on everything that happend and that her friends did. Usualy she would downplay her own achievements and focus on her mistakes.
I cant recomend this style for everyone couse you will forget inportant plot points if you dont have others to cover for your biases. But it helps me stay in carracter.
This is great , this is lovely , thanks 👍🏼
I remember the Ultimate Backstory video. How relevant are things like parents, the character's system of wants, and what they left behind to become an adventurer?
I would argue it really depends. Most of my characters are from far away lands and we pretty much never get to explore their home, which makes the majority of what you named mostly irrelevant. You can perhaps refer to it when you get to a similar looking town or encounter something reminiscent of what you left behind. Or you can write a letter home here and there. Those parts of a backstory are always at least somewhat useful. But it can be limited by simply not encountering it ever in the game or even not encountering anything similar.
Good tips! I'm a fan of games / systems that ask questions of characters at creation, but this video proves how easy it is to do it yourself.
It was great to meet you at UKGE and to play in one of your games of Bounty Hunter. My partner and I both had a great time, and you've made her a convert to RPGing!
I'll enjoy reading through my copy of Bounty Hunter soon, no doubt.
'Lingo Johnson' (a Bounty Hunter who walks into a trap before realising he's got no combat skills or equipment whatsoever...)
Amazing video!
I kept my stuff open ended for one of my games. Like super open ended. This is because it would deal with a lot of world lore, which was my intent when creating them, as the dm was frustrated he couldn’t show off that. Personally I enjoy making a character who feels like a living part of a world. So what I did was tie the character directly in via that.
Simply, I made a earth genasi but rather than them be from some elemental plane, I had them be a statue that had life breathed into it via the gathered souls of the dead who have a difficult time passing on, to which my character had a symbiotic relationship with as a swarmkeeper. This immediately ties my character into the part of the lore that deals with death and any part of the world where a soul might be. This especially ties my character into an uncanny awareness of a large number of souls suddenly dying in a traumatic way, which is what the party needed to get back to the quest line the dm originally designed (they were so off track the dm felt lost half the time and the players did too). Anyway, so other than personality and a personal mission, and my character having a question on why the souls gather and how they can fix it, the rest was up to the dm. Heck, my character doesn’t even know how old they are (due to their hermit nature that kept them isolated and the concept of time just not having much importance). Dm did admit to me today that my character is probably….ancient but won’t be aware of that since they lack context. But yeah, my character joined up with the party like this. The party vastly needed a voice of reason and calm and caretaking but also someone they could educate in social norms of the world. The party is actually having more fun now so I don’t regret joining. We still get up to shenanigans (my character isn’t someone who stops such things, just adds perspective and direction, not obedience or the like, just a voice). We still throw our dm for a loop. But we get along and have a good time and so does the dm now. It’s a careful balance of enough direction to not feel stuck or like you got to kick some beehives til you get a reaction and the flip side of letting everyone freely choose what they want of the game to lean into. But yeah, backstory was vague for this character and huge chunks I let the dm fill in. I wanted an esoteric type of character who slowly learns to lose some of that feel as they interact more with the living. They are deeply empathetic, intelligent, and insightful, but they lack experience among souls that are whole and lively and their own selves still. As I told an npc when they ask about my symbol (pact symbol with a god, but cleric dip mechanically), “I am allied with an aspect of death as our roles align. They deal with the passing of souls on the other side and I help the souls that find it difficult to find peace in this realm. My duty is to see to their passing into his hands so that they may heal and move on. My duty is not just to death, but the living, for it’s the living and their regrets whom I must assist so they need not see me after the end of their days.”
Anyway, it was a nice cycle as we had a cleric who served a god of life and tasked themselves with alleviating the suffering of the living and protecting it and being generous when and wear they could. A tad lawful good but a bit brutal at times to achieve their goals that they leaned neutral sometimes. Mine leans neutral to neutral good. And then we have the npc god of death that the party ended up serving (two of us have pacts but all have aligned goals) who is true neutral to chaotic neutral. Its leaves our more vibing style party members to pick and choose which mentor they wish to seek advice from in roleplay moments. Yes we talk a lot about death, grief, regrets, and mortality in this game.
Before 5e and having backgrounds setup. I was horrible at creating a backstory. Even then, it got better with XGE optional tables to help really flesh it out further.
These questions can certainly make that process much less painful. 😅
Pleasure to have met you at UK Games expo last weekend, Your Seminar was great, Thanks for signing my books im Currently reading your Creating Epic Campaigns book likeing it so far, Hope you'll return next year.
Rated 4.88 out of 5
With my most recent character I decided to write a backstory for my character and as the adventure starts and continues; all of my notes that I take I try to take in character. That way I remember what my character has heard and said to minimize metagaming, but it also fleshes out the character throughout the adventure and helps build relationships with characters that feel more real.
Brilliant video. Just ramble on about your life while teaching us a lesson about charakter backgrounds. Thank you for the inspiration. I am incredibly bad at writhing character backgrounds. No problem if it’s an npc.. but for my own pc. I am so bad at it.
I’m so excited to use this! I’m terrible at coming up with backstory!
I was born in the town of Narzulbur with my uncle, because of the my parents passing. His name was Corg. I miss those days, helping my rather clumsy uncle get around the house. One of the kids that was around my age showed me to his father, and we would train whenever I was'nt doing anything else. Times we werent training, we were writing or reading. They helped me to become the person I am today. Before I left the village, I sold books in the town. I was a popular poet, but not a popular person. On the way out of the town, I bought some armor and weapons to use on my journey. I'm not a great fighter, but I try my best with the training provided to me. I'm leaving in order to become someone. To save someone, or kill someone, or what I will do is unknown to everyone including myself.
I just love ads
“Where was your character born, and it’s- MR CLEAN MULTI-SURFACE LIQUID CLEANER”
Loved the guidelines, I'm still alive 😀
I unfortunately don't have a group to play with:(
But I have created 12 different lvl 1 characters in case I found a group.
I DIDN'T STRUGGLE WITH MAKING BACKSTORIES/CHARACTERS!
Additionally, none of them are tragic/bad/negative! None of them are Humans and have at least 350 yrs potential lifespan. All of them have loving & at least moderately successful families. Their family or village provide Starting Equipment AND Gold! They all lived with their family before adventuring, so when they start their adventure is basically their first taste of real adulthood.
The only one of my characters who comes close to Independence/Adulthood before adventuring, is my Female Chaotic Neutral Drow Feylost background Death Domain Cleric sworn to the Raven Queen. She spent several decades in the Feywilds before becoming an official Adult. But most of the time she was in them was with companions of some sort. Her first companion was a Rose Nymph who fell in love with each other. Her next companion was a traveling Wild Elven Bard who is content in the Feywilds. Her last companion while there was the Raven Queen herself while being taught/trained as her Cleric. Then after that she was back in her home village with her family. Then after a few decades reconnecting with them she started adventuring as an official Adult.
After watching this video I am definitely going to rewrite the backstories of at least two of my characters and maybe find a way to have them keep a journal in game too. If our dm will allow it.
To create a living backstory as you described really well, I encourage players to share a Google Doc with me with the backstory and I will ask them questions that may explain what they wrote or help them flesh it out more or I can go back later and ask them a question to bring online with the story possibly and then also reread it and remember themselves.
I have a merchant character. Every single ration, copper, gold,everything he gets/uses/sells is kept track of every session. After over a year it is a long document, but it is very useful. I remember sessions by the deals I make. Helps to keep in character.
I gave a thumbs up for the goodbye.
One thing I love in Mutant Chronicles is the character generation. Everything mentioned here (birth faction/place, education, job) is rolled on tables, along with random and fun events (an enemy, your grandfather gave you a gun, you partiicipated medical experiment...) that give you a wonderful base for your character backstory.
Thanks mellon gonna look at that. :))
The old D&D 3.0 book "The Hero Builder's Guidebook" had a character background generator as well.
This will be a tough task for me.. I play on discord, from our home office, while my wife watches our kids, so every time I finish a session, it’s usually late, and I know she needs help, so I sign off and jump up to help her or give her a much deserved break….
But I can see how this is helpful, and I want to do it
Short videos are prime!
"How were you educated?"
"RUclips videos.."
me: I feel called out.
My player and I have been working their backstory. What's fun is when you are playing horde of the dragon queen and they choose a blue dragon as their background and you know what the first encounter will be. I will be tieing the eggs in chapter 3 to the blue dragon. They are also making a diplomat so they will want to persuade the cultists not to destroy civilization. This has created a lot of work for me but I can't wait to see the results.
"It was only last week that I had the PRIVALAGE of being a player" 😂
-Every DM ever
We love our jobs, but getting to be a player is also such a thrill!
Hey Nice im actually making a pc rn! Gonna be a usefull one hehehe
Just thought i would share this story for funs sake. It is a long one so bear with me. Or just keep scrolling.
I have a Lawful/Neutral Human Artificer named "Gunther von Wolfheart" whom i always bring to the table along with 3 character sheets for him. One Alchemist, one Artillerist and one Armorer, just incase a specific role is needed but all 3 have the same backstory and i like to play it as Roleplaying that Gunther is knowledgeable in all 3 and simply chooses "Kit" from his little arsenal based on the sheet i pick. His story is that he is a noble hailing from the islands of Lantan, nothing tragic per se, his father, "Renaard" was a stern and harsh but fair gentleman who always pushed Gunther to be the best he could be and his mother "Margareth" was the most loving woman one could find. At a very young age his parents started seeing that Gunther had a gift for being overly imaginative always trying to invent things, simple things at first and then becoming helpful for his family such as his first grand invention, a small "Chore Automaton" to help his parents with menial tasks in their daily life. He inherited the family mansion when he got older where he today conducts experiments and the family crest dominates the grand foyer in honor of his parents, the crest is a grinning black wolfs head with two crossed rapiers behind it ontop of a two parted shield with red and dark purple background.
Gunthers journey to becoming an Artificers Guild member started at the age of 12 as he underwent the education most of the wealthier denizens of Faerun learned, such as writing, reading, math among other things and ultimately leading to help him evolve as an Artificer. I always picture the Guild as sort of a Sci-Fi-ish Hogwarts with all sorts of shenanigans going on. While in the Artificers Guild he and his colleagues undertook various missions, from the occational help an old lady cure her cold or other ailments, to inventing devices and contraptions to help the community the Guild is housed in, to some more heavy stuff almost like a group of Avengers taking down badguys threatening the city.
Now in his mid 30s he kind of looks like Sir Galahad face-wise from Order 1886 but his outfit looks more like a Commissar from Warhammer and has the mannerisms of Melchett from Black Adder, sure of himself and confident but not stuck up or spoiled he is very empathic but he can be too forgiving to people at times as he also inherited his mothers way of always trying to see the good in all living beings. And yes he does do the Melchett "BEEH!" when he enters a room with people. Due to his outfit the breastplate that comes with the Commissar look is just there for cosmetic for AC purposes since he is wearing Medium armor usually so the breastplate is dented, singed and numerous little blemishes but it has the image of Bahamut, the breastplate was previously owned by his mentor, who was an elite Armorer, who took Gunther under his wing when he was taken into the Guild and upon his mentors passing he gave the breastplate to Gunther.
Now comes the somewhat tragic part about him and that is his fiancee "Claudette" came down with terminal illness so he spent resources and with the help of the Guild crafted a brass body for her and then transferred her soul into the Steel Defender or Automaton on the moment of her passing and he finds out she was always sick and the new body made her very happy because she could move around and do things her broken body could not. The downside to this is that Gunther needs to make frequent visits to Avernum on quick resource runs to find a more solid way of not making her soul fade away. This is what motivated Gunther to become an adventurer and explore the world outside the islands he grew up on, and of course to learn and gather information on his occupation (Depending on the character sheet) and to honor his father who was quite the adventurer when he was young, Gunther keeps a journal of his travels and Claudette is always with him.
Gunthers quick visits to Avernum is a quirky one, he has a "Dimensional Door in a Cardboard box" in his pack that he throws on the ground and it folds up on the ground so he enters the door horizontally, almost looks like he falls right in but the gravity makes him take a natural step in so he just flips upright upon entering and exiting.
His Eldritch Cannon is called "Helmut" and looks like a WW1 helmet with a spike ontop of it and the rest of him was just a pair of lamps for eyes, his nose was the actual cannon and the feet were placed directly on the nose and he made noises akin to Poggle, the Geonosian from Star Wars. He was also about the size of a small dog.
Thank you for the videos and sorry for the text wall.
Great stuff! I always struggle with character backstories, the creativity is always there but I usually end up just writing a scene instead of a historical blurb!
It was awesome to see you guys at the UK Games Expo! Well done on selling through your stock of campaign books! I'm sorry I missed you at the Rumbleslam table maybe next year I can give you a demo?! 🤣😂🤣
One thing that I like to do when incorporating the backstory job, is even if uts something the character hated, include something they actually learned from that profession. Even minor stuff like a formula for mortar for construction. Never is useful until it is. Then it's a depth point on the character.
I will be a great gm one day ,I will adventure all the way there 😊
That's funny. I only did that with my last character. She was just so fun to play I even took notes as if she were writing it. She was a halfling Lightfoot not quite 3 feet tall. Who's family lost their land via nefarious circumstances. Moma and Poppa got a job in the big city and found a small apartment. Tallulah.. Tall.. Pika..Cinnamon.. Scatter-brain... Klutz... had trouble with finding and keeping a job. She sampled too much food, or spilled important brews, or a number of goof-ball reasons. Being 23 she felt like she had to help her parents but didn't want to do anything dangerous. By happenstance she ended up on a boat offering "nice people" cupcakes. She was super friendly and...gullible. "Always judge a book by it's cover!" Anyway she was too terrified to leave the side of her friends and was drug into all kinds of scary places. Divine sourcerer btw. Her wand resembled rock candy which she'd lick before she touched you with it in order to heal you. LOL Her spiritual weapon was a giant cupcake! Her weapon was hard candy and a Sling shot. 😆
I entertained the party reading her messages to her parents. As soon as she got the message spell she was busy telling her parents not to worry...then tell them about a scary event. Lol
Stargizers gade... you should use that--and similar--more often, reverend Spooner.
Just a little thing: When you say "5 questions," it would be useful if you numbered them when you put up those corner parchments. You ask many more than five. Thus, picking out the intended "majors" is not always intuitively obvious to the most casual observer.
The Modiphius Conan game drastically changed how I make character backstories, especially compared to other systems.
I'm making a charecter right now where I'm the second born son to a Duke and I was raised to be an advisor for my brother "Leo" I'm letting my dm decide what causes me to leave and do whatever quest he has in mind
I think that some of your education should be class based, a fighter could be many things from a noble who had casual combat training, or a farmer who dreamed of being a knight, well that noble likely uses the family sword, while that farmer likely uses a spear (closest weapon to a pitchfork), a blacksmith likely uses a hammer, but a bookkeeper likely doesn't swing a sword, but if they do, then they have some training even if informal
I had a DM who invalidated my backstory by saying that everything I had written was altered memories caused by a false hydra. I was given a very brief backstory that the DM had written that contradicted the mechanics of the character. (Suddenly my low intelligence uneducated peasant who had been pretending to be someone else was actually a wealthy privately tutored noble’s son). The false hydra was never made to be much of the campaign, maybe 2 sessions. The new backstory also had the overused trope of being nearly the only survivor in a whole township, certainly the only survivor in my family. What do you think of a DM rewrtiting a player’s backstory for their character like this? I felt like I had lost agency almost entirely and later left because of what I perceived as railroading and the DM having predetermined outcomes for encounters.
in my first campaign I had a bunch of letters I wrote to my character's god describing the day and asking for help and advice. to end them he'd burn them. it was pretty fun
I am currently playing as a Draconic bloodline Sorcerer Thiefling, who has had to move from city to another and had to join a big crime boss to not die after releasing his peacocks and after joining in the crime boss' line, she joined in a pirate crew to gain some money for her family. Her backstory helps with world building.
I died, but it was still worth it. Thank you for introducing me to life as a lich.
I'm a new DnD player and after our first session I started to write a journal of our adventures. Unfortunately none of them even read it to catch up. I've even dabbled in DMing for them. None of my Co players share the same enthusiasm for dnd. I think I'll start looking for like minded people on the internet.
The 10 min After an session was a big No for me, It did however resulted in something I could not expect. Making a character this way, or after using a character generator and going over the results of it, by using your marvelous points. I had So much more abl to get into roleplaying the characters. Beyond this it ALSO making it easier to get into character, or play something completely i am not! Rereading the few lines of it before start of a session, really is superb trick for me to become a better player.
I never really understood how this could be anyone's problem. I think I have around 80.000 Words of backstory each for both of my most played characters and I have to force myself to not write more and more about them, because at this point, their backstory is almost more interesting than their actual adventure... But still, everytime I find something that i didn't think about before (like more questions I could answer about them), I find myself opening the same word document again and typing down the 150th page or so. That said, my DM only got around 10 pages out of those and still asked me to summarise it for him. :D oops.
But as a DM myself, I'd love to have such a long backstory for each of my players' characters, honestly. There's so much to use for a campaign, so many details to refer to, when you have a really interesting and long backstory. Although I do understand that reading so much text is not for everyone...
Well, anyway. I really like videos like these and this one was especially well made, because it's not making everthing sound too complicated while still mentioning everything that's important.
THANK YOU. I feel the same way, I’m currently playing in a homebrew campaign, and since my character comes from a fairly remote continent and our DM hadn’t really fleshed it out yet, he said: go wild. And I did, I’m still building that world, lots of it directly tied to my character, almost 80 pages right now including a timeline of historic events that happened in the world and its effects on ‘my’ continent. I’m super grateful my DM is just as much of a lore nut as I am, but it always baffles me how people can’t think of anything at all backstory-wise, when it comes so naturally to me.
My character was born in a mountain village and was the son of a cartwright. If his father hadn't died before his apprenticeship was over, he would have become a cartwright, but his mother couldn't afford to pay for his apprenticeship with another carter. While she worked at the tavern to support the other children, my character hired himself as a guide through the mountain passes. Along the way, he picked up the skills of an adventurer, and seeing the major payoffs adventurers get, he decided to become an adventurer himself.
Luckily my cleric was close by to revivify me after my death from *looks at paper and squints* taking… notes
When my group started our campaign we had simple backstories. Mine was that I (Zelda) was a noble sent to Barovia to establish a political alliance through and arranged marriage to someone in Strahd's court. Unfortunately my guards got lost in the mists and I was all alone until I met my party on the road to Barovia. Knowing I would be safer in a group I decided to go adventuring with the party out of pure survival and potential allies. Later into the campaign I found my fiancé and didn't really like him, but unfortunately I had a duty to fulfil and nothing was going to stop me from making this alliance. That was until I remembered where I was from and what happened before the day of the wedding. Apparently assassins attacked Castle Ravenloft and I was forced to flee with Van Richten before the Count could do anything to me. Note: By this point Sergei (the middle child) and was killed centuries ago. I also found out that Strahd erased part of my memory and now wants me dead. He also managed to execute my father, the king of Neverwinter and possibly my guards. During the campaign, Zelda also lost her mother and found out she had a brother who disinherited her from the Alagondar royal family as soon as he became king of Neverwinter. Fortunately, one of the party members is Strahd's youngest brother (the forgotten prince, also a vampire btw) Alexander Von Roeyen (Zarovich) who promised my character the alliance with Neverwinter as soon as Strahd was defeated and he took the throne. As of now in the campaign, Zelda and Alexander are very close to the point of falling in love. This makes things both wholesome and complicated to say the least. Who knows what will happen next.
Keeping it simple is great advice. As a GM, all I really want in a PC's backstory is where they're from, how they learned to do whatever it is they do and why they want to adventure with the party.
Another thing about keeping it simple is that it leaves room to improvise. Don't try to nail everything down before the campaign starts. Give yourself a broad outline, but leave the precise details until later.
It's a hell of a lot easier for a GM to work, "I'm the youngest of the seven children of Lord and lady Bracknell." into the campaign than, "My oldest sibling is Arvost, and he ...".
so while it didn't kill me it might have taxed our DM's patience as i asked for a synopsis of our entire adventure thus far so i could write up my character comments. we're in book 5 of the rise of the runelords pathfinder adventure path and have been playing for nearly a year and a half now btw 😂 it was a really fun exercise and i loved making my bio page a living document.
I died. Undead DM here. Doesn't crave brains, craves more dice
I just realized it’s been almost a year since I watched your videos and I’m not sure how that happened.
Xanathar's Guide to Everything has a very helpful section for people who have trouble coming up with a backstory. It involves a bunch of dice rolls that generate your earlier life, family situation, place of birth, childhood memories, etc. Just jot down the results of each roll on a piece of paper and afterwards see if you can piece it all together in a compact way that makes sense. I am terrible at these things and this guide forces me to think outside the box sometimes.
I summarize backstories as follows: The best backstory explains the numbers that are on your characters. This allows both the player and GM to bring the backstory into the game whenever you find yourself needing to roll a dice.
I didnt die but my neighbour who kept blasting his music while I was trying to write it? He wasnt so lucky.
I find that I do all of these except, "why did I become an adventurer," which now makes me think of how many wasted opportunities I had
easy back stories
a dragon is holding my home town hostage, I must acquire X amount of gold by year X or bad stuff happens
one of the sacred objects was stolen from the temple, I must track down its location an return it
my dad went out to go get milk but never came back, I must return him to mother (an Annis Hag)
all of these are quests in them selves
this is what makes your GMs life easy
you have a personal goal and are taking agency
you are making content for your GM to use
"You had a nice life in a nice town, why'd you decide to go adventuring?"
"Eh, town suddenly had a rather large amount of angry husbands..."
I have a changeling who had been dumped at a monastery as a baby. Now he’s a changeling monk with “The way Of Mercy” and a bounty hunter background. Now he is searching for his family, plus he has a LOT of skills and abilities. Is that too corny???
I thought of a bard that came from a rich family and instead of continuing the family business he wanted to draw tentacle hentai so he adventures to get ideas for his next drawing
Still alive!
Here's a meta reason: Someone stole my garden gnomes.
I wonder how many people will get the reference?
Omg I wanted to be a paleontologist when I was little too!🤣🤣🤣
Me: I'll just sit down and type up a backstory. What harm could it do? Surely, the rumors of instant death are false.
The next morning my parent find a note next to my lifeless body.
Mother : "He was valiant and pure of spirit. Through his travels he found the Holy Grail in the Castle of Aaargh.
Father: What?
Mother: "The Castle of Aaargh.", He must have died writing it.
Father: Look, if he was dying, he wouldn't bother to write "Aaargh." He'd just say it.
Me: Why are you in my room!?! You're only supposed to use the house key in emergencies. Oh, are those donuts?
Unpopular opinion: Large backstories are often the most uninteresting. Mainly because most of the larger backstories are the one's with details no one cares about. If you have a large backstory, you probably had a lot of ideas while writing it, I personally recommend you find the interesting parts that shaped your character, and scrap the parts that are just extras that don't really matter. (A life changing event like an illness or a curse is an example of an important event, vs an unimportant event like what they ate for breakfast, or that one time they got a papercut.
I have more of the opposite problem, my players like to write a total of 0 backstory, goals, attitude and whatever
I'm dead, I've got my death certificate to prove it
Seriously good advice man as always, thank you
I died 💀
Did you just say starguisers gate at the end?
Rofl
FFS Guy I was writing my backstory over the last month, and was struggling. Why now? xD