Literally everytime that I can, I would rather rely on building an adventure on PC backstories than run any premade module. I might even include a module in the adventure, but truthfully, the adventure is exploring PC backstories. To me this feels like the players are FULLY playing. They want a game, I'm giving them the game that they want.
In case he doesn't/can't get around to it, ruclips.net/video/LmZSWKPXhZ4/видео.html I believe it's during the character creation segment of the video that they discuss backstories.
I come up with a general idea for the backstory and then I'll use the Xanathar tables to add an extra flavor (family, life events, lifestyle, etc). After I have all that I usually write a short story, about a half-page and submit it to my DM. Gives him the main points to work with and maybe some secondary points to surprise me in game.
The idea that backstory length is different for each player can be extended to individual characters. I've got a number of character concepts that have different levels of backstory, depending on their setup. Some are full of gaps for DM control while others have more defined details to help setup specific traits.
As a player, I always try to keep My backstory short; usually from half a page to a full page. Rarely do they ever go over 2 pages. Some most of the times, give just an outline of important events (hook starts?) That would have affected the PC.
AS A DM, I do ask my players if they want a backstory centric game and then do limit them to 2 pages. I know as DM I want to players to be happy and having fun and many do love making backstories but they are also aspiring writings and so I get 40pages. My SO wrote a backstory for their PC's mother before writing the PC's backstory and it did reach over 40pages. If she's reading this, I am sorry my love, but for me, anything more than 8 pages is excessive.
My Backstories are typically bullet points. They aren't a narrative, but bullet points that indicate specific events with 1-2 sentences each that helped shape my character's personality. I also put "Knives" that the DM can stab me with in my bullet points. The main story of the character is then played out in the game. That said, I look forward to what the vid has to say.
I’m the dm of our group, and this new campaign that we started im doing more of a sandbox than a rail road campaign. So I’ve actually decided to incorporate my players backstories into the campaign. While my players backstories are quiet detailed, it’s that detailed-ness that is helping me find things to help drive their story arc. So from my pov as a dm I’m all for backstories-be it short or detailed.
One of my problems with back stories is most people try to come up with amazing things that happened before the game starts. And I think, no... NOW is the time amazing things start to happen in your life. What led you to this point? Chances are you were as boring as everyone else until "X" happened. What was "X"? Monsters killed your family? Found out you had an aptitude for magic because of a time of extreme stress? What? Not "I was a child prodigy and slew a dragon at age 13." 😂
I've been praised by multiple DMs for the backstories I've created for various PCs I've played over the years, and I think a fellow player summed it up nicely when we did a post-campaign debrief. He said, "your backstories are always just plot hook factories. You give the DM this platter of story elements to choose from to use however they want." And that I think is the key approach to backstory, of understanding WHY we have backstories. They exist for two reasons: To inform the player about motivations and how/what to react to; and to give the DM ammunition they can use to craft the world. They're free worldbuilding for the DM, because it's EVERYONE's job to create the world. How big that story is, what it involves, and what details and gaps are there can vary wildly, but here are the three things that I always tend to include: 1.) Who were you as a kid, and what did you dream of becoming? 2.) What f'ed you up so that you can't live that life? 3.) What are you hiding from everyone, and maybe even lying to yourself about? There can be plenty other things in there, but if this is all you have, you have a compelling character that both you and the DM understand, and that the DM can use to fuel adventure if they so choose (and that should almost always be an "if", in my opinion).
Creating the backstory helps me learn my character. I must know where he's been to know where he wants to go. It also enriches the session-to-session gameplay for me, regardless of whether the DM incorporates my backstory into the adventure (which admittedly rules).
As a DM I’m okay with a brief backstory from my players so they and I know who the character is. I ask additional backstory questions as the campaign progresses and then tie it in later when it makes sense.
Brennan is 100% with this advice. Make sure you write enough so that your character has things they legit care about, and give your DM enough so they can create plot points you're sure to bite on. Good vid, Coach.
@The Dungeon Coach thanks for that, Coach! I'm a fan of your work, and have a great time deconstructing concepts to make them fit my brand of dnd. And whenever I hear/see something I don't like, I figure out why and learn more about myself and my vision of the game. It's a constant learning process, and I learned it from you; I apply it to every part of my life now.
I love writing up backstories but before the dnd hobby, I came from a place of writing actual stories. So a different medium but storytelling still. I tend to write backstories with an idea of themes, connections to their environment (people, places, things), motivations, and the trajectory of what type of character arc I’m hoping for. Please note that last part is a wishlist item rather than solid. Things change and dnd really teaches us that lesson very well. Anyway, so yeah, I came from a place in writing where I keep in mind arcs and such, elements that can vary on what type of length of backstory one needs. One of my favorite things I have learned I love to do with backstories too, is write them in such a way that it intrigues my dm too. I like leaving hints and open ended section in the backstory that snap up the interest of the dm and make them think “what happened/happens here?” and then try to fill it in after we discuss some things. I will of course try to give them a vague idea on what type of thing I want of that but I like inspiring their own creativity too. One of the major reasons I joined the dnd hobby is that I missed one of the biggest quality time activities among my friend groups, collaborative storytelling. Majority of the friends I have ever made have been writers or artists or some type of creative. I got very used to those “jam sessions” we all used to have time to come up with things collaboratively, sharing our skillsets with each other and helping each other reach the next level of whatever project we were putting together. As an adult, dnd has filled a lot of that type of socialization I missed. Not that I don’t still do this with my non-dnd friends, we just have less time for it since aligning schedules has only gotten harder (and doesn’t it really say something when I can schedule dnd sessions with more consistency than time with those friends, just all of us are way too busy). Honestly, I just really love collaborating. The mind meld part of it, being in sync and just the back and forth of that is really gratifying for me. But yeah, anyway, my thing with backstories is that I tend to heavily tailor them to the table I play at, who I’m playing with, and what the themes and world are of the campaign I’m playing in. I try to keep myself highly flexible when figuring out a backstory. I like making characters that feel living and breathing for the world they are in and who have good motivations to stay with their party and align with them. Not to mention I also figure out character traits that not only overlap but contrast with the others in such a way that we can best highlight each other. Let me put together an example. In one of my roleplaying/storytelling heavy campaigns I designed out a character to be made as I was a later addition to an ongoing campaign. After asking after the other players, and whatever they wished to share of their character’s stories, and asking the dm themself for bits and bobs, I sat down and created some points that have already started panning out in game. First, I have set up this character to be a scholar and of the same faction as our artificer (it’s a researcher/archivist faction) but unlike the artificer, they were more of a field agent and researcher of people (linguistics scholar) than an inventor of magical objects. The two have overlap but also contrast. As some of the other players put it, they enjoyed the contrast of the artificer researching because they wanted to use the knowledge FOR something while, for my character, the simple act of researching for the joy of researching was enough of a motivation, not necessarily needing or wanting to use it for anything except for understanding. Another overlap I made panned out particularly recently and highlighted a huge character arc for our monk. Monk comes from a backstory of being an ex-soldier turned mercenary but being born of nobility. They are jaded, bitter, and used to being used, weaponized even. For the setting of the world, his home country is at war with a neighboring country and the monk has participated in this war, despite their relatively young age still. One of the big arcs they have been on was to change themselves to a more emphatic individual who also is more independent and takes responsibility for that independence, not tolerating being used like he has in the past. Now, where does my character come into this? Well, other than my character and the monk clicking and getting along like a house on fire, we have contrasting experiences with the same neighboring country. He has grown up and lived an experience with the neighboring country as enemies. Mine? They had a late fiancé of that country. In other words? They came from a place of love rather than hate. Both our characters became affected by the ongoing war and both are jaded and disillusioned by the entire thing, but the monk was actually the first that my character trusted with the knowledge that they had a fiancé once, and one of that other country. This was a high risk for my character to admit, given they could be captured and killed for “being a traitor” if anyone found out (meta, outside the party that is). When my character was asked by the monk for my character to teach him the language of the neighboring country, my character agreed and gave their reveal on why they knew the language (the fiancé). The monk’s player admitted to me that, had my character revealed that even a week and a half ago in-game time, our characters would likely being having it out with each other and possibly have some negative tension. The timing of this reveal? It highlighted how far the monk came when he accepted it with sincerity and kindness and only made a request to be taught more understanding by my character for that country. It was probably the main moment when my character went from “this person I could see being my friend” to “this person is my friend and one of the major people I trust in this world.” And all that came from a minor detail of where my character’s fiancé is from, who my character saw their fiancé as (idealistic, optimistic, the war would have broken their heart), and where my character learned that language from. Just small details that wove together that moment. The party as a whole loved that rp moment and it’s probably the one I’m most proud of, not for my sake, but because it fulfilled the intended purpose of that secret, it highlighted the monk and really showed off how far he had come in changing his original path, and becoming a person he could feel proud of being. I was happy to be the foil to that. My character is settling in still but this is just a few examples of ways I set up my backstories to do their job and create moments for the entire party. How much backstory I create and what I create will vary depending on the party needs and the intended type of story I am thinking of playing out. I have my fun which is the entire point. 😊
In the campaign I'm currently running, the backstories were okay. Nothing wrong with them that I could put my finger on, they were all just missing that something special. The Iron Man click, as Brennan described it. For several sessions, the characters were just kind of floating along. We were having fun, but none of us were invested yet. Then about two sessions ago, they travelled through a magical area that made them relive their memories. They decided to tie a rope around their waists to prevent getting separated. We had adventures in each PC's backstory, which made it all a lot more concrete. I filled in the gaps in their stories with repressed memories. And now they have a magical unbreakable rope as a tangible representation of how they strengthened their bonds in the process. Point is, starting with a weak backstory and motivation isn't a death sentence to the narrative. There's always time to explore and find more depth in the characters.
I really don't like Aabria dming style, also asking other player's back stories before the game kinda spoils part of the fun. Imo backstories should max be 2 3 pages, it should describe a good origin, potential threats, what the character desires and aspires to be or do or find, that can be that motive to adventure. But the biggest is to not describe the root causes of every big events, that way the DM can play with your backstory znd surprise you with it
My favorite backstory out of all the characters I've created is one with the Feylost background. I basically wrote about how exactly he got to Feywild and then left what exactly happened there and how he got back to the prime material plane up for GM. Then gave them a small list or mood board if you will of the concepts behind the character to help form those decisions and they in return gave me the cliff notes version of what I needed to know while leaving blanks for me to find out along the way.
I do like writing my backstory out with some descriptions and some flair, but I also make a bullet point version and an NPC cheat sheet to send the DM. The act of writing it out is helpful to me as a player in figuring out my character. But the DM doesn't usually need two to three pages of prose, and as a DM I know how useful it is to have the short version on hand for mid-session check-ups.
Some good information. My player is it unilight on backstory and they have to build as they go. I was looking for the PDF document in the comments did I miss it?
As a long time DM, I don't care at all about your backstory, it is there to help you roleplay more effectively. I need to know about your character's GOALS. What do they want? And I will fill in why what they want is bad for them, and along the way, help them learn what they need. Hopefully have a grand adventure along the way.
![DDG & G Herbo - Nosey [Official Video]](http://i.ytimg.com/vi/I9Ra0Zc2NlQ/mqdefault.jpg)
How important are backstories to YOU?!
As a DM... I love backstory. It allows me to add so much emotional depth to the world for that player
Literally everytime that I can, I would rather rely on building an adventure on PC backstories than run any premade module. I might even include a module in the adventure, but truthfully, the adventure is exploring PC backstories. To me this feels like the players are FULLY playing. They want a game, I'm giving them the game that they want.
Depends on the character ...
Can you add a link to the original video in your description?
In case he doesn't/can't get around to it, ruclips.net/video/LmZSWKPXhZ4/видео.html
I believe it's during the character creation segment of the video that they discuss backstories.
I come up with a general idea for the backstory and then I'll use the Xanathar tables to add an extra flavor (family, life events, lifestyle, etc). After I have all that I usually write a short story, about a half-page and submit it to my DM. Gives him the main points to work with and maybe some secondary points to surprise me in game.
The idea that backstory length is different for each player can be extended to individual characters. I've got a number of character concepts that have different levels of backstory, depending on their setup. Some are full of gaps for DM control while others have more defined details to help setup specific traits.
As a player, I always try to keep My backstory short; usually from half a page to a full page. Rarely do they ever go over 2 pages.
Some most of the times, give just an outline of important events (hook starts?) That would have affected the PC.
AS A DM, I do ask my players if they want a backstory centric game and then do limit them to 2 pages. I know as DM I want to players to be happy and having fun and many do love making backstories but they are also aspiring writings and so I get 40pages.
My SO wrote a backstory for their PC's mother before writing the PC's backstory and it did reach over 40pages.
If she's reading this, I am sorry my love, but for me, anything more than 8 pages is excessive.
My Backstories are typically bullet points. They aren't a narrative, but bullet points that indicate specific events with 1-2 sentences each that helped shape my character's personality. I also put "Knives" that the DM can stab me with in my bullet points. The main story of the character is then played out in the game.
That said, I look forward to what the vid has to say.
I’m the dm of our group, and this new campaign that we started im doing more of a sandbox than a rail road campaign. So I’ve actually decided to incorporate my players backstories into the campaign. While my players backstories are quiet detailed, it’s that detailed-ness that is helping me find things to help drive their story arc. So from my pov as a dm I’m all for backstories-be it short or detailed.
One of my problems with back stories is most people try to come up with amazing things that happened before the game starts. And I think, no... NOW is the time amazing things start to happen in your life. What led you to this point? Chances are you were as boring as everyone else until "X" happened. What was "X"? Monsters killed your family? Found out you had an aptitude for magic because of a time of extreme stress? What? Not "I was a child prodigy and slew a dragon at age 13." 😂
Nailed it, Bug.
I've been praised by multiple DMs for the backstories I've created for various PCs I've played over the years, and I think a fellow player summed it up nicely when we did a post-campaign debrief. He said, "your backstories are always just plot hook factories. You give the DM this platter of story elements to choose from to use however they want."
And that I think is the key approach to backstory, of understanding WHY we have backstories. They exist for two reasons: To inform the player about motivations and how/what to react to; and to give the DM ammunition they can use to craft the world. They're free worldbuilding for the DM, because it's EVERYONE's job to create the world. How big that story is, what it involves, and what details and gaps are there can vary wildly, but here are the three things that I always tend to include:
1.) Who were you as a kid, and what did you dream of becoming?
2.) What f'ed you up so that you can't live that life?
3.) What are you hiding from everyone, and maybe even lying to yourself about?
There can be plenty other things in there, but if this is all you have, you have a compelling character that both you and the DM understand, and that the DM can use to fuel adventure if they so choose (and that should almost always be an "if", in my opinion).
Always enjoy your backstory vids!! I'm going to be using your background pdf in my next campaign! Amazing as always coach!!!
YES! Thank you for that! I use that is EVERYTHING I do lol :)
Creating the backstory helps me learn my character. I must know where he's been to know where he wants to go. It also enriches the session-to-session gameplay for me, regardless of whether the DM incorporates my backstory into the adventure (which admittedly rules).
I like a paragraph or two about the backstory, more than a page or two and I’m lost. I just need a little something to incorporate into the adventure
As a DM I’m okay with a brief backstory from my players so they and I know who the character is. I ask additional backstory questions as the campaign progresses and then tie it in later when it makes sense.
Brennan is 100% with this advice. Make sure you write enough so that your character has things they legit care about, and give your DM enough so they can create plot points you're sure to bite on.
Good vid, Coach.
Chris bro! I just wanted to say thank you for being a part of the crew for so long man! I appreciate you!
@The Dungeon Coach thanks for that, Coach! I'm a fan of your work, and have a great time deconstructing concepts to make them fit my brand of dnd. And whenever I hear/see something I don't like, I figure out why and learn more about myself and my vision of the game. It's a constant learning process, and I learned it from you; I apply it to every part of my life now.
I love writing up backstories but before the dnd hobby, I came from a place of writing actual stories. So a different medium but storytelling still. I tend to write backstories with an idea of themes, connections to their environment (people, places, things), motivations, and the trajectory of what type of character arc I’m hoping for. Please note that last part is a wishlist item rather than solid. Things change and dnd really teaches us that lesson very well. Anyway, so yeah, I came from a place in writing where I keep in mind arcs and such, elements that can vary on what type of length of backstory one needs. One of my favorite things I have learned I love to do with backstories too, is write them in such a way that it intrigues my dm too. I like leaving hints and open ended section in the backstory that snap up the interest of the dm and make them think “what happened/happens here?” and then try to fill it in after we discuss some things. I will of course try to give them a vague idea on what type of thing I want of that but I like inspiring their own creativity too.
One of the major reasons I joined the dnd hobby is that I missed one of the biggest quality time activities among my friend groups, collaborative storytelling. Majority of the friends I have ever made have been writers or artists or some type of creative. I got very used to those “jam sessions” we all used to have time to come up with things collaboratively, sharing our skillsets with each other and helping each other reach the next level of whatever project we were putting together. As an adult, dnd has filled a lot of that type of socialization I missed. Not that I don’t still do this with my non-dnd friends, we just have less time for it since aligning schedules has only gotten harder (and doesn’t it really say something when I can schedule dnd sessions with more consistency than time with those friends, just all of us are way too busy). Honestly, I just really love collaborating. The mind meld part of it, being in sync and just the back and forth of that is really gratifying for me.
But yeah, anyway, my thing with backstories is that I tend to heavily tailor them to the table I play at, who I’m playing with, and what the themes and world are of the campaign I’m playing in. I try to keep myself highly flexible when figuring out a backstory. I like making characters that feel living and breathing for the world they are in and who have good motivations to stay with their party and align with them. Not to mention I also figure out character traits that not only overlap but contrast with the others in such a way that we can best highlight each other. Let me put together an example. In one of my roleplaying/storytelling heavy campaigns I designed out a character to be made as I was a later addition to an ongoing campaign. After asking after the other players, and whatever they wished to share of their character’s stories, and asking the dm themself for bits and bobs, I sat down and created some points that have already started panning out in game.
First, I have set up this character to be a scholar and of the same faction as our artificer (it’s a researcher/archivist faction) but unlike the artificer, they were more of a field agent and researcher of people (linguistics scholar) than an inventor of magical objects. The two have overlap but also contrast. As some of the other players put it, they enjoyed the contrast of the artificer researching because they wanted to use the knowledge FOR something while, for my character, the simple act of researching for the joy of researching was enough of a motivation, not necessarily needing or wanting to use it for anything except for understanding.
Another overlap I made panned out particularly recently and highlighted a huge character arc for our monk. Monk comes from a backstory of being an ex-soldier turned mercenary but being born of nobility. They are jaded, bitter, and used to being used, weaponized even. For the setting of the world, his home country is at war with a neighboring country and the monk has participated in this war, despite their relatively young age still. One of the big arcs they have been on was to change themselves to a more emphatic individual who also is more independent and takes responsibility for that independence, not tolerating being used like he has in the past. Now, where does my character come into this? Well, other than my character and the monk clicking and getting along like a house on fire, we have contrasting experiences with the same neighboring country. He has grown up and lived an experience with the neighboring country as enemies. Mine? They had a late fiancé of that country. In other words? They came from a place of love rather than hate. Both our characters became affected by the ongoing war and both are jaded and disillusioned by the entire thing, but the monk was actually the first that my character trusted with the knowledge that they had a fiancé once, and one of that other country. This was a high risk for my character to admit, given they could be captured and killed for “being a traitor” if anyone found out (meta, outside the party that is). When my character was asked by the monk for my character to teach him the language of the neighboring country, my character agreed and gave their reveal on why they knew the language (the fiancé). The monk’s player admitted to me that, had my character revealed that even a week and a half ago in-game time, our characters would likely being having it out with each other and possibly have some negative tension. The timing of this reveal? It highlighted how far the monk came when he accepted it with sincerity and kindness and only made a request to be taught more understanding by my character for that country. It was probably the main moment when my character went from “this person I could see being my friend” to “this person is my friend and one of the major people I trust in this world.” And all that came from a minor detail of where my character’s fiancé is from, who my character saw their fiancé as (idealistic, optimistic, the war would have broken their heart), and where my character learned that language from. Just small details that wove together that moment. The party as a whole loved that rp moment and it’s probably the one I’m most proud of, not for my sake, but because it fulfilled the intended purpose of that secret, it highlighted the monk and really showed off how far he had come in changing his original path, and becoming a person he could feel proud of being. I was happy to be the foil to that.
My character is settling in still but this is just a few examples of ways I set up my backstories to do their job and create moments for the entire party. How much backstory I create and what I create will vary depending on the party needs and the intended type of story I am thinking of playing out. I have my fun which is the entire point. 😊
In the campaign I'm currently running, the backstories were okay. Nothing wrong with them that I could put my finger on, they were all just missing that something special. The Iron Man click, as Brennan described it. For several sessions, the characters were just kind of floating along. We were having fun, but none of us were invested yet.
Then about two sessions ago, they travelled through a magical area that made them relive their memories. They decided to tie a rope around their waists to prevent getting separated. We had adventures in each PC's backstory, which made it all a lot more concrete. I filled in the gaps in their stories with repressed memories. And now they have a magical unbreakable rope as a tangible representation of how they strengthened their bonds in the process.
Point is, starting with a weak backstory and motivation isn't a death sentence to the narrative. There's always time to explore and find more depth in the characters.
I really don't like Aabria dming style, also asking other player's back stories before the game kinda spoils part of the fun. Imo backstories should max be 2 3 pages, it should describe a good origin, potential threats, what the character desires and aspires to be or do or find, that can be that motive to adventure. But the biggest is to not describe the root causes of every big events, that way the DM can play with your backstory znd surprise you with it
But don't spend too much energy on backstory in case your character dies in the first encounter.
My favorite backstory out of all the characters I've created is one with the Feylost background. I basically wrote about how exactly he got to Feywild and then left what exactly happened there and how he got back to the prime material plane up for GM. Then gave them a small list or mood board if you will of the concepts behind the character to help form those decisions and they in return gave me the cliff notes version of what I needed to know while leaving blanks for me to find out along the way.
I do like writing my backstory out with some descriptions and some flair, but I also make a bullet point version and an NPC cheat sheet to send the DM. The act of writing it out is helpful to me as a player in figuring out my character. But the DM doesn't usually need two to three pages of prose, and as a DM I know how useful it is to have the short version on hand for mid-session check-ups.
I can’t find the link to the backstory pdf you talk about at the end of the video. Could you comment it here?
💜💜💜
Some good information. My player is it unilight on backstory and they have to build as they go. I was looking for the PDF document in the comments did I miss it?
Where can I watch the original
Game Masters of Exandria Roundtable on the Critical Role channel
Thanks
As a long time DM, I don't care at all about your backstory, it is there to help you roleplay more effectively. I need to know about your character's GOALS. What do they want? And I will fill in why what they want is bad for them, and along the way, help them learn what they need. Hopefully have a grand adventure along the way.
Very
ill never take a man seriously when they are wearing fucking nail varnish.
Its called nail polish, it makes your fingers pretty
Also this is one of the best DM in the world, he doesnt need you taking him seriously