D&D 5E How often do you tie in backgrounds?

[Azurewraith]

If the player gives me something to work with in said background ill work with it, if they don't well I'm stuffed

 

[jayoungr]

Are you including BIFTs in this question? (The gold dragon from HotDQ is technically a Bond, for example, rather than a Background).

Either way, I have seen it run the spectrum from "no effect on roleplaying" to "an important part of the core concept." For example, I have played alongside a cleric with the charlatan background: she used to pretend to be a cleric as a con game until some deity actually gave her powers. In the same game, I'm a bard with the urchin background; he's undergone an Oliver Twist-style rags to riches transformation but still knows stuff from his rough-and-tumble days.

 

[Ahglock]

Shouldn't the background that the player writes up include their background from the PH (or customer one)?

In my group we do frequently use backgrounds for more than just mechanical purposes. In our group it flows both ways, sometimes the DM initiates the use and sometimes the players do.

Sure. My point is if you just say soldier sure you get whatever the soldier feature bonus is if it comes up but I'm not rewriting my campaign around that. If you write up your soldier background I will. It's not even much needed. Where were you a soldier? Give me something to work with and I'll use it. Don't give me anything and I'll keep it more generic. I only have so much time in the week to prep things. If I'm doing it from scratch with no help from the players it will be more generic. I'm fine with organic backgrounds developed in play if you aren't the writing type. But until you develop it I have less to work with. You will get your free passage as a sailor but I'm not going to have a former crew mate bump into you and have a story hook about the white whale sighting if you don't tell me about the white whale that killed most of your friends.

 

[MrHotter]

I would hope that the players personal story (background) would come up in every adventure. If your player just has the background listed and does not have any story to go with it, then I would work with them to flesh out their character so they have a story that intertwines with your world.

I think the adventures we make (or published adventure you use) should be different based on the backgrounds of the characters in our game. I try to tie the characters directly to the story if I can to make them feel more involved. You may end up needing to change some of the story you already have, or just add in some new story ideas.

If their backstory gets more complicated than what could be expressed with one of the built in backgrounds then you can always change the name of an existing background or create a new one. In my game I have a player who has her background listed as village wise woman and uses the Folk Hero background because being a healer gets her a warm welcome in any village. Of course there are many other parts to her background story besides being a village healer, so I don't consider the background chosen to be the only thing we should think of when working the character into the story.

 

[Warmaster Horus]

As a DM I usually let players initiate references to their PC's background.

"Hey, my Fighter is an Outlander from the High Forest, so I become concerned when he merchant mentions..."

That tells me the player actually cares about the PC's background and wants it to matter in the story. I've usually got enough to do without dipping into backgrounds unless the player is indicating they want me to.

 

[ccs]

It depends upon the game/players.
I'm DMing 2 5e games. In the 1st the players requested pretty much random dungeons with only minimal plot. So their backgrounds aren't terribly important beyond whatever mechanics they gained. (in fact I can't name 2 of them without looking at my notes).
The 2nd game? All 4 characters are outlander barbarians from a northern orc/.5 orc tribe - who were summoned into the adventure via a Horn of Valhalla. The horn ended up being destroyed before the hours duration was up. Now without the horn around to send them back home they're stuck Gruumsh only knows where in the more civilized southlands. So yeah, their ignorant savage background matters quite a bit.

 

[Shiroiken]

Not as much as I should. With the exception of Sage and Entertainer, no one has really gotten benefit out of their Background Trait. I have attempted to incorporate some of their characters' history into the game. I feel I need to do a much better job in my next campaign.

 

[iserith]

In my episodic, pulp action Serial Hero campaign, I set up Achievements the players can earn during play which determines how many Hero Points they have in the next episode. (It's also a good way to structure a fun conversation that reinforces the events of play.) One of the standard achievements is:

Actually Useful Backstory
You used your background feature to achieve a goal.

Sometimes a little mechanical reward is enough to encourage players to be mindful of opportunities to use their background to good effect during play.

 

[Rhenny]

Like Iserith and Warmaster Horus, the sessions I run almost always give 1 or more players a chance to lean heavily on backgrounds (including flaws, bonds, personality traits, etc ), but it is up to the player to take the ball and run with it. Some of my players will run with it, while others not so much.

 

[Kite474]

So far never. Now player's do have backstories/gamestories that run the gamut of:
1. "LE wannabe warlord" turned dangerously close "LG wanna be "world unite-er"".... May also eventually steal the Antichrist
2. Disenfranchised Noble who became a bard to piss off dad turned "I keep ing up everything.... Also may have sired the Antichrist"
3. Bastard child of evil Emperor whos still pissed at dad. Background was used for an incredibly stupid 4th wall joke
4. A drow who followed the "How to have an edgy backstory" manual to the T
5. Two plain jane children of nobles off to make mom and dad proud
6. An old criminal after the man who sold him out and betrayed him
7. A young women raised in the woods who eventually learned she was the descendant
8. A quack who keeps collecting body parts for unknown reasons
9. A former university professor turned servant of the old gods
10. A pair of utter murder hobos
12. A Dwarf with a weird fetish for boats and a nose for ancient temples

So generally "Backgrounds" themselves have only really been used for skills. Though player's still have backstories some grand, some small, and some nonexistent (which is really fine. Those two murder hobos tend to be more "Roll with punches to forge identity" kind of guys which works great).

At least from my point of view it's mainly due to the mundanity of them. As they are essentially supposed to be your 9-5s before you decided to go kill monsters and rob tombs for a living. Even the most off the wall ones feel too.... "normal" I suppose, at least how they are presented