How to build an indepth character

[Dykstrav]

There is so much going on in an RPG that an elaborate backstory can be a hindrance. Plus, you don't want a character whose most interesting life events are behind him. I usually start with, "My character is named X. He is a ___ who ___." Then you figure out why he's with the other group members, what motivates him to adventure, and a few mannerisms, catch phrases, and habits.

I agree with this. In the beginning of a new campaign, too much background in a character can stifle creativity. Like real people, characters are far more interesting when you learn something new about them every so often. You should have enough description of the character to play them as distinct from other characters and little more. Worry about more background once the ball is rolling.

Writers for television shows specifically leave characters room to develop over time. Since we follow a similar serial format in a campaign structure, I think that it's a useful narrative parallel.

For example, it's perfectly acceptable to start off with, "My dwarf fighter is named Tordek. He adventures to prove himself to his clan elders and accumulate wealth." As the campaign progresses, the player and DM can jointly determine why and how the situation came to pass. Maybe in the Forge of Fury, Tordek's clan elders grudgingly approve of him recovering the weapons of Durgeddin the Black. The players seem a bit surprised that the dwarven elders aren't thrilled, so the DM and player decide why on the spot--Tordek's older brother Ralcoss was destined to be a great warrior and lead his clan, but suffered a debilitating injury when repelling an orc attack. They feel that Tordek is dishonoring his brother by outshining his achievements, but it's not a sentiment that they can directly express or really punish him for. He's just got middle child syndrome and has to deal with it.

As far as the initial party... I've never really understood the D&D tradition that the party members don't know one another when the campaign begins. Why not? As part of character creation, I have my players describe how they know one another and why they would be adventuring together before the campaign begins. Future characters that join the party must also have a connection.

For example, in my last ongoing 4E campaign, the characters in the party knew each other in the following ways:

• A shifter warden, he was a twin with our shifter shaman. He also knew the human fighter because they worked caravan escort duty together.
• A human fighter, he served with the warden on caravan duty and knows the human bard from tavern-crawls.
• A human wizard, he knew the bard from a regular arcane symposium and the shaman from ritual training.
• A shifter shaman, she knew the wizard from ritual training and is a twin with the shifter warden.
• A human bard, she knew the wizard from a regular arcane symposium and the human fighter from regular tavern-hopping when they have the cash.
• A goliath barbarian, he knew the shifter warden and the shifter shaman fro inter-tribal dealings.

 

[caelum]

Inspired in part by character creation in Dread and in part by the silly Facebook meme, here's the questionnaire I used for my most recent campaign. It was optional but the players seemed to love it and all did it.

I wanted a mix of big picture questions and more specific ones that could develop character traits. I am unapologetic about including leading questions: those led to some of the most interesting aspects, and the players weren't afraid to say things like, "I'd never be caught dead singing!" and only pick up on the ones that resonated with them.

There's also a questionnaire in Goodman Games' PC Pearls, but I find it too generic for my personal taste.

25 Random Things About Your Character
1. Why haven’t you settled down yet?
2. What makes you lie awake at night?
3. What have you been meaning to do for months, but haven’t quite gotten around to?
4. What is your best childhood memory?
5. At which game did you consistently beat your friends?
6. When did you first realize that you weren’t like the other children? And what did you do?
7. What did they do?
8. Were you “baptized”? Why or why not?
9. What won’t you even attempt to do, for fear of failure?
10. What did the witch woman tell your mother the day you were born?
11. When the world seems against you, what is the one thing that keeps you going?
12. Where did you get those shoes?
13. What do people automatically assume about you? Why are they wrong?
14. How often do you make something up in order to avoid answering “I don’t know”?
15. What’s the last song you sang? Did anyone throw anything at you?
16. What will you do to make a living if this whole adventuring thing doesn’t work out for you?
17. What happened to your first crush?
18. What brought you to Garollos?
19. How will you squander your first 10,000 gp treasure?
20. What disappoints your parents most about you? What disappoints you most about your parents?
21. What will the monument to you look like?
22. Is it the journey, or the destination?
23. Which of your nicknames did you hate?
24. If you were king of the world, who would suffer most?
25. Where are you going?

 

[KidSnide]

The most important part of building a PC backstory is that the character needs to be motivated to play the game. If the campaign is story focused, then the GM needs to give the player enough information to create a PC that wants to pursue the plot the GM intends to run. If the campaign is more free from, then the PC needs to know enough about the world (whether or not it's a published setting) to build usable connections.

If you don't build a character that's motivated to join the game, then the richness of your character background can actively work against you. The first thing your character is going to do is join the other PCs for an adventure. If that's not what your character wants to do, then your character's background is not serving the purpose of helping you (and your friends) have fun.

-KS

 

[Ed_Laprade]

Here's my current character questionnaire:

1) What does your character look like? What do s/he wear in combat? What does s/he wear when s/he isn't planning on fighting?
2) Where is s/he from? What were the dominant geographical features of her/his home?
3) How did s/he earn a living before living the life of an adventurer? What occupation has s/he had the most training in?
4) List at least two goals for the character. At least one of these goals should be one that the character has, while another should be one that you, as a player, want to see developed over the course of the game.
5) List at least two secrets about your character. One is a secret the character knows, one is a secret that involves him but that he is not actually aware of yet. This will help me in creating plots that center around your character. I will also be creating a third secret which you as a player will not be aware of, so expect some surprises!
6) Describe at least three people that are tied to the character. Two of them are friendly to the character, one is hostile. If you like, you can include an enemy, so I have an instant NPC nemesis to throw at you.
7) Describe three memories that your character has. They don't have to be elaborate, but they should provide some context and flavor.
8) Why did your character choose to live a life of adventuring, knowing full well that the most likely end for your character will be getting eaten while plundering a long-forgotten tomb?
9) What is your character's theme song? This song should reflect a fundamental aspect of your character's personality, background, or outlook on life.

If someone handed me something like that, he'd get back a list of questions, like:
1) What are the names and locations of every town, village and hamlet my character can come from?
2) Who lives in them?
3) What does everyone there do for a living, and what secrets do they have?
4) What organizations are there that my character can join, and where are they?

&etc., &etc., &etc. I've written page long backgrounds, but mostly I have no idea what a character has done before meeting the rest of the party until we've been on a few adventures. I usually dislike having a character constrained by decisions made without knowing how the campaign is going to unfold. So if you want specifics that I haven't already thought about, you'd better be willing to tell me what ALL my options are!

Of course, in all of the groups I've played with the GM rarely had to sweat coming up with something for us to do, as we'd blurt out something that was far worse than anything he'd be likely to come up with while trying to figure out what he was up to. And what's with all the theme songs?

 

[ArghMark]

As a rule, I like things to develop in game.

When recently doing a Changeling the Lost game, I had each person give me two 'stories' or hooks. What this did is allow everyone to have a personal story that affected the group in some way. I would generally have a hook pop up once a session.

For example; Redcoat Tim had an estranged wife and family, and wished to get on with them again. (Hook 1.) He also had an enemy, The Sergeant. (Hook 2).

In the first game, involving the PC's being summoned together, I had the game involve Tim's daughters school and his wife as part of the investigation into missing dreams.

This allowed the PC's to develop in game; the story popped up for the other PC's as they went along, and Redcoat Tim felt he 'belonged' in the setting.



I like the idea of weaving personal things with larger things; or having them happen simultaneously. It means PC's have to prioritize. I understand this is more difficult for standard D+D games where families could be anywhere. But to create more in-depth characters requires investiture of time into NPC's and roleplaying, I find - a questionnaire (which I have also tried) only made the players bored. They didn't come to my game to fill in forms, after all .

 

[KidSnide]

I find - a questionnaire (which I have also tried) only made the players bored. They didn't come to my game to fill in forms, after all .

There is a broader point here. You need to convince your players that your game will be fun before they'll be willing to put in a lot of effort. If they're not willing based solely on your reputation as a GM, then the first part of your game had better be fun. As ArghMark notes, filling out forms isn't usually fun.

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On a totally separate note, I get in-depth characters in my game by writing them for my players. I have a 10-year campaign that takes in a new player every year or two. So I think about what type of character would be fun for a perspective player, would contribute to the party dynamic in an interesting way and has personal connections to the major outstanding plot hooks. Then I pitch the character to the new player, explaining the character's background in the process. (This usually takes a few hours.)

Since I GM an unpublished world, I don't see how a new player could possibly integrate themselves into the party and the world. Sure, my first players wrote their own characters (with guidance), but I don't see how someone could do that now without first playing in the world for a few years.

-KS

 

[Dannyalcatraz]

Yet another vote for Central Casting.

Another thing to look for is the cards from Everway. Tell your players to pick a card from the stack to use to tell as story about their PC's history. The events in the picture could be something personal to the PC, something that happened in his family, or to his tribe...or maybe just the PC's favorite childhood story.

You might be surprised by what rattles out of your players' brains.

 

[LostSoul]

In my 4E hack I use Skills to develop a background that has a direct impact in play.

There are a number of different categories - background, racial, class, and two general ones. Most of them suggest something about the character's background; some require the player to define something (like Apprentice - who did you apprentice for, what did you do?). I only want a line or two, any more than that is no good.

The lone PC in the game so far ended up being "Born on the Streets" of the lone human city; that skill requires you to define how your PC survived living in the gutter. The player defined it by having his PC robbing graves for his master, a butcher by day and necromancer by night. He also took "Martial Training", and that was defined by being in a mercenary company.

To me that's ample material for a PC's background.

 

[Aus_Snow]

It totally depends on the system, the players and GM, the campaign and setting. . .

I don't quite undertand the (currently rather popular online!) view that complex, detailed PC backgrounds are universally 'unnecessary', 'overrated' or whatever else.* Because um, it just ain't so. There are games that thrive on such things, *as well as* high-action, fast playing sessions in some cases.

I don't mind either way. In media res can work just dandy for a number of systems, groups, etc. Anything from just beyond that to full-blown prose-based chargen (or, more or less, some equivalent of that) can work equally well. I know this to be true. IMXP and all that.


* Hm. It bears a striking resemblance to the view that complex, detailed world-building is badwrongfun, come to think of it. . .

 

[Dykstrav]

If someone handed me something like that, he'd get back a list of questions, like:
1) What are the names and locations of every town, village and hamlet my character can come from?
2) Who lives in them?
3) What does everyone there do for a living, and what secrets do they have?
4) What organizations are there that my character can join, and where are they?

&etc., &etc., &etc. I've written page long backgrounds, but mostly I have no idea what a character has done before meeting the rest of the party until we've been on a few adventures. I usually dislike having a character constrained by decisions made without knowing how the campaign is going to unfold. So if you want specifics that I haven't already thought about, you'd better be willing to tell me what ALL my options are!

I agree with this stance to a degree. Not only is your background dependant on the particulars of the setting, but often, most of it just doesn't matter over the course of the campaign. Just as I wouldn't expect to be able to walk into a city and have an in-depth conversation about life with all 10,000 of the NPCs that live there, I don't think that a DM is ever going to use the dozen or so members of my character's family or extended family as campaign material. Honestly, I feel like detailing a dozen family members is time that can be better spent.

Why isn't it sufficient to say that my character came from a large family that he mostly gets along with? If the DM wants to use them for something, let him detail the family member he wants to use for an adventure hook--the DM can tailor that NPC to his exact needs, and besides, we don't get to pick our own family in real life. I don't see how it makes the game worse for me to tell the DM the general situation and let the DM detail my family for me if he sees fit to do so.

There is also the "information dump" situation to consider. In most stories, you gradually learn about characters in increasing detail over the course of the narrative. Have you ever read a novel or watched a movie where the first thirty pages or ten minutes or so tell you everything you supposedly need to know about a character to enjoy the story? It's usually pretty boring because it doesn't feel like anything is happening. It feels like homework, not exposition.

On the other hand, consider the opening of Peter Jackson's the Fellowship of the Ring. They give you a brief snapshot of the world at the time the movie opens. They tell you what happened in the ancient past and abbreviate it into "bullet points," then jump directly to the Shire and let the story start. In that opening sequence, they don't tell you a single thing about Frodo Baggins, the Baggins family, Bag's End, what Frodo's hopes and dreams and desires are. You discover them over the course of the story, as he goes on adventures.

Or consider any of the Star Wars movies. They give you an opening crawl of perhaps a minute or so, then jump right into the action.

Can you imagine a biopic on Frodo Baggins or Aragorn as the opening of the Lord of the Rings? More importantly, can you imagine that you're going to care about a blurb on the main characters before the narrative begins? In Star Wars, Luke Skywalker's adventures are notable precisely because he's a farmboy with nothing interesting going on at home. Could you imagine being asked to describe the thrilling details of life on a moisture farm for a page before being allowed to play such a character?

It totally depends on the system, the players and GM, the campaign and setting. . .

This is what ultimately matters. Some players enjoy this amount of detail. Some don't. Ultimately, there is no "right" answer, only one that is right for your group and your players. I don't think that you're playing the game "wrong" if you don't enjoy the same things about it that I do, or have the same opinions about what makes a good narrative as me.