D&D 5E Three New 5E Backgrounds to Enhance Your New PC

[Griffon Lore Games]

Not my thing. Interesting ideas, but these backgrounds all give more than skills than any other background. I wouldn't use add in options that don't follow the same rules for the basic options.

Yeah, I probably should have been more verbose in that article.

The campaign setting they show up in is--challenging. And some of the players objected to the standard backgrounds on the grounds they were not that roleplay-ish, and a bit frou-frou given the gritty rules optional rules they play. There are other backgrounds that go in the opposite direction (fewer skills, no language, etc.).

 

[Griffon Lore Games]

Hey @BluejayJunior and commenters,

Here is a followup post with some custom feats that go with these backgrounds and a small explanation on the design. Thanks for the comments/suggestions/criticisms.

Three 5E Homebrew Feats that go with Homebrew Backgrounds

 

[Weiley31]

Except those are PC options. DM’s don’t need official backgrounds for NPC’s. They’re whatever backstory the DM wants them to have for plot purposes. I’m afraid to read anything else they want to publish. I get enough sexist comments from the redneck hillbillies I work with. I don’t need/want them in my games.

But they are also Bad guy NPC options too.

 

[Worrgrendel]

But they are also Bad guy NPC options too.

The title of this thread is: Three New 5E Backgrounds to Enhance Your New PC

why do you keep bringing NPC into the conversation? NPC’s don’t need PC options.

 

[Weiley31]

The title of this thread is: Three New 5E Backgrounds to Enhance Your New PC

why do you keep bringing NPC into the conversation? NPC’s don’t need PC options.

I enjoy giving certain NPCs class PC options to change them up or to give them increased powers.
I had one enemy once use the Sword Bard's Flourishes to represent the elite sword training it had.

Background options are another idea too. Also NPCs should use PC options when needed. It's a valid option.

A Dragon NPC with Metamagic sounds pretty cool too.

 

[Weiley31]

Will there be other backgrounds in the later books or are these gonna be the only ones available?

 

[Griffon Lore Games]

Will there be other backgrounds in the later books or are these gonna be the only ones available?

In the current module on Indiegogo, there aren't any backgrounds, as it's only a 32-page book dedicated to the adventure, lots of maps, and monsters. We designed the module to be, um, modular, so there isn't campaign-specific lore beyond a single page of information the DM can use if they don't have a setting.

This blog post describes how the example backgrounds came to be.

These three are basic backgrounds that I (or my players) developed--depending on how well the Tales of Lothmar line of modular adventures do; we'll sell the campaign setting. The Player's Guide for it will be a polished product with a multitude of backgrounds, some feats, class variants, and variants of the 5E / Pathfinder 1E races/ancestry, such as our version of lizardfolk.

Our Curse of the Lost Memories mega-module supersedes the 5E/Pathfinder background system with a "Curse Mechanic," which uses the 5E epic boons at first level to compensate for the PCs having a dramatic curse. The Pathfinder version uses a similar system.

I hope that answers your questions!