DM "adding" to your PC's background?

[The Shaman]

But the DM being responsible for 100 percent of the world creation is something that went out of fashion decades ago.

Then it's a good thing I'm not concerned about being fashionable.


And suddenly I feel the strange urge to start refereeing in a leisure suit.

 

[Janx]

What this means is that if one of the PCs asks "Do I know anyone in this town we're coming to?", I'll usually say 'Yes... AND it is the town blacksmith that had sold you your first sword several years ago when you first started adventuring." Now does saying this mean I'm "filling in" your character background? Absolutely. Would I expect you to be pissed off that I said this? Not at all (unless you had stated in your character background how you became an adventurer and got your equipment-- but then I wouldn't have stated that background point that went against that to begin with.) But this is the collaboration that comes with improvisation... you make the offer that you know someone in town, and I accept it and advance that offer by telling you who you know and how you know him. This pushes our story forward, because the players now have a plan of action to follow if they choose. They don't have to spend time spinning their wheels looking for someone to talk to.

Now some people don't agree or would go along with this kind of philosophy... and I would imagine it's because of one of two reasons. Either 1) they have a completely personal story they are trying to tell with their character, and don't want outside influences to derail what they are going for

I like this "Yes, and..." improv thing. I think a lot of people could learn to use it in RPGs to include, rather than block.

I got no use for a type 1 player. I'm not running my game them to to dictate the details of how I present your drama. Because I'm the GM, and they're the player. If they want to control all that, they should put on the GM hat or write a novel.

I actually tend to NOT bring up PC background, unless there's really some element that inspires me. I ran one LUG ST:TNG game, and a player had some link to Kodos from the original show. He was mad I didn't bring it up in the game. I asked him "who the heck is Kodos?"

While I reserve the right to use some material in your background, I tend to leave it alone as your material to explain your PC and let YOU bring up NPCs that you already know. But I get to control those NPCs, so long as I don't violate the "improv contract" and avoid contradicting things.

 

[pawsplay]

Now some people don't agree or would go along with this kind of philosophy... and I would imagine it's because of one of two reasons. Either 1) they have a completely personal story they are trying to tell with their character, and don't want outside influences to derail what they are going for... or 2) they are just not comfortable "improvising" an entire grand story because it's just too much for them to parse, and instead they just want to throw dice, move their miniature around a game board, and be a passive observer as the game world progresses around them and their character.

I am a gamer and I have experience with improv. I wouldn't enjoy this experience because

3) That's not what I would consider an ideal RPG format.

"Yes, and..." improv is a fun and powerful way of crafting stories. However, it is defective when applied to an RPG focused on exploration and dealing with external challenges. Not moving board pieces around and being a passive observer, but making difficult, meaningful choices.

Also, you can't write Shakespeare using improv. The product of improv is its own thing. Really, part of the reason it works is because of the spontaneity. Watching and rewatching improv on video does not have the same impact. Knowing that nothing has been decided in advance is what makes it work. Movies written with improvised dialog feel rather different than traditional poetics.

Same thing for an RPG; the undecidedness defines the genre. However, the method of making events significant in the moment is different. "Yes and..." is one possible technique, but "There is a gaping 10' pit in front of you, deal with it," is another. I can appreciate games where the adjudication and storytelling are widely distributed, but I do not prefer it. Whether as GM or as a player, I prefer an imaginary world that is stubborn, not pliable to a player's wishes.

 

[The Shaman]

I'm just looking for more immersion for the PC's, but tbh I just want to surprise my players.

Is there any reason why the surprise can't involve someone or something they've already encountered during the campaign?

In my experience, the strongest connection between the events of the campaign, the adventurers, and the players is forged through shared experiences during actual play. Character backstory events never happened - they're whole-cloth fiction created before the game starts. (The same is true of the referee's campaign backstory, btw.) But the events at the table are shared by all, and they are real to all of the players and their characters, at least to the extent which anything can be considered 'real' in a roleplaying game. The real backstory begins on the first game-night.

So, for me at least, pulling characters out of a fictional past that no one experienced, including the person who wrote it, is inherently weaker than pulling a character out of the past shared by everyone around the table. "My character's sister was abducted by baron de Bauchery when he was a boy," is inferior to, "That hot merchant's daughter my character has his eye on was abducted by baron de Bauchery last Saturday night." In both cases you get to call upon character background to create your surprise, but in the latter case this is background in which everyone at the table - all of the players and the referee - created in actual play, and to which, in my experience, they are more likely to have an emotional connection.

One of the PC is a bastard. I mean he's a good guy but a bastard, ok? I've been really comtemplating things about his real father. And one of PC's has seen an omen about impending catastrophe.

I wouldn't see a problem rolling with the 'omen of impending catastrophe,' provided it's vague and non-specific as to the nature of the catastrophe. I personally would be cautious about introducing family for the fatherless child, but obviously you know your players better than I do.

Now I need to visit the thrift store and see if I can find a Nehru jacket.

 

[The Shaman]

The product of improv is its own thing. Really, part of the reason it works is because of the spontaneity. Watching and rewatching improv on video does not have the same impact. Knowing that nothing has been decided in advance is what makes it work. Movies written with improvised dialog feel rather different than traditional poetics.

Same thing for an RPG; the undecidedness defines the genre. However, the method of making events significant in the moment is different. "Yes and..." is one possible technique, but "There is a gaping 10' pit in front of you, deal with it," is another. I can appreciate games where the adjudication and storytelling are widely distributed, but I do not prefer it. Whether as GM or as a player, I prefer an imaginary world that is stubborn, not pliable to a player's wishes.

"You must spread some Experience Points around . . . "




Would someone please be so kind as to share an XP with pawsplay for me?

 

[The Shaman]

Now some people don't agree or would go along with this kind of philosophy... and I would imagine it's because of one of two reasons. Either 1) they have a completely personal story they are trying to tell with their character, and don't want outside influences to derail what they are going for... or 2) they are just not comfortable "improvising" an entire grand story because it's just too much for them to parse, and instead they just want to throw dice, move their miniature around a game board, and be a passive observer as the game world progresses around them and their character.

Coming from a background in roleplaying games, let me offer you another possibility.

3) I'm not interested in telling a story, grand or otherwise, but rather experiencing the game-world through the presence of my character-avatar, and the more meta in the game the less I'm able to do that. This means that instead of asking, "Is there anyone I know in this town?" my character will actively seek out people in the town he wants to meet, learn something about them, introduce himself, earn their trust - which is far cry from passively moving my game-piece around the board and waiting for my next turn to roll the dice.

 

[Barastrondo]

3) I'm not interested in telling a story, grand or otherwise, but rather experiencing the game-world through the presence of my character-avatar, and the more meta in the game the less I'm able to do that. This means that instead of asking, "Is there anyone I know in this town?" my character will actively seek out people in the town he wants to meet, learn something about them, introduce himself, earn their trust - which is far cry from passively moving my game-piece around the board and waiting for my next turn to roll the dice.

Contrariwise, I find a world a little less realistic if I always know from a meta perspective that nothing in my character's life before Game Night One will ever prove relevant in the greater world. To me, it's a very meta presence to have that cut-off point always sitting right there, knowing that everything that happened to the left of the line "didn't really happen" but everything that happens to the right of the line did -- which isn't at all the perspective my character would have. Sure, he'll look back at the events of Game Night One and say "that's where everything really changed," but it just feels strange that only the faces he talked to after that point will ever be at all relevant to his life going forward.

Which is not to downplay the strength of shared connections made in gameplay, mind. It just feels odd when those are all there are to me, particularly when background happenings move into the play space and successfully become shared connections made in gameplay. Prior to her appearance, I just knew that my tiefling mage-thief had had a series of disastrous relationships, the most recent of which was a particularly dangerous lady more fiendish than he was. When the DM actually brought her forward into play, she became significant to the whole group: but there was an emotional context that simply wouldn't have been present if nobody in the group had ever had any previous contact with her before.

Of course, ex-girlfriends and romantic interests are a particularly difficult sort of contact to try invoking in the entire group the way that you can "the benevolent bartender." Unless you're running the Mahabharata, of course. Then everybody in the party can marry her.

 

[Beginning of the End]

I can appreciate games where the adjudication and storytelling are widely distributed, but I do not prefer it. Whether as GM or as a player, I prefer an imaginary world that is stubborn, not pliable to a player's wishes.

I would tend to agree with you. (When I'm roleplaying, I want to roleplay my character. When I want wider narrative control, I prefer a storytelling game that provides a more productive structure for improv.)

But this is the central tension of the situation: If you have your players generate backgrounds for their characters, you are, in fact, giving them narrative control and making the world pliable to their wishes.

It's easy to say, "Now that character creation is done, those things you've created are no longer pliable and you have no ownership or control over them." But that doesn't necessarily feel that your players will feel the same way when you get it "wrong".

In my experience, the strongest connection between the events of the campaign, the adventurers, and the players is forged through shared experiences during actual play.

This, BTW, is actually a pretty strong indictment of the position that characters from the PC's background should never be a part of play. I think you're generally right that relationships forged in play generally feel stronger for the player. In many cases they're the only relationships that have any reality to them at all. But that means that if you never involve their parents or their siblings or their childhood friends in the game, then those relationships will never exist.

For example, the PCs in the game your describe are effectively either orphans or completely estranged from their parents. That's a very limiting palette.

 

[Umbran]

Is there any reason why the surprise can't involve someone or something they've already encountered during the campaign?

There's at least one - The PCs have not made a lasting or strong connection to a suitable element in the campaign to motivate them to risk their lives.

There's another - the player *likes* having their history used as a motivator.

Case in point, from my own game:

The PCs are in Dodge City, Kansas, and they learn that out on the plains, something is attacking and killing buffalo hunters and cattle. They ignore this plot hook for months in-game time, preferring to hunt down stagecoach and bank robbers, which is okay by me.

One of the PCs sets himself up working for one of the local businesses that manages distribution of cattle out of Dodge. Some people he's met at work are killed by aforementioned thing. The party doesn't move on the plot, preferring to involve themselves with some espionage linked to the family of one of the PCs, which is also okay by me.

The PCs discover that dealing with whatever is happening on the plains might prevent a major catastrophe for a childhood friend of another of the PCs - now they are all over the problem like fruit flies on an overripe plum!

I understand that some folks like to play without consideration of character history. One of the PCs in my game is much like this - his character backstory is minimal, and that's fine. But many also like to play that the person and personality they're portraying comes from somewhere, and that somewhere is important. There are pivotal events and people back there.

I've got six players at the table, and I run four-hour sessions. Bonding between the PCs is more likely to happen than PC/NPC bonding. The players each have to worry about portraying one character - I have legions. Each of their characters gets a full four hours a session, while each of my NPCs gets minutes. So, their portrayals are going to be richer than mine, in general, and the interactions between them are usually going to be more interesting than interactions with me.

So, it makes sense to make at least occasional use of the pivotal events and figures that are of interest to one character, and let their internal bonds pull them to action, rather than to exclusively use the generally weaker connections they forge after the game begins.

 

[tehuber]

I have always done it where I ask the players to give me an open-ended hook or two in their player background that I can integrate into the story, such as:

• Player is left the broken hilt of a sword as an inheritance (or a mysterious map), but they have no idea what it belonged to or what its significance is.
• The player left their hometown because they alienated/angered a guild, gang, or other group of some sort.
• The player chose their current career because they have some large overarching belief or goal they wish to achieve, i.e. raised by monks who ran a large library/archive who endowed in the character the belief that relics should be in a museum where everyone can see and learn from them, not rusting away in some private collection.

Basically, the player determines the concept, but its open-ended enough that I, as the DM, can surprise them with things that their characters can react to meaningfully.

Note: never to be used to railroad characters or force your story on them.