DM question: how much do you incorporate PC backgrounds into the campaign?

[Panda-s1]

Nope. We've been at this for 25 years now. I know whats going on. thx for playing though.

something tells me you don't get a whole lot of new players either lol

 

[Lanefan]

something tells me you don't get a whole lot of new players either lol

In fairness s/he did claim in a post somewhere that replacing players hasn't ever been a problem. Maybe that style of play is common in that region; there's certainly regional differences in general playstyles.

 

[Panda-s1]

In fairness s/he did claim in a post somewhere that replacing players hasn't ever been a problem. Maybe that style of play is common in that region; there's certainly regional differences in general playstyles.

in my experience those "regions" usually involve a lack of other available groups, they can happen anywhere

 

[prabe]

In fairness s/he did claim in a post somewhere that replacing players hasn't ever been a problem. Maybe that style of play is common in that region; there's certainly regional differences in general playstyles.

Or the group size might be somewhat larger than the table size. Not a big difference, I guess.

 

[hawkeyefan]

This is the complaint I have about the 5e adventures “Curse of Strahd”, “Out of the Abyss” and “ Tomb of Annihilation”. Each of them takes steps to ensure your background is irrelevant by transporting you to a place where you are unlikely to have any ties to anyone.

On the other hand, I also own the Legacy of Fire Adventure Path and that AP makes it relatively easy to incorporate backstories while also integrating players without a relevant backstory.

I've run both Curse of Strahd and Tomb of Annihilation as part of my ongoing 5e campaign. Our level up pacing is much slower than the standard game, so Curse of Strahd was for levels 6 to 8 I believe, and then Tomb was for 11 to 12. I connected both very strongly to the ongoing events of the campaign. Curse of Strahd was much trickier to do so, but we did some interesting things by connecting the Vistani and our Diviner PC, and a few other elements.

But as they're presented, it can be done. CoS is the more difficult because it's meant to be a more short term situation, and it's a dangerous location in which the PCs are trapped and must escape. But if you know you're going to run it, I would either not bother with the mists and the demiplane angle, and instead just have Barovia and its surroundings be part of the campaign world. Then you can connect the PCs in any number of ways. Alternatively, they could be natives of Barovia. Beyond such tweaks, I'd maybe have a local town or maybe just a couple of NPCs vanish in the mists, and the PCs go in on a rescue mission. If you have a cleric or paladin, maybe they receive a vision of a holy sword they can obtain but they'll need to defeat a powerful evil to keep it.

With Tomb, it was much easier for us because we already had ties to Chult, so I replaced the Death Curse afflicted merchant prince with a known NPC who the PCs liked and were willing to help. It also helped that we had two PCs who had been raised, and so they were afflicted with the Death Curse, too. That was pretty much all the impetus needed. However, as presented, I think making the PCs natives of Chult rather than visitors is probably the most immediate way to connect them to the events there. Perhaps they're refugees from Mezzro or another city? Perhaps they have ties to the lost city of Omu or one of the other locations? There are a number of ways you can craft backstories that fit the adventure.

 

[FrozenNorth]

That's a movie. It's just a story, unlike in an RPG, where we want to maintain the premise of speculative plausibility.

Well, the Star Wars franchise is a fiction created by a professional writer for money for an audience of millions.

My campaign is a shared fiction by amateurs with full time jobs and family responsibilities for an audience of exactly 5.

It seems that you are holding the second to a higher standard of speculative plausibility than the first. If so, I am extremely curious as to why?

 

[FrozenNorth]

I've run both Curse of Strahd and Tomb of Annihilation as part of my ongoing 5e campaign. Our level up pacing is much slower than the standard game, so Curse of Strahd was for levels 6 to 8 I believe, and then Tomb was for 11 to 12. I connected both very strongly to the ongoing events of the campaign. Curse of Strahd was much trickier to do so, but we did some interesting things by connecting the Vistani and our Diviner PC, and a few other elements.

It’s definitely doable. My plea, to anyone here who works on APs or AL adventures, is two-fold:

• first, you don’t have to choose between a campaign geared to characters without backgrounds (even in APs and AL) and a campaign geared to characters who want their backgrounds to impact the campaign: it is possible to create campaigns that appeal to both types of characters.
• second, there are groups out there who want to run published campaigns (slightly, moderately or massively tweaked), for which being able to tie the campaigns to the characters’ backgrounds is a big plus.

 

[pemerton]

That's a movie. It's just a story, unlike in an RPG, where we want to maintain the premise of speculative plausibility.

Well, the Star Wars franchise is a fiction created by a professional writer for money for an audience of millions.

My campaign is a shared fiction by amateurs with full time jobs and family responsibilities for an audience of exactly 5.

It seems that you are holding the second to a higher standard of speculative plausibility than the first. If so, I am extremely curious as to why?

I would also ask - why are RPGs obliged to be boring in comparison to the genre works that inspire them?

 

[The Crimson Binome]

It seems that you are holding the second to a higher standard of speculative plausibility than the first.

That is definitely the case.

If so, I am extremely curious as to why?

A movie exists primarily for the purpose of telling a story. An RPG exists primarily to facilitate role-playing, with the literary merit of the generated narrative being irrelevant.

Things happen in a movie in order to facilitate a plot. Thing happen in an RPG because that's how the world works. If things happen in an RPG in order to facilitate a plot, then either you're playing in Discworld, or something has gone seriously wrong.

 

[hawkeyefan]

It’s definitely doable. My plea, to anyone here who works on APs or AL adventures, is two-fold:

• first, you don’t have to choose between a campaign geared to characters without backgrounds (even in APs and AL) and a campaign geared to characters who want their backgrounds to impact the campaign: it is possible to create campaigns that appeal to both types of characters.
• second, there are groups out there who want to run published campaigns (slightly, moderately or massively tweaked), for which being able to tie the campaigns to the characters’ backgrounds is a big plus.

Yeah, I agree with both of these points for sure. I think maybe some adventure-specific Backgrounds that can be selected would help in both instances. They can be there to plug the PCs into the world a bit, or they can serve as inspiration for other ideas on how to incorporate characters into the adventure. And of course they can be easily ignored for anyone who doesn't want that kind of stuff in play.