D&D General Background Vs. Backstory

[Lanefan]

... the oddity of RPG mechanics never acknowledging skill atrophy.

Yeah, this one's bugged me forever.

Once or twice I've given some serious thought to how "rotting" skills and levels would work but haven't ever codifed those thoughts into anything coherent.

This is relevant mostly for long-lived races e.g. Elves who for all we know at age 350 could be starting their third or fourth adventuring career from scratch when they join your party!

 

[Lanefan]

I'd think it would have to. I won't run more than six PCs.

Around here 6 PCs could mean anything between 2 and 6 players at the table, as I generally allow players to run more than one PC at a time (that way if one dies there's still the other to play ). Add in henches, recruited NPCs, plot-required NPCs, and so forth and my usual party size range is from about 7 to 12 adventurers; with 4 players at the table.

I won't run for more than 5 players*, largely because more than 5 can't fit in my gaming space (5 is kinda pushing it).

* - except rare one-off events.

 

[Lanefan]

I'm just gearing up to start a new campaign. (My group is about 3 encounters from the end of the Reign of Winter AP.) And although we've enjoyed the outgoing campaign, character motivation has been a difficult thing to establish.

So with that in mind the next game is going to have a few session zeros.

First up will be a group brainstorm for the campaign setting and style. I want as much player contribution as possible because I want to encourage as much player buy-in as possible.

After we've done that I'll dream up the broad strokes of the setting based on the brainstorm. I'll send a summary to the players.

Then we have a second session 0 in which we all sit around brainstorming characters. This will be a mix of mechanical character design and working out background stories. Each character will have to have 1 connection to another character in their background.

I'm looking forward to it and I think it will add a lot to the game for everyone.

I'll go out on a limb here and guess you're not expecting much by way of lethality or character turnover in this campaign.

For me, much of the second session would be a waste of time (other than the actual char-gen) given the very high odds of half the starting PCs not lasting through the first adventure.

And given as I usually spend the better part of a year designing a setting* before even seeking any players for it, there'd be an awful long time between that first session 0 (session -1?) and the second.

* - which is a lot of the reason why I make them last as long as possible!

 

[DrunkonDuty]

I'll go out on a limb here and guess you're not expecting much by way of lethality or character turnover in this campaign.
* - which is a lot of the reason why I make them last as long as possible!

LOL. Yeah, I don't plan a campaign with killing off PCs in mind. It can happen, but lethality is definitely set towards low.

I should mention that the game will be in HERO system, and I'm thinking starting the characters with 125 points to spend - so they'll be pretty competent right out of the starting gates.

 

[Dannyalcatraz]

Granted, that obviously doesn't work for every class or character, but the "level 1 character who's done extraordinary things pre-game" can work, if you ignore the oddity of RPG mechanics never acknowledging skill atrophy.

Actually, AD&D had an aging chart that raised and lowered stats depending on age, which, of course, affects stat bonuses. Anything depending on a stat would thus wax or wane with age.

 

[Dannyalcatraz]

If you write a long & detailed backstory for your PC, how are you justifying the fact that she's still only level 1? How can you have a "veteran of the ogre wars" who is a Fighter 1, or a Gandalf-aged mage who is a Wizard 1, only to see them quickly jump to level 3 or 4 after a few skirmishes with kobolds and giant spiders?

The way I did that once was with a long-retired ranger whose small wilderness village was wiped out in a raid. So Granny grabbed her staff and went seeking revenge.

As she leveled up, she wasn’t learning how to fight, etc., she was remembering as the years of inactivity were shaken off...

In the examples you posited, I could see things like the “veteran” who didn’t experience much, if any, front line combat; the mage who discovered wizardry late in life, but finds he has a knack for it.

 

[tetrasodium]

Functionally there is no difference between player written background and backstory from a gm perspective. Both of them will be atedious tug of war that gets worse the more into writing it the player is. For example...
Gm: this is going to be a grim dark gritty raven loft campaign.
Pc1 can I play a turtle?
Gm:yes but see grim dark raven loft
Pc1 shows up with ten pages of nonsense about how his tortle donataro is on a quest to avenge his family name after his father high king eleminster of water deep was disgraced by scheming backstabbing business partners.. oh and he wears a purple mask to match the purple grip on his quarterstaff. At every opportunity pc1 will remind someone "well on a role player and my character would.... " or try to call upon high king eliminster's name then argue with NPCs about it no matter how often the gm reminds him grim dark ravenloft so they don't exist and he was told.

Pc2 says "I'm an Everton style orc bard with cadet background. He shows up and dives into the grim dark ravenloft campaign where he discovers his character along with everyone else to fit the campaign as it progresses. . All is great.

Pc3 is also an Eberron type orc cadet bard but has four pages of msrysue fanfic about how he was wronged as a cadet and framed by corrupt superiors flto cover up their embezzling. He too says many of the same things as pc1 and never makes any attempt to join the grim dark ravenloft campaign or tie his pre written backstory to either the campaign or any other player no matter how many olive branches are extended to the party's second broken latch. Like pc1 he expects an 18 level ravenloft campaign about unethical human experimentation and the ramifications based loosely on an old racenloft module/supplement about that to significantly involve his corrupt boot camp instructors from $notbleepingravenloft

 

[Azzy]

Functionally there is no difference between player written background and backstory from a gm perspective. Both of them will be atedious tug of war that gets worse the more into writing it the player is. For example...
Gm: this is going to be a grim dark gritty raven loft campaign.

Aside from your senario being utterly ludicrous, I feel the need to point out that Ravenloft is not "grimdark" and that "grimdark" isn't something that would be applied to any setting that takes itself seriously. "Grimdark" is parody, like Warhammer 40K *where the term comes from) and Judge Dredd (which is a huge source of inspiration to WH40K)—not only do you turn things up to 11, but you go past that to the point where you're "wink wink, nudge nudge"-ing to the audience.

 

[Coroc]

So in another thread- the issue of players and large amounts of PC backstory came up. I'm not a fan- for a few reasons.

1) I find most of it "dead weight" (as another poster put it). The player gets very involved in this backstory, but it involves all sorts of fictional elements that don't/won't fit in the game/campaign as a whole.

2) For things that may actually tie in- Trying to work these elements into the game, for 4-6 PCs is a PITA unless the game is very scripted/some sort of railroad.

3) It's usually just "Hey look at me, my PC is so awesome"

In certain specific circumstances and a very specific plot-I'm OK with it. For example- Several years ago, my Son (a young teen) wanted me to run a single PC game in Middle Earth for him (Summer time- his friends all had stuff going on for a multiplayer game). He's not a Tolkien Scholar, but loves the movies and the Lore presented (and my blabbering on about things that are in the books but not the movies). He wasn't comfortable writing up a story about his PC-he's never been much of a roleplayer or writer, so he asked me to. ughh, I knew roughly the idea of what I wanted to present- but asked him a few questions- what kind of character, any story elements he wanted to touch upon, bits of lore he wanted to explore. etc. So I came up with this for him- which was a short backstory to get him to the present


So if someone came to me as a DM with this type of story in anormal multiplayer game, I'd roll my eyes and ask them- what is it that are looking to accomplish? That's just fluff. Do you have any goals? And If I got that type of thing from every player...::gags:

Now- Instead I ask Players to bring that creativity to the table with BACKGROUNDS and explore that together through play.

Backgrounds are a very simple mechanic that takes the place of skills in 13th Age. essentialy its a one to several word description of your PC's background. You can take up to 3 backgrounds and you have 8 points (max 5 points in any one background) to assign to them.

examples
Pirate Reaver of the Black Coast
Keeper of the Library at the ends of the Earth
Street Thief
Cobbler
Cook

As elaborate or simple as you like.

DURING GAME PLAY- you use these backgrounds to mechanical benefit by being creative with them in the fiction. For example- "Well, My PC was a Pirate Reaver of the Black Coast..he's an ace with knots and rope, he should be able to make a quick fix on the rope ladder bridge so we can get across..." Then the DM might say, OK- Make a DC20 Wisdom check, you can add your background points (+your Wisdom Mod). Or maybe it's some kind of conversation where you are trying to convince a NPC of something. The backgrounds are not tied to any one ability score. I might use that Pirate Reaver background to convince that NPC Pirate Captain to take me to the Lich King's Island using CHA .

Now if the explanation you give makes everyone at the table roll their eyes and groan- yeah not gonna work.

IMO the experience of creating the PC's background with everyone around the table- discovering these things through play is way more satisfying for me as a DM AND for the players- I also find it opens up easier and appropriate ways to tie the PCs backgrounds into the story/plot going forward. I take notes on the way the backgrounds get used for future sessions.

I use this background system now in pretty much every session I run for any game.

To make this work it needs two preconditions:

You are at least a bit into roleplaying (aka not only roll playing)

The player needs some background information, this is especially essential if the DM is running total homebrew or modded official settings.

If otoh the setting is an official public setting with lore and canon as written without major changes, then the backstory can be an exiting player DM co-op.
In another system I play (DSA) the lore and canon is very well written and available and not so intrusive like in almost all D&D settings. There the background (profession, region you originate etc.) plays very well into the story and is part of the crunch.
But also in 5e the background is more than some story about everybody and your mother, e.g. the criminal background makes a you almost full multiclass thief (for the special skills disarm trap/open lock)
The other background worth mentioning are those giving you a bit of arcane or the healer background.
So it is not all about fluff, just because it is filed under background.

For me personally the mechanic background in 5e is a must, you give up nice extras in not selecting one.
Almost every background pushes some of your skill(s), which is not so easy to obtain in 5e otherwise.
The story aspect, to my experience, depends on the level of roleplay that players individually want to do.
There are in fact players, for whom even in 5e, character development including the characters emotions, psyche, motives etc. is the most important aspect of the game, and the background gives some helpful tool, to see if some of it has mechanical impact.

 

[Chaosmancer]

For example...

None of these really have anything to do with backstories

Gm: this is going to be a grim dark gritty raven loft campaign.
Pc1 can I play a turtle?
Gm:yes but see grim dark raven loft
Pc1 shows up with ten pages of nonsense about how his tortle donataro is on a quest to avenge his family name after his father high king eliminated of water deep was disgraced by scheming backstabbing business partners.. oh and he wears a purple mask to match the purple grip on his quarterstaff. At every opportunity pc1 will remind someone "well on a role player and my character would.... " or try to call upon high king eliminster's name then argue with NPCs about it no matter how often the gm reminds him grim dark ravenloft so they don't exist and he was told.

Is just playing Donatello and trying to play the wrong setting.

So, is either trying to be disruptive or actually has no idea what setting Ravenloft is and got confused. Either way, nothing to do with backstories.

And actually, considering Strahd constantly pulls in people, a background where Donatello has been seperated from his real quest and has to finish this so he can escape and continue avenging his father could work really well. If the player is taking things seriously.

Pc2 says "I'm an Everton style orc bard with cadet background. He shows up and dives into the grim dark ravenloft campaign where he discovers his character along with everyone else to fit the campaign as it progresses. . All is great.

So no backstory is the best backstory? Except, there has to be something there since he is an Everton style Orc and a Cadet, which implies a military background.

So, there actually is a backstory here, just not one we are getting told. So again, not a great example of anything except that the DM seems to have no problem with this player.

Pc3 is also an Eberron type orc cadet bard but has four pages of msrysue fanfic about how he was wronged as a cadet and framed by corrupt superiors flto cover up their embezzling. He too says many of the same things as pc1 and never makes any attempt to join the grim dark ravenloft campaign or tie his pre written backstory to either the campaign or any other player no matter how many olive branches are extended to the party's second broken latch. Like pc1 he expects an 18 level ravenloft campaign about unethical human experimentation and the ramifications based loosely on an old racenloft module/supplement about that to significantly involve his corrupt boot camp instructors from $notbleepingravenloft

So, again, this has nothing to do with Backstories. The main complaint is that the player seems to not want to play Ravenloft. OR again, doesn't know what Ravenloft is. On top of spotlight hogging and probably a whole host of other things.

And if the DM told them it was going to be about unethical human experimentation... dang if PC1 and PC3 missed some hellaciously rich backstory opportunities. The Turtles were originally about pollution mutating animals and people, so you could easily have Donatello as an escaped experiment. The Corrupt Military being involved in the experiments, PC3 finding out and that being why his corrupt superiors booted him. Could have been great, and really tied things deeper together.

See, you can't blame backstories for players who aren't playing the game. Because if they were going to be disruptive anyways, then the backstory makes no difference.

In fact, PC2 could just have easily walked in with no background, and did what a group I played in did during a Ravenloft game. Kill anyone who inconvenienced him. Quite literally, a woman locked her door and was terrified to let us in. They broke the door and when she attacked them, they killed her in "self-defense"

Then did it again after my cleric used raise dead to bring her back.

But they didn't write backstories for their characters.