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Message: <blockquote data-quote="Charlaquin" data-source="post: 7907982" data-attributes="member: 6779196">I’m with you that an overly detailed backstory is something I as a DM don’t really like. Though, I recognize that it is a lot of fun for many players to come up with. So, what I say is, give me the details on the character sheet (personality traits, ideal, bond, flaw, and descriptive text like height, weight, hair and eye color, etc.) and up to a tweet worth of whatever additional detail you would like to include, such as backstory. If you want to come up with a more detailed backstory you are more than welcome to, but just give us the one-tweet teaser to start with, and let the rest come out during play.I really like Backgrounds from 13th Age, but I think if I were to convert that concept to 5e, I would do away with all the individual background with different point values and what not. That’s a bit more mechanical and granular than 5e’s design aesthetic. Instead, I’d dump the skill list and just say you can add your Proficiency Bonus to any ability check if something in your Background is relevant to the check.Another technique I’ve seen used is the way  [USER=97077]@iserith[/USER] handles knowledge checks. Instead of players asking to make a skill check or “does my character know anything about [whatever]?” and the DM telling them to make a skill check, he asks his players to state an action like “I think back to [relevant background detail] to try and remember [information they’re looking for]” (and he might or might not call for a check, depending on if the action has a chance to succeed, chance to fail, cost or consequence, all that jazz).What all of these techniques do though is they encourage the players to look for opportunities to make their own backstories relevant in actual play, instead of just handing them to the DM and asking them to do it. And it also allows players to share their backstories with the rest of the group in play, in a relatively unobtrusive way, rather than info-dumping. I think its a great practice, whichever version of this you go with.</blockquote>

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