Backstory - How Not To

[Ydars]

The Shaman,

I agree that a 'shared imaginative space' is exactly what makes an RPG so brilliant.

But I don't agree with the idea that this 'shared space' extends to my character.

I mean, as a player, I would take great exception to other players telling me how to play my PC and I wouldn't ever try to do that to them.

On the other side of the coin, it is my responsibility to play someone interesting and entertaining, so that I am contributing to the enjoyment of the other players and the DM.

All I am saying is, sometimes that contribution requires a bit of thought about what the character is like and what their goals are. This, in turn, necessitates a few details of life history for that character.

Because of my background in acting and drama, and after years of 'seat of the pants' DMIng, I can often produce decent characters out of 'thin air'.

Having said that, half the players in every group I have ever been a part of, have NEVER produced a decent character and just play 'themselves as a ranger, or whatever' over and over again and it annoys those of us who are trying to roleplay.

Are you seriously telling me that the gameplay of weaker players would not be improved by a bit of preparation?

I suppose it all depends on whether you think roleplaying is primarily about feats and combat with roleplaying second or the other way round.

For me it is 50:50 and I need both for a really good game.

 

[The Shaman]

What of literature based on RPGs?

What of it? A story based on, or which incorporates elements from, a game isn't the same as playing the game.

An adventure log or something similar recounts the events which took place while laying the game over the tabletop; it's not the game itself.

I agree that a 'shared imaginative space' is exactly what makes an RPG so brilliant.

Okay.

But I don't agree with the idea that this 'shared space' extends to my character.

I mean, as a player, I would take great exception to other players telling me how to play my PC and I wouldn't ever try to do that to them.

Huh? Who's telling you how to run your character?

On the other side of the coin, it is my responsibility to play someone interesting and entertaining, so that I am contributing to the enjoyment of the other players and the DM.

All I am saying is, sometimes that contribution requires a bit of thought about what the character is like and what their goals are. This, in turn, necessitates a few details of life history for that character.

Which is why I wrote in my first post to this thread that players in the games I run are welcome to write as much or as little as they wish if it helps them run their characters.

As the referee, I'm only interested in what the characters do, because that tells me who they really are.

Because of my background in acting and drama, and after years of 'seat of the pants' DMIng, I can often produce decent characters out of 'thin air'.

Because of my background playing roleplaying games, I know how to improvise when the occasion calls for it, and how to prep for the game to make improvising easier.

Having said that, half the players in every group I have ever been a part of, have NEVER produced a decent character and just play 'themselves as a ranger, or whatever' over and over again and it annoys those of us who are trying to roleplay.

Last time I checked, gamers who play themselves in the game-world are still playing a role.

Are you seriously telling me that the gameplay of weaker players would not be improved by a bit of preparation?

I don't know what a "weaker" player is, but to repeat myself yet again, players are welcome to create as much or as little background as they want to help them run their characters.

I suppose it all depends on whether you think roleplaying is primarily about feats and combat with roleplaying second or the other way round.

Roleplaying is everything you do with your character in the game; it's not just when you use your funny 'in-character' voice.

 

[Ydars]

The Shaman,

I think we largely agree but your earlier comments suggest that you don't see the value of understanding how your character's internal world works; all the actions of an intelligent being arise from from what they think, feel, believe and have experienced.

If you don't know these things for your character, then you often end up reacting (i.e. doing things) as YOU would, not as your character would. I agree that this is a fine way to roleplay if it is what you enjoy, but I enjoy creating and playing characters who are different from me; I find building and faithfully playing new personas a very satisfying pastime in its own right.

I would be interested to know if you often play or if you always DM; I had your attitude until I started playing as seriously as I DMed, and that was only about 4 years ago?

Now that I think about it, much of what I advocate above is probably because I am used to playing in a group that is very inexperienced. I focus on my character's persona as a way to avoid dominating the session too much, since I often work out the DM's plot quite quickly and can also build highly effective characters reasonably easily because I have been roleplaying so much longer than the others.

Instead of spoiling the DM's and the other players' fun, I instead create little character-driven 'micro-scenes' that don't affect the DM's plot, to amuse myself and those players who are not in the spotlight at that moment.

Say, for example, that the group has split, whilst the DM deals with those PCs who are in danger, I will start a scene where my character might be on guard with another PC, then we will talk in character, (the type of 'quiet interlude' scene that is a staple of films and books). This doesn't require the DM, amuses me and the other player and allows the less experienced players to get more spot-light time with the DM.

 

[Janx]

well, most of the character questions I asked have little to do with what happened to you before the game started, and more to do with what is your PC like.

I've done a number of characters that started as "like character X from a TV, book or movie". No background history. Just a statement of what their personality was like.

Which is pretty much what you see on any show for most the characters. They MIGHT show you the background of a PC. But many times, you just jump in, and only a few episodes in do you find out their father was a criminal, or they're an orphan, etc.

A player is welcome to write all they want. I'd certainly like a minimum to be defined, to encourage roleplaying characters, rather than cameos of the player.

But I don't want extravagant backgrounds that clash with DM expectations (particularly very presumptious backgrounds). I also don't see a point in lengthy background work on a 1st level PC who might die in the first few sessions.

 

[Rel]

I feel that the way in which character backgrounds are helpful to me is because they help shoulder some of the creative load in such a way that I can also make the players more invested. It needn't be overly detailed or complicated. A player might have a background as short as this:

Varsh was a thief in Deepford and part of the extensive Deepford Darklings, the local Thieves Guild. However he saw an opportunity to grab more than his share of a big heist and betrayed them. Later when he went to recover the treasure, it wasn't where he left it. He fled the city with the other Darklings still out for his blood, never having discovered what became of the treasure.

That short passage is a gold mine of adventure ideas.

First the player has given me the name of an organization, the Deepford Darklings. I immediately start to imagine how this thieves guild is organized. I can also imagine that they are still very angry with Varsh and might have sent assassins or thugs after him, so that gives me a great foe I can have jump out of the bushes whenever I feel like it*.

There's also the matter of that big heist! The owner of the treasure may likewise have gotten wind of the fact that Varsh was involved and could also have sent people after him. In fact the notion of two separate groups hunting him and the sorts of trouble that might cause if they should encounter each other all at the same time might be really fun and interesting.

Then there is the issue of the Treasure itself. Notice how it was left vague? I'd consider that the mark of a good player because they have given me an idea but left it open to mesh with any ideas that I myself might have as to the specific nature of the Treasure. It could be a lot of things. Valuable jewels, a magic item or even some cursed artifact. Maybe the fact that it was cursed is why it was missing when Varsh went to recover it from the hiding place.

The bottom line is that I have a host of ideas I can pull from that very simple setup. And I can use them in lots of different ways throughout the campaign, even if the party never sets foot in Deepford.



*I point this out because I try to establish this kind of thing in almost every game I run. Early in the game I want the PC's to run afoul of some nasty organization such that later on I can have minions from that group attack the party. This works especially well if I run into a situation where the party is doing something I hadn't anticipated and I need a few minutes to gather my thoughts. Out jump some ninjas and they can mix it up with the party while my brain is collecting itself about where things go next.

 

[Umbran]

Last time I checked, gamers who play themselves in the game-world are still playing a role.

I think you're in danger of allowing the semantic point (that it is all "role playing") to get in the way of the meat of the issue he's describing (a style mismatch between players).

 

[Stalker0]

To me the primary goal of the backstory is to provide motivation. Why is this character in the game, going on the adventurers and hanging out with the party?


Past that point it can be used to add more to the plot and to provide more roleplaying but I think those are secondary goals.


As far as backgrounds generates go by the way I still highly recommend the one in 3rd edition Heros Builder's Guidebook. That book is 90% garbage, but that little gem of bg generator (and the alignment questionnaire) make it a good buy

 

[The Shaman]

[Y]our earlier comments suggest that you don't see the value of understanding how your character's internal world works; all the actions of an intelligent being arise from from what they think, feel, believe and have experienced.

No, that's not what I said; I said I prefer that the internal world of my characters, and the characters in games I run, are developed-in-play rather than developed-at-start, that the events of the game contribute more to characterization than fiction written before the game starts.

If you don't know these things for your character, then you often end up reacting (i.e. doing things) as YOU would, not as your character would. I agree that this is a fine way to roleplay if it is what you enjoy, but I enjoy creating and playing characters who are different from me; I find building and faithfully playing new personas a very satisfying pastime in its own right.

The first time I sit down to play a character, my roleplaying is pretty much driven by what's on my character sheet: what's my character good at, what are his weaknesses, and so on. What happens as we play layers over this; successes, failures, interactions with others all shape how I roleplay the character as the game goes on.

I would be interested to know if you often play or if you always DM; I had your attitude until I started playing as seriously as I DMed, and that was only about 4 years ago?

When I started back in 1978 or thereabouts, I played and refereed in roughly equal measure; after awhile I refereed more than I played, but still played a fair amount. When I returned to gaming after a long hiatus, the pattern was the same. In the last few years, I've played about as much as I've refereed again.

I'm not sure why this is relevant, however. As referee I roleplay far more characters than I do as a player, and in those instances they often have lengthy backstories and well-established personalities, procilivites, and quirks.

I'm not sure how the distinction is valuable.

 

[NewJeffCT]

I prefer a backstory be limited - a few paragraphs to a page, at most.

I think if a player goes into too much detail and creates a too extensive backstory, you run the risk of several things:
1) The player feels disappointed if you "hit" on 80% of his backstory during the campaign, but not all 100%.
2) The DM feels obligated to include every bit of the lengthy background into the campaign, possibly making it seem the campaign is focused on that PC and not the players who wrote up more limited backgrounds.
3) And, the one I've seen the most over the years, the background has so much going on that it's more appropriate to being the memoirs of Gandalf (if a wizard type) or Conan (if a fighter type) than the backstory for a first level character with zero experience points.

Sure, the DM can put the kibosh on the extensive backstory, but then you also run the risk of disappointing the player who just wrote up War & Peace for their backstory.

 

[Orius]

I think backstory should be a source of "character hooks", not reams of details.

A DM who's presenting a new campaign world needs to be careful just how much detail he presents to the players. Too much, and they're not going to read it, but too little and they don't really have a feel for what the campaign is supposed to be like, and they create vague and generic characters. What the DM is really supposed to do is present plot hooks instead of fully fleshed out stories to get the players' interest and give them ideas about where to go and what to do.

However, too much detail from a play in background is over the top too. First off, as a DM, I feel it limits my creativity when a player comes up with an excessively long backstory. Also, the more a player details, the harder it is to mesh that PC with the other; either they'll be different enough that there's conflict, or the player seems to hog the spotlight.

That's why I say the player should provide character hooks, as opposed to the DM's plot hooks. These hooks are a tool for the DM to create plot hooks that are intended to motivate the players. It also helps if the various hooks the PCs have are compatible.

Bottom line: neither the DM nor the players are Tolstoy and they shouldn't try to emulate him. What they need to do is provide each other with hooks to get the campaign going.