Basic PC Motivations

[JoeGKushner]

Fear: The character lives in a constant state of fear and feels that only by putting his life on the line can he overcome it.

 

[JoeGKushner]

Hunted: The character is wanted by the law or other authority figure with such connections, that it might as well be the law. The Fugitive, The Incredible Hulk, Vanishing Sons, etc...

 

[Mark Chance]

Interesting thread. Motivations listed can serve as character traits, goals, or both. For example, consider the last two listed by JoeGKushner: fear and hunted.

Why does Gronk swing between taking extreme risks and taking almost no risks at all? Because he's both afraid of his own shadow as well as ashamed of his fear. As a result, he overcompensates.

A large part of Gronk's fear comes from the fact that he's hunted by a zombie ninja death cult. You can't ever be too sure if that fellow shuffling down the alley is really a drunk or if he's going to try to eat your brains. If it's the latter, how many ninja zombie death cultists might be lurking unseen in the shadows?

Gronk looks forward to the day when he finally defeats the ninja zombie death cult and earns some peace of mind.

These sorts of concrete, player-defined traits are, IMO, the appropriate means by which DMs can reward players for good roleplaying. It removes much of the subjectivity surrounding what "good roleplaying" looks like. Of course, these rewards don't need to be XP. I use a system by which characters can earn Action Points.

 

[Byronic]

Worthless at real life: He just isn't good at anything really, except for this whole adventurer stuff

Avoiding responsibility: the adventurers life has its downs, being burned, frozen, kept captive and sometimes going long times without seeing the light of day or decent food. But you never have to pay the gas bill (or world equivalent) and your income is more then enough to live by.