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<blockquote data-quote="Haldrik" data-source="post: 8063125" data-attributes="member: 6694221">Different cultures have different institutions, different economies, different values. Backgrounds represent these.I feel, the DM only needs to think about the most salient features of a culture. I would just pick out a handful of backgrounds for a locale that has a distinctive culture. And only add more backgrounds to its cultural assemblage as the player characters interact more with the culture, meeting new people and coming across new institutions. Like any worldbuilding, there is wisdom to starting small and expanding outward as players start to explore.There are times when the DM will want to write up a new Background to articulate a distinctive concept. Often a Players Handbook Background is close enough.It is ok to quickly use one Background as a placeholder, until developing it more fully to tailor it for the specific culture. It is also ok to reuse the same Background for more than one culture. The other backgrounds that are in a culture will be the context for how a particular background fits in. So the same background can mean different things in different cultures. For example, a background focusing on a specific spiritual tradition will mean different things depending on whether the majority of the culture adheres to the tradition or a minority. Likewise, a scholar will mean different things depending on how scholastic a culture tends to be. An athlete, depending on what degree the culture celebrates physical prowess.</blockquote>

[QUOTE="Haldrik, post: 8063125, member: 6694221"] Different cultures have different institutions, different economies, different values. Backgrounds represent these. I feel, the DM only needs to think about the most salient features of a culture. I would just pick out a handful of backgrounds for a locale that has a distinctive culture. And only add more backgrounds to its cultural assemblage as the player characters interact more with the culture, meeting new people and coming across new institutions. Like any worldbuilding, there is wisdom to starting small and expanding outward as players start to explore. There are times when the DM will want to write up a new Background to articulate a distinctive concept. Often a Players Handbook Background is close enough. It is ok to quickly use one Background as a placeholder, until developing it more fully to tailor it for the specific culture. It is also ok to reuse the same Background for more than one culture. The other backgrounds that are in a culture will be the context for how a particular background fits in. So the same background can mean different things in different cultures. For example, a background focusing on a specific spiritual tradition will mean different things depending on whether the majority of the culture adheres to the tradition or a minority. Likewise, a scholar will mean different things depending on how scholastic a culture tends to be. An athlete, depending on what degree the culture celebrates physical prowess. [/QUOTE]

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