Coming up with character backgrounds

[GMVictory]

I'm afraid to use my Central Casting books (there were 3 for background and 1 for dungeon creation) because they are so worn out now. But my players had fun using it.

I tended to limit the squirreliness so it wouldn't get too weird by not allowing additional rolls on the tables. I even had a campaign world that developed based on the backgrounds that players rolled. Tribalistic spear-wielding elves, civilized orcs, freedom fighting halflings under the tyranny of ogres, the dwarven race locked in a death spiral with the ever-encroaching goblins of the underground, and a human empire that was shattered by civil war and had broken down into warring fiefdoms.

 

[Angcuru]

I just warn them that if they end up with a friendless, orphan who simply stepped out of the cosmos fully trained and equipped, than the character's origin is now mine to do with as I please...

You are all half-siblings and your father was the gnomish god of TURKEY FARMERS AHAHAAHAHAHAHAHaH!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

maybe that's a little too wierd.....

 

[Gossamerblade]

I just warn them that if they end up with a friendless, orphan who simply stepped out of the cosmos fully trained and equipped, than the character's origin is now mine to do with as I please...


In most of the games I've been in, the DM reserves the right to ignore or change a character's background to fit certain plot points. I have no problem with this; it's his world I'm playing in, after all.

 

[Olive]

But still, I'm really surprised that no one decided to come up with a third edition version of the idea.

there's always the roll up your background system in the Hero Builders Guidebook

 

[Cedric]

Communication with my GM. Even if only part of it goes down on paper, I usually have tons of background for my character floating around in my mind.

Sometimes getting the GM to see it the same way I do is really tough, no matter how much I write. I've written 15 page essays before...and had the GM just not "get it". I've also scribbled out half a page on notebook paper and known that my GM and I were just totally eye to eye on the subject.

Also, knowing how much detail to put in the background. I rarely play in published worlds, almost all of my gm's past and present use homebrew worlds.

How much detail, like town names, city names, gods, politics, lifestyle etc, can I put into my background without stepping on the gm's toes by either forcing him to create new gameworld content or stepping on the content he's already created.

The problem gets worse in that once I have that background clearly set in my mind...I will not easily let it go. I can alter some parts of the basic details, but the flavor has to remain or I'll never be happy with the character.

Cedric

 

[willpax]

For my current campaign, I actually supplied characters with somewhat skeletal pre-created backgrounds.

I did this because we don't get to meet very often, and I wanted to have a fairly specific story line and "jump right in" with reasons for these characters to trust one another. I supplied social class and family background (ranging from second son of the local potentate [unfortunately, primogeniture is the norm here] to the immigrant orphan of a backwater halfling village), along with a few connections across the group (they are all participants in the same religion, and have a few cross-character connections as well). I did not give any other specific events and made sure that every background was fairly personality-open (no events that required a specific attitude on the part of the character).

Over the first few sessions, they took their chosen character and fleshed out a personality--significant personal events, goals, ambitions, and general attitudes. I worked it all in.

I'm not sure such a heavy-handed approach would work for every group. With this group, it worked well because of time constraints and the fact that no one in this group was likely to have gone to the trouble on their own. Despite the pre-rolled origins, all of the players are very attached to their characters, they all feel a part of the game world, and I have built in a number of plot hooks into the background.

On the down side, I had to do a lot of work, and I wasn't able to benefit from their creativity as much in the initial stages. So it goes.

 

[Norfleet]

I prefer the approach of sketching out a very basic framework for a character, and only bothering to fill in details at a later date.

This is in part due to time constraints, and in part due to the fact that there's no sense in investing too much time into a character liable to become a random casualty inside of 5 minutes.

 

[Angcuru]

I just have to comment on how GOD AWFUL the character background generation system in Cyberpunk is:

Ok, Rich, this is what I want to play: He's heir apparent to a wealthy oil tycoon who had his fortune waylayed by a lean placed on the company by...

*Rich rolls dice*
Nope. You're a buvarian nomad with dwarfism who lost two brothers and an uncle to malaria, you were imprisoned by...someone for 3 years and the left side of your face is deformed. *looks up* What are you putting your coat on for? Are you leaving already?

I'm resisting the urge to shove this pencil through your eye socket.

 

[Cedric]

Hehe, in Cyberpunk...

You don't come up with a character background, rather the character background comes up with you!

Cedric

 

[GMVictory]

I just warn them that if they end up with a friendless, orphan who simply stepped out of the cosmos fully trained and equipped, than the character's origin is now mine to do with as I please...


In most of the games I've been in, the DM reserves the right to ignore or change a character's background to fit certain plot points. I have no problem with this; it's his world I'm playing in, after all.

I agree. If something is way out and does not belong in the campaign at all, then I have no problem overruling it. Unless it is a hastily thrown together game, I usually brief the players on the setting to prevent things like that. However, I don't mind the players inserting things into my campaign. They enjoy being able to affect the game world by creating some of the things that are in it.

It also takes some of the load off of me since I don't have to create the whole planet, the players are helping me do it.