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General Tabletop Discussion
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DM question: how much do you incorporate PC backgrounds into the campaign?
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<blockquote data-quote="Jacob Lewis" data-source="post: 7933835" data-attributes="member: 6667921"><p>It depends on the game, and sometimes on the system. A one-shot or dungeon-crawl requires less investment and prep-work than a narrative game or plot-driven campaign. For the latter, pregens are great, especially for cons, demos, impromptu, and tutorial sessions.</p><p></p><p>But when I run something more elaborate that requires some long term buy-in, I want to make sure that the players feel that the story plots revolve around their characters, or at the very least, include them in a significant way. This is especially important if I`m using published adventures or similar materials cobbled together from different sources. The trick is to find ways to make sure the player characters become the protagonists in a script that wasn't already tailor-made for them. But rather than crossing my GM fingers and hoping the players will come up with something magically in line with details that they cannot (or should not) predict, I will often work closely with individual players to help build their character concept or background for a particular campaign.</p><p></p><p>This is usually an ongoing process that takes more than a single conversation and may require a little bit of compromise on both sides. However, my goal has always been to help produce a character that a) the player will absolutely be excited to play for more than just one session, b) will fit better into a storyline that will affect them directly, and vice versa, and c) allow me as the GM to know more about the goals and motives of the players and the characters they wish to play. In my experience, this has been a very good return on investment for the <em>extra work </em>and the additional requirement of <em>mutual trust</em>. Granted, some people are going to scoff and take offense at this level of involvement by a GM with their character ideas. But I'm very upfront about this when I invite people to play and, for the most part, everyone has been pleased with the results.</p></blockquote><p></p>
[QUOTE="Jacob Lewis, post: 7933835, member: 6667921"] It depends on the game, and sometimes on the system. A one-shot or dungeon-crawl requires less investment and prep-work than a narrative game or plot-driven campaign. For the latter, pregens are great, especially for cons, demos, impromptu, and tutorial sessions. But when I run something more elaborate that requires some long term buy-in, I want to make sure that the players feel that the story plots revolve around their characters, or at the very least, include them in a significant way. This is especially important if I`m using published adventures or similar materials cobbled together from different sources. The trick is to find ways to make sure the player characters become the protagonists in a script that wasn't already tailor-made for them. But rather than crossing my GM fingers and hoping the players will come up with something magically in line with details that they cannot (or should not) predict, I will often work closely with individual players to help build their character concept or background for a particular campaign. This is usually an ongoing process that takes more than a single conversation and may require a little bit of compromise on both sides. However, my goal has always been to help produce a character that a) the player will absolutely be excited to play for more than just one session, b) will fit better into a storyline that will affect them directly, and vice versa, and c) allow me as the GM to know more about the goals and motives of the players and the characters they wish to play. In my experience, this has been a very good return on investment for the [I]extra work [/I]and the additional requirement of [I]mutual trust[/I]. Granted, some people are going to scoff and take offense at this level of involvement by a GM with their character ideas. But I'm very upfront about this when I invite people to play and, for the most part, everyone has been pleased with the results. [/QUOTE]
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DM question: how much do you incorporate PC backgrounds into the campaign?
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