How much back story for a low-level PC?

[Barastrondo]

It's your character, and it's our setting; in no way whatsoever can this be considered fanfic. It's just "fic", plain and simple. So I'm curious too. Unfortunately, it's because I think it's coming across as simply using a disparaging term to dismiss a playstyle he doesn't like, but I could be wrong there and there's more to it.

I've disagreed with The Shaman plenty of times before, and he's done me the honor of never simply dismissing all the heathen hippie things I like to do in my own game. I fully expect there to be elucidation. I just don't tend to think of backgrounds in that way, so his distinction isn't explicit to me.

(I'll stop talking about you behind your back, now, The Shaman.)

 

[Vyvyan Basterd]

Uhm. They go overboard, it really happens.

That's when you step in as DM and say [monty python]"Start again!"[/monty python]

All too often I see players try to provide descriptions of their character's personalities but then either contradict or slowly turn their character's personality towards something else.

Don't you think leading the dangerous life of an adventurer might lead to changes in personality? I mean I've seen it in the real world when someone is stressed out over their 9-to-5 job for too long.

I prefer that the setting be changed in-character, in actual play, not in meta, and particularly not through some bit of fanfic.

I too would like to see this explained better. Because I'm reading that you hold yourself in higher regard as DM than your players. You're the "star" and they're your "fans?"

I think players should fit their characters to the setting (frex, the Northern Wastes dwarf example) rather than warping the setting to fit their characters.

I agree. I don't really advocate setting-wide changes. But I haven't created ever little organization in the campaign world, so the addition of a guild, family, monastery, etc. won't break the setting. And if a player does try to go too far see my first response in this post.

I agree players should be proactive, and I think they should make the setting sit up and dance when they pipe a tune, but I think they should accomplish this during the game, as a group, in actual play, not out-of-game before it.

How do you accomplish all of that in-game though? Unless you start your game at birth, something has to have happened to lead up to the point where the character starts. Characters without some background leave me feeling like they were born yesterday and is very off-putting to me (unless the character is a Warforged as was literally "born" yesterday).

I'm kind of curious as to what qualifies as "fanfic". Is it the lack of "authorization" by the setting's primary author (be it the GM, Greg Stafford, or H.P. Lovecraft)? I'm curious because I don't think of players as writing fanfiction by default; it would really only qualify if it's determined that it will have no impact on the game. I see the process more as contracting freelance work, in a way; it's subject to editing and may be sent back for multiple drafts, but if someone is playing in a game I'm running they're the equivalent of an author in a shared-world anthology, not a fan. And with that comes (through our table social contract, mind, not by virtue of RPGs as a whole) a variable level of permissions to add to the setting.

Well said.

 

[coyote6]

So, to you, six pages is a novel?

Perhaps they are very LARGE pages.

Campaign type is important to "how much background is appropriate", IMO. If you're running a game set in a single city-state, and involving a ton of politics and intrigue, some background is going to be necessary IMO, just so you know how you fit in. If you happen to all be superheroes, too, knowing how you came by your superhuman powers and/or unprecedented skills is inevitably going to come up.

But if you are 4-6 sword-and-spell-slinging strangers of level 1-3 who have just stumbled into a border keep with little more than a weapon, armor, and a donkeyhorse (if you're lucky), it probably doesn't matter much what you did before applying boot to door.

 

[Desdichado]

I've disagreed with The Shaman plenty of times before, and he's done me the honor of never simply dismissing all the heathen hippie things I like to do in my own game. I fully expect there to be elucidation. I just don't tend to think of backgrounds in that way, so his distinction isn't explicit to me.

(I'll stop talking about you behind your back, now, The Shaman.)

Yeah, I point that out (for The Shaman's benefit) that what he says comes across via casual reading as condescending and dismissive. But that rather than accusing him of such, I'm merely pointing that out as a means of requesting clarification since I don't think that's what he intended to communicate.

Sorry; didn't mean to sound all "attack dog mode" or anything. Just trying to be helpful!

Perhaps they are very LARGE pages.

Heh. Maybe. I do think 6 pages of background is rather a lot more than I'm used to seeing. To be honest with you, as a DM, I might start skimming it if I get that much. I don't really want to see that much background for your character. But if it's important to you as my player to develop your character's backstory; if it's how you get into character, if it's part of what you enjoy about playing, well, far be it from me to forbid it.

I think the comparison to a novel is kinda silly; however, comparing it to the internal notes that a novelist has on his characters before he starts writing: that's a pretty fair comparison.

 

[IronWolf]

... But if it's important to you as my player to develop your character's backstory; if it's how you get into character, if it's part of what you enjoy about playing, well, far be it from me to forbid it.

I think this is a good point. If writing some backstory for a character is a means for the player to get into the character and help form his or her idea for the character then I don't want to stop that. For some a few sentences may work for one player and a page or two for another.

As DM I will review it, make sure there isn't anything that I consider game breaking or just not feasible for the campaign we are getting started on and then roll with it. It would likely have to be a pretty big transgression for me to say no to something in a character background, as I don't mind folks creating that part of their world barring major contradictions to the campaign environment.

 

[Desdichado]

I wonder if underlying this discussion is a bit of "how compatible is your preferred playstyle with others when gamers with different playstyle preferences show up at the same table?"

I'd like to think that my preferred playstyle is one that's kinda non-intrusive, i.e., it doesn't necessarily require that other players at my table share my same playstyle in order to work. But maybe I'm just fooling myself there.

 

[TerraDave]

Hobo, at least your consistent, even as your screename and pic has changed.

Again... players mis-using the tool to cause problems is a problem with the player, not a problem with the tool.

Yes. Thank you. I already know that.

But its like saying, here is a knife. Look at these great things carved with a knife. Knifes rock!

I am just saying, watch out with that knife.

 

[Desdichado]

But its like saying, here is a knife. Look at these great things carved with a knife. Knifes rock!

I am just saying, watch out with that knife.

Hah! Fair enough!

 

[whitehairboy]

I asked my players to come up with a short backstory, only because we were starting a campaign in the Forgotten Realms, and to determine regional bonuses. Most of the backstory was limited to a few paragraphs only to give the players an idea of character motivations, or aspirations for a paragon path. I thought I would have to draw from those backstories to help the story move along, but like others have said, their characters find their identities during each session in the choices they make, and the things they accomplish.

 

[NewJeffCT]

My last campaign was a pretty big group. The backgrounds ran from “I am the fourth or fifth son of a minor noble family who decided to leave home and become an adventurer when he found out he could become a sorcerer” to a complex background where the player expanded upon a whole culture of Halflings from the campaign setting book and then set his character up to be a secret double agent spying on a noble household within an evil theocracy. I will say that most were a lot closer to the former than the latter and a couple of people had essentially no background until I asked them for one.

A funny bit, though, was one no background character was getting close to her hometown in game – so, I asked her if she wanted to fill in any details on her family. She then said that her father was a follower of the same god as her cleric and had died as a hero when she was young, but her mother was a frail and bitter and angry woman who resented how close she was to her father. She (the PC) left home a decade ago to follow the calling of her Goddess, and had only been home once in that time to see her sister, with whom she was still friendly with. (Really, only a paragraph then)

Since the mom was frail, I had her as having recently passed away (heh heh heh). The sister that stayed behind was rather rude, though. She became a cleric as well, though, but of a lawful good deity (instead of the PC’s chaotic good one) – the sister said it was because both she and her god believed in “loyalty, duty and honor” – unlike others in the family.

However, the bitter and angry mom was not quite done yet. Her death was just the beginning of her transformation into a lich, who then literally moved heaven and earth in her attempt to get revenge on her wayward daughter. She sent them back in time, then gated in a balor to soften the party up before attempting to kill the party herself. (She failed, but it was a fantastic encounter where the party was in serious danger and both the lich and the party really were down to their last hit points and spells… The lich’s phylactery was also concealed within the now dead body of the lawful good sister.)

I also made use of other backgrounds over time as well, though not always to the player’s detriment like that.

After the campaign, though, the player who wrote the complex double-agent background said that in order to prevent a lich-mom type scenario, he would write a background so detailed, yet so mundane, that it would be impossible for me to come up with anything bad. On the other side, everybody else said that they would go for the “blank slate” background to prevent a lich-mom scenario.

So, I think most types of backgrounds are okay for me as a DM and I prefer simpler ones. However, I think having too many players with detailed and complex background would likely lead to conflicts of interest in game and me to forget to include certain parts of some people’s backgrounds (PC A: Don’t forget, on page 3, paragraph 2, I am from Gilder and we are at war with Florin and my best friend is Prince Humperdink…. PC B: Hey, on page 4, paragraph 4, I am from Florin and we hate everybody from Gilder due to the war and my sister being killed by Prince Humperdink)