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Message: <blockquote data-quote="Man in the Funny Hat" data-source="post: 9376336" data-attributes="member: 32740">I've tried to watch CR a couple times and a few other such videos.  It doesn't work for me.  My guess is because it's oriented to be passive entertainment as much as interactive for the participants, so not really the same as PLAYING.Why would it NOT have been satisfying if the PC group had been leading the rebellion as opposed to being involved specifically because it's something in ONE PC's backstory?  If I play in a Star Wars rpg, does my character's father have to be Darth Vader in order for my character to have a personal stake in the Rebellion?  And if I wanted a mysterious, initially unknown father figure in my character's backstory to possibly surface in ongoing adventures, I can write that AS part of my backstory, rather than just one day find it's been inserted there FOR me.  If I don't put that in there, is it really the DM's prerogative to decide that it will be?  If I write my backstory as Luke originally understood it to be (I'm an orphan whose father was a navigator on a spice freighter), where does the DM get permission to first have an NPC tell me that's wrong and that he was a jedi who was betrayed and murdered, and then change that story again to tell me he is actually still alive and the BBEG of the whole campaign?D&D is not written fiction, nor is it a screenplay.  They may share a lot of traits, but they're NOT the same, and don't work entirely the same way.  Players only get to really control their PC.  With certain curses and spell effects even that can be taken away - and that is something that players sensibly AVOID.  DM's need to exercise care and caution when they deliberately take away control of a players PC for their own purposes - even if they HOPE that doing so will be a net positive for everybody.  I mean, if I create a PC whom I superficially describe in backstory as religiously devoted, that doesn't mean the DM is free to decide my character is actually devoted to a bizarre cult.If a DM actually wants adventure ideas to tie to everyone's PC that's one thing.  I might not even mind if the DM says at the outset that they intend to use any of that in any way they choose - and then I agree to play on that basis.  For a DM to simply demand 3 pages of backstory from everyone without explanation why or what they're intending to do with it and to it, and then do whatever THEY want with that backstory without explanation or justification, that's QUITE another.You also don't have to introduce an NPC friend from back in the day unilaterally (Oh, your backstory talks about a circus so... here's an old friend you also mentioned, and whatever you may or may not have thought about who that friend really is, THIS is now going to be the reality as I have decided it will be).  Perhaps just ASK if doing so would be an area of the PC's backstory that the DM may have PERMISSION to futz with.Tell that to Luke Skywalker.  <img src="https://cdn.jsdelivr.net/joypixels/assets/8.0/png/unicode/64/1f642.png" class="smilie smilie--emoji" loading="lazy" width="64" height="64" alt=":)" title="Smile    :)"  data-smilie="1"data-shortname=":)" /></blockquote>

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