I'm currently playing a halfling warlock who made friends with an elderly widow in her neighbourhood. When the old lady died, she left most of her property to my PC - including a Ring of Wishes with one charge remaining, but which was tied to a particularly vindictive dao who liked messing with people via wishes. My PC ended up wishing 'that you and I have a long and mutually beneficial friendship', and so a genie pact warlock was born. There was a bit of unpleasantness with the widow's grasping distant cousins that were the excuse to get my PC on the road to where the adventure was, but no angst at all really.
My backup PC was an sorcerer, a noble lady of late middle age whose children were grown and whose older husband from an arranged marriage had recently passed away of natural causes. Relegated to the dower house as her eldest son took over the title, and with free time to pursue her own interests for the first time in decades, she began to explore her magical talents as a hobby. The road to adventure started when she hit the road to travel to another town where her daughter and newborn grandchild live.
