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<blockquote data-quote="The Crimson Binome" data-source="post: 6289762" data-attributes="member: 6775031">It's two things: 1) A way to flesh out the character, beyond just class and race, and 2) A way to let the character interact with the setting in a manner beyond what a normal person could do. To be a sailor says a lot about the individual, and sailors can generally do things that landlubbers can't necessarily do. Those two aspects are linked.If you're running a naval campaign, would you prefer the situation where most of the party has a similar background? It can be fun to do a themed game, but I think it's fair to say that the traditional method is to bring in a diverse cast of characters, since it builds more contrast between them. We should not go out of our way to encourage multiple redundant backgrounds throughout the party.Is it good and desirable that the same one or two characters are the only ones making ninety percent of the non-combat checks? I would posit that it's less fun for whoever is consistently sitting on the sidelines, never being able to contribute to that half of the game.So it makes sense, to me at least, that we should try to make different backgrounds more useful in situations where they aren't directly relevant. You lose a little bit on the realism (where you would obviously want everyone in a naval campaign to know how to run a ship), but you more than make up for it with character variety.</blockquote>

[QUOTE="The Crimson Binome, post: 6289762, member: 6775031"] It's two things: 1) A way to flesh out the character, beyond just class and race, and 2) A way to let the character interact with the setting in a manner beyond what a normal person could do. To be a sailor says a lot about the individual, and sailors can generally do things that landlubbers can't necessarily do. Those two aspects are linked. If you're running a naval campaign, would you prefer the situation where most of the party has a similar background? It can be fun to do a themed game, but I think it's fair to say that the traditional method is to bring in a diverse cast of characters, since it builds more contrast between them. We should not go out of our way to encourage multiple redundant backgrounds throughout the party. Is it good and desirable that the same one or two characters are the only ones making ninety percent of the non-combat checks? I would posit that it's less fun for whoever is consistently sitting on the sidelines, never being able to contribute to that half of the game. So it makes sense, to me at least, that we should try to make different backgrounds more useful in situations where they aren't directly relevant. You lose a little bit on the realism (where you would obviously want everyone in a naval campaign to know how to run a ship), but you more than make up for it with character variety. [/QUOTE]

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