I want a backstory with broad strokes that hone in on specific details that help me engage with the character. Ideally, a backstory is going to have:
- a rough timeline of events that character has experienced.
- what their current motivations are
- specific locations that are important (hometown, battlefield of their first kill, church they were raised in, the theatre their troupe performs in).
- NPCs that I can bring into the main story from their past. Physical descriptions, their personalities, relationship to the player character.
- - ideally there should be someone the PC loves, someone they hate, someone that they want to know better, someone that was influential in their life.
Ideally this is all less than one page. It's fine if it's more, especially if it's interesting and engaging. After all, if you're going to describe a civil war that the character was born in, there's probably going to be lots of details and characters that are significant to set the stage.
exactly this! personally, i think broad strokes gives me a lot more to work with by being less upfront to deal with, and as i’m working and preparing the campaign, i can ask players for more information or even collaborate with them on these things if they haven’t thought them through. i appreciate that a lot of players like writing up long and detailed backstories, but as a dm i’m not likely to read something that long when i already have so much to prepare.
this checklist is kinda the perfect checklist for a backstory because it gives the dm a lot to work with while still having more they can talk with the player about AND lets the player choose to fill in some of those details as they’re playing instead of presenting them all up front
How do you get that down to 1 page? Last time I made a character with a similar idea I ended up with like 7 pages(with artwork for the characters taking up a total of about 3) of backstory that mostly detailed the most relevant 4 characters in their life (who they were, main personality traits, relationship to my character, and some idea of how they would behave towards my character and the rest of the party), a group they with, and then major events and how the character ended up the way they did.
It takes as long as it takes to do that and if it's 4 pages, it's 4 pages. In my opinion, it should almost be a reference document. It doesn't have to be in prose, it can be a bulleted list that has one to two sentences on each relevant character. If you want them to read your backstory and incorporate it, it should be easy for them to do so.
Oftentimes what I have to do is read a characters backstory, take notes on it and put those notes in a separate document that's standardized with other player characters info. Players are not always good at knowing what's relevant to a campaign.
well the great thing about a detailed backstory, at least the way I did it, is you have details to pull out a new character from. I'd be pretty damn bummed out about the character dying like any character I've put effort into, but the effort usually leaves interesting ways to bring in a different person from the same background.
An example was a character being hunted by a holy order that had twisted their work fending off fiends, to hunting anyone suspected of being involved with fiends, when she left the party, the one who joined was a revived member of that same order who was trying to find out what went wrong for them to destroy entire villages over rumors.
Yeah the main reason I like doing this is adding some filler to the world that the DM can adjust to fit theirs, it's amazing for the cooperative storytelling that I believe TTRPGs in general do best.
That's also why I seperate each portion into character fluff text, then a more buller-point style format that the DM can use for notes, then repeat for each relevant character. This also leaves lots of room for the "main" character(current PC) to evolve over the course of the campaign
Details with lots of plot hooks. I know some people don't like trying to work that stuff into the main campaign arc, but my DM style is very much "Throw as many plot hooks as possible at the party and let them decide which to pursue".
Plus: I love when my players give me a stable of NPCs. Nothing beats how invested players are in NPCs they've created.
I just ended a 3 year campaign last week where all 4 and eventually 5 of us players all had some form of amnesia with varying levels of detail. It was incredible how our DM made it all tie together into an incredible plot. I will always want to make stories for my players like that, but the people I play with tend to not do much for background.
Absolutely. I've had a player who decided their backstory was that they were enslaved and brought from another dimension. Their goal was to kill their captor and return home.
They had no interest in pursuing a party goal, and the other party members had no invested interest in that players goals in turn.
That sounds like a result of a lack of feedback to the player about what kind of adventure they are going into, or a lack of attempting to incorporate that captor into the adventure they are going into. The easiest solution from the DM side is to make that captor part of the hook that is intended to get the rest of the party engaged. Maybe he’s a lackey, partner, financier, or in some other way related to the bbeg (or whatever initial hook the players get).
Another aspect is that the player *has* to make a character that is appropriate for the adventure the DM is running. If they don’t know anything about the adventure, that’s difficult to do, obviously. But going into an adventure, the DM should be asking the player to come up with a few NPCs that are part of the characters background, which you can then incorporate into the story to give their character a reason to engage.
If a character is so singly focused on their one main goal that they can’t justify going with the party on side goals, the character is poorly made and needs additional motivations, goals, and links to the world you’re playing in, and that’s the kind of thing a session 0 can help the player nail down.
Honestly, whatever the player brings. I don't want too many details, because some things should be negotiable to a degree, but other than that I'm fine with whatever.
A blank slate just means we can work it out later. A detailed backstory just means I have things to work with.
I'm the same way. If the player wants to bring in a blank slate that we develop as we play, I can work with that.
If the player wants to bring in a fully-fleshed out backstory with a cast of supporting NPCs, I can work with that too (although it'll probably need a bit of back and forth to integrate it into campaign story).
What I don't like is players who want their own personal quest, but don't work with me to provide hooks for their characters. (Or worse, players who give me plot hooks for their character, but the moment those plot hooks show up, they run in the opposite direction and refuse to engage. Fortunately, this has only happened once.)
I ask my players for 5-10 bullet points about their characters backstory, and give some additional starting rewards for each point which links to either another players backstory or the world as a whole.
Here's an example
* Born and raised in the city of CITY NAME to his family of blacksmiths
* At a young age his family was hired by BBEG NAME to produce weapons for the war
* Whilst working in the forge one day OTHER PC NAME ran through his shop escaping the guards
* He helped her get away and they made a life long friendship
* With the coming of the great war he was enlisted into the army where he met ANOTHER PC NAME
* ANOTHER PC formed a minor rivalry with PC but after a surprise attack from the enemy they were the only two survivors
etc.
And from there - I would probably let every PC with at least 3 connections to the other PCs or Story take a free feat or something like that.
That's the beauty of it - I don't balance them - I just let the players have additional power for putting in work to improve the game.
It's not different to handing out inspiration but with lasting impacts for the whole game.
I like backstories with generalized "Ideas", not "Details". I can take ideas from a backstory and connect it into my world and/or to the backstories of other PCs. And once the connections are made, we can flesh them out with specifics.
So I suppose I'd be more in the blank page camp.
Generally, I either give the players a short questionnaire of around 20 questions revolving around things I'd need to know, or I'd tell them to give me short back stories, preferably in bullet point form.
After that, I usually go back and forth with them a little bit to hammer out any pertinent details and to make sure the character fits the campaign.
I do things this way because early on, I had a few players give me 30+ page back stories for their level 1 characters which is honestly just way to much.
I say I need a backstory 20-100 words long. You can write one longer than that if you want, but that's for you. The 20-100 words one is the one that I will start working on with you to incorporate into our game. If I need more info, we can look at the other one, but dont count on anything from it being accepted.
The game is about what happens in the game, not so much what happened before it.
I rather enjoy a highly detailed, well written backstory, but a lot of players *do not understand what that means.*
There is only one question your backstory needs to answer, and that is "why are you adventuring?" You need a backstory that gives a clear motivation for you to adventure with the current group. A lot of backstories provide really good reasons for you to go off on solo stuff or to leave the party, which isn't particularly helpful.
Everything else should, ideally, raise questions you do not know the answer to. Your backstory should be a starting point to find out. If you know exactly how its going to go then you are trying to write a script that you want me to narrate, and that's more work for me, not less.
If the details of your backstory are in service of that goal, great. I love it. If the details in your backstory work against that goal, I don't love it.
If your backstory makes it sound like your character's most interesting time of their life has already passed, then why play them now?
I'd rather get something fairly short and ask them to flesh it out versus the opposite. My favorite type of character backstories are pretty simple. For example: Vampire killed this characters parents -> grew up an orphan ->now they hunt the undead, etc. Vague enough where its gives a reason to be an adventurer but also as the DM if I'm in need of a plot hook I can bring in a vampire side quest or even THE vampire side quest later on.
Fairly broad. As long as you have:
-Main long term goal, preferably one that can be broken into little shorter goals so I can pepper them in to drive the character story forward
- 1 or 2 significant NPC that I can use in the previous point.
Everything else can be fleshed out during and in between sessions. I feel a too fleshed out backstory tends to feels a bit railroady in terms of character story arcs. Like the DM can't make it fit into the current story because theres no leeway to play with.
If they can't put it on one page, double-spaced, it's too much.
The most interesting part of the character's life should be during the campaign, not before it.
Big brush strokes for me. Give me a little history, motivations outside of adventuring with the party, name drop and important character or 2 from their backstory. Enough for me to pull from and the player to recognize that I'm pulling from their back story when I do.
Too many details and I find players can sometimes come up with ideas that conflict with the DM's world or the plot. Also too many details can make players get too married to their character or backstory being a certain way and can be detrimental to their enthusiasm when the DM's presentation of backstory tie-ins or the plotted story doesn't match their expectations.
Backstories have to have unanswered questions to be resolved during the campaign imo. I usually run backstory stuff as side-quests with powerful rewards rather than trying to force them into the main story. If a backstory happens to tie into the main story well, I’ll take the opportunity of course. The most important thing is that all storylines get to be full and interesting, not that they tie in with each other. The guy who killed the rogue’s parents doesn’t have to be involved with the bbeg’s plot to unleash a bubblegum bomb on the players’ favorite town.
Last session 0 I asked for 2 motivations and a goal. I don't remember who I stole that from.
Motivations are what motivates you to take plot hooks. My half orc is sense of duty, and will want to go help other orcs in trouble.
My wizard had a really cool backstory where a human wizard and a dragon fought and an amnesiac kobold with both memories came out. So they're highly motivated by gold and wizard knowledge.
Goals are just "something you want to do for your character to finish their story arc". So like finding out your past, or why you have shadow magic. Led to some really interesting characters.
I personally prefer, both as a GM and a player, a backstory that's more of a short list of bullet points, containing the most important parts of the characters backstory, rather than a one or more pages long, detailed backstory. The less detailed and rigid a backstory is, the easier it is to fit it into the story, and it also gives the player the ability to tie their character more tightly to the story as the campaign progress, by filling in some of the blanks in the backstory as they go.
I don't want too much from a backstory. A paragraph or two at most.
I think what marks off a backstory too much is if there is an "and" in it.
Like, for example, my character is a runaway princess who longs for adventure AND she secretly made a pact with a demon in exchange for magical powers.
There's too much there, so I'll usually tell a player to focus on one or the other.
you've hit on someting I so rarely see mentioned, the 'and' of backstories YES.
I had one player who I was constantly trying to reel back in regards to that yeah, some people try to shove too many disconnected things.
I don't think your example though is actually that bad, you need a way to explain powers and class, and 'princess' hasn't gotten us there yet, so there needs to be one 'and' in there. Royals surely know a thing or two about that sort of thing, and its who they'd be most keen to corrupt, it can be linked into the store well enough.
But if there was an additional 'and' in there I'd be raising eyebrows for sure.
Backstories should be very light typically. The more there is the more Ridgid the character the more expectations and reality is unlikely to meet.
But I like some. There is the occasional high detail backstory that I in my games but those are the exception not the rule.
I want the core history. If i can tell inherent bonds (key npcs/groups from their past), where theyve been, and what theyve done while there, im satisfied. I prefer one or two of the key bonds to have some uncertainty there so i can use them as plot hooks, but thats not required
I dislike either extreme and usually prefer more details to fewer. However, when it comes to each extreme? I would prefer a blank date for me to work with than several characters that I need to meroize such firn details of as the DM.
I made [this post ](https://www.reddit.com/r/dndnext/s/qFT9pT5bwl) going over the considerations of varying degrees I put forced for my players. At the core, I only need a goal/motive. What a character what's to accomplish and why they want to accomplish it. Everything else in the intermediate and advanced sections is just a bonus.
But for your example. It think I'd take none over everything.
I prefer to talk about backstories at session 0 rather than players make up one on their own. They can come in with ideas, but the glut of putting it together should be a conversation imo.
Don't get me wrong, I want them to have the backstory they want to have, but coming up with it or fleshing it out at session 0 allows us to work it into the setting well so I can incorporate it into the world.
It also let's me help them fill in gaps in their story by pitching ideas that use the setting we're playing in.
Backstory details aren't as important as making their backstory feel like a part of the world.
I just like them to mingle with the other characters' backstories a bit. I like when everyone's already been together a while. I don't like when no one knows each other
This is a great way to approach backstory. Keep it simple, punchy, and evocative. The point is just to give your character a reason to be in the adventure and suggest future plot hooks for them, not to write an unpublished novel about all the things that already happened to them. It's backstory not story.
I think being too detailed with a PC backstory without leaving room for the feedback of the DM or other PCs can put a halt to collaboration, in the same way that a DM can halt collaboration by creating a set, detailed plot or a setting that is too rigid to accommodate any player input.
I prefer that there is room for give and take, so everyone can work out the details together. The DM’s setting and plot hooks should make room (within reason) for all the PC’s background and goals. The PC’s concept, background and goals should fit the overall setting and the genre. All the PCs should be compatible enough (or have ties to each other or a common goal) so that it makes sense for them to adventure together.
A few paragraphs is good then I’ll ask questions as needed or offer ways it could better fit in the world or have ties to other PCs. I can veto things that just don’t fit but I will also check in with my PCs so they can veto my ideas that relate to their backstory if it contradicts their head canon.
I like two paragraphs, where you come from and where you're going. I don't need a ton of details unless you have specific blanks you'd rather fill in for me.
Blank page. I always thought backgrounds are better than backstory.
Ive never really focused on any one characters story, so not much need for plot hooks.
Even as a player I never do backstory. Half of the fun is figuring out what sort of character I'm playing in the context of the party
I like them with details, motivations and 1-3 named characters. That is a good way to create an arc for a player, which gives me plot hooks and that player a chance to develope and shine.
Me to my players after a gaming session:
# Good night, Westley. Good work. Sleep well. I'll most likely kill you in the morning.
Make all the backstory you want, but the game happens in the game.
For me, backstory should be short, to the point, and most importantly - most interesting things will happend at the table, not in backstory.
More often than not i would give a set of questions (kind of pbta-style, if you want). They would look something like this:
1. Who you were before you become adventurer?
2. Why do you become adventurer?
3. How do you joined the party/How do you connected to the party?
More questions can be added (but not too many, 1 or 2 more), or questions can be rephrased depening on broad character concept, class and subclass. Player answer with one, two, maybe slightly more sentances for each.
Preferably player would add NPCs that are relevant to the questions in some way, but they can always do that at the right moment in game.
After all of this i would end up with actually useful material i can use for a game instead of chapter of badly written novel (let's face it - you, me, and wast majority of players aren't writers at all).
A lot of people, myself included, like to figure it out as they go along. There's always a general idea floating around but never anything concrete.
This applies to my NPCs when i run a game too. Some of my party's favorite NPCs have literally nothing in their past. Doesn't make them any less of a good character.
and you can always define and declare stuff as you go - "oh yes, of course I know this town, I spent a while here when I was with that mercenary company. Matter of fact, the old captain retired here, I think..." That doesn't have to be declared pre-level 1, it's entirely valid for that to come up when it comes up.
The biggest thing is that I'd like my players to fit somewhere in the world. I want them to be from somewhere that the party may go to, to be able to meet someone they already know. I don't want them to be a blank slate of backstory with a personality
I'll take more detail over blank page. I like turning backstories into plot hooks to shape the campaign. Currently concluding a campaign (admittedly using a different system) where the most interesting and compelling adventure was derived almost entirely from a character's backstory.
I very much like detailed backstories. Not only because it gives me plenty of ideas about plot hooks, but it also lets me know they're invested in their character and know what they want. Blank pages or minimalist backstories disappoint me, because it feels like the player isn't actively willing to engage with the world, and as such I don't really know what to do for or with them as a result since they're just kinda there taking up space. Like an NPC, but slower and dumber in my experience. I know that's not true for all tables, but it certainly has been for mine. A player who actually spends time on their backstory is often far more attached, both to their character and the game itself, and they're often less likely to take stupid risks and actively engage in the gameplay. They're willing to put themselves in their characters position and think things through, and push the campaign forward. I've been in plenty of games where I was the only one who actually thought of their character and their backstory, and every time it felt like I was herding cats while suffering from Involuntary MC Syndrome. It wasn't because I wanted to be the leader, it was because I was the only one who gave the DM something to work with and who made character based decisions that pushed the plot forward.
In our group we tend to go for 2 single page backstories.
One that sets the actual character backstory: Where is my character from, what profession did I have before adventuring, any religion or cultural values they have, what are their likes and dislikes, etc. This is great, as it allows for some long term plot hooks and character development.
The other is focused in explaining why the character went from their old live into the life of an adventurer, and often describing how those first few days/events went. This gives some strong short term motivation and interesting plot hooks to kickstart the campaign.
The rest of the backstory tends to develop as we go. Often we players have more ideas in the back of our mind, and those slowly get revealed as we react to the world.
I always find that Mr. "I'm just Larry from Larry's village, I guess I kinda wanted to see the world I guess. Of course I'm a cleric. Uh, how did I became one? Eh, prayed really hard ig? Let's go" are really boring and horrible at play. Like the person didn't care enough to think on their character besides the little numbers or build, certainly won't care about any plot or character arc for their PC.
I get excited when a player sends me pages of background on their character. It demonstrates to me that they are really invested in the game.
However, I don't mandate this. If a player prefers to just write a few lines then that's okay too.
tbh it depends on the type of backstory.
one of my current PCs is super simple, just a girl from a small town. perfect i can do whatever i want.
another PC is like 5000 years old and used to be a dragon but was cursed to be a human, but the player hasnt fleshed out a lot about that past, so im kind of grasping at straws to make connections there. a bit more detail would really help, like where did she live and how? a dragon would not go unnoticed, neither would that dragon going missing all of a sudden.
I want a bit of upbringing, reason to leave home, reason to stay adventuring. If you want to give me more great, but I'll throw in that it might never come up.
I get players to bounce ideas off me from the start, when I send out the campaign summary, before they start fleshing things out. What is the general theme of the character, element(s) they want to include in their backstory. No specifics. E.g: "I want to play a noble who took up piracy after they were deposed."
Then we ping messages back and forth, usually over a week or so. There we hammer out specifics together. Who deposed you? I might have some NPC's/bad guys planned who will fit the bill. I am better able to flesh out my plans and NPC's with their input. How did you get into piracy and why? How does this get you to where we are starting in session 1. If the party are meeting in a tavern, I want to know why they're in that tavern to begin with and what they want to achieve on this adventure. Maybe they want to reclaim their lands, or maybe they just want revenge. I can then slot that into my plans in a more satisfying and holistic way.
Depends on the campaign. My group is playing an underdark and lloth/eilistraee heavy campaign, so I wrote up a big ol background for my half-drow cleric, so my DM has NPCs and plothooks to throw at us if need be. If we're doing just a 'normal adventurer' game with an overarching plot coming in later down the line, I'll go a bit light on the backstory.
Blank page. What I like to do is ask my players to provide me with one 'Core' aspect of their character. Something like a secret that the party don't know, or their one biggest goal. Then I'll work that into the story at some point, and let the rest of their character grow naturally from there.
Whatever the player wants. If they come with a huge fleshed out backstory, I'll try to make a character arc around part of it. If they just want to show up and hit stuff and do some RP without, that's fine, too.
I don't do a main campaign story anymore. I just make a loose framework and then entirely use the intersections of the themes and events in the characters' backatories to develop what happens in the campaign.
This means I never have to 'make something fit' bc it's all just what the players bring to the table and they're motivated to follow my (their) story threads.
I love having details so I can seed the story or module with the characters' stories, make it personalized a little. Like, a module definitely has a lot of capability for a unique tale all the players' own, but when one has a personal, deep-seated fear of Tiamat and has to confront her agents? Great stuff. Or the other player who is a shaman of sorts with a black dragon for a boss in that same party? You can get so many inter-character moments.
Generally before our first session I'll tell everyone the broad-strokes premise of the campaign and where the starting point. My instructions are simply "Get your character *here* and ready to do *this*." And if they make details that tie closely to story beats already in them I'll ask permission to weave them together. If not I seed new ones in in subplots and it's good fun for me.
I’d like them to know who their character is, what their motivations are, etc., but they don’t need to know absolutely everything about them. When I play I usually go into a campaign with a one page or so background and their motivations figured out. What kind of person they are will be a basic outline and it’ll get fleshed out through my playing them.
I want SOME backstory for my players so they understand where their character came from, but if they don’t want to flesh it out too much to allow for the campaign to build their story then that’s fine, too. As long as there’s SOMETHING to work with beyond “elf druid.” I can give them stuff beyond that.
Very much depends but typically more of a blank page that can be added to as the campaign progresses.
The length of your character's should be directly proportional to two factors... the amount of actual in-session time you've played this character and the amount of time you've spent discussing potential backstory ideas with your DM.
I love it when players give me a fairly detailed backstory with Goals, NPCs, background details, ect, because I adore rewarding their investment in making an entertaining character by making scenes with these elements being involved. My ranger player had one NPC in their backstory who became a major force in the plot, and my Barbarian's would-be arranged spouse is being set up as a major boss, and our Paladin's backstory in of itself (without his knowledge thus far) is involved with the origin of a massive monster terrorizing the continent.
It's even better if they work in certain details / talk with you in private for ideas of how to incorperate with the world in advance. Our Cleric being the world's first Warforge (steampunk setting with no relation to Ebberon), as the technology was recent. The best part is if any backstories have the potential to -unintentional or otherwise- overlap, such as the Ranger and Warlock having a connection to the forest to give their characters things to bond over.
Granted, a backstory doesn't need to be multiple pages nor an essay for me to find it engaging (even if that's my favorite format), as it might cause them to write boring filler or fluff. Heck sometimes bullet point listings or even answering the Big Four are enough or better for certain players.
"Who is your character?"
"What are their goals as an adventurer?"
"Where are they from?"
"Who are some individuals they might be associated with / what NPCs do you wanna see?"
The way I see it; the DM provides a world to play in, the players provide the DM with a fun cast.
I just want important characters traits en story hooks.
What's your goal, what's your friends and ennemy, what's your dilema, your flaws, maybe your obsession but honestly I don't care about your 3 page detailed lore about your family
Best option for me as a DM is a backstory that gives you a clear idea of the character the player has in mind but leaves enough openings for adventure hooks even if they are never explored.
I run public tables.
I like to have it as concise as possible.
Players sometimes need to have a very specific backstory, and that's fine. I need it to fit on one page.
If it can't fit on a page, it's too long or complex.
There are a number of reasons why, but the short of it is that sometimes players don't come back or miss more sessions than others. I can't invest so much into a backstory for the sake of the game.
Also the flip side, if I have a backstory given to me, with wiggle room, I can create a one shot from it for the player. This is what can happen if not enough people show up to play the regular adventure. It's awesome.
I generally require two backstories from my players.
The first minimum two paragraphs is for me. Their actual backstory, which I encourage them to list goals for their characters. Be it power money or magic items so I know what to sprinkle throughout the game to make them happy.
The second as long as they want for the other players. Or should I say what they want the other players to know about them?
After a slot zero I make sure everyone can read what you know about each other.
I'll just come out and say that I'm that problem player who makes way to much backstory for my character. I'll defend myself in a minute but at the end of the day that's me, my current character has a 15 page Google doc to their name.
Now to defend myself. First off that's not all backstory, the first page is my character synopsis and backstory. A few pages go towards fleshing out my character, like character quirks and motivation for adventuring and working with a party.
Then the next few pages are dedicated to important NPC's and such. It also usually grows with time, when we first started my most recent campaign my character was only a young noble who decided to run away from home to help people and adventure, and her personality was just the regular LG knight who was better at swinging a sword than academics.
The problem is I tend to get carried away and the backstory ends up expanding a ton outside of my character. My noble knight has parents, who are they? I ended up making them way to important and complex, with their own back stories and motivations. Her noble family ended up becoming one of the most influential families in their nation and are now a whole lineage of heroes.
I have a few pages where I note down cool ideas and such but I try really hard to let my dm know, "these are my ideas, the moment the game starts everything is in your control. If you never use any of this that's fine because I have my character at least. It's your game, this is my character, this is her backstory, do what you will."
With backstories, I like players to give me a draft rather than a finished manuscript. Ideally, you put in enough detail that you'll know how your character fits into the world but not so much that you feel like you've wasted hours of your life if I tell you that something doesn't work. That gives us something to talk about and helps us find something *you'll* enjoy playing and *I'll* enjoy DMing for.
In my experience, a lack of backstory means a lack of personality, or at best, a character that has one “gimmick” personality trait that is funny or interesting for a session, then quickly becomes tiresome. This may be just a problem with the people I play with however.
Backstory informs a characters motivations, ideals, goals, and flaws. It gives the DM a place to start from to present RP opportunities and gives the player a basis to determine how the character would act when presented with that opportunity. It’s definitely possible to build personality and then consider “what happened to my character to make them like this” but in my experience, either players don’t consider this during actual play, or it leads to inconsistent characters because they don’t always consider how that new backstory element might inform how they act in other situations.
So I prefer a character have a backstory. Not too detailed, but things like:
- Why are they adventuring, and if the initial hook is known, why are they going on *this* adventure.
- Where did they come from? At least what kind of society if not an actual location, what their parents did, what their social status was/is, etc.
- Who are some NPCs in their life and what kinds of feelings do they have for them (love, hate, jealousy, rivalry, etc)
- What are some of their “ethics”? Pf2e calls these edicts and anathemas - what are just a few things they feel a moral obligation toward and what are a few things are morally reprehensible?
Of course if it’s a one shot, backstory and motivation doesn’t matter so much. Just have a reason for adventuring so we aren’t faced in the first few minutes of the session struggling to get a character to go on the adventure in the first place.
Of the two extremes, it'd rather have play-doh. Character's backstory is good, but the character evolves as the game goes on and i get to know them better. It's with loose background and malleability that can help me write something to tie in.
Granted, it's always better yo have some details than a total non-engagement background like 'I like to hit things'.
As both a player and DM, I like characters to maybe have a couple of details, but that’s it. It means the character can grow with the story, which seems to work better than having a novel of a backstory that rarely sees the light of day. Also, characters can die more easily at lower levels so putting a bunch of work into a backstory only to have a character die can be…shitty
More is better but an NPC or two and a reason for adventuring is sufficient. And for gods sake if there is something you actually want to explore and to have come up in the campaign, tell me. I view backstories as something primarily for the player to draw from to help them with their character, and as an invitation to me for potential plot hooks, but just because you put them in your backstory doesn’t mean I’m going to use them, especially when there are 50. If you have a lot of plot hooks and a ton of NPC’s highlight the important ones.
I want a backstory with broad strokes that hone in on specific details that help me engage with the character. Ideally, a backstory is going to have: - a rough timeline of events that character has experienced. - what their current motivations are - specific locations that are important (hometown, battlefield of their first kill, church they were raised in, the theatre their troupe performs in). - NPCs that I can bring into the main story from their past. Physical descriptions, their personalities, relationship to the player character. - - ideally there should be someone the PC loves, someone they hate, someone that they want to know better, someone that was influential in their life. Ideally this is all less than one page. It's fine if it's more, especially if it's interesting and engaging. After all, if you're going to describe a civil war that the character was born in, there's probably going to be lots of details and characters that are significant to set the stage.
exactly this! personally, i think broad strokes gives me a lot more to work with by being less upfront to deal with, and as i’m working and preparing the campaign, i can ask players for more information or even collaborate with them on these things if they haven’t thought them through. i appreciate that a lot of players like writing up long and detailed backstories, but as a dm i’m not likely to read something that long when i already have so much to prepare. this checklist is kinda the perfect checklist for a backstory because it gives the dm a lot to work with while still having more they can talk with the player about AND lets the player choose to fill in some of those details as they’re playing instead of presenting them all up front
How do you get that down to 1 page? Last time I made a character with a similar idea I ended up with like 7 pages(with artwork for the characters taking up a total of about 3) of backstory that mostly detailed the most relevant 4 characters in their life (who they were, main personality traits, relationship to my character, and some idea of how they would behave towards my character and the rest of the party), a group they with, and then major events and how the character ended up the way they did.
It takes as long as it takes to do that and if it's 4 pages, it's 4 pages. In my opinion, it should almost be a reference document. It doesn't have to be in prose, it can be a bulleted list that has one to two sentences on each relevant character. If you want them to read your backstory and incorporate it, it should be easy for them to do so. Oftentimes what I have to do is read a characters backstory, take notes on it and put those notes in a separate document that's standardized with other player characters info. Players are not always good at knowing what's relevant to a campaign.
I'm genuinely curious: how would you feel if that character died in their first battle?
well the great thing about a detailed backstory, at least the way I did it, is you have details to pull out a new character from. I'd be pretty damn bummed out about the character dying like any character I've put effort into, but the effort usually leaves interesting ways to bring in a different person from the same background. An example was a character being hunted by a holy order that had twisted their work fending off fiends, to hunting anyone suspected of being involved with fiends, when she left the party, the one who joined was a revived member of that same order who was trying to find out what went wrong for them to destroy entire villages over rumors.
cool. that's good player buy-in. there's no reason that the DM has to be responsible for filling out all the corners of the game world.
Yeah the main reason I like doing this is adding some filler to the world that the DM can adjust to fit theirs, it's amazing for the cooperative storytelling that I believe TTRPGs in general do best. That's also why I seperate each portion into character fluff text, then a more buller-point style format that the DM can use for notes, then repeat for each relevant character. This also leaves lots of room for the "main" character(current PC) to evolve over the course of the campaign
Details with lots of plot hooks. I know some people don't like trying to work that stuff into the main campaign arc, but my DM style is very much "Throw as many plot hooks as possible at the party and let them decide which to pursue". Plus: I love when my players give me a stable of NPCs. Nothing beats how invested players are in NPCs they've created.
> Nothing beats how invested players are in NPCs they've created. This. Made for some of my most memorable moments as a DM.
I just ended a 3 year campaign last week where all 4 and eventually 5 of us players all had some form of amnesia with varying levels of detail. It was incredible how our DM made it all tie together into an incredible plot. I will always want to make stories for my players like that, but the people I play with tend to not do much for background.
I find that backstories are more interesting when they are developed in play, as players get a sense for who their characters are
Absolutely. I've had a player who decided their backstory was that they were enslaved and brought from another dimension. Their goal was to kill their captor and return home. They had no interest in pursuing a party goal, and the other party members had no invested interest in that players goals in turn.
That sounds like a result of a lack of feedback to the player about what kind of adventure they are going into, or a lack of attempting to incorporate that captor into the adventure they are going into. The easiest solution from the DM side is to make that captor part of the hook that is intended to get the rest of the party engaged. Maybe he’s a lackey, partner, financier, or in some other way related to the bbeg (or whatever initial hook the players get). Another aspect is that the player *has* to make a character that is appropriate for the adventure the DM is running. If they don’t know anything about the adventure, that’s difficult to do, obviously. But going into an adventure, the DM should be asking the player to come up with a few NPCs that are part of the characters background, which you can then incorporate into the story to give their character a reason to engage. If a character is so singly focused on their one main goal that they can’t justify going with the party on side goals, the character is poorly made and needs additional motivations, goals, and links to the world you’re playing in, and that’s the kind of thing a session 0 can help the player nail down.
Honestly, whatever the player brings. I don't want too many details, because some things should be negotiable to a degree, but other than that I'm fine with whatever. A blank slate just means we can work it out later. A detailed backstory just means I have things to work with.
I'm the same way. If the player wants to bring in a blank slate that we develop as we play, I can work with that. If the player wants to bring in a fully-fleshed out backstory with a cast of supporting NPCs, I can work with that too (although it'll probably need a bit of back and forth to integrate it into campaign story). What I don't like is players who want their own personal quest, but don't work with me to provide hooks for their characters. (Or worse, players who give me plot hooks for their character, but the moment those plot hooks show up, they run in the opposite direction and refuse to engage. Fortunately, this has only happened once.)
I ask my players for 5-10 bullet points about their characters backstory, and give some additional starting rewards for each point which links to either another players backstory or the world as a whole.
Could you give examples of those bullet points and the rewards you give them?
Here's an example * Born and raised in the city of CITY NAME to his family of blacksmiths * At a young age his family was hired by BBEG NAME to produce weapons for the war * Whilst working in the forge one day OTHER PC NAME ran through his shop escaping the guards * He helped her get away and they made a life long friendship * With the coming of the great war he was enlisted into the army where he met ANOTHER PC NAME * ANOTHER PC formed a minor rivalry with PC but after a surprise attack from the enemy they were the only two survivors etc. And from there - I would probably let every PC with at least 3 connections to the other PCs or Story take a free feat or something like that.
So what you meant by giving them starting rewards was in the form of connections with npcs that they can use in the campaign?
Rewards as in the feats or additional hit die or proficiencies etc. Mechanical rewards.
How do you balance those rewards? And how do you decide which ones to give?
That's the beauty of it - I don't balance them - I just let the players have additional power for putting in work to improve the game. It's not different to handing out inspiration but with lasting impacts for the whole game.
I like backstories with generalized "Ideas", not "Details". I can take ideas from a backstory and connect it into my world and/or to the backstories of other PCs. And once the connections are made, we can flesh them out with specifics. So I suppose I'd be more in the blank page camp.
Generally, I either give the players a short questionnaire of around 20 questions revolving around things I'd need to know, or I'd tell them to give me short back stories, preferably in bullet point form. After that, I usually go back and forth with them a little bit to hammer out any pertinent details and to make sure the character fits the campaign. I do things this way because early on, I had a few players give me 30+ page back stories for their level 1 characters which is honestly just way to much.
Hey, can I see the questionnaire? Sounds kinda cool
X2
Simples backstories are my jam. It let tge character focus be on the actual game story rather than their own backstory
I say I need a backstory 20-100 words long. You can write one longer than that if you want, but that's for you. The 20-100 words one is the one that I will start working on with you to incorporate into our game. If I need more info, we can look at the other one, but dont count on anything from it being accepted. The game is about what happens in the game, not so much what happened before it.
I rather enjoy a highly detailed, well written backstory, but a lot of players *do not understand what that means.* There is only one question your backstory needs to answer, and that is "why are you adventuring?" You need a backstory that gives a clear motivation for you to adventure with the current group. A lot of backstories provide really good reasons for you to go off on solo stuff or to leave the party, which isn't particularly helpful. Everything else should, ideally, raise questions you do not know the answer to. Your backstory should be a starting point to find out. If you know exactly how its going to go then you are trying to write a script that you want me to narrate, and that's more work for me, not less. If the details of your backstory are in service of that goal, great. I love it. If the details in your backstory work against that goal, I don't love it. If your backstory makes it sound like your character's most interesting time of their life has already passed, then why play them now?
I'd rather get something fairly short and ask them to flesh it out versus the opposite. My favorite type of character backstories are pretty simple. For example: Vampire killed this characters parents -> grew up an orphan ->now they hunt the undead, etc. Vague enough where its gives a reason to be an adventurer but also as the DM if I'm in need of a plot hook I can bring in a vampire side quest or even THE vampire side quest later on.
Fairly broad. As long as you have: -Main long term goal, preferably one that can be broken into little shorter goals so I can pepper them in to drive the character story forward - 1 or 2 significant NPC that I can use in the previous point. Everything else can be fleshed out during and in between sessions. I feel a too fleshed out backstory tends to feels a bit railroady in terms of character story arcs. Like the DM can't make it fit into the current story because theres no leeway to play with.
If they can't put it on one page, double-spaced, it's too much. The most interesting part of the character's life should be during the campaign, not before it.
Big brush strokes for me. Give me a little history, motivations outside of adventuring with the party, name drop and important character or 2 from their backstory. Enough for me to pull from and the player to recognize that I'm pulling from their back story when I do. Too many details and I find players can sometimes come up with ideas that conflict with the DM's world or the plot. Also too many details can make players get too married to their character or backstory being a certain way and can be detrimental to their enthusiasm when the DM's presentation of backstory tie-ins or the plotted story doesn't match their expectations.
Backstories have to have unanswered questions to be resolved during the campaign imo. I usually run backstory stuff as side-quests with powerful rewards rather than trying to force them into the main story. If a backstory happens to tie into the main story well, I’ll take the opportunity of course. The most important thing is that all storylines get to be full and interesting, not that they tie in with each other. The guy who killed the rogue’s parents doesn’t have to be involved with the bbeg’s plot to unleash a bubblegum bomb on the players’ favorite town.
Last session 0 I asked for 2 motivations and a goal. I don't remember who I stole that from. Motivations are what motivates you to take plot hooks. My half orc is sense of duty, and will want to go help other orcs in trouble. My wizard had a really cool backstory where a human wizard and a dragon fought and an amnesiac kobold with both memories came out. So they're highly motivated by gold and wizard knowledge. Goals are just "something you want to do for your character to finish their story arc". So like finding out your past, or why you have shadow magic. Led to some really interesting characters.
I like to do a lot of back and forth to heavily integrate the pcs backstory with my world.
I personally prefer, both as a GM and a player, a backstory that's more of a short list of bullet points, containing the most important parts of the characters backstory, rather than a one or more pages long, detailed backstory. The less detailed and rigid a backstory is, the easier it is to fit it into the story, and it also gives the player the ability to tie their character more tightly to the story as the campaign progress, by filling in some of the blanks in the backstory as they go.
I don't want too much from a backstory. A paragraph or two at most. I think what marks off a backstory too much is if there is an "and" in it. Like, for example, my character is a runaway princess who longs for adventure AND she secretly made a pact with a demon in exchange for magical powers. There's too much there, so I'll usually tell a player to focus on one or the other.
I feel like this isn’t the greatest example because replacing the AND with a SO makes perfect sense.
The difference there is that now you have cause and effect whereas before there might have been no connection between the two parts.
You're probably right. Couldn't think of a good example when I wrote the post.
you've hit on someting I so rarely see mentioned, the 'and' of backstories YES. I had one player who I was constantly trying to reel back in regards to that yeah, some people try to shove too many disconnected things. I don't think your example though is actually that bad, you need a way to explain powers and class, and 'princess' hasn't gotten us there yet, so there needs to be one 'and' in there. Royals surely know a thing or two about that sort of thing, and its who they'd be most keen to corrupt, it can be linked into the store well enough. But if there was an additional 'and' in there I'd be raising eyebrows for sure.
Backstories should be very light typically. The more there is the more Ridgid the character the more expectations and reality is unlikely to meet. But I like some. There is the occasional high detail backstory that I in my games but those are the exception not the rule.
I want the core history. If i can tell inherent bonds (key npcs/groups from their past), where theyve been, and what theyve done while there, im satisfied. I prefer one or two of the key bonds to have some uncertainty there so i can use them as plot hooks, but thats not required
I dislike either extreme and usually prefer more details to fewer. However, when it comes to each extreme? I would prefer a blank date for me to work with than several characters that I need to meroize such firn details of as the DM. I made [this post ](https://www.reddit.com/r/dndnext/s/qFT9pT5bwl) going over the considerations of varying degrees I put forced for my players. At the core, I only need a goal/motive. What a character what's to accomplish and why they want to accomplish it. Everything else in the intermediate and advanced sections is just a bonus. But for your example. It think I'd take none over everything.
I prefer to talk about backstories at session 0 rather than players make up one on their own. They can come in with ideas, but the glut of putting it together should be a conversation imo. Don't get me wrong, I want them to have the backstory they want to have, but coming up with it or fleshing it out at session 0 allows us to work it into the setting well so I can incorporate it into the world. It also let's me help them fill in gaps in their story by pitching ideas that use the setting we're playing in. Backstory details aren't as important as making their backstory feel like a part of the world.
I just like them to mingle with the other characters' backstories a bit. I like when everyone's already been together a while. I don't like when no one knows each other
[The _Burn Notice_ backstory](https://www.reddit.com/r/dndmemes/s/qoAAdCHBRB)
This is a great way to approach backstory. Keep it simple, punchy, and evocative. The point is just to give your character a reason to be in the adventure and suggest future plot hooks for them, not to write an unpublished novel about all the things that already happened to them. It's backstory not story.
I think being too detailed with a PC backstory without leaving room for the feedback of the DM or other PCs can put a halt to collaboration, in the same way that a DM can halt collaboration by creating a set, detailed plot or a setting that is too rigid to accommodate any player input. I prefer that there is room for give and take, so everyone can work out the details together. The DM’s setting and plot hooks should make room (within reason) for all the PC’s background and goals. The PC’s concept, background and goals should fit the overall setting and the genre. All the PCs should be compatible enough (or have ties to each other or a common goal) so that it makes sense for them to adventure together. A few paragraphs is good then I’ll ask questions as needed or offer ways it could better fit in the world or have ties to other PCs. I can veto things that just don’t fit but I will also check in with my PCs so they can veto my ideas that relate to their backstory if it contradicts their head canon.
I like two paragraphs, where you come from and where you're going. I don't need a ton of details unless you have specific blanks you'd rather fill in for me.
Blank page. I always thought backgrounds are better than backstory. Ive never really focused on any one characters story, so not much need for plot hooks. Even as a player I never do backstory. Half of the fun is figuring out what sort of character I'm playing in the context of the party
I like them with details, motivations and 1-3 named characters. That is a good way to create an arc for a player, which gives me plot hooks and that player a chance to develope and shine.
Me to my players after a gaming session: # Good night, Westley. Good work. Sleep well. I'll most likely kill you in the morning. Make all the backstory you want, but the game happens in the game.
For me, backstory should be short, to the point, and most importantly - most interesting things will happend at the table, not in backstory. More often than not i would give a set of questions (kind of pbta-style, if you want). They would look something like this: 1. Who you were before you become adventurer? 2. Why do you become adventurer? 3. How do you joined the party/How do you connected to the party? More questions can be added (but not too many, 1 or 2 more), or questions can be rephrased depening on broad character concept, class and subclass. Player answer with one, two, maybe slightly more sentances for each. Preferably player would add NPCs that are relevant to the questions in some way, but they can always do that at the right moment in game. After all of this i would end up with actually useful material i can use for a game instead of chapter of badly written novel (let's face it - you, me, and wast majority of players aren't writers at all).
I prefer no backstories… I believe that your characters story is the story that unfolds over the course of the campaign
I mean, something has to have gotten them to where they are They didn't do nothing for 18+ years Just nothing world changing
A lot of people, myself included, like to figure it out as they go along. There's always a general idea floating around but never anything concrete. This applies to my NPCs when i run a game too. Some of my party's favorite NPCs have literally nothing in their past. Doesn't make them any less of a good character.
and you can always define and declare stuff as you go - "oh yes, of course I know this town, I spent a while here when I was with that mercenary company. Matter of fact, the old captain retired here, I think..." That doesn't have to be declared pre-level 1, it's entirely valid for that to come up when it comes up.
That can be a background choice, I think that's their literal purpose
Spot on my man.. enjoy the upvote
Of the two I prefer too much detail to not enough.
If its a homebrew campaign, give me a page full of plot hooks. If its a pre-written campaign, anything from a paragraph to a page.
The biggest thing is that I'd like my players to fit somewhere in the world. I want them to be from somewhere that the party may go to, to be able to meet someone they already know. I don't want them to be a blank slate of backstory with a personality
I'll take more detail over blank page. I like turning backstories into plot hooks to shape the campaign. Currently concluding a campaign (admittedly using a different system) where the most interesting and compelling adventure was derived almost entirely from a character's backstory.
I very much like detailed backstories. Not only because it gives me plenty of ideas about plot hooks, but it also lets me know they're invested in their character and know what they want. Blank pages or minimalist backstories disappoint me, because it feels like the player isn't actively willing to engage with the world, and as such I don't really know what to do for or with them as a result since they're just kinda there taking up space. Like an NPC, but slower and dumber in my experience. I know that's not true for all tables, but it certainly has been for mine. A player who actually spends time on their backstory is often far more attached, both to their character and the game itself, and they're often less likely to take stupid risks and actively engage in the gameplay. They're willing to put themselves in their characters position and think things through, and push the campaign forward. I've been in plenty of games where I was the only one who actually thought of their character and their backstory, and every time it felt like I was herding cats while suffering from Involuntary MC Syndrome. It wasn't because I wanted to be the leader, it was because I was the only one who gave the DM something to work with and who made character based decisions that pushed the plot forward.
Whatever the player in question is comfortable with. That said, you don't write it, I take that as an invitation to "fill in the blanks".
In our group we tend to go for 2 single page backstories. One that sets the actual character backstory: Where is my character from, what profession did I have before adventuring, any religion or cultural values they have, what are their likes and dislikes, etc. This is great, as it allows for some long term plot hooks and character development. The other is focused in explaining why the character went from their old live into the life of an adventurer, and often describing how those first few days/events went. This gives some strong short term motivation and interesting plot hooks to kickstart the campaign. The rest of the backstory tends to develop as we go. Often we players have more ideas in the back of our mind, and those slowly get revealed as we react to the world.
I always find that Mr. "I'm just Larry from Larry's village, I guess I kinda wanted to see the world I guess. Of course I'm a cleric. Uh, how did I became one? Eh, prayed really hard ig? Let's go" are really boring and horrible at play. Like the person didn't care enough to think on their character besides the little numbers or build, certainly won't care about any plot or character arc for their PC.
I get excited when a player sends me pages of background on their character. It demonstrates to me that they are really invested in the game. However, I don't mandate this. If a player prefers to just write a few lines then that's okay too.
tbh it depends on the type of backstory. one of my current PCs is super simple, just a girl from a small town. perfect i can do whatever i want. another PC is like 5000 years old and used to be a dragon but was cursed to be a human, but the player hasnt fleshed out a lot about that past, so im kind of grasping at straws to make connections there. a bit more detail would really help, like where did she live and how? a dragon would not go unnoticed, neither would that dragon going missing all of a sudden.
I want a bit of upbringing, reason to leave home, reason to stay adventuring. If you want to give me more great, but I'll throw in that it might never come up.
I get players to bounce ideas off me from the start, when I send out the campaign summary, before they start fleshing things out. What is the general theme of the character, element(s) they want to include in their backstory. No specifics. E.g: "I want to play a noble who took up piracy after they were deposed." Then we ping messages back and forth, usually over a week or so. There we hammer out specifics together. Who deposed you? I might have some NPC's/bad guys planned who will fit the bill. I am better able to flesh out my plans and NPC's with their input. How did you get into piracy and why? How does this get you to where we are starting in session 1. If the party are meeting in a tavern, I want to know why they're in that tavern to begin with and what they want to achieve on this adventure. Maybe they want to reclaim their lands, or maybe they just want revenge. I can then slot that into my plans in a more satisfying and holistic way.
Considering that getting backstories out of my players is akin to pulling teeth, I take what I can get.
Something right in the middle, why is it always black and white, everything or nothing.
Depends on the campaign. My group is playing an underdark and lloth/eilistraee heavy campaign, so I wrote up a big ol background for my half-drow cleric, so my DM has NPCs and plothooks to throw at us if need be. If we're doing just a 'normal adventurer' game with an overarching plot coming in later down the line, I'll go a bit light on the backstory.
Blank page. What I like to do is ask my players to provide me with one 'Core' aspect of their character. Something like a secret that the party don't know, or their one biggest goal. Then I'll work that into the story at some point, and let the rest of their character grow naturally from there.
Whatever the player wants. If they come with a huge fleshed out backstory, I'll try to make a character arc around part of it. If they just want to show up and hit stuff and do some RP without, that's fine, too.
Up to the player. But even if they have pages of backstory, I don’t need to know it all. Just some locations, names, and motivation.
I don't do a main campaign story anymore. I just make a loose framework and then entirely use the intersections of the themes and events in the characters' backatories to develop what happens in the campaign. This means I never have to 'make something fit' bc it's all just what the players bring to the table and they're motivated to follow my (their) story threads.
I love having details so I can seed the story or module with the characters' stories, make it personalized a little. Like, a module definitely has a lot of capability for a unique tale all the players' own, but when one has a personal, deep-seated fear of Tiamat and has to confront her agents? Great stuff. Or the other player who is a shaman of sorts with a black dragon for a boss in that same party? You can get so many inter-character moments. Generally before our first session I'll tell everyone the broad-strokes premise of the campaign and where the starting point. My instructions are simply "Get your character *here* and ready to do *this*." And if they make details that tie closely to story beats already in them I'll ask permission to weave them together. If not I seed new ones in in subplots and it's good fun for me.
I’d like them to know who their character is, what their motivations are, etc., but they don’t need to know absolutely everything about them. When I play I usually go into a campaign with a one page or so background and their motivations figured out. What kind of person they are will be a basic outline and it’ll get fleshed out through my playing them. I want SOME backstory for my players so they understand where their character came from, but if they don’t want to flesh it out too much to allow for the campaign to build their story then that’s fine, too. As long as there’s SOMETHING to work with beyond “elf druid.” I can give them stuff beyond that.
Very much depends but typically more of a blank page that can be added to as the campaign progresses. The length of your character's should be directly proportional to two factors... the amount of actual in-session time you've played this character and the amount of time you've spent discussing potential backstory ideas with your DM.
I love it when players give me a fairly detailed backstory with Goals, NPCs, background details, ect, because I adore rewarding their investment in making an entertaining character by making scenes with these elements being involved. My ranger player had one NPC in their backstory who became a major force in the plot, and my Barbarian's would-be arranged spouse is being set up as a major boss, and our Paladin's backstory in of itself (without his knowledge thus far) is involved with the origin of a massive monster terrorizing the continent. It's even better if they work in certain details / talk with you in private for ideas of how to incorperate with the world in advance. Our Cleric being the world's first Warforge (steampunk setting with no relation to Ebberon), as the technology was recent. The best part is if any backstories have the potential to -unintentional or otherwise- overlap, such as the Ranger and Warlock having a connection to the forest to give their characters things to bond over. Granted, a backstory doesn't need to be multiple pages nor an essay for me to find it engaging (even if that's my favorite format), as it might cause them to write boring filler or fluff. Heck sometimes bullet point listings or even answering the Big Four are enough or better for certain players. "Who is your character?" "What are their goals as an adventurer?" "Where are they from?" "Who are some individuals they might be associated with / what NPCs do you wanna see?" The way I see it; the DM provides a world to play in, the players provide the DM with a fun cast.
I just want important characters traits en story hooks. What's your goal, what's your friends and ennemy, what's your dilema, your flaws, maybe your obsession but honestly I don't care about your 3 page detailed lore about your family
Best option for me as a DM is a backstory that gives you a clear idea of the character the player has in mind but leaves enough openings for adventure hooks even if they are never explored.
I prefer that their first few levels of experience are their backstory.
I run public tables. I like to have it as concise as possible. Players sometimes need to have a very specific backstory, and that's fine. I need it to fit on one page. If it can't fit on a page, it's too long or complex. There are a number of reasons why, but the short of it is that sometimes players don't come back or miss more sessions than others. I can't invest so much into a backstory for the sake of the game. Also the flip side, if I have a backstory given to me, with wiggle room, I can create a one shot from it for the player. This is what can happen if not enough people show up to play the regular adventure. It's awesome.
I generally require two backstories from my players. The first minimum two paragraphs is for me. Their actual backstory, which I encourage them to list goals for their characters. Be it power money or magic items so I know what to sprinkle throughout the game to make them happy. The second as long as they want for the other players. Or should I say what they want the other players to know about them? After a slot zero I make sure everyone can read what you know about each other.
I'll just come out and say that I'm that problem player who makes way to much backstory for my character. I'll defend myself in a minute but at the end of the day that's me, my current character has a 15 page Google doc to their name. Now to defend myself. First off that's not all backstory, the first page is my character synopsis and backstory. A few pages go towards fleshing out my character, like character quirks and motivation for adventuring and working with a party. Then the next few pages are dedicated to important NPC's and such. It also usually grows with time, when we first started my most recent campaign my character was only a young noble who decided to run away from home to help people and adventure, and her personality was just the regular LG knight who was better at swinging a sword than academics. The problem is I tend to get carried away and the backstory ends up expanding a ton outside of my character. My noble knight has parents, who are they? I ended up making them way to important and complex, with their own back stories and motivations. Her noble family ended up becoming one of the most influential families in their nation and are now a whole lineage of heroes. I have a few pages where I note down cool ideas and such but I try really hard to let my dm know, "these are my ideas, the moment the game starts everything is in your control. If you never use any of this that's fine because I have my character at least. It's your game, this is my character, this is her backstory, do what you will."
With backstories, I like players to give me a draft rather than a finished manuscript. Ideally, you put in enough detail that you'll know how your character fits into the world but not so much that you feel like you've wasted hours of your life if I tell you that something doesn't work. That gives us something to talk about and helps us find something *you'll* enjoy playing and *I'll* enjoy DMing for.
Blank page. I feel like a long backstory is a bit like meeting a dance partner in a club and they hand you a sheet of steps to memorise.
In my experience, a lack of backstory means a lack of personality, or at best, a character that has one “gimmick” personality trait that is funny or interesting for a session, then quickly becomes tiresome. This may be just a problem with the people I play with however. Backstory informs a characters motivations, ideals, goals, and flaws. It gives the DM a place to start from to present RP opportunities and gives the player a basis to determine how the character would act when presented with that opportunity. It’s definitely possible to build personality and then consider “what happened to my character to make them like this” but in my experience, either players don’t consider this during actual play, or it leads to inconsistent characters because they don’t always consider how that new backstory element might inform how they act in other situations. So I prefer a character have a backstory. Not too detailed, but things like: - Why are they adventuring, and if the initial hook is known, why are they going on *this* adventure. - Where did they come from? At least what kind of society if not an actual location, what their parents did, what their social status was/is, etc. - Who are some NPCs in their life and what kinds of feelings do they have for them (love, hate, jealousy, rivalry, etc) - What are some of their “ethics”? Pf2e calls these edicts and anathemas - what are just a few things they feel a moral obligation toward and what are a few things are morally reprehensible? Of course if it’s a one shot, backstory and motivation doesn’t matter so much. Just have a reason for adventuring so we aren’t faced in the first few minutes of the session struggling to get a character to go on the adventure in the first place.
Of the two extremes, it'd rather have play-doh. Character's backstory is good, but the character evolves as the game goes on and i get to know them better. It's with loose background and malleability that can help me write something to tie in. Granted, it's always better yo have some details than a total non-engagement background like 'I like to hit things'.
3 bullet points please.
As both a player and DM, I like characters to maybe have a couple of details, but that’s it. It means the character can grow with the story, which seems to work better than having a novel of a backstory that rarely sees the light of day. Also, characters can die more easily at lower levels so putting a bunch of work into a backstory only to have a character die can be…shitty
I don't want anything more than "I come from a farm/town/etc. and want loot."
I like them to answer each question in xanathar’s: this is your life section, any more detail than that is up to them to decide to include
More is better but an NPC or two and a reason for adventuring is sufficient. And for gods sake if there is something you actually want to explore and to have come up in the campaign, tell me. I view backstories as something primarily for the player to draw from to help them with their character, and as an invitation to me for potential plot hooks, but just because you put them in your backstory doesn’t mean I’m going to use them, especially when there are 50. If you have a lot of plot hooks and a ton of NPC’s highlight the important ones.
Back story is what happens before the PCs hit level 3.
😆 I'm probably in the minority here. "Do your characters know each other? Cool. Roll Initiative."