Opinon on backstory (Rough Copy)

[Olfgar]

So, i just wanted the play grounds honest opinion on this backstory for my character im making. This is currently a kind of basic version and a rough copy of such. Im going to been giving a good polishing, and and flesh it out a bit more. Im just wondering what you guys think? (The general concept, things to change around/revise, etc).



Karin, which means “Pure One”, was born to a blacksmith father, and a seamstress mother. Her father and mother, 25 and 17 at the time respectively lived in a small village located near a small mountain range rich in metals.

Her father was always strict and stern, but only wished to instill discipline in his free spirited daughter, while the mother believed to let one live as they felt, and this brought her parents into many arguments. All her life, Karin loved to sneak into places she wasnt supposed to be, and climb, no matter what it was. Approaching Karin's 10th birthday, the mines began to dry up in the metals that her father, Alven, would forge and smith to be shipped to the larger cities. The stress of losing much of his income, less food on the table, and being forced to also work on a farm coupled with his own child seeming to ignore all his lessens about discipline began to take its tole on him.

He would yell more and more every day for some of the smallest things, and eventually, for no reason what so ever. Her mother, Calessa, and close friend Norwirk were the only 2 strong emotional and supportive pillars in her life. Eventualy, her mother being so supportive still of Karin's lifestyle, that he even began lashing out physicaly, mostly against Calessa. Finally, the abuse lasted to long and she began talking about leaving with Karin, how ever these plans did not last. About a month before Karin's 15th birthday, her mother went missing. Her father claimed that she had left without Karin, and now it was just the 2 of them. Slowly, all the abuse her mother suffered slowly started hapening to her.

Now, all she had left in this storm to hold onto to stay above the surface was Norwirk, but always, it felt like she was being pulled under.

One evening 2 years later, Norwirk went to Karin's home , when he noticed her father dragging a large sack outside tot he back of their home, but something inside the sack was moving and making strange muffled sounds. He whisperd to the bag that if she was lucky, the slavers may have not sold her mother yet, and she might even see her once more before they get sold to some brothel, or labour camp. Hearing and seeing all of this Norwirk ran to the closest town guards to get help. After finally convincing him that he was telling the truth, they went to corner Alven, but when he saw that it was armed town guards, he fled into the farm fields and through the forests near the village. Norwirk was the one to open the sack to free Karin, and her first response was to hold onto him like a peice of floating debris to avoid from drowning. They sat there for nearly half an hour while the guards searced for her father, but as the sun set, it was going to be nearly impossible to find him in the forests. Karin stayed woth Norwirk and his family for a short while, and during this time, Norwirk started prayin to St. Cuthbert hoping that perhaps the god of retibution would help in the matter of Karins father reaping what he had sown, and eventually joined the ranks of St. Cuthberts clerics to work in the gods name and to help Karin getting the revenge she craved against her father, although he does try to keep her from thinking about murder and only to have him arressted.

When she turned 19 she decided to leave her village, not only to try and track down her disowned father, but to hopefully find her mother.Refusing to let her go alone, Norwirk gained permission from his clergy to leave and follow her on her journeys to be her protector, and to try and keep her mind in check, especially her desires for vengeance aginst her father.

After all this and what she is planning, the meaning of her nae seems to be a cruel irony. Pure One indeed.

[joca4christ]

The story was good, compelling even. What I am unclear on is whose backstory it is. Is it Karin's or Norwirk's? If it is Karin's, what class did she choose? I can see why Norwirk would become a cleric of St. Cuthbert, but if he is your character, it doesn't tell me much about him other than what his religious motivation was.

Is there any other connection between Karin and Norwirk?

Great job though! Makes me wonder what will happen in the future between these two.

[Roguenewb]

Content wise: not too shabby, I like it well enough.

Form wise: Pronoun's and clarity is confusing, I can't prove Karin's gender, or his(er) class....

[Olfgar]

Karin is mine. Its a female, shes going to be taking rogue (possibly dip or two into fighter). The parts about Norwirk are for my friend whos going to be playing Norwirk, and since this is his first time ever doing anything DnD related, we decided to make our characters know each other somehow, and so we are combining our backstories slightly so that he can have an easier time to create his.

Yeah like i said this is sill kind of rough, and I'll be doing some editing and polishing and such. But thank you for the kind words!

[Water_Bear]

Its interesting and poignant but raises several questions.

Is Norwick someone else's character, or just an NPC? The implication is that he's her boyfriend, but he also doesn't sound like he's planning on going anywhere and doesn't have a motivation of his own.

Is the abusive father character going to be a main villain or a footnote? I could sort of see Alven and the Chipmunks becoming a legitimate threat to the region if they keep up the slavery stuff, but if he's just a low-level guy there isn't much point in spending game-time hunting him down.

Do you have a plan for the mother? It seems like there isn't much of a reason for her to still be alive; the whole point of her being sold into slavery was so that Karin could be abused and Karin already has enough reason to chase her father without the mother around. Also it seems redundant to have two family-related sidequests based around tracking someone.

If it were me, I would...
a) Write out the mother character so that Alven has more of a reason to go to the dark side. Maybe have her die in childbirth, give him an actual reason to dislike his daughter.
b) Make the Norwick/Karin relationship more central to the abuse. Forbidden love is interesting and gives a visible tipping point where the emotional abuse becomes physical. Plus it justifies Norwick's existence a little more.
c) Give Alven some better villain credentials. Make him a veteran adventurer with similar talents to his daughter, who had to give up his work because of her birth and resents her for it. Then he can take over the slavers and maybe ally with the BBEG to give Karin more of a reason to join the party.

[Olfgar]

Great now i have to change the fathers name Lol i cant take it seriously now xD. As i said earlier Norwirk is someone elses PC and i put it that much into the backstory so as to help him create his own, since this is his first ever. Rpg And is having a bit of trouble creating one, so we will be combining history.

As for if the father will be a villain, i expect my. DM will do that, but ill also ask if he can be as well. I will also keep in mind what you said about WHY he hates his daughter, such as mother dieing in childbirth, ex adventurer, her relationship with Nor, etc.

And thank you for the advice as well :)

[Olfgar]

So how would you reccomend i turn the father into a villainish character class wise? Say that he used to be a rogue or something along those lines as well, or just say that he used to be an adventure with alot of martial skill, and leave the class up to the DM but that way he wont make it a caster.

[Water_Bear]

Hmm, well I'm not sure about rogue; it certainly fits for flavor but it's fairly weak. I know it's a bit cliche here on Giant but Factotum is a much better Rogue than rogue is; more skill points, better Saves/Attacks/Skill Checks, and limited Sor/Wiz spell-casting. But then again, builds are best left to the DM as you said.

In terms of story, he'll be leading Slavers which usually means either Orcs/Hobgoblin tribes or Human bandits. If they're Humans he ought to have a generic military or law enforcement background, the usual "led men into combat" or "knows the law from both sides" thing. If they're Nonhumans it turns into a Colonel Kurtz situation; he needs to know their culture inside-and-out and be respected by them, both of which can come from having fought against them particularly fiercely. I like the second one more, but they both demonstrate competence and a fall from grace.

BTW, thanks for taking my first post well. I've been called overly critical and I was worried the "Chipmunks" joke might be too much. It's always good to know that there are people out there who can take constructive criticism. :smallsmile:

[Olfgar]

I read that first post at work, and i started laughing my ass off xD

I think that it would work better if he led a group of humans. Perhaps some of the other Ex-Adventurers that he used to run with are there as well.

[Olfgar]

So, heres a more updated version thats incorporated some of your ideas so far, and make sit mroe clear that the character is a female. Havent realyl done editing for grammar or spelling etc, just a head ups lol.



Karin, which means “Pure One”, was born to a blacksmith father, and a seamstress mother. Her father and mother, 25 and 17 at the time respectively lived in a small village located near a small mountain range rich in metals.

Her father was always strict and stern, but only wished to instill discipline in his free spirited daughter, while the mother believed to let one live as they felt, and this brought her parents into many arguments. All her life, Karin loved to sneak into places she wasnt supposed to be, and climb, no matter what it was. This caused her to find an small chest hidden away in her attic, and when her father heard her moving around up there was the angriest she had ever seen her father. He told her to NEVER go into that chest, as it was filled with things from a life he had to give up. When he said that, Karin could almost hear malice in his voice about giving up a past life... She assumed he ment his time as an adventurer., and that he had to give it up when she was going to be born. Approaching Karin's 10th birthday, the mines began to dry up in the metals that her father, Alven, would forge and smith to be shipped to the larger cities. The stress of losing much of his income, less food on the table, and being forced to also work on a farm coupled with his own child seeming to ignore all his lessens about discipline began to take its tole on him.

He would yell more and more every day for some of the smallest things, and eventually, for no reason what so ever. Her mother, Calessa, and close friend Norwirk were the only 2 strong emotional and supportive pillars in her life. Unfortunatly, her father seemd to carry almost a hatred towards Norwirk, and wouldnt constantly demand that she ignore the boy and not associate with him, but that would never happen.

Eventualy, her mother being so supportive still of Karin's lifestyle, that he even began lashing out physicaly, mostly against Calessa. Finally, the abuse lasted to long and she began talking about leaving with Karin, how ever these plans did not last. About a month before Karin's 15th birthday, her mother went missing. Her father claimed that she had left without Karin, and now it was just the 2 of them. Slowly, all the abuse her mother suffered slowly started hapening to her. It didnt help that now she would spend even more time, agianst her fathers wishes, with Norwirk.

Now, all she had left in this storm to hold onto to stay above the surface was Norwirk, but always, it felt like she was being pulled under.

One evening 2 years later, Norwirk went to Karin's home , when he noticed her father dragging a large sack outside tot he back of their home, but something inside the sack was moving and making strange muffled sounds. He whisperd to the bag that if she was lucky, the slavers may have not sold her mother yet, and she might even see her once more before they get sold to some brothel, or labour camp. Then in a voice of pure disdain, he growled at her that she would finally be useful to him in the slave trade. Hearing and seeing all of this Norwirk ran to the closest town guards to get help. After finally convincing him that he was telling the truth, they went to corner Alven, but when he saw that it was armed town guards, he fled into the farm fields and through the forests near the village. Norwirk was the one to open the sack to free Karin, and her first response was to hold onto him like a peice of floating debris to avoid from drowning. They sat there for nearly half an hour while the guards searced for her father, but as the sun set, it was going to be nearly impossible to find him in the forests. Karin stayed woth Norwirk and his family for a short while, and during this time, Norwirk started prayin to St. Cuthbert hoping that perhaps the god of retibution would help in the matter of Karins father reaping what he had sown, and eventually joined the ranks of St. Cuthberts clerics to work in the gods name and to help Karin getting the revenge she craved against her father, although he does try to keep her from thinking about murder and only to have him arressted.

When she turned 19 she decided to leave her village, not only to try and track down her disowned father, but to hopefully find her mother.Refusing to let her go alone, Norwirk gained permission from his clergy to leave and follow her on her journeys to be her protector, and to try and keep her mind in check, especially her desires for vengeance aginst her father.

After all this and what she is planning, the meaning of her nae seems to be a cruel irony. Pure One indeed. Perhaps it is time to finally break her fathers last rule, and open the chest.

[Invader]

As far as making the father a villain;

Years ago he was an ambitious albeit conniving young wizard who prided himself on his studious behavior and obvious prowess with magic. He would show complete disdain for the commoners and nobles alike if they showed any interests in the martial arts. He showed a complete lack of respect for authority given his air of superiority and in fact looked down on everyone that was less practiced in magic than he was. Given time, this attitude provided an ample supply of enemies. Eventually a more powerful wizard/good cleric/pissed of deity/etc. etc. cursed the wizard causing him to forget who was and they implanted him as a blacksmith apprentice in a back water town where he would spend the rest of days toiling in manual labor as one of the craftsman he used to despise.

This went on for years until the troubles you mentioned with the mines and business drying brought him to start drinking. Over the months he became a full blown drunk and began having terrible dreams about his past life. At first he didn't understand what they meant but eventually he past memories came flooding back and he remembered everything.

Having his memories back did little to help him without his spell book, magic items, components, etc etc so he devised a plan to make some quick money so he could get back to where he had stashed emergency supplies when he was still a wizard. With these items he would have a good start on regaining his power and getting his revenge on the person that cursed him so many years ago.

You might have to say he tried selling both you and your mother at the same time for it to make more sense but you get the idea.

It gives you your motivation and makes him a major plot hook at the same time. Your friends story could stay pretty much the same.

[Olfgar]

Im thinking that it would fit better if he was still an ex-adventurer, (not of a particularily good alignment lol) that was more martialy focused. Perhaps a skilled fighter or rogueish character, and if some kind of the latter, it turns out my character will be unwittingly taking u the same calling as him.