Noble background advice

[SliceandDiceKid]

I'm going to make a tiefling warlock who is a noble in an upcoming campaign.

I'd love ideas for backstory. Was I adopted by a family with no heir?

Idk y'all are always great with the RP ideas. I'm stumped on this one...

[Ferrin33]

I'm going to make a tiefling warlock who is a noble in an upcoming campaign.

I'd love ideas for backstory. Was I adopted by a family with no heir?

Idk y'all are always great with the RP ideas. I'm stumped on this one...

Could be you were born from human parents and raised in secret. I doubt you'd be adopted as a tiefling, even by a tiefling noble as I think they tend to be suspicous.

[Naanomi]

Could be you were born from human parents and raised in secret. I doubt you'd be adopted as a tiefling, even by a tiefling noble as I think they tend to be suspicous.
A noble family with ancient ties to a cult that produced the tiefling might have a little more incentive to look after their old legacy

[randomodo]

Concepts
- Noble in a society in which tieflings are the ruling class, lording it over the human serfs
- Born (so far as anyone knows), to a pair of human parents, which begs the question:
-- Is one of your parents secretly a fiend?
-- Did your mother have a dalliance with a fiend, uknown to your father?
-- Is one of your parents a fiend-pact warlock (or cult member), and was rewarded by being given a tiefling child?
- Every Xth generation, a tiefling is born into the family line (and dire rumors of dread retribution prevent the family from simply killing the demon-babe at birth). Perhaps your character will be the one to break the centuries-old family curse?

[Inevitability]

A noble house was on the verge of being destroyed/exterminated, be it because of an invasion, a hostile house or something else. Suddenly, one of the few remaining nobles heard a voice. The voice said it would help him to become powerful again as long as he would adopt the first orphaned child he came across as his son.

Big noble agrees, gets powerful again, and then one day stumbles on a seemingly abandoned child. Not wanting to lose everything again, the noble takes the child home, where it grows up.

This way, the DM's got a lot of story hooks to tie in with your character, and you have justified your noble background.

[Fwiffo86]

Family blessed by X church or maybe even visting fey dignitaries. Father rebuffs the advances of the fey (remaining true to his wife and family) which the fey takes as an insult and exacts revenge by cursing their only son/daughter and striking the mother barren.

The child will always carry the curse and pass it to their own children. As soon as the child is born, the wife becomes barren. The curse has the potential to last a dragon's age.

[D1ng]

- Your family is "new money" - Tieflings who have recently entered the nobility, despite racial prejudice, through either a great act of selflessness and service to the kingdom or various shady deals and the accumulation of huge wealth. As the first of your family actually born a noble, you feel that you must prove that your family's elevation was just and/or dispel the (possibly true) rumors about the shady nature of your parent's sudden rise.

- By virtue of your parents' wealth and power, you have never experienced the mistrust and prejudice that other Tielfings get. When you step out into the world, however, all this changes - and it comes as a nasty shock.

- You were born seemingly a normal human, and raised as just another noble despite an easily dismissed omen that occurred alongside your birth. However, after your 13th birthday, tiefling traits started to slowly manifest in your appearance. Realizing what was happening, you sought ways to cover it up - first cosmetics, then turning to disguise magic and possibly even making a pact. Finally, however, your secret was exposed and your parents or wider society and you were cast out ("adventuring") to preserve the reputation of the nobility. You might seek revenge on whomever exposed you or the nobility at large, or instead seek to prove yourself worthy of the titles you technically still hold.

[Person_Man]

The City of New Moab is ruled by the Demon Lord Belphegor, who conquered the city after crossing over from the dark planes generations ago, shedding much blood, accumulating many spoils, and shortly thereafter accumulating even more cultists and other followers who were happy to indulge his every whim in exchange for his favor. But as the years on the prime material plane have dragged on, Lord Belphegor has become disinterested and complacent in worldly affairs. He has allowed defacto control of New Moab to pass to a byzantine and treacherous noble class, made up mostly of a motley amalgamation of his mortal spawn and the many branches of their decedents. You are the youngest member of a middling but ambitious noble house that is rife with intrigue, and so you have intelligently chosen the life of a traveling adventurer. You have found that navigating the threats of owlbears and gelatinous cubes has ironically been much safer then the constant backstabbing and veiled threats of your own family. And you hope that one day, you will be able to achieve your heart's desires and truly determine your own fate.

[SliceandDiceKid]

The City of New Moab is ruled by the Demon Lord Belphegor, who conquered the city after crossing over from the dark planes generations ago, shedding much blood, accumulating many spoils, and shortly thereafter accumulating even more cultists and other followers who were happy to indulge his every whim in exchange for his favor. But as the years on the prime material plane have dragged on, Lord Belphegor has become disinterested and complacent in worldly affairs. He has allowed defacto control of New Moab to pass to a byzantine and treacherous noble class, made up mostly of a motley amalgamation of his mortal spawn and the many branches of their decedents. You are the youngest member of a middling but ambitious noble house that is rife with intrigue, and so you have intelligently chosen the life of a traveling adventurer. You have found that navigating the threats of owlbears and gelatinous cubes has ironically been much safer then the constant backstabbing and veiled threats of your own family. And you hope that one day, you will be able to achieve your heart's desires and truly determine your own fate.

Awesome. I assume there are still humans in New Moab? I'd prefer if my retainers were human/halfling etc.