Backstories which work for games we're in

[MarkVIIIMarc]

Another thread got me thinking about what makes a good backstory. After typing the ones below I think its simplicity, being open ended so the DM can include them, and not involving too big a part of the world the DM has to fit all the players into.

Before writing too much or better yet, while working up your story talk with your DM. He may have a reasonable (or unreasonable) world designed which would make bending your story necessary. Maybe your sailor has to run a caravan over deserts if for some reason the oceans have ran dry. Also keep the summary short. There can be a long version but sometimes too many specifics are difficult to deal with.

What I think have been some good back stories myself or other DM's have made work really well:

Ben was a stand out student at an orphanage with a knack for memorizing things but a terrible physical ailment which caused immense pain and him to need a cane. One day something changed. His physical pain went away and he became stronger and more agile than average. But he has had dark ideas or a dark voice in his head ever since... To this day Ben carries a cane as a reminder.
---------------------------------
One player told me his PC, Shallows, and his brother were members of the 13th Legion (he told me of whatever army I needed him to be in). After four tours they've decided to leave and since they know no other life they're going to be mercenaries / adventurers. In game during session 0 they talked about things like it was the Roman Army so I walked them into a story where a Demon Lord massacred and captured many members of the 13th at a Teutoburg Forest like disaster a generation before.
----------------------------------
A warlock Horace who was a non magical human smuggler with an attractive elf wife and a troubled teenage half elf son. His drinking was a little out of control and their marriage was strained by the his line of work and the boy's trouble. They sent the boy to his brother in law's monastery where he ran away. The tax man came looking for Horace and now with all that the guy's wife who still looked identical to the day they met, left him. This pushed Horace to drink more and eventually strike a deal with some Fey god through a painting he thought was talking to him just because he was drunk.

In a complicated turn this player was taken over by our DM when it became necessary for us to switch roles and he's been hilarious ever since. You should have seen this guy go back and forth with a unicorn heal bot his patron guided him to.
-----------------------------------
Val a charlatan background elf girl whose father ran a daycare of sorts for a silver dragon lost a dragon wyrmling. This was a terribly big deal to the whole town. To prove she wasn't the bad kid her and her sister went to get it back. That didn't go well, they got kidnapped by human supremacists, terrible things happened, Val got away but not her sister.
-----------------------------------
Dirrk, a half orc Ranger, was forced to leave the orc clan by his ashamed and drunken father. Since then he's been more comfortable around the forces of nature who behave as they should than people.
-----------------------------------

We have a couple others including a stereotypical drow rogue with a missing brother, a monk who left his monastery to find a stolen tome and the thief, a tiefling who joined a cult then escaped after finding out how nuts they were and another half orc whose father was murdered by some mercenaries.

What do you all have that have worked well with the campaign.

[KyleG]

Still early days for me and the character I am working with feels like he doesn't have a purpose as yet because I got handed him. But the characters i've been trying to write have backstories and backgrounds its tying in ideals/traits etc that I struggle with. What traits etc did your above characters have?

[MarkVIIIMarc]

Still early days for me and the character I am working with feels like he doesn't have a purpose as yet because I got handed him. But the characters i've been trying to write have backstories and backgrounds its tying in ideals/traits etc that I struggle with. What traits etc did your above characters have?

That's another part of the character, maybe the part which is seen more by other players.

To be clear, the Charlatan Elf is the only one that is mine. She's more a talking or poetry Bard than a musician but despite all them points in CHA trying to start a riot in the ghetto or whatever comically almost never works. She also likes to go shopping for gear for the group and despises being in melee.

The Warlock started off as mine. He's kind of a grumpy fellow who grudgingly ends up on the side of good. Despite being in pretty decent shape for being (gasp!) 40ish he complains about ailments and being old. After his experience with the elf wife leaving he's anti-fey. The fellow who took him over so I could DM uplays the drunk part which I probably downplayed.

How did you get handed a character and what do you have on him so far?

[SpamCreateWater]

I have fun creating builds I'd like to play, and then setting them up with generic backstories. But, once I get into a group, I'll mould a backstory filled with more detail around the world we're playing in.

For example, one of my characters was a build challenge where I could take, at most, 3 levels of any one single class.

Generic backstory was of someone who lived in a remote area. Bright, but unmotivated. Charismatic, but unable to commit. Eventually was forced from his home due to a very local issue that only very superstitious and primitive people would have - his hair was a different colour from everyone else's that they ever had, and ever would, meet. It's part of their bloodline "curse". Just turns out an ancestor had red hair. Easy enough to slot an unknown tribe into a wasteland where few outsiders have contact with them.

Then, when the time came, added the name of the country and the name of the wasteland that's in that country. Added the ancestor into a war that happened. Added in some racial tensions due to the country he was a part of. All of a sudden he was part of the world.

I think it helps if you (and the DM) have the outlook that classes and abilities are not in-game things and are not tied to one another (in-game). So the reason my guy can cast spells isn't because he's a "Cleric", but because he is pious and/or holds to ideals. He isn't skilled in multiple things because he's a "Rogue", but because he is naturally talented individual with a full life and inquisitive mind.



Another generic backstory: character I had started out as a child who was cursed for an unknown reason. The curse seemed to be contagious and he was abandoned. He grew up with a chip on his shoulder, and his emotions hidden.

Time for the game came around and he was a Noble House blacksmith's son, removed due to a curse that they believe was meant to target the blacksmith and spread to the nobles. He was given to a local church, and then passed onto another noble house when his magical abilities became apparent. It was a gamble on their part as they were a minor house and magical ability is highly prized. Still had the chip and emotional issues.

[Zaharra]

I tend to keep my backstories simple and vague enough to be easily inserted into the story. My noble bard just doesn't want to get married, and adventuring is a way to delay her family's plans for her, even if they keep sending people to try and drag her back home.

[Man_Over_Game]

I do try to add something unique each time so that the DM can have it fit part of his grand scheme.

------------

Had a Barbarian who often went into civilized towns, got hammered and went back to his tribe the following morning. Until one morning, he visited his tribe and all the buildings were burnt and there were no corpses. He has been searching for them since.

------------

Arcane Trickster spent his entire life in his brother's shadow, jealous of his brother's natural talent with people and magic. My Rogue went to Bard college with his brother, plagiarized to graduate, and scouted the dean for blackmail to ensure he wouldn't get kicked out. Found out the dean had been using a magical flute that can cast Speak with the Dead and has been using it to steal music from dead composers and playing it off as his own. A little bit of threatening, and my Rogue was a fully documented "bard".

------------

Dwarven Monk comes from a place of war in the mountains. His people summoned a demon to destroy their enemies, and then they summoned a celestial to deal with the demon, and they just ended up with two problems instead of none. They resorted to a blood curse, putting a small part of both entities into every member of their bloodline. Now, they train the young ones to survive with both counterparts inside of them, a literal devil and angel fighting for attention, before sending them away from the tribe (to prevent the fragments from ever reforming into the full being again).

-----------

They might be a bit grandiose, but they don't necessarily make the character overly important as opposed to the situation that they came from. They make the world bigger, not the character.