Is campaign backstory a waste?

[Talakeal]

I am working on a new campaign for when my regular gaming group gets together again in a few months. I have a put a lot of effort into the setting (which is a continuation of my previous campaign but set hundreds of years into the future) and have put a lot of work into the backstory of the region.

I am having a bit of trouble getting the first adventure to flow, and there is one point where I am having a lot of trouble figuring out how to get the players from one plot point to the next. I asked the DM of my current group and he came up with a good solution, but one that required me to rewrite or abandon large elements of the setting.

He told me that is totally irrelevant. Backstory only exists to drive the current plot forward and has no value. Players won't even bother to learn 90% of the background elements you put in the game, and the ten percent they do learn they won't care about and it will be quickly forgotten. He went on to say that backstory and setting detail serves no purpose but to drive the story at the moment, and one should not even bother to make anything that happened in the past, or in the present if it is outside of the players vicinity, interesting or compelling let alone consistent.

Backstory and setting details are for novels, he said, and the worst thing in the world a DM can do is treat their game like a novel.


I hadn't really thought about this before, but I feel there is a lot of truth in what he said. Most players do seem to flat out ignore flavor text and not care at all about the game's plot even as it affects their character, and many players actively refuse to come up with or care about backstory for even their own PC. Am I wasting my time putting all this effort into setting detail? Should I throw out months of work on the campaign backstory for the sake of making a session flow a little smoother?



Note: I am talking about setting and backstory, not plot. I don't have anything set up for the future, only the past and present. This is not about railroading or spotlight hogging NPCs, or any other sort of restriction of player agency for the sake of my story.

[BWR]

It depends on the player.

Campaign backstory is the setting. The details, the flavor, the history that gives a sense of age and 'realism' to the setting. I love it and have a hard time getting invested in any game without a proper setting description and history I can learn about and get excited by. It helps build my character and my interest. Backstory and setting are not novels, they are the stage on which the PCs act. Star Wars wouldn't have been as great as it is if not for the hints of an ancient and vast setting to play in, yet it is very much the PCs' story.

I know players who don't give a crap about anything but bland backdrops for their latest murderhoboing.

So for me it's not a waste. For others it is.

[Ninjadeadbeard]

Backstory for settings and campaigns rarely have any meaning for PCs beyond the thin explanation of who they gotta kill and loot this time around.

The Backstory is for the GM. I am regularly praised for my DM-style because it is heavily sandbox and my players generally love that there is ALWAYS something new whichever direction they take. I know everything about my universe, and so I am able to convincingly improvise on the spot endlessly. If I didn't know the backstory, could I keep my players entertained in this way? Of course not.

Your GM friend has a different style. Keep to yours.

[Fri]

Depends.

For me the question is this. Does it matter in the actual game at all?

If no, yes, it's a waste.

If yes, no it's not a waste.

I mean, will your player learn about the backtory without the gm feeding them? I mean, will they look at a library looking for a way to kill the mysterious evil wraith. Then in the library they'll find out that the evil wraith is actually an ancient king who did some unspeakeable deed a thousand years ago and it can only be hurt by a weapon forged by his son.

Then go for it. Think about the backstory, think up about that ancient kingdom and where was it capital located and what's their typical army (for the zombie army) and so on.

If your players won't do that or don't need to do something similar? And the only reason they'll find out that there used to be an ancient kingdom and there's a line of 15 godking and such is because you'll narrate it to them before the game? Then why bother.

[mephnick]

Like Ninjadeadbeard said, the back story is there for you to run the setting properly and efficiently. Your players probably won't care otherwise.

My setting has a lot of history, but before our first session in it, all I gave them was a few sentences about what happened in the last major war because that's the thing that most effects the setting at this time. The rest is in my mind so I can answer questions and make the actions of the NPC's make sense. I love writing history, but I know it's for me and the sooner I made peace with that the better my games ran.

You should definitely never ever expect the players to read a document about your setting, or sit there and listen to 20 minutes of exposition. The eager over explanation of setting details that is common with DM's can make it seem like they're running a novel. However I disagree that background isn't important, because it helps the game (and DM) in so many other ways.

[Flickerdart]

The backstory of a campaign setting is essentially Schrodinger's Cat - until the players witness a portion of it, it exists in a superposition of every possibility. Just because you were originally thinking it's one way doesn't mean that you can't change it. How much you change it is also up to you. If you spent months working on it, there must be a lot of material. Do you have to dump all of it? Can you only change some parts and leave others? Of the parts you do dump, can you reuse them in another place?

You should never treat your setting as a novel, but rather as a Lego set. There are different pieces in there, and the picture on the box is not necessarily how you will put it together when you start playing.

[Red Fel]

I hadn't really thought about this before, but I feel there is a lot of truth in what he said. Most players do seem to flat out ignore flavor text and not care at all about the game's plot even as it affects their character, and many players actively refuse to come up with or care about backstory for even their own PC. Am I wasting my time putting all this effort into setting detail? Should I throw out months of work on the campaign backstory for the sake of making a session flow a little smoother?

Picture it. A group of tourists arrive in Ruritania. They're here for various reasons. There's a family of four doing a tour of the continent, a geologist traveling and taking soil samples, a bird watcher, a retiree who has made a tradition of coming here every year, and so forth. Lots of them are there for various reasons.

In Ruritania, there may be a large, dense forest. Now, if this was a group like the family of four, who want to see a few castles and then spend the rest of the vacation by the pool, that's entirely irrelevant. However, if one of the tourists was a botanist, and his thesis happened to be on the forms of plantlife indigenous to this part of Europe, you're **** right he's going to want to go to that forest.

That's the point. Many players do ignore a lot of backstory, except where it directly impacts them. And that's fine. But some players relish it, and those players will feel a bit let down if your campaign comes up lacking in that way.

Now, look at these players. The ones coming to your game. All generalizations aside, are there any among these players who like backstory? If so, you'd better have some available if they ask. If not, then you're right, it doesn't add a lot.

For them.

Here's the other thing, though - does backstory help you? Sometimes it does. Sometimes, knowing the history and culture of a region helps you figure out how various NPCs would act or react. If it does, it might be worthwhile to have purely for your own reference, and to heck with the players.

[Ruslan]

I write backstory because I like writing backstory. It would be nice if the players would read it, even nicer if they remembered it, but I'm honestly not counting on it.

Mysterious old man gives you quest, you go. That's what I'm counting on.

[nedz]

What a campaign back-story can add is depth, which can aid verisimilitude.

If your players are only interested in hack 'n' slash then it's bit pointless — so it depends upon your players.

If they are interested in the detail of the setting then you need to know this stuff, or at least have it sketched out. What happens when someone makes a Historian type character — or does that not happen ?

[Keltest]

The backstory is much more a GM tool than it is window dressing for the players. A well developed world has a lot of places to go to and explore, and if the party sets off in a random direction, you can be sure they will encounter something exciting eventually. Even if the players don't remember it at all, it helps the DM run a fun game, and that, IMO generally makes it worth it.

[veti]

As others have said, the backstory is what you use to write the world. It's why this city is ruled by a council of elders while that one has a king and the other one has a 30' city wall, why elves are rare and why left-handed people speak a different language. And so on.

Change the backstory, and you need to change the world to match it. Or rather, change the world, and you need to change your backstory to match it. Otherwise your world becomes incoherent.

That might or might not matter to your players, depending how much attention they're paying and how much they expect to be able to use their natural intuition about the world. But it'll surely matter to you.

[Cluedrew]

I can think of 2 main uses for backstory:

One it is a tool for you to use. If the party sails off to Port Harbor and all you know about Port Harbor is that it is where the treasure is... you might have some problems filling out what sort of place Port Harbor is. On the other hand if you know how the treasure ended up their, what sort of industries are found there, who founded it and how long ago there is a lot more you can say about it.

Compare Port Harbor: where the thief fled to, a fishing town created and sustained by the fisher folk themselves with Port Harbor: where the treasure was sealed away, a center of trade that originated as a military outpost in the last war. I haven't stated any thing about the town now in either case but you (hopefully if I did a good job) should have different images of what the town is like now anyways.

The other is for the players to interact with. They can interact with it out of pure curiosity ("What order did the mad wizard belong to?") or to understand the currant world for a very particular reason. Actually the question about the mad wizard could be critically important if they are about to storm his tower. Even if he is not a member now it could still inform what sort of magical defences he has available.

Maybe more than two depending on how you count (actually almost certainly since I probably forgot something) but there you have my 2.

[Micah Watt]

As others have said - it entirely depends on your players and the tone of the campaign

My players are disappointed if there's no campaign backstory. Generally when creating characters they want a place to start to weave their own individual histories into the campaign. However, these are players that care about continuity and want to carve their place into the world.

I've played in other groups that just want the loot! 😉

[goto124]

One it is a tool for you to use. If the party sails off to Port Harbor and all you know about Port Harbor is that it is where the treasure is... you might have some problems filling out what sort of place Port Harbor is.

That's my take on it as well. The backstory is a part of the setting, the explanation for why things happen. If the setting has no backstory, that means there's no explanation for why the the bad guys are trying to steal the McGuffin, why the good kingdom isn't doing anything, etc. Good luck trying to respond to the players when they go off the rails.

There's the "Using Modules- Do they really save time?" thread.

[Quertus]

As has been said, backstory is for you, the DM... and for those players who will enjoy / utilize / need it.

Having a backstory should make it easier for you to roll with the punches, to respond when players do something unexpected.

If, instead, the structure of a thought-out backstory is limiting you, as sounds like is the case, perhaps you will have better luck with a more extemporaneous style. Just make sure you know how to keep such a "Schroedenger's world" consistent, else you might be causing yourself more problems down the line - especially if you have players who care about such things.

Know yourself, know your players, know what backstory does for you.

[Magikeeper]

I agree with a lot of what's being said here, so I'll just add that the caring generally happens before paying attention to lore. Like, Bob is unlikely to remember the history of Examplius if he doesn't already care about Examplius. The best you're likely to get is a player fishing for something to drive their character, skimming setting lore while hunting for element(s) to tie themselves to / oppose / etc.

----

On a similar note, one of the most tied-to-world, character-development-having PCs I've had the pleasure of DMing for had an initial backstory of two short sentences and an initial personality that lasted all of.. 5 minutes. We apparently changed his name too, as everyone at the table pronounced it wrong and the player just rolled with it for the rest of the lengthy campaign. The PC basically started out as a pile of optimized stats.

What I'm getting at is that someone not being big on starting with a lengthy backstory doesn't necessarily mean they aren't going to care about the world - maybe they just don't know what they want to do with their PC yet. Think about it - when designing a character, do you generally picture what you want to RP in your mind THEN craft a backstory to match? What if you weren't sure what you wanted to RP yet? I'm not saying all bland backstories are amazingly fleshed out PCs waiting to happen - some folk just want to kick down the door - but I wouldn't assume someone isn't going to care about the plot just because they are iffy on having a lengthy PC background from the get-go.

[Winter_Wolf]

I write backstory because I like writing backstory. It would be nice if the players would read it, even nicer if they remembered it, but I'm honestly not counting on it.

Mysterious old man gives you quest, you go. That's what I'm counting on.

Pretty much what I wanted to say. Backstory is mostly for your own gratification, and if players show any interest in it, consider it a bonus.

[themaque]

Speaking as a player, I like having backstory. It makes the world feel a little more solid and I can work myself into the world better.

Speaking as a GM if I have a good grasp of the backstory it helps me keep my world stable for players and I can make up things easier with a foot hold to get started.

[Fri]

Speaking as a player, I like having backstory. It makes the world feel a little more solid and I can work myself into the world better.

Speaking as a GM if I have a good grasp of the backstory it helps me keep my world stable for players and I can make up things easier with a foot hold to get started.

That's true. Some one-two sentences bits of lore used sparingly can add a lot of feeling that the place you're adventuring is a real world. But just remember to keep the dosage right and keep the novel-long bits of lore on things that are actually important/related to the actual game/mission your player is doing.

For example, other than the important page-long lore on the wraith king and the son-forged weapon I mentioned before, I could mention that the city they're currently in produces lemon, or the wall is thought to be built by giant.

Just be prepared when your players decides to start a realm-wide lemonade consortium instead of killing the wraith king

[Sredni Vashtar]

It's never a waste. You use that backstory to draw ideas and inspiration from. Sure, lots of players will never pay any heed to it, but that's still no reason to throw it all away.

[nedz]

It's actually better to reveal the back-story slowly rather than as a huge info-dump. Less is more, and the idea that some information is hidden or lost is itself interesting. This way you create questions in the minds of the players which should pique their interest.

[Freelance GM]

I agree with most of the people here: Backstory is as relevant as your players choose to make it.

In my case, I like having backstory so that when the players ask questions like, "Where are all these cultists coming from?" I can answer with in-game information like, "they've been recruiting for 20 years," instead of, "well, because I needed this many cultists for a level-appropriate encounter."

Granted, 7 times out of 10, the players will miss or ignore your exposition. But, for the 30% of the time where they don't ignore it, it's better to have it than not.

[goto124]

Yet another vote for "small pieces of the lore". Instead of throwing an entire wall of text at the player, I break up the wall and throw the small bricks at them until they get it. Heh heh.

the wall is thought to be built by giants.

Alternative.

Just be prepared when your players decides to start a realm-wide lemonade consortium instead of killing the wraith king

Have the wraith king send minions to chase the adventurers because he hates lemons or something

[Flickerdart]

Just be prepared when your players decides to start a realm-wide lemonade consortium instead of killing the wraith king

The wraith king's lime monopoly would be threatened by this kind of drastic disruption, and he would send his armies to sort things out.

...unless you decided in your backstory that the wraith king would never do that and now you have to come up with some alternative villain instead of just rolling with it. Flexibility is important!

[Talakeal]

It's actually better to reveal the back-story slowly rather than as a huge info-dump. Less is more, and the idea that some information is hidden or lost is itself interesting. This way you create questions in the minds of the players which should pique their interest.

Agreed. I plan on doing just that.

One thing I am actually going to be trying something different for this campaign and typing up small bits of information like letters and flyers and stuff and handing them over to the olayers as props when their characters discover them. I dont know well it will work, but I think it will be more immersive than just giving them an info dump of exposition at the start if done sparingly.

As has been said, backstory is for you, the DM... and for those players who will enjoy / utilize / need it.

Having a backstory should make it easier for you to roll with the punches, to respond when players do something unexpected.

If, instead, the structure of a thought-out backstory is limiting you, as sounds like is the case, perhaps you will have better luck with a more extemporaneous style. Just make sure you know how to keep such a "Schroedenger's world" consistent, else you might be causing yourself more problems down the line - especially if you have players who care about such things.

Know yourself, know your players, know what backstory does for you.

Its not that I am getting caught up in per se. Basically I was having trouble figuring out how to get the players from one scene to another without railroading and asked a fellow DM for advice. He came up with an idea that would work, but it would contradict the established backstory at numerous points and I said it was not worth rewriting massive chunks of the backstory for a one time transition, and his response was that the backstory is 100 percent inconsequential and expendable and no amount of backstory justifies even the slightest inconceniance when you are actually at the table.

[Fri]

Agreed. I plan on doing just that.

One thing I am actually going to be trying something different for this campaign and typing up small bits of information like letters and flyers and stuff and handing them over to the olayers as props when their characters discover them. I dont know well it will work, but I think it will be more immersive than just giving them an info dump of exposition at the start if done sparingly.



Its not that I am getting caught up in per se. Basically I was having trouble figuring out how to get the players from one scene to another without railroading and asked a fellow DM for advice. He came up with an idea that would work, but it would contradict the established backstory at numerous points and I said it was not worth rewriting massive chunks of the backstory for a one time transition, and his response was that the backstory is 100 percent inconsequential and expendable and no amount of backstory justifies even the slightest inconceniance when you are actually at the table.

I understand what you're saying.

Now my question is, is the changed backstory important or relevant to the game at all? If it's relevant and it would change the meaning or some such of the game, then don't change it. But if you the only one who would know the backstory change because the player would never learn or stumble onto it? Then by all mean, change it.

[Mr.Moron]

A homebrew campaign or setting is no different than pre-published one in any substantive way. Treat it however you'd treat that. Generally speaking no matter how you're running things simply generating plot hooks generally shouldn't require massive revisions of the surrounding framework. In fact I'm struggling to even think of how such a situation would be at all possible.

What exactly is the situation your players are in, what are their motivations & goals and how do they fit within the current context of the setting? If we knew that it'd be possible to get into specifics that relate to your actual situation at the table.

[Red Fel]

Its not that I am getting caught up in per se. Basically I was having trouble figuring out how to get the players from one scene to another without railroading and asked a fellow DM for advice. He came up with an idea that would work, but it would contradict the established backstory at numerous points and I said it was not worth rewriting massive chunks of the backstory for a one time transition, and his response was that the backstory is 100 percent inconsequential and expendable and no amount of backstory justifies even the slightest inconceniance when you are actually at the table.

I'm confused about how the backstory impacts scene transitions or railroading. I'm not entirely sure on how we got from one to the other. Could you elaborate?

Here's the other thing, though: Getting the players from one scene to another, unless they are going that way of their own choice, is railroading. It just is. There's a small amount of railroading almost inherent to gaming, and telling the players, "Okay, so you leave the town and go into the forest," is railroading.

Now, if the players say, "We want to leave the town and go into the forest," great. They're going, you're not making them. But if the next spot in your story is the hills, not the forest, and you're trying to steer them towards the hills, that's railroading again. It's not inherently bad, but that's what it is. So it's very hard to say "I want my players to go from A to B, so how do I make them do that without railroading them?" Making them do that is railroading, although whether it's heavy-handed or delicate is a matter of personal style and subtlety. You might as well as, "How do I defenestrate someone without throwing them out a window?" (In this example, "Kick them out the window instead" is not a helpful response.)

[Mr.Moron]

Now, if the players say, "We want to leave the town and go into the forest," great. They're going, you're not making them. But if the next spot in your story is the hills, not the forest, and you're trying to steer them towards the hills, that's railroading again.

Not necessarily. Let's say I want the players to discover an ancient shrine in the hills and I know because of their character's backstory and just the player's general love for "Free the Slaves" plotlines, that they're near certain to jump on that stuff. The next time they go to the tavern they are hear some rumors about band of slavers operating in the area that are holed up in the hills. Also it looks like they're getting help from that one jerk who stole a bunch of stuff from them two adventures ago and got away.Presto the players are making a bee-line for those hills, where it turns out the only reasonable hiding place is some old ruins... with ancient shrine inside.


They could ignore that whole plot hook with the thing their character cares about and the bandit they never got even with, so it's not railroading they're free to literally anything else. I've never seen it happen though.

[Talakeal]

I'm confused about how the backstory impacts scene transitions or railroading. I'm not entirely sure on how we got from one to the other. Could you elaborate?

Here's the other thing, though: Getting the players from one scene to another, unless they are going that way of their own choice, is railroading. It just is. There's a small amount of railroading almost inherent to gaming, and telling the players, "Okay, so you leave the town and go into the forest," is railroading.

Now, if the players say, "We want to leave the town and go into the forest," great. They're going, you're not making them. But if the next spot in your story is the hills, not the forest, and you're trying to steer them towards the hills, that's railroading again. It's not inherently bad, but that's what it is. So it's very hard to say "I want my players to go from A to B, so how do I make them do that without railroading them?" Making them do that is railroading, although whether it's heavy-handed or delicate is a matter of personal style and subtlety. You might as well as, "How do I defenestrate someone without throwing them out a window?" (In this example, "Kick them out the window instead" is not a helpful response.)

I suppose it is a matter of subtlety. If I know a player wants to get rich and I drop a hint that the local dungeon is full of gold they will probably go there on their own, where as if I say "Look, the adventure is in the dungeon. If you want to play tonight your characters better get their butts over there," it is pretty blatant railroading.

Both end up with the PCs running the dungeon, but the first doesn't feel like I am taking away their agency.

A homebrew campaign or setting is no different than pre-published one in any substantive way. Treat it however you'd treat that. Generally speaking no matter how you're running things simply generating plot hooks generally shouldn't require massive revisions of the surrounding framework. In fact I'm struggling to even think of how such a situation would be at all possible.

What exactly is the situation your players are in, what are their motivations & goals and how do they fit within the current context of the setting? If we knew that it'd be possible to get into specifics that relate to your actual situation at the table.

I suppose I can give more info, although most forum readers are like PCs, too much backstory scares them away and kills the thread. Some of this might seem familiar for those of you who have been reading my threads in the past.


Long story Short;

Current campaign is set several centuries after a previous campaign.

After the old PCs killed the BBEG his evil kingdom was left a desolate wasteland with no clear ruler. (Think LoTR if after Sauron was destroyed the surviving Nazgul each declared themselves rulers of Mordor and made the orcs fight amongst one another).

A young hero who wanted to follow in the retired PCs footsteps led a crusade into the wasteland to cleanse it and destroy the remnants of the evil forces.

The crusade disappeared and no one knows what happened to it.

Several hundred years passed and the area is no longer a wasteland. The PCs grew up in a small village in this area.

They discover the ruins of an ancient keep. Inside they find that this was the last resting place of the crusade and once a stronghold of evil. The lich who ruled the stronghold was destroyed and his soul imprisoned beneath the tower, but the crusaders, lacking the provisions to return or the strength to continue holed up in here and died, eventually resorting to cannibalism and dark magic. Their ghosts haunt the tower.

PCs explore the tower, adventure over.

Next adventure the enemy of the current campaign has a massive army and the PCs village is right in its path. I want the PCs to somehow recruit the ghosts that inhabit the nearby tower to aid them, once again similar to the Army of the Dead in Lord of the Rings, both saving the town and redeeming the lost souls.

The problem is I have no idea how the PCs would communicate, let alone control, the ghosts on a large scale. The only idea I can think of it awakening the lich that is imprisoned beneath the tower, but the problem is getting the PCs to have that idea (particularly at the right time, if they just happen to awaken him when they first come to the tower they will all end up dead).



So, one of the PCs is a child priest who is believed to be the reincarnation of a saint. The advice was to have the saint he is a reincarnation of be the one who led the crusade. Which is a good idea but...


I already know who led the crusade and have a fairly detailed backstory for her
It was a secular rather than a religious crusade
The order he is a member of didn't exist when the crusade was lost
The crusade was lost, and what happened to it was a mystery. If the leader had gone on to found an order of monks and then have a line of incarnations it would imply that someone survived the crusade and knew what happened to it, which deflates the mystery entirely.

And there were a couple other problems that I can't quite recall atm.


So yeah, there's the story, as brief as I can give it. Let me know if you have any thoughts or advice or need any more info.

Thanks!