Arelith

Sartain wrote: Thu Apr 04, 2019 11:58 am That wasn't really my question though. What j was trying to ask is: Is there a place to put my background where DMs can see it and hopefully decide to engage in it?

No.

The Rambling Midget wrote:Adding to this, nobody cares about your backstory... until they do.

One of the most powerful things about Arelith is that nothing else matters besides what happens IG. If you're incorporating your backstory into events in game, then you'll have more of an opportunity for someone to run with it - DMs included.

The way I like to do it is to have enough of a backstory that let's your character have some depth and personality points, but keep it open enough that it allows freedom. If you make a super defined backstory that is awesome but I feel it's best to also allow wiggle room for, as some DMs said, intervention on their part. This also extends to other PCs. Have your backstory help define some finer points for your character, or be the reason he does things, but always be ready for improvisation. I try to make my characters have a simple enough backstory that allows me a lot of options for the future.

Yeah I don't really get that approach you describe Ork. I know we're not playing your standard roleplaying game here but it seems a bit strange that the only way to get the DM involved with your story/character is by ordering an event.

How are DMs supposed to know which stories they can/want to get involved in, what backstory hooks they might be able to use in game, if their only way to get our stories is to play peeping tom in game and hope they catch something good?

By all accounts DMs have plenty of other stuff to do that sit around hoping to spot a decent background they could do something with. Not to mention, how much time investment does that actually require, if everything has to be delivered in-game? Seems to me that might skew the whole thing a lot in favour of the people who can sit around and play all day, all week

A dependable way of getting a DM involved is by involving a lot of players in roleplay. DMs are inspired to run quests on what they find interesting, and have no responsibility to run your plot. If you inspire them with your roleplay, you'll probably wander into a DM plot one of these days.

Ork wrote: Thu Apr 04, 2019 2:24 pm A dependable way of getting a DM involved is by involving a lot of players in roleplay. DMs are inspired to run quests on what they find interesting, and have no responsibility to run your plot. If you inspire them with your roleplay, you'll probably wander into a DM plot one of these days.

I didn't say anyone was obligated to run my plots, I was asking how they DMs can possibly know what kind of backstory stuff to use IF they decide to. As far as I can tell the answer is that backstory doesn't really matter at all, it's only the in-game stuff that's relevant

Sartain wrote: Thu Apr 04, 2019 2:37 pm

Ork wrote: Thu Apr 04, 2019 2:24 pm A dependable way of getting a DM involved is by involving a lot of players in roleplay. DMs are inspired to run quests on what they find interesting, and have no responsibility to run your plot. If you inspire them with your roleplay, you'll probably wander into a DM plot one of these days.

I didn't say anyone was obligated to run my plots, I was asking how they DMs can possibly know what kind of backstory stuff to use IF they decide to. As far as I can tell the answer is that backstory doesn't really matter at all, it's only the in-game stuff that's relevant

Good question.

I suppose there's two ways to go at this.

1) Request a Backstory Plot.
Basicaly this is done by sending us a PM saying 'Hi, my character is a X and I have this xxx in my backstory and I'd like you to run something for it.' (Hopefully more detailed than that but there you go)
Whether or not we'll agree will depend on a few things.
1) Can we do it mechanicaly?
2) Does it involve a lot of work?
3) Does it involve other players?
4) Does it make a fun story or is it just self aggrandizing?
5) Are we interested in the first place?

So it's a bit hit and miss, but if we like the idea, if we think it could make a fun larger story, or it's very short, or we're just in the mood - we may do something with it. But again, there's absolutly no promises here.

2) Play Your Backstory and See What Happens.
As others have said: If you play your backstory, then sometimes Dms will take an interest.
Let's say that the character concept is a Paladin Wild Mage Hunter. He goes around hunting wild mages, capturing, interrogating, and sometimes even executing them. When pushed he speaks about how his wife was a wild mage who lost control one day and turned his children into statues of glass, and they cannot be turned back. So he hunts down wild mages to make sure it never happens again.
Well, if this character makes enough ripples, intersts enough other characters, as a Dm I would certainly be interested in maybe dropping something down to interact with their current aims. E.g. dropping down wild mage npcs for them to attack, organizing a 'wild mage group' to defend against them, something like that.
But if you mean, 'bring out an npc from my characters background' I think I, and the other DMs, would be far, far more leery of doing that without a players expressed permission.
In the above example, if the matter of his children is a main character driving goal for the pc, then dropping down them as npcs, and dong a short quest where they get 'fixed' without the players permission would perhaps seem a bit... vexing? It takes away a bit of character motivation, without the players permission. So anything in the sense of npc backstory is probably something we'd be wary of touching without request/permission from the player involved.

I completely understand not wanting to impose on somebody's background story but I do also feel it's a bit of a shame that there's not much of a chance for some dynamic, un-requested RP as a DM decides to pick up on a plot hook

Sartain wrote: Thu Apr 04, 2019 3:43 pm I completely understand not wanting to impose on somebody's background story but I do also feel it's a bit of a shame that there's not much of a chance for some dynamic, un-requested RP as a DM decides to pick up on a plot hook

There just isn't enough time in the day. If DMs were expected to engage spontaneously in people's backstories, they wouldn't have enough time to read everyone's backstories, let alone actually do things.

I've had a DM help me to play out an important consequence of one my characters' backstories, but I had to request it and do a portion of the planning myself, because that DM would never have noticed me among the hundreds of other players, otherwise, and could never know all of the critical details of it from something I'd written.

Moreover, because of the favoritism that this implies, there was a policy shift some years ago (I don't know how well this has held up) instructing DMs to focus less on events for the individual and more on events for large groups and the server as a whole, so that more players could become engaged.

The bottom line is that there isn't enough DM time to do this sort of thing, so we have to do some of the legwork ourselves.

Sartain wrote: Thu Apr 04, 2019 11:58 am

The Rambling Midget wrote: Thu Apr 04, 2019 8:12 am

Sartain wrote: Thu Apr 04, 2019 8:06 am

Can anyone answer this?

If you want to run an event with a DM, you can send a forum PM to the Active DMs group, and see if any of them are interested in helping.

That wasn't really my question though. What j was trying to ask is: Is there a place to put my background where DMs can see it and hopefully decide to engage in it?
The IC stories forum doesn't seem to quite fit it and I don't really see any other options

*ponders*
> Crafted Notebook?
> Other RP items in your char's inventory?
> Character Description?

DM GrumpyCat wrote: Thu Apr 04, 2019 3:16 pm ...'Hi, my character is a X and I have this xxx in my backstory and I'd like you to run something for it.'...

L I E S !

The IC backstories section is for that stuff. DMs are not obliged to read anything/everything in there but they’ve been known to browse and poke about in the subsection

Backstories are tempting to flesh out in full before you begin playing, it's true - but I find that it's generally speaking not really worthwhile, and comes across as unexpectedly hollow if you try to determine everything about your character before any of it has a chance to be played out in organic interaction. It doesn't help that a lot of these backstories in the hands of inexperienced players tend to be spilled out all over the place at the slightest provocation, ironically telling the audience very little about your character other than the fact that they're long-winded narcissists.

Until you're playing, your character isn't really a person, they're a list of stuff that hasn't been expressed in any meaningful way - informed attributes in other terms.

A more robust approach, in my opinion, is to begin with a rough sketch of a character concept and let the interactions that occur fill in their features and behaviors as you go, with your simple initial premise as a starting point. There will be many, many opportunities to create additional complexity and let behaviors emerge over time. This has the benefit of letting character growth be a naturally occurring, near-inevitable process over time, instead of following a pre-packaged "arc" with discrete beginnings and ends.

That is not to say that planning ahead is necessarily bad, but it's incredibly easy for it to come across as a contrivance, in which you are trying to force the world to revolve around your character's personal journey - which might make sense if you're writing a novel with a strong focus on that character, but doesn't really work in a large multiplayer environment in which everyone is trying to write their own story.

I never bother with trying to create a story for my characters. Be them led by me or a dm. I'm more the guy that enjoys being a small part of YOUR story. I don't like the lime light or mass attention. I'm the guy that is never remembered for the small rolls played and I'm good with that.

To be honest at this point, for Arelith, I just go with a couple of mental notes. Not going to bother monologuing about my dramatic backstory when everyone just wants to get to grinding or faction warfare anyway

I'm pretty sure a great portion of the playerbase does want more than just faction warfare and grinding.

Ah, ah, that's what you meant with a personal story.
Honestly, my millennial speed-addled mind just read the first paragraph and rushed to the commentary box.

All my characters have something of an ongoing personal story going, but I play them more as loose thematics arcs.
Which means that sometimes my characters are going through something, or are dealing with something; loss, anxieties, manias, obsessions, addictions, afflictions, magical and mundane, they are seeking something, they are trying to achieve something. Sometimes they are small plots that are resolved at the moment, sometimes they are moderately more complex plots that drive my character and those around them into motion to try and achieve something with them.

My monk was chased by his own shadow, and it was trying to murder him. I know, sinfully old story, but it was when the SDs just got their not-lame shadow and I wanted to do it before anybody else on the server. It was something on the side, but it colored the character and it explained some of his manias and his fears, or his mood.

Xarge VI wrote: Fri Apr 12, 2019 8:42 am I'm pretty sure a great portion of the playerbase does want more than just faction warfare and grinding.

Probably. I do run into people who RP although it seems mostly as preludes to going to farm XP/materials/gold/writs. I've noticed that with those of my characters that have actually gotten involved with another group in-game the amount of interest in other character's backgrounds is about nil. Not as much as a "so where are you from?", "why did you come to X?", "how come you drink so much alcohol?", "do you have a corpse fetish?" or any other relevant questions you might ask a person you're about to enter into what is essentially a working relationship with

And like I said, I definitely can't be bothered badgering other character's with my dramatic backstory when it seems like they'd rather just get to the killing. I have a dramatic backstory, the server just doesn't really seem interested in it

Maybe its just to... 'dramatic' :p

The backstory isn't there just to be told. It is there to explain why your character is the way they are. Someone you come across might 'eventually' take an interest in that. And even then, only specific parts and details thereof.