October 23, 2023 • 67 mins
Ever wanted to craft a captivating backstory for your tabletop role-playing game characters that resonates with every player, whether they're seasoned gamers or RPG rookies? Get ready to level up your game as we journey together into the art of character creation. Join us on this episode of Legends, Loot, and Lore as our guest, the esteemed Courtland Goldengate, shares his wisdom and wealth of experience in crafting evocative backstories and introduces us to his innovative software venture, Tall Tavern.
Ever felt the challenge of striking the perfect balance between creating a unique, powerful character and tailoring it to blend seamlessly with the campaign world? We've got you covered. We dissect the process, from creating a character's past and present to shaping their future. We delve into the critical role of a Dungeon Master in backstory creation, discuss the significance of player autonomy, and the value of a well-conducted session zero. Not only that, but we also dive deep into the influence of a character's past on the campaign's progression.
What's more, we equip you with an arsenal of tools, tips, and resources to fuel your creativity and help you generate engaging character backstories. We'll guide you in drawing inspiration from various sources such as literature, history, and popular archetypes. We also present practical advice on how to break through writer's block and transform existing narratives into unique character arcs. So, pull up a chair, roll the dice, and embark on this enriching quest with us and Courtland Goldengate. Remember, every great adventure starts with a compelling backstory!
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Tall Tavern - https://talltavern.com/
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Mark as Played
Transcript
Episode Transcript
Available transcripts are automatically generated. Complete accuracy is not guaranteed.
Speaker 1 (00:07):
Welcome back to everyone to the Legends, loot
and Lore podcast.
Today's episode features ourguest, cortland Goldengate, and
we are going to talk about allthings character backstory.
So that's going to be today'sepisode really diving into what
makes a great backstory and whatthings you should think about
(00:29):
how to go through that wholeprocess, because when Joe
returns from Fall Soccer, we aregoing to create some of our
first characters.
So really, backstory is reallywhere you're going to get to use
your imagination.
So that's what we're going totalk about today.
(00:50):
But, cortland, please introduceyourself for all of our
listeners and tell us a littlebit about yourself.
Awesome.
Speaker 2 (00:59):
Thank you, Andrew.
So yeah, as Andrew said, myname is Cortland and I don't
know what there is to say.
I love TTRPGs.
I've been playing them prettyheavily for maybe five years now
, but I'm one of those guys thathad the books when I was
younger and was very intoreading them and reading all
(01:22):
about the pantheons and theitems and the monsters.
But, then never really gotaround to playing or tried to
play in junior high, maybe inhigh school, but not doing it
right.
Not that there's a wrong way toplay these games, but it can be
intimidating with hundreds ofpages of rules and all the
(01:43):
coordination and all of that.
So I would say I've been intofantasy and role-playing games
my entire life, but only reallywith fifth edition have I very
much gotten into playing andacting as a game master.
Outside of that, I enjoy thishobby so much that I actually
(02:06):
recently left my boring oldcorporate enterprise job to
start my own company.
So I've been working in thespace of software developer
tools, data science, machinelearning and software for these
(02:26):
people, and that's all well andgood.
But what I really most wantedto do is get deep into the
community of people that sharethe same sort of hobbies that I
have, and so I'm now currentlytrying to blend my hobbies and
my out-of-work interests with myactual work and as a result, I
(02:53):
am building software called TallTavern.
It's TallTaberncom and it'ssoftware to record, transcribe
and then summarize your tabletoprole-playing game sessions so
that you can have history ofyour campaign.
Thank you, yeah, it's one ofthose things where I take a lot
(03:15):
of notes, but sometimes I justfall off doing that and it takes
a lot of work to keep a recordof that, and so it's just one of
those things where I'm buildingsomething that I want and I
hope that it's something thatcan bring other people joy as
well, and we'll see.
So the app is actually going.
(03:38):
The beta test, the first roundof beta testers, is starting
tomorrow.
Awesome, I'm really excited toget some real feedback on it.
Speaker 1 (03:47):
So let's dive into this a little bit more, so give
us some more detail about whatthe app actually does.
Is this an iOS, Android-basedapp, or is this a computer-based
, like web-based app?
What's the actual process?
Speaker 2 (04:04):
It's a web app and so it runs great on mobile, but
it's not like an iPhone app oranything like that.
So you can just run it off abrowser or off a mobile device
or tablet, whatever you want.
And it's very simple andstraightforward.
You just create a campaign.
You can have whatever number ofcampaigns you want, and then
each time you sit down for agame session you just click Add
(04:26):
Session and click a button andit starts recording and it will
then take that audio recordingand transcribe all the text to
it, so you have a history of allthe text.
But then I think maybe the moreinteresting thing is that it
then allows you to summarizethat.
So if you want to have ajournal, basically as a player
(04:50):
in a TTRPG campaign, you canhave that without distracting
yourself during the game andjust focusing on the people
there and focusing on the gamerather than jotting down notes
the whole time.
And then, as a Game Master, youcan take those summaries and
then, without any effort really,you can do the post-session
(05:11):
recap.
So if you play weekly orbi-weekly or monthly, it's
really easy to say, hey, as areminder, here's what happened
last session, because we justgot that summary ready to go
already.
Speaker 1 (05:24):
That is super cool For me, I know, as both a player
and a DM.
Note-taking is not one of mystrong suits, so I have to
really work to get better atnote-taking and I play now in
(05:44):
three separate campaigns One.
I've gotten much, much betterin the newer ones as I go along
taking detailed notes I reallylike in the one campaign that I
play, the DM basically haseverybody write a summary of
that's night activities based ontheir perspective, so you get
(06:06):
to see everybody's perspectiveof the same type of events from
their character's perspective.
So that one's reallyinteresting as well.
So I'm a huge proponent ofanything that makes that process
easier, to share thatinformation out, because not
everybody is a note-taker.
(06:26):
It just helps for recollectionas to all sorts of things what
loot you got, who said what,just trying to keep track and,
depending on sometimes it may beweeks in between your gameplay
sessions.
So it's a nice healthy reminderto oh yeah, that's what
(06:48):
happened three weeks ago thelast time we were able to play.
So that's really cool.
I can't wait to see it and tryit out.
Speaker 2 (06:57):
And we will definitely link in the show
notes for everybody.
And what was the URL?
Again, talltavroncom.
Speaker 1 (07:03):
TallTavroncom Excellent.
So we will definitely have thatin the show notes so everybody
can go there and check it out.
So tell me a little bit aboutyour background.
So you really got into playingwhen 5e came out.
(07:23):
So do you remember the firstcharacter you created in 5e?
Speaker 2 (07:32):
I do, I do.
I don't remember thischaracter's name and that's
probably an indication that thischaracter wasn't that
interesting.
It was just a stat block.
It wasn't a character, it was awarlock that had a dexterity
(07:56):
based weapon.
There was no backstory, wedidn't do a session zero and it
was still fun to play.
I think I had kind of a greatold one back, so I was very
excited about having mycharacter be like drawing upon
(08:18):
some of the stuff from theCthulhu mythos and I had it in
my mind, the idea that mycharacter would grapple with
growing mental health challengesand insanity setting in from
his connection to the alienentity.
I think it was interesting inmy mind, but really more of a
(08:47):
learning experience actually inwhat not to do.
Okay, yeah.
So it was a fun idea, I thinkin my mind and then in practice
it was a kind of a chaoticcharacter behaving irrationally
at some times that got in theway of what the rest of the
(09:09):
party wanted to do, as thecharacter was like grappling
with insanity.
And I think the thing that Ireally didn't consider is that a
good backstory isn't just aboutyou.
A good backstory is a backstorythat enhances the enjoyability
(09:31):
of everyone at the table thegame master, the other players
and yourself.
Speaker 1 (09:38):
So that will lead me into my first question for you.
So what really makes acompelling backstory that's
engaging for both the player,the campaign, the rest of the
party and even the DM.
So what really makes that acompelling character?
Speaker 2 (10:01):
as far as the backstory is concerned, Well, I
mean, the first thing you got toget right is you need to
min-max all your stats.
You need to go online and doyour crafty character out to
level 20.
Don't worry about any of that,and, in fact, creating a
powerful character can be a lotof fun, but it's actually really
(10:26):
limiting in a lot of ways ifyou want to create an
interesting character, becauseeveryone generally wants to
create a powerful character, andso there are certain types of
characters that are just morepowerful than others, and those
are the most common ones.
And I find that what peoplereally enjoy is creating a
(10:47):
character that feels unique tothem, where it's a character
where the player gets to act asthe author of that character, or
that character can be used toexplore an aspect of the
player's identity, and both ofthose can be interesting,
(11:10):
because you're drawing on realhuman characteristics to try and
make your character relatablebut also unique.
So it's a balance between thosetwo things, I think, where you
want to make a character that'sdifferent and interesting
(11:32):
because of the fact that they'redifferent, but that has enough
about them that can be connectedto, so that the other people at
the table feel like this issomeone that they want to get to
know someone that they mighthave things in common with and
someone that's different enoughthat makes them want to spend
(11:53):
the time to figure out what theyhave in common with that
character.
I think that it helps to thinkabout the personality that your
character has and then workbackwards to think about their
history that would have led themto have the kind of personality
(12:17):
that they have, or do thereverse Think about their
history and how that wouldimpact their personality.
Did you grow up in a very safeenvironment where the authority
figures in your life werecharacters that brought safety
and comfort and were reliable?
(12:38):
As a result, do you generallytrust authority?
Or maybe it was the reverse?
Maybe your first inclination isto be distrustful, to be
skeptical?
What would cause you to havethose kind of characteristics?
I think you can start in eitherdirection, but it's important
(12:59):
to connect the past to thepresent.
Speaker 1 (13:04):
That's a really good point, I think.
In my own character creation Ithink I've really tried to
understand who that I alwaysstart with the present.
Who are they?
Who are they now?
Then I go back where I'm, thetype that I'll start with this
(13:24):
is who I want to be.
Now I'm like, okay, well, whatmade him that way or made her
that way?
What made them that way?
That's typically the attackI've taken when drawing up a
backstory for a character.
It's interesting going all theway back to say, well, what
(13:44):
happened to them?
First, let's talk about theirpast, and what kind of character
does that morph them into today?
That's an interesting vantagepoint from character creation.
Speaker 2 (14:00):
If you want to go that less common route that
started with what happened in mypast to then figure out who am
I today, that can be good.
If you don't know exactly whoyou want to be when you have a
character I know a lot of thepeople that listen to your
podcast are newer to the hobbythat might be an interesting
(14:21):
thing to try.
If you're not really sure whatkind of character you want to be
, you could even do things likeroll on a table to have life
experiences that took place andthen think about how would that
life experience affect who I amtoday.
You could use some tools toeffectively get through writer's
(14:44):
block or that feeling ofstaring at an empty page and not
knowing where to start.
Speaker 1 (14:52):
You're taking a look at it from a different angle is
definitely a good way to curethe writer's block of trying to
figure out who am I say.
Well, where did I start from, Ithink of?
The first thing that pops intomy head is the backstory for
(15:14):
Bruce Wayne, batman, and thetragedy that happened in his
young life.
You could go either way.
That could become the beginningof your villain arc, or that
could become how you become thehero.
(15:35):
You could really take it bothways.
It's really an interestingstarting point to go from the
past.
And where does it lead Fromthere?
It could be anywhere.
It's a fun adventure.
Trying to figure all that out.
Tell me this.
(15:56):
Let me ask this question Canyou think of an example of a
character backstory of all thecharacters that you've played or
someone that has been at yourtable that you've DMed?
What's a memorable backstorythat has left an impact or left
(16:19):
a mark on your memory of all thetables you've been a part of?
Speaker 2 (16:28):
I think that it's good to have some amount of
backstory, but not have so muchthat it takes center stage.
It's called a backstory for areason the coolest parts of your
character and their storyshould take place and should
(16:51):
emerge through gameplay.
But it is important because itgives you a way to react and to
build your character and theirstory, because it gives you an
idea of how you would react tothe situations that the Game
Master is going to throw at you.
(17:14):
Let me answer your question.
To answer your question, acharacter that comes to mind for
me, I feel like I'd make a goodpolitician.
Speaker 1 (17:27):
That was a great political answer.
Speaker 2 (17:29):
That was an interesting question, a deep,
thoughtful answer that hasnothing to do with the question
itself.
Not at all.
That was a brilliant questionasked by a beautiful person.
Let me talk about somethingelse that I want to talk about.
There is a character that comesto mind for me.
This is a character whose nameI do remember.
(17:51):
That's immediately a good signversus a good character that I
created.
This character's name was AidanBroadmore, who was an arrogant,
selfish, condescending, vain,noble, not a good guy, not
someone that you'd want to hangout with, but who had a little
(18:15):
bit of a comedic air as well.
I thought it would beentertaining for the table to
have an unlikeable, arrogant butkind of comic relief character.
When creating this character'spersonality, I was actually
(18:37):
inspired by what's his name?
The military officer inFuturama, I can't remember his
name, the blonde guy and his gothis alien.
Speaker 1 (18:52):
Absolutely, I know who you're.
Now I'm going to have to lookit up because Zapp Branigan.
Speaker 2 (19:00):
There it is, zapp Branigan.
Speaker 1 (19:02):
Yes, Zapp Branigan.
Yes, exactly, I know he's sococky and just full of himself
and yep.
Speaker 2 (19:14):
Yeah, so just the idea of comedically repeating
what other people at the tablesaid, but more loudly and with
more gusto it was a fun littlequirk to add in there and the
(19:35):
thought I had about kind of hisbackstory in terms of like what
would cause that arrogance andobviously a life of privilege
like growing up with richparents being spoiled, having it
just be expected that you'd beleading in whatever situation
(19:55):
you're in and have it not evencross your mind that you
wouldn't.
This thought that there's acertain amount of predetermined
leadership capacity that peoplehad and you happen to be born
with it and other people happento not be, and just kind of like
sheltered, like not being in asituation that, not really
(20:19):
having ever faced any challengesand being pretty weak as a
result, not having kind ofadversity, to like build kind of
his own character.
And I thought that would be kindof a good way to tackle a
backstory, because during anadventure you encounter a whole
(20:41):
lot of adversity.
And so that was a sort ofbackstory that like
pre-programmed room for growth.
And yeah, I think that's partof what makes kind of a
character interesting ormemorable is that they're not
static, that they change overtime.
And so, like I remember, at thestart of the campaign, a giant
(21:06):
kind of like spider creature wasattacking the party and like
and not even a giant spider,like some sort of demonic
librarian spider creature inthis old decrepit library and
you know there was an NPC alongwith us and I just remember it
(21:31):
like the creature was coming into like stab at Aiden Broadmore
my character, one of its sharpkind of forelegs and my
character like grabbed an NPCand, like you know, block the
attack with the NPC to like savehis own skin.
Speaker 1 (21:51):
And so that makes sense.
Speaker 2 (21:54):
Decidedly unheroic, but then like also something to
reflect on, something to beashamed of.
As the story went on and Iobserved like the much more
heroic kind of characteristicsof this other group of people
and then started to like changemy mind over time and then like
see them do things for me that Iwouldn't do for anyone, like
(22:17):
rescue me, save my life, andthen just starting to over time
become less and less selfish,more and more open and kind and
like really bond with you knowhis newfound family of this, you
know the other people in theadventuring party?
Speaker 1 (22:38):
That's fantastic.
That is because, again, youcould play it either way.
You could play that thecharacter does grow and changes
and learns, or you could justplay that this is the way the
character is and the party kindof has to like.
(22:58):
What does the party do withthat?
So interesting I'm playing, I'mlooking forward to.
I started playing a tieflingwarlock.
I've been in one of thecampaigns and similar thing.
So my patron is an undeadEgyptian God and unbeknownst to
(23:25):
me.
The patron is trying to get meto raise an undead army to take
over the world and destroy theworld for them.
But I'm a little naive andunaware of what their goal
actually is.
I was more interested ingetting the power from the
(23:47):
patron, not so much interestedin the details of the contract.
So I'm going to.
I still haven't decided whichway it's going to play out.
Is he going to turn and say, no, this is not something that I'm
okay with.
I'm not going to help you raisean undead army.
(24:10):
Or is he going to say, well, Iwant to keep my power?
This is kind of what I have todo to keep my power.
So I'm curious to see how thecampaign plays out and what
choices my character makes.
But I've kind of put him inthis precarious kind of big life
(24:31):
decision of choosing good orevil and he's kind of chaotic,
neutral at the moment, so itcould go either way.
So I've never played thatbefore where the outcome is
undetermined.
Speaker 2 (24:49):
Awesome.
Well, as someone who likes tothink of himself as chaotic,
good in real life, I hope youchoose the light, my friend, and
the cool thing I like aboutyour story and that setup is
that there's a real cost behinddoing something good.
(25:09):
You have to give up.
You know potentially the sourceof your power, the source of
your kind of uniqueness and yourusefulness to the party and
your ability to potentially doother kind of good with that
power in order to really kind ofbreak with your patron there.
(25:31):
So I always think that you knowa value is only a value if you
do it when it's hard, and so ifyou make that kind of decision
with your character, that's areally kind of strong indication
of the character of yourcharacter.
Speaker 1 (25:51):
The character of the character, exactly.
Speaker 2 (25:53):
Yeah, yeah, I love that.
I'm rooting for your character.
Challenge the patron, take himdown.
Speaker 1 (26:04):
Yeah, I want to say it's.
I've been working with the DMon trying to figure out how that
all fits into the campaign, butwe'll see how it plays out.
I want to see.
I mean I think ultimately he'sgoing to choose right over wrong
and sacrifices power, but doesthat mean loss of life?
(26:25):
Does that mean you know whatdoes that mean?
So I'm very curious to see howit all plays out.
He's got something, the DM'sgot something in mind.
So that brings me to my nextquestion.
So how much collaborationshould there be with the Dungeon
Master when developing acharacter's backstory?
(26:46):
Like how much?
Because I mean you kind of wantto create a character that's
going to kind of fit thecampaign but still be something
of your own.
So to what extent should a DMbe involved in helping you craft
(27:06):
your character or help guideyou kind of to finding something
that's going to be a good fitfor the party, for the campaign,
et cetera?
Speaker 2 (27:18):
Well, as a you know Game Master or the Dungeon
Master myself, I think that theDM should proactively solicit
input from the players at thetable and involve them in
building the world, because it'seasy for a Dungeon Master to
(27:40):
get lost in the world thatthey're creating and think of it
as their world, their story,and that leads to, I think, the
single biggest killer of fun ina role-playing game, which is
this feeling like you're onrails.
Yes, you don't have real choiceor agency.
(28:01):
It's like, okay, the DM has gotan idea of where this is going.
I actually don't have anychoice.
It's like the train is headingthat way.
You know get on it or don't.
And then you know think abouthow the player feels about their
cool backstory that they spendall this time creating.
(28:24):
That's right.
Why does your backstory matterif you don't have any choice or
agency in the present?
You know.
So I think there are ways toavoid that, and I would say I
(28:44):
borrowed this idea from someonethat is a better Dungeon Master
than me, and there are plenty ofthose out there, and I think
people should generally juststeal good ideas whenever they
see them.
No one can hoard good ideas inour community, in this space and
hobby and the idea is to ask ofthe players at the table to
(29:10):
create parts of the world, givethem a little homework, create
an NPC that exists in this world.
Where does that NPC live?
How did you know that NPC?
Give them an item or have themcreate an item that comes from
the world but has no utility.
(29:31):
So I remember a character ofmine in a game that I was
playing from this DM that Ilearned this kind of thing from
had a miniature boat and abottle like a little kind of
like handcrafted miniature boatand a bottle.
So no use, no value.
It's not going to help incombat, it's not going to help
(29:54):
in social interaction.
There's literally like zeromechanical use for this thing,
except to force me to considerlike, where did I get this?
And in this particular game I'mplaying in the Dragon Lance
setting, which some people mayremember from Tracy Hicks and
(30:18):
Margaret Weiss' books I thinkI'm getting their names correct
but a lot of people read thosebooks back in the day the
dragons of blank season and soit acted as a start like a
thought starter.
It's like, well, okay, I gotthis tiny little boat crafted by
(30:39):
tiny little kinder hands, whichis like that setting's version
of the halfling Okay, well thenI was in Kendermore, okay, well,
if I was in Kendermore, might Ihave met this other player's
character at the table who's aKendr?
And so it acted as a seed fromwhich more story could grow.
(31:03):
So I think, yeah, dms shouldgive their players that
opportunity to like createsomething from the world.
Don't just hand them the worldlike involve them actively in
trading it and then from there,like encourage them to like
think about those sorts ofthings.
(31:23):
I also think that, like a protip for DMs is to have, like
players characters, know some ofthe other players characters,
because why would a group of youknow people risk their lives to
pursue some call to adventureand like stay with each other
(31:46):
versus any other loyalty thatthey might have to their family
or their kingdom or whateverelse, to their own sense of
safety and security?
And one way to do that is like,if you have a group of four
players at a table you have havelike one character, no, the
second character and the thirdcharacter, but not the fourth
(32:09):
character.
Okay then you can have, like thesecond character no, the first
character and the fourthcharacter, but not the third
character.
So everyone knows someone elseand everyone doesn't know
someone else.
And so there's some people thatyou're meeting for the first
time, other people where youhave some background in history
(32:30):
with, and then it not only likeavoids the pitfall for a player
and their characters backstory,to just be all about them and
only be interesting to them andnot the rest of the table.
It also opens up theopportunity to like introduce
people.
No, oh, you know, likecharacter character two, I know
(32:55):
you and I know character three,but I don't know character four.
You know character two.
Can you introduce me tocharacter four?
How did you?
You know, it just opens upopportunities for a dialogue.
So I, you know, I put a highdegree of responsibility on the
DM for that and to do thingsthat will involve you know
(33:22):
characters and their backstoryand its creation.
But there's more players outthere than there are DMs and it
certainly doesn't hurt to askand to be proactive right.
Or maybe you have a newer, anewer DM or a DM that hasn't
tried that particular trick.
(33:42):
I mean, you know in, why notask like, hey, you know, can I
create an NPC in the world?
I don't think any DM would saylike, no, get out of here, this
is mine, definitely not.
You know.
You know players that offer todo some of the work, to lift
some a load from a DM right.
(34:03):
I think the response that you'regoing to get 100% of the time
is like yes, absolutely, likeyou know.
Come on, let's.
Let's do this together.
Speaker 1 (34:13):
Yeah, that's, that's.
That's a great point.
Yeah, I think this topic hascome up with with other others
that I've interviewed on thepodcast about, yeah, railroading
, kind of railroading theplayers in one way, or giving
them a sandbox to play in, and Ithink having that that level of
(34:33):
autonomy and just and justbeing able to kind of choose
where, where you get to go,really, really, I think enhances
the game Even, even as if we'regoing back to talking about
backstory.
You know, why is there?
What's the purpose of abackstory If you're just going
to railroad them down theparticular path you know there's
no, there's no, there's verylittle point to it at that point
(34:57):
, I think.
So, so, by giving them thefreedom to choose where to go,
you know.
So, based on on their history,where do you feel your character
would, would go?
So that's a really good, areally good point to make.
Speaker 2 (35:16):
So maybe add one thing to that, which is that you
can go too far in the otherdirection.
You know, you can have a worldthat's so open that the players
just don't know what to do,don't feel like they have a
purpose, and so it is a trickybalance to, you know, allow
(35:41):
freedom and maybe there, maybethere is a path, maybe there is
a railroad and there is a kindof a central antagonist at the
end of the campaign, or you knowthat needs to be stopped,
whatever it is, but then you atleast have to allow for detours.
Speaker 1 (35:58):
Absolutely.
Yeah, I completely agree.
I think it's good to have athread that the story follows.
I always liken it to a chooseyour own adventure book.
You know there's a story,there's a plot, but there's
still room for you to make ityour own.
(36:20):
Yeah yeah, for sure I agree.
So I don't know about you, butI've seen this with some people.
I struggled with it the firsttime.
Again, people new to D&D,sometimes it's not, there's so
(36:44):
much to remember.
So there's all the rules,remembering the dice which dice
do I roll for this?
Which dice do I roll for that?
How much do I use for my weapon?
Oh wait, there's advantage andthose disadvantage.
You know inspiration, yada,yada, yada.
But it can sometimes, on theface of it, be a little
intimidating and overwhelming.
(37:05):
So, as far as creating thebackstory is concerned, what's
some advice you'd give tosomeone to maybe jump over that
hurdle when they're creatingtheir first character?
What's a good starting offpoint?
Maybe to again.
(37:28):
So we talked about eitherstarting back from kind of a
trigger point in their historyor how are they right now.
But what might you say tosomeone who's trying to kind of
come up with that backstory forthe first time for a new
character?
Speaker 2 (37:49):
I would say especially for D&D, which is
fairly combat heavy, likethere's not a lot of D&D games
out there where combat is aminimal or absent part of the
game.
And with that in mind, I thinka good place to start is to ask
yourself a couple of questions,the first one being why would I
(38:11):
risk my life?
What would I risk my life for?
And communicate that to the DM?
This is something thatmotivates my character and that
is important enough to mycharacter that they would risk
it all, risk losing their ownlife to advance, whatever that
(38:32):
thing is.
And there's a whole host ofmotivations for that, good ones
bad ones somewhere in between,and so answering that question
can be a good first step.
A second one, and at least asimportant, is asking yourself
(38:53):
the question what would lead meto be loyal to other people?
What would lead me to be loyalto the other people around the?
table what sort of person andpersonality?
Would my character need to haveto go to the mat for the other
(39:15):
characters at the table?
And if you answer those twoquestions and communicate that
to the DM, you should have acharacter that will heed the
call to adventure that they willinevitably get and that will
feel natural and true when youmake decisions to support the
(39:38):
other player characters at thetable.
And that's not just about youand your own thing, but it's
being a part of a found family,which is really, I think, what
these tabletop role-playinggames are all about Like.
Why are you spending all yourtime with these other weirdos
around?
The table, oh for sure.
(40:01):
It's because you care about themand care about them enough that
you choose them, over whateverbackground or circumstances that
you came from.
So, yeah, I think to me, keepit simple.
Just ask those two questionswhat would cause me to risk my
life for something, for a cause?
Who would I need to be to riskmy life for something, and who
(40:27):
would I need to be to haveunwavering loyalty to other
people?
What would need to be trueabout me and about them for that
?
And then just talk.
That's what a Session Zero isall about is crafting your
character and your backstory asa collaborative effort, not as
an individual author coming upwith a cool individual story.
Speaker 1 (40:52):
So let's talk a little bit about it, because we
haven't really yet touched onthis topic.
We've mentioned it severaltimes.
But let's talk about SessionZero and what that means for
what kind of what happens at thelike.
Let's talk about your tables,for example, that you DM.
(41:13):
So what are?
How do you weave in, how do youwelcome in new players into a
Session Zero to talk aboutbackstory and their character
development?
And how do you kind of blend,help blend that party together
so that when they're ready forthe first session together
(41:34):
they're a cohesive unit?
So how do you tie in all thosebackstories into an adventuring
party for a campaign?
Speaker 2 (41:45):
Yeah, I feel like I've done this with varying
degrees of success in games thatI've run, and even in some
recent ones I have not given.
You know, just to be honest,haven't given Session Zero its
proper time and attention andthen, like, really quickly
(42:07):
realized what a big mistake thatwas.
But I'm just going to talkabout the times when I did stuff
good and well rather than mymistakes.
So I remember kind of a groupthat I started with where I was
the DM and we've been playingsince the start of the pandemic.
(42:28):
This was an online game and it'syou know, it's still going you
know where, I think close tothree years on, something like
that.
It started out with a prettyinvolved Session Zero.
It was, you know, a lot of usgetting together.
We met online.
We didn't know each otherbeforehand and we're all kind of
(42:50):
just, you know, stuck at home,you know, sheltering in a place,
and part of it was just gettingto know these people, like
asking them like why they'reinterested in playing D&D to
begin with.
So you know, there was a guywho had never played before but
had, like, was a critter andwould watch and listen to a lot
(43:13):
of critical role and just reallydrawn to it.
You know, due to that, there was, you know, another person that
had played for decades and kneweverything about the game and
was a DM and his motivation forplaying was different.
He was like I just want to playLost Minds of Fandelver.
(43:35):
I want something simple.
I feel like every campaign Iplay is made for people that
have done it all and seen it all.
Like I just want like a verystraightforward experience.
I was like, okay, that'sinteresting.
And there was a couple you know, a husband and wife, and she
(43:58):
had kind of like grown upplaying D&D second edition with
her family, and she brought herhusband into the hobby.
I thought that was super cool,because I hear the reverse of
that all the time.
Speaker 1 (44:11):
Right, right, that's awesome.
Speaker 2 (44:15):
So that was, you know .
It made me realize I had thispreexisting you know.
Note that.
I hadn't really even thoughtabout.
But I was like oh yeah, that'scool and you know they wanted
characters that knew each otherand like came from a similar
place and background.
So that was important to them.
(44:37):
And so, yeah, I mean I startedout with, like why do you want
to play D&D?
Like you're the person, andthen from there went into those
two questions that I asked, likewhat would cause you to risk
your life or something and whatwould cause you to be loyal to a
(44:58):
group of other people you know,basically a group of strangers,
or you can know them in yourpast and that sort of thing.
So I teed it up like that forthem and got a sense of the
character arcs that I believewould have been fulfilling for
(45:19):
the players and overwhelminglyit was about self discovery.
It was like the motivatingfactor for people Like wanting
to you know.
So one of the guys that wascurrently doing a lot of improv,
(45:40):
she wanted, like she wasdrawing actually inspiration
from Ariel the little mermaid assomeone that just wanted to
like get out from a shelteredkind of experience and like see
what else is out there in theworld and having that be like
such a huge draw that you knowyou would actually, you know,
risk your life to do that, tolike experience, you know, a
(46:05):
whole new world.
And I thought that wasinteresting because I would have
never made a character likethat, with a motivation like
that.
But then I was thinking aboutit like, oh yeah, ariel the
little mermaid, she like goes toa pretty sketchy sea, which
just like you know, see, youknow part of the world that was
(46:32):
previously inaccessible to her.
So that was, I think, laid outand, as a result, you know,
we're all you know, we're stillplaying this campaign.
We've got, you know, this groupof people that are three years
on still adventuring andactually like not even that far
(46:56):
along after three years, I thinklike the party's level eight.
All right, that's.
Speaker 1 (47:02):
After three years that's got to be quite an
adventure to not know, I wouldlove to thought like level eight
is what just your just yoursecond ability score increase.
So interesting yeah.
Speaker 2 (47:21):
And you know to think that we started off on the
intro campaign, lost months ofhand over the original one, not
the new one.
Right.
Speaker 1 (47:32):
And that's how I started.
I started on lost minds and Istill love it.
Speaker 2 (47:38):
It's supposed to be a five session adventure, which
is like Is it really?
People get through that and noone gets through it in five
sessions.
But, like, like in the book, itactually says like oh yeah, you
know you should be able toaccomplish each of the five
chapters of one session, eachLike with you, like playing with
the, you know anyway.
(47:59):
Right.
So we played it particularlyslowly and you know they want to
beat path and completely offthe rails and we're doing their
own thing and really identifying, or you know, finding
themselves and who they werethrough that play.
And it was, yeah, as a, as a DM, that that's.
(48:24):
I mean, I've DMed a number ofgames in my usual group, with
the people that I play with inperson.
They're such power gamers,every single one of them.
Yeah, to be honest, as, as I'm,I have to like, fight the urge,
like you know, like, like I'vegot, like you know I must, you
know, have eight intelligenceand 20 strength and I have to,
(48:44):
like you know, tone it back andand not, you know, make such
cookie cutter characters.
But you know this group ofpeople.
Most of them were so new to DWell, half of them were so new
to D and D that you hadcharacters like a fighter that
somehow managed to have, like 13AC as, like you know, a level
(49:09):
four or five character.
Like how do you create afighter that's so easy to hit?
Oh, my goodness.
But yeah, this this guy did andand what you know it was this
super fun character and likejust looking at the stats and
things of all of them is likehorribly unoptimized and yet
this group it's been the mostlike, enjoyable and fulfilling
(49:32):
D&D game I've ever played.
Because the stats, that's notwhere their attention was.
Right.
You know their attention werewhat was in like their
backstories and their story arcsand how it would change over
time and the role playing moment.
So I knew this group was specialwhen they were just traveling
(49:54):
along the road and you know,from point A to point B and you
know I just put up a screen oflike a campfire you know
crackling sound of a kind of acampfire going as they made camp
for the night and they were alljust sitting around the
(50:14):
campfire just talking to eachother and character and I was
doing nothing.
I was just sitting there likelistening to them, like recount
the day and like what they werehoping to do.
When you know, when theyreached never winter and and you
know, talking about this funnymerchant that they had like ran
into the day earlier on the roadand like and they're just, you
(50:36):
know, like building off eachother and like the more
comfortable one player got with,you know role playing, the more
comfortable everyone got Right.
And I think, like this, thisvirtuous cycle is really cool
and, as a DM, just a veryrewarding experience.
Speaker 1 (50:54):
That's fantastic.
I think you said something I'mtrying to remember.
I was just listening to whatyou were saying so I lost my
train of thought.
You know, I think it's reallyinteresting how, how the back
story is really.
(51:14):
I think it drives a lot of therole play, like you said, really
really well, because that's Imean we talked about.
We've talked about a bunch ofthe races, classes, et cetera,
you know, and all that's kind ofpre-built, like you can play
(51:38):
opposite a class or race orthings like that, but a lot of
that's already kind of set instone, so to speak.
But really the back story iswhere you get to to put the meat
on the bones that D&D hascreated, and I think you know
it's.
I liked what you were sayingabout the players not optimizing
(52:02):
the stats, because you canreally create some interesting,
very interesting interactionsfor your character by not
necessarily optimizing them.
You know, you can imagine afighter with 13 AC.
He goes into the fight, he'sgetting hit every time, but you
(52:25):
know he may be, it may be justbecause he's slow, but you know,
but he's still gonna go inthere and fight and then stand
beside his party.
So there's some reallyinteresting ways you can
definitely play that, so I lovethat.
Yeah thank you, it's.
I never think about thatbecause it's after you've played
(52:48):
a while.
You know, I think you're justlike you said.
I think you fall into that trapof trying to optimize your
character and really make themstrong and everything like that,
but you forget about kind ofthe early days and how you
really didn't understand a lotof those concepts and you just
had you almost had more fun withit then than you do now.
Speaker 2 (53:08):
Yeah, yeah, it's, you know you can over complicate
things, for sure, and it canactually take away from the
experience, right, but you know,it's obviously there's no one
right way to play D&D.
But one thing that I think isgenerally true is when players
(53:33):
spend time and care on theirbackstory, it shows DMs
appreciate it and it makes theDM wanna do the same.
You know, it makes them wannareciprocate.
And so, okay, you created acharacter with this awesome
backstory and, oh right, yeah,you're a fighter with 13 armor
(53:55):
class but, like, let me playinto this and some of the stuff
that you've written and let medesign a game session that's
just all for your character andwill like create something in
game that will actually make youlike stay conscious during the
(54:16):
combat encounters.
Yeah, right, because the DMwants everyone to have fun and
it's no fun to like just be apunching bag, you know, in a
combat encounter.
And so what that means is thatthe DM is going to balance the
strengths of the characters out.
You know, I think people forgetthat a DM can, you know, create
(54:40):
an item that you find thatincreases your armor class?
Sure, they can, you know,create an experience that
happens to your character thatchanges their abilities, so you
can make an unoptimizedcharacter and that character
could become the most powerfulcharacter at the table just
through story and customizationthat the DM does.
(55:03):
So it can feel, I think, as aplayer, a little risky to do
that.
Like it feels like a little bitof a leap of faith, like how do
I know, if I create this likehorribly unoptimized character
that is unoptimized for a reason, because of this interesting
(55:25):
backstory, how do I know thatthe DM is going to like
compensate for that to make sureI'm having fun, because it's
then fundamentally out of yourcontrol.
But that's part of the game,that's part of the experience.
It's not a one player game youknow, for sure, for sure.
Speaker 1 (55:46):
So I know we're running out of time here, so let
me ask you this question tokind of wrap up here.
So are there any resources ortools that you would recommend
for both DMs and players who arelooking to trying to?
Maybe they've already createdsome backstories for characters
(56:07):
and maybe they're looking toenhance their abilities, you
know, are there any tools orresources out there that you use
or have used that might be ofvalue to to others trying to
write up a backstory for theircharacter?
Speaker 2 (56:23):
I mean, the first thing that comes to mind is
probably going to be apolarizing answer, depending on
kind of what your stance is on,like chat GPT specifically,
generative AI generally but ifyou are comfortable using a tool
(56:45):
like that, if you believe that,like anything, there are bad
people that use tools to do badstuff and there are good people
that use that same tool to, like, do good stuff or harmless
stuff, then you could considerusing a service like chat GPT as
a thought partner you know abrainstorming buddy, just you
(57:05):
know.
Yeah, here's what I'm thinkingfor my character.
Give me 10 ideas that you knowwould help me flesh this out, or
you know that sort of thing.
I think it's what you don'twant to do is just have
something, or someone elsecreate something entirely for
you.
But I do think that tools likechat, gpt or any other large
(57:32):
language model can help get youunstuck and then, if you know,
if you don't want to use thetool.
The other thing is to like riffwith a friend.
You know someone else at thetable like do the same thing,
but you know, brainstorm with ahuman instead of you know, an AI
(57:54):
chat bot.
So I, you know, I wouldrecommend, you know, using that
if you're comfortable doing so,like if you don't have, probably
.
You know, there's a lot ofpeople that have very well
thought out reasons for beingkind of philosophically opposed
to the stuff, and that's awesome.
(58:15):
Yeah, I have a ton of respectfor people that have different
points of views than I have, andespecially people who take a
principled stance on a point ofview.
But if that's not you and youknow you've thought it through
and you do believe that thesetools are, like, worth using, or
(58:38):
there's not a kind of an issuein how you would intend to use
them, and I think they're agreat resource, you know,
absolutely a great resource.
There are a bunch of servicesout there that offer like tables
that you can use.
(58:58):
Roll a dice, get an idea.
Mm-hmm yep, those are created byhumans.
Probably too many to list.
Don John, I think, is a commonresource that people use.
Yeah, I met this guy, you know,we met on threads.
There's somebody else I met onthreads, I think it's handle is
(59:20):
Dungeon Glitch and he's got asite that's got some tables.
I wanna say All right, cool.
But yeah, to be honest, like Iuse chat, gpt, but I know
there's a lot of great tools outthere that, like you know,
offer that same sort of thing,but without the AI.
Speaker 1 (59:41):
I would even say, you know, for book lovers, comic
book readers, you know, take alook at there.
You know a lot of thesebackstories are very common
archetypes of you.
Look at the, you look at Batman, you look at Lion King, the
parents who die in thebackground and they run off and
(01:00:03):
kind of find themselves and comeback to be the you know the
hero and save the day.
You know these are a lot of thevery common stories that you
can take those same backgroundsand use that same kind of
concept for your own character.
Like I, one of my characterswas a Tabaxi monk who I based
(01:00:25):
off of kind of the backstory ofDaredevil and he was a blind
monk, so he had the martial artsabilities he couldn't see.
So he had that same kind ofstory as Daredevil did, but it
became my own character.
You know, after that that wasjust a jumping off point to get
started.
So there's all sorts of great,great backgrounds in literature
(01:00:49):
and things that you can use inhistory.
I'm another user of chat GPTjust for generating ideas at
volume.
You know it can be reallyhelpful to see something that
might spark your interest andyou use that as a jumping off
point.
So there's a lot of tools.
(01:01:11):
You have the tables that youmentioned.
You know you roll and you cancome up with all sorts of random
ideas for your character.
So there are lots of tools andlots of ways to be inspired for
those backstories.
So I think that's a great thingto remember, don't?
There's nothing that's gonnalimit you, don't?
(01:01:31):
You don't have to be, itdoesn't have to be 100% original
.
You know that's it's hard toit's hard to be 100% original
these days.
So think about what you love,especially if this is your first
character.
Think about a story that youlove and maybe pick up from
someone's backstory there andmake it your own.
(01:01:52):
So there are tons, of tons ofoptions out there for, I think,
for for getting inspiration forwriting your character's
backstory.
Yeah so, coralyn, thank you.
Thank you so much for for beingon the podcast today.
Are there?
Speaker 2 (01:02:10):
do you have any any parting words or anything else
you would like to share with ouraudience before we, before we
wrap up, Well, I mean, first andforemost, I wanna thank you for
having me on your show and justlet you know this was a blast
for me, like what a fun way tospend an hour just talking about
this hobby that you know bothyou and I enjoy.
(01:02:30):
You know parting thoughts not,you know not really If.
If I'm I'm on the internet atTull Tavern, mainly active on on
threads, and I love meeting newpeople and talking to folks and
all of us out here in the TTRPGcreator space we're real humans
(01:02:53):
, like.
We're not like companies, andyou know we talk to people and
like talking to people and Iknow a lot of us are introverts
but I know personally that whatare you talking about?
Yeah, I mean I'm I'm a prettyshy person myself, but what I've
found since kind of getting alittle bit deeper into the scene
(01:03:14):
here is that people are awesomeand and cool and nice and
generally like connecting.
It's not like, it's not animposition, you know, to just
like reach out and say hi andask questions like a
conversation.
So I don't know, I guess I feellike I'm giving advice to
(01:03:36):
myself not, not to anyone else.
But yeah, that's all right.
It's been really cool meeting alot of new people in the TTRPG
space and it's just you knowwhat a beautiful, diverse,
vibrant, interesting, smart,kind group of people, and so
that's probably the biggestbenefit of getting into like a
(01:03:59):
TTRPG, like Dope and.
Dragons is you get to meetawesome people.
Yep, you know, I'll leave it atthat.
Speaker 1 (01:04:08):
Excellent, great, great, great note to end on
Cortland.
Thank you again so much.
I appreciate you being heretoday and for sharing your
expertise.
And tall, it was atalltaverncom, correct.
Speaker 2 (01:04:20):
Talltaverncom.
Yeah, you got it and it was ablast, thank you.
Speaker 1 (01:04:24):
Awesome, thank you.
Welcome back to everyone to the Legends, loot
and Lore podcast.
Today's episode features ourguest, cortland Goldengate, and
we are going to talk about allthings character backstory.
So that's going to be today'sepisode really diving into what
makes a great backstory and whatthings you should think about
(00:29):
how to go through that wholeprocess, because when Joe
returns from Fall Soccer, we aregoing to create some of our
first characters.
So really, backstory is reallywhere you're going to get to use
your imagination.
So that's what we're going totalk about today.
(00:50):
But, cortland, please introduceyourself for all of our
listeners and tell us a littlebit about yourself.
Awesome.
Speaker 2 (00:59):
Thank you, Andrew.
So yeah, as Andrew said, myname is Cortland and I don't
know what there is to say.
I love TTRPGs.
I've been playing them prettyheavily for maybe five years now
, but I'm one of those guys thathad the books when I was
younger and was very intoreading them and reading all
(01:22):
about the pantheons and theitems and the monsters.
But, then never really gotaround to playing or tried to
play in junior high, maybe inhigh school, but not doing it
right.
Not that there's a wrong way toplay these games, but it can be
intimidating with hundreds ofpages of rules and all the
(01:43):
coordination and all of that.
So I would say I've been intofantasy and role-playing games
my entire life, but only reallywith fifth edition have I very
much gotten into playing andacting as a game master.
Outside of that, I enjoy thishobby so much that I actually
(02:06):
recently left my boring oldcorporate enterprise job to
start my own company.
So I've been working in thespace of software developer
tools, data science, machinelearning and software for these
(02:26):
people, and that's all well andgood.
But what I really most wantedto do is get deep into the
community of people that sharethe same sort of hobbies that I
have, and so I'm now currentlytrying to blend my hobbies and
my out-of-work interests with myactual work and as a result, I
(02:53):
am building software called TallTavern.
It's TallTaberncom and it'ssoftware to record, transcribe
and then summarize your tabletoprole-playing game sessions so
that you can have history ofyour campaign.
Thank you, yeah, it's one ofthose things where I take a lot
(03:15):
of notes, but sometimes I justfall off doing that and it takes
a lot of work to keep a recordof that, and so it's just one of
those things where I'm buildingsomething that I want and I
hope that it's something thatcan bring other people joy as
well, and we'll see.
So the app is actually going.
(03:38):
The beta test, the first roundof beta testers, is starting
tomorrow.
Awesome, I'm really excited toget some real feedback on it.
Speaker 1 (03:47):
So let's dive into this a little bit more, so give
us some more detail about whatthe app actually does.
Is this an iOS, Android-basedapp, or is this a computer-based
, like web-based app?
What's the actual process?
Speaker 2 (04:04):
It's a web app and so it runs great on mobile, but
it's not like an iPhone app oranything like that.
So you can just run it off abrowser or off a mobile device
or tablet, whatever you want.
And it's very simple andstraightforward.
You just create a campaign.
You can have whatever number ofcampaigns you want, and then
each time you sit down for agame session you just click Add
(04:26):
Session and click a button andit starts recording and it will
then take that audio recordingand transcribe all the text to
it, so you have a history of allthe text.
But then I think maybe the moreinteresting thing is that it
then allows you to summarizethat.
So if you want to have ajournal, basically as a player
(04:50):
in a TTRPG campaign, you canhave that without distracting
yourself during the game andjust focusing on the people
there and focusing on the gamerather than jotting down notes
the whole time.
And then, as a Game Master, youcan take those summaries and
then, without any effort really,you can do the post-session
(05:11):
recap.
So if you play weekly orbi-weekly or monthly, it's
really easy to say, hey, as areminder, here's what happened
last session, because we justgot that summary ready to go
already.
Speaker 1 (05:24):
That is super cool For me, I know, as both a player
and a DM.
Note-taking is not one of mystrong suits, so I have to
really work to get better atnote-taking and I play now in
(05:44):
three separate campaigns One.
I've gotten much, much betterin the newer ones as I go along
taking detailed notes I reallylike in the one campaign that I
play, the DM basically haseverybody write a summary of
that's night activities based ontheir perspective, so you get
(06:06):
to see everybody's perspectiveof the same type of events from
their character's perspective.
So that one's reallyinteresting as well.
So I'm a huge proponent ofanything that makes that process
easier, to share thatinformation out, because not
everybody is a note-taker.
(06:26):
It just helps for recollectionas to all sorts of things what
loot you got, who said what,just trying to keep track and,
depending on sometimes it may beweeks in between your gameplay
sessions.
So it's a nice healthy reminderto oh yeah, that's what
(06:48):
happened three weeks ago thelast time we were able to play.
So that's really cool.
I can't wait to see it and tryit out.
Speaker 2 (06:57):
And we will definitely link in the show
notes for everybody.
And what was the URL?
Again, talltavroncom.
Speaker 1 (07:03):
TallTavroncom Excellent.
So we will definitely have thatin the show notes so everybody
can go there and check it out.
So tell me a little bit aboutyour background.
So you really got into playingwhen 5e came out.
(07:23):
So do you remember the firstcharacter you created in 5e?
Speaker 2 (07:32):
I do, I do.
I don't remember thischaracter's name and that's
probably an indication that thischaracter wasn't that
interesting.
It was just a stat block.
It wasn't a character, it was awarlock that had a dexterity
(07:56):
based weapon.
There was no backstory, wedidn't do a session zero and it
was still fun to play.
I think I had kind of a greatold one back, so I was very
excited about having mycharacter be like drawing upon
(08:18):
some of the stuff from theCthulhu mythos and I had it in
my mind, the idea that mycharacter would grapple with
growing mental health challengesand insanity setting in from
his connection to the alienentity.
I think it was interesting inmy mind, but really more of a
(08:47):
learning experience actually inwhat not to do.
Okay, yeah.
So it was a fun idea, I thinkin my mind and then in practice
it was a kind of a chaoticcharacter behaving irrationally
at some times that got in theway of what the rest of the
(09:09):
party wanted to do, as thecharacter was like grappling
with insanity.
And I think the thing that Ireally didn't consider is that a
good backstory isn't just aboutyou.
A good backstory is a backstorythat enhances the enjoyability
(09:31):
of everyone at the table thegame master, the other players
and yourself.
Speaker 1 (09:38):
So that will lead me into my first question for you.
So what really makes acompelling backstory that's
engaging for both the player,the campaign, the rest of the
party and even the DM.
So what really makes that acompelling character?
Speaker 2 (10:01):
as far as the backstory is concerned, Well, I
mean, the first thing you got toget right is you need to
min-max all your stats.
You need to go online and doyour crafty character out to
level 20.
Don't worry about any of that,and, in fact, creating a
powerful character can be a lotof fun, but it's actually really
(10:26):
limiting in a lot of ways ifyou want to create an
interesting character, becauseeveryone generally wants to
create a powerful character, andso there are certain types of
characters that are just morepowerful than others, and those
are the most common ones.
And I find that what peoplereally enjoy is creating a
(10:47):
character that feels unique tothem, where it's a character
where the player gets to act asthe author of that character, or
that character can be used toexplore an aspect of the
player's identity, and both ofthose can be interesting,
(11:10):
because you're drawing on realhuman characteristics to try and
make your character relatablebut also unique.
So it's a balance between thosetwo things, I think, where you
want to make a character that'sdifferent and interesting
(11:32):
because of the fact that they'redifferent, but that has enough
about them that can be connectedto, so that the other people at
the table feel like this issomeone that they want to get to
know someone that they mighthave things in common with and
someone that's different enoughthat makes them want to spend
(11:53):
the time to figure out what theyhave in common with that
character.
I think that it helps to thinkabout the personality that your
character has and then workbackwards to think about their
history that would have led themto have the kind of personality
(12:17):
that they have, or do thereverse Think about their
history and how that wouldimpact their personality.
Did you grow up in a very safeenvironment where the authority
figures in your life werecharacters that brought safety
and comfort and were reliable?
(12:38):
As a result, do you generallytrust authority?
Or maybe it was the reverse?
Maybe your first inclination isto be distrustful, to be
skeptical?
What would cause you to havethose kind of characteristics?
I think you can start in eitherdirection, but it's important
(12:59):
to connect the past to thepresent.
Speaker 1 (13:04):
That's a really good point, I think.
In my own character creation Ithink I've really tried to
understand who that I alwaysstart with the present.
Who are they?
Who are they now?
Then I go back where I'm, thetype that I'll start with this
(13:24):
is who I want to be.
Now I'm like, okay, well, whatmade him that way or made her
that way?
What made them that way?
That's typically the attackI've taken when drawing up a
backstory for a character.
It's interesting going all theway back to say, well, what
(13:44):
happened to them?
First, let's talk about theirpast, and what kind of character
does that morph them into today?
That's an interesting vantagepoint from character creation.
Speaker 2 (14:00):
If you want to go that less common route that
started with what happened in mypast to then figure out who am
I today, that can be good.
If you don't know exactly whoyou want to be when you have a
character I know a lot of thepeople that listen to your
podcast are newer to the hobbythat might be an interesting
(14:21):
thing to try.
If you're not really sure whatkind of character you want to be
, you could even do things likeroll on a table to have life
experiences that took place andthen think about how would that
life experience affect who I amtoday.
You could use some tools toeffectively get through writer's
(14:44):
block or that feeling ofstaring at an empty page and not
knowing where to start.
Speaker 1 (14:52):
You're taking a look at it from a different angle is
definitely a good way to curethe writer's block of trying to
figure out who am I say.
Well, where did I start from, Ithink of?
The first thing that pops intomy head is the backstory for
(15:14):
Bruce Wayne, batman, and thetragedy that happened in his
young life.
You could go either way.
That could become the beginningof your villain arc, or that
could become how you become thehero.
(15:35):
You could really take it bothways.
It's really an interestingstarting point to go from the
past.
And where does it lead Fromthere?
It could be anywhere.
It's a fun adventure.
Trying to figure all that out.
Tell me this.
(15:56):
Let me ask this question Canyou think of an example of a
character backstory of all thecharacters that you've played or
someone that has been at yourtable that you've DMed?
What's a memorable backstorythat has left an impact or left
(16:19):
a mark on your memory of all thetables you've been a part of?
Speaker 2 (16:28):
I think that it's good to have some amount of
backstory, but not have so muchthat it takes center stage.
It's called a backstory for areason the coolest parts of your
character and their storyshould take place and should
(16:51):
emerge through gameplay.
But it is important because itgives you a way to react and to
build your character and theirstory, because it gives you an
idea of how you would react tothe situations that the Game
Master is going to throw at you.
(17:14):
Let me answer your question.
To answer your question, acharacter that comes to mind for
me, I feel like I'd make a goodpolitician.
Speaker 1 (17:27):
That was a great political answer.
Speaker 2 (17:29):
That was an interesting question, a deep,
thoughtful answer that hasnothing to do with the question
itself.
Not at all.
That was a brilliant questionasked by a beautiful person.
Let me talk about somethingelse that I want to talk about.
There is a character that comesto mind for me.
This is a character whose nameI do remember.
(17:51):
That's immediately a good signversus a good character that I
created.
This character's name was AidanBroadmore, who was an arrogant,
selfish, condescending, vain,noble, not a good guy, not
someone that you'd want to hangout with, but who had a little
(18:15):
bit of a comedic air as well.
I thought it would beentertaining for the table to
have an unlikeable, arrogant butkind of comic relief character.
When creating this character'spersonality, I was actually
(18:37):
inspired by what's his name?
The military officer inFuturama, I can't remember his
name, the blonde guy and his gothis alien.
Speaker 1 (18:52):
Absolutely, I know who you're.
Now I'm going to have to lookit up because Zapp Branigan.
Speaker 2 (19:00):
There it is, zapp Branigan.
Speaker 1 (19:02):
Yes, Zapp Branigan.
Yes, exactly, I know he's sococky and just full of himself
and yep.
Speaker 2 (19:14):
Yeah, so just the idea of comedically repeating
what other people at the tablesaid, but more loudly and with
more gusto it was a fun littlequirk to add in there and the
(19:35):
thought I had about kind of hisbackstory in terms of like what
would cause that arrogance andobviously a life of privilege
like growing up with richparents being spoiled, having it
just be expected that you'd beleading in whatever situation
(19:55):
you're in and have it not evencross your mind that you
wouldn't.
This thought that there's acertain amount of predetermined
leadership capacity that peoplehad and you happen to be born
with it and other people happento not be, and just kind of like
sheltered, like not being in asituation that, not really
(20:19):
having ever faced any challengesand being pretty weak as a
result, not having kind ofadversity, to like build kind of
his own character.
And I thought that would be kindof a good way to tackle a
backstory, because during anadventure you encounter a whole
(20:41):
lot of adversity.
And so that was a sort ofbackstory that like
pre-programmed room for growth.
And yeah, I think that's partof what makes kind of a
character interesting ormemorable is that they're not
static, that they change overtime.
And so, like I remember, at thestart of the campaign, a giant
(21:06):
kind of like spider creature wasattacking the party and like
and not even a giant spider,like some sort of demonic
librarian spider creature inthis old decrepit library and
you know there was an NPC alongwith us and I just remember it
(21:31):
like the creature was coming into like stab at Aiden Broadmore
my character, one of its sharpkind of forelegs and my
character like grabbed an NPCand, like you know, block the
attack with the NPC to like savehis own skin.
Speaker 1 (21:51):
And so that makes sense.
Speaker 2 (21:54):
Decidedly unheroic, but then like also something to
reflect on, something to beashamed of.
As the story went on and Iobserved like the much more
heroic kind of characteristicsof this other group of people
and then started to like changemy mind over time and then like
see them do things for me that Iwouldn't do for anyone, like
(22:17):
rescue me, save my life, andthen just starting to over time
become less and less selfish,more and more open and kind and
like really bond with you knowhis newfound family of this, you
know the other people in theadventuring party?
Speaker 1 (22:38):
That's fantastic.
That is because, again, youcould play it either way.
You could play that thecharacter does grow and changes
and learns, or you could justplay that this is the way the
character is and the party kindof has to like.
(22:58):
What does the party do withthat?
So interesting I'm playing, I'mlooking forward to.
I started playing a tieflingwarlock.
I've been in one of thecampaigns and similar thing.
So my patron is an undeadEgyptian God and unbeknownst to
(23:25):
me.
The patron is trying to get meto raise an undead army to take
over the world and destroy theworld for them.
But I'm a little naive andunaware of what their goal
actually is.
I was more interested ingetting the power from the
(23:47):
patron, not so much interestedin the details of the contract.
So I'm going to.
I still haven't decided whichway it's going to play out.
Is he going to turn and say, no, this is not something that I'm
okay with.
I'm not going to help you raisean undead army.
(24:10):
Or is he going to say, well, Iwant to keep my power?
This is kind of what I have todo to keep my power.
So I'm curious to see how thecampaign plays out and what
choices my character makes.
But I've kind of put him inthis precarious kind of big life
(24:31):
decision of choosing good orevil and he's kind of chaotic,
neutral at the moment, so itcould go either way.
So I've never played thatbefore where the outcome is
undetermined.
Speaker 2 (24:49):
Awesome.
Well, as someone who likes tothink of himself as chaotic,
good in real life, I hope youchoose the light, my friend, and
the cool thing I like aboutyour story and that setup is
that there's a real cost behinddoing something good.
(25:09):
You have to give up.
You know potentially the sourceof your power, the source of
your kind of uniqueness and yourusefulness to the party and
your ability to potentially doother kind of good with that
power in order to really kind ofbreak with your patron there.
(25:31):
So I always think that you knowa value is only a value if you
do it when it's hard, and so ifyou make that kind of decision
with your character, that's areally kind of strong indication
of the character of yourcharacter.
Speaker 1 (25:51):
The character of the character, exactly.
Speaker 2 (25:53):
Yeah, yeah, I love that.
I'm rooting for your character.
Challenge the patron, take himdown.
Speaker 1 (26:04):
Yeah, I want to say it's.
I've been working with the DMon trying to figure out how that
all fits into the campaign, butwe'll see how it plays out.
I want to see.
I mean I think ultimately he'sgoing to choose right over wrong
and sacrifices power, but doesthat mean loss of life?
(26:25):
Does that mean you know whatdoes that mean?
So I'm very curious to see howit all plays out.
He's got something, the DM'sgot something in mind.
So that brings me to my nextquestion.
So how much collaborationshould there be with the Dungeon
Master when developing acharacter's backstory?
(26:46):
Like how much?
Because I mean you kind of wantto create a character that's
going to kind of fit thecampaign but still be something
of your own.
So to what extent should a DMbe involved in helping you craft
(27:06):
your character or help guideyou kind of to finding something
that's going to be a good fitfor the party, for the campaign,
et cetera?
Speaker 2 (27:18):
Well, as a you know Game Master or the Dungeon
Master myself, I think that theDM should proactively solicit
input from the players at thetable and involve them in
building the world, because it'seasy for a Dungeon Master to
(27:40):
get lost in the world thatthey're creating and think of it
as their world, their story,and that leads to, I think, the
single biggest killer of fun ina role-playing game, which is
this feeling like you're onrails.
Yes, you don't have real choiceor agency.
(28:01):
It's like, okay, the DM has gotan idea of where this is going.
I actually don't have anychoice.
It's like the train is headingthat way.
You know get on it or don't.
And then you know think abouthow the player feels about their
cool backstory that they spendall this time creating.
(28:24):
That's right.
Why does your backstory matterif you don't have any choice or
agency in the present?
You know.
So I think there are ways toavoid that, and I would say I
(28:44):
borrowed this idea from someonethat is a better Dungeon Master
than me, and there are plenty ofthose out there, and I think
people should generally juststeal good ideas whenever they
see them.
No one can hoard good ideas inour community, in this space and
hobby and the idea is to ask ofthe players at the table to
(29:10):
create parts of the world, givethem a little homework, create
an NPC that exists in this world.
Where does that NPC live?
How did you know that NPC?
Give them an item or have themcreate an item that comes from
the world but has no utility.
(29:31):
So I remember a character ofmine in a game that I was
playing from this DM that Ilearned this kind of thing from
had a miniature boat and abottle like a little kind of
like handcrafted miniature boatand a bottle.
So no use, no value.
It's not going to help incombat, it's not going to help
(29:54):
in social interaction.
There's literally like zeromechanical use for this thing,
except to force me to considerlike, where did I get this?
And in this particular game I'mplaying in the Dragon Lance
setting, which some people mayremember from Tracy Hicks and
(30:18):
Margaret Weiss' books I thinkI'm getting their names correct
but a lot of people read thosebooks back in the day the
dragons of blank season and soit acted as a start like a
thought starter.
It's like, well, okay, I gotthis tiny little boat crafted by
(30:39):
tiny little kinder hands, whichis like that setting's version
of the halfling Okay, well thenI was in Kendermore, okay, well,
if I was in Kendermore, might Ihave met this other player's
character at the table who's aKendr?
And so it acted as a seed fromwhich more story could grow.
(31:03):
So I think, yeah, dms shouldgive their players that
opportunity to like createsomething from the world.
Don't just hand them the worldlike involve them actively in
trading it and then from there,like encourage them to like
think about those sorts ofthings.
(31:23):
I also think that, like a protip for DMs is to have, like
players characters, know some ofthe other players characters,
because why would a group of youknow people risk their lives to
pursue some call to adventureand like stay with each other
(31:46):
versus any other loyalty thatthey might have to their family
or their kingdom or whateverelse, to their own sense of
safety and security?
And one way to do that is like,if you have a group of four
players at a table you have havelike one character, no, the
second character and the thirdcharacter, but not the fourth
(32:09):
character.
Okay then you can have, like thesecond character no, the first
character and the fourthcharacter, but not the third
character.
So everyone knows someone elseand everyone doesn't know
someone else.
And so there's some people thatyou're meeting for the first
time, other people where youhave some background in history
(32:30):
with, and then it not only likeavoids the pitfall for a player
and their characters backstory,to just be all about them and
only be interesting to them andnot the rest of the table.
It also opens up theopportunity to like introduce
people.
No, oh, you know, likecharacter character two, I know
(32:55):
you and I know character three,but I don't know character four.
You know character two.
Can you introduce me tocharacter four?
How did you?
You know, it just opens upopportunities for a dialogue.
So I, you know, I put a highdegree of responsibility on the
DM for that and to do thingsthat will involve you know
(33:22):
characters and their backstoryand its creation.
But there's more players outthere than there are DMs and it
certainly doesn't hurt to askand to be proactive right.
Or maybe you have a newer, anewer DM or a DM that hasn't
tried that particular trick.
(33:42):
I mean, you know in, why notask like, hey, you know, can I
create an NPC in the world?
I don't think any DM would saylike, no, get out of here, this
is mine, definitely not.
You know.
You know players that offer todo some of the work, to lift
some a load from a DM right.
(34:03):
I think the response that you'regoing to get 100% of the time
is like yes, absolutely, likeyou know.
Come on, let's.
Let's do this together.
Speaker 1 (34:13):
Yeah, that's, that's.
That's a great point.
Yeah, I think this topic hascome up with with other others
that I've interviewed on thepodcast about, yeah, railroading
, kind of railroading theplayers in one way, or giving
them a sandbox to play in, and Ithink having that that level of
(34:33):
autonomy and just and justbeing able to kind of choose
where, where you get to go,really, really, I think enhances
the game Even, even as if we'regoing back to talking about
backstory.
You know, why is there?
What's the purpose of abackstory If you're just going
to railroad them down theparticular path you know there's
no, there's no, there's verylittle point to it at that point
(34:57):
, I think.
So, so, by giving them thefreedom to choose where to go,
you know.
So, based on on their history,where do you feel your character
would, would go?
So that's a really good, areally good point to make.
Speaker 2 (35:16):
So maybe add one thing to that, which is that you
can go too far in the otherdirection.
You know, you can have a worldthat's so open that the players
just don't know what to do,don't feel like they have a
purpose, and so it is a trickybalance to, you know, allow
(35:41):
freedom and maybe there, maybethere is a path, maybe there is
a railroad and there is a kindof a central antagonist at the
end of the campaign, or you knowthat needs to be stopped,
whatever it is, but then you atleast have to allow for detours.
Speaker 1 (35:58):
Absolutely.
Yeah, I completely agree.
I think it's good to have athread that the story follows.
I always liken it to a chooseyour own adventure book.
You know there's a story,there's a plot, but there's
still room for you to make ityour own.
(36:20):
Yeah yeah, for sure I agree.
So I don't know about you, butI've seen this with some people.
I struggled with it the firsttime.
Again, people new to D&D,sometimes it's not, there's so
(36:44):
much to remember.
So there's all the rules,remembering the dice which dice
do I roll for this?
Which dice do I roll for that?
How much do I use for my weapon?
Oh wait, there's advantage andthose disadvantage.
You know inspiration, yada,yada, yada.
But it can sometimes, on theface of it, be a little
intimidating and overwhelming.
(37:05):
So, as far as creating thebackstory is concerned, what's
some advice you'd give tosomeone to maybe jump over that
hurdle when they're creatingtheir first character?
What's a good starting offpoint?
Maybe to again.
(37:28):
So we talked about eitherstarting back from kind of a
trigger point in their historyor how are they right now.
But what might you say tosomeone who's trying to kind of
come up with that backstory forthe first time for a new
character?
Speaker 2 (37:49):
I would say especially for D&D, which is
fairly combat heavy, likethere's not a lot of D&D games
out there where combat is aminimal or absent part of the
game.
And with that in mind, I thinka good place to start is to ask
yourself a couple of questions,the first one being why would I
(38:11):
risk my life?
What would I risk my life for?
And communicate that to the DM?
This is something thatmotivates my character and that
is important enough to mycharacter that they would risk
it all, risk losing their ownlife to advance, whatever that
(38:32):
thing is.
And there's a whole host ofmotivations for that, good ones
bad ones somewhere in between,and so answering that question
can be a good first step.
A second one, and at least asimportant, is asking yourself
(38:53):
the question what would lead meto be loyal to other people?
What would lead me to be loyalto the other people around the?
table what sort of person andpersonality?
Would my character need to haveto go to the mat for the other
(39:15):
characters at the table?
And if you answer those twoquestions and communicate that
to the DM, you should have acharacter that will heed the
call to adventure that they willinevitably get and that will
feel natural and true when youmake decisions to support the
(39:38):
other player characters at thetable.
And that's not just about youand your own thing, but it's
being a part of a found family,which is really, I think, what
these tabletop role-playinggames are all about Like.
Why are you spending all yourtime with these other weirdos
around?
The table, oh for sure.
(40:01):
It's because you care about themand care about them enough that
you choose them, over whateverbackground or circumstances that
you came from.
So, yeah, I think to me, keepit simple.
Just ask those two questionswhat would cause me to risk my
life for something, for a cause?
Who would I need to be to riskmy life for something, and who
(40:27):
would I need to be to haveunwavering loyalty to other
people?
What would need to be trueabout me and about them for that
?
And then just talk.
That's what a Session Zero isall about is crafting your
character and your backstory asa collaborative effort, not as
an individual author coming upwith a cool individual story.
Speaker 1 (40:52):
So let's talk a little bit about it, because we
haven't really yet touched onthis topic.
We've mentioned it severaltimes.
But let's talk about SessionZero and what that means for
what kind of what happens at thelike.
Let's talk about your tables,for example, that you DM.
(41:13):
So what are?
How do you weave in, how do youwelcome in new players into a
Session Zero to talk aboutbackstory and their character
development?
And how do you kind of blend,help blend that party together
so that when they're ready forthe first session together
(41:34):
they're a cohesive unit?
So how do you tie in all thosebackstories into an adventuring
party for a campaign?
Speaker 2 (41:45):
Yeah, I feel like I've done this with varying
degrees of success in games thatI've run, and even in some
recent ones I have not given.
You know, just to be honest,haven't given Session Zero its
proper time and attention andthen, like, really quickly
(42:07):
realized what a big mistake thatwas.
But I'm just going to talkabout the times when I did stuff
good and well rather than mymistakes.
So I remember kind of a groupthat I started with where I was
the DM and we've been playingsince the start of the pandemic.
(42:28):
This was an online game and it'syou know, it's still going you
know where, I think close tothree years on, something like
that.
It started out with a prettyinvolved Session Zero.
It was, you know, a lot of usgetting together.
We met online.
We didn't know each otherbeforehand and we're all kind of
(42:50):
just, you know, stuck at home,you know, sheltering in a place,
and part of it was just gettingto know these people, like
asking them like why they'reinterested in playing D&D to
begin with.
So you know, there was a guywho had never played before but
had, like, was a critter andwould watch and listen to a lot
(43:13):
of critical role and just reallydrawn to it.
You know, due to that, there was, you know, another person that
had played for decades and kneweverything about the game and
was a DM and his motivation forplaying was different.
He was like I just want to playLost Minds of Fandelver.
(43:35):
I want something simple.
I feel like every campaign Iplay is made for people that
have done it all and seen it all.
Like I just want like a verystraightforward experience.
I was like, okay, that'sinteresting.
And there was a couple you know, a husband and wife, and she
(43:58):
had kind of like grown upplaying D&D second edition with
her family, and she brought herhusband into the hobby.
I thought that was super cool,because I hear the reverse of
that all the time.
Speaker 1 (44:11):
Right, right, that's awesome.
Speaker 2 (44:15):
So that was, you know .
It made me realize I had thispreexisting you know.
Note that.
I hadn't really even thoughtabout.
But I was like oh yeah, that'scool and you know they wanted
characters that knew each otherand like came from a similar
place and background.
So that was important to them.
(44:37):
And so, yeah, I mean I startedout with, like why do you want
to play D&D?
Like you're the person, andthen from there went into those
two questions that I asked, likewhat would cause you to risk
your life or something and whatwould cause you to be loyal to a
(44:58):
group of other people you know,basically a group of strangers,
or you can know them in yourpast and that sort of thing.
So I teed it up like that forthem and got a sense of the
character arcs that I believewould have been fulfilling for
(45:19):
the players and overwhelminglyit was about self discovery.
It was like the motivatingfactor for people Like wanting
to you know.
So one of the guys that wascurrently doing a lot of improv,
(45:40):
she wanted, like she wasdrawing actually inspiration
from Ariel the little mermaid assomeone that just wanted to
like get out from a shelteredkind of experience and like see
what else is out there in theworld and having that be like
such a huge draw that you knowyou would actually, you know,
risk your life to do that, tolike experience, you know, a
(46:05):
whole new world.
And I thought that wasinteresting because I would have
never made a character likethat, with a motivation like
that.
But then I was thinking aboutit like, oh yeah, ariel the
little mermaid, she like goes toa pretty sketchy sea, which
just like you know, see, youknow part of the world that was
(46:32):
previously inaccessible to her.
So that was, I think, laid outand, as a result, you know,
we're all you know, we're stillplaying this campaign.
We've got, you know, this groupof people that are three years
on still adventuring andactually like not even that far
(46:56):
along after three years, I thinklike the party's level eight.
All right, that's.
Speaker 1 (47:02):
After three years that's got to be quite an
adventure to not know, I wouldlove to thought like level eight
is what just your just yoursecond ability score increase.
So interesting yeah.
Speaker 2 (47:21):
And you know to think that we started off on the
intro campaign, lost months ofhand over the original one, not
the new one.
Right.
Speaker 1 (47:32):
And that's how I started.
I started on lost minds and Istill love it.
Speaker 2 (47:38):
It's supposed to be a five session adventure, which
is like Is it really?
People get through that and noone gets through it in five
sessions.
But, like, like in the book, itactually says like oh yeah, you
know you should be able toaccomplish each of the five
chapters of one session, eachLike with you, like playing with
the, you know anyway.
(47:59):
Right.
So we played it particularlyslowly and you know they want to
beat path and completely offthe rails and we're doing their
own thing and really identifying, or you know, finding
themselves and who they werethrough that play.
And it was, yeah, as a, as a DM, that that's.
(48:24):
I mean, I've DMed a number ofgames in my usual group, with
the people that I play with inperson.
They're such power gamers,every single one of them.
Yeah, to be honest, as, as I'm,I have to like, fight the urge,
like you know, like, like I'vegot, like you know I must, you
know, have eight intelligenceand 20 strength and I have to,
(48:44):
like you know, tone it back andand not, you know, make such
cookie cutter characters.
But you know this group ofpeople.
Most of them were so new to DWell, half of them were so new
to D and D that you hadcharacters like a fighter that
somehow managed to have, like 13AC as, like you know, a level
(49:09):
four or five character.
Like how do you create afighter that's so easy to hit?
Oh, my goodness.
But yeah, this this guy did andand what you know it was this
super fun character and likejust looking at the stats and
things of all of them is likehorribly unoptimized and yet
this group it's been the mostlike, enjoyable and fulfilling
(49:32):
D&D game I've ever played.
Because the stats, that's notwhere their attention was.
Right.
You know their attention werewhat was in like their
backstories and their story arcsand how it would change over
time and the role playing moment.
So I knew this group was specialwhen they were just traveling
(49:54):
along the road and you know,from point A to point B and you
know I just put up a screen oflike a campfire you know
crackling sound of a kind of acampfire going as they made camp
for the night and they were alljust sitting around the
(50:14):
campfire just talking to eachother and character and I was
doing nothing.
I was just sitting there likelistening to them, like recount
the day and like what they werehoping to do.
When you know, when theyreached never winter and and you
know, talking about this funnymerchant that they had like ran
into the day earlier on the roadand like and they're just, you
(50:36):
know, like building off eachother and like the more
comfortable one player got with,you know role playing, the more
comfortable everyone got Right.
And I think, like this, thisvirtuous cycle is really cool
and, as a DM, just a veryrewarding experience.
Speaker 1 (50:54):
That's fantastic.
I think you said something I'mtrying to remember.
I was just listening to whatyou were saying so I lost my
train of thought.
You know, I think it's reallyinteresting how, how the back
story is really.
(51:14):
I think it drives a lot of therole play, like you said, really
really well, because that's Imean we talked about.
We've talked about a bunch ofthe races, classes, et cetera,
you know, and all that's kind ofpre-built, like you can play
(51:38):
opposite a class or race orthings like that, but a lot of
that's already kind of set instone, so to speak.
But really the back story iswhere you get to to put the meat
on the bones that D&D hascreated, and I think you know
it's.
I liked what you were sayingabout the players not optimizing
(52:02):
the stats, because you canreally create some interesting,
very interesting interactionsfor your character by not
necessarily optimizing them.
You know, you can imagine afighter with 13 AC.
He goes into the fight, he'sgetting hit every time, but you
(52:25):
know he may be, it may be justbecause he's slow, but you know,
but he's still gonna go inthere and fight and then stand
beside his party.
So there's some reallyinteresting ways you can
definitely play that, so I lovethat.
Yeah thank you, it's.
I never think about thatbecause it's after you've played
(52:48):
a while.
You know, I think you're justlike you said.
I think you fall into that trapof trying to optimize your
character and really make themstrong and everything like that,
but you forget about kind ofthe early days and how you
really didn't understand a lotof those concepts and you just
had you almost had more fun withit then than you do now.
Speaker 2 (53:08):
Yeah, yeah, it's, you know you can over complicate
things, for sure, and it canactually take away from the
experience, right, but you know,it's obviously there's no one
right way to play D&D.
But one thing that I think isgenerally true is when players
(53:33):
spend time and care on theirbackstory, it shows DMs
appreciate it and it makes theDM wanna do the same.
You know, it makes them wannareciprocate.
And so, okay, you created acharacter with this awesome
backstory and, oh right, yeah,you're a fighter with 13 armor
(53:55):
class but, like, let me playinto this and some of the stuff
that you've written and let medesign a game session that's
just all for your character andwill like create something in
game that will actually make youlike stay conscious during the
(54:16):
combat encounters.
Yeah, right, because the DMwants everyone to have fun and
it's no fun to like just be apunching bag, you know, in a
combat encounter.
And so what that means is thatthe DM is going to balance the
strengths of the characters out.
You know, I think people forgetthat a DM can, you know, create
(54:40):
an item that you find thatincreases your armor class?
Sure, they can, you know,create an experience that
happens to your character thatchanges their abilities, so you
can make an unoptimizedcharacter and that character
could become the most powerfulcharacter at the table just
through story and customizationthat the DM does.
(55:03):
So it can feel, I think, as aplayer, a little risky to do
that.
Like it feels like a little bitof a leap of faith, like how do
I know, if I create this likehorribly unoptimized character
that is unoptimized for a reason, because of this interesting
(55:25):
backstory, how do I know thatthe DM is going to like
compensate for that to make sureI'm having fun, because it's
then fundamentally out of yourcontrol.
But that's part of the game,that's part of the experience.
It's not a one player game youknow, for sure, for sure.
Speaker 1 (55:46):
So I know we're running out of time here, so let
me ask you this question tokind of wrap up here.
So are there any resources ortools that you would recommend
for both DMs and players who arelooking to trying to?
Maybe they've already createdsome backstories for characters
(56:07):
and maybe they're looking toenhance their abilities, you
know, are there any tools orresources out there that you use
or have used that might be ofvalue to to others trying to
write up a backstory for theircharacter?
Speaker 2 (56:23):
I mean, the first thing that comes to mind is
probably going to be apolarizing answer, depending on
kind of what your stance is on,like chat GPT specifically,
generative AI generally but ifyou are comfortable using a tool
(56:45):
like that, if you believe that,like anything, there are bad
people that use tools to do badstuff and there are good people
that use that same tool to, like, do good stuff or harmless
stuff, then you could considerusing a service like chat GPT as
a thought partner you know abrainstorming buddy, just you
(57:05):
know.
Yeah, here's what I'm thinkingfor my character.
Give me 10 ideas that you knowwould help me flesh this out, or
you know that sort of thing.
I think it's what you don'twant to do is just have
something, or someone elsecreate something entirely for
you.
But I do think that tools likechat, gpt or any other large
(57:32):
language model can help get youunstuck and then, if you know,
if you don't want to use thetool.
The other thing is to like riffwith a friend.
You know someone else at thetable like do the same thing,
but you know, brainstorm with ahuman instead of you know, an AI
(57:54):
chat bot.
So I, you know, I wouldrecommend, you know, using that
if you're comfortable doing so,like if you don't have, probably
.
You know, there's a lot ofpeople that have very well
thought out reasons for beingkind of philosophically opposed
to the stuff, and that's awesome.
(58:15):
Yeah, I have a ton of respectfor people that have different
points of views than I have, andespecially people who take a
principled stance on a point ofview.
But if that's not you and youknow you've thought it through
and you do believe that thesetools are, like, worth using, or
(58:38):
there's not a kind of an issuein how you would intend to use
them, and I think they're agreat resource, you know,
absolutely a great resource.
There are a bunch of servicesout there that offer like tables
that you can use.
(58:58):
Roll a dice, get an idea.
Mm-hmm yep, those are created byhumans.
Probably too many to list.
Don John, I think, is a commonresource that people use.
Yeah, I met this guy, you know,we met on threads.
There's somebody else I met onthreads, I think it's handle is
(59:20):
Dungeon Glitch and he's got asite that's got some tables.
I wanna say All right, cool.
But yeah, to be honest, like Iuse chat, gpt, but I know
there's a lot of great tools outthere that, like you know,
offer that same sort of thing,but without the AI.
Speaker 1 (59:41):
I would even say, you know, for book lovers, comic
book readers, you know, take alook at there.
You know a lot of thesebackstories are very common
archetypes of you.
Look at the, you look at Batman, you look at Lion King, the
parents who die in thebackground and they run off and
(01:00:03):
kind of find themselves and comeback to be the you know the
hero and save the day.
You know these are a lot of thevery common stories that you
can take those same backgroundsand use that same kind of
concept for your own character.
Like I, one of my characterswas a Tabaxi monk who I based
(01:00:25):
off of kind of the backstory ofDaredevil and he was a blind
monk, so he had the martial artsabilities he couldn't see.
So he had that same kind ofstory as Daredevil did, but it
became my own character.
You know, after that that wasjust a jumping off point to get
started.
So there's all sorts of great,great backgrounds in literature
(01:00:49):
and things that you can use inhistory.
I'm another user of chat GPTjust for generating ideas at
volume.
You know it can be reallyhelpful to see something that
might spark your interest andyou use that as a jumping off
point.
So there's a lot of tools.
(01:01:11):
You have the tables that youmentioned.
You know you roll and you cancome up with all sorts of random
ideas for your character.
So there are lots of tools andlots of ways to be inspired for
those backstories.
So I think that's a great thingto remember, don't?
There's nothing that's gonnalimit you, don't?
(01:01:31):
You don't have to be, itdoesn't have to be 100% original
.
You know that's it's hard toit's hard to be 100% original
these days.
So think about what you love,especially if this is your first
character.
Think about a story that youlove and maybe pick up from
someone's backstory there andmake it your own.
(01:01:52):
So there are tons, of tons ofoptions out there for, I think,
for for getting inspiration forwriting your character's
backstory.
Yeah so, coralyn, thank you.
Thank you so much for for beingon the podcast today.
Are there?
Speaker 2 (01:02:10):
do you have any any parting words or anything else
you would like to share with ouraudience before we, before we
wrap up, Well, I mean, first andforemost, I wanna thank you for
having me on your show and justlet you know this was a blast
for me, like what a fun way tospend an hour just talking about
this hobby that you know bothyou and I enjoy.
(01:02:30):
You know parting thoughts not,you know not really If.
If I'm I'm on the internet atTull Tavern, mainly active on on
threads, and I love meeting newpeople and talking to folks and
all of us out here in the TTRPGcreator space we're real humans
(01:02:53):
, like.
We're not like companies, andyou know we talk to people and
like talking to people and Iknow a lot of us are introverts
but I know personally that whatare you talking about?
Yeah, I mean I'm I'm a prettyshy person myself, but what I've
found since kind of getting alittle bit deeper into the scene
(01:03:14):
here is that people are awesomeand and cool and nice and
generally like connecting.
It's not like, it's not animposition, you know, to just
like reach out and say hi andask questions like a
conversation.
So I don't know, I guess I feellike I'm giving advice to
(01:03:36):
myself not, not to anyone else.
But yeah, that's all right.
It's been really cool meeting alot of new people in the TTRPG
space and it's just you knowwhat a beautiful, diverse,
vibrant, interesting, smart,kind group of people, and so
that's probably the biggestbenefit of getting into like a
(01:03:59):
TTRPG, like Dope and.
Dragons is you get to meetawesome people.
Yep, you know, I'll leave it atthat.
Speaker 1 (01:04:08):
Excellent, great, great, great note to end on
Cortland.
Thank you again so much.
I appreciate you being heretoday and for sharing your
expertise.
And tall, it was atalltaverncom, correct.
Speaker 2 (01:04:20):
Talltaverncom.
Yeah, you got it and it was ablast, thank you.
Speaker 1 (01:04:24):
Awesome, thank you.
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