Character Backgrounding

What separates a good background from a adequate one, and what makes a great background?

I see a background as needing to answer three questions when I make one. Does a background create a motivation, an intent, and a history (MIH for short).

Motivation - what the character wants for the future. These are the long-range wants/desires.

Intent – How is the character planning on getting what they want/need/desire. How does the character react when trying to get wht they want, or get what motivates them.

History – the character's own little biography.

We'll take a look at each of these in reverse order.

For me, history is the ground that everything else is built on/around. This is how the character grew up, what were his or her earliest influences in life. Was he raised by wolves, was her family already superheroes or supervillains, or was the background just vanilla-normal? Every little thing here has an influence.

Intent is, for me, the most difficult to explain. Intent is what the character wants at the time he or she is in-game. This often is NOT what motivates the character. As an example, when StarWyng faced off with Masonry, her intent was to KILL him. Nothing else. That was her intent. When Dead-Bang goaded Notion and Soldier Futura, his intent was to get into a fight with one of them. It is the short-term wants/needs that the character has in that moment, and how this helps the character get their motivation. With Dead-Bang, the intent to fight was also a way to defuse tensions, and thus in a way bond slightly so that he is not alone in trying to reach his motivation.

Motivation – the big nebulous drive. What the character wants or is trying to get. Dead-Bang's motivation is to find the man that killed his girlfriend and kill him with his bare hands. He may not act like that is anything he is thinking about, but it IS the filter that everything is touched by, for good or ill, as, for example, his intent described above.

So now that we have a cursory look at these, let's take a look at some histories.

Yellowjakket - “You don't need to know my name or my life. All you need to know is I will do anything to stop crime in my city.”

This is about the shortest one I ever wrote, and you can infer a lot from it. 1) the character is very defensive and secretive, 2) she says she is ready to do “anything”, which might mean she is willing to kill if the situation warrants. This also gives us a glimpse at her history. Something has made her this focused and secretive in her past. She very obviously is a loner. Her obvious motivation is in the last sentence – stop crime. So although short, it does give us a glimpse at her personality and motivation, and hints at some possible traumatic event that focused her on this path.

Here's another -

StarWyng - “I was thrown here long before I knew what I was or even where I was from. I wanted a friend, and the darkness answered with a light, and a kindly voice asked if I would allow her to join me. I said yes and we were born. I do not know my past, it is broken and beyond N'shta and myself to recover in whole, but pieces may be possible. I know.... I am an Aerian, I am a Protector, I am a Pathfinder. I was trained to protect any who could not protect themselves, and to find Nictus, hunt Nictus, stop them. I hate them beyond my understanding. I don't know why. Maybe a piece of my memory will someday tell me....”

This one missed being good I think, and is only an adequate background. It is nebulous, but there is no real feel for anything other than “I hate Nictus”. The Protector and Pathfinder do give clues as to what the motivation might be, but in all I think this one could be re-written much tighter than it is a present.

and finally, here's one that really works in my opinion.

Morrow Project – “Started by Thaddeus Orson Morrow, the Morrow Project was initiated in 2025. James Gunn was chosen as the lead member of the project, whose mission is to re-write history and to prevent the destruction of the United States by stopping the rapidly escalating gang problem. If he can reverse the fall of Paragon City to the Council, the history of the United States may be re-written, and a whole civilization may not have to suffer palgues, famine, and strife.”

This works because we see the history (the project, the military background), the Motivation (re-write history ) and there is a definite intent for each mission Morrow goes on – is this helping the mission as a whole. Are these effects ones that will change history? There is so much here I can't begin to give it all word space.

You don't have to start any particular place with this, I am saying that for me, a good background needs these three pieces well thought out. This for Role-Playing purposes. The better the background, the more 'real' the character becomes.

Pictures

StarWyng and Masonry got a little 'enthusiastic about re-decorating!

Oh no! I hope Kit isn't too mad that the workshop is messed up!

whoa!

There are nights when everything is fine, you have a good time with what you are doing, maybe a few rough spots but that's all right, you can deal with that. But when the evening falls into place with an audible 'click' and no matter what you seem to do works like it was pre-ordained, THAT is when the little mind-bugs come out and screw with you, because it is going so perfectly, and usually that is when it all goes to hell. Last night was one of those nights where you hear the 'click'. It was so real I could taste the tension, and the dust thrown up by the conflict.

The background to this conflict was set months ago, when Masonry wa joined with a legendary status peacebringer by the name of Lodestar, who had been on earth since the rise and unitifcation of Eqypt. Masonry had been given the choice of being killed or a chance to redeem himself by being bonded. He chose the latter. Lodestar was a passive rider, only occasionally stepping into the light when Masonry started to lose himself in his rage. But what Lodestar found, and Nathan did eventually, was that Lodestar could not truly control Masonry. As Masonry learned this his violent tendencies started to come back to the fore. He would go to the rogue isles, draw disaffected youth to him and go on a spree of destruction, and occasionally, murder.

Months prior to this, when Lodestar realized that Masonry could mentally lock him away, he made StarWyng, an aerian "Protector", promise to kill Masonry, and by default Lodestar, if he returned to his murderous ways. She reluctantly promised to do so. Masonry's forays to the isles increased in frequency until he came back one evening and was confronted by StarWyng, who smelled the blood on him and bluffed that she could smell the Rogue isles on him. Masonry believed her, and started to try and say why, and StarWyng attacked. The players took the conflict to the arena at this point, and played the fight out.

StarWyng and Masonry were in a literal fight-to-the-death-last-one-standing. Star was a level 41 peacebringer, Masonry a level 50 peacebringer. It could have been a wipeout, but Star had an ace up her sleeve, two actually that equalized the conflict. The first was her Flash/disorientation attack. That could make Mase drop toggles (I think) and leave him vulnerable for a few moments. he second was invisibility, which gave Star the advantage of when and how the fight would start.

The setup was a first to five wins with no time limit, which worked ultimately in Star's favor. The fight was very evenly matched, with the two characters going 4 to 4. The player running Maonry, however was magnificient. The range of emotions and patterns of dialog throughout the fight was Role-Play at it's finest and I feel very lucky to have been part of it. The vision of Masonry screaming "no more, don't kill me" as he was pounding the heck out of StarWyng was wonderful. It was like the player had channeled Clint Walker's character from the movie - "the Dirty Dozen" (I don't like to be PUSHED!) I got chills. Another player signed on and the two of us wanted the drama to continue, so we took it back to the SG base where the third character Hope's Fury, found the two fighting hard.

Hope's Fury took command of the situation, and listened to an accounting of what transpired. We all at this point thought that debris ( rubble and dirt pieces ) would make a good look to the base to show the damage. (It looked wonderful to me and I'll try to get pictures up) Both charcters were beaten, bruised and bloody from the fight. Hope's Fury heard the main story from Masonry while Star hovered in the hopes of finishing the fight permanently. Star got called away as things were quieting down and after Hope's Fury extracted a promise that Star would wait on pursuing the fight until after Masonry had been heard out by the others in the super-group.

Star was called back after the others came to the base and was informed that there would be NO repeat of the fight for ANY reason. (( I have to apologize here to the base architect, we put a lot of stuff in the base, and although we did not move anything or delete/change any placements, it was still screwing with the base without permission or prior statement of intent. Sorry about that Kit )) Star and Msonry were placed in charge of cleanup, and that is where it all rests, for now.

The RP of the others discovering the damage was a lot of fun to hear about. I didn't get a chance to see it except at the end where StarWyng made her appearance, but the little I got to participate in was a lot of fun! Notion, Kit, Soldier Futura, newcomer Margatti, and Keen Frost all helped to make it very memorable and fun! Thanks guys! I hope you all had fun with things like I did