Character Backgrounds

Variety and flavor are important assets in any good fantasy roleplaying game. One main problem with some game systems is a lack for allowing a GM a great deal of development power. Earthdawn enables GMs to vary characters with numerous disciplines and talents.

Background material is the best tool for individualizing characters. Each player should have some idea of there characters history, from childhood to adulthood. The characters backgrounds will run the scope from being abandoned at birth to being a spoiled noble brat. Never knock down a players idea for his/her character background. If their history doesn't fit into your grand schemes of the campaign work with them until it suits both of you. Do not lord it over a player that you are THE GAMEMASTER! Very bad practice. Besides, all these ideas will present colorful variations in your campaign approach. Just remember a strong detailed background means a solid character foundation.

Now, if you are the type of person that is not quite imaginative then there are some materials that help. I personally like The Central Casting System by Taskforce Games for creating character backgrounds. You will not believe the type of things that can happen to a person in there lifetime. Just make sure you and the player agree on using that system to create their background. No sense in having a rich flavorful history rolled up and the player deems it "undesirable".

Personality: Players often interject their personality into their character, which I quite alright. Although, it is always nice to have them embody a totally different persona altogether. I emphasize roleplaying and PC/NPC interaction in my games. My players know that it is a story and not a contest of who has the biggest sword or who does the most damage! Most of the time you find that players fall into these categories:

The Combat Nut	The Copy Cat	The Game Expert	The Weekend Warrior
The Brain	The Personality Junky	The Professional	Romeo / Juliet
The Racketeer	The Showoff	The Target	The Buddy

Motivation: What are his/her objectives in the game? What makes them do what they do? Is it to amass countless riches and magic. Or is it to vanquish the evil that has spread throughout the lands? Whatever the character's motivation, it really helps to incorporate their background to help flesh this out.

Alignment: I never did like determining a character's alignment. It seems so restrictive to place a label upon ones philosophy and morals. But, I have found that this is sometimes a significant aspect of a character. But, I still don't LABEL the character as Lawful Good or Neutral Evil! I simply ask the players:

• What are their character's morals and philosophy?
• Does he respect order and law?
• Is she hedonistic?

These are just examples of what can become real complex, if you let them. Don't get caught up in it.

Earthdawn is a Registered Trademark of FASA Corporation. Original Earthdawn material Copyright 1994 by FASA Corporation. All Rights Reserved. Used without permission. Any use of FASA Corporation's copyrighted material or trademarks in this file should not be viewed as a challenge to those copyrights or trademarks.Except where otherwise noted, all other original material is Copyright 1997-99 by L.A. Pride, Bill Hayden, Josh Young, and Chris Brumley.