Backgrounds: Who Cares? You Should. Let’s Fix That.

What Are Backgrounds in D&D 5e?

Backgrounds as described in the Players Hand Book (PHB), “Reveal where you came from, how you became an adventurer, and your place in the world.” (Pg. 125) The PHB describes them as “Providing you with important story cues about your character’s identity”, but then it carries on with a short series of questions asking you to provide the meat and potatoes of your character as a player in relation to the world. They ask the player, “What changed? Why did you stop doing whatever your background describes and start adventuring? Where did you get the money to purchase your starting gear, or, if you come from a wealthy background, why don’t you have more money? How did you learn the skills of your class? What sets you apart from ordinary people who share your background?”  This section of the PHB is largely glossed over in my play experience.

In reality, backgrounds in D&D 5e boil down to a set of skill, tool, and language proficiencies, maybe an additional feature, some suggested characteristics, and some starting equipment in addition to your classes’ starting gear. I think with an additional table or two, backgrounds can turn from something unimportant and glossed over, to an important aspect of roleplay, character development, and mechanical function.

Why They Suck

The backgrounds listed within all of the official D&D content supplements and otherwise provide a myriad different flavors and concepts to pick from, but when it comes to game play and function other than statistical boosts, they lack severely on one front. Namely in the fact that they provide no concrete easy way to make your background important at all to the adventurer, Let’s take a look at the Entertainer background.

“You thrive in front of an audience. You know how to entrance them, entertain them, and even inspire them. Your poetics can stir the hearts of those who hear you, awakening grief or joy, laughter or anger. Your music raises their spirits or captures their sorrow. Your dance steps captivate, your humor cuts to the quick. Whatever techniques you use, your art is your life.”

Okay, now let’s take a look at how that shows up in the game world:

Skill Proficiencies: Acrobatics, Performance

Tool Proficiencies: Disguise Kit, one type of musical instrument

Equipment: A musical instrument (one of your choice), the favor of an admirer (love letter, lock of hair, or trinket), costume clothes, and a belt pouch containing 15 gp

Feature: By Popular Demand

You can always find a place to perform, usually in an inn or tavern but possibly with a circus, at a theater, or even in a noble’s court. At such a place, you receive free lodging and food of a modest or comfortable standard (depending on the quality of the establishment), as long as you perform each night. In addition, your performance makes you something of a local figure. When strangers recognize you in a town where you have performed, they typically take a liking to you.

Specialty: 

1. Actor
2. Dancer
3. Fire-eater
4. Jester
5. Juggler
6. Instrumentalist
7. Poet
8. Singer
9. Storyteller
10. Tumbler

They then give you some personality traits, ideals, bonds, and flaws to choose from.

We’ll pick Fire-Eater, Juggler, and Jester, for our Specialty, because I’m sure those will come up in play, how do these tie in? I have no idea, they don’t give you any examples of how it would.

So what do we get from this background, some fluff that will never come up, and some statistical bonuses. The Feature provides Free lodging at any location you perform at, that sounds interesting, but stops becoming useful after the first adventure when lodging and rations become irrelevant in cost in a typical campaign.

The constant implementation of more “interesting” and “specific” backgrounds isn’t the answer to making backgrounds more engaging, tie-ins and hooks are. And this shouldn’t be left entirely to the dungeon master and player to collaborate on outside of character creation, or in addition to character creation.

How We Fix It (Spoiler: Stealing Things)

Many different RPG systems provide these hooks directly in character creation, such as Cypher System, and Ten Candles. These systems can leave a lot to be desired as far as complex character conceptualization and have their own pitfalls (But they are absolutely wonderful, I recommend them 100%), but what they do give characters, is a direct link to party members and the world, and an easier way for the Game Master / Dungeon Master to drum up content. 

Cypher System

Within the Cypher system instead of only a brief blurb describing how your character acts and what gear they’re carrying, when you pick a Focus, (These are like classes in DnD, albeit more broad) The first thing a player chooses after reading the descriptive blurb, is a “Connection”. These connections provide you with 4 different options for a link that you have that connects you to other members of the party, typically 1 member will know a secret or have a direct link to your character that directly influences the way that you interface with that party member. These range from mechanical benefits to purely social role playing cues that always directly tie to your Focus. For example:

Abides In Stone: This focus basically makes you The Thing from the Fantastic Four. They have you choose from the 4 following connections.

Connections:

1. Pick one other PC. You were once convinced that he wanted to reduce you to rubble, but you have since grown to think what you believed wasn’t true, or at least no longer is so.
2. Pick one other PC. She roused you from a long period of inactivity, and you feel indebted to her for returning you (perhaps accidentally) to mobility
3. Pick one other PC. She knows the secret of your origin, but whenever she speaks of it, you forget it. Perhaps you suffer from a curse?
4. Pick one other PC. If you go berserk, you’ll never attack that character.

Here’s a link to Cypher System by Monte Cook Games

Ten Candles

Ten Candles handles background integration in an entirely different and more free-form manner that works really well. During character creation, every character at the table writes down a Virtue, and a Vice on an index card, they then pass these to another member at the table clockwise and counterclockwise. This forces the players at the table to know a little bit about their companions before the game even starts, having written their character traits for them.

The players then create concepts individually after the traits are passed, these are basically character identities, like “Cop” or “Dog” etc.

Players then each define a moment, essentially a scene that that player wants their character to play out, and these are discussed aloud at the table, once again fostering a connectedness and understanding of individual characters at the table. 

After this, players write a “Brink” basically a thing that describes what the character is capable of when pushed to their brink. These are then kept secret from the greater table, but you pass them once more, creating a secret link between you and one person at the table. You both know a terrible secret / thing about each other, and these are typically kept secret until they are revealed later, but players are free to confront each other etc.

This system turns character creation into party creation, where every character is interconnected, knows secrets, and has valuable role-play material to act on and react to before the game is even started.

Here’s a link to Ten Candles by Cavalry Games

Let’s make a table for some of the PHB Backgrounds

Ten Candles, and Cypher take backgrounds from an afterthought statistical boost, to an interconnected web of role-play cues and interest very easily, 5e’s bonds attempt to do this, but they tend to be vague, and the quality of the bonds vary wildly between backgrounds.

I’d argue that the 4 selections available in Cypher’s Focus offer more than each background blurb in the PHB of Dungeons and Dragons 5e, The backgrounds available for DnD as a concept are fine, and I think with an additional simple table to roll on, or selection to choose from, expanding on the content already within the PHB, we can make backgrounds more useful and impactful. So let’s do that. This additional table should contain connections that players can choose from on character selection, that specifically link with your specific game world and party.

Below are some example connections: 

1. Acolyte:
   1. My temple is in direct conflict with another temple, and I frequently receive contact about this other faction.
   2. You were a drunkard or otherwise lost to questionable practices until a party member plucked you out of the gutter and cleaned you up. You found your calling after that.
   3. You have a prayerbook of your faith, it was a gift given to you by a fellow Acolyte, the last page references a saint or passage you aren’t familiar with.
   4. I have confided with a party member that I have recently been shaken in my faith, after witnessing an atrocity or otherwise.
2. Charlatan
   1. You carry a few bottles of miracle cure, that you whipped up to swindle people, but the last person you gave it to was actually cured.
   2. I’m no longer allowed within the city limits of blank, not after they found me out.
   3. You once swindled another player character, you may or may not have been disguised at the time, that player decides whether they know it was you or not.
   4. You once spent way too long on a con, and now you have a stalker, they follow you endlessly, blind to your distaste, and your lies.
3. Criminal
   1. A player in the party inadvertently foils your actions, or atleast makes them more difficult. If this player is nearby, the DC for criminal activity increases by 5.
   2. My criminal contact is an important official in a large city.
   3. I once stole an object from a mark, and I got caught, I now work for officials
   4. I once got locked up for a crime, my old team has been quite successful since my going away.
4. Entertainer
   1. I have a contractual obligation to perform.
   2. Rumors have spread that a player character and I have a secret relationship.
   3. I’m convinced that my latest piece is priceless, I’ll do anything to have it sold.
   4. You have a groupie that follows you.
5. Folk Hero
   1. The way that I gained my heroic status wasn’t entirely my doing, and a party member knows.
   2. I owe my great feat to a powerful being, they expect something from me.
   3. My defining events problem was in fact, caused by me.
   4. I’m convinced that a party member is integral to my destiny.

The bonds in the PHB do some work at incorporating the character into the larger world, but having more integrated and clear cut examples of issues / connections that players and the DM can dig into allow for more streamlined play. Having hooks that specifically integrate with locations in your game world, characters and NPCs takes a vague idea, and translates it into something that can be acted upon more easily without tons of work. These types of connections can also give valid and understandable reasons for why a party of wildly different personalities and backgrounds have come together in the first place.

I would recommend creating a selection of connections that tie into your specific game world as a GM before the character creation process, or even during, you can brainstorm with your players, for possible hooks and links, while going over your particular campaign setting and world in session zero. Turn the hard work of tying backgrounds into the story into a collaborative world building experience with your players. The players in my campaign have enjoyed these deeper connections, and each of the players having small insights into one another allows for more smooth roleplay in session one.