5 Questions to Write a Better Backstory for Your D&D Character

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this is it of asked in a hushed whisper you wanted rebels these are the

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only ones i could you wanted the rebels these are the only ones i know

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of they've come here to talk to you and say something hurly responded tersely you

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sigh and step forward you look around the basement of the tavern only a few

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candles hang around the

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oh only a few candles give the room a gloomy cast you meet the eyes

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of each of the five people sitting on barrels in this dank cellar thank you

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for meeting me my companion here told me that you've had certain misgivings about the

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current regime of pauses to let the listeners absorb his words and we've come here

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to see that justice is done upon his cursed head are you going to lead

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us to march against the king are we going to fight says one burly woman

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loudly the others nod their heads and crack their knuckles your courage is to be

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in mine but we're here just to observe and strategize we don't want to take

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any undue risks as of yet now who is your leader o asks you mean

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burt he's a tactical genius he is great where is this but of masks oh

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he's in prison so what would you like to do every dungeons and dragons game

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starts with character creation and if you don't help your characters flash out a good

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back story your players will have a stale character they won't like much so today

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let's fix that welcome back to how to be a better d m i'm justin

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lewis and i'll be your host and d m today as you and i learned

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how to craft better stories oh yeah

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for yourself and your players as u d m sessions of dungeons and dragons today

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we will be talking about writing back stories but first housekeeping items as i said

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before we have our one shot in september coming up on september seventeenth all the

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slots for that are actually already filled up but if you want to watch the

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show you can go to better dungeon master dot com slash watch on september seventeenth

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at two o'clock mountain time to watch the whole one shot at the time of

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the game otherwise you can sign up for the october one shot with guest host

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bone daddy from this dungeon is occupied and as if right now as i record

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this episode we have exactly one slot left so you better sign soon and then

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after that we're going a open up slots for november's one shot i also want

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to give a special shout out to josh herman storfer h thank you so much

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josh for filling out the survey and giving us feedback on the show telling us

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how to be better hosts and give better content and what i'm talking about is

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actually josh went to better dungeon master dot com slash feedback and filled out a

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survey telling us how to make the show better so if you want to do

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that same thing go to better dungeon master dot um slash feedback fill out a

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quick survey all the answers are optional and just help us help you become the

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best dungeon master possible now let's talk about writing back stories as we've said before

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having your players flesh out their character at the beginning can help set them up

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for an incredible time playing dead

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playing dan d with you as their dungeon master one big part of flashing out

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their character is writing their back story and if there's one thing that any dungeon

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master is aware of its that their players rarely write their back stories and if

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they do they don't do it to the level that we want well no longer

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you see you as their d m will be to ask them these questions and

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help them generate the back story they need if you want you can even write

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down what they say and take that step from them you know just make sure

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to form it in these terms one last thing that i like to add before

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we get started

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yeah help your players write back stories that are equal to their level a level

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one character has only ever done level one things and lower that doesn't mean that

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they can't have an interesting back story instead what it does mean is that the

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impact of what they've done is generally very small and localized affecting mostly themselves and

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their family they've never saved the world and in most cases they may never have

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slain anything even for many yeah oh yeah for many level one characters causing death

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is something they learn to do after they start adventuring if a character is the

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exception then that should actually be a big part of their backs what they've done

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is generally small but the emotional impact is often huge so number one first thing

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to do is start out with parents one of the best ways to start your

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back story is by asking what were my characters parents like before the character was

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born see this question will inform your characters of story and help flash out some

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of the later questions i'm going to have you ask many of our lives as

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people are determined by who our parents were before were born where they decided to

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settle down oh where they decided to settle down if they did were your parents

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warriors were they scoundrels were they simple farmers why did they decide to have a

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child how did they regard you when they found out they were having a child

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what changes did they make did they shift their life away from what they were

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previously doing are they still doing what they were doing if not why did they

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stop let's do an example my characters parents used to run a library in a

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ver small town they were seen as the knowledge center of this town because the

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population was so small they also did some secret jobs for various adventures that came

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into town such as acquiring special spell components or herbs on a few occasions they

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put their lives at risk for these components but mostly it was just mondaine items

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that took time finding them in the forests and the like and when they found

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out that they had become pregnant they reasoned a small town could not pay them

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enough to allow a family of three to sist they then decided to move their

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library and book store to a much bigger city this caused a tremendous culture shock

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for the parents and eventually push them yeah yeah yeah yeah push them into poverty

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and then prompted them to seek out powerful friends and allies who could help offer

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protection although for a price you see how this simple question has led to a

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pretty interesting back story already and we don't even know who my character is yet

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number two is the childhood now you need to delve into your characters childhood there

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has long been a debate in the world of psychology of whether it's your nature

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in gens from your parents or your nurture what affected you after you were born

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that determines how you develop and now they're actually attributing your develop on both we've

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already discussed your nature some of your parents heritage so talking about your childhood is

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moving into the net your aspect and you need to ask questions like what was

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their childhood demeanor did they have siblings who were their best friends how did they

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treat authority figures and why what did they think about their parents what did they

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think about their environment when if at all was their innocence taken from them when

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did they learn about death did they have a favorite pet and these questions will

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actually just set the stage for them stop your back story and if you think

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about the back story is actually just a compendium of the coolest and most interesting

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stories of your character's life and in reality we all have interesting back stories we

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just need to kind of dig deep think about those interesting stories that might not

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be really long oh might not be really long but would instead be useful for

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instructing player the player on how to actually play the character they create so let's

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actually continue with my pre example in my previous character for simplicity let's call this

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character john john's parents always provided for him and his younger brother though there were

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times when john's parents would hide things from their children john would be inside and

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his parents would tell him to take his brother out to play and not come

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back until sundown and actually john remembers a specific time when he came home because

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his little brother had got a scrape on walked into the house and saw a

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group of people with strange white masks john's parents immediately got very angry and yelled

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at him to leave and from that time on john did everything he could to

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discover what his parents were up to he was convinced that it was because his

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parents were struggling financially that they were seeking the strange help so he also started

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looking for ways to some extra money and because of that he actually took jobs

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very early on and seemed to lose a lot of his innocence and childhood in

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the pursuit of providing for his family meanwhile john's little brother became somewhat neglected because

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john focused more on discovering secrets and making money and john's parents spent more and

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more time with this strange masked society and as they grew the two there's developed

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a challenging relationship john loved his little brother but his little brother seemed to fall

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in with the wrong crowd and not knowing what else to do john started tinkering

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inventing in hopes of eating something that he could sell that would allow him to

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spend more time at home with his brother and parents while making some more money

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and all the while he tried this it seemed that his family life fell apart

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number three why did they leave home let's think back to joseph campbell's hero's journey

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in every mythic hero's journey tale the hero is for to leave their place of

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comfort or they decide to yeah they are invited or forced out into a world

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beyond their comprehension and shown things they do not understand they also start to explore

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and adventure more and they start to see the world for what it truly is

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this is when their innocence truly leaves them because they have to leave their old

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self behind and really forge themselves anew here you're going to be answering questions like

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how did they gain their abilities and actually we're going to talk about that a

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little more in the next step but did they have a mentor and if so

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who what forced them out into the world why haven't they returned home yet what

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discomforts were the most difficult for them to come to terms with and what are

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they afraid of now who or what did they leave behind and how if at

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all

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do they keep that relationship strong what are they running from or running to how

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do they feel about their home now that they're not there and what questions do

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they have that need answering you see with all these questions you're really starting to

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fill out your character and help yourself understand their decisions and how in the world

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they've landed where they are currently either section zero or session one and to be

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honest and god d m will help you write these and also give an opportunity

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to actually maybe play through some of these experiences the biggest point of this section

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of questions is to start to explain why the adventurer's life started hanging from normal

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to a life of adventuring now let's go back to my example with john during

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his adolescent years john spent lots of time creating inventions and then he started noticing

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that some of his inventions began disappearing one day he came home from a short

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walk to find his parents and the people in the strange white masks taking his

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inventions he tried to stop and amidst his struggle one of his inventions accidentally exploded

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the blast nearly killed john but set the rest of the house ablaze john searched

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the records for his parents and found his moth dead among the rubble he also

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found three of the strange people with the white masks dead as well feeling intense

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grief and shame for the death of his mother john decided he could face his

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brother or father so he decided deity john disappeared into the city and did what

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he could to survive he begged for food and even petitioned local machinists for some

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work he finally found a nome iron worker from the confederacy who took john in

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because he saw the prowess in the young inventor john learned various skills there and

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even got a glim of his mentor's process for smithing deep iron but unfortunately his

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past caught up to him one night the workshop where john stayed was assaulted by

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people in mysterious white masks john's no mentor was killed but not before giving john

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time to escape now john runs from the mysterious society with the white masks though

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john has spent years trying to understand who they are he has found little answer

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he has found few answers unbeknown to john his little brother has joined the white

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mask society and now seeks revenge upon john for the death of their mother

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i never thought i'd miss row of whispers to heap one yeah i suppose she

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was good for something peepmwhisters back in a very unconvincing tone yeah yeah i suppose

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she was good for something pam whispers back in a very unconvincing tone it's lucky

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huger has a very high tolerance for alcohol of matters i think he actually kissed

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protection from poison before starting his drinking game harley whispers the group sits at a

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table in one of the cities taverns in the city across the room sits huge

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here bellowing loudly and drinking with another man that man is one of the captains

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of the city's prison he is one of the captains with a key to the

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city his prison huger's job is to get the man blind drunk and then have

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one of the groups steal his key none of the group were particularly suited to

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thieving not like re was but you're just going to have to make do either

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way just keep an eye out for anything suspicious we don't need to of whispers

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and then cut off of whispers and then cuts off as he notices the captain

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of the city prison throw our right ho right into huger's jaw immediately that table

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erupt into a brawl guess we'll have to do this the not so sweak i

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guess we'll have to do this the not so sneaky way cogarisize as i gets

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up from the table and joins the fight number four gaining abilities one of the

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more important singular questions in writing a back story is how did they start to

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gain their abilities or discover their abilities each adventurer dungeons and dragons is on the

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path to becoming something special even level one heroes have started something amazing and the

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question to answer is how did they begin let's look in this for each class

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as a barbarian you need to explain where and how your character started learning how

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to fight you also need to explain the source from which they draw their rage

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as a bard you need to explain how they start to learn how to use

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music to access magic as a cleric you need to explain how your character is

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connected with divinity as an artificer you need to explain how your character started to

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learn how to tinker as a sorcerer you need to explain how your character discovered

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their latent magical abilities while as a wizard you need to explain how your character

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first interacted with magic and what drove them to learn it naturally as a warlock

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you need to explain how your character first connected with their patron as a rogue

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you need to explain how your character fell into the underworld of crime as a

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ranger you need to explain how your character learned the arts of survival and how

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you also learned certain aspects of magic as a monk you need to describe how

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your character started practicing the art of key and self discipline as a paladin you

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need to explain how your character both learned the art of weaponry and how they

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connected with divinity and lastly as a druid you need to explain how your character

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first connected with the magic of nature and why that impacted your character obviously these

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are all questions you need to answer about your characters abilities but they will get

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you started now let's go back to our example with john john met his nome

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inventor mentor while walking the streets trying to sell nicknacks the nomes saw that john

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had created various trinkets and thought teach the boy something new john became intensely interested

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in the nomes teachings and the nome found a willing pupil he brought john into

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his home and made him his apprentice a year went by in which john learned

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at the beginnings of artificing he witnessed various miracles wrought by the no masters mechanical

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skills and over the year the two became great friends and the nome finally gave

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john his own team or tools a gift fortunately the apprentice ship came to an

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end when the mysterious group with the white masks attacked the nomes home and killed

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his mentor john escaped with his life the tools given to him from his tour

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and his mentor's journal of schematics number five current quest you can't finish your back

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story without you can't finish your back story writing session without figuring out what your

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character cares about right now as you start playing with your character you have to

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pull all of their emotional baggage and passed into the press by having it have

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by having it have residual effects on what they do right now so answer the

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following questions what is your character's goal right now what are they trying to accomplish

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why do they care about that thing what are the main obstacles stopping them from

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doing that what resources do they need to accomplish that goal what will they do

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once they achieve their accomplishment this is crucial information so stepping back into the justin

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role when i'm talking to you the d m instead of being the d m

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talking to the player you as the d m need your players to fill out

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this part a question m everything has really been building up to this this informs

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on some of the characters main motivations right now and it can help you align

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their desires with some of the other members of the party to hopefully jell the

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grow together that is of course assuming that you're starting with the characters not knowing

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the character is not knowing each other let's go back to our example with john

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the artificer john has now left the town where he grew up he spent a

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year or so on the road just trying to survive and he realized that his

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mentor's journal was actually an arcane creation in each page was sealed by an can

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cypher on each page he had to solve a certain riddle in order to access

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that specific schematic john also realized that the strange society was still following him he's

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been moving from town to town trying to evade them but they always seem to

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find him and he assumes that his brother still wants revenge on him for the

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death of his parents for the death of his mother unknown to john the society

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actually wants the journal for a very specific schematic that actually hired the nome to

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create the nome had created the schematic but then realized that the specific invention was

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dangerous so he decided not build it for them at which point society attacked the

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nomes house john's brother volunteered for the mission not for revenge but to convince john

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to join the mysterious society and to give them the schematic john's goals now are

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to unlock the journal learn about the white mask society and avoid his brother and

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the society and obviously stay alive so hopefully that helped you learn how to help

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your players write better back stories naturally i'd probably miss something so if i did

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reach out to me on instagram at how to be a better d m and

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i'd love to hear your take on it but as always this this episode isn't

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perfect there are likely things i missed that you do in your character planning that

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helps your players and like i said reach out to me if you know anything

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but hopefully this gets you started so thank you so much for listening to today's

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show last week we have the most downloads we've ever gotten in a single day

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and you know what it's all because of you you like the show you've supported

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the show you've shared it with other dungeon masters and speaking for tanner my cohort

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and my we both want to thank you for all your support and we promise

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to continually be worthy of that support by trying to give you ever better resources

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so you can become the best dungeon master the world has ever seen we're going

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to be back next week with another awesome episode but until then let's go ahead