Backgrounds

[SeekingKnight]

Hello all.

I will try to make this short.  To all the DMs/STs/GMs/MCs out there I am curious which background you prefer.  Now I know most who run games enjoy a character with a background that is detailed and has plenty of story line hooks to use.  What I am curious about is which of these background is prefered?

A background where the character has nothing bad happen to him/her, little drama or just raised normally in a quiet village.

A background where the character has nothing but bad stuff happen to him.her, orphaned or so horribly abused that how they survived is a miracle

A background that is a mix of the two.

Thanks in advance.

[veekie]

I'd say the order for me is the mix, followed by the detail filled character and then the blank. Each has its own merits, but moderation is best.

High detail makes it easy to hook the character into a plot, or create points intersecting with the character. Too much makes the character feel 'fake' but how negative THAT is varies. Works best if you're coming up with a plot on the fly.

Blanks fit well into predefined plots. Generic Hero rescues standard issue princess, etc. They rarely have the unique snowflake syndrome, and in larger groups, can be easier to work with than the half dozen characters each with their unique styles and plot hooks.

[b100d_arrowz]

To me I prefer a background that allows my PCs to flesh out the character to whatever depth they want it to have. In my most recent campaign I had a player who had a two sentence backstory. "I am Rothario! I smite demons!" He was a Ranger/Paladin/Knight of Chalice who had favored enemy demon. It worked very well for him. I had another player who had a 4 page typed backstory for his psion detailing all of his characters various neurosi, and it ended up being one of his favorite characters, and honestly that player's most useful (for the party) character and the one he enjoyed the most.

[Novea]

From what I've experienced, the more a player puts into the background, the better. You might not want them to detail how they stole a particular lily out of the princess' private garden, but if that caused them to fall in love with said princess, go for it.  As a player and a DM, I've always created at least a 1 page typed backstory with TONS of loopholes for the DM to play with.  Including not giving them the last name XXXXX (fill in here) so the DM has the option of adjusting the character to fit the story plot.

For instance, I put in a cute story for my current character saying that she the only daughter born into a noble family with 7 brothers.  She was forced into learning to be like a lady (She was CN in a LG/LN household).  She never saw her father, so she started going into the town and learning to party / drink / etc.  She was forced to get engaged to Derrick XXXX (insert name here) which she fled from and become a cleric of the Lazy Drunkard (think Bacchus). 

From a 1 page desc, the DM made me the only daughter of the Crassus family which was the richest family in the empire and directly under the emperor himself.  And Derrick?  Oh... he was a noble that was possessed by a Demon, killed my character's true love then tried to kill her himself.  It's fun to let the DM fill in some portions of your backstory.  If you set certain things into your story without any leeway, it doesn't allow your DM to be creative & insert you into the story.  You may create a drunken high priestess who happens to be a noble with connections

[SneeR]

I make it very clear that I reward backstory. If your cleric was the high priest of a temple of Obad-Hai, people respect you, and provisions shouldn't be a problem for you in encounters with anyone halfway respectful of religion.

I find that when I include characters that are only off-handedly mentioned in the PC's backstory, the player feels special, like he is contributing to the plot, and he is interested in seeing what I interpret the character to be like.

In aswer to the OP, I prefer something along the middle. That is only in regards to experiences, though! I love detailed backstories, even if the character lived an uneventful life. Name-drops are my one true love.

I've had PCs I DMed have absolutely tortured backstories, and sometimes is stretches things a little; like, "How have you not flipped out and murdered everyone if your father lit your bed on fire if you fell asleep to keep you vigilant?"
Of course, that character did have an extremely short fuse, and his resulting brashness made for a lot of fun.

I do not dislike relatively tame characters, either, but a mix of the two is ideal. Either way, I want my players to provide oodles of details about their past!

[wotmaniac]

I typically don't care much.  As long as the backstory is enough to give a plausible explanation for their existence in the world and is a viable concept for the campaign I'm running, I'm generally happy.  If I say "pirate campaign", then as long as the characters like to be on boats, that's all that matters ... lumberjack characters are quickly booted.
The thing is, if I'm running a game, it generally starts off "... the Adventure Begins", not "... the Adventure Continues".  Sure, it's nice to be able to tie plot to background, but it's not necessary.  If kick off things with "goblins invade village", then all need to know is that somebody in the group is from the invaded village.  Done.
Now, once things get rolling, then of course the story is going to revolve around the characters; but nobody else cares what your character did before you joined the party -- they just want to know about now.  If you need more than a couple of paragraphs to tell me about your character, then you should probably just go and write some short-story fiction or something.

but that's just my 2cp.