Making your Characters feel real...

[Rainbow Six]

When I was playing I liked to create detailed characters with a good backstory....four to five pages of A4 was the norm for a PC, one to two pages for an NPC. After I stopped playing actively I still used to write up NPC's for a while as a way of finding an outlet for my creative side...

[Targan]

One of my favourite NPC backstories in my current campaign is that of Cpl Virgil Morris Price, a Canadian infantryman who, before the war, was an up and coming porn star. He has been the butt of many jokes by the PCs and NPCs in the party and when the party reached New York City one of the PCs even put a lot of effort into finding a couple of video taped films in which Price had starred. Of course the laughing tends to stop when the others sneak a peak while Price is taking a leak... he got into porn for obvious reasons, being rather generously endowed in the trouser department.

[Graebarde]

I totally agree Grae...

only 2 characters dead in 20 years!!!!!!! now that means either really soft GMs or a really lucky player or perhaps smart hehe...

Well I don't think it was soft HoGs, rather luck, though I think smarts too has something to do with it. There's a time to fight and a time to get the hell out of Dodge.

[Cdnwolf]

Best way to get the feel is first.... stop referring to your character in third person and go back to the good Dungeon and Dragon days and keep everything in first person....

"I roll to the left and take a quick shot with my rifle" (dice roll - miss) "and watch my bullet take out the last frame of glass in the window. NOW I was starting to get worried!!"

[JimmyRay73]

When I'm playing I try to sit down with the GM and work up a story we can both use, and when I run I try to do the same with all my players. It helps get the appropriate feel and gives us material to use to expand the story.

Maybe at some point I'll explain the stories behind my namesake character, or my friend Dan and his wife in a few of our games... As a GM I love to have those backgrounds to use when I need a story on short notice and I'm running low on ideas.

[Raellus]

I kind of like the Traveller char-gen system. For every "term" in a chosen career field, the player has to roll on tables (events & mishaps) that includes mishaps, contacts, rivals, windfalls, life events etc. It really helps create the framework of a pretty comprehensive backstory.

Also, it can deviate a character from the career path that the player chooses, adding a bit of extra realism. For example, a player wants his PC to be a Green Beret. During one of his career terms leading up to the SF term, he rolls on the events table and the result mandates that he roll again on the mishap chart. He rolls and the result is a badly broken ankle during the selection course.

So, the PC doesn't get to be a Green Beanie. He goes back to the Ranger regiment and has a bit of a limp for the rest of his life.

This is a really basic example of how the system works. Some of the events & mishaps are really creative. It's probably not going to happen but I'd love to convert T2K char-gen to a Traveller style.

[natehale1971]

I was able to find a PDF copy of the Freedom Fighters RPG, to replace my old paper copy that I had used to roll up backgrounds and contacts and the like. It was GREAT to use for coming up with hobbies and non-normal skill sets that a person can pick up over the years... If anyone wants to see it let me know.

[Targan]

I kind of like the Traveller char-gen system. For every "term" in a chosen career field, the player has to roll on tables (events & mishaps) that includes mishaps, contacts, rivals, windfalls, life events etc. It really helps create the framework of a pretty comprehensive backstory.

Also, it can deviate a character from the career path that the player chooses, adding a bit of extra realism. For example, a player wants his PC to be a Green Beret. During one of his career terms leading up to the SF term, he rolls on the events table and the result mandates that he roll again on the mishap chart. He rolls and the result is a badly broken ankle during the selection course.

So, the PC doesn't get to be a Green Beanie. He goes back to the Ranger regiment and has a bit of a limp for the rest of his life.

This is a really basic example of how the system works. Some of the events & mishaps are really creative. It's probably not going to happen but I'd love to convert T2K char-gen to a Traveller style.

This is very much like the char gen system we use for Gunmaster but our system is even more detailed and is year-by-year after high school.

[TiggerCCW UK]

I was able to find a PDF copy of the Freedom Fighters RPG, to replace my old paper copy that I had used to roll up backgrounds and contacts and the like. It was GREAT to use for coming up with hobbies and non-normal skill sets that a person can pick up over the years... If anyone wants to see it let me know.

I'd be very interested in seeing that Nate.