Alright, so last time we discussed players that really, truly do not want to take part in roleplaying. This part of the article isn\u00e2\u20ac\u2122t for them. It\u00e2\u20ac\u2122s for the players who are potentially interested but don\u00e2\u20ac\u2122t know how to roleplay or won\u00e2\u20ac\u2122t come out of their shell. The best advice I can give here is to make it personal. The character needs to care about the plot he is involved in. This is why I\u00e2\u20ac\u2122m not a big fan of uber save the world quests where the players are the only ones capable of standing up to overwhelming evil forces. Those quests aren\u00e2\u20ac\u2122t personal, they\u00e2\u20ac\u2122re right place, right time. Whenever I run a game I require a character backstory. No exceptions. Period. End of discussion. Players who object don\u00e2\u20ac\u2122t get to play. And in all fairness players who don\u00e2\u20ac\u2122t want to write a page or two about their character probably wouldn\u00e2\u20ac\u2122t enjoy my style of game anyway.<\/p>\n
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The backstory accomplishes two important goals. The first is that it gives the GM plot hooks. Your players should have goals and events left unresolved. Use those to your advantage! Even if you\u00e2\u20ac\u2122re using a pre-written adventure module you can use these. If a PC\u00e2\u20ac\u2122s parents were murdered in the night, you better put that murderer in game. You don\u00e2\u20ac\u2122t even have to insert a new character into the game. Just merge \u00e2\u20ac\u0153parent murderer\u00e2\u20ac\u009d into an existing NPC. I\u00e2\u20ac\u2122m a big fan of merging NPCs and events together. When the player encounters this NPC, he\u00e2\u20ac\u2122s going to give a damn about what happens. Because the murderer has been merged into another NPC, he\u00e2\u20ac\u2122s now tied into whatever plots the original NPC had going on. If you do things right, your player will now have a reason to care about that plot. You can also use techniques like this to merge players together. A couple games ago I had one PC whose wife left him and another player who was raised by a single mother who left her husband on bad terms. The PC\u00e2\u20ac\u2122s ages were about right, so I merged the lost wife with the single mother and one PC became another\u00e2\u20ac\u2122s father. There was little reason for this and I didn\u00e2\u20ac\u2122t even tie that plot into anything else very well, but the revelation of this was a lot of fun and it created a new dynamic in the group. They were no longer a band of equals, but there was a distinct hierarchy between those two characters.<\/p>\n
I should point out that merging too many plots and NPCs will make your game look contrived. Too many coincidences and things stop being believable. Stop worrying about that and just write the damn game. As GM you always have a bird\u00e2\u20ac\u2122s eye view of the game. This means you see the dozens of linked plots and characters all at once. Yes, it does look unbelievable. To the players\u00e2\u20ac\u2122 point of view it will be fine though. Players will encounter this coincidences one at a time. Individually they\u00e2\u20ac\u2122re very digestible. Furthermore, your players won\u00e2\u20ac\u2122t even encounter all of the coincidences you put in the game. In my experience they play through 50-75% of them, and only realize about half of those. It\u00e2\u20ac\u2122s even worse if the players are secretive. Back to the point, use backstory to your advantage.<\/p>\n
Players will write plot ideas for you. Be a lazy GM! Don\u00e2\u20ac\u2122t come up with ideas yourself. Use your players backstory plots. They\u00e2\u20ac\u2122ll have a much better time interacting with NPCs they wrote. It\u00e2\u20ac\u2122s a great way to involve PCs with the plot. There is one caveat to this technique though and that\u00e2\u20ac\u2122s that some players dismiss another adventurer\u00e2\u20ac\u2122s plot. They see it as Steve\u00e2\u20ac\u2122s turn in the spotlight instead of the main plot. This gives Steve a great game session, but leaves the others bored. The trick is not to run the game as Steve\u00e2\u20ac\u2122s session. Run a normal game session while merging Steve\u00e2\u20ac\u2122s backstory into the game session. This will enhance the session for Steve, but give everyone else the sort of game they\u00e2\u20ac\u2122re expecting. If Steve\u00e2\u20ac\u2122s character decides to tell the others that this plot is personal, that\u00e2\u20ac\u2122s his business. But the plot should be able to carry itself without being tied to any PC. Tying it in just makes it even more interesting.<\/p>\n
The other advantage of a good backstory is that it gets the players into the characters heads. I advocate dialog in backstories. Biographical information is all well and good, but naming your parents or home town rarely helps with getting into your character\u00e2\u20ac\u2122s head. Dialog does help. Events leading up to game start help too. When I write backstories I spend a whole lot more time on those two things than on biographical factoids. The backstory is especially helpful at game start. It\u00e2\u20ac\u2122s always bothered me that most games start with all the characters in bar introducing themselves. You\u00e2\u20ac\u2122ve got characters making first impressions on each other and nobody has played their character yet. Ideally players have pregamed with the GM, but that\u00e2\u20ac\u2122s not always feasible. A good backstory is the next best thing and will let your characters introduce themselves properly. This will help negate a lot of the awkwardness that takes place in a new game and that will help loosen up your players and get them chatting.<\/p>\n
Those are the two big things. Use backstory to make plot personal. Encourage your players to use backstory to rehearse their character. There\u00e2\u20ac\u2122s more to come, but these are the two biggest things for me.<\/p>\n