Childhood
Discover the people, places, and early experiences that first shaped your character.
5E & 5.5E CHARACTER CREATION SYSTEM
BACKGROUNDED
FROM CHILDHOOD TO HEROISM
Your story begins during character creation.
Character creation is often a process of moving from one table to another. You choose where your character comes from, what they learned, who they became, and what they carry into the adventure.
Backgrounded turns that process into a story you play.
You still build a complete character. You still make choices and roll on tables. The difference is that every result becomes part of a developing life rather than another isolated entry on your character sheet.
THREE PHASES OF YOUR LIFE
Discover the person behind the character sheet
Backgrounded follows your character through three phases, with each one exploring a different part of who they are.
Growing Up
Make choices, form relationships, and follow the paths opened by earlier events.
Heroism
Enter the campaign with a life already in motion and stories that are ready to continue.
The events of one phase lead into the next. A person you meet may remain in your life. A place you visit may become important later. A choice may open a new path or leave you dealing with its consequences years afterward.
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LIFE EVENTS
Build your history one event at a time
You are not trying to write four pages of history before you understand the character. You discover that history as you play through it.
The final result may be mechanically similar to a traditional background, but the character behind those mechanics feels very different.
BACKGROUND CREATION IS PART OF THE GAME
Create it together
You do not write your background alone and hand it to the GM before the campaign. The GM presents situations, plays the people you meet, and helps connect your results to the setting. You respond as your character, make decisions, and find out what those decisions change.
By the time regular play begins, you have already played part of this character’s life.
Nothing needs to be translated from a private document into the game. It was part of the game from the beginning.
BUILT INTO THE CAMPAIGN FROM THE START
Give the GM material they already understand
A four-page background can contain great ideas and still be difficult to use. The GM needs to read it, separate the useful material, find places for it in the campaign, and decide which parts can return without disrupting everything else.
Backgrounded creates that material at the table. The GM already knows the characters, locations, relationships, and events in your history because you created them together. They were there when you made the enemy, left the town, accepted the favour, or lost something important.
ARRIVE WITH A LIFE ALREADY IN MOTION
Your background is not something that happened before play.
It is where play begins.
Backgrounded is currently in development.