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RPG Ideas — Origins

Welcome once again to the weekly newsletter. This week’s topic is origins, which we discussed in our weekly live chat. We hangout every Monday evening at 8 p.m. EST on Nerdarchy Live to talk about D&D, RPGs, gaming, life and whatever nerdy stuff comes up. Speaking of origins the very first module we put together through collaboration with another creator is Lord of Dead Dreams. When we asked our Patreon supporters what module they’d most like us to revisit and expand on this one came about in first place by a wide margin. We’re dreaming up a new nightmare for the near future so keep an eye out and don’t sleep on this one!  You can get Nerdarchy the Newsletter delivered to your inbox each week, along with updates and info on how to game with Nerdarchy plus snag a FREE GIFT by signing up here.

Nerdy News

Rev your engines for the week that was! Tear up the fantasy landscape on magical motorcyles, discover new fantasy character race options, answer the call of the deep and enjoy some new shorts plus our weekly hangout, a live chat with an industry pro and live game play rounds out this week’s Nerdy News. Check it out here.

Delving Dave’s Dungeon

I love a good origin story. Tabletop roleplaying game players love to come up with their origins usually referred to as the backstory. In the early days of our gaming group as Game Master I’d agonize over how to get all the players and their characters together in the campaign. Every player would show up to the table with a complete character and backstory already fleshed out.

Nowadays we figure out the groups’ origin together and often create characters during session zero.

The Process

Step 1: What are we Playing. We decide the game system and genre we are looking to play as a group. This might be D&D, Pathfinder 2E, Cypher System, Monster of the Week or whatever the person running the game feels comfortable with running. It’s very important to keep in mind the GM should only offer up options they are interested in exploring.

Step 2: The Pitch. The GM comes up with campaign pitches. I like to come up with three or four campaign ideas. Then the players vote on them in the order of their preference. The most popular wins. Again GMs need to be selfish here and offer up only pitches they are interested in exploring.

Step 3: Session 0. We decide on what people find acceptable in a game and things people want to keep out of the game. This could even be done anonymously through a questionnaire. Generally people come to the table with ideas for their characters but maybe not completely fleshed out. This can be a lot of fun. At this point we get the players to answer some questions.

• How do you know each other?
• Have they been on adventures/missions/quests/etc. With each other before?
• Does everyone get along and like each other?
  • If not, why?
  • If not, why are they able to work together despite their dislike?
• If starting at a higher level or system with more fully developed characters what did they do to get to where they are now?
  • Did they all get to this point together?
• Is there anything from these origin stories that adds to the campaign or worldbuilding?
  • Do you allow your players to add to the world in your games?
  • Do they have a base of operations?
  • Do they have other shared equipment or possessions?
    • HQs
    • Vehicles (vans, boats, spaceships)
    • Construct or robot that assists and acts as a servant
    • Pets
• How many sessions do you plan on running this game?
  • You can also extend or shorten the campaign later
  • This gives everyone involved an idea of what kind of commitment they are making to the group.

In my experience the power of step three is when you let the players tell a story about their characters origins and where they are going during session zero. This cements their relationship as a team. It also gets them vested in the campaign really quickly. This step is guided by the two previous steps. This is super important. They ensure the game being played is one the GM is interested in running. Never forget the person running the game, no matter the title, is still another player at the table. They just have a different role than the other players.

I’ve seen GMs submit to peer pressure and run something they weren’t really into because they wanted to please their friends. The problem with these games is they tend to abruptly end as the person running the game loses interest. Steps one and two let the person running the game choose a direction they are interested in while also giving players a place to have input.

I highly recommend letting the players do some of the worldbuilding during session zero. It gets them more invested in the world and story. I’d encourage — but not pressure — players to come up with connections between their characters during this time. These shared character origins really bind the party together and get them to care about each other in the game. You’ll also hear, “My character wouldn’t do that,” a lot less often.

From Ted’s Head

Where to start? Ha ha. I hope you got my little joke there. Origins are just that — the beginning. Regardless of what type of story being told, regardless of what game you are playing, the origin is where your story started. Our current Nerdarchy Live Tuesday night game is Nobody’s Heroes and each of us have a different thought on what a character’s origin means. When it comes to a superhero game like ours it can be that way. Nerditor Doug’s character Nite Lite’s origin story is taking place as the campaign unfolds. Conversely Nerdarchist Dave and I, playing Blowhard and WinDuh respectively, have been around a little while performing super heroics.

Even though origin stories might seem more integral to a superhero game, all characters have an origin story. You can ask yourself, “Why is my character adventuring? Why do they want to be a hero?”

There are several schools of thought when it comes to who the characters are before you start rolling dice at the table. Dave and I differ on this thought. Dave likes to come up with stuff on the fly and I much prefer to come up with an origin beforehand. But why not marry the two? No, I do not mean marry Dave and me. That would be weird as he married my sister. But why not come up with some of your origin and build upon it where it is fitting and matches with the story?

We see this concept worked into TV shows all the time. You think you know a character and then all of a sudden a new detail emerges. It makes sense and explains the character a little bit better. Numerous shows do this well, and others feel shoehorned in, so you want to find the delicate balance for your own characters. As always check with your Game Master and see what their thoughts are on player agency to add to the story before you spout out with more character stuff. When you do you tie your character to the ongoing plot as well as inject some drama for the fellow characters to react to in the game.

I am always down for player agency and this strategy is quite sound to strengthen the bonds of the party. Another approach is the slow burn. Do not give all your origin story in one go but let it out in pieces. I feel this is something Critical Role does exceptionally well and I certainly have emulated it in the games I have played. This method matches real life — only sharing the details pertinent to the plot or the situation as it comes up. Go back and look at those questions and have an answer at some point, but as always have fun with it in your own style.

From the Nerditor’s Desk

Between my Nerdarchy Live chat with Nerarchist Ted along with his and Nerdarchist Dave’s editorials we covered individual character and RPG group origins pretty thoroughly. What’s left? It took me a couple of days mulling to come at origins from a different angle and what I landed on is the idea of origins taking place very frequently throughout a campaign irrespective of genre and any often the player characters involved — at least directly.

Player characters are always the protagonists of an RPG story. Their words and deeds form a narrative and move it forward through whatever sorts of adventures they embark on along together with the slower moments of downtime or whatever valleys the story flows through between peaks of high action. At any point the outcome of these adventurers’ activity can become origins for those with whom they interact and that’s where I find an intriguing conceptual space for this week’s topic.

This approach to origins applies primarily for Game Masters. Basically the idea avoids static settings — the people, places and objects touched upon by player characters. Anything the players interact with becomes changed in some way and therein lies a potential new origin story. Consider the following scenario. A group of adventurers helps out poor Farmer Jethras with one of the many problems that seem to continually plague his homestead. During one such encounter they solve his haunted chicken coop issue with a fireball, which is not at all unusual for adventurers, and they move on to the treasure filled dungeon in the area.

Poor ol’ Farmer Jethras may be freed from the fiendish infestation but now he’s sitting on the smoldering ruins of his farmstead wondering what to do with his life. Then he has a Josey Wales moment. Those wandering sellswords ruined everything! Jethras spends the next several weeks training himself and steeling his nerves to go after the adventurers. A mysterious new villain emerges in the campaign, their origin manifesting as a direct result of the player characters’ actions.

Origins created through player characters’ actions don’t need to become problematic for them down the road either. In a science fiction Cypher System game I ran a very significant event took place in session one. Without getting too deep into details the characters discovered an incredibly important location, which they immediately understood because of the tremendously high difficulty to interact with it in any way. But players being players this only intensified their curiosity. After some time planning and plotting they pooled all the resources they could muster and managed to overcome the target number. Their actions led to the origin of a solar system spanning event they have yet to even fully recognize or comprehend. (Incidentally one of the cool things about Cypher System is how a GM can telegraph the importance of something through the Difficulty, which puts the onus of taking action in the players’ hands.)

Anything characters say or do during the course of a campaign holds potential for an amazing origin story. Friends, foes or foils may emerge. New opportunities arise and new challenges await organic creation and discovery when GMs keep an open mind to the possibilities. A great origin story can evoke tension, drama or just plain interest from the players and when it spins straight out of their own words and deeds it’s all the better.

*Featured image — Within Lord of Dead Dreams you’ll find threats from the wild places where the fey come from. Not all fey are nice and playful. Some thrive on dark dreams and nightmares. Heroes face off against one such villain who revels in ripping the dream essence from mortals. If you dig dreams and nightmares in your D&D games our villainous dream thief has even more resources at their disposal like the Dreamtaker Orb and The Dreamt minions.

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