I started running Vaesen with one of my RPG groups recently and, while overall the support for GMs in the core book is not bad, there was one area where it seemed very poor. Each Player Character has a Dark Secret that complicates their life. There are some prompts to help players come up with their Dark Secret, but after that the book basically tells them not to worry about it, and the GM will work it into the game. In this 200 page book there is a short paragraph on 'Dark Secrets in Play', giving some very general advice that doesn't get far past the concept of "yeah, you should have the Dark Secrets come up during play". Not terribly helpful.
D&D 5E has this same problem. Players are encouraged to come up with a Backstory and to "work with the DM" so that it can be worked into the game. But there's not much support for the DM as to how they're actually supposed to do that. I've always found it tricky. Sometimes there are obvious ways to make it work, but as soon as you're having to introduce new elements (characters, places, things or events) it can start to clutter up the game, slowing progress and killing momentum.
But the promise of a PC's backstory coming up has so much potential - when it works it really works. Players are so much more engaged and it truly takes the game farther in the direction of collaborative storytelling. So how can we as GMs fix this?
The way that Myths work in Mythic Bastionland is that each Myth has 6 Omens. These take the place of Wilderness Encounters: Whenever something would happen, you don't roll for a Random Encounter, you encounter the next Omen of the nearest Myth. It allows the Myths to play out organically, but still in a satisfying arc because you're encountering them in order. It's a really flexible system, and in play feels a bit like the NPC questlines in a Souls game. I think this would be a great engine to drive PC backstory arcs.
I'm going to use the Backgrounds from the 2014 Player's Handbook to quickly pull together a backstory for an random example Character: A sorceror named Reena, who is a Forest Gnome with the Hermit background.
She lived in seclusion as the caretaker of an ancient ruin or relic. Her Ideal is Free Thinking (believing that inquiry and curiosity are the pillars of enlightenment). Her Bond is that she entered seclusion to escape from the ones who might still be hunting her, whom she must someday confront. Her Flaw is that now she has returned to the world, she enjoys its delights a little too much.
The 2024 backgrounds are great but wow, I really miss these background tables from the 2014 PHB!
We've got a Character on the run from a group she must someday confront. If this were a real Player Character, I'd be inviting the player to tell me a little about who that could be but for this example I'm going to generate a Cult from Sly Flourish's Lazy DM's Companion. So Reena is on the run from The Paper Masks : A wasp-worshipping cult who serve The Yellow Queen. So maybe Reena's sorcerous origin is linked to this cult. Whatever the reason, it sounds like a confrontation with them would be the climax of this arc. So the Omens might be something like this:
- A faint buzzing can be heard, only by Reena. It sounds close, but there's nothing there.
- A traveller, dead at the side of the road. Huge welts cover their skin, they were stung to death by giant wasps.
- A village fayre, in lively celebration of The Yellow Queen, who has provided a great feast in exchange for their subservience.
- A faint buzzing, heard by all, getting louder as a group of giant wasps attack.
- A ruin conceals a terrified pair of scriveners, who have escaped The Yellow Queen's palace.
- Paper Mask assassins now hunt the party. They try to remain hidden until an opportune moment to strike. Their target is Reena.
- Challenge an Ideal
- Test a Bond
- Provoke a Flaw
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