Quote from: CRKrueger;974388That's not his phrase.

Okay. Go on. I was wondering too.

Gronan is the King of Random Roll proponents.  And that is the simplest mechanic for people who, in his words, cannot do shit unassisted.  So I'm left confused, do you, or don't like random rolling?

Wow.  What a fucking non sequitor.

[SAMUEL L. JACKSON]

READING COMPREHENSION, MOTHERFUCKER!  DO YOU HAVE IT?

[\SAMUEL L. JACKSON]

Post 147...

Quote from: daniel_ream;974145The reason "orphaned sociopath with amnesia" is such a common character back story is that a very, very large portion of players are not interested in the slightest in playing a character - they want to kill things, or disturb shit, or just pfaff around in a fictional world without consequences.

Post 154...

Quote from: Gronan of Simmerya;974224The reason "orphan sociopath with amnesia" is such a common character type is that most people are booger-eating morons who are doing well to shit unassisted.

Quote from: Nexus;974415Okay. Go on. I was wondering too.

Gronan was answering Daniel Ream, who first used the phrase in his post.

It's gotten to the point where Brady is just embarrassing himself in his fervor to argue with Gronan.

Quote from: CRKrueger;974444Post 147...


Post 154...




Gronan was answering Daniel Ream, who first used the phrase in his post.

It's gotten to the point where Brady is just embarrassing himself in his fervor to argue with Gronan.

I had the impression it was "Booger eating morons" that was the issue but maybe I misread the situation.

Quote from: Nexus;974458I had the impression it was "Booger eating morons" that was the issue but maybe I misread the situation.

Oh. Well maybe, who knows.  But Gronan says something like that 3 times a week.  Based on the Nightly News, I don't know that I'd argue with him.

Not required at all, but please keep it short and sweet if it's written. For example, below, one sentence is great (1.) and a couple more are fine if they're succinct and give me the referee something fun (and optional) to use later (2.-3.). I do not want to to read someone's short story or novella that introduces lots of complexities and specifics. You'll probably die in the first session anyway.

1. Old Man Halgron's a 67 year-old first-level cleric who spends most of his time drinking too much.
2. He's decided to adventure because he owes a serious gambling debt to the thieves guild.
3. If he doesn't pay it, he's worried something might happen to innocent clerics at his temple.

Quote from: CRKrueger;974444Post 147...

Post 154...

Gronan was answering Daniel Ream, who first used the phrase in his post.

It's gotten to the point where Brady is just embarrassing himself in his fervor to argue with Gronan.

To add on that, CB could have attempted the same thing (assuming he had a point other than pick the same fight of the past X years) by saying something along the lines of, "wait, random roll is the simplest mechanic for people who cannot do shit unassisted. So do you not like random rolling?" And even if everyone would jump in to say, "no, that wasn't said, look here, here, and here," people would not come down on him, since we all get misreading something.

Quote from: cranebump;974122This is the "right way" for someone who likes keeping players on a short leash (i.e., YOU). You can also ask the players to list this items as bullet points, rather than mandating a random roll. This is assuming, of course, that you actually view your players as people, rather than vacuous ciphers sitting at your table to serve your interests alone.

I have a backlog of dozens of local gamers who would sell their grandmothers to get a chance to game at my table.

When players are presented with random rolls, it allows them to think up how to interpret those rolls into a character they would not have thought up through the process of their imagination alone. Of course, some narcissists have trouble visualizing the fact that their own imagination can actually be improved upon.  They usually end up playing Players-as-Divas Storygames. You know, the ones that usually only last one or two sessions?

QuoteOn this we agree. But make no mistake. You're still an asshole GM, for asserting random rolls are the "right" way to address character background. For that matter, you don't need any background at all. The characater's race, class, attributes, and skills (if any) allude to that. But, rather than allowing me to concoct a brief abstract, let's just roll on your random tables, shall we, so we don't disturb your gentle sensibilities by allowing one iota of player input.:-/

My players have enormous input and make incredibly creative characters. Thanks to the tools that are provided to them.

Quote from: RPGPundit;975403When players are presented with random rolls, it allows them to think up how to interpret those rolls into a character they would not have thought up through the process of their imagination alone...
...My players have enormous input and make incredibly creative characters. Thanks to the tools that are provided to them.

Yeah, this fits my recent experience using the White Star life path Serial system (three players rolled their own, two took my pregens). I think the PCs turned out much more interesting than you'd usually see with purely self-written backgrounds, and they all fit in a paragraph or two.  I have them at http://smonstats.blogspot.co.uk/2017/06/white-star-toshe-station.html - can't post an example as 'non-English characters not accepted', but I think they all turned out well. One thing I like about these life path type background generators is that they are designed to create material for use in play, and make the game richer. Left to themselves, some players will write stories that close off possibilities, not open them up.

I'm going to say that 95% of the time randomly generated characters are the way to go as you get PCs you wouldn't otherwise create, and there's nothing less interesting than players spending hours trying to make their PC be just what they imagine they want, which is usually a retread of their last PC or a character from fiction.

I'll give 5% to games where you're consciously creating something based on stereotypes, like the templates from West End Star Wars or a super hero game.

Quote from: Dumarest;975483I'm going to say that 95% of the time randomly generated characters are the way to go as you get PCs you wouldn't otherwise create, and there's nothing less interesting than players spending hours trying to make their PC be just what they imagine they want, which is usually a retread of their last PC or a character from fiction.

I'll give 5% to games where you're consciously creating something based on stereotypes, like the templates from West End Star Wars or a super hero game.

My preference is mostly random generation with a few built in options to make choices and/or steer the randomness a little.  For a made up example, I think I would like the BECMI/RC random generation method a little more if you picked your class first, and then that choice affected the random rolls for the characteristics.  But you can get effectively the same thing with a little judicious options stacked on top of the random generation, if the players are reasonable: "I'm cool rolling on a random personality trait as long as I don't have to accept choice #47, which I don't want to play."  "Fine, if you get that one, you can reroll."  Likewise, when we played a lot of Basic D&D, we'd sometimes have every player plus the GM roll up a random character.  Then we'd roll off to see the order of picking, and let each player pick one of the generated characters.  People still had to deal with what they got, but they had a little choice.  (That worked fine, because inevitably we had a TPK and started over soon enough.)

Quote from: Steven Mitchell;975486My preference is mostly random generation with a few built in options to make choices and/or steer the randomness a little.  For a made up example, I think I would like the BECMI/RC random generation method a little more if you picked your class first, and then that choice affected the random rolls for the characteristics.  But you can get effectively the same thing with a little judicious options stacked on top of the random generation, if the players are reasonable: "I'm cool rolling on a random personality trait as long as I don't have to accept choice #47, which I don't want to play."  "Fine, if you get that one, you can reroll."  Likewise, when we played a lot of Basic D&D, we'd sometimes have every player plus the GM roll up a random character.  Then we'd roll off to see the order of picking, and let each player pick one of the generated characters.  People still had to deal with what they got, but they had a little choice.  (That worked fine, because inevitably we had a TPK and started over soon enough.)

That's the beauty of TPKs. Get tired of your character? Who had the time? They dropped like flies when I was a kid playing D&D.

Quote from: RPGPundit;975403My players have enormous input and make incredibly creative characters. Thanks to the tools that are provided to them.

Their brains, one would hope. You need much more than that.

Quote from: RunningLaser;968838In another thread there were posts about character backstories.  Some preferred sparse ones, others preferred longer ones.  What are you looking for in a backstory as a player?  What are you looking for in a player's backstory as a GM?

Personally, the most fun with characters I've run are those with the least amount of backstory going in.  I've learned that it's the unexpected awesome that comes out during play that I like the most.

I gone both ways as a player and a GM. Random backstory is fun because it lets you come up with the "why" rather than the "who." By this I mean you randomly roll Beekeeper as your background and you get to decide why a beekeeper left the apiary in order to seek adventure. This allows a character's persona to develop organically over time.

Creating your own backstory let's you determine who this person was, is, and will be (if you set some goals ahead of time). For me, the real fun in this one is seeing how far afield the character flies from those principle foundations during the course of the game through choices and consequences of randomized rolls; good or ill. This also allows a character's persona to develop organically over time.

So long as the player is flexible enough and didn't make their backstory based on say, a character from fiction and they only play Gilgo Gaggins exactly as Bilbo Baggins progressed. This is the type of player who eventually gets mad at the GM for not giving him a ring of invisibility sometime throughout the campaign or cries when the dragon just eats his ass instead of listening to his silly stories (sorry, Gilgo, you failed that bluff check and Skraug eats you for a light snack.)