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Not yet, not for lack of skill. I am still a bit of the rookie, my backstory not fleshed out as well as it can be. But after the first arc of this campaign I joined has shown he can pull it off and respects our real personality as well as our in game character I have made one major request for my character and that is nothing happen to his family due to his backstory narrowing from my real life story. He has promised not to touch them and was careful with a dear friend's backstory recently only just coming to light, he made it clear her mother while looking for her daughter did not kill herself in desperation, no she had wasted away searching for her daughter determined to find her but her heart was slowly fading in will to live, all her will was to find her daughter. There is a reason he made it clear she did not take her life out of despair I will not say why but it held a lot of meaning to my friend Toni and he wouldn't put us through mirrors or past real pains. He has a heart even as devious as his story can be, he will not hurt us personally without doing something like this DM, genuine concern for our selves before letting us pick what happens.
I feel bad saying this because it was so well played out, but that backstory was basically a Uchiha Sasuke(from Naruto) what if story. His older brother was totally an out of control Itachi.
The true quest of a PC is to have the player write a story that tests the story-telling abilities of the DM. It is, after all, and outside of bribery using food and other IRL goods, the best way to steer the DM.
heartless0n3 Normally I’d agree with you, but since it was a session -1, I’m more willing to give it a pass. The DM could have done it a little more subtly, but ultimately certain pieces had to be set in place to make the backstory work. Had it been a regular session, though, that would have been a bit different.
Read, a lot. As you take in more and more stories from experienced authors, you'll be able to fabricate your own when you see certain pieces lining up.
I find actually Rping the players back story makes a huge difference to the way they treat it. They players tend to actually respect there goals, or sorrow's that there characters suffered and get into the mindset better
Ferry,ferries They,their Y's like to become I's when you add to them. Little tip to help with the surprisingly common mix-up between there(here/there), their(they/their), and they're.
This is so true.i took over a campaign 2 sessions in and did a flashback scene as my first game with them so I can get situated and used the players backstories. After that the 3 players who were new to dnd then became so much more invested when we went “back to current day” to see what their choices in the past really meant.
I've tried to do this in numerous campaigns I've run but I almost always get pushback from the players. There's a rare few that enjoy the RP side of D&D as much as I do that I've played with.
Negative 1 is like a more in depth session 0. Sounds like DM took each player aside and played a -1 for each. OP said his lasted about three hours for just his character.
Chaslasher H *cuts off the voice, turning to an average voice* ah, no. This is the club. The class is in the big town five towns east, it’s the one with the walls.
Will Mangrum *in DAgames’ voice,* you thought the safest place to hide was right inside your room, but once the clock begins to chime your fate will lead to doom!
"Your brother fell for you. You are your brother's keeper." This had my eyes tear up a bit so I had to pause it so the waterworks would go away. Probably wasy close to sobbing right then and there suddenly too.
@@justaaveragetaxcollecter4241 : Well reading your comment and then the first sentence out of context certainly jd out of context to the video since it's been a while. But I still remember what the entire video is about. Really powerful stuff.
I love when DMs use people's backstories to forge the campaigns because it makes characters feel much more involved. Also emotional kidney punches in the form of stories like this I love
I'd love to have a DM that incorporated my backstory that much. Being included like that and having such a masterpiece of a story make a huge impact on not just me as a PC but everyone in the game? Perfect vision of what I always saw DnD to be.
I just started DM'ing and I thought including player backstory was the norm. My players don't know this but like 60% of the plot is based on there backstories
@@coby-jaehughes6191 The difficulty here is to have the backstory have meaning, but not overwhelm to main campaign. Been DMing over 30 years now, and its very rare that both mesh up together properly. When they don't, it can feel cheesy and/or forced. It also helps when your players get to that stage in gaming where the story is more important then "winning". When a whole group works like that, it's like magic.
Inexperience tends to contribute... For Players, it's too easy to get caught up in answering all the questions/calls of the system (D&D or otherwise) and create some ridiculously elaborate backstory that the GM simply doesn't have time or energy to get through... For GM's it's hard to spend so much time hand-crafting a world, and then smash PC-backstory into some weird connection... SO sometimes the easiest way to handle it is ignore it, so the PC gets whatever backstory the Player wants, and the story can still carry on without too much "damage" to the world... I've GM'ed a long time... AND when I'm world-building I rarely (if ever anymore) do anything with maps. It's too easy to get "tied down" in the rigidity of a world map, so these two tribes/countries/cultures absolutely must be a thousand miles apart, and create a bunch of mental gymnastics for me or a Player to get a backstory's figurative sh*t together... Nope... Just don't draw the map before the game starts... Then we discovered that it tied Players into the world better if everyone prepped their own "one shots" and just added to the world map in turns. THEN when someone wants some elaborate backstory, we just shrug off the minutia, and can go ahead and start tying it in however it's going to fit. If certain territories have to be "adjusted" or "created" wherever on the map to make sense, we can pencil it in... together. When the Player takes up the GM-screen for his/her turn to run an adventure "Because they've got the perfect place to tie into the Campaign"... They get full control of the map, other GM's notes, and all... for their leg in the Campaign... It's surprising how well some avid Players can create great ideas for adventures and keep things "relatively contiguous"... with a bit of practice. ...and we learn to laugh off the less than stellar plot-holes and move on. Nobody's perfect. However, tying together all the backstories with the Campaign IS most certainly optimal. Some Players just run dry of ideas, though... AND when you have "session-0" chats they can (and should) explain if they don't really have an opinion about tying in so much as for the adventure ahead... That's okay, too. In Practice at Tables other than "my usual"... I've found just having a loosely "roughed in" idea of the backstory is enough to get most GM's to invest and not so inundating as to scare them off from incorporating it to the "main plot points" somewhere... even if it gives the invitation for PC-disaster... That's part of the fun of trusting a GM with "filling in"... Just be aware of what you're doing... inviting PC-disaster. ;o)
@@OthelloDeaman how I've planned the BBEG or conflicts is more or less based on there backstories. They essentially made there backstories and skeleton outlines. I added in a couple things that made it whole and fit into my world. And now I have groups of people that plan to do evil/bad things and it's up to the PC's if they want to stop them. Not just that, there are different concepts and ideas I wanna play around with like lycanthrope and it's impact. And because that one of my players Is a shifter it gets to play a big role In how it affects the story.
I'm currently running a cleric/mage of wee jas in 2nd ed, haven't written my backstory down but it's essentially my father was a powerful mage and my mother was a ranger, my mother spent most of her time in the forests and my father spent most of his time practicing magic and studying, this left me alone most of the time, wasn't poor, wasn't being abused, had a place to live, just felt lonely because my parents were off doing their own thing most of the time, my character stumbles upon the church of wee jas at one point, which is pretty small because of the area I lived, but wee jas also happens to be a god of vanity (love) so it didn't take too much for the church to sell me on the idea of wee jas, so I spent my remaining child hood as a servant of the church before going off on a mission of my own, I would spread the word of my godess to everyone that would hear it.
F Huber my first character backstory was three pages long, it was done with a generic setup so that I could be flexible, but never got a game, or to use him. The character’s backstory had three important parts. One; bard colleges were actual studies I could have my character pursue. Two; fantasy sirens existed in some form and my character’s touch with music made him immune to their persuasion or they just chose not to target the child. Three, in spite of being a traveler, messengers were able to take a letter to the character. The character’s story was, and still is good, in spite of being made at 14 and without much thought process due to how new I was. Since then, I’ve struggled to find an RP-heavy group I’ve found myself fit in to
F Huber I’m currently playing a orphaned (doesn’t know his father) former loner who’s whole world is his patron and his group. The usual rough childhood and discrimination based on his race(half sea elf) and location(port city commonly hit by raiding sea elf pirates) has made him have interactions since he covers himself up to hide his skin. My DM and me have planned where if he survives long enough they’re a betrayal arc and he tries to get his friends to join him and his patron’s hostile takeover of the world.
Jack Nelson make sure that signs are left for the players to catch on to this. Otherwise, they’ll be pretty pissed when you betray them, or it’ll feel like it came out of nowhere since there were no signs.
That type of story is why I only tried the "my character has amnesia, and can't recall anything but his name" backstory once. Whole campaign ended up revolving around me, lol.
I gave my character amnesia once, but I also had a backstory involving why he had amnesia. I was kind of messing with the DM (he was a bit heavy handed about the prominence of Fey NPCs) and built a backstory for why he hated Fey with passion, though he could no longer remember why.
Quit complaining he got sponsored by raid. We should be celebrating because they pay big bucks and that means UA-cam will be a more sustainable job for him, which means the channel will be more sustainable Also this was such a good one
I think it's due to Raid buying up every youtuber they can, and not one of them are thinking "Maybe I shouldn't shill this terrible rip off to my actual fans."
Wow by the title alone I’ve become incredibly jealous, I remember hearing how the backstories if my two characters would be incorporated into the campaign but they never came to fruition do to a break up between players. Yirbel lives and ooghie craft good too and, a shout out to all the war forged and golems in the house too!
So my character was a noble, a cleric of the dawn father. Throughout the whole campaign she's looking for her father, who has been shown to be captured by the chained oblivion. Keep in mind, this is the first long term dnd campaign I've ever been apart of. Shit gets real in the shadowfell, and we find her father trapped against a wall of melted flesh, his own flesh changing to match it. We rush him to the temple of the Raven Queen, where one of our PC's who was not religious at all but had a connection with her knelt down to pray. The Raven Queen tells us that what afflicts my characters father can't be undone, and they needed to kill him now before he lost himself completely. She implied that the character with a connection to her should be the one to kill him, but if not there was a follower of the Raven Queen that could do it. Now, my character has always been the happy go lucky spaz of the party, never takes a damn thing serious. But this is her father. So when the message is relayed to her she asks the party if they can give her and her father a moment alone. They all jump to agree, knowing my character wanted to say goodbye in private, which she did. But that wasn't all. See, my cleric had this sword that we started out with, nothing special about it. Because she was so focused on spells she never even used the damn thing. Not until today. She hugs her father close, tells him she's sorry she was too late and that she loves him. And then she draws the blade. She sinks it into his heart, tears streaming down her face as ooc the rest of the table, dm included is losing their shit because she wasn't supposed to be the one to do it. His body disappears in a shower of sparks and my character leaves the sword that ended her father's life in the temple. Aaand that's where the session ended. I ended up explaining to the table that as lighthearted as my character was, she would not allow her friends to take her father's life, that was not their burden to bare. She did what she had to do and took responsibility for herself. I got my first point of inspiration that night and I've never felt more badass.
@@DawnStarLightning Not at all! In fact my dm was very excited that it happened considering she didn't get surprised easily. The group I was with had always been very roleplay heavy and this just gave us more to roleplay about. My character had to come to terms with the fact that she killed her father. Not only was he the reason her quest began, but he was also someone that meant the world to her. The struggle of coming to terms with not being strong enough to find another way and having to kill him to save him was something that she would not be able to get over. As for the rest of the crew, they were mad at themselves because they couldn't help but also secretly relieved. I mean- who wants to kill their friends dad? It was a really good session, and probably my favorite moment for that character in particular!
"When did you get taller than me?" At that moment my eyes teared up. Love this story, I hope that someday I can get such a great GM or maybe even become one myself.
In the campaign I'm running for my players right now, one of my players' characters wanted to do something like a Jekyll and Hyde thing with his character. He told me to have fun with it and not tell him all the details. So his mother is an Aasimar Champion of Tyr, and his father is Titivilus, second in command to Dispater, Lord of Dis (the Second Circle of Hell). By the end of the campaign he's either going to be an angel or the BBEG. Lol.
Interesting. I saw various takes on half-aasimar half-devils/Tieflings and by lore if it's Tiefling then Tiefling blood wins and the child looks like a Tiefling. But if it's a devil then it's up to you :)
@@destroyerinazuma96 So I'm playing this a little weird, but the idea was his mother was seduced by Titivilus without knowing he was a devil, and he didn't know she was an Aasimar. Mid-romp, she figures out he's not actually human and hits him with Detect Good and Evil... realizes his "Evil" meter is off the freakin' charts and goes ham on him. But Titivilus, being only a small step from being an archdevil, easily overpowered her and took advantage of her. Turned her into a Fallen Aasimar, but her celestial blood prevented the child from becoming a Cambion... instead he was born with a "split soul"... so all this time he's been alive thinking he was a human, he's had this dormant devil entity inside him. Kinda like how Harry Potter ended up becoming Voldemort's unintentional horocrux. Only now the devils have figured out he's actually still alive, so they've been using their power to awaken the slumbering devil soul inside him in an attempt to take over his body and bring him back to Dis so he can help his father overthrow Dispater and take over the Second Circle of Hell. (Yeah... it's gonna be a hell of a ride... no pun intended. lol.)
@@EPÏKUS.MUSÏC Unfortunately the campaign died out due to real-world things getting in the way before we got to explore the whole backstory. They did meet his mom, and they found out who his dad was, but that was as far as they got.
Guys. Imagine if ALL DMs were like this. I certainly hope my first DM is someone as awesome as this guy. Always wanted to play DnD but obviously there is nobody in my area that plays it... Or the people who I know that want to play it, can't. And so far I don't know any way to """find""" people to play it with. Though I have high hopes my first DnD experience will be fun.
I'm really am not crying... All my tears are already wasted on Onyxia and Oohgie... So that wet thing under my eyes aren't actually tears... You see, that's just salted water. Yep, that's totally them... Not tears at all...
There's also lots of online groups. I use Roll20 to play and it works great. Most DMs aren't as amazing as this one, but maaaan if you find one of those DMs...good times.
Holy, this was the story I sent in it was so terribly written I’d thought you’d never cover it. Thanks for covering it I can show my DM people like his story telling skills. Thanks for covering y’all are awesome. I’ve had the good fortune to play multiple campaigns with my DM and I’ve had so many of these amazing stories because of him maybe I’ll send in another.
My one group is playing through Waterdeep Dragon Heist. In my backstory, I left it fairly loose with only a few notes. Basically that my mother had also been a tiefling and a bard, working for the Harpers in Silverymoon. She’s met my father, one of the knight corps that help protect Silverymoon. Had me and been happy until my mother died by a wasting disease when I was about 8. I’d left Silverymoon when I was older to write my own epic of sorts. That was all I wrote. What follows is all the DM’s building up from that. During the campaign, the Harpers got ahold of me to let me know that my father had been kidnapped by an unknown party. After a few half-forgotten memories and other reveals, the party and my bard found out that one of my mother’s old informants was responsible. After several encounters with her, including one where she faked my father’s death, we set off to get what we thought was going to be revenge by confronting the bitch. Turns out it was a trap, and the former informant admitted she still had my father alive and gave us a 24 hour deadline for a ransom. We managed to pull it off and I kept my cool for the most part until she subtly hinted that the wasting disease my mother had died from had not actually been a disease. She’d slowly poisoned my mother. That rattled my bard a bit but I’ve shown from other incidents that she’s the type to let things simmer before going nuclear revenge. We did manage to save my dad, but sadly we didn’t manage to get rid of the informant. She did leave us a nice gift on our doorstep though when I told her to leave us alone after sending a henchman after us: said henchman’s decapitated head for failing to get rid of us. It’s been a blast and the DM is hinting that the bard’s fiancé is about to have his backstory come into play at the end of the last session. The group was freaking out with excitement after the session ended.
For one of my characters, I used a homebrew race and asked my DM if I could use it after showing it to him. He agreed and asked if he could make changes to the race to make it fit in better with the story and even give my character a strong role in the story. We ended up making a bunch of changes to it to make it more fun to play as and with. We often used enhanced cat stats due to the race being feline and basically just a cat with superpowers (those superpowers being the ability to go into people’s dreams and manipulate the dreams, even being able to twist them into full-on nightmares. The race was simply named “Dreamcat.” I found it on Reddit). The campaign is still in the early stages of being played through so I don’t know too much about what he’s going to do. The setting’s in Waterdeep, it has something to do with Galorr and the stone he’s trapped in. There’s also something with Lantan. The thing is- he tends to make changes to places in the setting for a more dynamic story with what he’s planning. He also said that Dreamcats don’t like Aboeliths (if I’m spelling that right) and that me being a Warlock of the Great Old One would help explain why I’m even on Earth. Please do not spoil the story for me, though. I’m curious and hopefully curiosity will not kill the cat this time. But if you want to potentially save my character from death than you are welcome to do so without spoiling the story if possible...
I did a similar thing in the last game I ran. My friend wanted to make an Aasymar so I made him the son of the God of the Land and the Goddess of the Sky. The God of Death had prophesised that he would not be able to contain the Lord of Calamity, Torgus, for much longer. So the God of the Land and the Goddess of the Sky made his soul and put it into the body of a human. They handed him off to the Caretaker, a strange being that acted as a go between for the Gods and the material plane. He gave the baby to some monks who would train and raise the child so he could one day stand against the demonic generals of Torgus.
Just. . . wow. This story sounded freaking amazing, I really would've wanted to be there for it. I never thought that backstories of players could've be tied in so amazingly, I only ever thought they were there for the player's benefit to tell them how they got to where they were. I only ever did it once for an Elf Druid of mine, but it wasn't considered for the story, just as I said, how I bumped into that ragtag band of misfits and odd balls.
My DM hasn't done anything like this just yet, but the fact that he used my Tiefling Wizard's Heart of Darkness feature to help make the innkeeper look nicer was such a satisfying touch. Really showed he knew what he was doing
I had a druid who was railroaded by a DM to be the main "thing" for the story, I stopped playing that campaign, I played a cleric who was a keystone for a monster campaign that was fun, and I played a bard who was just kinda there n I felt pretty useless (until I got gauntlets that made it so I took no physical damage on top of my armor that negated magical and elemental damage) my DM slowly tried to corrupt my Bard from NN to CN or NE. The bard was a linguest and knew all the languages aside form druidic but was being taught by a druid.
I had a GM force my noble into a tourney though the PC hated it. I had repeatedly stated my character thought these were foolish and risky games and a waste of resources. We're still cool but I wish he could read the cues and the mood and respect my wishes more.
So first you were annoyed about being the main character so you quit. Then, you play a bard and are annoyed that you aren't important, until you become immune to physical damage. Even though you already had immunity to magical and elemental damage. So those immunities weren't enough. Plus you know every single language, likely including Thieves Cant, and was learning the last, Druidic. No.
MAN this made me cry. I don't even know why, I don't usually cry while reading or listening to stories-- I barely even cry in movies unless I really get into it. This was beautiful and devastating all the same.
This made me teary eyed. I can't even conceive of having such a brilliantly made character arch like this. I loved every minute of it, thank you for making this video and sharing it with us.
This just makes me more excited to write more of my campaign I already plan to have a session -1 with each player individually, or in small groups depending on where they decide they're from I also plan on them each having basically a relic from their families that's a legendary item drained of power, and it'll be refilled throughout the campaign Might submit it if anything interesting happens
@@destroyerinazuma96 oh, I fully expect that. It wouldn't be a good campaign if they didn't. Hell, my current group just caused the DM to stop the section we're in because he didn't expect us to touch a teleportation circle into the enemy's main base. He especially didn't expect us to succeed the bluff checks to get a tour.
That right there -- that is Exactly what a DM is supposed to be like. Backstory, character development, in-party bonding... they make all the difference.
I made the mistake of having a reeeally loose Backstory for my elven cleric and now I'm stuck with a crippled Ilithid parasite in my head that I need to get out before I actually turn into one. I'm never making an unspecific Backstory ever again.
@@asrieldreemurr1988 I actually don't know yet, but it seems my clerics mom was pregnant with her when the Ilithids caught her and implanted a parasite. It was too weak to take my cleric over and the mom died somehow, which is why she was able to grow up normally. His name is Mimo and I dubbed him my brainmate. He gotta eat brain like once a month, but I made him promise not to attack the party. I regularly check up when he gets hungry so I can look out for some douche whose brain I'll snack on. I get the most important memories of the people whose brain I snack. We're working towards getting to the colony he's from and finding a way to get him out. We're not even level 5 yet though, which is why we lost an NPC in the fight against a vampire paladin last session. My DM is crazy but amazing, I love her and I'm scared of her. She threw a Tarrasque at us when we were level 3 or 4. We only survived because my goddess did an emergency teleport, which resulted in my cleric being pronounced dead for like 3 weeks, because she was the last to go. I really hope I can get my group to stream our sessions or get them on UA-cam because they are so crazy.
@@asrieldreemurr1988 I mean it kinda is, but it's OK, I gave her permission to do what she sees fit. Of course it's not what I expected, but that's the fun part about DnD, right? And we could have avoided the Tarrasque if we had just put out the campfire, which we forgot, lol.
I can't wait to play our next campaign to create a rich, beautiful backstory for my new character. I love my character now, as she's my first and even though her background is basic in most ways, my DM has helped fluff it out. He asked all of us to have simpler backgrounds because it was our first characters and i suppose it was easier this way for us and our DM. I just can't wait to write a unique and rich backstory like this. It made me have real feelings and that's a sign of great storytelling.
I shed some tears at that "when did you get taller than me?" line... my god that was a masterfully crafted story, I can't even imagine how much emotion the players must have felt.
I love a story where the main villain is someone who, through their actions, became the very monster they vowed to destroy. This DM wrote that story spectacularly, even allowing the brother a chance to realise what he had become after seeing his brother fall despite his best efforts, and seeing how he was the catalyst of the event he had killed so many to prevent. I'm not gonna lie, my throat tightened up from the suspense when I realised where this might have been going. This is easily one of the best DnD stories I have ever heard. [Edit]: Am I the only one who got Revenge of the Sith vibes from this the more I thought about it?
This idea is something I wanna do when I am confident enough to DM a campaign. Go through backstories and tie them into the main story. Beautiful. I cannot wait for something like this to play out. Wish me luck.
CosmicChief13 I had a group of solid noobs aside from two people for my first group, I was one of the two. The second was a guy who just moved back to the states. I ended up as DM. The first two sessions went well, running fortnightly sessions that last six hours, we’ve only had five total sessions this far, with the first one being an S0, but halfway through S0 everyone was done, so I took what I had developed that far to use for the world. Thus far they’ve mostly enjoyed it. Hoping for another session soon
In a game of champions I was playing me and my DM had given me an epic NPC bad guy character who my character thought was killed but was revealed to be alive in one of the first two sessions we played. My character was a super hero speedster and was a pow in the game universe World War 1 and was kind of a high society flyboy turned iron worker as a a career, well the story of my entry to the game universe was willfully ignored by a fellow pc and I being a good player followed my fellow pcs, and so the story my character was to have never happened and so the bbeg my character was to face got stronger, and 6 sessions later as a result of my fellow pcs in action I got to witness a kick ass kidnapping and the start of torture for my character, I loved it as a player cause it was so awesome to see a plot taken the right way and it having real consequences, and my DM was like "look I'm sorry you had to sit a do nothing" I was hamming it up even going so far to rp my characters involuntary twitching due to the comic book even device overloading my speedster nerve impulses. It was so cool, I'm sad the game just died and that character is religated to the dustbin...
I think the line of 'When did you get taller than me' was good. Like all things drama, you need something to lighten the tension a little, but not enough to break immersion or destroy the tone set. I think this did that and accentuated the death looming over them.
I had a campaign somewhat like this my character had cursed him self to never feel again in an attempt to save his mother to no avail. Her soul was taken and throughout the campaign he was able to free her and undo his curse. The curse turned his blood to dust and dried up all of his organs to the point where he was practically undead. The entity that took his mothers soul had made a deal with him he would take what he values most and she would be spared. He was to much of a coward to take his life so he took away what made him "human" in his eyes hoping it would be enough it wasn't.
The DM of a campaign I'm in that starts in a few weeks used some spare time over the past few months to roleplay my (and a few other characters') backstories (mostly because I created my character back in like January and have been frothing at the mouth to play him as much as possible ever since). I have little idea of what's to come in the main story, but I have been given enough to be deeply excited for whatever it may be. I can only hope it gets this good.
Awesome story. Sitting here waiting to see if my story becomes one of these awesome videos. If it doesn't, oh well. If it does....*silently squee's* Zar Zar is still my favorite character I've ever played and wish to play him again. As soon as I can find another group
I made a session -1 to one of my players. Ea was a Tiefling Fighter who had a medic/war doctor background. Her character started to deal with the struggles pf being an tiefling since a very young age. But then, after commiting crimes she was throwed in the military forces of the realm to learn manners and to respect authority. She surprisingly tried to do this and for five years she trained and now was finally respected and the looks of hatred she once received were now looks of awe and admiration of her might in battle and kindness to the people she cured during war. But she had an enemy in the army, at first she tought that the High Elf Fighter (I can't remember the name I gave to this NPC) was plotting to get her out of the Army lines. *Jumping some years, still in her backstory* Ea and a fellow Half-Orc Ranger namer Korrak (played by one of the players of the campaign and a DM himself) were given a mission. They should gather a group of soldiers, rangers and whatnot to give chase to a group of 12 orcs in the plains. It was a really easy mission, the first encounter was a group of goblins that almost killed Ea and Korrak (it is hard to be level 1) but they survived. The second encounter was a spy who was hidden in some bushes but Korrak spotted him with a nat 20 Investigation. This encounter was going to decide if they would attack the orcs man to man in the plains or attack them from the forest. The 3rd and last encounter was the Orcs. Since they defeated the spy, the group did not had to care about being called out. As the Orcs approached the rangers and fighters made arrows rain upon the orc group. The orcs started to dash towards the tree line and were faced by Korrak, Ea and some fighters. The fight only lasted 5 rounds. The Orcs who survided killed at least 4 fighters while Ea and Korrak fought bravely shoulder to shoulder. But finally they were successfull. Yaaay! And then Ea gathered the injured and started to apply bandages to the captain of the squad when an arrow pierced his throat. His dead body falling limply in her arms. The rest of the group was the attacked by arrows, leaving Ea and Korrak surrounded by bodies. From the hills the saw the banners of their Empire and smiled of relief, until they could see the captain of the horsemen was the High Elf NPC. She approached and held them in shackles. One of the horseman dismounted and got their weapons and with them he stabbed every single dead body with Ea's and Korrak's weapons. Planting evidences against them. Ea and Korrak were them imprisioned for almost a decade until the High Elf NPC was killed and forced by a Zone of Truth Spell to tell all the things she did. But when this finally occured Ea was completely broken. She left the army, adopted the name Aurora and started to work in small jobs as an adventurer. This session for her background took almost 6 hours and was mainly two characters and me. Now the player know exactly what Aurora feels, wants, likes and dislikes.
This is the DM I aspire to be with more experience. I'm only on my first campaign, so I've got a long way to go, but holy cow! I really hope I can be that awesome
I've gotta question Dude awesome story hook. Feels like it was my long lost brother lol, seriously bad ass sessions, ty for...🤗 How do I submit stories... Because I've got a few, this one reminded me of how Awesome it is when you're feeling more pc than player. I LOVE THIS CHANNEL!! Onyxia and Oohgie (I know bad spelling) stole my heart. Hands down my favorite of all time is the 4 year old little girl that rp'd with her daddy... That was so amaze balls.
One idea I had for a 2nd edition Pathfinder character is a Hobgoblin Sorcerer with access to the Primal school of magic. His backstory is that his military unit accidentally wandered into the middle of a druidic glade while on patrol, and he was exposed to a very large concentration of Primal magic. The rest of his unit was destroyed by the blast, but he managed to survive the ordeal. He later awakens to quickly discover he now has an inherent affinity for "elf magic" and decides to flee the army in disgrace. In other words, he's a self loathing Sorcerer, who actually hates the fact he has magical abilities!
The storyarc actually reminds me a lot of the Sasuke&Itachi arc from Naruto. Killed everyone in the place they grew up in (when they deserved it), except his "little brother". A story full of hatred and the difficulty to find redemption. Their related physical abnormalities (the white/bony wings vs the Sharingan) Their fight ending in a almost mutual death.
Agreed, the moment he said about brothers and how the older brother try to hide his true self to protect his little bro; my mind immediately wondered to Itachi & Sasuke.
Im not crying, you're crying... Shut up. Beautiful story and wonderfully role played. The closest thing i have to this is my character (a rogue) was searching for his family who was kidnapped by an evil lord who holds some significant power. He had been getting close to finding them, and after a couple years of searching started getting small boxes sent to him. Small cut off parts from his family. Our party eventually learned what happened and is trying to help him, and we eventually found out they had been magically hidden and were very far away... As in not on the continent anymore. Our party found the one responsible for the hiding magic amd they tried to flee. Our party gave chase and my character caught up to them first. He tried to play it off like he would ditch his adventure group if he could just know where his family was. Bad guy says no, admits he was the one to hide them and big fight ensues. We win. Thats basically were our story arc ended for now untill our DM has time to write some more.
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nice one
Another excellent story! Thanks for such quality content time after time.
This is a nice violent story. I like.
Pretty neat he got his wife back 😁
Not yet, not for lack of skill. I am still a bit of the rookie, my backstory not fleshed out as well as it can be. But after the first arc of this campaign I joined has shown he can pull it off and respects our real personality as well as our in game character I have made one major request for my character and that is nothing happen to his family due to his backstory narrowing from my real life story. He has promised not to touch them and was careful with a dear friend's backstory recently only just coming to light, he made it clear her mother while looking for her daughter did not kill herself in desperation, no she had wasted away searching for her daughter determined to find her but her heart was slowly fading in will to live, all her will was to find her daughter. There is a reason he made it clear she did not take her life out of despair I will not say why but it held a lot of meaning to my friend Toni and he wouldn't put us through mirrors or past real pains. He has a heart even as devious as his story can be, he will not hurt us personally without doing something like this DM, genuine concern for our selves before letting us pick what happens.
I feel bad saying this because it was so well played out, but that backstory was basically a Uchiha Sasuke(from Naruto) what if story. His older brother was totally an out of control Itachi.
Damn that DM sure was flexing his great story-telling talents. I mean, unironically, it was an excellent way to use a PC's backstory
The true quest of a PC is to have the player write a story that tests the story-telling abilities of the DM. It is, after all, and outside of bribery using food and other IRL goods, the best way to steer the DM.
Why does it have to be parental. Guidance
That dm needs to write a book
Aw the uchiha plot......
@@coinshot the Uchiha plot is nowhere near as good as this.
"Something was holding me back" - (Player) This is a cutscene, isn't it?
One of my players watched his wife die infront of him and almost got his son killed cause he thought it was a cutsence
@@coby-jaehughes6191 Susan Empathizes with your problem: www.egscomics.com/egsnp/parable-054
Yah wee bit of railroading..
Shoulda made it an opposed agility check
@@heartless0n3 the person who killed who was wife got a surprise round. Luckily his son didn't die
heartless0n3 Normally I’d agree with you, but since it was a session -1, I’m more willing to give it a pass. The DM could have done it a little more subtly, but ultimately certain pieces had to be set in place to make the backstory work. Had it been a regular session, though, that would have been a bit different.
Jesus Christ I got the chills dude, how does one ever become such a god-tier DM?
Was this DM Matt Mercer? Was it Chris Perkins? LOL These questions!!!
Imagination
Read, a lot. As you take in more and more stories from experienced authors, you'll be able to fabricate your own when you see certain pieces lining up.
Its excelently executed but its bassically the same as a few others notably naruto's sauska itachi arc
@@davidholmes3728
Nothing wrong with inspiration.
Nothing wrong with shameless ripoffs, as long as nobody knows.
I find actually Rping the players back story makes a huge difference to the way they treat it. They players tend to actually respect there goals, or sorrow's that there characters suffered and get into the mindset better
Ferry,ferries
They,their
Y's like to become I's when you add to them. Little tip to help with the surprisingly common mix-up between there(here/there), their(they/their), and they're.
@@giin97 I just didn't proof read my comment. I understand English...
@@coby-jaehughes6191 :P it's a surprisingly common error, just trying to spread some knowledge :)
This is so true.i took over a campaign 2 sessions in and did a flashback scene as my first game with them so I can get situated and used the players backstories. After that the 3 players who were new to dnd then became so much more invested when we went “back to current day” to see what their choices in the past really meant.
Session Negative 1. I have never heard of such a thing, but I love the idea.
I always heared session 0 from a dm, never a -1
Its more or less a session 0.
I've tried to do this in numerous campaigns I've run but I almost always get pushback from the players. There's a rare few that enjoy the RP side of D&D as much as I do that I've played with.
Agree with other replys, always used session 0 to play backstorys.
Negative 1 is like a more in depth session 0. Sounds like DM took each player aside and played a -1 for each. OP said his lasted about three hours for just his character.
All Things DnD: Does raid shadowlegends promo
Me: *Bane voice intensifies* "So you think darkness is your ally?"
borntodie297 *me, trying a Nightmare Moon voice with an echo* you call that fear? I SHALL SHOW YOU TRUE TERROR!
@@flyingturret208thecannon5 *in the voice of a small kobold* "Sorry, is this the scary voices class?"
Chaslasher H *cuts off the voice, turning to an average voice* ah, no. This is the club. The class is in the big town five towns east, it’s the one with the walls.
*In Makuta Teridax voice*
"I can think of one thousand ways to end your feeble life, and nine-hundred forty-one of them hurt!
Will Mangrum *in DAgames’ voice,* you thought the safest place to hide was right inside your room, but once the clock begins to chime your fate will lead to doom!
“When did you get taller than me?”
That line remind me of gurren lagann so much... different story, same sadness
I swear I teared up when he said it😭😭
Im not the only one!!
@@jimbenzo that line hit so hard
"Your brother fell for you.
You are your brother's keeper."
This had my eyes tear up a bit so I had to pause it so the waterworks would go away. Probably wasy close to sobbing right then and there suddenly too.
How to fix that: that the first sentence out of context
@@justaaveragetaxcollecter4241 :
Well reading your comment and then the first sentence out of context certainly jd out of context to the video since it's been a while.
But I still remember what the entire video is about. Really powerful stuff.
@@bethanydavis9023 Oh man I was outright crying from this. I don't normally get emotional but this hit different.
@@whythehellnot6502 I don't usually get that emotional either in terms of crying. This is *powerful* stuff.
I love when DMs use people's backstories to forge the campaigns because it makes characters feel much more involved. Also emotional kidney punches in the form of stories like this I love
I'd love to have a DM that incorporated my backstory that much. Being included like that and having such a masterpiece of a story make a huge impact on not just me as a PC but everyone in the game? Perfect vision of what I always saw DnD to be.
I just started DM'ing and I thought including player backstory was the norm. My players don't know this but like 60% of the plot is based on there backstories
@@coby-jaehughes6191 You're actually right, but this is not obvious for everyone.
@@coby-jaehughes6191 The difficulty here is to have the backstory have meaning, but not overwhelm to main campaign. Been DMing over 30 years now, and its very rare that both mesh up together properly. When they don't, it can feel cheesy and/or forced. It also helps when your players get to that stage in gaming where the story is more important then "winning". When a whole group works like that, it's like magic.
Inexperience tends to contribute... For Players, it's too easy to get caught up in answering all the questions/calls of the system (D&D or otherwise) and create some ridiculously elaborate backstory that the GM simply doesn't have time or energy to get through...
For GM's it's hard to spend so much time hand-crafting a world, and then smash PC-backstory into some weird connection... SO sometimes the easiest way to handle it is ignore it, so the PC gets whatever backstory the Player wants, and the story can still carry on without too much "damage" to the world...
I've GM'ed a long time... AND when I'm world-building I rarely (if ever anymore) do anything with maps. It's too easy to get "tied down" in the rigidity of a world map, so these two tribes/countries/cultures absolutely must be a thousand miles apart, and create a bunch of mental gymnastics for me or a Player to get a backstory's figurative sh*t together... Nope... Just don't draw the map before the game starts...
Then we discovered that it tied Players into the world better if everyone prepped their own "one shots" and just added to the world map in turns. THEN when someone wants some elaborate backstory, we just shrug off the minutia, and can go ahead and start tying it in however it's going to fit. If certain territories have to be "adjusted" or "created" wherever on the map to make sense, we can pencil it in... together. When the Player takes up the GM-screen for his/her turn to run an adventure "Because they've got the perfect place to tie into the Campaign"... They get full control of the map, other GM's notes, and all... for their leg in the Campaign... It's surprising how well some avid Players can create great ideas for adventures and keep things "relatively contiguous"... with a bit of practice.
...and we learn to laugh off the less than stellar plot-holes and move on. Nobody's perfect.
However, tying together all the backstories with the Campaign IS most certainly optimal. Some Players just run dry of ideas, though... AND when you have "session-0" chats they can (and should) explain if they don't really have an opinion about tying in so much as for the adventure ahead... That's okay, too.
In Practice at Tables other than "my usual"... I've found just having a loosely "roughed in" idea of the backstory is enough to get most GM's to invest and not so inundating as to scare them off from incorporating it to the "main plot points" somewhere... even if it gives the invitation for PC-disaster... That's part of the fun of trusting a GM with "filling in"... Just be aware of what you're doing... inviting PC-disaster. ;o)
@@OthelloDeaman how I've planned the BBEG or conflicts is more or less based on there backstories.
They essentially made there backstories and skeleton outlines. I added in a couple things that made it whole and fit into my world.
And now I have groups of people that plan to do evil/bad things and it's up to the PC's if they want to stop them.
Not just that, there are different concepts and ideas I wanna play around with like lycanthrope and it's impact. And because that one of my players Is a shifter it gets to play a big role In how it affects the story.
First requirement is a viable backstory that can fit the campaign.
Not the "I'm an orphan and a loner who sits in dark corners" edgelord.
I'm currently running a cleric/mage of wee jas in 2nd ed, haven't written my backstory down but it's essentially my father was a powerful mage and my mother was a ranger, my mother spent most of her time in the forests and my father spent most of his time practicing magic and studying, this left me alone most of the time, wasn't poor, wasn't being abused, had a place to live, just felt lonely because my parents were off doing their own thing most of the time, my character stumbles upon the church of wee jas at one point, which is pretty small because of the area I lived, but wee jas also happens to be a god of vanity (love) so it didn't take too much for the church to sell me on the idea of wee jas, so I spent my remaining child hood as a servant of the church before going off on a mission of my own, I would spread the word of my godess to everyone that would hear it.
*whats your class*?
My edge.
F Huber my first character backstory was three pages long, it was done with a generic setup so that I could be flexible, but never got a game, or to use him. The character’s backstory had three important parts. One; bard colleges were actual studies I could have my character pursue. Two; fantasy sirens existed in some form and my character’s touch with music made him immune to their persuasion or they just chose not to target the child. Three, in spite of being a traveler, messengers were able to take a letter to the character. The character’s story was, and still is good, in spite of being made at 14 and without much thought process due to how new I was. Since then, I’ve struggled to find an RP-heavy group I’ve found myself fit in to
F Huber I’m currently playing a orphaned (doesn’t know his father) former loner who’s whole world is his patron and his group. The usual rough childhood and discrimination based on his race(half sea elf) and location(port city commonly hit by raiding sea elf pirates) has made him have interactions since he covers himself up to hide his skin. My DM and me have planned where if he survives long enough they’re a betrayal arc and he tries to get his friends to join him and his patron’s hostile takeover of the world.
Jack Nelson make sure that signs are left for the players to catch on to this. Otherwise, they’ll be pretty pissed when you betray them, or it’ll feel like it came out of nowhere since there were no signs.
That type of story is why I only tried the "my character has amnesia, and can't recall anything but his name" backstory once. Whole campaign ended up revolving around me, lol.
So basically
You're finally awake!
I gave my character amnesia once, but I also had a backstory involving why he had amnesia. I was kind of messing with the DM (he was a bit heavy handed about the prominence of Fey NPCs) and built a backstory for why he hated Fey with passion, though he could no longer remember why.
Mobius Aereos
lmao
Quit complaining he got sponsored by raid. We should be celebrating because they pay big bucks and that means UA-cam will be a more sustainable job for him, which means the channel will be more sustainable
Also this was such a good one
It's great he got a sponsor, I agree! Whatever helps pay the bills.
But we're still allowed to dislike the sponsor.
I think it's due to Raid buying up every youtuber they can, and not one of them are thinking "Maybe I shouldn't shill this terrible rip off to my actual fans."
I think it's more quantity, given how often Raid sponsorships seem to be. Though regardless it will help keep the channel going.
Yes. Raid is a meme and everyone knows it. Just let the man earn his daily bread.
Pays the bills and it's not hurting anyone, what's the big deal
Wow by the title alone I’ve become incredibly jealous, I remember hearing how the backstories if my two characters would be incorporated into the campaign but they never came to fruition do to a break up between players. Yirbel lives and ooghie craft good too and, a shout out to all the war forged and golems in the house too!
This hit my heart so hard my phylactery took damage
So my character was a noble, a cleric of the dawn father. Throughout the whole campaign she's looking for her father, who has been shown to be captured by the chained oblivion. Keep in mind, this is the first long term dnd campaign I've ever been apart of. Shit gets real in the shadowfell, and we find her father trapped against a wall of melted flesh, his own flesh changing to match it. We rush him to the temple of the Raven Queen, where one of our PC's who was not religious at all but had a connection with her knelt down to pray. The Raven Queen tells us that what afflicts my characters father can't be undone, and they needed to kill him now before he lost himself completely. She implied that the character with a connection to her should be the one to kill him, but if not there was a follower of the Raven Queen that could do it. Now, my character has always been the happy go lucky spaz of the party, never takes a damn thing serious. But this is her father. So when the message is relayed to her she asks the party if they can give her and her father a moment alone.
They all jump to agree, knowing my character wanted to say goodbye in private, which she did. But that wasn't all. See, my cleric had this sword that we started out with, nothing special about it. Because she was so focused on spells she never even used the damn thing. Not until today. She hugs her father close, tells him she's sorry she was too late and that she loves him. And then she draws the blade. She sinks it into his heart, tears streaming down her face as ooc the rest of the table, dm included is losing their shit because she wasn't supposed to be the one to do it. His body disappears in a shower of sparks and my character leaves the sword that ended her father's life in the temple.
Aaand that's where the session ended. I ended up explaining to the table that as lighthearted as my character was, she would not allow her friends to take her father's life, that was not their burden to bare. She did what she had to do and took responsibility for herself. I got my first point of inspiration that night and I've never felt more badass.
Dang. I hate to ask... but were there any bad repercussions because you were the one that did it?
@@DawnStarLightning Not at all! In fact my dm was very excited that it happened considering she didn't get surprised easily. The group I was with had always been very roleplay heavy and this just gave us more to roleplay about. My character had to come to terms with the fact that she killed her father. Not only was he the reason her quest began, but he was also someone that meant the world to her. The struggle of coming to terms with not being strong enough to find another way and having to kill him to save him was something that she would not be able to get over. As for the rest of the crew, they were mad at themselves because they couldn't help but also secretly relieved. I mean- who wants to kill their friends dad? It was a really good session, and probably my favorite moment for that character in particular!
"When did you get taller than me?"
At that moment my eyes teared up. Love this story, I hope that someday I can get such a great GM or maybe even become one myself.
My level 20 Necromancer walking up to his dead brother: this is where the fun begins
The entire party: DO NOT
It's free real estate
"I will never be a memory"
@@leila13dnd hey im just a really late healer that refuses to give up
So uncivilized...
That was basically the Uchiha clan but with extra steps.
Literally came on here to say that 😂
Eli Ookami Same
Least it wasn't yet another Drizzt copy paste
Thought so too
Eli Ookami same lol
"Under no circumstances do I want my brother to die."
*You aren't weeb enough Sasuke*
Oof, right in the *kokoro*
In the campaign I'm running for my players right now, one of my players' characters wanted to do something like a Jekyll and Hyde thing with his character. He told me to have fun with it and not tell him all the details.
So his mother is an Aasimar Champion of Tyr, and his father is Titivilus, second in command to Dispater, Lord of Dis (the Second Circle of Hell).
By the end of the campaign he's either going to be an angel or the BBEG. Lol.
Interesting. I saw various takes on half-aasimar half-devils/Tieflings and by lore if it's Tiefling then Tiefling blood wins and the child looks like a Tiefling. But if it's a devil then it's up to you :)
@@destroyerinazuma96 So I'm playing this a little weird, but the idea was his mother was seduced by Titivilus without knowing he was a devil, and he didn't know she was an Aasimar. Mid-romp, she figures out he's not actually human and hits him with Detect Good and Evil... realizes his "Evil" meter is off the freakin' charts and goes ham on him. But Titivilus, being only a small step from being an archdevil, easily overpowered her and took advantage of her. Turned her into a Fallen Aasimar, but her celestial blood prevented the child from becoming a Cambion... instead he was born with a "split soul"... so all this time he's been alive thinking he was a human, he's had this dormant devil entity inside him. Kinda like how Harry Potter ended up becoming Voldemort's unintentional horocrux. Only now the devils have figured out he's actually still alive, so they've been using their power to awaken the slumbering devil soul inside him in an attempt to take over his body and bring him back to Dis so he can help his father overthrow Dispater and take over the Second Circle of Hell.
(Yeah... it's gonna be a hell of a ride... no pun intended. lol.)
@@Scorpious187 sounds well written, looking forward to hear more (when there is more ofc)
@@Scorpious187 Any updates? That's freaking savagely good!
@@EPÏKUS.MUSÏC Unfortunately the campaign died out due to real-world things getting in the way before we got to explore the whole backstory. They did meet his mom, and they found out who his dad was, but that was as far as they got.
Guys.
Imagine if ALL DMs were like this. I certainly hope my first DM is someone as awesome as this guy.
Always wanted to play DnD but obviously there is nobody in my area that plays it... Or the people who I know that want to play it, can't.
And so far I don't know any way to """find""" people to play it with. Though I have high hopes my first DnD experience will be fun.
It's a high bar but there's a good number of us DMs that can reach it
Not even gonna lie, this brought a tear to my eyes as well. This was insanely deep and such an amazing story.
Im not crying, you're crying!
No you’re crying *as she bawls* lol
No I'm sweating from my eyes dam it!
I'm not crying, its just sweat from around my eyes 😭
I'm really am not crying... All my tears are already wasted on Onyxia and Oohgie... So that wet thing under my eyes aren't actually tears... You see, that's just salted water. Yep, that's totally them... Not tears at all...
I never played D&D... Now i'm curious.
Asveses
Look up D&D adventure league if your looking for a place to start they have locations all over. Normally in major cities.
There's also lots of online groups. I use Roll20 to play and it works great. Most DMs aren't as amazing as this one, but maaaan if you find one of those DMs...good times.
Well, I guess I should say... *_How do you want to do this?_*
I recommend finding a group, he careful to make sure the DM is a decent person I got lucky both times.
@@yaburu I wish I could online groups, but I don't have a microphone
Holy freaking moley Batgirl....
Seriously heart wrenching. Epic story. Wish I could've played that campaign.
Damn, this was inspirational to someone who's gonna start GM-ing soon
Pikasayan same
"Don't you fall." Legit made choke up. Imagine if this was an anime.
If my brother murders my wife and calls me a little brat I'd be a bit miffed.
DnD can be such a wonderful thing if you have a crazy talented dungeon master.
Holy, this was the story I sent in it was so terribly written I’d thought you’d never cover it. Thanks for covering it I can show my DM people like his story telling skills. Thanks for covering y’all are awesome. I’ve had the good fortune to play multiple campaigns with my DM and I’ve had so many of these amazing stories because of him maybe I’ll send in another.
My one group is playing through Waterdeep Dragon Heist. In my backstory, I left it fairly loose with only a few notes. Basically that my mother had also been a tiefling and a bard, working for the Harpers in Silverymoon. She’s met my father, one of the knight corps that help protect Silverymoon. Had me and been happy until my mother died by a wasting disease when I was about 8. I’d left Silverymoon when I was older to write my own epic of sorts. That was all I wrote. What follows is all the DM’s building up from that. During the campaign, the Harpers got ahold of me to let me know that my father had been kidnapped by an unknown party. After a few half-forgotten memories and other reveals, the party and my bard found out that one of my mother’s old informants was responsible. After several encounters with her, including one where she faked my father’s death, we set off to get what we thought was going to be revenge by confronting the bitch. Turns out it was a trap, and the former informant admitted she still had my father alive and gave us a 24 hour deadline for a ransom. We managed to pull it off and I kept my cool for the most part until she subtly hinted that the wasting disease my mother had died from had not actually been a disease. She’d slowly poisoned my mother. That rattled my bard a bit but I’ve shown from other incidents that she’s the type to let things simmer before going nuclear revenge. We did manage to save my dad, but sadly we didn’t manage to get rid of the informant. She did leave us a nice gift on our doorstep though when I told her to leave us alone after sending a henchman after us: said henchman’s decapitated head for failing to get rid of us.
It’s been a blast and the DM is hinting that the bard’s fiancé is about to have his backstory come into play at the end of the last session. The group was freaking out with excitement after the session ended.
For one of my characters, I used a homebrew race and asked my DM if I could use it after showing it to him. He agreed and asked if he could make changes to the race to make it fit in better with the story and even give my character a strong role in the story. We ended up making a bunch of changes to it to make it more fun to play as and with. We often used enhanced cat stats due to the race being feline and basically just a cat with superpowers (those superpowers being the ability to go into people’s dreams and manipulate the dreams, even being able to twist them into full-on nightmares. The race was simply named “Dreamcat.” I found it on Reddit). The campaign is still in the early stages of being played through so I don’t know too much about what he’s going to do. The setting’s in Waterdeep, it has something to do with Galorr and the stone he’s trapped in. There’s also something with Lantan. The thing is- he tends to make changes to places in the setting for a more dynamic story with what he’s planning. He also said that Dreamcats don’t like Aboeliths (if I’m spelling that right) and that me being a Warlock of the Great Old One would help explain why I’m even on Earth. Please do not spoil the story for me, though. I’m curious and hopefully curiosity will not kill the cat this time. But if you want to potentially save my character from death than you are welcome to do so without spoiling the story if possible...
This is the way a good dm ties parties together regardless of alignment storylines are key...bravo well executed
I did a similar thing in the last game I ran. My friend wanted to make an Aasymar so I made him the son of the God of the Land and the Goddess of the Sky. The God of Death had prophesised that he would not be able to contain the Lord of Calamity, Torgus, for much longer. So the God of the Land and the Goddess of the Sky made his soul and put it into the body of a human. They handed him off to the Caretaker, a strange being that acted as a go between for the Gods and the material plane. He gave the baby to some monks who would train and raise the child so he could one day stand against the demonic generals of Torgus.
Just. . . wow. This story sounded freaking amazing, I really would've wanted to be there for it. I never thought that backstories of players could've be tied in so amazingly, I only ever thought they were there for the player's benefit to tell them how they got to where they were. I only ever did it once for an Elf Druid of mine, but it wasn't considered for the story, just as I said, how I bumped into that ragtag band of misfits and odd balls.
My DM hasn't done anything like this just yet, but the fact that he used my Tiefling Wizard's Heart of Darkness feature to help make the innkeeper look nicer was such a satisfying touch. Really showed he knew what he was doing
I had a druid who was railroaded by a DM to be the main "thing" for the story, I stopped playing that campaign, I played a cleric who was a keystone for a monster campaign that was fun, and I played a bard who was just kinda there n I felt pretty useless (until I got gauntlets that made it so I took no physical damage on top of my armor that negated magical and elemental damage) my DM slowly tried to corrupt my Bard from NN to CN or NE. The bard was a linguest and knew all the languages aside form druidic but was being taught by a druid.
I had a GM force my noble into a tourney though the PC hated it. I had repeatedly stated my character thought these were foolish and risky games and a waste of resources. We're still cool but I wish he could read the cues and the mood and respect my wishes more.
So first you were annoyed about being the main character so you quit. Then, you play a bard and are annoyed that you aren't important, until you become immune to physical damage. Even though you already had immunity to magical and elemental damage. So those immunities weren't enough. Plus you know every single language, likely including Thieves Cant, and was learning the last, Druidic.
No.
When he said “when did you get taller than me” it felt like a scene from an anime
MAN this made me cry. I don't even know why, I don't usually cry while reading or listening to stories-- I barely even cry in movies unless I really get into it. This was beautiful and devastating all the same.
*All things DND has done a Raid Shadow legends promo.*
They have been captured by the evil dragon that hoards all your money!
This made me teary eyed. I can't even conceive of having such a brilliantly made character arch like this. I loved every minute of it, thank you for making this video and sharing it with us.
This just makes me more excited to write more of my campaign
I already plan to have a session -1 with each player individually, or in small groups depending on where they decide they're from
I also plan on them each having basically a relic from their families that's a legendary item drained of power, and it'll be refilled throughout the campaign
Might submit it if anything interesting happens
Your rogue player who read your comment: "I'm about to derail this entire campaign!"
@@destroyerinazuma96 oh, I fully expect that. It wouldn't be a good campaign if they didn't. Hell, my current group just caused the DM to stop the section we're in because he didn't expect us to touch a teleportation circle into the enemy's main base. He especially didn't expect us to succeed the bluff checks to get a tour.
@@ZariesTheHealadin wow!
@@destroyerinazuma96 it's a good time, we're excited to see what he comes up with, and he's excited to write it.
I love how in dnd the most powerful character can be beaten by anyone if they roll high enough
Omg i teard up during the end, it was so amazing. It's so sad, but the way the story is told is really incredible
Session -1 why did I never think of doing something like that?
I have not had one of these stories make me so emotional since Astoshan. This is fantastic
Wow one of, if not the best stories by far. This DM can twist and tell a story.
Wow best story I’ve heard so far from these videos. A tearjerker
That right there -- that is Exactly what a DM is supposed to be like. Backstory, character development, in-party bonding... they make all the difference.
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This is the 3rd story in 2 weeks that has made me cry. Dam! I wish I had an epic DM like you guys
This story is wonderful! Major kudos to this DM, seriously! All the emotions, oh my god. What an emotional rollercoaster! This would be a great book.
I loved it so much I started crying. These are good videos, keep them coming
I made the mistake of having a reeeally loose Backstory for my elven cleric and now I'm stuck with a crippled Ilithid parasite in my head that I need to get out before I actually turn into one.
I'm never making an unspecific Backstory ever again.
How did that happen
@@asrieldreemurr1988 I actually don't know yet, but it seems my clerics mom was pregnant with her when the Ilithids caught her and implanted a parasite. It was too weak to take my cleric over and the mom died somehow, which is why she was able to grow up normally. His name is Mimo and I dubbed him my brainmate. He gotta eat brain like once a month, but I made him promise not to attack the party. I regularly check up when he gets hungry so I can look out for some douche whose brain I'll snack on. I get the most important memories of the people whose brain I snack. We're working towards getting to the colony he's from and finding a way to get him out. We're not even level 5 yet though, which is why we lost an NPC in the fight against a vampire paladin last session. My DM is crazy but amazing, I love her and I'm scared of her. She threw a Tarrasque at us when we were level 3 or 4. We only survived because my goddess did an emergency teleport, which resulted in my cleric being pronounced dead for like 3 weeks, because she was the last to go. I really hope I can get my group to stream our sessions or get them on UA-cam because they are so crazy.
Mega-Lucario meets Zoroark sounds evil
@@asrieldreemurr1988 I mean it kinda is, but it's OK, I gave her permission to do what she sees fit. Of course it's not what I expected, but that's the fun part about DnD, right? And we could have avoided the Tarrasque if we had just put out the campfire, which we forgot, lol.
I can't wait to play our next campaign to create a rich, beautiful backstory for my new character. I love my character now, as she's my first and even though her background is basic in most ways, my DM has helped fluff it out. He asked all of us to have simpler backgrounds because it was our first characters and i suppose it was easier this way for us and our DM.
I just can't wait to write a unique and rich backstory like this. It made me have real feelings and that's a sign of great storytelling.
Wow! that made me tear up! What a great story telling ability.
Wow I dont think I ever have with this much care and detail for a character
I shed some tears at that "when did you get taller than me?" line... my god that was a masterfully crafted story, I can't even imagine how much emotion the players must have felt.
The fact that some graph paper, some pens, and a little imagination can make you feel like your whole family just died is something truly amazing
I love a story where the main villain is someone who, through their actions, became the very monster they vowed to destroy. This DM wrote that story spectacularly, even allowing the brother a chance to realise what he had become after seeing his brother fall despite his best efforts, and seeing how he was the catalyst of the event he had killed so many to prevent. I'm not gonna lie, my throat tightened up from the suspense when I realised where this might have been going.
This is easily one of the best DnD stories I have ever heard.
[Edit]: Am I the only one who got Revenge of the Sith vibes from this the more I thought about it?
This story changed me so much that I went from lawful evil to chaotic good.
This idea is something I wanna do when I am confident enough to DM a campaign. Go through backstories and tie them into the main story. Beautiful. I cannot wait for something like this to play out. Wish me luck.
CosmicChief13 I had a group of solid noobs aside from two people for my first group, I was one of the two. The second was a guy who just moved back to the states. I ended up as DM. The first two sessions went well, running fortnightly sessions that last six hours, we’ve only had five total sessions this far, with the first one being an S0, but halfway through S0 everyone was done, so I took what I had developed that far to use for the world. Thus far they’ve mostly enjoyed it. Hoping for another session soon
In a game of champions I was playing me and my DM had given me an epic NPC bad guy character who my character thought was killed but was revealed to be alive in one of the first two sessions we played. My character was a super hero speedster and was a pow in the game universe World War 1 and was kind of a high society flyboy turned iron worker as a a career, well the story of my entry to the game universe was willfully ignored by a fellow pc and I being a good player followed my fellow pcs, and so the story my character was to have never happened and so the bbeg my character was to face got stronger, and 6 sessions later as a result of my fellow pcs in action I got to witness a kick ass kidnapping and the start of torture for my character, I loved it as a player cause it was so awesome to see a plot taken the right way and it having real consequences, and my DM was like "look I'm sorry you had to sit a do nothing" I was hamming it up even going so far to rp my characters involuntary twitching due to the comic book even device overloading my speedster nerve impulses. It was so cool, I'm sad the game just died and that character is religated to the dustbin...
I cried and felt my throat pressure up when I heard this conclusion. This is beyond normal storytelling
Wow that was touching and nearly made me cry as it made me think of my younger brother.
Love the passion applied to the craft.
I cry so hard~ Thanks for the perfect story~
I think the line of 'When did you get taller than me' was good. Like all things drama, you need something to lighten the tension a little, but not enough to break immersion or destroy the tone set. I think this did that and accentuated the death looming over them.
Really like the negative one idea. I would if loved to play in that campaign. Ty for sharing, great story line.
This was the BEST one yet!
Now going to play this as a character. Genius .
GOD, what would I give to have THIS guy as my DM! I mean, mine's OK, but this guy is just plain AWESOME!
The Unexpectables is riddled with this level of storytelling
I love how positive the title is!!!
What a fantastic DM! Made me tear up!
This is what DnD is about: happiness, drama, delima, pain and hope. This is great.
This story put on the heart strings of my heart strings What an awesome character story Arc. And conclusion
I had a campaign somewhat like this my character had cursed him self to never feel again in an attempt to save his mother to no avail. Her soul was taken and throughout the campaign he was able to free her and undo his curse.
The curse turned his blood to dust and dried up all of his organs to the point where he was practically undead.
The entity that took his mothers soul had made a deal with him he would take what he values most and she would be spared. He was to much of a coward to take his life so he took away what made him "human" in his eyes hoping it would be enough it wasn't.
This is one of the best stories I’ve ever heard. I wish I could play an epic campaign like this
The DM of a campaign I'm in that starts in a few weeks used some spare time over the past few months to roleplay my (and a few other characters') backstories
(mostly because I created my character back in like January and have been frothing at the mouth to play him as much as possible ever since). I have little idea of what's to come in the main story, but I have been given enough to be deeply excited for whatever it may be. I can only hope it gets this good.
Awesome story. Sitting here waiting to see if my story becomes one of these awesome videos. If it doesn't, oh well. If it does....*silently squee's* Zar Zar is still my favorite character I've ever played and wish to play him again. As soon as I can find another group
Maybe your story is already in queue and will release in April 🙃 there are so many stories, sorry I couldn’t post it sooner.
@@allthingsdnd SQUEEEEEEEEEEEE!!!!!!
I made a session -1 to one of my players. Ea was a Tiefling Fighter who had a medic/war doctor background. Her character started to deal with the struggles pf being an tiefling since a very young age. But then, after commiting crimes she was throwed in the military forces of the realm to learn manners and to respect authority.
She surprisingly tried to do this and for five years she trained and now was finally respected and the looks of hatred she once received were now looks of awe and admiration of her might in battle and kindness to the people she cured during war.
But she had an enemy in the army, at first she tought that the High Elf Fighter (I can't remember the name I gave to this NPC) was plotting to get her out of the Army lines.
*Jumping some years, still in her backstory*
Ea and a fellow Half-Orc Ranger namer Korrak (played by one of the players of the campaign and a DM himself) were given a mission. They should gather a group of soldiers, rangers and whatnot to give chase to a group of 12 orcs in the plains.
It was a really easy mission, the first encounter was a group of goblins that almost killed Ea and Korrak (it is hard to be level 1) but they survived. The second encounter was a spy who was hidden in some bushes but Korrak spotted him with a nat 20 Investigation. This encounter was going to decide if they would attack the orcs man to man in the plains or attack them from the forest.
The 3rd and last encounter was the Orcs.
Since they defeated the spy, the group did not had to care about being called out. As the Orcs approached the rangers and fighters made arrows rain upon the orc group. The orcs started to dash towards the tree line and were faced by Korrak, Ea and some fighters. The fight only lasted 5 rounds. The Orcs who survided killed at least 4 fighters while Ea and Korrak fought bravely shoulder to shoulder.
But finally they were successfull. Yaaay!
And then Ea gathered the injured and started to apply bandages to the captain of the squad when an arrow pierced his throat. His dead body falling limply in her arms.
The rest of the group was the attacked by arrows, leaving Ea and Korrak surrounded by bodies.
From the hills the saw the banners of their Empire and smiled of relief, until they could see the captain of the horsemen was the High Elf NPC. She approached and held them in shackles. One of the horseman dismounted and got their weapons and with them he stabbed every single dead body with Ea's and Korrak's weapons. Planting evidences against them.
Ea and Korrak were them imprisioned for almost a decade until the High Elf NPC was killed and forced by a Zone of Truth Spell to tell all the things she did.
But when this finally occured Ea was completely broken. She left the army, adopted the name Aurora and started to work in small jobs as an adventurer.
This session for her background took almost 6 hours and was mainly two characters and me.
Now the player know exactly what Aurora feels, wants, likes and dislikes.
This was one amazing story. Absolutely epic.
This is the DM I aspire to be with more experience. I'm only on my first campaign, so I've got a long way to go, but holy cow! I really hope I can be that awesome
If a story like this doesn't make the whole part cry like baby's I don't know what would
I had literal chills at the end of this story oh my god
One of the best stories I've heard so far.
Hey where‘s that “and now what you‘re here for“ at 1:09?
I've gotta question
Dude awesome story hook. Feels like it was my long lost brother lol, seriously bad ass sessions, ty for...🤗
How do I submit stories... Because I've got a few, this one reminded me of how Awesome it is when you're feeling more pc than player.
I LOVE THIS CHANNEL!! Onyxia and Oohgie (I know bad spelling) stole my heart. Hands down my favorite of all time is the 4 year old little girl that rp'd with her daddy... That was so amaze balls.
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Wow... This story actually struck me hard. It was so good!
One idea I had for a 2nd edition Pathfinder character is a Hobgoblin Sorcerer with access to the Primal school of magic. His backstory is that his military unit accidentally wandered into the middle of a druidic glade while on patrol, and he was exposed to a very large concentration of Primal magic. The rest of his unit was destroyed by the blast, but he managed to survive the ordeal. He later awakens to quickly discover he now has an inherent affinity for "elf magic" and decides to flee the army in disgrace. In other words, he's a self loathing Sorcerer, who actually hates the fact he has magical abilities!
The storyarc actually reminds me a lot of the Sasuke&Itachi arc from Naruto.
Killed everyone in the place they grew up in (when they deserved it), except his "little brother".
A story full of hatred and the difficulty to find redemption.
Their related physical abnormalities (the white/bony wings vs the Sharingan)
Their fight ending in a almost mutual death.
Ya. I'm surprised no one has caught this.
First thing I thought of too.
Agreed, the moment he said about brothers and how the older brother try to hide his true self to protect his little bro; my mind immediately wondered to Itachi & Sasuke.
Nothing wrong with taking good storylines from other good stories into the own campaign :)
Rutana don’t think anyone is hating on it. Quality DM May have borrowed the framework here clearly made it his own going forward.
Wow I cried.. what a beautiful story.
That DM is amazing! Wish I had a DM like that!
Im not crying, you're crying... Shut up.
Beautiful story and wonderfully role played.
The closest thing i have to this is my character (a rogue) was searching for his family who was kidnapped by an evil lord who holds some significant power. He had been getting close to finding them, and after a couple years of searching started getting small boxes sent to him. Small cut off parts from his family. Our party eventually learned what happened and is trying to help him, and we eventually found out they had been magically hidden and were very far away... As in not on the continent anymore. Our party found the one responsible for the hiding magic amd they tried to flee. Our party gave chase and my character caught up to them first. He tried to play it off like he would ditch his adventure group if he could just know where his family was. Bad guy says no, admits he was the one to hide them and big fight ensues. We win. Thats basically were our story arc ended for now untill our DM has time to write some more.
This is the ultimate version of a DM
my eyes started tearing up I wish to someday be this good
I love the transition to animated photos! The still were amazing but there’s something attracting with the animation. (I know it’s simple but still)