You know you’ve done it countless times. You’ve cursed your Dungeon Master, but inside your head so you won’t get deducted points for speaking out of character. Mostly, you may feel ill-equipped in fully fleshing out your wizard or ogre-warrior to the extent that participating in a role-playing game may be a bad experience. But the key term is role-playing and you should be having fun. James D’Amato has thought about the novice and the experienced player and has put together ‘The Ultimate RPG Character Backstory Guide’ to essentially have you be an RPG superstar.
The table of contents alone looks as if they’re snippets for the rules of life. From titles such as ‘Save The Cat’ to ‘Five Things You Packed But Shouldn’t Have’ teaches the reader to examine what identity is their character in the game. Take the chapter ‘Five Fears’ where you have how fear affects not only your mind but parts of your body. It starts with how fear can be used, and more importantly that it’s natural to be afraid. Taking fear into account can make your role-playing character come to life by giving them a sense of humanity and creating interesting gameplay. That’s something only D’Amato has realized and gamers will be the better for it.
Besides the meta-existential meaning discussed in a pragmatic manner, there are worksheets to further improve your role-playing skills. For instance, you may be a wizard from an overpopulated region who has banned magic. There’s a breakdown that forces you to write down and determine who you are and where you’re from. Not only that but what are your influences and how do they affect your decision making. In a sense, you’re creating a tangible history for your character. You’re world building a complete entity whose choices aren’t only controlled by a roll of the dice. That makes for some serious power-moves and maybe a not so happy Dungeon Master. The book is also divided into levels. There’s advice for the beginner, but you know you want to know about the ‘Veteran Heroes,’ especially where there are subtitles like ‘Wed, Bed, or Behead.’ The set of characters listed would make for some intriguing stories, further developing the game within the game. If you wed the butcher, bed the head of the thieves’ guild and behead the lich king think of the storyline possibilities.
James D’Amato has done something special with his new book ‘The Ultimate RPG Character Backstory Guide.’ It’s akin to a graduate school course in role-playing games. Now when you build your character you’ll have a running background narrative to rely on. And perhaps your four foot Ork won’t get killed by tripping over their six-foot sword and busting their head on a rock.
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