Why is the Family Friend background a trap option?

[Colette Brunel]

In Doomsday Dawn's parts #1, #4, and #7, there are absolutely no nobles to be found anywhere outside of the low-stakes mission briefing sequences. Similarly, there are no opportunities whatsoever to use Diplomacy (Gather Information), which is a downtime action.

Why, then, does one of the backgrounds tailor-made for those three parts, Family Friend, grant training in Nobility Lore and the Hobnobber feat? The skill and the feat are totally useless throughout the three parts, so why is the adventure even offering this background? It is a trap option, plain and simple.

[Tamago]

It gives the PC a connection to Keleri Deverin, which gets them on board with the first adventure.

That said, it does seem like it would never come up after page 2 of the module.

[jerenda]

Yeah... that's terrible, because it's assumed that every PC has a connection to Keleri and regardless of your background, you get involved in the first adventure. Otherwise, the adventure doesn't go.

I will advise my players against picking this background. Thanks for pointing this out, Colette!

[Shisumo]

Much the same can be said about Pathfinder Hopeful, which gives what is arguably the worst Skill Feat in the game and links the PC to an organization with no actual role in the adventure.

That said, Backgrounds aren't really supposed to be power choices to begin with. Labeling one of them a "trap" choice seems unnecessarily derisive.

[pauljathome]

I suspect that some GMs will use the existing module as the framework and will add their own adventures into the mix. Maybe not so much in the 5 months of the playtest (although I'm certain some groups will manage) but later on.

But Shisumo got it right. In a lot of backgrounds at least 1 of the Skill feat and knowledge skill are pretty darn marginal at best. The backgrounds are far more about creating a well rounded character with some actual history than they are about numbers

[Colette Brunel]

Shisumo wrote:

Much the same can be said about Pathfinder Hopeful, which gives what is arguably the worst Skill Feat in the game and links the PC to an organization with no actual role in the adventure.

That said, Backgrounds aren't really supposed to be power choices to begin with. Labeling one of them a "trap" choice seems unnecessarily derisive.

Players should not be mechanically punished for their background choices. There is no reason why a flavorful option cannot also be mechanically useful.

For example, the Esoteric Scion is a fairly useful background, because Quick Identification cuts down the awful one-hour identification time to merely ten minutes.

[jerenda]

My players were pretty excited about Family Friend and Pathfinder Hopeful for flavor reasons, so I opted to swap out the not-useful abilities with useful ones.

Pathfinder Hopeful:
Pathfinder Society Lore -> Esoteric Order Lore. That seems pretty obvious to me.

Family Friend:
Hobnobber feat -> Skill Focus (Diplomacy)
Nobility Lore -> Some other kind of Lore, TBD. I'm trying to convince them to take History Lore since this whole campaign is about ancient old stuff but they don't seem to think that's a valid option.

Mind Quake Survivor
I'm running Dubious Knowledge as Insane Ramblings instead. I'm not sure I can come up with convincing false knowledge all the time, and given what I've been reading about mind quakes, I'm not entirely convinced you can have one and not turn evil. I'm reserving the right to give him creepy deranged ramblings about whatever he's rolling on, which may or may not have any bearing in reality and he can interpret however the heck he wants. I think this follows the theme while being easier on me.