So basically, I think having just 1 background is bland and boring.
So this is my houserule proposal.
Instead of gaining 4 boosts after steps A, B, and C, you can choose up to 3 backgrounds in step B.
You gain the boosts and lore skills from all 3 backgrounds, but you can only pick 1 of the trainings and 1 of the skill feats.
If you choose only 2 backgrounds, you instead gain 2 free boosts in addition to those from your backgrounds.
Likewise, if you only chose 1 background, you gain 4 free boosts instead.
Optionally, you can choose to simply take 6 free boosts, 1 free skill training, and 1 skill feat of your choice. However, this option grants no lore skills at all.
What do You guys think? Any holes in it? Ready to create a Bounty Hunter - Acrobat - Farmhand???
Can I be a Field Medic - Martial Disciple - Warrior?
Triple Warfare Lore ftw!
@Fuzzywuzzy: Hells yeah! lol!
@Reziburno25: I like it! Yeah, that sounds perfect! :D
@Fuzzywuzzy: Absolutely! Lol!
@Reziburno25: Love out! I'll definitely use that!
I have used custom backgrounds already. They still aren't enough for me. That is to say, a single lore skill isn't enough when you consider how much focused knowledge a person can learn growing up.
Even in a medieval setting, a religious monk or noble could potentially have knowledge in a wide variety of subjects.
I've been a little inclined to create a new tier, between Untrained and Trained, called 'Familiar'.
I've considered for instance granting a free 'Familiar' Lore in one's settlement they grew up in and racial/culture they were raised in/by, and potentially, their chosen faith if they have one. IT wouldn't be giving out a full trained skill but would help someone know things you would think they would likely know.
Granted, part of it might simply be solved by saying... If you are from this town, you automatically know, 'such-n-such'. But it would allow one to write something down on your character sheet about knowing about some extra things.
But aside from the lore skills you can achieve “multiple backgrounds” by simply explaining all your boosts in a similar way
So you only have one official background (say scholar) but if you have a boost in con or strength from either the floating ancestry boost or the free boost phase you can say that you got that from being a farmer or labourer as a child making you unusually resilient compared to the base line...
It doesn’t all need to be codified into strict choices
So you average character gets two sets of two boosts right at the end that can easily be reflective of two backgrounds in addition to the one you already have
Then you can houserule 2 extra lore skills if you want as those aren’t gamebreaking
I've been a little inclined to create a new tier, between Untrained and Trained, called 'Familiar'.
I've considered for instance granting a free 'Familiar' Lore in one's settlement they grew up in and racial/culture they were raised in/by, and potentially, their chosen faith if they have one. IT wouldn't be giving out a full trained skill but would help someone know things you would think they would likely know.
Granted, part of it might simply be solved by saying... If you are from this town, you automatically know, 'such-n-such'. But it would allow one to write something down on your character sheet about knowing about some extra things.
I might suggest 'Acquainted' over 'Familiar' just so the latter doesn't have two technical meanings.
I'll also suggest that if you decide you can Earn Income with a Familiar/Acquainted Lore that you get only the Failure column on the Earn Income table, representing that you only know enough to get a pittance no matter how well you do. That also lets you avoid adding another column to the table.
There'll be some other nontrivial mechanical interactions, starting with what happens if you put a skill increase into such a Lore.
I have used custom backgrounds already. They still aren't enough for me. That is to say, a single lore skill isn't enough when you consider how much focused knowledge a person can learn growing up.
Even in a medieval setting, a religious monk or noble could potentially have knowledge in a wide variety of subjects.
The point here is that you are assuming an experienced character to be lvl 1.
Want an character expert it a wide variety of subjects?
How is it supposed to be lvl 1?
How can a 30 years old mage be lvl 1, and then achieve the rest of his stuff in few years?
If you want to start with already experienced characters,consider the possibility to start the campaign at higher lvls.
I'm not assuming anything about a character at level 1 besides what is defined in the rules.
To the best of my knowledge, a level 1 character is at least an adult who has become an adventurer of some sort.
Is there anything I'm missing in that interpretation?
As far as my houserule, all I'm doing is shuffling the 4 free boosts into the Background step and saying you can express them as extra backgrounds with some limits.
This does not make the characters more experienced. They are just more complete people.
You could be creating some confusion about how the ability boosts stack if you don't explain it really carefully. In the original rules, the background stage gives you two boosts out of six, and then there is another stage where you get four boosts out of six. Any scheme for combining them needs to generate equivalent results for balance.
I've been a little inclined to create a new tier, between Untrained and Trained, called 'Familiar'.
I've considered for instance granting a free 'Familiar' Lore in one's settlement they grew up in and racial/culture they were raised in/by, and potentially, their chosen faith if they have one. IT wouldn't be giving out a full trained skill but would help someone know things you would think they would likely know.
Granted, part of it might simply be solved by saying... If you are from this town, you automatically know, 'such-n-such'. But it would allow one to write something down on your character sheet about knowing about some extra things.
I've actually done something similar in a version of Microlite20 that I'm writing that uses a proficiency system like P2e.
I added Versed in between Trained and Expert.Mine is Untrained, Trained, Versed, Expert, Master, Epic, and Mythic.
Epic and Mythic can only be reached after level 20.
You could be creating some confusion about how the ability boosts stack if you don't explain it really carefully. In the original rules, the background stage gives you two boosts out of six, and then there is another stage where you get four boosts out of six. Any scheme for combining them needs to generate equivalent results for balance.
I was actually just thinking about that.
Apply the boosts from your first background as normal.Then apply the other four and treat them like as if they were a separate step.
If the two backgrounds share any specific boosts you combine them into a single set.
For example,
2nd background gives you a choice of STR or DEX.
3rd background gives you a choice of DEX or WIS.
So in this step you instead gain 2 free boosts and 2 boosts of your choice out of STR, DEX, or WIS.
Does that cover all my bases?
Eh.
Maybe you’re looking for more powerful backgrounds?
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Based on what I read, they don't seem to be really wanting it to be more powerful. They are trying to use the same number of boosts, same number of non-lore skills. It was inflating the number of lore skills, but I think those are 'generally' considered weaker skills, although not necessarily always the case. In any case, I think they weren't trying to make it more powerful, just more varied.
They wanted their process and character sheet to reflect they were born into a farming family, who dreamed of becoming a pathfinder (hopeful), that ran away to travel with a circus that was headed to the Absalom.
Technically, a character with this story, with rules as is picks one of the three aspects of their background story as being the 'most important' aspect of their background, and the others mechanically vanish, although may still be part of the story.
The proposal was to make these choices have mechanical meaning without substantially bloating the attributes, normal skills or feats. [the proposal would add 2 lore skills, if I understood correctly, however]
I think I remember someone else recommending splitting the backgrounds in two, picking one of the choice attribute boosts from each backgroud, choosing the feat from one of the backgrounds, and choose a lore skill from two. (I think it was brought up during the playtest, so I don't think they had the training choice in them there, but presumably, it would be a choose one from the two backgrounds) It gave the same number of items, but pulled parts out of two backgrounds, to give someone the feeling that they were pulling from more than one aspect of their past.
Traits used to be a way to provide multiple ways to pull in their past, but I supposed for some it appeared to just be used for mechanical benefit rather than roleplaying purposes. Backgrounds are actually mechanically more significant, but provide only a single 'item/background', rather than being able to potentially tie in two different aspects in a weaker manner.
The loss of traits has bothered me. I'm exited about most of the new rules in general, but the backloading of racial differences and pushing what used to be two traits into a single choice does seem to have lost some customization. That and skills now at first level are either trained or untrained, while before there was a much wider variety, ranging from untrained, to trained, to trained with class bonus, with or without some trait or racial bonuses. So I appreciate the intent. I'm not certain I find it simple enough that people would not likely come out with misunderstandings on what they are supposed to do. Perhaps rewording and examples could help with that, but I'm not completely positive.
I wonder if you allowed the two extra lore skills, but with a caveat that they got less focus and thus take a -2 circumstance penalty for any checks with them as they were neglected some in their studies/work. It complicates things a bit, but might alleviate some people's concerns about giving too many lore skills.
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I had one idea like this a while ago, where I gave people 1x creature Lore and 1x regional Lore by default in addition to their background Lore.
That was meant to lead to more varied, fleshed out characters without everybody just getting fiend, undead and beast lores.
Based on what I read, they don't seem to be really wanting it to be more powerful. They are trying to use the same number of boosts, same number of non-lore skills. It was inflating the number of lore skills, but I think those are 'generally' considered weaker skills, although not necessarily always the case. In any case, I think they weren't trying to make it more powerful, just more varied.
They wanted their process and character sheet to reflect they were born into a farming family, who dreamed of becoming a pathfinder (hopeful), that ran away to travel with a circus that was headed to the Absalom.
Technically, a character with this story, with rules as is picks one of the three aspects of their background story as being the 'most important' aspect of their background, and the others mechanically vanish, although may still be part of the story.
The proposal was to make these choices have mechanical meaning without substantially bloating the attributes, normal skills or feats. [the proposal would add 2 lore skills, if I understood correctly, however]
I think I remember someone else recommending splitting the backgrounds in two, picking one of the choice attribute boosts from each backgroud, choosing the feat from one of the backgrounds, and choose a lore skill from two. (I think it was brought up during the playtest, so I don't think they had the training choice in them there, but presumably, it would be a choose one from the two backgrounds) It gave the same number of items, but pulled parts out of two backgrounds, to give someone the feeling that they were pulling from more than one aspect of their past.
Traits used to be a way to provide multiple ways to pull in their past, but I supposed for some it appeared to just be used for mechanical benefit rather than roleplaying purposes. Backgrounds are actually mechanically more significant, but provide only a single 'item/background', rather than being able to potentially tie in two different aspects in a weaker manner.
The loss of...
Yes! You got my intent perfectly.