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Not sure if you are responding to my post...
Absolutely not CZ, it was just my piece on the topic in general and wasn't aimed at anyone in particular. I also didn't mean to seem nearly as fiery as I think the comment came across either, you don't need to worry about defending yourself here, after all, your perspective is just as valid as my own.
I usually follow this list: https://www.reddit.com/r/DMAcademy/comments/4y9zit/how_do_i_develop_persona l_plotlines_for_my/d6mej6u/
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I think it also needs to match the intended campaign. The whole knives and spoons thing... I think most of that would just be DOA in a typical AP. The typical Paizo AP is written by six authors that loosely communicate through some editorial staff and have no clairvoyant ability to know anything about your character's specific backstory. So everything written in the book is very focused on THAT story, not on YOUR story.
Next, if you have any ambition of actually making it to the end of that ride, you kinda need to focus on that main storyline and where you're supposed to go, so there's only so much bandwidth to delve into individual characters. Add to that that APs get picked up by GMs who are either (1) new and want to stick to the material (2) too busy to homebrew their own and want to stick to the material or (3) the group wants to do the OG version of the AP and stick a lot to the material...
And you see why I don't think this knives forks thing is really brilliant for APs. It's nice if you want a very character-centered campaign, not so great if you want to do a very story-centered campaign. Neither of those is inherently better or worse, but techniques and backgrounds can work better or worse with them.
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I like to think out what they are, what they do, and one or two formative experiences or circumstances that had the greatest affect on their character. I havnt played this yet, but I want to make a dhampir necromancer. His father was estranged and he lived in his mother's estate until she died of old age; the sight of her withered and terrified of the end shook him to the point where he now wants to study different methods of immortality. A little callous and a bit of a tongue in cheek attitude that obfuscates the emotional core of a scared child. Stuff like that. So right there, I normally have my characters done in a paragraph or so. The rest can develop on the table.
I've got a variety of background depths in my AoA campaign. A half Elf Cleric of Shelyn, from a one night stand an Elf who came for the Call for Heroes had with a member of the Posandi family, buying in to local lore, a Paladin of Shelyn fleeing Westcrown from my player who knows least about Golarion. The 4 sentences he gave me seem to be going very well. A human Changeling Fighter, returning grandson of Renatta Gilroy - from a player who wanted a simple start to the campaign with a character that felt like an outsider. But then I've also got the ancient Elf sorcerer (rogue) with a three page background giving about 200 years worth of events!
Most of my players wanted to see how the campaign would start to play out before developing their back stories. It means I get to personalise more as they become more comfortable in their characters.
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This is a problem I've seen not just in TTRPG's but pretty much all sorts of fiction from anime to videogames or fantasy novels and which I've started referring to as the 'Gimmick problem.' Basically someone comes up with one super original idea, but the rest just feels lackluster and like it's only interesting because of that one 'gimmick'.
I can't tell you how often someone recommends me an anime because "it has this super interesting power system!" or some novel "because of how amazing the world building is!" Only for me to find the most generic plot and boring characters and give up on it.
I don't think this is the biggest deal in TTRPG's because everyone kind of plays for their own reasons and it's not a job, but this gimmick burnout I've been having has definitely lead my last few characters to be very generic concepts, (I used try to play the weirdest/most interesting characters I could think of) that I focus on sculpting through actual play.
People have a tendency to complain about one note characters and gimmick ones in their media, but often will fail to realize that they're doing the same thing with their gimmicky character.
A quirky and unusual mix of class, ancestry and background will only get so far. Characters need some depth and layers in order to feel interesting throughout the course of longer campaigns.
Having a richer backstory will help one to inform their behavior on the table, that's why it's advisable to write the most important aspects of your character's personality. Beyond the simple "likes/dislikes" of shallow stuff, those things we can come up easily on the fly, but, for example, deep resentment of authorities, fear of being left behind, abandonment issues, hatred for those that accept bargains (one of my characters had that) is something that it's far harder to come up on the fly and without a basis to build from.
I can't tell you how often someone recommends me an anime because "it has this super interesting power system!" or some novel "because of how amazing the world building is!" Only for me to find the most generic plot and boring characters and give up on it.
Couldn't agree more. People that only watch anime have a very narrow perspective on quality, given that the vast majority of anime lacks, sometimes severely, in various aspects, while offering in return just flashy fights that capture the attention.
Take Jujutsu Kaisen, for example, the main character is a straight up Mary Sue that gains huge power ups by 20 seconds pep talks in the middle of a battle and the character was still on the running up for Best Protagonist of the Year in some anime award shows. Beyond absurd.
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Well, when it comes to anime, one of the bigger factors to this is how anime seasons work now. Most shows that actually go through are rarely given more than 12, 20ish miniute after taking out ads, episodes, so they dont really have a lot of time to tell the story, build a world, and flesh out characters.
I've noticed that, in many cases, ttrpgs can fall into a similar pitfalls, for similar reasons. Limited time, or even just the perception of it, can sometimes cause people to distill their character down to a handful of gimmicks.
For example, in the game I run, I had a couple people rely on gimmicks because I've only got 4-5 hours every other week to play a game with 6 players. With 2 combats per session, a lot of my players didn't feel like they had enough time to feel comfortable wanting to do roleplay scenes, and thus mostly what they played up was a couple gimmicks of their character. Initially, I did this because it seemed like the players wanted a fast plot to make up for the lack of time, but when I did an experiment and tried slowing down story progression to make more room for roleplay, the players loved it.
Since I started adopting my new pace, my PCs started getting a lot of added depth; the fortune teller finally got to show off how isolated her supernatural knowledge made her, to the point where her first instinct when meeting an npc who understood her plight was basically to cuddle her. The half drow who sought vengence on lolth for enslaving her people got to show that her hatred for being manipulated was greater than her vengence, and when a shadow demon hopped into her body and tried tempting her into a deal, she trapped it inside her body so she could take it to an exorcist, and tormented it the whole way. The merciful and kind Sarenrae priestess ended up showing off some battle zeal when some rp research showed that the big bad's minions where basically psychic phantoms that are vulnerable to her positive energy spells the same way undead are, and when I had her assist in the exorcism listed above, she found a love of using her magic in all sorts of ways that extended beyond just restoring hp damage. I've got more, but that kinda gets the point across that if you make more time for characters to act, they're less likely to be one dimensional.
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I've noticed that, in many cases, ttrpgs can fall into a similar pitfalls, for similar reasons. Limited time, or even just the perception of it, can sometimes cause people to distill their character down to a handful of gimmicks.
Semi-related, I'm slightly worried about how the "One Shot" line, developed as a direct response to podcasting, will go.
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I've noticed that, in many cases, ttrpgs can fall into a similar pitfalls, for similar reasons. Limited time, or even just the perception of it, can sometimes cause people to distill their character down to a handful of gimmicks.Semi-related, I'm slightly worried about how the "One Shot" line, developed as a direct response to podcasting, will go.
With most one shots I've ran, or short games, people did tend to make more silly characters, though I don't mind; most of the time when I do a one shot, it's for the prupose of trying stuff out that epuld ve fun, but hard to base a whole campaign around, like a Monster Hunter game, or an ocean's 11 style heist
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I think gimmicky characters have their place. Especially in a format such as online PFS where you're probably playing with total strangers a lot of the time, it's a GOOD thing if you need only 1 minute to give enough of an introduction of your character to get the ball rolling.
That doesn't precisely mean that your character really should be no more than 1 minute deep; but you need to be able to deliver an elevator pitch.
I think also for these formats it's better to have a character that's happening more "on the surface" where other players can see what's going on, with visible behaviors, reactions, likes and dislikes. The opposite, a character with a deep and mysterious backstory that the other players never find out anything about... it just doesn't do anything in a campaign like that.
So that's not exactly the same as defining your character by a gimmick, but it's also not miles apart. It's just that the gimmick doesn't have to be an exotic ancestry, it can also be a particular behavior or tactic.
The Abomination Vaults group I'm playing in, I feel is handling this very well. We chose to do a bit of a Goonies theme (which is admittedly a bit out of place for most of the content of the AP). But we have a group of generally younger teenagers from the local town. Nothing too 'unique' about them. No involved backstories, just a couple of connections to our local families. Sure it(being younger/attached to notable familes around town) makes things bit harder for the GM at times, and while we talk about being grounded a lot for all our exploring, it doesn't end-up directly impacting the AP.
I'm playing the nerdy, awkward type(modelled a bit on the Wensleydale character from the TV adaption of Good Omens); hero-worship the two older boys in the party (who are also the front-liners). A bit impulsive at times (if there's a book/scroll/any writing, my character is probably running ahead); they've learned to grab me to stop that impulse. But he's also saved the day on at least three of the almost TPK fights, so he has the party's respect even if he causes problems other times.
The characters had an easy personality to get into -- we generally tried to all play human (one went with a versatile heritage, one went halfing). So RPing as younger boys is not a major stretch for anyone in the group. But people are letting early experiences shape their characters -- the fighter spent three fights missing with his weapon, goes back to town, and buys a different weapon. (Changing from a two-handed weapon to a sword and shield). The players know it was pure bad luck, its not like the math changed, but it grows the story.
The whole group is great about playing along with bad recall knowledge checks; the GM is also great about feeding us stuff that our characters would believe anyways.