Forums of the Megaverse®

When determining a charaters back ground the most important
thing is to make sure that the charater flows organically.

First what OCC is the charater?
A mage should have a differnt mindset then an Experment.

Next is personality what does the charater like what does he
belive in. Personality is important and it could and probally should
influance what powers the charater chooses.

Finally motivation why does the charater put his butt on the line.

Once you have these three concepts everything else should flow
organically.

The player and I generally work it out between us, as he will generally have an idea how he wants the character to have come about and I will have a story set and try to work it in. Often the character background/origin will get worked into the first few sessions if they are established as being new to their powers...

IMO, the hardest part of character creation is the background. The numbers and to a lesser extent the concept are easy, but the "Why is this guy an adventurer?" part is hard to do correctly. Usually, with a lot of campaigns they are pretty much mass murderers with a larcenous streak...well, that's not very heroic. A lot of times they will justify it as saving humanity, well that just makes them genocidal (Kill the orks, kill the elves, kill whoever you want to as long as you can justify it) theives.

It is much, much harder to make a Hero in a superheroic game because so many of the tried and true methods (slave, vengeance, become the king, fulfill the prophecy) of making a PC just don't work. In essence, a superhero is not about powers, abilities or even vision for a better world. The essence of a Hero in these games is someone who sees a need to DO something and instead of just ***** about it or waiting for social change or others to do something, they decide to do it themselves.

That is what these heroes are, people (or at least psychologically similar enough to humans) who have decided to make something happen. HOW they make this happen is what makes them heroes or villains and the powers are really just tools to speed up the process.

Just my thoughts, although a bit rambling. I hope that helps...

-STS