Darren and Michelle: Background

[GM Craig]

If you guys are going to be Norse, just confirm here and we can get started.

Begin with a 1d6 for what region you guys are from, then 1d20 for where specifically you come from. If you guys are related, you can both use the same roll.

Then I need 1d20 for your father's class. This will determine your character's starting skill adjustments.

I also need 1d6 from each of you for birth order.

[Arne]

Okay, I'm up and running.   

Regrettably, I haven't had much of a chance to run through the Land of Giants supplement yet, but I have a good idea in my mind of what Arne (my PC) is like.  Michelle and I are going to be playing blood-siblings (ie. blood-brother and sister), and we liked the idea that we were exiled.  Here's the basics of our exile that I proposed to her:

Here's an idea that I had.  Tension between two strong families.  You were being subtly pressured to marry a son from the other family, but the guy was a d-bag, and you and I both knew it.  Despite the fact that a marriage could strengthen the bond between our family and the other, you couldn't go through with it 'cause you hated the guy.  And after his last unwelcome advance (I was there as your escort, and one of his kinsmen was with him), you very bluntly told him what you thought of him.
 
That really torqued him off, and his true ugliness came out.  He belted you, and before I could act, you stuck him with a knife.  His kinsman went after you, and I killed him.  So now your "paramour" is dead by your hand, and his kinsman by mine.  Bad blood now, and the situation was explained to both families, who nearly went to war over what happened.  Our dad came up with a solution to avoid a war.  Have us instead of executing us or going to war.  The other chieftain (or family head) reluctantly agreed to this.
 

[GM Craig]

OK, we can keep working the background. There's definite potential there.

To begin, here's what I need:

Roll 1d20 for your father's class. This will determine your character's starting skill adjustments.

Roll 1d6 from each of you for birth order.

[GM Craig]

Here's an idea that I had.  Tension between two strong families.  You were being subtly pressured to marry a son from the other family, but the guy was a d-bag, and you and I both knew it.  Despite the fact that a marriage could strengthen the bond between our family and the other, you couldn't go through with it 'cause you hated the guy.  And after his last unwelcome advance (I was there as your escort, and one of his kinsmen was with him), you very bluntly told him what you thought of him.
 
That really torqued him off, and his true ugliness came out.  He belted you, and before I could act, you stuck him with a knife.  His kinsman went after you, and I killed him.  So now your "paramour" is dead by your hand, and his kinsman by mine.  Bad blood now, and the situation was explained to both families, who nearly went to war over what happened.  Our dad came up with a solution to avoid a war.  Have us instead of executing us or going to war.  The other chieftain (or family head) reluctantly agreed to this.

That might work, but why send you to Logres? You could have fostered with another norse family, gone to Denmark or one of the far northern kingdoms.

I think we need something more dramatic. Maybe the incident sparked a blood feud with a powerful family, and you guys went into exile to spare your family retribution? There needs to be a reason why you went to a foreign land.

If the family is still around, you probably have a few servants and guards with you, but we'll work that out later.

[Arne]

Wow.     Umm, the first roll might change the back story somewhat . . .


Arne's father's class (1d20):  1

Arne's birth order (1d6):  3

[Valka]

Pfft, figures Anyway, Craig had other suggestions (before your roll):

But I was also thinking, it makes live easier for me if you guys dislike Saxons. So, maybe the guy was a coward and rather than face you himself, hired Saxon mercenaries to attack you. Sink ships? Burn the family home? And the antagonist may be known, or not know, but he acted from the shadows, which gives reason for your exile. Hard to face an enemy that chooses to be a coward and not face you openly. Northmen do not fear death, so if you had an open enemy, there's little reason the family wold not throw themselves at him. Ragnarok and all that gives them a "carpe diem" view of life. ☺But one who chose the coward's path - a hidden enemy, that might drive you into Exile.

Michelle- Birth order
1d6
6

[Arne]

Pfft, figures Anyway, Craig had other suggestions (before your roll):

But I was also thinking, it makes live easier for me if you guys dislike Saxons. So, maybe the guy was a coward and rather than face you himself, hired Saxon mercenaries to attack you. Sink ships? Burn the family home? And the antagonist may be known, or not know, but he acted from the shadows, which gives reason for your exile. Hard to face an enemy that chooses to be a coward and not face you openly. Northmen do not fear death, so if you had an open enemy, there's little reason the family wold not throw themselves at him. Ragnarok and all that gives them a "carpe diem" view of life. ☺But one who chose the coward's path - a hidden enemy, that might drive you into Exile.

Hmmmm . . . that does sound cool.  Yeah.  But would our exile stop the antagonist from continuing to take it out on our family back home?  Possibly, if he's completely obsesessed with the two of us.  I can't see him as the chieftain of the other family, 'cause it would be kind of hard for him to go into hiding.  And it would still give our dad a legitimate reason to go after his family.  Maybe the antagonist is the brother (or close relative) of the other chieftain?  What if the antagonist wouldn't let the death of his son go, and chose to lash out at our family (ie. hired the Saxons to attack our ships/farmsteads)?  Then the other chieftain found out, was outraged at his brother/cousin's actions (how dare he defy his chieftain's orders and risk a war that wasn't wanted!), and decided to execute/exile him - only to find out his brother (or close relative) was forewarned, and chose to go into hiding with his family. 

So, I'm thinking that our antagonist's name is known to us, but we don't know where he is.  And he still has money and power to cause trouble.  Maybe he's actually doing this with covert help from the other family's chieftain!  Anyway, we decided that since we have no idea where the antagonist is - and seeing that he's fixated on us - we'd best leave our home so that our family isn't harassed anymore.  And maybe our leaving will make the antagonist careless and expose himself in his desire to track us down.

[GM Craig]

So the plot thickens a little.

Darren is the third son of your tribal chieftain, but that only really sets the stage for your skills. I'll explain more below.

For your backgrounds, there are some required elements I need to see:

1. A strong reason for the two of you to leave your homeland: Maybe you were exiled. Maybe you were framed, or actually guilty of a crime against the tribe, knowingly or not. Maybe the tribe no longer exists? Maybe the designated heir of the tribe was killed? Lots of options there, but I think this has to include your family - otherwise the family would find some place safe for you to be.

2. Something that prevents the two of you returning at this time: There needs to be a reason why you could not seek refuge somewhere else, like Hrothgar's kingdom in Denmark or one of the northern Northman kingdoms. Something must be keeping you from taking that option. Maybe one of you has earned the name kinslayer, one of the highest crimes the Northmen know. Maybe one of you has been declared traitor, and as word spreads you would find no welcome among norse tribes or kingdoms.

3. Some reason for you to strongly dislike Saxons: This game is about Cymric knights, and much of the campaign hinges on the struggle between the Cymru and the Saxons. It would be a lot easier for me if you guys have a strong dislike of Saxons. Maybe your family made arrangements for you to have shelter among the Saxons, but when you arrived they turned on you? Maybe the reason for the exile was actually higher than the two of you, and when the Saxons attacked, the  true exile was captured or killed, and you guys managed to survive? Maybe you two and a few followers are the only ones who survived a shipwreck when the Saxons intercepted you? I need this to better incorporate you into the campaign. For example, your hatred of saxons would lead you to seek out their major enemy, the Cymru of Logres, and possibly take service with one of their lords.

Perhaps treason (real or imagined) against your king, King Wald of Ostland, precipitated this event? Maybe Michelle was accused, and her good friend forsook his family and came with her into exile? Maybe Darren was accused, and Michelle followed her friend into exile? Maybe it was someone else, and misfortune struck and the two of you are now on your own (possibly with a small number of followers). Maybe there was a true crime, maybe a false-witness crime? Maybe the tribe was destroyed and you fled - not out of fear, but ti unmask the coward and seek revenge?

I'm not telling you what to write, I'm just suggesting things for inspirational purposes.

In the end, your characters are going to be incredible in Arthurian England, and incredible characters demand incredible backgrounds.

I'm also not too concerned with what the parent rolls and such suggest. Darren's father may well have been a cheiftain, but maybe he died decades ago, and Darren now makes his way as a thrall or common warrior? There is no hereditary right among the northmen. Each man and woman earns his place, so the fact that Darren's father was chief of the tribe sets the tone for some of his stills and his legacy, but it does not determine who Darren is. He could still be a family servant or family friend to Michelle's character. So however you guys want your relationship to be, that's how it is. Among the men of the north, fortunes rise and fall like the tide.

So, let's continue the discussion, but keep in mind the essential elements I'm going to want to see in your shared background.

Darren, I'm going to shift your character development mechanics to a different thread, so we keep this one for the background.

[Arne]

1)  I'm thinking we were exiled, but not out of disgrace.  There's still tension between the two tribes, and we're not entirely certain that the other tribe's chieftain is actually supporting the brother/relative that went into hiding.  It turns out that one of the two men killed (either Michelle's character's paramour, or his escort that Arne killed) was the designated heir.  Also, I'm thinking that other tribes are watching and waiting on the sidelines to see how things play out.  They might even be encouraging a fight between our two families. 

2)  Michelle and I can't return right now because things are way too tense in our homeland.  Also, we fled to England because another Northern tribe (or Denmark) harboring us might be seen as our benefactor favoring our tribe over the other one, which could cause friction and escalate matters (ie. other tribes starting to take sides and encouraging open war) back home.

3)  Saxons . . . saxons . . . well, maybe Arne has no love for foreigners meddling in Norse affairs, and matters were made worse when the antagonist used Saxon mercenaries to attack our tribe's ships and farmsteads.  He may have also noticed that some of the other tribes - in particular, the tribes that seem to be supporting the one the antagonist came from - have also hired/used Saxon mercs.  And he's also heard rumors that Saxon mercs have been known to turn on their employers if they think said employer isn't strong enough to repel them.



Too vague/weak?  I'd appreciate feedback/other ideas from both Craig and Michelle on this.

[GM Craig]

I think the paramour angle is a little weak compared to the motivation of going into exile.

Also, Northmen do not fear death (Ragnarok being their pervasive myth) so they'd quite happily throw themselves at an unbeatable foe to die a glorious death. I think having a coward enemy who strikes from the shadows rather than openly makes a stronger case. If your enemy is unknown and refuses to show himself, that makes a stronger case for self-imposed exile, but there's lots of room there to manoeuvre.

Family is very strong for Northmen, so given the above paragraph, I cannot see any family willingly exiling their children, unless the crime or affront was against the family directly. The easiest ways to resolve that is if the crime was against the family directly, or the family does not exist anymore as a cohesive unit. Those are perhaps the easiest, but there are other ways to resolve that conflict.

No northman is going to exile a child of theirs without a damn good reason.

But maybe they did have a damn good reason, and made arrangements for you to find refuge with the Saxons of Southern Britain? Only instead of offering refuge, they attacked? That's an angle that gives the hate of saxons, but you'd need to resolve the fact that your family exists but you cannot return to them somehow.

Hope that's food for thought.

[Arne]

Okay, then we'll work with an unseen enemy.  Would it just be easier to trash the whole "Arne and his sister killed two guys from another family" premise?"  I really don't know how to tie everything together here at this moment, and I'd rather avoid having us exiled out of disgrace (but that's just my opinion).

[GM Craig]

We're getting a little ahead of Michelle. I'm going to wait for her to chime in.

[Arne]

No problem.  I did find a different take that would account for a legitimate exile, though.  Going back to the "paramour" angle if I may . . . maybe he insulted Arne's sister, and she wounded him with a dagger instead of killing him.  Both Arne and the paramour's kin quickly stepped in to intervene. A bit of a tussle ensued, but others stepped in to stop the fight from escalating.  As both sides left, Arne and his sister told the "paramour" and his kin that they'd kill them if he saw them again.

Mistake.  Everyone heard that.

The enemy in the shadows took advantage of that, and had the paramour and his kin killed.  Guess who takes the blame for that? Two possible reasons for this that I can see:  1)  The unseen enemy wanted to get rid of the heir-designate from the other tribe (either the paramour or his kin), and we provided him with the perfect scapegoats, and/or B)  The unseen enemy wanted our two tribes to go to war (for whatever reason).

Would that be cause enough for our tribe to exile us?  Or would Arne and his sister actually have been justified in tracking down and killing those two for what happened (ie. as the set-up was staged)?

So . . . if that actually works (and is approved by all),  I guess the next thing is to explain why Arne and his sister went to England of all places - and how their hatred of the Saxons come into this.

[GM Craig]

I wanted to wait for Michelle, but she's busy with family today and I'm impatient.

From what I know and have read of Norse culture (in the context of this rules expansion), if someone says, "If I see you again, you're dead!" and having the second person end up dead would normally be met with shrugs by most folk, knowing nods from allies and grudging respect from enemies. An heir who gets himself killed has been proved to be a poor heir.

There's ways to twist that, of course - if the killing were witnessed and done in a cowardly way, that could cause disgrace, and the family may have banished you to remove the taint of it. But the evidence would have to be extremely compelling. Hearsay would not suffice. The Chied

No, if your father is still alive, I think the only way you get banished is if the crime (real or falsified) was against the tribe itself, or your father directly. The evidence would have to be pretty compelling.

[Valka]

I want to avoid exile out of disgrace. Voluntary exile is fine. Im okay with an attack on the family+, burning our lands, homes, our ships. An unseen enemy is intriguing. And apparently intrigue is what my family is known for? But the reasons they attacked us and caused us specifically to leave (revenge for what?) is what I cannot come up with, but I have been celebrating a little hardy