The importance of a character background

Your character’s background is something that will follow your character and influence the way it acts. Therefore, it is important that you have a solid background already thought out for your character.

The number one thing to remember when writing a background for your character is to keep it believable. Nothing can cause so many problems further on than a background that is unbelievable. The background defines your character. Just like in real life where our education and experience makes up much of who we are as a person, your characters background defines how to play your character.

One of the most disturbing things in a background is when the character has already saved the world twice before even graduating. Okay, maybe that was a bit too exaggerated but you get the point. This “hero syndrome” creates characters that are unrealistic and extremely hard to play. If you are going to have fun posting, you need to meet challenges and conflicts. A character that breezes through everything without problems simply is not fun to post for.

The thing to remember is to write your background so that you do not limit the possibilities for posts and storylines. For example; unless you have a very specific reason, you should keep as many of the character’s parents and relatives alive in the background. You never know when you are going through a dry-spell (posting-wise, that is) and need to make a filler post. Perhaps you need a way to give your character more depth, explain the character’s feelings or past. Then it is always good to have a lot of supporting characters for your character’s background available to use. For example to write a letter to, visit or just happen to run into.