Tolkienian Science Fantasy - Replacing the PC Species

Recently, Trey of From the Sorcerer's Skull proposed a worldbuilding concept that interested me. How would it change the game to replace the species available to the player characters?

Trey first proposed imaging a fantasy setting without elves, dwarves, or hobbits, but featuring the species from TSR's Star Frontiers setting - the insect-like Vrusk, amoeba-like Dralasite, and flying-monkey-like Yazirians.

Later, he suggested a pulp scifi campaign using the same species, set entirely within the Solar System. (Trey has a bit of a cottage industry reimagining interstellar scifi as 1930s-style pulp confined to just our one star system. In addition to the Solar Frontiers I just mentioned, he's briefly written about Solar Wars, and he has a whole series of posts about Solar Trek.)

  

  

Elf Replacements - Vulcan, Talosian, Minbari

 

I want to build on his original suggestion though, and try some worldbuilding that stays relatively close to D&D's world, populated with Tolkien's heroes and monsters, just with, you know, different heroes, and different monsters.

We know that constraint encourages creativity, and I think that's especially true of worldbuilding. By limiting yourself to a small number of component parts, you can create a compact, thematic setting that's uniquely your own. Look at the 10 Monster Setting, or the 7 Class Setting, or the New New Crobuzon Challenge - they're all worldbuilding prompts that encourage you to select a small number of components and use them as the basis for a fantasy world.

 

If your handful of seedlings are particularly weird, so will be the garden that grows from them. The downside of that is that you can end up with a setting that's so weird that it doesn't really make sense to other people, and maybe not even to yourself. And obviously, actually running a campaign like this requires securing enough player buy-in beforehand, since their options for possible characters are radically restricted compared to a more open setting.

(Alternately, if you wanted, you could spend your Session Zero letting each player pick out their bespoke species and occupation combo, and then working together to imagine what sort of world it must be if those particular sorts of characters are a totally typical, run-of-the-mill adventuring team.)

  

  

Dwarf Replacements - Klingon, Narn, Rigelian

  

A variation on this kind of prompt would be to try to make your own "French Vanilla" setting. By that, I mean a setting that mostly draws on the tropes of vanilla fantasy, but is specific enough to be uniquely your own, the kind of thing Trey writes about here. And as both Trey and Jack from Tales of the Grotesque & Dungeonesque have argued, vanilla fantasy is, almost by definition, something that is understood by almost all potential players, something that essentially generates its own buy-in because its expectations are so clear. Done well, french vanilla might give you the best of both worlds - enough familiarity to form a solid basis for a shared fantasy gameworld, but enough difference to make something that's personal and interesting.

(I had some success with this in a campaign where I offered my players a handful of classes - human fighters, thieves, and wizards, plus "venturers" who are basically adventuring capitalists, or like, white collar thieves; elven druids and "courtiers", another variety of legit thieves; and dwarven roboticists and tomb robbers, who are, you know, basically more thieves. My players seemed content with the assortment, and I felt like I had established a strong sense of what sort of people go adventuring in that setting.)

What I've called the "Non-Core" is one source for a french vanilla setting. The non-core is made up the kinds of ideas that don't usually make it into the core rules of most fantasy games, but do usually appear in the first batch of expanded content. 

 

Imagine the sort of setting you end up with if you replace elves, dwarves, and hobbits with drow, duergar, and svirfneblin? Instantly you have a darker and spookier campaign setting, and one will make extensive use of the Underdark as a location. 

 

Or what if you used only the species that got added when OD&D expanded to become AD&D? What if you had only half-elves, half-orcs, and gnomes? Unlike the "good fey" of a straight Tolkienian game, this settings imply that humans deal with the Unseelie Court as often as the Seelie, and that full-blooded elves are, in their own way, as monstrous as orcs, and both are ineligible as player characters.

Restrict yourself to just "new school" creature types like tieflings, dragonborn, and goblins, and while Old School players might grumble about the loss of elves, the younger generation of Critical Role and Adventure Zone fans might not even notice the restriction - or if they did, they might be more upset by the loss of aasimar and genasi than of hobbits and dwarves.

In a variation on Trey's initial idea to use the species from Star Frontiers, you could also borrow the playable species from TSR's Alternity game - the psychic Fraal, cybernetic Mechalus, bat-like Sesheyan, fringed lizard Tsa, and bestial Weren. 

(One advantage of using totally alien species like these is that it lets you get away from an effect you sometimes see with the standard demi-humans, where each represents a different extreme, with humans like Goldilocks in the middle, defined by our flexibility and moderation. I suspect but I don't know, that Tolkien intended his elves to seem French and his dwarves German, one overly artistic and cultural and the other too industrial and militaristic compared to the "just right" modern middle-class British hobbits and medieval British humans. Though for all I know, old JRR could have been taking potshots at the Irish and Scottish, or maybe I'm imagining chauvinism where none exists. In other people's writing, I think I sometimes see elves, dwarves, and hobbits as representing feminine, masculine, and childlike qualities. This is fine if you want it, though it always contains some embedded assumptions about what humans are "supposed" to be like, which others might find objectionable. Scifi species potentially give you the chance to make humans just one species among several, rather than the center of Creation.)

  

  

Hobbit Replacements - Ferengi, Orion, Centauri

 

But suppose for now that we want to stick fairly closely to the Tolkienian archetypes, but use alien species to create a kind of science fantasy french vanilla. Still unquestionably D&D, still built on familiar tropes, but with enough a difference to make this campaign feel special. For each species being replaced, I have a suggestion from regular Star Trek, from Babylon 5, and from the original Star Trek pilot episode "The Cage".

 

Elf Replacements - The alternate elves I've chosen here all reflect a vision of elves as "human, but better". I could write a whole post - and who knows, maybe sometime I will - about how fundamentally weird it seems to me that there's a widespread belief reflected in science fiction, everything from pre-Golden Age pulp stories to Star Wars and The Matrix suggesting that human perfection, whether it comes on a species level through evolution or individually through enlightenment, looks like an emotionless ascetic in a monochrome outfit, living in a harsh environment, spending all their time meditating for mental discipline and learning to fight real good.

Vulcans - The Vulcan homeworld is a harsh desert with habitation concentrated around the few oases. Both as individuals and a society, they used to be very passionate and emotionally-driven. At some point in their past, they adopted en masse a philosophy of logic, asceticism, and emotional self-control. The lawful Vulcans have a counterpart in the chaotic Romulans - who are the same biological species, but a different society, one that split off from the other Vulcans before the adopted their new philosophy (or perhaps as a rejection of it?) Vulcans famously have the the abilities to perform a Nerve Pinch that can stun most humanoids, and a Mind Meld that allows them to share thoughts and memories.

Minbari - Minbari society is divided into three castes - warriors, workers, and religious. They value honor and tradition, formal rituals and baroque decorations. Their society is the oldest of the current age, and they have the closest relationship with the Vorlons, the last remaining elder civilization of the previous age. They grow buildings out of crystal, and their ships incorporate biotechnology. Their warriors are skilled martial artists, while their religious caste can use crystal-based technology to produce almost magical effects.

Talosians - The remaining Talosians are the last survivors of a once great civilization. Their physical bodies are weak and somewhat frail, but their enlarged brains possess incredible psychic powers. They speak only telepathically, and routinely project illusions to disguise themselves and their allies. Talosians can read thoughts and project physical pain, but their powers can't penetrate really powerful emotions, such as rage.

I would represent Vulcans and Minbari with D&D's Monk class, which is a good match for their fighting style. I would probably pick the Cleric as a second option. Spells like Command, ESP, and Hold Person are pretty good representations of their abilities. Talosians should probably be Bards and Wizards, perhaps with an emphasis on illusions and enchantments to match their powers.

 

 

Dwarf Replacements - Although we might think of dwarves as being miners, or engineers, the replacements I've chosen all kind of tap into the "proud warrior race" archetype. Really, scifi has an embarrassment of riches for this particular trope, so you have plenty to choose from that aren't listed here. Your only limitation is probably your willingness to use a species that's been portrayed as an antagonist for your player characters, since these guys are rarely the heroes in fiction.

Klingons - The Klingons are a very proud society. They prioritize personal honor and the glory won in battle and they inflict harsh corporeal punishment for all crimes and moral transgressions, especially cowardice and other forms of perceived weakness. They consider a death during combat to be the only acceptable way to die. Klingons have distinctive ridged foreheads and fight with a two-handed, multi-pointed sword called the bat'leth.

Narn - The Narn have a reptilian appearance, hairless and mottled with spots. Although once a peaceful society, they were conquered by the Centauri and their planet occupied until they could drive the invaders out. They are now militaristic and intent on both protecting themselves and getting revenge on their enemies.

Rigelians - Okay, so technically these guys, the inhabitants of Rigel 7, are called Kalar, while it's the inhabitants of Rigel 5 who get the honor of being called Rigelians, but it's clearly the better name, and could be applied to anyone from that star system. They are notably taller than other humanoids, and prefer to fight with spear and shield. While Klingons and Narn routinely wear metal armor, Rigelian's wear thick layers of leather and fur.

All three of these species should probably receive a Fighter option, although they have different fighting styles - Klingons prefer two-handed weapons, Narn daggers, and Rigelians fight with one-handed weapons and shields, and are the only species here who wouldn't use guns. Although most Klingons vocally support honorable conflict, their ships use invisibility cloaks, they surgically alter spies to pass as human, and occasionally use poison and suicide bombs to achieve victory, even at the expense of honor. Their second option should probably be Assassin, or its equivalent. The Narn are shown to be pretty religious, so their second option should be Paladins or Clerics, even though in the show, it's a big deal that they're one of the only species to not have indigenous telepaths. Rigelians are clearly also Barbarians.

 

 

Hobbit replacements - The symbolic role of hobbits is a bit unclear to me. As I said above, I think Tolkien wrote them as being essentially like modern humans, contrasted against the old-fashioned humans of Rohan and Gondor. In most D&D settings, they don't seem to have a culture that's any different from human society, with the exception of Eberron, where they have their own little Dinotopia. For my replacements here, I've chosen species that are cast as sort of "dark mirrors" of humanity, reflecting our worst qualities back at us. Instead of modern middle-class homeowners, I've chosen capitalists, gangsters and slavers, and colonizers.

Ferengi - The Ferengi are mercantile capitalists. They don't particularly make anything, but they make money as middlemen, buying low and selling high. Their whole society is structured around commerce; their Rules of Acquisition are practically a sacred text, and their currency, gold-pressed latinum, is more-or-less the currency of universal interchange. Their leader is simply whichever Ferengi has the most money at any given time. The Ferengi have very prominent large ears, and they're immune to telepathy. Ferengi society classifies women as property, owned by their fathers and later by their husbands; by law and custom, their rights are severely restricted.

Centauri - The Centauri are a society past their prime. They once had an expansive empire, but most of their former colonies have since won independence. The hierarchy of their society is based on proximity to the hereditary emperor; status in the royal court is the primary determinant of social position. Centauri culture and fashion are still very much frozen as they were at the height of their power; anything new is almost automatically worse. Their taste is ornate and baroque. Centauri look very much like humans, although their women shave their heads bald, and their men grow fan-like crests of hair, the taller the better.

Orions - The Orion people have carved out a niche for themselves as dealers in illegal merchandise. While the Ferengi sometimes dabble in legal vice - such as gambling and holographic prostitution - Orions deal almost exclusively in contraband and outlawed services. Orion slavers kidnap members of their own species, and others, to sell into forced labor. Orion pirates raid ships and seize their goods. Orion gangsters make loans, collect debts, deal illegal drugs, and sell stolen goods they received from the pirates.

All three of these species should obviously receive Rogue as one of their class options. After that, I'm a little bit torn. Ferengi and Centauri would both probably alike another roguish archetype, but more along the lines of a Merchant or a Noble, though most rulesets don't treat those as playable classes. Bard might be a fair representation of their more flamboyant and charismatic members? As for the Orions, I think they could use a Fighter type to act as enforcers for some of their more violent crimes.

DCC Occupations for the Occupationist's Female Relative

A recent comment on my post about the trend of naming books for "the occuaptionist's female relative" gave me the idea that it might be fun to use these as 0th-level occupations for Dungeon Crawl Classics. The result is a varied and interesting list, different from anything I would have written myself, in a way that I find appealing.

Roll 1d20 to determine your relative's occupation. This provides your trained skill, your starting weapon, and one piece of equipment. Roll 1d6 to determine your relationship to them. This provides your Lucky Sign and a single-use magic item.

Ronja, the (12) Robber's (2) Daughter

WHO IS YOUR RELATIVE? (roll 1d20)

1   Antelope - antelope's horns (1d6, use crit table M) - bottle of antelope milk

2   Bonesetter - bone saw (as short-sword) - bandage and batch of plaster

3   Clockmaker - clockmaker's tools (as dagger, usable as thieves' tools) - clock missing 1d4 parts

4   Hangman - length of executioners's rope (as garrote, wielder can Backstab as Thief) - 2 gold coins

5   Heretic - cruciform dagger - apocryphal illuminated manuscript missing 1d4 pages

6   Hummingbird - rapier (as short sword) - green feathered cloak

7   Kitchen God - fireplace iron (as mace) - 12 small cakes with silver coins baked inside

8   Liar - club - deck of marked cards and set of weighted dice

9   Lighthouse Keeper - lamplighter's pole (as staff) - lantern and flask of lamp oil

10 Memory Keeper - shepherd's crook (as staff) - handwritten chronicle of your village's history

11 Orphan Master - willow switch (as club) - large gunny sack

12 Robber - shortbow - climbing rope and key to the city jail

13 Stargazer - sling - telescope and hand-drawn celestial map

14 Taxidermist - flensing knife (as dagger) - glass jar of formaldehyde and pair of glass eyes

15 Tiger - tiger's teeth (1d8, use crit table M) - children's book of jungle animal stories

16 Time Traveler - deer-hunting bow (as shortbow) - pocketwatch that runs backward

17 Traitor - backstabbing knife (as dagger, wielder can Backstab as Thief) - letter of marque

18 Witch - broom (as staff) - talking cat (AC 11, 1 hp, MV 20' or climb 10', SV +0, AL  N)

19 Witchfinder - witch-pricking needle (as dagger) - flask of holy water

20 Zookeeper - catch pole (no damage, but add +1d6 to grappling roll) - giraffe calf (as pony)


HOW ARE YOU RELATED TO THEM? (roll 1d6)

1  Daughter - hp/level and Deity Disapproval - saint's medallion (use in prayer to heal 1d4 hp)

2  Daughter - Initiative and Thief skills - magic arrow (+1 to attack and damage, ignore resistance, can be wielded as dagger)

3  Daughter - Reflex saves and Grappling checks - rag doll (use to change fumble to miss)

4  Sister - Armor Class, ability checks, and occupational skill checks - jade amulet (1 point of Luck to spend)

5  Wife - Fortitude saves and damage rolls - manticore's tooth (use to change hit to critical hit)

6  Wife - Willpower saves and spellcasting checks - oracle bones (consult to learn if planned action is weal or woe, 75% accurate)


Thank you to mudfish for the inspiration!

Resurrection of Wormwood - Warlock Mentor - Anshall of the Spirits

Your mentor is Anshall, a spirit medium who channels the voices of the dead to provide comfort to the grieving, and taught you to channel a god. Your class is warlock.

Anshall is a foreigner from across the Darkling Sea, a woman with pink skin and white hair whose native garb is decorated with insect motifs. Anshall believes in a spirit world, where the ghosts of the dead lie dreaming, and she claims an affinity with these spirits. Many shun Anshall as a heretic and eccentric, but others pay her to conduct séances, where she speaks with the dead to temporarily reconnect families separated by the plague.

Anshall taught you mediumship and channeling. She showed you a glimpse of the spirit world, where her soul appeared to you as an alien insect. Anshall trained you to contact an otherworldly god, to supplicate and beseech it, to swear a pact to become its avatar in the mortal realm.

If you are the first player to train with Anshall, select a vacant building on the town map and label it as "House of the Spirits".


You are a warlock. You know the spells eldritch blast and hex.

You have leather armor, two daggers, and a scholar's pack. You own a memento portrait of your dead fiancé, who you have never been able to contact during a séance. You also own a mask of your patron god's face, which you wear while channeling their power.


d6 How did your fiancé die, and what otherworldly vista did you glimpse when Anshall showed you the spirit realm?

1 Your fiancé died of plague. You saw the Tombstone Stairwell, where the souls of the dead descend endless engravened stairs down into the spirit world. You know the spells minor illusion and unseen servant.

2 Your fiancé starved to death in a plague house, locked in for quarantine with too little to eat. You wept before the Alabaster Gates, where the doors were locked, where every soul was turned away, the innocent and the unrepentant alike. You know the spells mage hand and protection from good and evil.

3 Your fiancé died while traveling - sleepless, lost, exhausted - when no one would open their door to aid a stranger. You saw the Grey Wastes, where each soul wanders alone through a faded afterimage of the living world, empty and devoid of life. You know the spells friends and witch bolt.

4 Your fiancé was killed by bandits, beaten and abandoned alongside the road. You turned away from the sight of the Inverted City, the place of all demons, where human spirits were helpless before their tormentors, tossed about an tortured like playthings. You know the spells blade ward and hellish rebuke.

5 Your fiancé died of exposure, traveling through the rain on a cold winter's night. You stared into the Frozen Lake, where the loneliest souls are imprisoned in isolation, far from the warmth of others' love. You know the spells frostbite and charm person.

6 Your fiancé died by ingesting false medicine, deceived by poison disguised as panacea. You watched the Transmigration of Souls, where the ancient dead finally escape the spirit world to be reborn as living infants. You know the spells poison spray and comprehend languages.

What was your fiancé's name? What business called them to travel to the distant city so often? As a complication, your game master may rule that an ongoing adventure involves completing your fiancé's unfinished business.


d6 Which otherworldly patron did Anshall teach you to channel?

1 You knelt in fealty at the court of the Umbral Queen, the raven-haired sovereign of the shadowed realms, who wears a crown of knives, who is cloaked in a gown of swords. In time, the Queen will send one of her umbral knights, a tiny raven-winged humanoid, dressed in autumn leaves, wearing a bird's skull as a mask, to serve as your familiar (as imp).

2 You bowed your head in prayer to the celestial Archangel of the Bell Choir, who rings out a song of resistance against the plague and the rule of the Plague Lord. In time, the angel will send you the apocryphal Gospel of Lazarus, a prayer book that teaches the spells guidance, resistance, and thaumaturgy.

3 You raced along footpaths through the trees behind the fey Daughter of the Dreaming Forest, as she lead a wild hunt through thickets of memory and groves of deceit. In time, she will send you Trumvaldbuch, a book of fairy stories illustrated with ambiguous inkblots, that teaches the spells druidcraft, primal savagery, and thorn whip.

4 You wandered lost through crooked streets to find the Architect of All Mazes, a great elder from the Abhorred Cosmos, who looks like a fractured reflection in a shattered mirror. In time, the Architect will send you a crooked cormorant, like black bird viewed through broken glass (as pseudodragon).

5 You descended to the bottom of abyssal waters to reach the Avanc of the Depthless Fathoms, a miles-long serpent lurking in the deep, whose slumber stirs gentle the tides, whose thrashing roils typhoons and floods. In time, the Avanc will send you a manuscript in a bottle, Voyage of the Arathustra an account of a failed expedition to the polar ice that teaches the spells infestation, ray of frost, and shape water.

6 You opened your mind to accept Concept of the Stellar Wind, an immortal entity representing the idea of undying light blowing across the void of the outer dark. In time, your patron will send an allegory of photon, a tiny insect-winged humanoid made of golden light, to serve as your familiar (as sprite).

Select a vacant building on the map and label it as your patron's place of power - the House with Black Walls, the Church of the Bell Choir, the Floral Greenhouse, the Crooked House, the Drowning Well, or the Stargazer's Observatory. As a complication, your game master may rule that an ongoing adventure requires an additional task requested by your otherworldly god.


Designer's Commentary
When Jack Shear published The Liberation of Wormwood, I thought he'd come up with a remarkably flexible framework for combining random character generation with co-creation of the campaign setting with an overarching campaign goal that players could pursue in a variety in ways. It occurred to me at the time that rather than the town of Wormwood being conquered by a Usurper and their army, that the whole region could be oppressed by the personification of plague, who could eventually be overthrown by sufficiently ambitious adventurers.

I didn't do very much with this idea when I first had it, besides jotting down some notes about possible Plague Lords and some potential ideas for character and setting creation. But recent events have gotten me thinking about the idea again.

The idea behind Anshall is to provide a different, hopefully Gothic-seeming, interpretation for warlocks and their powers.

Best of the Blogosphere (Jan/Feb 2020) Fun Character Classes!

One of my goals for my blog this year is to do a bit more sharing of other people's work that I find interesting or enjoyable. You may have gathered from my post collecting character backgrounds that I enjoy the opportunity to play someone interesting and special. So, first up, fun character classes!



From Twitter, @spookybri has a couple posts with some great inspirational art for Gothic horror gaming. I'm especially fond of  the Dire Knight and the Thief in the first image, and the Nightingale from the second. (Thanks to the Graverobber's Guide to bringing Spooky Bri to my attention!)

Necromancer, Apothecary, Dire Knight, Theurgist, Thief by Spooky Bri

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Nightingale, Pariah, Doctor, Hunter, Priest by Spooky Bri

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Also over on Twitter, @scumbelievable has a 42-post thread of delightful sounding character classes. The list is worth reading in its entirety, both for the names alone and for the delightful suggestions of interesting character powers. I've included a few examples below. (Thanks to Tales of the Grotesque and Dungeonesque for linking me to this one!)

.@Frolord: The Hive, a living host to a variety of exotic eusocial insects able to refine the insects' populations through selective breeding to infuse their own bodies with strange chemical properties, or deploy the creatures themselves as living weapons.

— Gretchen Felker-Martin (@scumbelievable) November 26, 2019

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.@YOUWONTBELAFFIN: The Haunt, a spirit possessing a suit of armor or some other mobile piece of equipment, driven by unfinished purpose and existing half in the astral world and half in the material.

— Gretchen Felker-Martin (@scumbelievable) November 26, 2019

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.@samzorn: The Magpie, a maker of divine and arcane charms and trinkets, some empowered with looted holy symbols, the remains of familiars and animal companions, and pages torn from spellbooks. They can expend or wear these trinkets for defense or flashes of stolen power.

— Gretchen Felker-Martin (@scumbelievable) November 27, 2019

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Over on an actual blog, Flight of the Sky Eels has a list of 16 character precis that sound delightful. These aren't as easy to list as the others, but here are a couple examples:

"Blossom is a Jezoflorid ecologist. Jezoflorids are serpentine plant people who are sold by the monolithic Mothercorp. Blossom is a member of the Glade, an anarchist faction that opposes Mothercorp. They are exploring the galaxy looking for bio weapons to use in their guerrilla war."

"Sir Kraver of Dung hill is a Fandoran trash knight. The Fandorans are a rat-like race that have recently been annexed into the neo-floozy empire. In the conquest Sir Kraver lost their ancestral home. They are questing for allies and material for their rebellion against the nep-floozies."
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You might remember Stone Drunk Wizard from his D6 Crabmen and D6 Slugmen character sheets that made the rounds on Google Plus. He also has some really interesting character designs for a polar bear who hunts orcas, a ghost narwhal, a three-headed seagull in a diving helmet, and a "Priest of Pearly Wisdom".

Ghost Narwhal by Stone Drunk Wizard

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Priest of Pearly Wisdom by Stone Drunk Wizard

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Ynas Midgard has an ongoing project to write up a "heartwarming sandbox". This post has the Badger and the Basilisk as playable character classes, and this one has Crows, and Dwarves that are unlike most contemporary fantasy dwarves.

My favorite so far are the Badgers, who are described as "Dwarf-sized bipedal creatures; they often wear suits and glasses. Badgers are grumpy and cynical, but also hard-working and loyal to their friends and loved ones. Most work as solicitors, accountants, and real estate agents for the fairy folk. They never give anything away for free, and they despise slouches and bums. They hate Foxes, but due to some esoteric fairy law, they belong to the same trade union."

I don't know why, but I love that detail about the trade unions.



Advanced Xerox Lord only has one post so far, but it's a really good one. They wrote three new player species for the Mausritter game. What particularly impresses me is that these three aren't just variations on a common theme; each species has unique abilities that make them feel different from the others. Consider just one ability from each:

"Moles can easily dig in soil. They aren't restricted to already existing tunnels, and can dig far faster with their powerful front claws than a mouse can with a shovel - about half their walk speed. This is tiring and tunnels can only go a short distance before you must rest: think tunneling a shortcut in a burrow maze, not tunneling across a map hex. Your GM will let you know if you can dig, and where you come out!"

"Lemmings love adventure and inspire others. Roll with advantage when forming a war band or determining 'number appearing' for hirelings."

"Hedgehogs are well traveled. When exploring a map hex, roll d6: on a 6, you've been here before. The GM will tell you what you know about the area - for example, you may know a safe path past the owl’s nest, the name of the mouse family who live in the oak tree, or where the squirrels bury their nuts."



Over at ArtStation, Kyong Hwan Kim has a series of 12 concept art images for cats with character classes. I first saw this being called "Floofs of D&D", but that appears to have been a fanon title. As with so many of these lists, it's difficult for me to pick my favorites, but I think I'm particularly fond of the Turkish Angora Healer and the Siamese Magician.
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Turkish Angora Healer by Kyong Hwan Kim

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Siamese Magician by Kyong Hwan Kim

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Finally, Remixes and Revelations has a system for organizing of knights. In addition to the expected Paladin as White Knight and Blackguard as Black Knight, we also get the Folk Hero as Blue Knight, which was the entry that especially caught my eye. There's also the barbarian-like Red Knight, and the ranger-like Green Knight. As a system, I thought this was quite clever, and it's not often you see the Folk Hero (the Knight Errant, perhaps?) elevated to the same status as Paladins.


As a final bonus, here's a d100 table for choosing one of these classes to play:

1     Necromancer
2     Apothecary
3     Dire Knight
4     Theurgist
5     Thief
6     Nightingale
7     Pariah
8     Doctor
9     Hunter
10   Priest
11   the Bruiser
12   the Martyr
13   the Blue Mage
14   the Hedge Witch
15   the Entity
16   the Damned
17   the Cipher
18   the Drudge
19   the Punished
20   the Warrant
21   the Hive
22   the Murmur
23   the Fatale
24   the Haunt
25   the Beast
26   the Twins
27   the Falconer
28   the Weaver
29   the Cur
30   the Spiritualist
31   the Mandrake
32   the Lurk
33   the Penitent
34   the Eater
35   the Devout
36   the Swarm
37   the Wind Singer
38   the Bloom
39   the Shard
40   the Automage
41   the Grave-Robber
42   the Clothier
43   the Huntmaster
44   the Null
45   the Carrier
46   the Bellwright
47   the Atavist
48   the Oracle
49   the Vessel
50   the Magpie
51   the Husk
52   the Maestro
53   robotic sword fighter, black rainbow destroyer
54   human monster hunter from a death world
55   dog person, member of the Cult of Master Vigilant
56   former human mutated into a candyling from candy addiction
57   serpentine plant person ecologist
58   sapient computer virus and hacker in a humanoid robotic frame
59   Prime Strain crystal smith
60   human academic from the Academy of Gnomic Arts
61   psychically strong but physically underdeveloped Power Fetus
62   cybernetic grub-creature telekinetic
63   reptile/human hybrid with biokinetic powers
64   a human that has adapted to live in dreams
65   a cyborg monk with an electronic brain and organic body
66   a rat-like trash knight
67   an amphibious star fish, former Orphan Guild operative
68   a sapient fungus, exorcist
69   Crabman
70   Slugman
71   Polar Bear
72   Ghost Narwhal
73   Sea Gull
74   Priest of Pearly Wisdom
75   Badger
76   Basilisk
77   Crow
78   Dwarf
79   Mausritter
80   Mole
81   Lemming
82   Hedgehog
83   Maine Coon Berserker
84   Abyssinian Bard
85   Norwegian Forest Cat Shaman
86   Persian Scholar
87   Bombay Assassin
88   Sphinx Fighter
89   Scottish Fold Warrior
90   Bengal Archer
91   American Short Hair Knight
92   Turkish Angora Healer
93   Siamese Knight
94   Russian Blue Thief
95   Paladin (White Knight)
96   Folk Hero (Blue Knight)
97   Holy Marshal (Grey Knight)
98   Red Sword (Red Knight)
99   Druidic Warrior (Green Knight)
00   Blackguard (Black Knight)

5e - Alternatives to Darkvision

Darkvision is fairly common among the character races in D&D 5e.

Dwarves have it, elves have it, gnomes have it, half-elves and half-orcs have it, and so do tieflings. Only humans, halflings, and dragonborn don't, at least among the races in the Player's Handbook.

Open up Volo's Guide to Monsters, and you'll find darkvision among aasimar and tabaxi, among all the monstrous races available for player characters - bugbears, goblins, hobgoblins, kobolds, orcs, and yuan-ti - along with a few more who don't, like goliaths and tritons.

Because almost every species has darkvision, it doesn't end up having much effect in play. Being able to see in the dark doesn't make you feel special, and can't become a key facet of your character's personality, if everyone else can do the same. Likewise, darvision never offers a character the chance to reveal hidden information none of their party members can discover if everyone knows that information by default.

So it would be more interesting, I think, from the standpoint of both characterization and information gathering, if different characters had a variety of different abilities, instead of all having the same one. It makes sense that Underdark natives - drow, duergar, svirfneblin - might have true darkvision, but this ability will feel more special if they're the only ones. I would also for sure let them see right through magical darkness.

I've made a list of some possible replacements. I've assigned them based on species, but you could also roll the dice, or just pick one you like. After the list, I have some thoughts about what it means for 5e to be designed so that so many player characters end up with darkvision. You could also add any of these abilities to a magic lantern or to a pair of glasses, like Luna Lovegood's spectra-specs. You can't really do that with darkvision, since every lantern already grants the ability to see in the dark. (Although I do deeply love The Manse's idea - orcs can see in the dark because their eyes glow red, and you can make a lantern by filling a glass jar with orc eyes.)

If you add to the list, make sure not to include things like "knows true north" or "can accurately guess distances" or "can count all the coins in a hoard on sight". Those might be superpowers in real life, but most GMs regularly assume that all player characters can do all of those things; it's ingrained in the way we share information with players. Offering those as special abilities is either going to be a cheat to those players when everyone else gets the same information anyway, or its going to impoverish your game by removing several common ways of communicating about the game world.

The senses listed below could be "always on" or they could require concentration to use. Some of these senses more-or-less replicate the effect of a spell. If that bothers you, you could make it take as long as a ritual to use effectively. You could also rule that some of these senses only work in total darkness, giving the players and incentive to douse the lights. If you don't like any of these options, you could also remove darkvision and replace it with a language, or with another proficiency.
 

image from Spelunky

ALTERNATIVES TO DARKVISION

Hill Dwarves - Gold Sense
Some hill dwarves possess a "gold scent" - they can literally smell the presence of gold, and the greater the concentration, the stronger the smell. They can tell when they're in the immediate presence of gold, and are drawn to the largest supply in the area - unless that's already on their person! (This one is adapted from DCC.)

Others possess a "gold sight" that lets them see gold glowing with a warm yellow light. A single gold coin gives off less light than a candle, but a small cache will shine like a torch, and a hoard like the noonday sun.

Mountain Dwarves - Trap Sense
Raised in labyrinthine halls amidst every available architectural trick and travail, mountain dwarves have an innate sense for building features intended to deceive or deal harm. In any built environment, they'll notice when they're in the presence of a "trick" or "trap" although they won't automatically be able to identify the nature of the hazard.
(Yes, "find traps" is a 2nd level spell. So is "darkvision".)

Duergar - See Invisible
The diabolical duergar have mastered the magical art of turning invisible at will. With proprietary alchemical paints, they've also filled their cities and lairs with invisible hazards to ensnare invaders. What is invisible to outside eyes is not simply visible to the duergar, it actually glows with ghostly white light to their eyes.
(This could be in addition to their darkvision, instead of replacing it.)

High Elf - Aura Sight
Millennia of schooling and study have trained high elves to recognize magic on sight. Every living spellcaster possesses a faint aura, as does every magic item, and every creature with a magical attack. Depending on the circumstances and the strength of the magic, these auras may be faint, sometimes almost invisible. Powerful auras glow like a bonfire of magical potency.

Wood Elf - Door Sight
In ages past, every forest was filled with hidden doorways that led directly to the Feywild. Today, nearly all of those doors are gone, but wood elves retain a special sense for noticing the presence of secret passages. Doors that are hidden or locked by magic appear as glowing rectangles. Other doors might not be visible, although the elves will know they're there. The means to open these doors will not usually be obvious.

Drow - Poison Scent
Surrounded by scorpions and spiders, successive generations of their leaders assassinated by tainted food, adulterated drink, and poisoned blades, the drow have evolved an infallible nose for toxins of all kinds. They know when rations are unsafe, when monsters are venomous, and when weapons have been coated with poison. Drow with particularly discriminating palates can even identify different types of poison by scent alone, although such sommeliers require additional training in alchemy or herbalism.
(This is in addition to darkvision, however, drow just get regular old darkvision, not the superior kind.)

Stout Halfling - Food Sense
These hereditary gourmets have a knack for finding edible morsels. When foraging or examining the corpse of a monster, they're able to the safest and tastiest portions. Except in unusual situations, poisonous  items that offer no nourishment will appear obviously inedible. Stout halflings can also "follow their noses" to locate kitchens, larders, pantries, feast-halls, and even occasionally guardposts where meals are taken or prepared.
(This replaces Halfling Nimbleness, which becomes a Lightfoot ability only.)

Forest Gnome - Hazard Sense
The untamed wilderness is full of natural perils, and territories controlled by other species are more dangerous still, littered with abandoned siege weapons, crumbling border fortifications, and half-forgotten anti-invasion ordinance. Forest gnomes, who claim no territory and wander freely across the frontier and the settled lands, have encountered all of them. From infancy they learn the tell-tale signs of danger, and as long as they're outside, they know when a trap or natural hazard is present, although its source might not be readily apparent.

Rock Gnome - Machine Canny
Even rock gnomes who don't build machines themselves understand how they work, an ability that appears near-miraculous to other species. To gnomish eyes, every machine is made of parts that operate by cause and effect. "Cause" one part to activate, and its "effect" becomes the cause for the next part, and so on until the machine completes its final effect. While they have no special talent for spotting mechanisms, a rock gnome who notices a machine part can intuit its "cause" and its "effect" and can guess what kind of part comes before it and after it. They can also tell if the part is broken, or if its link in the chain of cause and effect is broken.

Deep Gnome - Gem Sight
Although everyone perceives gemstones as lustrous, to deep gnome eyes they literally glow, the color of the light determine by the color of the gem. Raw and uncut stones give off a dim light that aids in mining, while finished jewels cast a brilliant sparkle. Though unlit to outside eyes, deep gnome cities and lairs appear filled with rainbows and kaleidoscopes to their builders, with strategically placed gems drenching every corner in colorful light.
(This could replace darkvision, leaving svirfneblin on equal footing with others outside their own territory.)

Half Elf - Fey Sense
The elfin blood in half-elves veins calls out to other fey, granting them a powerful intuition that is felt more than seen. Half elves can identify fey creatures, and can tell the difference between those native to the Feywild and those born into the material world. They can identify radiant magic and positive energy. They can identify fairy pranks, even before the prankster has been spotted. They can see the bond between warlocks and the Archfey and the Celestial; and they can tell when someone has been charmed, frightened, or possessed by a fairy or celestial.

Half Orc - Shadow Sight
Born between worlds, half-orcs can see just past the veil between worlds, into the Border Ethereal and the Shadowfell. They can perceive ghosts and fiends lurking invisible and incorporeal, whenever they are close enough to manifest. They can see the difference between dead bodies and the undead, between ordinary shadows and shadow-monsters. Half orcs can see the bond that connects warlocks to the Raven Queen or the Fiend; can perceive when someone has been charmed, frightened, or possessed by an undead creature or fiend; and can see necrotic magic and negative energy whenever they're used.

Tiefling - Mind Reading
If a tiefling can look directly at another being and concentrate, they can actually hear the other's thoughts, the voice in their head like a half-whispered, half-mumbled monologue. This only works if the tiefling can see the others' eyes, the windows to their soul. They hear surface thoughts only, and can't elicit or insert specific ideas, but their infernal ears are especially attuned to thoughts of temptation and desire.
(Like "darkvision" and "find traps", "detect thoughts" is also a 2nd level spell.)

Other Options
When designing a new 5e race that you're tempted to give darkvision, ask yourself if any other divination ability might be more thematically appropriate. Does your species have infravision, able to see heat signatures, but unable to detect oozes, constructs, undead, or even lizards, fish, or amphibians against the ambient air temperature? Can they dowse for water? Are they magnetically drawn to the presence of iron? Can they see emotions? Can they hear lies? Are they able to perceive cosmic alignment, or see the umbilical threads that bonds believers to their deities? Can they sometimes talk to insects or plants or rocks? Can they speak with the recently dead? Be creative, and your world, and your players' experiences, will be richer for it.

image from Legend of Zelda: A Link to the Past

WHY I THINK DARKVISION NEEDS ALTERNATIVES

So, maybe almost every species has darkvision. So what? Is that a problem? Well, maybe. I can think of two possible reasons for 5e to be designed this way, although of course I'm only speculating. The first possibility is that darkvision isn't really intended to be relevant in play very often or to have a frequent mechanical effect. Maybe it's mostly meant to be a nifty factoid about your character, something flavorful to distinguish the various demihumans from humanity, but ultimately no more important than green skin or pointed ears. (Although if so, it ultimately makes humans seem like the strange ones, cursed with a night-blindness that doesn't afflict anyone else. And at least "I have green skin" and "I have pointy ears" mark actual differences between half-orcs and half-elves!)

The second possibility is that WOTC is scared to death of resource management play, and doing everything in their power to prevent it. Maybe they think that only asshole GMs run resource management games, and want those assholes to stay away from their popular new edition. Maybe they're afraid that a novice GM will find an asshole OSR blog exhorting that "Gary wants you to count torches", will naively try to run a resource management game, and will end up driving themselves and their novice player friends right on back out of the hobby after a single bad session.

Whatever the reason, one thing is clear. Between the ubiquity of darkvision and making the "light" spell a cantrip with unlimited re-use, it's basically impossible to run a game where the player characters get trapped somewhere because they're unable to see.

Now, I've been very vocal in the past about not wanting to run a darkcrawl game, but I also don't really care for solutions like this. They feel dishonest. If you don't want to play a game where it's possible to get trapped in the dark, then don't, but don't pretend to offer it as a possibility with one hand, while using the other hand to smuggle it back off the table. Don't make a rule, then give every player permission to break it. Don't claim darkness is important, then fail to write any procedures that would actually support using it, then try to escape the contradiction you've set up by handing out "get out of dark free" cards.

Be honest. Tell potential GMs "The rules of this game assume that a low level of lighting is available at all time. Whether from moon and starlight outside, phosphorescent fungus growing in caverns and tombs, intelligent monsters lighting candles and braziers to illuminate dungeons for their own purposes, or from the player characters bearing torches and lanterns - it will never be truly dark. If your fictional solution involves the characters wielding light sources, these should never cost treasure to supply, never run out, and never count against the characters' encumbrance limits. Assume they are omnipresent, like the clothes on the characters' backs. This is not a game about counting torches or mapping caves in the dark." Then set the example and teach novice GMs how to do this by using the read-alouds and box-text in your sample adventures.

That would have pretty much the same effect as the current arrangement, but it would have the benefit of not pretending to do something you really don't, and it would allow GMs and players who want to engage in resource management play to do so without having to rewrite the spell list and nearly every species' racial traits. Ironically, under such an arrangement, the rules themselves would be more agnostic toward RM play than they are now, when they claim to take no official stand, but then saturate the game world with so much darkvision and magical light that RM play is rendered impossible in practice.

5e Characters I Want to Play - School of Red Magic Wizard Archetype

SCHOOL OF RED MAGIC

Red Mages are polymaths and dilettantes. They try to bridge the divides between martial prowess and magical insight, between the "white magic" of healing and the "black magic" of war. They study widely and attempt to unify separated schools of thought into a monist personal philosophy. 

They reject boundaries and borders and often violate laws and prohibitions meant to enforce separations or prevent the "mixing" of unlike peoples and things. They are fiercely loyal comrades, striving for oneness with their friends and unity within any group they join.

Red Mages' understanding of magic tends to be more lyrical and mystical than other wizards'. They see occult symbolism in colors and forms, write their own spells in allegory and verse, and embellish their spellbooks with calligraphy, marginalia, and iconography.

Red Mages are often drawn from the ranks of acolytes and hermits, folk heroes and soldiers. Because they strive to balance the competing influences of white and black magic, red mages are often neutral in alignment.
 

Red Mage from Final Fantasy XI

READ FROM THE RED LEDGER
Beginning at 2nd level, you begin blending white and black magic in your casting. Your training makes you much more versatile than those who specialize in a single domain of white magic or a single school of black magic.

You gain proficiency with all simple weapons.

Immediately replace one of the wizard cantrips you know with a cantrip from the cleric spell list. Then erase one 1st level wizard spell from your spellbook and replace it with a 1st level spell from the cleric spell list.

From now on, whenever you prepare the list of spells that is available for you to cast after you finish a long rest, you must prepare at least one wizard spell and at least one cleric spell for each spell level on your list.


DRAW FORTH THE DIAPHANOUS VEIL OF DIVINE PROTECTION
Starting at 6th level, your study of white magic teaches you to better protect yourself and others.

You gain proficiency with light armor.

You have a limited well of white magical energy you can draw on heal injuries. On your turn, you can use a bonus action to regain hit points equal to 1d6 + ½ your wizard level; or you can use a bonus action to touch another willing character to heal hit points equal to 1d6 + ½ your wizard level. Once a character has benefited from this feature, they must finish a short or long rest before they can be healed by it again.


ASSAIL THE UNWORTHY WITH ARCANE ALACRITY
Beginning at 10th level, your study of the principles of black magic trains you to fight more dangerously and opens new avenues of attack.

You gain proficiency with all martial weapons.

On your turn, you can take one additional action on top of your regular action and a possible bonus action. You can use this additional action to attack after casting a spell, or to cast a spell after attacking, but you cannot make two attacks or cast two spells using this feature. Once you use this feature, you must finish a short or long rest before you can use it again.


BRAID TOGETHER THE BIFURCATED THREADS 
Starting at 14th level, you perfect the ultimate blending of white and black magic, allowing you to release both arcane and divine energy with each spell you cast.

You gain proficiency with medium armor and with shields.

Whenever you cast a spell from the cleric spell list, as a bonus action, you may make a melee or missile attack to strike a creature within 30 feet with pure necrotic energy. This attack deals damage equal to the spell level.

Whenever you cast a spell from the wizard spell list, as a bonus action, you may choose a willing character within 30 feet to infuse with pure radiant energy. This infusion heals hit points equal to the spell level.
 

Red Mage from Final Fantasy XIV

Links to Occupations

Below is a list of occupation lists I might use in my own DCC games.

I like occupation lists, both for the way they paint an immediate picture of the game world, and also for the way they provide an instant prompt for playing the role of a new character.

The Medievalists:

from Coins & Scrolls:
Actual medieval occupations

from Ten Foot Polemic:
Failed Medieval occupations

from Zenopus Archives:
OD&D NPC occupations

from Into the Dark:
Old School occupations

The Dickensians:

from Into the Odd:
Failed occupations (for the Bastionland city setting)

from Zero Level Blog:
Our World occupations (for the Our World / Lost World setting)
Lost World occupations (for the Our World / Lost World setting)

from Roles, Rules, and Rolls:
Baroque occupations

from Iron & Ink:
Yellow City races, castes, and backgrounds (for the Yoon-Suin setting)

from Pride & Parchment
Scythian / Slavic occupations, goals, and traits

from Tales of the Grotesque & Dungeonesque:
Dark Secrets (and a pdf of the same)

The Weirdos:

from What Would Conan Do?:
Planar backgrounds (for the Troika! setting)
Bonus planar backgrounds (for the Troika! setting)

from Living 4 Crits:
Mouse Guard occupations and character creation
Disney occupations (and a pdf of the same)
Revolutionary War occupations (and a pdf of the same)
Numenera occupations
JRPG occupations
Star Wars occupations

from Giblet Blizzard:
Weird Urban occupations

from Rogues' Repast:
Carcosan occupations (for the Carcosa setting)

5e Backgrounds, Lifepaths, Random Generation ... and an Unexpected Convergence with the GLOG

I like random character generation. Rather than coming up with a robust concept for my character and then trying to generate her, I usually prefer to let the dice make a lot of my decisions for me, then build my concept off of that. (Although that's not always the case - playing Numenera, I read through the available options and got inspired, which was fortunate, since random generation isn't super supported there.)

If a system allows random generation, unless your referee is a jerk, you can usually still pick options like it's a menu if you have a concept in mind. But if a ruleset isn't set up for random generation, it's usually hard to add it back in. And if you don't have a concept before getting started, it can be easy to fall prey to analysis paralysis, or else to just making the same character over and over. Random generation provides a starting point, it tells you who your character was, before you started playing them, before they started a life as a full-time adventurer.

Random ability scores are one way to insert some randomness into character creation; random backgrounds are another. Both of those are pretty de rigueur in retro roleplaying. Most players still expect to be able to choose their own character race and character class though. (Although again, there are exceptions. GLOG players might be expected to roll for a random race, and in Jack Shear's upcoming Cinderheim campaign-starter, players roll for both a random background and a random character class.)

Maybe the ultimate in random character generation is lifepath generation. This is when you generate a random character by creating them in stages that mimic successive stages of their life. The result is not just a random character, but one who has a bit of a backstory about how they got where they are at the start of the first session. The best-known example is probably Traveller, which infamously has a lifepath char-gen system where your character can die mid-creation. (That's because in Traveller, there are no levels or XP advancement; whatever skills and abilities you start the game with is all you're ever going to get. You go through char-gen in "loops," and in each loop you get richer and more experienced, but you also risk dying. At the end of each loop, you can choose to "retire" and start playing the game, or you can continue the process. If you die though, you have to start over, so when you get a decently good character, there's a temptation to enjoy what you've won so far and stop pushing your luck trying for more.)

There's no reason, though, that you couldn't have a lifepath generator that stops with you ending up as a 1st level D&D character. In fact, there are a few that do just that, so let's look at them, and some other suggestions for generating random backstory as part of character-generation.

2015 Gongfarmer's Almanac

First, because of my inordinate fondness for Dungeon Crawl Classics, I'd be remiss if I didn't mention Paul Wolfe's "virtual funnel" from the free 2015 Gongfarmer's Almanac, vol 6. Like Traveller, the "virtual funnel" involves "looping" a character - or in this case a group of four characters - multiple times through a dangerous path. Each "loop" indicates an event that happened to the character, and requires some kind of save or throw to attempt.

If you fail the attempt, you take a penalty, sometimes death, usually damage, sometimes cash. If you succeed, you get a bonus, usually an ability score increase, sometimes a weapon, occasionally something magical. (If you roll well enough on the event table that "cash" is your penalty, the bonus is something really special!) And then, regardless of the outcome, you get some XP and a modifier on the roll to determine the next event. If the character dies, the next character inherits all the XP, money, and equipment received so far. When a character gets to 10 XP, they've made it to 1st level.

Good news! for Traveller fans, Paul Wolfe reports that in his playtesting, the first two characters in a group of four nearly always die, and about 1/3 of the time, all four die and you have to start over. (Pretty typical for DCC, really.) Calling this a virtual funnel is pretty accurate, since it pretty well mimics several features of zero-level play, especially the way that later characters basically get a free ride on their forebears coattails.

Player's Handbook

The random bonds, ideals, and flaws built into 5e's core rules are one method of getting random backstory, albeit one that really doesn't resemble a lifepath at all. Instead, it generates specific moments of backstory to ensure that you have three distinct kinds of moments that you can call on during play to gain "Inspiration." Inspiration is pretty much a "hero point" - you can spend it to gain advantage on a roll, or to remove disadvantage. You can only have one point at a time, although you can give it away to another character if you want.

Your "bond" is an NPC you know and care about, likely some kind of parent/mentor or sibling/friend. (Would it be worth trying to categorize and tally up the different entries in 5e's backstory tables? I really don't have the heart.) But it's also some task you're trying to accomplish for that person. The way "Inspiration" works is that you have to act on your bond, ideal, or flaw to receive it, so these entries are written to be very actionable (if perhaps overly simplistic?) Your "ideal" is like an ethical code that your character follows, or at least, one rule from such a code. Again, they're all things where it would be very easy to point out an example of your character following their ideal to show that you earned Inspiration. Like the other two, "flaws" are mistakes or mis-steps that you're encouraged to make in order to receive your hero point.

Unlawful Games suggests giving every character a goal, a kind of thing that they're looking for, not for Inspiration, just to give them some extra oomph of motivation, but this might be a pretty good replacement for ideals if you were in the market for one. I'm not sure how I feel about all this. Rotten Pulp makes a pretty well-grounded argument against offering extrinsic rewards for roleplaying. On the other hand, Dyson Logos suggests giving out Inspiration the way Numenera give out magic items - with the profligacy of a Dickensian landlord trying to ward off the Ghost of Christmas Past through a flamboyant display of generosity - to encourage the players to acquire and spend them freely rather than trying to save them up. Personally I wish that Inspiration were both more powerful and a little harder to come by. Like, it should be harder to get than just saying a catchphrase once a session, but also something that if you earn it, really does something to help you out. Anyway, that's a thought for another day.

Weirdly, 5e's recommended method of character generation almost inverts the lifepath idea. You pick a character race, then class, then set your ability scores (which are immediately modified by your race, unless you forgot since you read about that two steps ago), then finally you pick a background (and if your background skills are the same as the ones you picked for your class, then you have to go back again and select a different class skill to replace the doubled-up one.) It's really counter-intuitive.

Xanathar's Guide to Everything

Xanathar's Guide to Everything has a kind of lifepath generator for 5e characters. You still pick your race, class, and background, but then the generator helps fill in more backstory. There's a series of tables to learn about your family, although I find these tables to be oddly preoccupied with things like where you were born, your birth order among your siblings, and other information that feels like it's of dubious value at the table. There are tables you can roll on to find out why/how your character "chose" the background and class you picked for them, and then a life events table that you can roll on multiple times. Instead of "looping" through the table like in Traveller or Paul Wolfe's virtual funnel, you roll once to find out how old you are, roll again to find out how many events you experienced, and then finally roll on the table once per event. Your "event" is most likely to be an actual event (and then, most likely to just be "make money working your job"), with about a 1-in-3 chance you are connected for good or ill to an NPC, and about a 1-in-4 chance of some unusual experience. Some author or group of authors on the D&D Wiki has a lifepath generator for 3rd edition characters, and a 5e version that changes little, but is slightly worse. I might like this one better than the official version, mostly because it's a bit streamlined than the one in Xanathar's Guide.

Cinderheim

This is a lifepath just for generating backstory though - it's an optional additional step after character creation is finished. Jack Shear has announced that he's working on a lifepath generator for his Cinderheim campaign that actually generates (most of) the character for you. Roll once to learn who your parents were - and thus what your background is. Then roll on a sub-table to learn another fact about your parents. Roll again to learn who your mentor was - and thus what your class is. And again, roll on the sub-table to learn an additional detail. It's elegant in its simplicity, and the subtables remind me of Into the Odd's new Bastionland careers, possibly just because that's the first place I saw something like that, and it made an impression on me.

Goblin Laws Of Gaming

Probably my favorite lifepath character generator though comes from Goblin Punch's GLOG rules. You generate your character in thee life stages - childhood, adolescence, and adulthood. In childhood, you roll 3 random events. Each event is paired with two ability scores, and awards a specific number of points to each. For example "You read books in the library" is paired with "+1 Str, +4 Int", while "You once destroyed a book" gets you "+2 Str, +1 Int". In adolescence, you get asked 3 questions. Each question is a dilemma that your character faced as a teen, and your answer gives you advantage rolling a dice for one ability score, and disadvantage rolling for another one. For example "Did you divide the food evenly (Int), or give the hungrier ones a little bit more (Wis)?" In adulthood, you get to roll twice on a table of random careers and then pick the one you want. You then roll four random events that happened to you during your pre-adventuring career. About half the events ask you to test one ability score to potentially improve or worsen another, and the other half award you additional starting skills and equipment. For example, if you join the army, you might get an event like "Is your scar awesome or disfiguring? Where is it?" that instructs you to "Test Con to influence Cha", or like "You are haunted by your memories. Of what?" that tells you "Learn Ghosts" as a skill.

The events in the GLOG's lifepath generator are not very specific to any particular campaign. They're less like specific backstory events and more like prompts to guide the invention of those specifics. One of the strengths here is that the generator creates a random character as you go, so that specific elements of the random backstory get tied to specific improvements (or injuries) to the character as they advance through the stages. It's entirely possible to know that you were a weak child, but your adolescence made your stronger, and you toughened up in the army - precisely because each event is tied to a specific change to an ability score.

On the other hand, if all we want is random backstory, Bardiches & Bathhouses suggests only using your class to generate it. He actually suggests using four subtables per class (double what Jack and I2TO are using) to help establish things like how you got started, what specifically you do, potentially some major beliefs, and how the NPCs in your home community feel about you. In all 3 campaign settings (Cinderheim, Bastionland, and ... Bardich-Bathhouse-land?) the subtables provide specific, evocative detail that help tie the character to the setting. If you wanted to use any of these set-ups in a different type of campaign world, you could keep the broad mechanics, but you'd need to rewrite the details. The backstory that comes from 5e's default bonds, ideals, and flaws gets around this problem by being both more generic and more vague, and then asking the player to fill in the details. It's the same way in the GLOG. Ten Foot Polemic uses a similar approach for his list of 100 retroactive backstories - the incidents described are non-specific enough to belong to almost any time and any setting, and it's up to the player add in the setting- or character-specific details.

One last suggestion that feels worth mentioning here is The Retired Adventurer's idea to physicalize backstory by tying it to specific objects, like a diary or a letter. Having that item in your inventory then serves as a mnemonic reminder of the relevant bit of backstory.

There's a partial convergence between 5e's backgrounds and its classes. Acolytes are a little like proto-clerics, criminals are like proto-rogues, entertainers like proto-bards, hermits like proto-druids, outlanders like proto-barbarians, soldiers like proto-fighters, and sages like proto-wizards. The correspondence is imperfect though. Most of the backgrounds seem like precursors to at least a couple classes, and most classes have more than one possible precursor background. And then there are the backgrounds like Sailor and classes like Monk that feel untethered from any sort of matching. (As an aside, this is probably because you have 3 "base" classes - fighter, thief, and wizard, plus wizard-thieves, ie "bards" ... plus like two more wizards for some reason, "sorcerers" and "warlocks." Then you just add on descriptors to get the others. Divine wizard is "cleric" and divine wizard-fighter is "paladin." Wilderness fighter is "barbarian," wilderness thief-wizard is "ranger," and wilderness wizard is "druid." Monks feel out of place in this system because they ARE, they are literally from an entirely different genre of fiction than any of the other characters. Although I guess you COULD probably consider them fantasy-Asian fighter-wizards.)

There's a second convergence (the one I promised up there in the title, the one that surprised me) between 5e's backgrounds and the GLOG's random careers. "Army" matches soldier, "clergy" matches acolyte, "criminal" matches ... well, criminal, plus maybe charlatan, "forest" more or less matches outlander, "hobo" matches either hermit or urchin, "nobility" matches noble, "rural" fits most of the same idea as folk-hero, "sailor" matches sailor, natch, "scholar" "wizard's apprentice" matches sage, even after the name change, and "town" matches the guild artisan / guild merchant pretty well. I think that just leaves entertainer unaccounted for on 5e's side, and the GLOG's lone remainder is the "strange" career for a backstory involving meeting fairy tale monsters. (And "strange" isn't even really a full career, one event on each other career table tells you to roll once on the "strange" table.) It's interesting to me though, that two different designers (or TEAMS of designers in 5e's case) converged on pretty much the same list of pre-adventuring character backgrounds. If you wanted to design your own list of generic backgrounds, the areas of overlap might be a good place to start, and their areas of disagreement might help you focus on what you think is most important for your list.

One final note, Bardiches & Bathhouses other post about backgrounds argues that backstory is intimately tied to character goals and motivations. He then talks through some of the most common backstories, and points out potential problems caused by some of them being pretty anti-social to try using in a cooperative game. This is an entirely different view of backstory, and one that's unrelated to the other background elements I've talked about so far. In the kind of retro-roleplaying games I'm used to, the characters might have different occupations, but they all have the same motivation - to find treasure. Empire of the Petal Throne adds a slight wrinkle to this by making all the characters barbarous foreigners trying to both make their fortune and find their way in a bizarre alien city. In Mouse Guard, Spears of the Dawn, and Mutant Crawl Classics, again, the player characters have different "jobs" but they all have the same role - that of newly-minted tribal defenders who explore the wilderness and fight off threats to their home village. The fact that one character is a glass-blower and the other's a beekeeper is irrelevant to their in-game motivation.

But 5e is a game where the player characters want different things. It's not just that one wants jewelry and one wants gemstones and one wants a magic sword. It's that one wants to help their noble family, and one wants to explore their village's hinterland, and one wants to lead their army to victory. That table of goals from Unlawful Games that I linked to earlier also introduces divergent motivations into the party. I worry a little that this is "splitting the party" at the very moment of character creation, but I would hope that most player groups can think of missions that advance multiple agendas at the same time, or else can agree to a bit of friendly "turn taking" to advance one goal at a time. I also suspect that the emergent motivations that always come up during play as a result of the players interacting with the setting will help to re-unite the party behind a common motivation.