I love playing in a group where the characters have a common backstory. It enables so many opportunities for role playing and storytelling. A married couple with in-laws or other relatives, family connections have great dynamics. A group of former slaves, who bought their freedom. A troupe of artists on tour. Delegation of athletes. All from the same village. Fans of the same football team.
Yeah I don’t think I would happily play another “and then you all meet for the first time and work together” game unless it was like intentionally subverting the trope. It adds so many problems and suspension of disbelief problems.
The last game I played started with one party member‘s birthday party. Everyone gave a little speech reminiscing about past experiences they had together.
The adventure began, when the party was interrupted by the bad guys.
I think the best game I’ve done started as “it’s a DND world and you’re a band on tour”.
It started with a simple “the bridge is out on the way to your next show”, then there was a battle of the bands, a sketchy record label, and then the players organized a recall of the mayor that was in bed with the capitalists. That game went great places.
Oooo! Reading recommendation for you, if you’re not aware of the title: Kings of the Wyld by Nicholas Eames. The author said that he envisioned the various roles musicians tend to take in a band, and he mapped those stereotypes onto an adventuring party. So, the hot-headed character wielding an enchanted axe is the lead guitarist, the sword and board tank is a bassist, the rogue dual-wielding daggers is a drummer, the mage is a keyboard/synth player, and so on. The conceit is moreso for flavor and world-building than actual plot motivation, so these analogies aren’t necessarily explicit, but it’s still a fun set of character dynamics to hang an adventure story on.
