I Cast...Brainstorm issue 2!

The mission of I Cast…Brainstorm! is to share ideas to add interesting and fun details to your game, and advice to help make DM-ing and playing easier and more enjoyable! Thanks so much for reading!

Along with some DM- and player-focused ideas, we’ll talk about all sorts of things — game hooks, NPCs, magic items, monsters, encounters, towns, and other ideas that (fingers crossed!) you can drop right into the worlds you’re creating. I’m currently playing a lot of 5th edition D&D, (more on that below), but most things we talk about should be applicable to any edition, or even other RPG systems, with a tweak or two.

I’m still adjusting the format and content, (for example, see below about our Brainstormer Community section!), and real talk, I’ll probably keep changing it up. I Cast…Brainstorm! is meant to foster a community, and should be as helpful and fun as possible for you. Please let me know if there’s anything in particular you’d like to see or talk about at [email protected]. I’ll also add some questions and polls down the line.

And speaking of community, please share our link with your friends and fellow gamers, so they can join us! https://icastbrainstorm.beehiiv.com/

Let’s brainstorm some fun!

Table of Contents

• All About Backstories

• Game Hooks

  • Serious

  • Scary

  • Silly

• NPCs

  • Mickelmin and the Stump

• The Brainstormer Community

• Brainstorming Links

• What I’m DM-ing

• Ye Olde Shoppe

All About Backstories

A backstory is the history of your character up to the point the adventure begins, and they’re are as varied in form and content as the people who play RPGs. Some players write incredibly detailed histories for their characters, some craft just a sentence or two, and some don’t use them at all. My opinion is, as with all things TTRPG-related, whatever works for you, and maximizes your fun is the correct way to do it. I love them on both sides of the DM screen, and here’s why —

As a player, even a short backstory for my character helps me understand their personality, goals, motivations, and other factors, which create a guide I can lean on as the character makes choices in all three pillars of play — social interaction/RP, exploration and combat.

In terms of RP, the backstory helps me choose the right attitude and approach for every moment. Any details in the character’s past can give me something to use. If my character is speaking to a local noble, should I play them as deferential because they come from a family of farmers who lived on the noble’s land, or as confident and haughty because they’re from a rival noble family? Or play them like they’re trying to be confident, and failing, because some event has shaken their confidence? Whatever choices the character takes can reflect their history.

In exploration, something as simple as deciding the character is from a specific area can give you a little something to play off of, as the party moves around the world. “We should avoid the Charming Forest on the way — I was once lost in it, and the name doesn’t have anything to do with how adorable it is. Its the home of a clan of devious harpies!”

And in combat, the backstory can help guide the character’s tactical decisions. If you decide they were once part of a traveling circus, they might use acrobatic movements to position themselves around the battlefield, swinging on chandeliers, careening off pillars and the like. Were they once imprisoned by hill giants? That could make them afraid of the creatures, more likely to hide on the fringes of the battle. Or perhaps the sight of a hill giant could fill them with such anger that they attack them on sight. The choice you make can be anything that you think makes sense.

When you create the backstory, any concrete details — birthplace, family relationships, major events — are helpful, and there are no wrong answers, (as long as your choices fit within the world, story, Veils and Lines, and things like that). Just consider that once you make a decision, consistency is key. Staying true to those details will make it easier to role-play the character over time, and will help them feel like a living, breathing part of the game world. Also consider leaving some parts of the story vague for your DM to play with — even something like “Carries a button with a pentagram etched on it” or “Has a phobia of soup” are details that a DM can use.

As a DM, I always ask the players to create backstories, and if they’d like me to, I suggest specific details that help the character fit perfectly into the world, campaign and adventure. Then — this is key, I think — I make sure that over the course of the adventure, I pull on the threads in the backstory to give the character some personal stakes in the story. Creating personal connections for your players is such a powerful tool in the DM toolbox, and can involve an elaborate weaving into the main plot, or just a brief but unforgettable moment or two.

For example, if a player decides something concrete, like their character is estranged from their family, I might drop that family into the story at some pivotal point. The character might see their family being carted off as prisoners of an evil cult, or a brother or sister might show up just before some important plot moment to beg the character to return home for an emergency. Don’t hesitate to put some pressure on the character, (and the player!), to make choices that will have real impact.

Even vague ideas in the backstory can become fun game hooks. That button your character has been carrying around, with the pentagram etched into it? Well, it just happens to be from the favorite jacket of a particularly ornery demon, who is hell bent on getting it back!

One last bit of advice — if you use one character’s backstory in some impactful way, try to give every character the same moment(s) in the spotlight, so every player feels like they’re an equally important part of the story you’re all creating together.

Game Hooks

Game hooks, one of the adventure-drivers for your game, can help you —
• Add depth and texture to your game world
• Introduce side quests for information and/or treasure
• Drop important (or just fun) NPCs into the story
• Support a sandbox style of game with additional quests
• Guide the players back to the main quest if they’re stumped or stalled
• And more!

Here are this week’s hooks.

Serious

The characters hear that a small hamlet nearby is being shunned by the local populace. One of the residents of the hamlet is said to have offended a local hedge wizard, who has placed a horrible curse upon the whole village.

Scary

The characters meet a trusted NPC, (a shopkeeper, guard, tavern owner, etc.), that they haven’t seen for a few days, and something seems…off about her. Though she claims all is well, she doesn’t recognize the PCs or remember their names, and her pupils look black and lifeless.

Silly

A powerful sea hag has literally played “got your nose” with one of the characters, and will only return their missing proboscis if they complete a quest or task for her!

NPCs

If you need a couple guards for your game, maybe these two knuckleheads will do.

Mickelmin and the Stump

Mickelmin has years under his belt, and is lucky to have made it this far — he’s lazy, inept, and stupid. He’s suspicious that everyone is a criminal, and terrified that anyone actually is. He has been “training” the Stump (as Mickelmin calls him), who is obviously the much more capable guard, and would immediately hide behind the younger man should anything dangerous actually occur. Feddy, for his part, is doing his best to learn from his veteran trainer, and as Mickelmin blathers on, he quietly observes everything around him, ready to act at the first hint of chicanery.

Mickelmin Gurch

Age, Gender, Species - Middle aged, (DM chooses gender and species)
Personality - Suspicious, nervous, cowardly, never shuts up
Alignment - LN
Type - Guard

Items and Appearance - Short, skinny, unkempt, wears a shortsword
Values - Staying alive, getting paid
Goals - To get through his shift, and his life, unscathed
Knows - Only ridiculous rumors
Does Not Know - Anything of value
Revealed -

Feddy “the Stump” Stumpner

Age, Gender, Species - Young adult, (DM chooses gender and species)
Personality - Serious, thoughtful, rarely speaks (and when he does, quietly just says one or two words)
Alignment - LG
Type - Guard

Items and Appearance - tall, 320 lbs, wielding a halberd
Values - Honesty, lawfulness
Goals - To crush villainy in all its forms
Knows - Any major current events and situations
Does Not Know - Mickelmin is a complete idiot
Revealed -

The Brainstormer Community

Some folks in the Brainstormer community have asked about sharing their own ideas and advice in the newsletter, and I would love to do that. We’ll need to set some ground rules first, but what a great way to help create a dynamic, strong community!

Here are the rules so far — We’ll only publish original ideas, at our discretion. We reserve the right to edit your idea. The work will be attributed to you, and you retain all rights to your ideas for publishing, and offer them for free to I Cast...Brainstorm! and the Brainstormer community under the BY-SA Creative Commons license. (You can read about Creative Commons licenses here -- https://creativecommons.org/share-your-work/cclicenses/)

If that sounds good to you, please send any ideas you'd like to share to [email protected]. I'm happy to chat about DM-ing and answer questions, too, via email, or in the newsletter if its a more general topic.

As always — thanks for staying in touch!

Brainstorming Links

If you love D&D and other RPGs as much as I do, you probably already know about the folks below, who are real inspirations to me. If you haven’t already, please check ‘em out!

Treantmonk
https://treantmonk.wordpress.com/

RPGBot
https://rpgbot.net/

The Arcane Library
https://www.thearcanelibrary.com

Sly Flourish
https://www.slyflourish.com/

What I’m DM-ing

• A weekly Curse of Strahd campaign via Roll20 using 2014 5th edition rules — 53 sessions so far

• A weekly Rime of the Frostmaiden campaign, in-person with 2024 5th edition rules — 1 session

• A series of one-shots at a bi-weekly game at a bar, where we just kicked off Forge of Fury from Tales from the Yawning Portal — 18 sessions

• and a couple campaigns with my kids, when schedules align

What I’m Playing

• A 5th ed. Dragonlance campaign as a 9th level Tinker Gnome Gadgeteer Rogue, named Professor Flondersnoot

• About to start playing Vecna: Eve of Ruin as a 9th level Halfling great-weapon Fighter — Flimm the Clumsy

• And in all my free time, I play a LOT of Hearthstone!

Ye Olde Shoppe

You can also check out great gifts for the gamers in your life at Total Party Kits, which features all-original designs by yours truly on shirts, hats, mugs and other gifts!

 www.totalpartykits.etsy.com

I Cast…Brainstorm! subscribers can save 10% off everything in the store.

If you have an online store that sells D&D or TTRPG themed things, let me know — I’d love to add it here.

What Do You Think?

How do you like I Cast…Brainstorm! so far? What’s working for you? What would you like to see more of? Or less of, or done in a different way? How’s the layout? Please let us know at [email protected]

The original ideas in this issue of I Cast….Brainstorm! are covered under the Creative Commons BY-SA license — all content is free to use (including commercially) and change, with proper attribution.

You can read about the license here: https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-sa/4.0/deed.en