When is a background story too edgy

It's perfectly possible to write a shitty background that isn't edgy.

Let me rephrase this then.

When the number of deaths, not kills, in your character's backstory is higher than the first session of the campaign.

Also, anything involving a character magically controlling blood or bones to make weapons.

Depends on the setting, often. I wouldn't worry about it. One could say Batman's background is too edgy, and people still like the character. Just to be sure to keep your head out of your ass and you'll be fine.

Never said anything to the contrary

So if I'm a soldier who fought in a war, I better make damn sure my platoon didn't suffer any casualties at all, or I'm suddenly edgy.

You did, though.

No I didn't, not once did I say anything that implies edgy backstories are the only ones that are shit. I just said the point when you should reduce the amount of edge is when it starts to e shit.

>Playboy billionaire learns kung fu from Illuminati-ninjas in order to fight crime because his parents were murdered while he was a kid.

Doesn't really sound edgy as much as bum-fuck stupid. The edgy didn't really start until Session 0, when he decided to be a broody edgelord because "muh character developement, user."

>when the tiefling too angsty

When you start getting paper cuts no matter how you handle the sheet.

>the death count in your character starts from their backstory

>game about fantasy violence
>all PCs have never killed anyone before
>they all have to make SAN rolls whenever they see a dead person

Edgy doesn't mean anything, it's just a snarl world you use when you're gay and you hate the idea of other people having fun doing stuff they enjoy. Which is why it's so popular on the internet.

Even the most Drizzt of characters can be cool if you're good at what you do, and if you suck nothing you make will be good.

When is a backstory too tryhard

When it's fanfiction-tier.

Okay, how about personal ones?

When it has twice as many pages as the character has levels (or equivalent).

I think what he means is if your pretend family starts off DOA and anyone else who was close to you is also dead, or personal favorite, you're the last of your kind and that lets you be angsty AND existential about it 24/7. That's edgy.

So Luke Skywalker is edgy I'm A New Hope, because his uncle and aunt died?
Nemo from Finding Nemo is edgy?

*in a New Hope

The man never said all deaths were edgy

With Luke they were in the middle of the session.Th GM killed his aunt ans uncle.

How many did he kill over the film, again?

When the backstory introduces characters just for the sole purpose of getting them killed later on in the backstory. And how the PC doesn't care that they died?

Or when a PC does body mutations on him/herself in the past just to see how freakishly other people would react to them?

Several thousands on the death star.
He said that having people close to the character due was edgy, though. Read the thread.

Okay.

>When the number of deaths, not kills, in your character's backstory is higher than the first session of the campaign.

oh shit that's dark

The one fucked up arm thing.

Where he has one arm that's weird and the other's normal. One arm is mutant, one arm is robotronic, or he's got a bigass gauntlet on one arm, or it's magic and the other one's a sword.

Any time he has one special arm, that's edgy as fuck.

Pic related: faget

"Your background was fine for maybe a level 18. You know we're starting at level 1, right?"

What about magic skeletons or blood sacrifice? They're not inherently edgy when used as weapons

But if I can't have at least one robotic arm then how am I supposed to fire high caliber munitions from my palm?

I just want to flak slap people, man.

This is a good one. Edgy right down to the underlying symbolism. "Anything I do with my own two hands ends up twisted and violent, because of who I am."

When your best friend betrays you, kills your other friends, rapes your girlfriend while you watch with the one eye you have left because one of those little shits he summoned just gouged the other out, so you try and smack his shit by ripping your own arm off and screaming at the top of your lungs.

But if you do it quietly?

So mai waifu is edgy?

When I feel like you're trying to impress someone
That wasn't really a background so much as the first story arc

I dunno who that is cause I'm not gay, but probably.

checked out that patreon... there's more smile.rare

Mostly just generic and forgotten after the author got shit-canned for copying something if I remember right

>anything involving blood manipulation
Pic related, the face of someone going full edgelord apparently.

I thought everyone stopped caring over the giga-pause because the author had the AIDS?

there is some slime too

>demon
>fights his own people
>one big arm
>wears a trench coat
>smokes
is edgy?

>sorry, i'm a pedophile

>talking to a literal monster

He's speaking to sapient goop. For all we know, loli is a recognized species where he's from

>nobody is commending him for being super honest

Don't even suggest such heresy like that. Hellboy is pretty damn far away from edgy.

See >47105156

He checks all the boxes but he's written well so he's cool. And a guy who can't write doing everything he can to avoid being edgy will still write shit.

What dies that even mean

Probably that your character has accomplished much more than they should have at their level of ability

As a sucker for gritty/dark shit, I can say that there are two things that can take a character over the edge:

>is the edge reasonable based on history/development?
>is the edge reasonable within the context of the setting?

Anyone can make a dark and gritty character, but the main decider on what qualifies as 'edge' lies in how well it fits with everything else. Most edgetards just slap on a coat of black paint or drench it in blood and call it a day, with flimsy or no motives that apply to the setting/story. A man might vow revenge for the death of his family, but he's not going to dress in a trench coat and start swinging katanas at anything that second guesses him or because "lol my character is edgy and that's what he'd do XD", nor is it appropriate to force such a character into a setting that lacks the proper tone.

tl;dr don't be a faggot and use reason and you won't be called 'edgy'

my guy had sex out of wedlock but all his parents and that one bartender he likes and the guy he worked for are alive
Am I ok

When you can't read the whole thing because you cringe too hard.

Raider turned slave who was in a homosexual relationship with his slave-caravan guard before said guard set him free only to be executed in slaves place. Edgiest one anyone has pitched to me, anyway.

He isn't though. He's just deflecting

Is that dude outside just trying to shoot at Horus?

Let me just run this character by y'all

>Female player, male character
>Half-elf
>Raised in a monastery
>except everyone hated him, because he was a "half-breed"
>Player is debating with me how many people he killed when he left/fled
>Warlock, and all his spells are more damage than healing
>Tells me how much she wants 9th level Power Word Kill
>Chaotic Evil

Backstory's a little dark but it's primarily the player's behavior that's pushing it into edgy territory. I give it 2 trench coats out of 5

Considering he was drawn away from the side of Evil by consuming pancakes for the first time, it's not that edgy.

Discretion is the better part of valor.

This. Simply having killed a few people as they were leaving and planning on getting a powerful spell isn't a bad thing, but the insistence and focus on it makes it worse than it could be.

I mean you're not wrong, but people enjoy it. As a kid I enjoyed Adam West with his bat shark repellent corniness and all, and nowadays kids like the gravel gargling guy with the body armor and admittedly neat tank car. Fun starts the moment you're willing to suspend your disbelief, I think.

is implying my character is a strong fighter and served well in the army during war too much for level 1

Nope

I've had characters who have adventured with another party or spent twenty years at their job at level one. It just means they weren't especially special until the campaign started.

>Half-elf
>tend to be charismatic as fuck

Probably the one hybrid that doesn't really have a hard time making friends. They just don't have their own natural in-group.

Simply sounds like an edgelord player though.

>>Female player, male character

I hate stereotype but I'm gonna stereotype. Too many female players I've come across play male characters as edgelords or gay edgelords. There's just something about playing crossgender that brings out the worst in some players.

No. PC levels should be something Really Special and adventurers are invariably above the rest. It's a bit fuzzy, but you get level 1 when you first do or at least set out to do something out of the ordinary.

NPC classes were a mistake.

In... twelve or fifteen games, she's played /two/ female characters, outside of pre-gen oneshots.

When you can't describe it to your gran without cringing.

>DURRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRR

Depends on the setting and other characters.
If it fits in with the setting and isn't played Super Serious, then it's fine.

Otherwise, it sounds a little edgy.
Though if it's played right it could be rather dramatic villain backstory.

Well, he's the only Evil character, and a couple of us lean just a bit on tropes and snark. Betting a copper here and there on whether or not npcs (and by extension, the gm) are going to do what.

What if a character "accidentally" caused an entire commune to commit mass suicide through inflecting a joke about suicide wrong(they thought he was serious), and is now on the lam because a few members of said commune were sons/daughters of senators/patricians?

If you can't tell it with a straight face while "Crawling" plays in the background

This. Nonheroic NPCs shouldn't have classes or levels.

Being an honest creep is slightly better than just being a creep. However it's assumed you just shouldn't be a creep in the first place.

Like, it would be nice if a dude warned me he might punch me in the face and steal my wallet but I'd rather he just didn't do that in the first place. No amount of charm or politeness can make up for being a bad person.

What if you wanna fight them?

You means classes were a mistake.

>grew up on a bismuth farm