{"id":86,"date":"2024-11-26T18:38:45","date_gmt":"2024-11-26T18:38:45","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.theblackpudding.com\/dragonage\/?p=86"},"modified":"2024-11-29T06:57:47","modified_gmt":"2024-11-29T06:57:47","slug":"background","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.theblackpudding.com\/dragonage\/2024\/11\/26\/background\/","title":{"rendered":"Character Backgrounds"},"content":{"rendered":"\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\">Campaigns often decide where characters are going. What lies ahead. What trials they&#8217;ll face as their role as a hero expands. The future. Therefore things like character backgrounds are the most influential part in determining where they have been. The past. Before they became a hero of destiny. Were they a Grey Warden? A lowly fishmonger?<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\">Your character did not spring from nothing. Just like real life,<br>culture and upbringing shaped their personality and attributes.<br>In Dragon Age you pick a background to represent<br>these facets of your character and to determine your race.<br>You should read over the following section and then pick<br>the background you find most appealing or suitable for your<br>character concept. The descriptions of the backgrounds will<br>also give you a better sense of the setting and help you place<br>your character within it. Choosing a background modifies<br>your character in several ways. These are spelled out in each<br>description, but generally include the following:<\/p>\n\n\n\n<ul class=\"wp-block-list\">\n<li>An increase to one or more of your abilities.<\/li>\n\n\n\n<li>One or more ability focuses.<\/li>\n\n\n\n<li>Determination of your race (dwarf, elf, human, or Qunari).<\/li>\n\n\n\n<li>Determination of your class choices.<\/li>\n\n\n\n<li>The languages you can speak and read.<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n\n\n\n<h3 class=\"wp-block-heading\">Example<\/h3>\n\n\n\n<blockquote class=\"wp-block-quote is-layout-flow wp-block-quote-is-layout-flow\">\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\">Now that Kate has rolled her abilities, it\u2019s time to pick a<br>background. She is drawn to city elf because of the injustice<br>of elves\u2019 treatment, and this works well with her character<br>concept. She\u2019s already thinking about how growing up in<br>an alienage explains her character\u2019s poor Constitution.<br>The background increases her character\u2019s Dexterity by 1,<br>making it an impressive 4. She can choose one of the two<br>offered focuses, and settles on Perception (Seeing). She<br>notes that she speaks the Trade Tongue, the most common<br>language of Ferelden. She then must choose a class and has<br>the option of playing a warrior or a rogue. With her character\u2019s<br>high Dexterity, she\u2019s leaning toward rogue, but wants<br>to read over the classes before deciding for sure. Lastly, she<br>rolls on the city elf background table twice to get two more<br>benefits. She gets a +1 to her Perception, which brings it up to four, and gainst another focus, Dexterity (Bows)<\/p>\n<\/blockquote>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\">As noted previously, backgrounds have limits on race and<br>class of character. For example, you can\u2019t have a Dalish background unless you\u2019re an elf. Of course, rare exceptions might exist. For example, a human raised by a Dalish band might have a background similar to Dalish elves. Unique backgrounds might also be possible in some campaigns, such as Shale, the golem from Dragon Age: Origins. Players wanting to play such unusual concepts should talk to their GMs to customize an existing background or come up with their own using the guidelines provided at the beginning of this section.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<h3 class=\"wp-block-heading\">Available Backgrounds<\/h3>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\"><a href=\"https:\/\/www.theblackpudding.com\/dragonage\/2024\/11\/27\/background-ander-survivor\/\" title=\"\">Ander Survivor<\/a><br><a href=\"https:\/\/www.theblackpudding.com\/dragonage\/2024\/11\/27\/background-apostate\/\" title=\"\">Apostate<\/a><br><a href=\"https:\/\/www.theblackpudding.com\/dragonage\/2024\/11\/27\/background-antivan-wayfarer\/\" title=\"\">Antivan Wayfarer<\/a><br><a href=\"https:\/\/www.theblackpudding.com\/dragonage\/2024\/11\/27\/background-avvar\/\" title=\"\">Avvar<\/a><br><a href=\"https:\/\/www.theblackpudding.com\/dragonage\/2024\/11\/27\/background-chasind-wilder\/\" title=\"\">Chasind Wilder<\/a><br><a href=\"https:\/\/www.theblackpudding.com\/dragonage\/2024\/11\/29\/background-circle-mage\/\" title=\"\">Circle Mage<\/a><br>City Elf<br>Dalish Elf<br>Dwarf Duster<br>Escaped Elven Slave<br>Fereldan Craftsman<br>Fereldan Freeman<br>Fereldan Noble<br>Free Marcher<br>High-Born Dwarf<br>Low-Born Dwarf<br>Nevarran Adventurerer<br>Orlesian Commoner<br>Orlesian Exile<br>Orlesian Noble<br>Orlesian Student<br>Qunari Beresaad<br>Qunari Saarebas*<br>Rivaini Merchant<br>Seheron Convert<br>Surface Dwarf<br>Tal-Vashoth<br>Tevinter Altus<br>Tevinter Laetan<br>Tevinter Soporati<br>Waking Sea Raider<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>Campaigns often decide where characters are going. What lies ahead. What trials they\u2019ll face as their role as a hero expands. The future. Therefore things like character backgrounds are the most influential part in determining where they have been.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":114,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_uag_custom_page_level_css":"","neve_meta_sidebar":"","neve_meta_container":"","neve_meta_enable_content_width":"","neve_meta_content_width":0,"neve_meta_title_alignment":"","neve_meta_author_avatar":"","neve_post_elements_order":"","neve_meta_disable_header":"","neve_meta_disable_footer":"","neve_meta_disable_title":"","footnotes":""},"categories":[4],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-86","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-gameplay"],"aioseo_notices":[],"uagb_featured_image_src":{"full":["https:\/\/www.theblackpudding.com\/dragonage\/wp-content\/uploads\/2024\/11\/gameplay-backgrounds.jpg",675,450,false],"thumbnail":["https:\/\/www.theblackpudding.com\/dragonage\/wp-content\/uploads\/2024\/11\/gameplay-backgrounds-150x150.jpg",150,150,true],"medium":["https:\/\/www.theblackpudding.com\/dragonage\/wp-content\/uploads\/2024\/11\/gameplay-backgrounds-300x200.jpg",300,200,true],"medium_large":["https:\/\/www.theblackpudding.com\/dragonage\/wp-content\/uploads\/2024\/11\/gameplay-backgrounds.jpg",675,450,false],"large":["https:\/\/www.theblackpudding.com\/dragonage\/wp-content\/uploads\/2024\/11\/gameplay-backgrounds.jpg",675,450,false],"1536x1536":["https:\/\/www.theblackpudding.com\/dragonage\/wp-content\/uploads\/2024\/11\/gameplay-backgrounds.jpg",675,450,false],"2048x2048":["https:\/\/www.theblackpudding.com\/dragonage\/wp-content\/uploads\/2024\/11\/gameplay-backgrounds.jpg",675,450,false],"neve-blog":["https:\/\/www.theblackpudding.com\/dragonage\/wp-content\/uploads\/2024\/11\/gameplay-backgrounds.jpg",675,450,false]},"uagb_author_info":{"display_name":"Mike Ellis","author_link":"https:\/\/www.theblackpudding.com\/dragonage\/author\/theblackpudding_9fzfpg\/"},"uagb_comment_info":4,"uagb_excerpt":"Campaigns often decide where characters are going. What lies ahead. What trials they\u2019ll face as their role as a hero expands. The future. Therefore things like character backgrounds are the most influential part in determining where they have been.","_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.theblackpudding.com\/dragonage\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/86","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.theblackpudding.com\/dragonage\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.theblackpudding.com\/dragonage\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.theblackpudding.com\/dragonage\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.theblackpudding.com\/dragonage\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=86"}],"version-history":[{"count":10,"href":"https:\/\/www.theblackpudding.com\/dragonage\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/86\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":280,"href":"https:\/\/www.theblackpudding.com\/dragonage\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/86\/revisions\/280"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.theblackpudding.com\/dragonage\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/114"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.theblackpudding.com\/dragonage\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=86"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.theblackpudding.com\/dragonage\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=86"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.theblackpudding.com\/dragonage\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=86"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}