Background

Developing a background

The descriptions of the Empire and the world are presented on the wiki as a broad but deep overview. They include all the detail you should need to be able to create your background including culture, history and geography relevant to your character. When you develop your personal background the briefing material is designed to allow you to perhaps add some small details to the setting during the submission process.

Submitting a background

• Submit your background online when you create your character or group
• Our plot team will check your background

Your background will be checked by out plot teams who will ensure that it fits with the detail of the Empire setting. If your background is not possible within the setting then they will be able to give you feedback so that you can amend your background accordingly. They may also be able to give you some additional input or ideas to enhance your background. Please ensure that your email address is up to date on your Profound Decisions account, as this is how they will contact you.

Language

The pre-dominant language in the Empire, and the surrounding region, is called Imperial, which is phys repped by the English language.

Common misunderstandings

We have already noted some consistent errors or misunderstandings.

• Inheritance - the Empire is a meritocracy where there is negligible inheritance of property, lands or titles.
• Lineage - lineage is not a genetic inheritance and can occur in many ways. Individual lineages are passed on in different ways.
• The Throne - Personal relationships with previous incumbents of the throne are not appropriate background material.
  
• Avoid inappropriate references - Themes Not appropriate for Empire include non‑consensual sex; please do not include these references in your background.
• Orphans - Please consider the way children are raised and treated in the Empire when writing your background.
• Law and Order - The Empire is an orderly place. Our NPC magistrates are equally happy to prosecute crimes that players have written into their character backgrounds as they are crimes they have committed on the field - there have been some high profile cases in which characters were executed for murders committed in their backgrounds.
• Prisons - The Empire does not imprison criminals. Criminals in Empire are generally either fined or executed, depending on the severity of their crimes.
• Social mobility - The Empire categorically has no slaves, and every citizen is equal under the law. While some citizens are richer or poorer than other, there are no serfs and any peasant can end up a landowner simply by taking two years of military service.
• Relatively wealthy - Every character has a persona resource.The game assumes that characters attending the Anvil summits are influential people - it is tricky to characterise yourself as a beggar when you have access to money, herbs, resources, crystal mana or the like.
• Equality - Unlike some of the historical settings the game uses for inspiration, the entire Empire world is egalitarian and gender-blind. Nobody anywhere discriminates against anyone based on gender or sexuality. There are plenty of other things that they can discriminate on. Our equality and diversity rules apply in character as well as out of character.
• Arranged marriages - People may marry for political reasons, but the idea that someone might feel they had the right to force someone to marry someone else against their will is laughable, and also a crime.
• Highguard & Lineage - While Highguard "is not a generous nation to the less than fully human" it is not an oppressive state.
• Longer backgrounds - we do not accept longer backgrounds by email. The limit is there for a reason.

Amending a background

You cannot use the website to change a character background once you have played your character at an event. If you need to change any details on your background then email admin@profounddecisions.co.uk with any changes you want to make.

Submitting a personal background

Creating a Personal background

• A personal background is a brief biography of your character.
• A personal background should be no more than 2000 characters in length (including spaces).
• Please contact us at empire.backgrounds@profounddecisions.co.uk if you want additional help or information when writing your background.
• Please spellcheck your background before submitting it.

A background summarises the things you have done and your reasons for being at Anvil for the meetings of the movers and shakers of the Empire. Creating a background can help you develop a sense of who your character is and how they interact with the world in which the game is set. Detailed information about the campaign setting is presented in the Empire wiki. The information presented in the Wiki is all available to any Imperial character and if you read the sections of the wiki that are relevant to your character then they should help you develop a background that is in keeping with the setting. You will not be provided additional briefing material after you have generated your character; all the information available is kept on the wiki.

It is also important to keep it simple enough that you will remember it! It is quite possible that two years down the line a plot writer may see an element of your background and include it in a plot. If you don't remember your background, you are likely to be left out or miss your opportunity.

What to include

• A short character history.
• Any secrets that your character might have.

When submitting your background for the plot team to read, please try to bear in mind that there are hundreds of players in the campaign so the plot team have a lot of backgrounds to read through. A background that is informative but concise is ideal. A background that includes a short in-character piece or description is fine, but lengthy in-character documents are not necessary. Occasionally the plot team will make use of details submitted in backgrounds when creating plot for events. This is fairly unusual; your background is intended for your use, to help you create goals and a motivation for your character. The kind of background that is most useful to the plot team is a short summary of the things you have done and how your character fits into your nation's and the Empire's history. Descriptions of your personality or your arch-nemesis are not used by the plot team.

It is also useful to focus your background on your character and what they have done. Knowing your parents' names and their actions is only relevant to the plot team if those actions somehow reflect on your character. Knowing you are the child of someone executed for treason, who strives to clear their name, is cool. Knowing that your parents were bakers called Lois and Clark who met during a bar fight is much less useful.

Submitting a group background

Creating a Group background

• A group background is a brief history of the group.
• It should be a short summary, providing key details, of no more than 4000 characters (including spaces).
• The Group's Oath should be no more than 1000 characters (including spaces).
• Please contact us at empire.backgrounds@profounddecisions.co.uk if you want additional help or information when writing your background.
• Please spellcheck your background and oath before submitting them.

A group background summarizes the history of your group, how it came into being and what it has done since its founding. Creating a group background can help develop a sense of what your group is, how the characters in the group relate to each other as well as provide you all with objectives and activities for fun at events. Detailed information about the campaign setting is presented on the Empire wiki and should provide a number of possible group types for each nation that might be very applicable to your group - some of these have their own pages that discuss how to create that type of group.

What to include

• A short group history.
• Any secrets that your group might have.

When submitting your background for the plot team to read, please try to bear in mind that there are hundreds of players in the campaign so the plot team have a lot of backgrounds to read through. A background that is informative but concise is ideal. A background that includes a short in-character piece or description is fine, but lengthy in-character documents are not necessary. Occasionally the plot team will make use of details submitted in backgrounds when creating plot for events. This is fairly unusual; your background is intended for your use, to help you create goals and a motivation for your group. The kind of background that is most useful to the plot team is a short summary of the things your group have done and how you fit into your nation's and the Empire's history. Descriptions of your personalities or your group's arch-nemesis are not used by the plot team.