The first one alphabetically is the acolyte. You’ve spent time in service to your deity. For example, maybe you started as someone who assisted the priestess as a child and then rose all the way up in the ranks to become the high priestess yourself. As I mentioned, there could be a large gap of time since the period when you were in service to your deity, but even though it could be something you did a long time before you started adventuring, it can still be a part of who you are as an adventurer. It is just a piece that has helped define who you are as a person.

There are a number of obvious classes that make the “most” sense to go with if you are an acolyte, the first being cleric. If you’re a cleric, that’s exactly what your job was in the temple that you served in, and it makes perfect sense. Next, there is paladin. This also makes a ton of sense; you are a knight in service of a deity. And then there is the monk — while the monk in Dungeons & Dragons is as much a ninja as a monk, they can make sense as an acolyte, as they trained in a monastery and have devoted their body and actions to their deity. I’m probably not going to write out much of a background for any of those classes, but I’m going to give you some weirder options or show you how you can play against type. Let’s see what some of those look like now:

I spent so many years in service of Tymora, the goddess of good fortune, and I had worked my way up into the temple. I loved the life as I spent time drinking and eating with the rich and famous of my home city. Life was great, and I was close to becoming the high priestess in my town, until my rival, Gerhim Methezar, lied to the leaders of the religion and told them I’d been preaching lies and accepting bribes. I was branded a heretic and cast out penniless onto the streets. I hate it out here, and I hate Gerhim for what he did to me. In my weakness, a voice came to me and offered me hope, offered me power, and offered me a way to get revenge. I will prove Gerhim for the liar that he is, and regain my spot in the temple of Tymora — until then, I’m going to be a thorn in his side.

Class: Warlock
Alignment: Lawful Neutral

For this one, I really leaned into the idea of being kicked out and wanting revenge as the bond and then loving rubbing elbows with the elite as a personality trait. The ideal that I used was around wanting power in the faith, and the flaw is picking a goal and becoming obsessed with it. I’m not going to break down all of them like this, but I wanted an example of how I wrote a backstory with using specific aspects from the handbook, even though I didn’t pick them out ahead of time.

I’m also going to be adding in alignments. I doubt you’ll ever see any acolyte character be actually evil, but in this case, the character might border on lawful evil at times, especially when it comes to undermining Gerhim and gaining back their old position, because of their obsession with getting their power back.

The gods speak to me and through me. That’s how the temple of Mystra found me. They seek knowledge, and I had a knowledge that they didn’t have access to. I was raised in their temple as an oracle of the gods and never knew what real life was like. Things were great until one of my visions was wrong. I don’t know what happened — maybe we interpreted it wrong, but people lost their lives, and I do not consider that acceptable. I ran away that day, but the visions didn’t stop coming. Now I’ve had another vision, about a lost relic of Mystra. I can prove to myself that I am worthy of returning to the temple if I can find this relic and bring back a piece of lost knowledge.

Class: Wizard – Divination
Alignment: Lawful Good

Life was hard for me growing up; I was living on the streets and having to steal. I made the mistake of breaking into a temple of Bhaal. They had some very nice things in there, but they caught me. According to their beliefs, that would be enough to have me put to death, but instead, they had some pity on me — I guess it was pity, anyway — and they put me to work. Apparently, no one else had ever gotten as far into the temple as I had. I didn’t love the work they made me do; it was messy work, and as my skills were honed, the work became so violent that after one mission I didn’t feel like I could return. So I didn’t. I ran away, and now agents of Bhaal are trying to track me down. But they trained me well, and with a lot of skill and a bit of luck, I’m sure I can stay ahead of them. Time to find a crowd to blend into and pretend like I’ve had a normal life.

Class: Rogue – Assassin
Alignment: Chaotic Neutral

This is definitely one that you could go evil with — just swap it around so that the temple of Bhaal has burned your character because of some mistake done on an assassination, and now you have a character who is still on the run from them but who enjoys the killing and being a rogue if you’re playing an evil campaign.

I loved living in the church, I spent my youth at the foot of the eldest priest listening to the stories he told. I memorized every single one of them, as I asked him to tell them over and over again. When he passed away, the temple in my little town didn’t get another priest, and I wasn’t sure what to do. I took up traveling. It felt like the right thing to do — seeking out those who are part of my faith so that I can listen to their stories and add them to my knowledge, so I can spread the word to the masses who might not have heard the stories before. There’s a proverb for everything, and I know them all. Unfortunately, life on the road is a bit tougher than life in the temple, but I will not give up my mission to bring these teachings to the masses. However, after a run-in with some people who claimed to be following my deity who then robbed me, I probably should figure out a better way to travel — I’m sure there is someone out there who would let me travel with them and whom I can share my message with.

Class: Bard – Lore
Alignment: NG

How have you played an acolyte before? Is your character a strict follower of some deity, or a former disgraced member who has been kicked out?

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Warlocks are one of the more interesting classes. A Warlock makes a pact with another entity of some sort to get their powers. It’s the “deal with the devil at the crossroads” sort of idea. You get power, but the power comes at a cost, and you have someone who can take away your power if you don’t do what they want. You can make a pact with a fiend, a great old one, a fey, or even a blade, and they’ll become your patron. The reason this makes for interesting storytelling is that no matter who you are, there has to be something in your history that shows why you made the deal you’ve made. People generally make deals for a couple of reasons — either to help someone they love, or to hurt someone who hurt them or someone they loved.

Mechanically, you are a simplified spell caster. You don’t have the spell options that a Sorcerer, Wizard, or Druid would have — probably more on level with a Paladin in terms of number of spells. However, the spells themselves are very limited, and you don’t have the weapon proficiency that a Paladin would have. You get a nice advantage in that your spell casting is based off of Charisma — this means that you get to have some face-of-the-party abilities as well. Generally, that charisma seems to be balanced out role-playing-wise by some level of twistedness or some broken part of your character, as again, the inciting incident for becoming a warlock generally isn’t good.

Let’s look at some ideas for Warlock backstories:

You watched in horror as your father and mother cried. Your life had been normal up to this point, but at 16, when you came of age, the told you a horrible secret. At your birth, you hadn’t been alive. You had been stillborn, and your parents didn’t know what to do. They had been trying for a child for so long, but it hadn’t worked out until your mother got pregnant with you. They cried, pleaded, hoped, and prayed, but you were dead. And then a voice had come to them, and time seemed to stop. “You wish to save your child?” it had asked them. They had told the voice that yes, that they would do anything. “Your child can live, but there is a price. On their sixteenth birthday, they are mine to do my bidding when I need them.” In their grief, they had agreed. And now, as a 16-year-old, you got powers that you never would have imagined — and along with that, a curse, as your parents still didn’t know who had brought you back to life. You felt a tug on you, and you left your home searching for answers as to whom they had made a deal with, to figure out if there was a way you could get out of the deal. However, you hadn’t been trained to study, so you needed to find someone to help you, someone who could determine whom the deal was made with.

Background: Haunted (Curse of Strahd) or Guild Member (?)
Patron: Great Old One

You found the blade as you cleared lands for your farm. You and your new spouse were building near where their family lived. The blade didn’t seem like it was anything special. You brought it back and placed it above the fireplace mantel. You weren’t a fighter, but it didn’t feel right to leave the blade out in the woods. A raiding party of giants came out of the hills, and while they hadn’t been seen in a while, there were many more that you’d expected, based on the stories people had told about them. Your farm was in their path, and you rushed from the far fields back home in hopes of getting to your spouse in time. You got back to the farmhouse just before the giants came, and bursting into the house, you saw your spouse hiding in the corner. The giant crashed into the house, and the whole thing shook. You could see through a window that they were going to strike again to bring down your house on top of you and your spouse. You grabbed the sword from the mantel, knowing that in your hands, it wasn’t going to be effective. But you felt a jolt of energy and a voice in your head that asked you if you accepted its power. “To protect my spouse, yes.” That’s what you said out lout, and the power flowed into you. With a lucky dash and blow, you took down the giant. The rest fled after seeing someone to stand up to them, but they are still raiding out there. You left your spouse with their parents and have vowed to finish off the giants and then return.

Background: Folk Hero
Patron: Hexblade

The best time of the year was when the peddler came through town. The adults liked it because they were able to replace things that had broken and hear the news of the world; the kids loved it because the peddler always told great stories and could make them laugh. They could even do a little bit of magic. The peddler had been coming around for generations to your village, and you knew a number of his stories by heart. When everyone had gone to bed one night, you couldn’t sleep because you were too excited to see the peddler. He’d come in late that night, so he hadn’t been able to tell any stories. You snuck out of your bedroom and into the inn next door where he was staying. You were able to go and find his room, and timidly, you knocked on his door. He answered, looking a little tired, but fully dressed and with a jovial smile on his face. He let you into his room, and he told you a story, then asked if you wanted to be able to help him and tell stories like he did. You said yes, of course — what child wouldn’t want to be like him? He smiled and bent down to touch your head. You felt power go through you, and he told you that you were his. When he left the village a few days later, he hid you away in his cart, and you learned from him. Then one day, he disappeared without leaving you a message. You found out that he and his cart weren’t appreciated in some towns — something to do with the mayor’s daughter — and soon, those stories cropped up in more and more towns, and people hated you. Now you need to find him again to get a normal life back.

Background: Guild Member or Entertainer
Patron: Archfey

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