Most/Least Favorite Background

[edgefigaro]

Sister to the Most/Least Favorite Species thread.

Top 3 and Bottom 3

Favroite
I like Monks
I like Summoners
I like Wanderers
Honorable Mention- Venom Mage, Enchanter, Berserker

I tend to play more book starts.

Least Favorite
I dislike Arcane Marksman. What a terrible starting book.
I dislike Warpers. Maybe these two should be merged. Also, I have never used the tomahawks of dispersal effectively.
I dislike Air Elementalists. The shock game annoys me. Static Discharge annoys me.
Dishonorable mention: Transmuters. I wish the background wasn't so difficult, because I like the idea in concept. Starting with UC and spells ends up being hard.

[FraterFugae]

My Most Favorites:

Gladiator, because it goes well with merfolk. (which are my favorite species)

Ice elementalist, because I love the idea of a wizard-warrior hybrid and they are nice to play.

Earth elementalist, because the damage spells are all nicely powerful and useful for pretty much any point in the game. Also, stone arrow, the nicest damage spell.

My Least Favorites:

Assassin, it's a little like an less fun, magicless enchanter.

Air elementalist, because it just makes me feel disappointed. I want lightning to be chaotically powerful, yet dangerous, (which chain lighting is, while mostly also not being worth the xp) but it mostly feels like trying to micromanage Shock and Lighting Bolt double-zap to just get "meh" damage.

Summoner, for somewhat the same reason as AE. Becasue of the xp-malus from summoned creatures, I am punished for using the coolest spells in the game, and becausue the penalty is really actually difficult to notice meaningfully, I just get vaguely concerned/stressed about whether i'm overusing my spells early game (when I need them the most) to leave me underleveled for later encounters.

[chequers]

Like: Monk, Conjurer, Chaos Knight

Dislike: Fighter, Arcane Marksman, Hunter

[duvessa]

Favourite to play for fun: Be > EE > AE > IE > FE > Tm > Wn > Gl > Mo > Fi > VM > As > Sk > Cj > Wz > Hu > Ar > Wr > AM > Ne > CK > AK > En > Su
Melee is fun except for all the monsters that actively try to make it annoying and ruin it, so Be and Tm are high because you get easy ways of removing those monsters from your game

Favourite from a design perspective: I don't think I like any of crawl's backgrounds from a design perspective other than Wn, actually. Fi misleads people into thinking they shouldn't use two-handers, Gl misleads people into thinking they shouldn't wear heavy armour, Mo has the nonsensical piety thing, ranged/book/zealot backgrounds are ranged/book/zealot backgrounds. So I guess it'd be
Wn >>>>> Fi > Gl > Mo >>>>> FE > IE > EE > AE > Tm >>> As > Hu > Ar >>>>> Be > Sk > VM > Cj > Wr > AM >>> En >>> AK > CK >>> Wz > Ne > Su

marker so that i can search for this post easily when this question gets asked again in a week: shingles

[ydeve]

Like: FE, Wz, Cj, En
Dislike: Fi/Gl, Hu, Su

[radinms]

Like: Be
Dislike: everything except Be

Be is the most optimal background.
because early game is the most stupid part in this game, any background that dies at stupid early game is completely meaningless.

[Sprucery]

Like: every background.

[Sar]

Like - IE, Su, Ne - versatile and strong backgrounds with some fun spells that you can build in any way you want.

Dislike - Hu, AM (ranged), En (stabbing).

@radinms: how can Be be strong if Be can't follow Chei (the strongest god) without dying

[radinms]

Be is strong whether or not you can worship Chei

[sizz]

like: Fi, FE, Tm
dislike: Su, AM, Wn