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CHIM Background Life

Background Life lets selected NPCs keep living their lives while you are somewhere else. They can travel, work, rest, send letters, and create new stories over time.

Getting Started

  1. Open Background Life from the Roleplay section of the web interface or from the in-game CHIM menu.
  2. Add the NPCs you want CHIM to follow.
  3. Keep playing normally while CHIM updates those NPCs in the background.
  4. Use the map and history to see where they are and what they have been doing.

Start with one or two NPCs while you get used to it. You can add more whenever you are ready.

Managing NPCs

  • Actions: Allows the NPC to choose and perform new Background Life activities.
  • Letters: Allows the NPC to send letters as their off-screen story develops.
  • Tracking: Keeps the NPC's map position updated when CHIM receives new location information.
  • Trigger Action: Asks the selected NPC to decide what they should do next.
  • Send Letter: Asks the selected NPC to write and send a new letter.

Select an NPC on the map or in the NPC list to review their current activity, recent events, letters, and inner thoughts.

Map And History

The map shows the latest known position of each tracked NPC. Zoom in to inspect busy areas, then select an NPC marker to open their Background Life details.

The History tab records travel, work, rest, conversations, and other off-screen activity. The newest events appear first, making it easy to catch up after a long journey or time away from the game.

Rumors

Rumors give NPCs new local stories to react to. You can create a rumor for a specific hold, choose how long it remains active, and let it influence Background Life events over time.

Creating Background Life NPCs

You can create a new character from either Background Life menu. Choose their race, role, and starting location, then leave Skyrim running and unpaused while CHIM creates them in the game.

Created characters are added to Background Life automatically and can be found later through CHIM NPC filters.

Tips

  • Give the system time to develop stories instead of repeatedly forcing actions.
  • Use letters and rumors when you want off-screen events to reach the player naturally.
  • If an NPC's position is stale, use Send All Locations from the CHIM MCM while Skyrim is running.
  • Background Life Trigger Time is configured in hours under Global Settings. The default is 24 hours.