Possible Party Rationales

Fortunately, Dragon magazine published a bunch of possible solutions many years ago. Issue 177 included an article entitled "Keeping the Party Going" (ah, the advantages of the Dragon Archive. I hardly ever use it, but when I do it proves invaluable), which included seven possible reasons for a party to come together, each of which provides some reason for the party to stick together. Unfortunately, two of these were near duplicates, leaving five:

1. The party are all agents in service to the same god. Replace with guild, patron, or other agency as appropriate.
   
2. The party all come from the same town. Having grown up together, they remain old friends.
   
3. The party are all members of the same extended family.
   
4. The party are true mercenaries. So, Vibius would not be a loyal servant of the empire, Jerriz would be motivated more by greed than by worship of Paso, and so forth.
   
5. The quest party. The group was formed to complete a specific quest, and are all loyal to each other far enough to complete that quest.

This is a rather vexing issue. I always take the view that players should be able to create characters they will enjoy playing, and constructed the main arc of the campaign in such a manner that almost any group should be able to follow it (or not, if we spin off in that direction). But, things aren't looking too good.