I totally agree.
Our MC needs to feel unique, both in her answers as well as the way npcs address her.
I won't accuse paradox of being the best publisher around, but have anyone played Tyranny? The game is by obsidian though, whom have a pretty good background.
In Tyranny, after creating our character, we are given the layout of the land and a mission by our master.
In a few quick steps we go through scenes that allow us to solve conflicts with choices.
I remember being faced with the queen of this region we were in the process of enforcing the empire's will, and tricking her into a duel and killing her.
Later in the game I felt really good when people called me the Queen's killer.
I'm not sure this would be the "best" approach to a background, but it certainly does give significance to our character, as well as places us in the world with an already established "history" of sorts.
If something like this would be added though, perhaps it could center around the backgrounds and the choices one would make to achieve the "become an adventurer" goal through them. No idea how they'd pull that one off with Guild Artisan while giving us choices that wouldn't be something like "spent the rest of my days honing my craft and becoming a master smith".
Just wanted to share the idea, think it worked well in Tyranny, even with the flaws the game has (too many dlcs)
Or character creation in Torment Tides of Numenera.
