I don't want a special background, I want a special present. I want Tav to through the story get something unique that no origin gets. I agree that Tav being a blank slate is good, but it feels like Larian didn't put in the effort to make Tav a good blank slate. We hardly ever get to express our internal lives, hardly ever get the option to express even vague backstory beyond the set backstory tags we're given at the start. Hell, if you play a character with the Baldurian tag then at several points people will randomly say they can tell you're Baldurian, not to mention multiple places where you're unable to express pretty obvious thoughts and feelings a character might have in the situstion. To me that is the game pushing us to do certain things and be a certain way through mechanics if not narrative. So as a blank slate Tav isn't even a good example of one.
I agree with this, too. Although I don't think the way blank-slate Tav is handled is the worst (at least it's better than the PC in Neverwinter Nights OC, for example), I would have loved to see a personal storyline for Tav that no other character gets. This could be based purely on something that happens to Tav during the story, too, a scripted event like Alfira is for DU. Then Tav would have their own special events like all the other origins. Granted, Tav still gets all the tadpole stuff, but that isn't unique to a Tav playthrough.
Though I prefer it when the PC is treated as the main character with ties to the story (like BG1 and 2), I'm okay with blank slates as long as they get some personal connection to the story (like the PC becoming king/queen in Pathfinder: Kingmaker). I like the PC being the main character by virtue of more than "he/she is the only one who gets stuff done, so they are the hero."
As for DAO style origins, they could have even made "Baldurian" a real origin instead of a dialogue tag. Then you could interact with people Tav knew from their life in the city, come Act 3, and have a personal quest.
