It’s pretty simple: players’ characters are the heroes. They’re the ones that in a movie or a TV show would have their names in the credits. But for a game, book, show, movie to be interesting, there have to be people outside of your few players to interact with. The supporting cast…the NPCs.
Some beginning GMs are loathe to include NPCs in the party (assuming fantasy here) as it takes away from the players having to do things. In fantasy, you can get away with this fairly easily — the advnetures are often rural or remote in nature and there aren’t a lot of people you have to deal with outside of the requisite monsters. They are the busty girl that brings you your drinks at the obligatory “meet at the inn” sequence, or perhaps a villain monster.
Some games, however, have settings that necessitate more interaction with NPCs. An urban setting with bring you up against merchants, thieves, drunks, other service and crafts people. You can get by in “cut sequences” — where the action can be glossed over with some subtle description, “the barmaid provides you with a barely contained surly manner, slapping down dishes of food, nearly spilling your ale…but there’s a frazzled quality to her grumpiness that suggest fatigue. She could be overworked, she might have been accosted by some adventure hungry tits like you guys…” You haven’t done much, but it gives the players a sense of reality. After all, how much interaction do you have with your waitresses at Denny’s?
Occasionally, this kind of thumbnail character catches some players’ interest. a few jocular lines from a mechanic have them chuckling, and suddenly, he’s their go to guy on all things mechanical… Now you need a name and a very basic outline of the guy’s personality. This is that fellow you don’t know really well, but you talk cars, or guns, or politics with when he’s around…but you don’t know the name of his wife, or daughter, or where (or if) he goes to church.
Some genres will bring you into more contact with NPCs, but some will necessitate that NPCs act not as scene dressing or your villain, but as your support, as well. In campaigns centering on the military, or intelligence work, or even criminal work (and, let’s face it, what is most dungeon crawling..?), you’re characters aren’t always going to have the requisite skills. Or they’re part of a group where they might have backup coming to save their asses in a pinch. They build or supply your equipment. They do the stuff you can’t.
These NPCs might not need to be fleshed out beyond a basic personality and background — as with the mechanic aforementioned. All you might know is SGT Biggs likes his scotch expensive, smokes a lot, and bitches about having to carry the Beretta 9mm (“We should go back to the .45, man!) He drives a truck and has a girlfriend no one has met. He’s good as a field medic. That’s all you might really need to know. Hell, most of the people in the military I knew, this was about the extent of who they were to me. Extras.
You hold these guys in reserve. Your team is tasked with an extraction of bad guy #1 from his base of operations in Colombia. SGT Biggs is tasked as your backup, his guys holding open your egress route and providing cover for your escape. However, in a pinch, he and his guys can swoop in to aid you, should you need. Some basic stats might be needed, if you want to roll for these guys. They’re still the bit players…but even the bit players occasionally get to save the day.
The commandos in black rollneck sweaters with camo on their faces do fastrope into the volcano to save James Bond’s bac0n. they don’t get to capture/kill the bad guy, per se…but they play a role. The geeky hacker might be the only thing that gets you out of the building you’re ripping off (but no one played geeky hacker boy). Don’t be ashamed to have NPCs do stuff that is needed: help bail out the characters if they get in too deep, provide vital bits of information, provide the skills your characters are lacking (that native guide leading your intrepid explorers up the Amazon and who is the only one that can talk to the natives…)
Even having an NPC command your ship in Star Trek or Battlestar Galactica is a good idea. the characters have a certain latitude of behavior when they aren’t the big shot that can get everyone killed. It allows them to do their shtick, and allows the GM to keep the game on track through fiat…Captain Pike is giving the orders, knows the mission parameters, keeps you guys from wandering too far afield. But you get to find out how the monster works. (Just remember the phrase, “Captain! AAAAAH!!!!)
When I started running a Galactica campaign, I realized that key to giving the players the right jolt — which the series never really gave you — was what the characters had lost. Everything — sure; that explains the stress, the bad decisions, and the drama. People don’t function well under intense stress and they make stupid mistakes and decisions. To give the players that same sense of loss their characters felt, it was necessary to set the scene properly — give them wives, and husbands, and lovers, children and friends. Pet dogs. Favorite diners, cars, people they knew just as “that guy I chat with at the news stand on Fridays…”
Things that define your life and things people miss when a bunch of pissed-off robots scatter their ashes over a wide area.
The trick here is to decide exactly how much focus you need on the NPCs. Can you get away with a cardboard cutout? Do they need a name or are they “Dude #1” in the end credits? Give them a simple quirk or thing to stand out — a tic, an accent (works quickly and well), a type of sword/gun/whatever, the asshole that wants to drag you in their Camaro/fast spaceship. Build on that if the NPC catches the players’ attention. (Think of how many bit players grab fans’ imaginations, and they get promoted into minor or major characters? [SGT Harriman in Stargate SG-1 and Helo in Battlestar Galactica, for instance.])
You don’t have to have the name and a detailed background on everyone in your hamlet, town, ship…but you should be ready to roll with it when some NPC suddenly outshines the others.
Important to note: you (the GM) are going to have your favorites, as well. Some will rise to the position of major characters in their own right. We had a starship commander in a Star Trek game that just snagged my imagination and I loved bring the character back frequently as a foil or friend. She was often the person in charge…but the characters were the ones doing the work. Generals, captains…they tend to be too busy to research this, build that widget, command the small away mission.
Resist the urge to have your favorite NPC be the hero all the time. But occasionally, you can give them their moment in the sun, and the players — if they like the character — won’t mind; if they don’t, you can use it to create some dramatic tension and give them a shot to take said NPC down a peg or two.
The Black Campbell 