Have you ever had an NPC surprise you, when you are DM?

[Oogar]

I like to concern myself with the motivations of the NPCs in my game. It is much more interesting to understand them, and why they do things, rather then to know what "the Plot" is.

I was pondering an upcoming game of mine and realized something, NPC X is going to turn on the party. He is not a major NPC, and is going to attack at a point quite bad for the players, but this surprised me. I know why he will do it, and I know how he will do it, I just had not planned on him doing it. NPC X was just a minor little helper for the party, who had his own personal history and was really nothing more then flavor. But in his development he evolved an agenda that was not my doing, and seems so consistent that I hate to stand in his way.

Has this ever happened to you?

Am I insane?

 

[Mortaneus]

Am I insane?

Definitally Barmy.

Don't worry though. I once had an NPC of mine (a love interest for one of the PCs) spontaneously turn into Asmodeus. The PC wasn't happy.

I was tired.

 

[Crothian]

Sure. I had this little ambassodor gnome NPC that bragged about the PCs going to assault the leader of an opposing nation, 3 weeks before they did. I wasn't expecting it, but I accidently set it up perfectly. The gnome was in a poker game with some other imbassidors and one was the ambassador of the country. He had always talked about the PCs and what they were doing and planning. THis time could be no different.

 

[Furn_Darkside]

I had a Kenku pirate who one of the players became obsessed about- it led to some great moments outside of what I had planned for the character.

FD

 

[Ruavel]

former PC turned NPC...

When I took over a campaign from a DM leaving my city, I retired my character (after his in-game resurrection) to the realms of NPC-hood...

the campaign setting has humans distrusting and even hating elves after a war between the races (that ended 1000 years ago) resulted in most races regressing to the point of associating with no-one but their own kind...

the character was a half-elven bladesinger but during his resurrection he was given a bit of a "shot in the arm" and brought back to life as a pure-blood elf... having been killed while attempting to rescue a number of kidnapped elves, I found this character initially rebelling at the idea of having been made pure elf because he now had hundreds of years to regret his failure...

but recently, there was a shift in his attitude... instead of continually to wallow in self-pity, he would make amends for all elves by rebuilding the might of the old elven nation (by any means) and claiming back lands lost during the old war...

the closest human settlement to the elves is a town that was recently placed under the rule of the PC's and my NPC elf finds himself preparing to make an example of this former allies...



messy situation, huh...?

 

[dshai527]

All of my NPC's like yours seem to have their own agenda and life. My players treat my NPC's with a good amount of respect because they are just as alive and part of the game as any of the players. This has lead to many episodes of banging my head on the table when the PC's forget or do something stupid.

Case in point...they were traveling with a half-ogre warrior who detested magic and would attack anyone who used it in his presence since it was a mage who caused him to be born like this (the PC's knew this well) and for many days they were able to keep from casting around him, until the cleric wanted to heal himself from a minor scratch.
ME: "Um, You (PC) know that the half-ogre is right next to you right?

PC: "Yeah why, does he need healing too. How many points do I get back."

All the other PC's just stepped away from him.

 

[Bihor]

the strange little boy

The PC help in saveing a boy. They found out that peaplee from a other country whanted him and the boy was some kind of construc.
A year later, every body as forgoten him even me. Then it hit me, why would a bunch of demon controled by a other country, would attack there village (last game session), for the boy. And the reason why? It's that the other nation was trying to create a tarasque. So when the boy grow up (fasterr than normal) he will be a tarasque easy to control.

 

[Moe Ronalds]

story 1---1st session of campaign was initially going to be spent making characters. That finished faster than expected, so I ended up BS-ing my way through an adventure. In this adventure, the PCs found an evil gnome cleric up to something wonky involving burning mass bodies in a big pit. The pcs killed the gnome, put out the fire, and saved everyone. However, a large rolling ball of smoke shot out from the bodies and into the sky... I then decided that the gnome had released the spirit of an old dark god (impressive for a first level gnome. ) who then became the main big bad guy for the entire campaign that we're currently playing.

Story 2--- This actually wasn't my own NPC. THe party was playing the sunless citadel, and had Meepo as a guide. They took a liking to him, and when the party monk destroyed a skeleton that had severely pissed him off, he made a make-shift mace out of its bones and gave it to Meepo! Of course, after that they immediately tricked the goblins and kobolds into killing one another in a full-out war... With meepo being the only survivor. Running from the carnage, Meepo hid out in the woods, where he was contacted in his dreams by a dark god with offerings of power (the BBEG of the campaign, mentioned above).