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Message: <blockquote data-quote="(Psi)SeveredHead" data-source="post: 6206792" data-attributes="member: 1165">There is no official definition. A DMPC is just a type of NPC (as the DM is not a player)*. An NPC that travels with the party can be considered a DMPC (generally a negative term) but there's no hard-core definition, anymore than there's a hard-core definition for a Mary Sue. An NPC is more likely to be considered a DMPC if they play a lead role instead of fading into the background.There's too many definitions (and you're not giving enough info, except about the kobold) to say whether those are DMPCs or not, but "excellent" NPCs that accompany PCs sometimes aggravate players. It's probably not a good idea to have NPCs travel with the PCs that are higher-level than them though, especially if it's obvious.Good if the party doesn't already have a dedicated archer. (The players were looking for an archer, suggesting they didn't have one.)Yes. If you're already got a PC healer, you don't need an NPC healer. If you already have a PC rogue, you don't need an NPC rogue. If you've got a PC bard, you don't need an NPC face. Overlapping is generally bad. It might be okay if you desperately need more than one character in a role (eg a large party that is too much for a single healing PC to handle).Of course, simply asking the players if they need another "X" is a good way to avoid this problem. You might think they don't want another healer when they do, or you might think they want another healer when they don't.Whether he's a DMPC or not depends on whether he's taking a lead role. In this case, he's not, unless he's telling PCs to throw him down hallways.This is a kind of NPC to avoid. Not that it's your fault, as you didn't seem to expect PCs to use him as an "easy mode" trap detector. I went through a GURPS Traveller (of all things!) adventure where we encountered a colony of sapient (Int 7 or 8-equivalent) anthropomorphic penguins that can turn invisible (no, that's not a typo) and unfortunately most of the PCs tried to use them as scouts. (Between lack of Intelligence and having little familiarity with technology, they made poor scouts. One mistook a cleaning robot as a combat robot!) Making matters worse, most of the PCs were cowardly, so they were really insistent on using an invisible scout. They ignored me when I said stupid scouts were... stupid ... until the cleaning "deadly" robot incident.A DMPC is easy to mess up. That's why some people avoid them. Does this mean that DMPCs are automatically bad? No. But they're easy to mess up. If I were to use myself as an example, I wouldn't mind painting my bedroom walls (easy to do, hard to mess up) but I wouldn't try to write a business budget (hard to do without proper training, easy to mess up).Most people overestimate their own skills. DMs do this too.*Unless you've got rotating DMs in the same campaign. Is that common? People rarely disdain these PC/NPC "hybrids".</blockquote>

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