Imhotepthewise said:
I also think that this is a most useful article. Plentiful, interesting npc's are the sign of a healthy campaign.
When this subject has come up on the boards in the past, I admit I'm a bit surprised by the number of GMs who indicate that they largely 'wing' their NPCs. Now there's no way that a GM can hope to generate background for every shop keeper or town watchman or road agent, but certainly spending the time to flesh out the important NPCs, the ones that are likely to have an effect on the players directly or
indirectly deserve a background.
For our Modern PbP campaign, the adventurers are in a company of paratroopers. I have about five or sx sentences describing most of the men in their platoon (soon to be expanded slightly) and about seven or eight paragraphs
* on each of the members of their section/squad, plus the platoon sergeant and the lieutenant. These are the characters with whom the adventurers will interact regularly in almost every adventure, so
really knowing their mates personalities, habits, quirks, and so on is helps me to bring their world to life.
I also tend to go thin on plot and rely on character motivations. Instead of writing intricate stories with twists and plugging in adventurers (my
least favorite style of gaming...) I prefer to develop deep characters and then allow the characters' motivations to drive the action. A lot of what happens in the game from my side of the screen becomes the actions and reactions of the NPCs to the adventurers.
I dimly remembered the 'seven-sentence' approach, and I thank
Psion again for the refresher - I'm going to add a few more details to my NPCs.
*A sample of my NPC backgrounds...[sblock]
Sergent Henri Souchez
Platoon sergeant, 2nd Platoon, 3rd Company, 1st Foreign Parachute Regiment
Henri Souchez was born in Milhaud, a suburb of Nîmes in southern France on 8 June 1920. His father Joseph was a tailor, his mother Vivienne a housewife. Henri was the middle child – his older sister Louise and his younger brother Georges were born in 1916 and 1923, respectively. The Souchez family lived a quiet life until 1940, when Henri, then a clerk at a haberdashery, was conscripted to serve in the French Army.
Henri was assigned to a supply battalion as a truck driver – his war was a short one however, as the French Army collapsed and an armistice with Germany was declared. After the establishment of the neutral Vichy government Henri was retained as part of the
Armée Nouvelle allowed the French under the terms of the armistice. Henri found himself part of an infantry battalion assigned to patrol the border with Italy.
In the fall of 1942 Operation Torch, the American invasion of North Africa resulted in the Germans ordering Vichy to disband the
Armée Nouvelle as Germans and Italians moved to occupy southern France. Henri was discharged and returned home to Milhaud where he returned to his job at the haberdashers. In February 1943 the Vichy introduced the
Service du travail obligatoire, a labor conscription program for the purpose of sending workers to Germany in support of the war effort. Henri moved to a farm owned by his uncle Henri (for whom he was named), as agricultural workers were exempt from labor conscription. His father Joseph had developed a thriving business as a tailor to German and Italian officers, while his sister Louise was mistress to a married German colonel and Georges served in the French militia, the
Milice – that September Georges was killed by
maquisards near Grenoble, and Louise fled France for Germany after receiving death threats from the Resistance.
After the war, Henri attempted to return to Milhaud and resume his quiet life, but his family was stained by its embrace of Vichy and the Nazis. His father’s business was destroyed by members of the Resistance following the departure of the German soldiers, and he was forced to take a job sweeping floors in a machine shop – Joseph’s health deteriorated rapidly, and he died in December 1945 of pneumonia. Vivienne moved to her brother’s farm early the next year, and Henri, on the basis of his brief and mostly uneventful military service, decided to join the Foreign Legion, enlisting in October 1946. He served with a mechanized infantry battalion in Madagascar and later in Morocco, rising to the rank of corporal. In the hopes of gaining another stripe, Henri volunteered for jump training in July 1954 and joined the 1st BEP (later REP) that fall, and shortly after the unit was reorganized the following year, Henri was promoted to sergeant and assigned command of a squad.
Henri is of average height with a stocky build. His hair and brushy mustache are brown flecked with grey. Like most of the men with long service in Africa, his bluff round face and burly arms are deeply tanned. Henri’s small brown eyes are watery, his brow furrowed by a perpetual scowl – he gives the outward show of a cuckolded husband searching for a straying wife. His appearance is neat, as one would expect of a tailor’s son.
Sergeant Souchez is a methodical and efficient soldier and non-commissioned officer, but he lacks creativity and initiative at times. He executes orders adequately, but his ability to think on his feat, to adapt to changes in battlefield conditions, is questionable. Unlike most of his peers, Souchez never served in Indochina – his postings to Madagascar and Morocco did not season him for the fast-paced environment of Algeria, and so far he has proven slow to learn the lessons of counter-insurgency warfare. In Captain Martini’s view, Sergeant Souchez thinks too much like a plodding infantryman, not a paratrooper, and has reservations about the sergeant’s fitness to serve in the 1st REP. Souchez is sometimes the butt of jokes among the other non-commissioned officers of the company for his fastidious ways, but as a man who embraces structure, military life is good for Henri – while he lacks tactical acumen he is an effective administrator with an eye for detail.
In some ways Henri is an unhappy man. He came to the Legion to escape the legacy of his past during the war – he found himself treated with thinly-veiled contempt on his return to Milhaud over his service in the Vichy army, his non-participation in the Resistance, and his family’s collaboration with the Nazis, making life in France difficult for him. In his heart Henri’s a patriot – he chose to serve in the
Armée Nouvelle to defend France and enforce her neutrality following the armistice and he avoided labor service rather than give aid to the Germans whom he still considered to be the enemy. He regrets his decision not to join the Resistance, but he did not want to take arms against other Frenchmen, including his own brother. His humiliation at his family’s collaboration with the Nazis manifests itself as a chip on his shoulder, and by his service in the Legion seeks to atone for an awkward past. Occasionally he still dreams of the life of a shopkeeper or businessman – he’s considered leaving the Legion to start a small trucking company or delivery service in Algiers after the FLN is defeated – but for the time being at least, he has found a home.[/sblock]
