So, I have been told (and believe it) that one of my big strengths as a GM are my NPCs.  I believe in what I call the "Cast of thousands", where if you have a huge number of fleshed-out NPCs, and have them interact, develop in their own directions, evolve as time goes by with or without the PCs being around them, etc., this will basically make emulation happen by default.

The thing is, this works less well in a campaign that assumes the PCs are going to be traveling fairly often from place to place, and rarely staying in the same region frequently enough.

So, how does one deal with this? Aside from "well, they'll see them again the next time they happen to pass by Bumfuckshire", how does one work on developing NPC characters?

Or, alternately, what's the equivalent in a non-stationary campaign? How do you get the same emulative sense when you're basically stuck with a cast of characters that are the PCs and maybe one or two NPCs who travel with them?

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This is a very specific instance, so I'm not sure it will help you. A Talislanta game I ran a while back had the characters on the run from the law and hiding out/traveling with a large party of Sarista. The Sarista of Talislanta are basically reskinned gypsies so, in effect, the village kind of travelled with the players. They needed the Sarista to keep them camouflaged from the people who were looking for them and the Sarista needed the skills that several of the PCs possessed.

Another option that just occured to me is that instead of NPCs gathered geographically perhaps they could be bound together by profession. I'm kind of thinking spy books/ movies here. Espionage circles are kind of small, so even if you are say assigned to Moscow there's still a chance you might run into an agent who you crossed paths with in Morroco. So if the players are part of a reasonably select group its possible that they will keep running into NPCs who have the same training, goals and interests as they do.

Can't the NPCs travel, too?

You could either do this via dynamic modeling, which is pretty hard, or via encounter tables.

The former: figure out what each NPC is doing or wants to do, have them moving around the setting as necessary, create timetables, and overlay that onto what the PCs are doing to find collisions.

The latter: include a range on your random encounter tables, for at least some locales, which is "Major NPC". If it comes up, choose a random NPC, and then imaginatively or randomly (more tables) find a reason for them to be there.

In practice, I'd think you'd use a combination of the above, with the dynamic method limited to a very few NPCs that you had a very good idea of what they're about.

Also, some NPCs may not travel much, but they might have a long reach. So PCs might run into their envoys or minions.

Quote from: Elliot Wilen;448183Can't the NPCs travel, too?

That's where I was going.

I'm picturing a seafaring or starfaring campaign in which rival (friendly or otherwise) ships are a major part of the game. You could possibly make cards for the ships you are interested in, and then move them around by rules, perhaps individualized to each ship, that regular their movement. Different ships might have specific runs, some may be more or less random. Some may be tracking the PCs or some other ships.

Most of my games turn into traveling games.

Instead of deeply focusing on the personalities of the NPCs, I try to make their brief histories come out in what is going on - to always have them in the middle of something when the players get there as if they were living their lives.

I know that is standard fair for any game, but I think it becomes more important when the characters travel.

I also try to get across the idea that people from one region or another are predominantly of certain ethnic groups, or not, and stick to the idea of making the local culture glow.

New NPC's at every location.

Recurring NPC's are usually only plot characters who are travelling in the same general direction anyway.  These are advanced as normal according to PC actions and adventure events.

NPC leaders and such in locations around the map may or may not develop according to the campaign time, adventure events (that might affect their demeanor with the PC's) and campaign events (which occur according to adventures / campaign time).  

In general, you don't need to worry about it as much as a campaign that takes place in one location.

In the longest campaign I ever GMed the players were traveling all over the world, meeting new factions and NPCs wherever they went.
But even in that campaign there were locations (two cities) that acted like "hubs" or safe havens, so the characters encountered old acquaintances (and I remember that I had lots of fun detailing how situations had evolved without them).

Actually, I miss that element of really long, ongoing campaigns that can only come to shine with regular, weekly (or at least bi-weekly) play. One-shots or short campaigns can't do that.*

In addition, they occasionally met a certain NPC bard along their travels, a rival NPC wizard (a former patron) and his goonies, and one or two elven nobles on diplomatic missions. (So basically NPCs that had reasons to travel around themselves, and which had reasons to be where "stuff" was happening.)


* And that's just one of the things very focused Forge-like story games can't provide. As much as I really like The Mountain Witch or Lady Blackbird - their aim to quickly get to the point of the story/problem and solve it is ultimately unsatisfying (at least for me).

Some great ideas already.  I'll add that if NPCs in different locations can communicate with each other (phones/internet in the modern day; letters/couriers in historical settings; or magical means in fantasy settings, etc), the NPCs' presence can still be felt, even if they're not physically there.  This could include, for instance, a character in a new location having an initial reaction to the PCs based on his or her own relationship with an NPC in another location.  It also provides a way for the PCs to hear updates from time to time about what NPCs are doing while the PCs aren't around, muck around with their plans, and so on.  Granted, this is  easier when the group is likely to visit the same locations multiple times, rather than an Oregon Trail style journey where the group never visits the same location twice.

Quote from: Elliot Wilen;448183Can't the NPCs travel, too?

There are certainly NPCs who could, fellow adventurers, mostly, or merchants. Or wandering scribes or somesuch thing.  But in a fantasy setting, a lot of NPCs are basically bound to where they live; either because they're serfs, or bound by their work, or ruling-class types who are tied to the city, or they'd have no good motive to travel.

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