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Author Topic: The Cast of Thousands  (Read 1581 times)

RPGPundit

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The Cast of Thousands
« on: September 13, 2006, 04:17:57 PM »
Yesterday I talked about the multiverse, one of the two features of my DMing style that I think makes my games stand out.  The other is what I call the Cast of Thousands. But before I go into that, I should add that of course, there are a lot of other features that make for a good game: careful plotting, interesting adventure premises, a good balance of humour and serious issues, familiarity with the system, a sense of risk, and most importantly putting the PCs in the spotlight as the main characters, all the time.  The PCs, not the story, not the setting, not the NPCs.
 
But those are all things that are fairly common in any good DM. The multiverse and the cast of thousands are things that I've very rarely seen in most games, even well-run games.  I'm sure there are others out there who have used them both, and I theorize that they too would be considered exceptional DMs, in part due to the correct use of these two techniques.
 
On to the cast of thousands, then.  This is again something I clued into using from my Star Wars campaign; although, like the multiverse concept, the cast of thousands is something I owe more to Amber than anything else.  Amber essentially uses both of these principles as part of the very mechanic of the game.
 
The cast of thousands is the concept of having LOTS AND LOTS of npcs, and having them all fully-flushed out individuals with priorities and changing plot developments of their own, happening in the background usually, and in the foreground when they interact with the PCs.
 
Usually, in too many games I've seen, there are one or two NPCs that reach the level of two- or three-dimensional characters. Usually these are the pet NPCs of the DM.  And the rest of the personalities that the players might run into act a lot like the "npcs" in a computer rpg: they only exist in as much as they interact with the characters.
 
In extreme cases, they are like the storekeepers and tavern-owners of the older, crappier computer games: you leave the store, and they cease to exist. You come back into the store, and they are exactly as they were before. When the PCs aren't in the store, you could only imagine the storekeeper standing idly, waiting to recite his set lines when the PCs come back in.
 
When the pcs go to a city/planet/farm/etc. for the second time, its pretty much unchanged since they left, unless something absolutely pressing to the adventure has caused a change.  Most NPCs won't even have a name, much less an individual personality.
 
Even those "named" NPCs will have a fixed personality, fixed motives and behvaiours, that will only change inasmuch as the PCs interact with them.  At worst, they will be stereotypes; at best, they will be "two-dimensional", complex but purely reactive personalities that don't change and grow the way the PCs change and grow.
 
The concept of the "cast of thousands" is to make every NPC a living, breathing personality.  They have their own motives, they are out there doing things even when they aren't with the PCs, and sometimes the PCs will end up noticing the things these NPCs are up to. Other times they won't, but they'll always know that whatsisname is out there doing stuff.
 
My Star Wars game came alive when I decided to create about fifty fully-fleshed out NPCs and had them all living and going through problems, having their own motivations and personal battles, so that the things the PCs did, the PCs own motivations and personal battles, criss-crossed in and out of the lives of these NPCs.
 
I've applied the same technique to my following campaigns.  In my Historical Rome campaign, this became particularly interesting as the NPCs were a mix of real figures from history and fictional personalities.  The PCs ran into Vespasian as a young legionaire fighting in Britain for the emperor Claudius.  Later on, they went on running into him at irregular intervals, all through his career right up till the moment he decides to make his move for the Imperial throne in 69ad, more than twenty years from when they first met him.
 
In my Port Blacksand campaign, I've used every NPC in the Port Blacksand book plus a couple of dozen of my own creation. These characters each have a story, and they are all in the setting doing things. The PCs have only met about half of these characters so far, but in some cases the activities of the characters they haven't even met yet have directly affected the PC's lives.  When they do run into these guys, they might already know of them by reputation.  Others they've met in one context early on in the campaign may be very different when they run into them later on.
 
My Traveller campaign features the PCs as a humble crew of a Far Trader, just trying to get by, but getting slowly more and more caught up in an oncoming civil war, while also running into a mystery surrounding alien intervention with humanity and humanity's ultimate destiny.  The PCs have only seen one Senator in person, and then only very briefly, and they've never met the President of the galactic republic or any of the big players on the political scene (the Caliph, the Pope, the presidents of the various corporations, or the heads of any of the opposition political parties), but all of these big players have been doing things, behind the scenes, that have had a big impact on the game.  There are also various lesser npcs; a Navy Colonel who's helped the PCs in the past, and tried to kill a couple of them too; a pair of neo-communist revolutionaries, a semi-retired Tong boss, and the unsinkable TAS reporter whose blog-like newsfeed reports have made him the bane of the military's existence.  All of these NPCs are out there doing things, all the time, that affect the campaign.

Likewise, the things the PCs do affect all of them. And this interaction between realistic NPCs and the realistic PCs creates a sense of simulation that gives the campaign far more life than could be possible otherwise.

Why don't more DMs do this? Aside from the fact that many may not have thought of this, the fact is it takes massive amounts of work. Creating a one-dimensional world is difficult enough, keeping track of the pcs actions and how they affect the world is one thing; but creating a three-dimensional world where you have to always keep in mind the present whereabouts and priorities of dozens of NPCs is far more difficult.
 
In the end, though, it's worth it.

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beejazz

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The Cast of Thousands
« Reply #1 on: September 13, 2006, 11:24:35 PM »
This really isn't something that would come naturally. Luckily for me, though, I have vocal curious players. I give them a picture of a monster without its name, they want to know what it is, and so on and so forth...

On that note, the first time I noticed players of my current setting being interested in an NPC was also the first time my players so much as interacted with one... He was the barkeep at the tavern. The tavern gets overrun by wasted humanoid monsters (living zombies), and the barkeep pretty much pulls out a shotgun and starts kicking ass. Like it was nothing.

The players wanted to know who that was and why he wasn't cowering. So the barkeep became a retired vet. It didn't really matter after this point, because the PCs were banned from the bar for having trashed it entirely.

I'm probably going to find some excuse to drag the PCs back there... maybe burn it down... just for an excuse to bring back the barkeep. Afterwards, some kind of showdown or secret basement in the ruins... It's all kind of sketchy at this point...

Anyway, I see your point though about things happening offstage. It isn't immediately apparent to the DM, but players are *actually* curious about the world around them.

mywinningsmile

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The Cast of Thousands
« Reply #2 on: September 14, 2006, 10:23:14 AM »
I can see how that would work, and be very gratifying both for the players and yourself. Locking into characters enough to forecast where they would be after one year of absence, comprehending how they would interlock and transform one another; these things are rooted in committed involvement to the story, and have the effect of producing ever-more involvement and gratification.

It's for precisely these reasons I can't see going down that road myself: I could see it utterly consume my life, in the same way I suspect MMORPGs would if I ever let them get a handhold. Every spare evening would be spent developing and interweaving the established players, or fleshing out a bit player to a more realised level.

For me, my love of gaming, producing stories together with my friends, is a good and bright thing in my life. For me, my love of noodling and knitting stuff together in isolation is in tension with the other things I want to do, because it's such a timesink. I'm glad if you can juggle it, though :bow:
 

Vellorian

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The Cast of Thousands
« Reply #3 on: September 14, 2006, 11:02:50 AM »
I have enjoyed letting players create some of the NPCs in the worlds that I (as GM) present to them.  From character creation, they generally create 10 - 15 NPCs (whether they know it or not, in fact).

I always ask each of them to give me 9 NPCS:
3 Friends, 3 General Contacts and 3 Rivals

Then I also have them tell me about their character's close family: father, mother, siblings.  Even if the character is an orphan, there is bound to be at least one "person of import" in their life.  

That's 10 right there.

As we discuss the recent history that lead the PC to the starting point of the adventure, I get usually get a short list of NPCs they've dealt with, even if it's only some shop-keepers, policeman, beggar or whatever.  

While I go on to do the same with the next player, I ask them to flesh out the details of these people with names and whatever personality information they can add.  

By the time the game starts, I have nearly populated a small village with NPCs with very little effort.
Ian Vellore
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Reimdall

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The Cast of Thousands
« Reply #4 on: September 14, 2006, 11:18:53 AM »
Quote from: RPGPundit
Likewise, the things the PCs do affect all of them. And this interaction between realistic NPCs and the realistic PCs creates a sense of simulation that gives the campaign far more life than could be possible otherwise.

Why don't more DMs do this?


I think the work involved is part of it.  I also suspect that a lot of GMs don't think about or don't desire that level of change in a campaign story.  They want the goody goal to eventually be reached, but that's it.  If the pivotal antagonist general starts thinking of the PCs as good joes, the kickass Final Battle that you've been planning all these months for might have to be reexamined.  :eek:

The level of environmental interaction you're talking about is, IMO, when characters really start to feel that they're having an effect on the universe around them, and also the most fun that a GM can have.

I think it also works from a (foreign to some) assumption that NPCs in a story can have changing, and even conflicting motivations toward the characters as events unfold.  This idea is acceptable to a lot of people in theory, but much tougher to consistently apply.  And once GM starts doing it, they gotta keep going, because it'll jazz the players so much.
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Reimdall

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The Cast of Thousands
« Reply #5 on: September 14, 2006, 11:25:26 AM »
Quote from: Vellorian
I always ask each of them to give me 9 NPCS:
3 Friends, 3 General Contacts and 3 Rivals


Brilliant!  So totally stealing that.  :D
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Vellorian

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The Cast of Thousands
« Reply #6 on: September 14, 2006, 11:39:29 AM »
Quote from: Reimdall
Brilliant!  So totally stealing that.  :D


Thanks for the compliment, but I stole it from someone else years ago.  :)
Ian Vellore
"Is life so dear, or peace so sweet, as to be purchased at the price of chains and slavery? Forbid it, Almighty God! I know not what course others may take; but as for me, give me liberty or give me death!" -- Patrick Henry