Random NPC generator

The Random NPC generator is for creating a distribution of plausible NPC scores for GURPS. Right now only 7 NPC's are created at a time due to spacial concerns. The table can be copy and pasted directly into excel if you take the whole table without the buttons. The generator is here.

I hope you find it as useful as I have. I have grown dependent on this personal (personnel) tool. 

When To Use The Generator

This generator was originally designed for differentiating NPC's that all fill the same roll. If they only exist to fight, giving the enemy soldiers all ST 11, Broadsword 12, and HT 10 is just fine. But sometimes the PC's need to interact with the soldiers. Sometimes they've been captured and you need to figure out which soldier is the best to try the jail break on.

Varying the stats of an NPC is inherently humanizing. It makes them stick out as a person, and Players remember who they are and have ways to interact with them. Yes, that can be done with characterization, but stats are an additional help, and they actually have an in game effect. Characters don't grab a random NPC from the family, they look at their resources and pick who is best. Of course, if you don't want NPC's to be paid attention to, don't vary their stats.

This tool was originally made to for a set of solo campaigns where the PC would run into a group of people who were all pretty much similar, and who had a set of internal politics for the character to navigate -- and eventually move past. The stats gave a framework to build the characters on.

Layering on Templates

Often, you are generating a set of people who fill the same role: the classic example here is a team of soldiers, but it could also be a team of scientists or the crew of a sailing ship. If doing this, simply apply a template to your list of generated NPC's.

Alternatively, if you aren't quite sure what you need out of your template, generate more than you need and pick the best ones. You can simulate the exact level of 'eliteness' by picking the size of your pool. If I want a 'picked' crew, I may choose 5 NPC's out of a set of 10. If I want a group of top notch scientists, I may pick the best 5 out of 25. In this case, 'best' means 'best for the job', not 'highest point value'.

Remember that all types of people do all sorts of things. Sometimes you'll have worse quality NPC's than you expected. This is a role-playing opportunity! perhaps Fred with the low DX really can't hit the broad side of a barn. Or maybe he is crap at most DX things but is aware of his weakness and has more points in riffle than everyone else (which is useful if its floated to another skill). Necessity is mother of invention: be inventive.

This doesn't seem to be centered on 10--

IQ and DX are centered at about 10.5. HT is centered around 10. ST is centred around 10 if you take both and women into account: its skewed to make men larger and women smaller (as per statistics on average human weight distribution).

The skew towards higher numbers is based on GMing tendencies. Most GM's are more liberal about increasing the traits of NPC's rather than decreasing them. I very often give NPC's scores of 11's or 12's, but rarely 9's or almost never 8's. Thus: a 10 is a mildly below average person, while an 11 is mildly above average.