Demigod(dess) NPCs and Normal PCs

[mr beer]

Originally Posted by whswhs

I think the highest end version of this I've done was not in GURPS, but in DC Realtime, a DC Heroes campaign I ran many years ago. At one point the PCs' actions resulted in their meeting two of the Endless, Dream and Delirium. I didn't even attempt to come up with character sheets for them; I just had them do the things I thought were in character.

Yeah they would be tricky to stat out to say the least.

[JoelSammallahti]

My ongoing vampire campaign has featured two appearances by Satan. No character sheet for him, though... He's something between a patron and a contact, so far.

Demigod-level NPCs have made appearances in many of the games I've run, but I practically never bother with full character sheets for any NPCs, and these would be more trouble than most. As long as I have a rough idea of what kind of powers they have, and a couple of essential numbers like their Will, HT, and Power Talent if applicable, I consider myself good to go. The biggest point total NPCs I've actually statted up were a couple of 4000-point supers, but that was a 2000-point campaign, so they weren't actually that far beyond the player characters.

[VariousRen]

Some advice to anyone who's going to put a demigod level character in a party of normal human scale adventurers: Please don't. Unless there's a very good reason why the players are present and useful, every single conflict will come down to "How can we get our ally to do this for us?". It almost always completely overshadows the PC's and stinks of GM-PC-ism. The same goes for "random NCP's who joined up and happen to be gods.". The moment they help the players will realize that either A) They've never been in any real risk and their challenges didn't matter, or B) you're making it all up as you go along (and even if you are, don't make it this obvious!)

If you have Demigods, or any other characters that so massively outstrip the PC's in their abilities that they are basically untouchable, you need to really ask yourself how the PC's are meant to interact with them. There basically can't be any source of conflict between the PC's and the demigods in the game, because the demigods would win 100% of the time.

[RyanW]

I had a monster hunters game where the PCs were intended to interact with what was left of the honest to god gods. They were rendered substantially less powerful than they once were, and largely forbidden from directly interfering in the mortal world anymore. Anansi and Bastet were intended to be very important.

Sadly, the campaign didn't last long enough to be explored significantly.

[ericthered]

I think most of my Demi-god level NPC's come from the world hopping games Lost in Dreams, where they are generally restricted by location. They also generally tried to use the PC's to do tasks for them rather than defeating the PC's or doing the tasks themselves. One found the PC's more expendable than himself, one was at a loss and wanted ideas from the PC's, and one tried to use the PC's abilities to augment his own. In all cases, the NPC's were localized in the campaign, and didn't wish the PC's death.

[johndallman]

I have used an exceedingly powerful NPC (not technically a demigoddess, but someone who disciplines them), in Infinite Cabal. She is basically part of the immune system of the living universe.

She was firstly interested in their ethical stance (she kills Cabalists who abuse their power excessively), and finding that more-or-less acceptable, she enlisted their help for a situation where she needed some extra pairs of hands, since she can only be in one place at a time.

She left them at that point, but Reich-5 lost most of its inter-world transport capability. The party have learned some interesting tricks by trying to reproduce things they saw her do, and gained reputation amongst the Cabal simply by having met her and survived. This may even motivate some Cabalists to be more ethical.

[Dalin]

Originally Posted by VariousRen

If you have Demigods, or any other characters that so massively outstrip the PC's in their abilities that they are basically untouchable, you need to really ask yourself how the PC's are meant to interact with them. There basically can't be any source of conflict between the PC's and the demigods in the game, because the demigods would win 100% of the time.

While I agree that a straight up armed conflict doesn't make sense, many gaming genres are rife with examples of beings who outstrip the power of the protagonists. In the Lord of the Rings, for example, we have wildly different power levels between the hobbits, Gandalf, the ringwraiths, Treebeard, Saruman, Sauron, and even Tom Bombadil. I've run games that had a feel like that with power levels all over the place, but each character has their own motivations and limitations. The player characters never felt that they weren't the protagonists of the story, even though there were lots of other more powerful figures engaged in various ways.

One reason I prefer GURPS to level-based games is that it makes it much easier to have characters of different power levels mixing together. Though, admittedly, I rarely stat out background NPCs beyond having a general understanding of their motivations and abilities.

[gibberingmouther]

in my D&D 3.5 campaign my PCs acquired a relic of a dragon demigod. the dragon can watch the material plane through the relic, unbeknownst to the PCs. (i didn't come up with this idea, though, it was more a modification of an existing Eberron setting adventure - my game is in the FR).

really i just made this post to see if my sig would show up right, lol ... but it is an example of what the OP asked for!