Friends, Hirelings, and Side-Kicks

[restlessgriffin]

Originally Posted by Rolando

What I do, but admittedly I don't really play classic dungeon crawls, is to give NPCs personality, names, appearance (things to differentiate them and remember them) and some core abilities.

In your example your players need or want a healer and maybe a squire, they don't have to be player character "classes", so they are not paladins, druids, etc, they are hirelings. NPC Nº1 is a fighter/healer (squire), in background may be paladin aspirant or just squire, in game terms it have healing skills at 12 to 14 and maybe some healing magic, also professional skills to do the job (tending horses, weapons and armors), maybe also some knowledge skills about religion and high society (all of them at 12).

Cleric/Holy Warrior are probably at the top of the list unless a PC fills each of these roles. A Squire (i.e junior Knight) aslo works well as side kick to Knight, Holy Warrior, or maybe Cleric.

NPC Nº2 is a swashbuckler, so besides the flamboyant personality and garish clothes it is good with some social interaction skills, have seafaring skills, maybe appraisal and low and high society skills (all at 12 to 14), also good with the sword and evading getting hit by way of acrobatics or parry.
... you don't care about detailed stats, just the capabilities and everything else is narration and description.

I really like this idea, I just want to ensure the Swashbuckler sidekick doesn't
steal the spotlight from the PCs. One thing I want for the NPCs is to highlight the PCs. What can the PCs do to influence, command, and guide the NPCs. What skills and capabilities can the PCs have to best do this and to command the spotlight and highlight the PCs capabilities.

Game effect of these supporting characters is:
In combat both NPCs will take some of the baddies with them, so 8 orcs attack the party, 2 orcs will be trying to kill each character, but only the players will be actively rolling skills and defenses, the NPCs will only be narrated, NPC1 will be surviving by shield and armor while the NPC2 by dodging, parrying and laying insults to the orcs, the players must do the actual fighting and maybe when they go to help the hirelings there is one orc down and maybe the hireling have a cut or bruise, but you don't bother rolling attacks, defenses and damage for a fight between NPCs, just narrate some reasonable outcome.

I'm not sure I'd really want to go full in on this, especially if the NPC seems never to get hurt, while the PCs who have superior skills are taking a beating. I can definitely see NPCs making only occasional attacks and going full on ALL-OUT defense half the time and retreating defense at every opportunity. Maybe play it safe on attacks, like use ranged attacks when possible, especially aiming. Also maybe use polearms when available,

Outside combat these NPCs will add some commentary in their expertise, or help making some interaction smoother, or even stealing something from someone (if the hireling have the skills), in those occasions you do roll for the NPC skill.

OK, sounds good, but only where PCs don't have the skills. Maybe use hireling/side-kick as distractions when PC thief pickpockets or steals something. Provide distracton when PC thief is stealthing around to get in position for Backstab. Use ranged attack to get the enemy's attention so the Barbarian PC can charge forward and make big attack with his battleaxe.

[quote]in this way the NPCs are great color and are there for all the narrative and roleplaying experience but are not cumbersome to play, and do add some skills and needed support.[quote]

OK, sounds good.

If the hirelings know magic you do have to list their spell list and energy availability and take acute account of energy, also use the personality of the NPC, so the NPC may hold unto some energy or sacrifice more energy that what is healthy if that is what this particular NPC would do.

This sounds interesting, but I'm not sure I follow. Can you give me an example or two? The idea is very appealing to me, just not clear on how to implement.

Also in a fight against a big baddie the NPCs will help distract and annoy the enemy, or even add some damage but it is all narrated not rolled and played, when the turn to act come for an N?C you narrate the outcome right away, you may roll if you want and make something special if a critical success or failure is rolled though, some players like to know the dice and not the GM is in command, but otherwise only the actual player characters are the ones doing the fight.

OK, I'll look at this as striking a balance.

you add interesting situations and make the players appreciate their hirelings as characters and not as tools, but they are tools to make the game easier to game master and play.

Thanks, that's exactly the type of advice I was looking for!

[restlessgriffin]

Originally Posted by Rolando

What I do, but admittedly I don't really play classic dungeon crawls, is to give NPCs personality, names, appearance (things to differentiate them and remember them) and some core abilities.

In your example your players need or want a healer and maybe a squire, they don't have to be player character "classes", so they are not paladins, druids, etc, they are hirelings. NPC Nº1 is a fighter/healer (squire), in background may be paladin aspirant or just squire, in game terms it have healing skills at 12 to 14 and maybe some healing magic, also professional skills to do the job (tending horses, weapons and armors), maybe also some knowledge skills about religion and high society (all of them at 12).

Yep. Squires main role is hauling around all the knights extra gear and assisting him with it. As no magic ability, healing is limited to the squire as First-Aid. If doing Squire as a Holy Warrior, Jonas Suntemple (Miriams younger brother, also with same Sun based diety and temple order), then some "magical" faith based healing is available, but on a limited budget.

NPC Nº2 is a swashbuckler, so besides the flamboyant personality and garish clothes it is good with some social interaction skills, have seafaring skills, maybe appraisal and low and high society skills (all at 12 to 14), also good with the sword and evading getting hit by way of acrobatics or parry.

Yep, less good with sword than PCs, pretty good with defenses though.

you don't care about detailed stats, just the capabilities and everything else is narration and description.

I do care about detailed stats but that's just a personal choice, also just in case a PC dies, THEN I'd be willing to hand over one of the NPC hirelings as a temporary PC character.

Game effect of these supporting characters is:
In combat both NPCs will take some of the baddies with them, so 8 orcs attack the party, 2 orcs will be trying to kill each character, but only the players will be actively rolling skills and defenses, the NPCs will only be narrated, NPC1 will be surviving by shield and armor while the NPC2 by dodging, parrying and laying insults to the orcs, the players must do the actual fighting and maybe when they go to help the hirelings there is one orc down and maybe the hireling have a cut or bruise, but you don't bother rolling attacks, defenses and damage for a fight between NPCs, just narrate some reasonable outcome.

I don't think I'd want to do that all the time, but that does seem a good way to speed up combat and keep the focus on PCs. Good suggestion. Thanks.

Outside combat these NPCs will add some commentary in their expertise, or help making some interaction smoother, or even stealing something from someone (if the hireling have the skills), in those occasions you do roll for the NPC skill.

in this way the NPCs are great color and are there for all the narrative and roleplaying experience but are not cumbersome to play, and do add some skills and needed support.

OK, sounds good.

If the hirelings know magic you do have to list their spell list and energy availability and take acute account of energy, also use the personality of the NPC, so the NPC may hold unto some energy or sacrifice more energy that what is healthy if that is what this particular NPC would do.

Noted!

Also in a fight against a big baddie the NPCs will help distract and annoy the enemy, or even add some damage but it is all narrated not rolled and played, when the turn to act come for an NPC you narrate the outcome right away, you may roll if you want and make something special if a critical success or failure is rolled though, some players like to know the dice and not the GM is in command, but otherwise only the actual player characters are the ones doing the fight.

you add interesting situations and make the players appreciate their hirelings as characters and not as tools, but they are tools to make the game easier to game master and play.

OK, sounds good.

[restlessgriffin]

Originally Posted by sjmdw45

Is there any special reason you need the GM to control the hirelings? The old-school way is for players to play their hirelings (with GM veto power over decisions to prevent suicidal or overly robotic actions like handing over valuables to PCs for no reason), which keeps the spotlight on the players of not necessarily the PCs. Sometimes players would even play a whole adventure as one of their PC's hirelings instead of the PC.

I've found that players really enjoy collecting even fairly mechanically-pathetic hirelings, and will invest in their welfare and work to keep them safe, as long as they have some sense of "ownership" over the hireling, and letting the player mostly control the hireling does that.

The hirelings aren't PCs, nor are they puppets, tools, or disposable weapons. I want the players to explore GURPS non-combat skills and abilities. Leadership really shines when applied to NPCs, its nearly worthless when dealing with PCs. If the players control the hirelings why bother improving Leadership? There a a host of options I want to explore which you really don't get into with only PCs. If the players control the hirelings they're just low level PCs and frequently extensions of the PCs.

I want emphasize the role playing aspects of GURPS and the usefulness of things that aren't directly combat skills and abilities. Why improve Leadersip if you rarely have the ability to use it. If the PC knight has a Squire, does he really need to have good Leadersip to order around the Squire effectively if he already controls the Squire?

Also I want the players to not be burdened with learning to much at once. They should be focusing on learning all the skills and abilities on one character sheet not two or three.