Musings on an NPC Generator

I'll gotten a few people to ask about including an NPC generator: either a random NPC generator or just a wizard which creates an NPC. These are both great ideas, however there is something to mention about both. With a random NPC generator, that will take time. I probably won't get to that until after I finish up the Custom Database Application. In regards to a NPC creator via Wizard, well... that already kinda exists.

Yeah. You can create an NPC using the existing PC Wizard. How? Well, there are a few hidden secrets in AutoHARP you probably didn't know.

Secret #1: You don't have to fill in all information when creating a character sheet. In fact you can skip right over the Adolescence ranks and just add them later. In fact you don't even need to add Statistics information on the 2nd step. All you need to create a character is the race, culture, sex and social class (if necessary), race talents, profession and profession talents. That's it. You can skip over everything else.

Secret #2: You can manually adjust your character sheet in just about every possible area in the main editor. From adding adolescence ranks, profession ranks, ranks in general, statistics, talents, etc. Did you know you can adjust the skill type to add adolescence ranks, profession ranks, purchased ranks, etc? You can adjust most of the values for your character's statistics. You can manually select talents, or even write in talents that don't appear in the list. You can manually adjust your spells to create a cleric spell list by changing cost values for each spell you want to include. You can even move spells into your cleric sphere by right clicking the spell and selecting Move to Sphere. Right click a skill or spell and notice all the things you can manually do in this tab. There is a lot.

Secret #3: Need to manually change your character's level quickly? Just select new level in the toolbar, skip all new level steps and finish the wizard. You don't have to do anything with the New Level Wizard to increase your character's level.

These three secrets will help you create an NPC in no time flat. If you own Martial Law you will already know there are NPCs in that book. Utilizing the secrets above I was able to create one of these NPCs in around 20 to 30 minutes. A random NPC generator would make this happen in seconds, but that kind of application is a long way off.

So how do I utilize the three secrets to make an NPC? First off make a normal PC character, but follow Secret #1 to input only the basic character information and skip over the other stuff. Second, manually adjust all information in the main character window. To add skill ranks, select the skill, and click under the Ranks column of the skill and select the up arrow to add a rank under the Ranks column. Do this until you have added all the ranks to all the skills that are necessary. You lose all level information for skills but that's not a problem. Third, update your statistics. You can change all values except for the stat bonus. That value is based on the Stat Value. Let me make this even more clear. You can change the racial bonus. Does your NPC have special racial bonuses? No problem. Make the changes in the statistics tab.

To add talents find them in the list and add them to your character. If the talent you need doesn't exist, write in the text box anyways, add the rest of the information such as cost and description and add it manually.

In thinking about how an NPC wizard would look it would basically look like the PC wizard now. You just don't need all the steps. However a person might want to make an NPC using the same PC technique for NPCs that are major characters. I'm even thinking about making templates from Martial Law using the technique above. For quick and dirty NPCs? That would be a random generator. That I have to say, coming soon. Haven't even thought about it yet. Probably the end of the year.