Recurring NPCs

Some recurring characters blasting off yet again

If you have a really neat and well-developed non-player character as part of your ongoing tabletop campaign, chances are you will want to keep them around for future encounters. As a DM, this can become quite a feat to pull off, especially when the players hold so much influence on an NPCs ultimate fate. Here are a few things to keep in mind when running a game with characters who will be recurring as part of a regular cast in your games.

First, let your players decide which NPCs should hang around in future sessions. Watch their reactions, and see which characters they respond to the most. Your best NPCs should fall into two categories: those your players love, and those your players love to hate. If your players find a character boring or just distasteful, don't cling to that NPC just because they are your favorite. Move them away from the spotlight and bring in the characters that your players prefer. Bring in allies that they cheer for and villains who they truly desire to bring down.

Speaking of villains, there is a time-tested problem that you will need to address at some point with any good major villain... how to keep them around for more than one encounter. If you stat it, your players will kill it, so how do you keep a bad guy from being taken out in their first engagement with the heroes? One way is to not have them directly encounter the heroes at all until their first and final confrontation. A villain who pulls strings and taunts the hero from a hidden lair can be a fun antagonist, even if they aren't personally engaging the party. Have them establish themselves through machinations and schemes rather than combat, leading to the ultimate showdown with the players.

You can also build safeguards into each encounter, multiple means by which the villain can escape and elude the heroes in the eleventh hour. But don't make it entirely impossible for the players to catch their foe. Always leave a bit of leeway, and plan for a scenario where the players might succeed overwhelmingly. If you rig the game, it takes away the organic progression that is a touchstone of tabletop RPGs. You are free to stack the odds in favor of your baddie's escape, but be prepared for the small chance of his failure. If anything is a foregone conclusion, it's naturally not as fun to experience and discover through gameplay.

Jetpacks, trapdoors, teleporters.. main villains need an exit strategy.

This rule can be applied to allied NPCs too... never put an NPC in harm's way without a plan for what happens if they fall to that harm.  If you want to keep any character safe, keep them out of combat or give them gimmicks to escape and run away. Don't make them invincible or impervious to danger. It's cheating and makes the players feel inferior by comparison. If they are in a combat that has no bearing on the adventure, you might handwave it away, but if they fight directly alongside the PCs they shouldn't have special advantages over the players.

Bring back popular characters and don't force your own preferences on the group and you will have a cast that your players truly connect with. Find ways to weave the characters in and out of the narrative, and let your players offer their own suggestions on how to do this as well. If your players want to return to a particular blacksmith they met previously, all the better! You are surely doing something right. At the same time, be prepared to make changes to your cast of NPCs based on player input and the natural progression of the game. The same old faces can get stale after a while, so always be ready to change things up and add some fresh new characters to your gaming world!

Happy ventures!