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igenlodeI came across this https://mediachomp.com/npc-personality-generator/ as a quick NPC generator for role-playing games, intended to randomise the characters that the players meet.
But thanks to the way my mind works (in terms of people and tropes rather than plot arcs and Hero's Journeys) it seems to me that it would actually serve quite well to generate story ideas via a main character around whom the plot can be built ;-)
For example (using an Internet random number generator) I got:
Now, that immediately brings to mind the Squire's wife in a small country village, talkative, gossipy and somewhat nosy, always calling on 'the poor' with gifts of food, blankets etc. and trying to fix other people's problems, while conducting an ongoing terribly polite feud with the other influential ladies of the area over whose husband is going to be selected to stand as the local Conservative party candidate for what is one of the safest seats in the country. But her dark secret is that she is secretly conducting a passionate postal affair with a firebrand union organiser from Manchester, whom she heard speak at a meeting which she accidentally mistook for the symphony hall concert she was expecting to attend, and who unbeknownst to her is planning to stand as the Socialist candidate opposite her husband and turn the cosy tenor of their lives upside down...
Humans are a story-telling species, and apparently when presented with a random character summary we just can't help joining the dots :-D
(Also, I still have absolutely no idea what her hair, skin and eye colour are (or of anything else about her appearance), what her name is, what her favourite scent is, what her hobbies are, what her basic need or want that will be fulfilled in the story is, what her childhood was like, what relatives she has, or any of the other things that are apparently vital to a 'character template'... but I do have a sense of what she is *like*.)
But thanks to the way my mind works (in terms of people and tropes rather than plot arcs and Hero's Journeys) it seems to me that it would actually serve quite well to generate story ideas via a main character around whom the plot can be built ;-)
For example (using an Internet random number generator) I got:
- 3 on d10
- Talkative -- talks too much, overshares
- 8 on d10
- Charitable - gives what they can to less fortunate
- 1 on d8
- Fears dark secret revealed
- 1 on d8
- Desires political power
Now, that immediately brings to mind the Squire's wife in a small country village, talkative, gossipy and somewhat nosy, always calling on 'the poor' with gifts of food, blankets etc. and trying to fix other people's problems, while conducting an ongoing terribly polite feud with the other influential ladies of the area over whose husband is going to be selected to stand as the local Conservative party candidate for what is one of the safest seats in the country. But her dark secret is that she is secretly conducting a passionate postal affair with a firebrand union organiser from Manchester, whom she heard speak at a meeting which she accidentally mistook for the symphony hall concert she was expecting to attend, and who unbeknownst to her is planning to stand as the Socialist candidate opposite her husband and turn the cosy tenor of their lives upside down...
Humans are a story-telling species, and apparently when presented with a random character summary we just can't help joining the dots :-D
(Also, I still have absolutely no idea what her hair, skin and eye colour are (or of anything else about her appearance), what her name is, what her favourite scent is, what her hobbies are, what her basic need or want that will be fulfilled in the story is, what her childhood was like, what relatives she has, or any of the other things that are apparently vital to a 'character template'... but I do have a sense of what she is *like*.)