The Relationship-crawl: Part 3, Drafting a generator

In my previous post, I finally gave shape to what a "socialcrawl" could even look like.

The last step I can take to convey a vision for this concept is to literally visualize it, and I think the most interesting and useful way to do that is to end where I secretly began with this tirade and show you a rough Dice Drop Generator.

Design vs. Generation

The one interruption I'll allow myself this time before delivering the goods is to muse for a moment on the tradeoffs between designing a bespoke experience, and generating one:

• Designing something guarantees that all the elements of the finished product will work in concert towards a desired gameplay experience, but requires much more time, and some skill. For some this is "work", and the gains are only marginal anyways.
• Generating something saves you a lot of time leaning on the creativity of someone else, but, by virtue of the randomness involved, gives no guarantee that the finished product will make sense as a cohesive product, or in the context in which you use it. (Or else, if it does, the generator may be quite cumbersome to use in it's own right). For some, the outcome will be unsatisfying.

Generators can vary widely, however, and this isn't entirely an either-or decision. Some generators explicitly define every important fact for you, while generators of the kind found in Cairn's 2e Warden's Guide float somewhere in between, functioning more like a structured collection of spark tables.

While I am strongly inclined to design a dungeon myself, I do really like generators, and I'm of the opinion that social networks in particular can tolerate a lot more messiness and randomness than a typical dungeon. So, that's the approach I will present to you now. (Once again, this generator will assume Cairn rules, and intentionally integrate with other generators and tables found in Cairn's Warden's Guide.)

Community Seeds

Prior setup

This is great for elaborating on a particular settlement after you've already generated a Setting with Cairn's Setting Seeds generator.

What you'll need to start

A blank piece of paper and a notebook, and at least one d6 and one d20 (though having more will make things easier).

Step 1: Seed NPCs

Begin by gathering a handful of d6's, appropriate to the size of Community you wish to generate:

• 5-6 for a Village
• 8-10 for a Town
• 12+ for a City

(Alternatively, break up larger settlements into Neighborhoods or Districts, and roll each as if for a Village.)

Roll the collected dice onto the page. Set aside any dice that roll off the page and repeat this step until all dice have been rolled and recorded as specified in this step. (If you don't have enough dice, it's ok to roll as many as you can and update the page until you've rolled the desired amount.)

For each die, designate the place where the dice landed with a unique letter or number, and write that identifier and the Role corresponding to the die value on your scratch page. (As you pick up each die, you'll need to roll it again to determine the NPCs specific Role within the Community.)

d20	Role	(Essential)	(Auxiliary)	(Uncommon)
1	Essential	Hospitality	Labor	Nobility
2	Essential	Law	Nature	Alchemy
3	Essential	Commerce	Entertainment	Academics
4	Auxiliary	Farming	Artifice	Warfare
5	Auxiliary	Religion	Apparel	Crime
6	Uncommon	Craft	Medicine	Adventure (roll a Player Background)

Example:

First, roll.

From these rolls, I ended up with the following.

Step 2: Set Available NPCs

Look at the generated Roles and designate one or more of your NPCs as "Available" within this Community, based on the previously generated character of this region and settlement. Note these NPCs by drawing a box around their identifier on both the page and in your notebook.

Example:

NPCs focused on Hospitality and Religion seemed like the most suitable "Available" NPCs, perhaps tied to a local Inn and Shrine, respectively.

Step 3: Generate Resources

For each NPC, roll on the Resource table, and note the results next to their identifier in your notebook.

In addition, roll a Die of Fate for each NPC to determine if they also have a Rumor as a Resource.

d6	Resource
1	Gossip
2	Quest
3	Lore
4	Special Service
5	Training
6	Faction

If no Faction resource is rolled, add one to an appropriate NPC or add a new NPC to the network for each Faction with a presence in this settlement.

Example:

Since we didn't roll any Faction connections here, I'm going to elect to add a new NPC. The Faction I rolled for this area (which I'll get to in more detail at the end) indicates that the Faction Agent is a "Monk", so I think it makes the most sense to situate a Hidden Faction contact somewhere near NPC B.

Step 4: Make Connections

On your paper, draw lines between NPCs. First, connect any NPCs with the same Role, then draw lines according to the following principles:

• NPCs grouped closely together should be connected to each other.
• NPCs close to the edge of the page should have fewer connections.
• No NPC should be isolated from the rest of the network; every NPC should be transitively connected, with at least one connection to another NPC.
• If an NPC has the Faction Resource or a Role of unique standing, consider making all connections to them Hidden (with a dotted line), or add another placeholder NPC to the page that is connected solely to them by a dotted line.
• Avoid making too many lines connecting to any individual NPC (more than three or four). Each line will require extra rolls, and bulk up NPC entries; you can always add more connections later as you feel the need!

For each line, roll twice on the Connection table below to characterize the Connection from the perspective of each NPC, and make a note of the relationships on your scratch page.

d20	Quality	Nature
1	Growing	Romance
2	Constant	Kinship
3	Honest	Friendship
4	Reliable	Trust
5	Thoughtful	Gratitude
6	Patient	Support
7	Energetic	Respect
8	Outspoken	Guidance
9	Bashful	Cooperation
10	Passive	Affiliation
11	Languid	Ambivalence
12	Repressed	Disagreement
13	Petty	Doubt
14	Scrupulous	Rivalry
15	Anxious	Dependency
16	Grudging	Prejudice
17	Zealous	Debt
18	Spiteful	Envy
19	Secret	Betrayal
20	Waning	Resentment

Example:

Step 5: Finalize NPCs

Make an entry for each NPC in your notebook. Generate any other attributes, including their appearance, quirks, virtues and vices, etc. Write a brief description of the NPC, taking into account how their personal attributes and the local character of the region, settlement, and factions shape this Community.

Additional notes: 

• Let the facts of the region and settlement color your NPCs, but also consider how the eclectic mix of generated NPCs can give flavor back to the settlement. A town without an Innkeeper, or with 4 different Blacksmiths, might seem like a difficult prompt, but can be the basis of a unique and memorable settlement.
• For NPCs with Lore or Training opportunities, if you're having difficulty coming up with the details, consider rolling a player Background for that NPC to inform where their expertise or knowledge came from.
• For NPCs with Gossip, select one or two nodes in the network as the focus of their Gossip. The further away in the network the focus is, the more shameless the Gossip!
• Available NPCs should usually be tied closely to significant locations in the settlement. Other NPCs may be as well; consider how Hidden NPCs move through the settlement and where their private meetings are held.

Acknowledgements

Before fleshing out the examples previewed above, I want to take a moment to give credit where it's due.

When I started this series, I didn't have any inspiration or prior art in mind except for the original series by A Knight at the Opera. In between my posts, however, I've gotten recommendations for other reading. Most of that material, while interesting, did not really influence my own thinking; the exception was this excellent post by elmcat from the Cairn discord: Sandbox Settlements: Prep, Run, and Thrive

It's an excellent post, and generally much more fleshed out than mine (and if I understand correctly, has actually been used in play!) If what I've written just doesn't quite jive for you, maybe go over there and reap the fruits of elmcat's labor.

I want to acknowledge and address some similarities in method, since the origin of my ideas is a little messy:

• I can honestly say that conceiving and visualizing NPC relationships in a social-network, with relationship-flavored edges was initially my own idea. However, I was later pleasantly surprised to see elmcat doing something incredibly similar, though without the framing of the socialcrawl. (I was sheepish to find I'm not quite as original as I thought, but also glad to have come up with a similar to someone whose ideas I admire!)
  Also, elmcat's relationship generation was way cooler than my original attempt, with a pair of d20 tables to create a much larger variety of "petty desires" connecting NPCs. Mine was a simple d20 with entries like "jealous of", "in debt to", etc. After reading, I was inspired to beef up my table to a 2d20 as well, and it's way cooler that way!
• elmcat describes generating locations, then tying places to NPCs. I love this idea, and tacked a token of it on to my own generator at the end.

After writing my own thoughts and reading what elmcat has written, I think a truly ideal procedure/generator is still out there, incorporating elements from both in some fashion. 

I'm very pleased with the way I've defined the social network, but elmcat's is the more polished and just net-better tool for defining the entire settlement in terms of its interesting locations with a lot of interesting NPC material baked in. Go check it out!

Riding into the sunset: finishing the example

Rolling up all that stuff was just so evocative that I wanted to do you the service of putting some more meat on the bones, both because it's fun and because it never hurts to demonstrate how one goes from spark-table-output to full ideas.

To do that, let me first dump some Setting details I got from Cairns Wardens Guide generator (for speed, on this occasion I used the tools embedded in Cairn's official app, Kettlewright)

Realm

The Zephyr Hegemony

People

Character: Mercantile

Ambition: Conquest

Abundance: Knowledge

Scarcity: Food

Factions

Name: The Frost Stuffed Enclave

Type: Settlers

Agent: Monk

Trait 1: Judicious

Trait 2: Bankrupt

Advantages: Wealth, Subterfuge, Ruthlessness

Agenda: Revive a Former Power

Obstacle: Another faction has the same goal.

Terrain

1. Deserts. Difficulty: Tough. Landmark: Sunken Colossus.

2. Craters. Difficulty: Perilous. Landmark: Reverse Waterfall.

3. Deserts. Difficulty: Tough. Landmark: Leviathan Bones.

4. Canyons. Difficulty: Tough. Landmark: Hanging Valley.

Points of Interest

1. The War Curiosity: Dripping Archway, Ancient Trash Heap

2. Plunging Curiosity of the Green: Sunken City, Irregular Gravity

3. Settlement of the Ashen Thunder: Fortress, Impregnable

4. Curiosity of the Dead Thunder: Buried Megalith, Hidden Market

5. The Violet Lone Curiosity: Hanging Bridges, Carnivorous Plants

6. Waypoint of the Furious Sorrow: Trading Post, Decrepit Buildings

7. The Blue Curiosity: Petrified Trees, Cult Ritual Site

Noting some important framing details from what was rolled that should color how we interpret our NPC results:

• This is all set in a region whose people are Mercantile, and seek Conquest! That tells me that perhaps these NPCs are not natives to this land, but instead recent interlopers looking to spread their territory for the sake of economic prosperity.
• Knowledge is abundant, and Food is scarce. These NPCs are skilled and the desert is barren!
• The rolled Faction informs this theme nicely: they're Settlers! I won't get into them much more, as we'll only be hinting at the faction for now. Their agenda is Reviving a Former Power, so perhaps that's a hint as to why settlers would want to conquer this region to begin with--the presence of that Sunken Colossus among the Landmarks might do just the trick!
• I'm going to retroactively decide that this NPC Community is situated in the Settlement of Ashen Thunder--an impregnable fortress!

Great, now let's roll some more NPC traits and flesh out these individuals:

(A) 

Name: Dain

Role: Steward (Hospitality)

Virtue: Compassionate

Vice: Xenophobic

Quirk: Broad Face

Goal: Freedom

Dain is the Steward of the Ashen Thunder (the name of the fortress), come to this place in the hopes of making a new life for himself, and housed in the central Keep. He is welcoming to his own people, and goes out of his way to meet new settlers and see that they're comfortably situated in the fortress, but does not think highly of those who have found their way to this land by other means.

Resources:

• Rumor (Wary): Dain has heard from other settlers of a lost, sunken city in the region, with many treasures said to be buried within.
• Quest (Friendly): Dain is enamored with the stories of the sunken city, and would greatly like to see some evidence of the rumors. (Reward: Increase Status to Helpful)

Connections:

• Dain spends much time at the Shrine, advising Eoin in the operation of the shrine and the comfortable accommodation of new settlers.
• Dain is increasingly uncomfortable with the way Caius operates; he has tolerated his operations thus far, but begins to worry that his far away superiors will catch wind, and Dain will be stripped of his authority and sent home.
• Dain is fed up with Seraphine; she is difficult to work with, requiring great effort to rouse to her duties within the fortress.

Note how the generated "Role" is not a specific profession or background--it's merely a descriptor that we have to finalize for ourselves. Since this settlement is a fortress, I asked myself "who in a fortress would occupy a role of 'hospitality'?" This is what I came up with.
I also like how smoothly the rumor and the quest that we rolled can work together here. I decided that Dain is pretty loose-lipped with his rumor, telling it to even those he doesn't trust, but to those with whom he has a closer relationship he will actually reveal how deep his interest goes. To make his Status reward more impactful, perhaps he could reveal new NPCs within the settlement, or perhaps he will find more comfortable housing for the players in the settlement.
Also, for the socialcrawl: Dain might reluctantly introduce players to Caius, but we can see why he might not want to! Perhaps only if the players can prove that their need is great...

(B)

Name: Eoin

Role: Priestess (Religion)

Virtue: Tenacious

Vice: Craven

Quirk: Young

Goal: Freedom

Eoin is a young priestess of the settler's native religion, and occupies the Shrine within the fortress. She is persistent and outspoken (perhaps that is why she was chosen for one so young) but fears what lies outside the walls of the fortress. Like Dain, she came to this land in hopes of finding a new life and new horizons--if she could only overcome her fears. As a priestess, she is blessed with divine powers of healing, which is a great boon to those in the fortress.

Resources:

• Quest (Helpful): Eoin seeks knowledge of an entrance to the Sunken Colossus on behalf of her Faction contact, and will give this quest to someone she believes truly capable and trustworthy.
• Faction: Eoin has a connection to Cleaver, an agent of the Frost Stuffed Enclave; she will make an introduction to those who complete her quest, as the Enclave desires this knowledge as well.

Connections:

• Eoin is completely infatuated with Dain, and admires his steady leadership.
• Eoin is thankful to Caius for some useful procurements needed for her duties; she'll gladly point anyone his way!
• Eoin is privately resentful of Mariner's grandstanding and exploitation of her position, but can't deny that attendance at the shrine is up, so bites her tongue.
• Eoin believes in Cleaver's cause, and is enthusiastic in trying to help him complete his mission.

I'm quite pleased as we proceed with how this stuff kind of just writes itself! Combining "young" and "energetic romance", the idea of a dramatic crush was interesting to me. Because of this relationship, within the socialcrawl, I might rule that Eoin's feelings toward the party are completely based on whatever Dain thinks of them! Considering Dain's wariness towards strangers, that could turn sour in a pretty funny way right at the start.

(C)

Name: Caius

Role: Smuggler (Crime)

Virtue: Witty

Vice: Aloof

Quirk: Pleasant Voice

Goal: Domination

Caius is a roguishly charming smuggler. If you need it, he can find it--for a price, of course. He is especially good at getting things that you aren't supposed to have within the fortress, like weapons--or extra rations! Caius came to this land with plans for grandeur and authority, hoping to be made a lord or a baron or some such thing. He doesn't especially care for the other settlers, only as a means to his own goals--Caius knows that the fastest way to get what you want is to give others what they want!

Resources

• Rumor (Curious): Caius knows about the Frost Stuffed Enclave and what they want in this area. What they want is one of the few things he can't supply.
• Gossip (Helpful): Caius is well aware of Eoin's infatuation with Dain; he also knows about her friend within the Enclave and assumes she can make an introduction.

Connections

• Caius goes way back with Dain; it was Dain who first interested him in coming to this land, and overlooked Caius' shady occupation.
• Caius has nearly paid off a debt to Seraphine; he's embarrassed about it and glad to be done with it.
• Caius is anxious about Eoin; when she moved in he helped her get a few trinkets, and now she's cutting into his medicine business with those ridiculous blessings of hers!

Caius, it seems, will prove an important person to know around here; he can procure important things, and reveal the path to our local Faction agent! He might fall into the equivalent role of a "shopkeeper" here. We see a crack in his armor through his debt; knowledge of this debt is not likely to be something Caius would want to reveal, but perhaps could make a great detail for our Clue Event on the Community Events table to get some leverage!
I hadn't figured out how to explain Eoin's rolled relationship to Caius until I got deeper into this entry, and I'm pretty amused by what I came up with. The promise of the socialcrawl is fulfilled: you've got better chances of a favorable first impression with Caius through Dain than Eoin!

(D)

Name: Seraphine

Role: Aurifex (Artifice)

Virtue: Judicious

Vice: Cruel

Quirk: Heavy Brow

Goal: Power

Seraphine is a prudent, intelligent, and cold master of the arcane craft, employed in the reinforcement of the fortresses defenses. Seraphine understands that knowledge is power, and therefore has applied herself with extreme discipline to her art. She has come to this land in hopes of discovering new material components and lost knowledge with which to hone her craft. She cares little for the other settlers, though she understands the social utility of playing her part--but only to the minimum required to keep up appearances.

Resource:

• Training (Friendly): Seraphine is proud of her craft, and can dispense a theoretical knowledge of the craft of an Aurifex (though not a practical skillset)

Connections: 

• Seraphine is fastidiously mindful of the service she owes to Dain; she does the precise minimum required of her, giving only what she must, and no more.
• Seraphine is disinterested in Caius; she has used his services, has provided her unique talents to fulfilling some of his personal needs, and keeps him mindful of his debt to her, but cares little besides.
• Seraphine disagrees pedantically with Thaddeus on the principles and applications of their craft, despite many years of professional acquaintance and grudging respect.

Seraphine was a tough nut to crack; I chose "Artifice" for my Role table as the best word I could think of for something like an artisan or "fine" craftsman, as opposed to a more mundane smith or carpenter, but in some ways its still a very broad term. Seeing that Seraphine had some training to give, and unsure of what that might be, I took my own advice and rolled a player background and got "Aurifex". This was too harmonious to ignore, and Seraphine came together quickly after that.
On her Training: there are a lot of ways you can go with this, I have chosen the simple path of "one who trains with her gains the background knowledge of an Aurifex, but not any actual abilities". Think of it like an entry level course.
A useful note on the potential mechanical impact of Seraphine's personality: given her cruelty and selfishness I might skip rolling a Reaction for her, and just assume she starts as Wary. I would also consider it a generally difficult proposition to get on her good side thereafter, with the "Helpful" status being virtually impossible to attain--the fiction tells us that Seraphine is not a pleasant person. With more development of this setting she may even make a good villain!

(E)

Name: Thaddeus

Role: Aurifex (Artifice)

Virtue: Methodical

Vice: Greedy

Quirk: Harsh Voice

Goal: Expansion

Thaddeus is brusk, avaricious, and extremely thorough. He has come to the fortress as a master of armaments, applying the hard-won skills of his craft to create ingenious tools and weapons for the protection of the fortress. He is interested in developing new military inventions from the resources of the region, and establishing his own enterprise for their mass distribution.

Resource: 

• Special Service (Friendly): With the carapace of local dune-crawlers, and sufficient time (and money!) he can craft a set of Chitinous Plate (grants 2 Armor and requires only 1 inventory slot, but is extremely vulnerable to water which will corrode the armors effectiveness, eventually destroying it)

Connections:

• Thaddeus grows weary of Seraphine's acquaintance; where once they bore mutual respect of each other's genius, Thaddeus is much more interested in practical applications and the monetization of his skills, compared to Seraphine's focus on personal empowerment.

Once I had Seraphine worked out, the nature of her relationships to Thaddeus did most of the work for me! Given their "scrupulous disagreement" it felt natural and fun to give them the same profession, with different specialties. I take some wicked delight in how unpleasant much of this Community is shaping up to be! It feels appropriate for this harsh frontier and imposing fortress. 
I'm also pleased with Thaddeus's Special Service: it's unique and evocative to the setting, and serves as a bit of a quest in and of itself. Remember, all of these Roles and Resources are ultimately just prompts; the purpose is to inspire playable content, not to lock you into tight, narrow features.

(F)

Name: Mariner

Role: Evangelist (Entertainment)

Virtue: Witty

Vice: Corrupt

Quirk: Young

Goal: Enrichment

Mariner is a young, good natured, and charismatic evangelist, who spends his time spreading highly dramatized renditions of religious stories promoting the local shrine--and Eoin's personal talents. He enthusiastically collects donations for the operation of the shrine (which he enthusiastically pockets for himself). Mariner would like nothing more than to climb the social ladder to a life of luxury.

Resource: 

• Rumor: Mariner is full of rumors! There isn't a local story he hasn't heard, and there isn't a local story he won't repeat so long as it's dramatic enough.
• Training (Helpful): Mariner can teach you some local fables he's picked up, useful for a good distraction or a rejuvenating campfire gathering (restore 1 WIL or STR to all participants when the weather is good and camping goes undisturbed)

Connections: 

• Mariner is Eoin's most eloquent supporter; her talent's make for a great story!

This one was too easy! Between the rolled Connections, the Role, the Virtue and Vice, and the Rumor, it's just becomes kind of obvious doesn't it? I started by just labelling him a "Jongleur" (effectively a Bard), but decided I wanted to be a bit more judicious in passing out player backgrounds to NPCs. Unlike the last few, he's not so much a bad guy as just one of weak character.
Again, if I were really going to flesh this out for a campaign, I'd probably make a table of local rumors to go with him, and stuff all of my local adventure hooks in there.

(G)

Name: Cleaver

Role: Monk (Faction Agent)

Virtue: Courageous

Vice: Xenophobic

Quirk: Tired

Cleaver's life of self-denial means he's perpetually hungry and tired--sleep and food are obstacles to Enlightenment! As an Agent of the Frost Stuffed Enclave, he seeks the restoration of the Sunken Colossus, for the protection of his homeland, and fears no enemy in that quest. For all his amiable qualities, he is quite mistrustful of foreigners; perhaps his service to his homeland has made him paranoid of the threats on the horizon. He does not live within the settlement, and visits only rarely, preferring to walk the land in pursuit of his quest.

Resources:

• Faction (Friendly): Cleaver is an Agent of the Enclave, and can mediate on it's behalf; he can lend the Faction's resources to trusted associates, reveal the Faction's movements in the region, and initiate new members into the fold.

Connections:

• Cleaver begins to see Eoin as a vital ally to his cause, placing great trust in her judgement. Perhaps she could be persuaded to join the Enclave herself.

In this case, I skipped generating a Goal and a Role for Cleaver--we were given those already based on the details of the Faction! The rest is still useful for giving him more color; we could generate a personal Goal anyways to create some interesting tension or resonance.
By the way, "Frost Stuffed Enclave" is a ridiculous name for a faction. I love Cairn's generators, but I would personally only use the naming tables for inspiration rather than actually letting the dice decide what to name everything!

And there you have it! A whole batch of NPCs ready to go, full of hooks and rewards for the engaged party to discover. We have a few primary NPCs that can give our players a place to stay and heal up between their excursions, and a whole bunch of supporting cast to give this settlement character and weight.

Final thoughts

With this, I think I have conveyed my vision for the socialcrawl, and jumpstarted further refinement of these ideas. If nothing else, I think the tables and methods in this particular post are extremely useful for adding more depth and color to any batch of NPCs, or just helping you get started populating your worlds with interesting people and relationships.

Thanks for reading!