In any given scenario, there may be dozens of minor non-player characters that are encountered, but how many of them are more than faces in a crowd with gossip to share or goods to sell? Are they characters or are they just props? Any non-player character worthy of dialogue deserves a bit of personality, a bit of life. A quirk here and a distinguishing feature there can turn even the most seemingly incidental characters into interesting recurring characters and give an added dimension to an adventure. When a GM gives life to non-player characters, it makes the setting come alive.
One way to infuse non-player persons with a little personality is to give them something to talk about other than the most pertinent adventuring opportunities or the most tantalizing rumors when player characters meet them. The average bystander or shopkeeper will probably have more important things on his or her mind than how to help a suspicious-looking stranger. Perhaps they know something, perhaps they don't. In any case, the best way to entice people to talk is usually to talk about something that interests them. It is not difficult for a GM to choose credible subjects of interest for non-player characters who are fully detailed, but those who are little more than a name, a profession, and a brief description on a random encounter table offer rather less insight. For such characters we simply note one or two common topics of conversation.
A topic of conversation could be anything from the superficial to the personal to the obsessive. It could be the weather, a hobby, a sports team, a television show, a news story, politics, anything. Not all topics will be appropriate for all situations, of course, but it can be useful to have it in reserve just in case. You can add topics to character descriptions beforehand (or jot them beside their names if that is all they consist of), or you can make your own Random Conversational Topic Table and roll on it whenever it seems appropriate, such as for spontaneously created characters. (If you decide to use a random table, it might be helpful to write any topic so generated in the character's description for future reference.) If you don't have any preconceptions about a given character's interests, the random table may help to add flesh to that character's skeleton as it were.
Topics of conversation for non-player characters can be beneficial to players as well as GMs. In role-playing games that utilize character skills, they provide a usefulness for Trivia skills beyond adding color to a character. Even if the player isn't knowledgeable about a topic, the character might be, and that could be just the edge that is needed.
[Originally posted in Fudgery.net/fudgerylog on 12 February 2011.]
