1 thing I did Is made lore about a old crone that said "the most powerful Warrior to ever exist will be named tim" so everyone started naming their kids tim and that's how all my npcs are named Tim and the players know someone's is important when the name is not Tim.
@@thegreatandmightyseff7214 Ya... my party got me to DM. Swedish friend was like, "Oh, it's not that hard". On our 6th session and when you're a Chaotic DM like me... *YES IT IS*.
@@fenrirswolh3 I always feel that DMing is like riding a bike. Really hard when you first start to learn and when you screw up it can hurt. However once you get used to it it becomes pretty easy. The hard part though is to get from the first part to the second part.
@@fairystail1 I have a plethora of homebrew content from my own written stories that I've been using to supplement my lack of experience. So far, my players are pretty happy with it!
She got me 'cos I was expecting her as white knight bait. A soft lovely bar maid who is worried about the well being of my horse... and someone has been hurting her? To arms, lads! To arms and save the fair mai-... oh. Nope... nope she crazy." Well played.
I'm digging Tilly. A normal girl, but with a monster at her side. Though for the level my parties are at. I think I'd make her an Aranea in disguise! :P
Well, Now I have to craft an entire world around a queen who can see the future, and a bard in love with the Queen's third daughter. I'm both excited AND annoyed! Thanks a LOT, Ginny (please, take this both as Genuine thanks, AND sarcasm with eye rolling) Also, can we TALK about the production values on this? You gave us FOUR fully costumed, accented and be-wigged NPCs, what a lovely Christmas gift!!!
I love the ad transition almost as much as Clover! Good job with Tilly's accent; it's not easy to do a natural Celtic lilt, and you did well. It sounds like a Highlands accent (kinda like Karen Gillan's) with a bit of Irish newsreader mixed in to soften some of the harsher sounds.
What about a reverse of Valra. The guy is a young gypsy who grew up in a family of "fortune-tellers". He legitimately does have second sight and just assumes that it's normal. He's in his mid-teens and is just confused as to why his family doesn't take his visions seriously and is starting to question their sight.
@@JudasRose Were all Romani nomadic? I thought Romani is ethnicity and Gypsy was the lifestyle. If the character I suggested came from a family of fortune tellers who couldn't tell the future than the term still fits.
I like Tilly - anybody trying to get a monster on their side is a hoot. That being said, there's nothing wrong with a neer-do-well who keeps an oytugh on standby for disappearances.
Yeah, my character would have an epic moment interacting with Tilly , because she cured a evil hag of her curse, reverting her back to a scared young girl, and then decided to adopt her, she would be able to empathize with someone who is trying to bring goodness to a evil being by way of love. On the other hand, the ettercap is still a active threat to society , but my character would never suggest killing it. Maybe try to return it to a another group of ettercaps and let it be free maybe?
Tilly's surprise is a lot more intriguing than I thought! That's honestly a fantastic quest hook I could see being an interesting moral dilemma for my players.
I agree. I actually enjoyed her. I thought a cartographer with really bad carpal tunnel syndrome was actually a great NPC. Here we find the adventures in desperate need of a good map of the Pirate Reef Islands for their all important mission but they must wait at least a month for her to draw them up because of her backlog and her inability to work hastily. They can work to help her find healing for her wrists or somehow get other folks waiting on maps to wait awhile longer so your party can move up the queue. All were great. Still I liked Frances a lot from the short bit we got. The accent was great.
The most difficult part is when players take the game in a direction you _really_ hadn't planned for and suddenly you need an additional ten to twenty NPCs you never knew existed. Thanks for filling three of those spots!
"Very subtle Francis." Lmao, that is definitely a new fave ad segway of mine. Also, if Tilly & Clover were to make it in to someone's campaign, would they be better introduced as not knowing each other that well or friendly enough to know & able to the party with each other's plot hooks?
@@theladynim2 Oh yeah of course. Now i think about it, besides being (potential) work colleagues i dunno if their back stories would work with each other.
"Perhaps the party will hear about it later." They think she'll be fine and suddenly are awoken the next morning by the report of the duelist pistols. I've got plot point ideas already for Valra. Search for the item and find it, only to discover her mother using said item. Or an ally casts a healing spell and unlocks the sight in her.
TO MAKE HER A VIRTUOUS RULER ON THE PLAYERS SIDE: She doesn't have the GIFT because she never proved herself worthy, behaved like a spoiled child and was awaiting the gift FOR HERSELF (where the gods would only give the gift to someone ruling for the good of others)... so the gods didn't send it to her. BUT by a twist of event, she ends up putting herself in arms way to help/safe/defend the players from some events when she had nothing to gain from it and THEN showing her worth in the eyes of the gods by doing so, she has her first vision OF the players concerning their THEIR quest... and from that point the team has a very good ally in that town, that would of course call on them if required (and they could call on her in some way too). Just my 5 cents added in :P
I was thinking the mom (or another ancestor) was lying too. I like the idea that the mom was also lying. I imagine she never told her daughter because she was scared Valra would reveal HER secret, (kids are pretty talkative even into their teens) then when Valra pretended she had the sight, her mom believed it had simply skipped her generation and never brought it up. It would be interesting if nobody ever had the sight, and maybe it’s not even real future vision, they are just _really_ good at analyzing situations and everyone took it as magic. Or someone once got stuck in a groundhog day loop and everyone assumed they were psychic. Okay now I’m just running with it XD
No way! My first ever dnd character was a bard named clover. She was a satyr bard who is a child, yes, a 10 year old child. We love her. I love this bard so much
I think I'm going to include Valra, after I change some names of course. Also, Tilly's plot hook seems great for a low-level party, and I'm definitely keeping it in my back pocket next time I'm running those levels in a game. (Currently they're level 5).
The coolest solution for valras problem that I could come up with involves a monster from tome of beasts two. There’s a huge evil cr12 two headed mole rat who can see into the future and the past and have telepathy and know deep speech. If the party were able to capture it ( or lure / trick it) and seclude it in a place where it couldn’t burrow out of, perhaps valra could exchange food for prophecies to it if it was desperate enough, may the gods have mercy on her soul if she was ever spotted sneaking out at night and her prophecy beast was revealed , or worse.... escaped
@@Spiceodog Ooh what if she had already hired adventurers to do that, and when your party comes along it had escaped and she needs discrete help in tracking it down
Your gnomish map-maker gives me an idea for a hook. Pretty basic, she hires your party to protect her as she maps potentially hostile lands, like the Arakokan Empire, The Shadowfell, or Dis.
My first immediate thought about Valra was "Dang, another stuck up princess." That was wiped away by how interesting you made her backstory, motivation, and desires. Very cool!
It’s definitely given me pause for when my next campaign kicks off - those shy NPCs might have hidden motives. Out of curiosity, from the Backstory cards for Tilly - denial, obsession & pet - When the party enters the tavern, is there any evidence of children in Tilly’s life or hints that she might want children?
@@thedisabledviking I get that; I was kind of interested if the idea had cropped up when Ginny was creating Tilly - in the Backstory cards she used for the character ‘Obsession’ was one of them; the idea of raising this creature that is humanoid sparked the question in my mind
All right, I'll admit, that was a pretty amusingly clever way to slide in an Advertisement. :) Very interesting NPCs you performed there. Though I half expected Valra to have gone the opposite way. Instead of failing to LEARN the 2nd sight, she was somehow CONCIEVED with the 2nd sight! And innately has had it all her life. (ala Paul Muadib's sister Alia from Dune, who was driven MAD because of it) Good video.
What if she “ was gifted with the second sight” but in reality, every night 20 minutes after midnight, she sneaks out of the castle to a cave, where a dreaded and evil prophetic creature is left chained, and she has to force it to answer her questions somehow. And maybe she claims to have lost the sight for some reason, but in reality, the beast had escaped and she’s been trying to cover up several incidents involving the creature. Something like the galidroo would work if you have tome of beasts two
I've been loving all the dnd resources you've posted so much, these videos are treasure trove of fun ways to add to the game! These character concepts are so so good, I immediately fell in love with Tilly especially, and all of them come with super fun and intruiging side quests! Definetely would love more of these!
These characters are so cool! And the way you acted as them was incredible, I’d love to see more of these videos!! (Also here’s a comment for robot currency :) )
Covid made my group stop playing, But for the last months I've tried playing online on Roll20.com I've had alot of fun playnig online with only voice and few maps. I can recommend trying Roll20 =)
@@archienoyce2453 I have always wanted to play DnD but never knew anyone who played it. Back in September I believe I finally started on roll20 and have been having a blast. So I would recommend it as well.
I love how I am pretending to be my character and role playing while sitting in a tree and drawing my character. She is somewhat of an assassin, so she does good for this.
Hey, good luck on that campaign! Also, I don’t know if you know about this, but it is a great place to find inspiration, monsters, NPCs, adventures, and just about every resource you can imagine: www.dmsguild.com/ . Hope this might help!
@@caracal429 Thank you! That's really useful! I am fairly new to DnD as a player let alone a DM so this is really useful. (Some people I knew wanted to start a campaign but didn't have a DM and no one was brave enough to give it a try because we are all fairly new so I decided to give it a shot. I am probably the most experienced having looked up tips and tricks and such.)
My favorite NPC I made was a chronomancer elf. I made her around 16 years old, and pretty neurotic. She had gambling debt because she would use her chronomancy skills to cheat until the rakshasa owner of the casino caught her. She constantly would lie to the players, but like obvious lies, she would wander off while they plan stuff, she wouldn't listen, she was super impulsive and impatient, she could haste or slow an enemy but she would rather run around scream... I DON'T KNOW WHAT TO DO!! . I had no idea I would appreciate her as much as I did, then at the end of the campaign she sacrificed herself for the players.
OKAY GINNY I HAD THIS CRITICAL ROLE IDEA- So, I believe in episode 3 of campaign 2 Fjord just went “Rewind” and Laura said “Oh now I wanna do Hamilton with our voices!” Do you see what I’m getting at?? You could make like a Satisfied Paroday or something with Jester cosplay or something, i have no clue. It’s just a lil idea :P
I'm currently playing my go-to PC(Nathaniel Trevelyan- level 5 NG Human Noble Fighter: Banneret of Restenford), so here's how he'd react to your NPC's Ginny(i'm totally gonna 'borrow' ever one of them, fyi)... CLOVER WITTHORN= having travelled within the same circle as Ridolpho(unsure of spelling), he'd at least volunteer himself(and the party by extension) to act as an intermediary to try to get Clover out of it with her honor(and life!) intact. FRANCIS SUMMERPIKE= First things first, Nate would get the party healer(currently a Tortoise Druid named Bic)to look at her. Then he'd try to figure out how's she keeps gettin injjured at a very low-risk job(Carpel Tunnel syndrome being the only real long term issue). TILLY THE BARMAID(love that accent btw! MUCH better than my horrible Connery attempts)=Tilly might unfortunately cause a party split as while both Nate & Bic could see where her heart is, they'd dtill vote to kill or remove the Ettercap from the area,as it's just too much of a danger. Unfortunately, there's a Hobgoblin Samurai(a story for another day) & a Drow Rogue that'd see no problem with what tilly's doing... PRINCESS VALRA= having grown-up within a similar environment, Nate would have a great deal of sympathy & understanding for Valra's plight. He'd even volunteer himself to help her out for free. He would recommend(you never dictate to royalty) that she tell the truth, if not to the court then at least to her parents. May your pantheon ever favor you(and Happy holidays!), Baron Trevelyan of Restenford
Fabulous portrayals... As I watch these, I can't help but think about how you'd handle the coven of 12 witches in my setting. Each witch is unique, with her own personality, quirks, backstory, and how they interact with the PCs. Each is "cursed" by an ancient magic (more powerful than any spell can fix, including wish), and this heavily influences them. For example, Propheta (rogue/wizard multi-class) has the gift of sight, but her curse is that she only speaks in riddle and hyperbole; Navita, a halfling sorceress, triggers a wild magic surge every time she casts a spell; and Colubra, a tiefling sorceress, turns into a demon if she's exposed to raw meat (she's a vegetarian), and the only way she can turn back is to consume raw meat from three innocent creatures. Once every 30 days, on the night of the full moon, the witches gather for a coven meeting. Occasionally, the PCs get to watch. If the witch can't be there physically, she appears in the form of an illusion (like the holographic Jedi Council).
I recently used Tilley and clover in the same tavern in my game tonight and my party where so intrigued by both of them and our excited to figure out both story’s. Left them on a cliff hanger as the stumbled across the ettercap but unfortunately due to a failed stealth check we’re also stumbled upon by Tilly who was tidying up the evening shift!
ugh, great, my party's resident disaster lesbian has a crush on Clover Whitthorn now and is trying to simultaneously make sure she wins/survives the duel and frame kellen for a crime/get him out of the picture so that she rebounds to dating her instead. what have you done ginny./s
Plot twist: The princess' mother doesn't have the sight either. She's been part of an enemy kingdom, secretly gathering information. She gains their trust by claiming she has the sight in order to "let them win" in some war or something.
As much as Francis was kind of a throw-away, ad-specific character, I think having an aspiring map maker with some sort of disability that makes such a task difficult is a really interesting plot point! Perhaps the party could take Francis out to protect and assist her in her cartography, or find a way to make such a task more accessible (either through magic or tinkering - or both). Either way, All of these characters are intriguing and though I'm not a DM (yet), I would be delighted to encounter them, I'm sure!
I like how in both your "NPCs you can steal" videos you showed one brunette, one with black hair and one with white hair. Intentional or not, that was a nice touch.
That sounds like a really fun plot rabbit-hole to send your players down!! Where's the real princess, and does SHE have the second sight? Lots to explore there!
That was really well done :-). those be very useful characters in a campaign I think. Been a long time since I've played. You could also totally mess with the DM by trying to get NPC to join your party LOL.
I love the love we're getting for Tilly, but honestly my favorite character is the deceitful princess Valra. I adore her whole deal. I guess it's because I'm a heavily politically oriented player & DM, but damn Valra is rad.
I admit that I usually go AFK during sponsored video commercials... but not for Ginny D's. Being silly and entertaining, and putting time and effort into the commercials, WORKS. Your advertisers will notice the higher returns...
Here are three sidekicks that you may borrow: Albrecht Singlestone, a Dwarf bard/sage. His iconic greeting is, "Buy us a drink!". If your party is stumped with too many clues, Al can solve the quest with his Theory of Relative Generality. Badonka Donk is a beautiful Elf with expertise in Performance and Persuasion. If an NPC just won't give up the info your party needs, then Badonka can loosen their lips with nothing more than a bedroll and an hourglass. Nudge, nudge, wink, wink. Tink Wildweed is a Halfling that loves to craft common magic items. His favs are a sword that casts Faerie Fire, a Ring that casts Find Familiar and a pouch of "mystic tobacco" that casts Minor Illusions. The last item also comes with a box of munchies. Happy New Year!
01:25 To me, Clover Whitthorn is an absolute gem, and I'm in the midst of writing up a divergent(( and hopefully intriguingly complex? ))story wherein she -- unbeknownst to her -- is certainly its crux, but quite possibly(( much to her incredulity and consternation/dismay )) _also_ its **unforeseen* key protagonist...
Clover: "How can I possibly win the duel tomorrow?!" Fighter: "I have some skill with a blade and I'd be happy to provide lessons in the craft." Monk: "I can also teach you how to better fight unarmed, so you won't be doomed if the sword's knocked out of your hand." Artificer: "And I can make a truly unique sword for you." Wizard: "And I have magical access to a time-dilated pocket-dimension. You can train for months in there before the sun's rise tomorrow." Cleric: "Guys, this is all actually unnecessary. I had a chat with Lady Redolfo and convinced her to become a Nun of Pelor, thus breaking off her betrothal to pursue a celibate life in a convent." Rogue: "Well this saves me the trouble of poisoning her breakfast porridge tomorrow morning."
Honestly, from my perspective, these have a bit of an issue. They are TOO good of characters! No, seriously. They're so well developed, and specific, that these aren't' just 'drop in' NPCs...these are people you use an entire PLOT ARC around. Which is awesome, and cool, and now I want to use them. Tilly especially.
Hmmm.... Interesting that Clover drops her accent and goes full British when throwing the bar tender under the bus..... Anything you want to say about the British, Ginny? Hmmmm? Hehehe.... Good video, thanks. Insta-inventing characters is pretty tough, especially when the players unexpectedly engage them more than expected and suddenly that zero level NPC needs to be at least a level 5 "somebody". Playing games like Cyberpunk and Rolemaster I learned a long time ago to keep a few sheets of random skills, attributes etc - oh, Vampire RPG was great for Talents and Flaws - but basically 5 or 6 A4 pages of cheat sheets where you can roll a D20 or percentile on the fly and make up the character as you are speaking. If you're quick minded enough to have a basic character sheet on hand you can actually flesh them out as you go (don't bother with a full sheet unless you have to). Those cheat sheets? Personality, Education, Addictions, current / past lovers, guile etc... you can get all of that in one drop of 10 dice, assigning a dice - but not score - to each. Insta-character and you have the option to make them "proper" later. Back to my oringinal point... I guess its true what they say about the international community always associating the British with being the bad guy..... hehehehe. (You're welcome)
I love these NPCs!! They have a nice range of story moods. I'm already thinking of possible ways their stories might unfold... :) also, lol "robot currency" XD
Another thing I'd recommend is to keep old NPCs when a game wraps... reduce (work), re-use and recycle (NPCs). Any player who complains gets to bring in a stack of ten (10) interesting NPCs that might be encountered in the world. Make sure they know upfront that you may change and rewrite things about the NPCs, to include affiliation, motivation, alignment, gender, or background without notice... that Overpowered Cheese of an NPC they're hoping might make things easy and profitable for them might just make things easy and profitable for the villain, but hey, your players might be willing to pull some weight to make the world more interesting.
I said this about the person who is the Dm for the Dungeon Dudes games and I will say it about You, Ginny D! You should Totally become a character actor! You would make a FORTUNE!!!
Absolutely loved these characters, Ginny! Thanks for sharing them with us. Quick question: as a DM, how quickly/easily can you come up with characters? I find I have to create ones with deeper personalities away from the table, but it's usually the grumpy ol' coot that my players pester first.
Cool!!! More videos please, this is amazing inspiration for me trying to start my own campaign. Especially loved Tilly the barmaid, i might tweak her a little, like perhaps, unwillingly engaged to a vampire (yes, i played CoS, loved the campaign) or maybe a werewolf. Would that be okay? Or do you have any other tips to help an aspiring DM?
Love all three ideas....I'm new at DM'ing and not very good at it but I try. I will use these NPCs at some point of my campaigns. At this point I just play D&D with my kids. It's hard to find players where I live. Then when I do it's about a hour drive to where we play. Keep those videos coming. Best Wishes Ginny.
Well, Tilly in concept is certainly flexible - I can think of a few ways to implement her into *Through The Breach* (tie-in RPG to Malifaux, think Weird West meets Victorian Horror with a dose of steampunk). Stick her in a saloon in a small contract town and replace the ettercap with some sort of monstrous creature from the Bayou. Or a tavern on the edge of Malifaux City's quarantine district and the creature's an undead of some form.
This is really helpful for me! I’m running my first campaign as a dm and decided to go with my own home brew world, having interesting NPC ideas has been a struggle Thank you!!!
5:50 I'll make sure no paladin nor clerics are in my group before I try this. We tend to be a little _PURGIE_ with our faith based PCs. -I blame WH40k-
D&D NPC/Quest idea: a double whammy! Old Cynthia and Daisy. Old Cynthia is an old halfling who's descended from a long line of reclusive witches. She works as a healer in the middle of town and is always taking visitors either for work or for chatting, but she rarely leaves her house, preferring instead to hire the local adventurer's guild to gather ingredients for her from the local forest. She has a dog named Daisy who is a very sweet little brown Pomeranian and very docile, but also curious. One day Daisy escapes and Cynthia needs someone to go and get her back. She insists that only high-level adventurers should go on the quest and is offering a ridiculously high amount to get her back. If the PCs are at least level 10 or lie about being a higher level, she'll give it to them, and tell them to be very careful because Daisy gets herself into trouble sometimes. What she doesn't tell them is that Daisy's collar is a powerful warding amulet called the Eye of the Storm, and it protects the wearer by drawing in chaos and absurdity and then redirecting it whenever it's about to harm the wearer. About to shoot Daisy with a bow and arrow? A Purple Wyrm comes up from below your feet and swallows you whole. About to hit Daisy with a sword? A portal to hell randomly opens up and swallows your sword and possibly you. Just walking around? Too bad! A war between Mechanus and Limbo has started and it's happening right where you're walking. It's an heirloom worn by Old Cynthia's ancestors for centuries, and it's protected them from harm but also isolated them from the rest of the world, and Cynthia decided long ago that she wanted to have friends and so put it on Daisy for safe-keeping and has kept Daisy in her house surrounded by Runes and Abjuration spells to limit the Eye of the Storm's power in the house. That's why Cynthia hired high-level adventurer's to get her back. I have a table of effects, but I need to work on it so that it's a little more interesting than "a thing appears and attacks you, roll initiative" 99 times and then one interesting thing.
This was such a fun video! Although creating NPC's on the fly hasn't been a big problem for me thusfar, I am so glad that this video exists to spark more variation in the types of NPC's I make. I'm definitely using a figure like Tilly at some point!
Oh hey! You can now pick up a full character sheets (complete with stat block!) for Clover on my Patreon: www.patreon.com/posts/pdf-clovers-73262628
1 thing I did Is made lore about a old crone that said "the most powerful Warrior to ever exist will be named tim" so everyone started naming their kids tim and that's how all my npcs are named Tim and the players know someone's is important when the name is not Tim.
until the day they meet the REAL Tim and he solo kick their asses X)
That's freaking amazing
Genius!
Permission to steal this idea?
I love this
Tilly's accent is a lot better than many attempts we hear on American TV shows!
Tilly's accent is better than mine.... and I'm Irish.
Tilly scares me, and I'm the GM...
Yesss!! Success!!
@@GinnyDi 🤣🤣
Hah thats my name😂
Tilly absolutely terrifies me in ways I cannot describe ... but she will terrify my party more.
Ginny is really out here singlehandedly curing my DM anxiety
My party always leaves dming to the least shy person
@@thegreatandmightyseff7214 Ya... my party got me to DM. Swedish friend was like, "Oh, it's not that hard".
On our 6th session and when you're a Chaotic DM like me... *YES IT IS*.
@@fenrirswolh3 I always feel that DMing is like riding a bike.
Really hard when you first start to learn and when you screw up it can hurt.
However once you get used to it it becomes pretty easy.
The hard part though is to get from the first part to the second part.
@@fairystail1 I have a plethora of homebrew content from my own written stories that I've been using to supplement my lack of experience. So far, my players are pretty happy with it!
SAME! As a new DM, Ginny, you videos are total lifesavers and so helpful!!!
Damn, Tilly is easily one of the most interesting NPCs I've seen in a while.
Oh my gosh, thank you so much!!
She got me 'cos I was expecting her as white knight bait. A soft lovely bar maid who is worried about the well being of my horse... and someone has been hurting her? To arms, lads! To arms and save the fair mai-... oh. Nope... nope she crazy."
Well played.
I like her! She gave off kind of witchy / necromancer-y vibes to me... which could also be a fun twist in another setting. ^^
@@CappyKI was thinking battered woman at first too.
Tilly and Clover are definitely making it into my repertoire of potential tavern encounters!
I'm digging Tilly. A normal girl, but with a monster at her side.
Though for the level my parties are at. I think I'd make her an Aranea in disguise! :P
idk there might be more you could do what if tilly was a drow in disquise on the run from he people for stealling one of the royal ettercap
I feel bad for her, she means well but clearly needs therapy of some kind
@@DeathnoteBB
There needs to be a cleric spell:
"Analyze delusion".
Well, Now I have to craft an entire world around a queen who can see the future, and a bard in love with the Queen's third daughter. I'm both excited AND annoyed! Thanks a LOT, Ginny (please, take this both as Genuine thanks, AND sarcasm with eye rolling)
Also, can we TALK about the production values on this? You gave us FOUR fully costumed, accented and be-wigged NPCs, what a lovely Christmas gift!!!
Lucky for me I already have such a world, complete with a wizard who stole the gift a ways back. (But no one knows). Teehee.
I love the ad transition almost as much as Clover!
Good job with Tilly's accent; it's not easy to do a natural Celtic lilt, and you did well. It sounds like a Highlands accent (kinda like Karen Gillan's) with a bit of Irish newsreader mixed in to soften some of the harsher sounds.
I loved that accent as well! It was really great.
What about a reverse of Valra. The guy is a young gypsy who grew up in a family of "fortune-tellers". He legitimately does have second sight and just assumes that it's normal. He's in his mid-teens and is just confused as to why his family doesn't take his visions seriously and is starting to question their sight.
Ooooh, this is fantastic, too!! Nicely thought of!! (Skip the gypsy thing though, that's a slur)
That is AWESOME
@@JudasRose Were all Romani nomadic? I thought Romani is ethnicity and Gypsy was the lifestyle.
If the character I suggested came from a family of fortune tellers who couldn't tell the future than the term still fits.
I like Tilly - anybody trying to get a monster on their side is a hoot. That being said, there's nothing wrong with a neer-do-well who keeps an oytugh on standby for disappearances.
Yeah, my character would have an epic moment interacting with Tilly , because she cured a evil hag of her curse, reverting her back to a scared young girl, and then decided to adopt her, she would be able to empathize with someone who is trying to bring goodness to a evil being by way of love. On the other hand, the ettercap is still a active threat to society , but my character would never suggest killing it. Maybe try to return it to a another group of ettercaps and let it be free maybe?
@@Spiceodog Yeah, release it back into the wild!
Tilly's surprise is a lot more intriguing than I thought! That's honestly a fantastic quest hook I could see being an interesting moral dilemma for my players.
Clover will end up with the bethroted lady.
That sponsorship character (Frances) was so cute and such a clever way to insert a sponsorship plug
That one was kind of my favorite.
I agree. I actually enjoyed her. I thought a cartographer with really bad carpal tunnel syndrome was actually a great NPC. Here we find the adventures in desperate need of a good map of the Pirate Reef Islands for their all important mission but they must wait at least a month for her to draw them up because of her backlog and her inability to work hastily. They can work to help her find healing for her wrists or somehow get other folks waiting on maps to wait awhile longer so your party can move up the queue.
All were great. Still I liked Frances a lot from the short bit we got. The accent was great.
Umm petition for more Ginny halfling characters!!! Clover is so CUTE!
The most difficult part is when players take the game in a direction you _really_ hadn't planned for and suddenly you need an additional ten to twenty NPCs you never knew existed. Thanks for filling three of those spots!
These are all so good, accents, ideas everything. Not to meantion the outfits which are really amazing.
"Very subtle Francis." Lmao, that is definitely a new fave ad segway of mine.
Also, if Tilly & Clover were to make it in to someone's campaign, would they be better introduced as not knowing each other that well or friendly enough to know & able to the party with each other's plot hooks?
Presumably that would be up to the DM!
@@theladynim2 Oh yeah of course. Now i think about it, besides being (potential) work colleagues i dunno if their back stories would work with each other.
Was very turned off by the princess... til it turns out shes lying. BOOM! Fascinated in that story.
"Perhaps the party will hear about it later." They think she'll be fine and suddenly are awoken the next morning by the report of the duelist pistols.
I've got plot point ideas already for Valra. Search for the item and find it, only to discover her mother using said item. Or an ally casts a healing spell and unlocks the sight in her.
Oh, I LOVE the idea that her mother is somehow faking the sight, too!! That's such a fun twist!
TO MAKE HER A VIRTUOUS RULER ON THE PLAYERS SIDE: She doesn't have the GIFT because she never proved herself worthy, behaved like a spoiled child and was awaiting the gift FOR HERSELF (where the gods would only give the gift to someone ruling for the good of others)... so the gods didn't send it to her. BUT by a twist of event, she ends up putting herself in arms way to help/safe/defend the players from some events when she had nothing to gain from it and THEN showing her worth in the eyes of the gods by doing so, she has her first vision OF the players concerning their THEIR quest... and from that point the team has a very good ally in that town, that would of course call on them if required (and they could call on her in some way too). Just my 5 cents added in :P
I was thinking the mom (or another ancestor) was lying too. I like the idea that the mom was also lying. I imagine she never told her daughter because she was scared Valra would reveal HER secret, (kids are pretty talkative even into their teens) then when Valra pretended she had the sight, her mom believed it had simply skipped her generation and never brought it up.
It would be interesting if nobody ever had the sight, and maybe it’s not even real future vision, they are just _really_ good at analyzing situations and everyone took it as magic.
Or someone once got stuck in a groundhog day loop and everyone assumed they were psychic.
Okay now I’m just running with it XD
It would also be cool if the queen‘s mother really had the sight, but for some reason it didn’t pass on to the mom.
@@DeathnoteBB plot twist: valra is not the daughter of the queen. she's a cover-up child for the queen being infertile
No way! My first ever dnd character was a bard named clover. She was a satyr bard who is a child, yes, a 10 year old child. We love her. I love this bard so much
Look, I don't wanna be extorting ya for likes kid, but in this town, ya gotta pay the robot toll
I think I'm going to include Valra, after I change some names of course. Also, Tilly's plot hook seems great for a low-level party, and I'm definitely keeping it in my back pocket next time I'm running those levels in a game. (Currently they're level 5).
The coolest solution for valras problem that I could come up with involves a monster from tome of beasts two. There’s a huge evil cr12 two headed mole rat who can see into the future and the past and have telepathy and know deep speech. If the party were able to capture it ( or lure / trick it) and seclude it in a place where it couldn’t burrow out of, perhaps valra could exchange food for prophecies to it if it was desperate enough, may the gods have mercy on her soul if she was ever spotted sneaking out at night and her prophecy beast was revealed , or worse.... escaped
@@Spiceodog Ooh what if she had already hired adventurers to do that, and when your party comes along it had escaped and she needs discrete help in tracking it down
Thanks to Dungeon Fog for sponsoring this video! Check out their easy, highly customizable map-making software: www.dungeonfog.com/ginnydi/
How do we submit to the Patreon grant?
The links to all the information you need are in the description.
Thanks I'm going to still the map maker.
I'm using Francis and you can't stop me.
Also, I'm subscribed to Dungeon Fog, so I'm not just trolling your video.
Curses! I was tricked into watching another ad by it being good and funny!
Your gnomish map-maker gives me an idea for a hook. Pretty basic, she hires your party to protect her as she maps potentially hostile lands, like the Arakokan Empire, The Shadowfell, or Dis.
My first immediate thought about Valra was "Dang, another stuck up princess." That was wiped away by how interesting you made her backstory, motivation, and desires. Very cool!
I love them all, especially Tilly!
It’s definitely given me pause for when my next campaign kicks off - those shy NPCs might have hidden motives.
Out of curiosity, from the Backstory cards for Tilly - denial, obsession & pet - When the party enters the tavern, is there any evidence of children in Tilly’s life or hints that she might want children?
thats up to you, Ginny just gives the framework to work with
@@thedisabledviking I get that; I was kind of interested if the idea had cropped up when Ginny was creating Tilly - in the Backstory cards she used for the character ‘Obsession’ was one of them; the idea of raising this creature that is humanoid sparked the question in my mind
@@matthewlaing5245 I think it meant she’s obsessed with changing the Ettercap
I have known people very like these three... and a half. I applaud your craft.
I realised the lipstick pattern on Valra with a similar shape to Tasha's lipstick. I love how it is unique and brings a regal and mysterious vibe.
Well spotted!! I really loved how it looked on Tasha so I decided to try it in another color for Valra!
Consider this my contribution to robot currency... and please share more of these!
All right, I'll admit, that was a pretty amusingly clever way to slide in an Advertisement. :)
Very interesting NPCs you performed there. Though I half expected Valra to have gone the opposite way. Instead of failing to LEARN the 2nd sight, she was somehow CONCIEVED with the 2nd sight! And innately has had it all her life. (ala Paul Muadib's sister Alia from Dune, who was driven MAD because of it)
Good video.
What if she “ was gifted with the second sight” but in reality, every night 20 minutes after midnight, she sneaks out of the castle to a cave, where a dreaded and evil prophetic creature is left chained, and she has to force it to answer her questions somehow. And maybe she claims to have lost the sight for some reason, but in reality, the beast had escaped and she’s been trying to cover up several incidents involving the creature. Something like the galidroo would work if you have tome of beasts two
As a cartographer by trade, Francis hits wayy too close to home
These are so fun! I love the voice you use for Tilly, it's so soothing (although I'm sure it wouldn't stay that way if you crossed her)
I've been loving all the dnd resources you've posted so much, these videos are treasure trove of fun ways to add to the game! These character concepts are so so good, I immediately fell in love with Tilly especially, and all of them come with super fun and intruiging side quests! Definetely would love more of these!
These characters are so cool! And the way you acted as them was incredible, I’d love to see more of these videos!! (Also here’s a comment for robot currency :) )
I like that there was a bonus NPC.
True she wasn't as fleshed out obviously, haha, but still super cute and usable!
Thanks for the creative characters! :D
Great characters! Weirdly I could actually use the joke character, the gnomish mapmaker.
You got me! I was surprised to see an NPC that wasn't one of the pics you put on Patreon. Fantastic ad (and video!)
I feel so depressed now lol, I love this so much but don’t know anyone to play d and d with 😭
same :(
Covid made my group stop playing, But for the last months I've tried playing online on Roll20.com
I've had alot of fun playnig online with only voice and few maps.
I can recommend trying Roll20 =)
@@ErikWidlund thanks I will!
@@archienoyce2453 I have always wanted to play DnD but never knew anyone who played it. Back in September I believe I finally started on roll20 and have been having a blast. So I would recommend it as well.
@@paulmiller7838 thanks!
I love how I am pretending to be my character and role playing while sitting in a tree and drawing my character. She is somewhat of an assassin, so she does good for this.
This was perfect timing!!!! I needed this! I'm running my first campaign so this is absolutely perfect! I was running out of ideas. Thank you!
Good luck
Get a list of random names and then make a list of simple motivations and flaws
Hey, good luck on that campaign! Also, I don’t know if you know about this, but it is a great place to find inspiration, monsters, NPCs, adventures, and just about every resource you can imagine: www.dmsguild.com/ . Hope this might help!
@@MathasiaJ Thank you! Good idea!
@@caracal429 Thank you! That's really useful! I am fairly new to DnD as a player let alone a DM so this is really useful.
(Some people I knew wanted to start a campaign but didn't have a DM and no one was brave enough to give it a try because we are all fairly new so I decided to give it a shot. I am probably the most experienced having looked up tips and tricks and such.)
Just when I am sitting down to write notes for my next session. As always thank you so much Ginny!
How DARE you bait me with an adorable gnome.
My favorite NPC I made was a chronomancer elf. I made her around 16 years old, and pretty neurotic. She had gambling debt because she would use her chronomancy skills to cheat until the rakshasa owner of the casino caught her. She constantly would lie to the players, but like obvious lies, she would wander off while they plan stuff, she wouldn't listen, she was super impulsive and impatient, she could haste or slow an enemy but she would rather run around scream... I DON'T KNOW WHAT TO DO!! . I had no idea I would appreciate her as much as I did, then at the end of the campaign she sacrificed herself for the players.
OKAY GINNY I HAD THIS CRITICAL ROLE IDEA-
So, I believe in episode 3 of campaign 2 Fjord just went “Rewind” and Laura said “Oh now I wanna do Hamilton with our voices!”
Do you see what I’m getting at??
You could make like a Satisfied Paroday or something with Jester cosplay or something, i have no clue. It’s just a lil idea :P
I'm currently playing my go-to PC(Nathaniel Trevelyan- level 5 NG Human Noble Fighter: Banneret of Restenford), so here's how he'd react to your NPC's Ginny(i'm totally gonna 'borrow' ever one of them, fyi)...
CLOVER WITTHORN= having travelled within the same circle as Ridolpho(unsure of spelling), he'd at least volunteer himself(and the party by extension) to act as an intermediary to try to get Clover out of it with her honor(and life!) intact.
FRANCIS SUMMERPIKE= First things first, Nate would get the party healer(currently a Tortoise Druid named Bic)to look at her. Then he'd try to figure out how's she keeps gettin injjured at a very low-risk job(Carpel Tunnel syndrome being the only real long term issue).
TILLY THE BARMAID(love that accent btw! MUCH better than my horrible Connery attempts)=Tilly might unfortunately cause a party split as while both Nate & Bic could see where her heart is, they'd dtill vote to kill or remove the Ettercap from the area,as it's just too much of a danger. Unfortunately, there's a Hobgoblin Samurai(a story for another day) & a Drow Rogue that'd see no problem with what tilly's doing...
PRINCESS VALRA= having grown-up within a similar environment, Nate would have a great deal of sympathy & understanding for Valra's plight. He'd even volunteer himself to help her out for free. He would recommend(you never dictate to royalty) that she tell the truth, if not to the court then at least to her parents.
May your pantheon ever favor you(and Happy holidays!),
Baron Trevelyan of Restenford
Fabulous portrayals... As I watch these, I can't help but think about how you'd handle the coven of 12 witches in my setting. Each witch is unique, with her own personality, quirks, backstory, and how they interact with the PCs. Each is "cursed" by an ancient magic (more powerful than any spell can fix, including wish), and this heavily influences them. For example, Propheta (rogue/wizard multi-class) has the gift of sight, but her curse is that she only speaks in riddle and hyperbole; Navita, a halfling sorceress, triggers a wild magic surge every time she casts a spell; and Colubra, a tiefling sorceress, turns into a demon if she's exposed to raw meat (she's a vegetarian), and the only way she can turn back is to consume raw meat from three innocent creatures. Once every 30 days, on the night of the full moon, the witches gather for a coven meeting. Occasionally, the PCs get to watch. If the witch can't be there physically, she appears in the form of an illusion (like the holographic Jedi Council).
I'm in love with all of them! Tilly is def my favorite one, I love the potential with her
Thanks for sharing! I was looking for something gloomy for the new town, Tilly will be a great addition!
Jeez, 1k likes and 0 dislikes is just the marker of a well-done content.
The princess would work perfectly for the capital of one of my coutries. Keep up the good work
I recently used Tilley and clover in the same tavern in my game tonight and my party where so intrigued by both of them and our excited to figure out both story’s. Left them on a cliff hanger as the stumbled across the ettercap but unfortunately due to a failed stealth check we’re also stumbled upon by Tilly who was tidying up the evening shift!
Here's some robot currency. Oh and I might yoink some of these... Great job, Ginny!
ugh, great, my party's resident disaster lesbian has a crush on Clover Whitthorn now and is trying to simultaneously make sure she wins/survives the duel and frame kellen for a crime/get him out of the picture so that she rebounds to dating her instead. what have you done ginny./s
Hmmmm Might have to use tilly in one of mine. She would fit well. Thank you Ginny.
Plot twist: The princess' mother doesn't have the sight either. She's been part of an enemy kingdom, secretly gathering information. She gains their trust by claiming she has the sight in order to "let them win" in some war or something.
As much as Francis was kind of a throw-away, ad-specific character, I think having an aspiring map maker with some sort of disability that makes such a task difficult is a really interesting plot point! Perhaps the party could take Francis out to protect and assist her in her cartography, or find a way to make such a task more accessible (either through magic or tinkering - or both). Either way, All of these characters are intriguing and though I'm not a DM (yet), I would be delighted to encounter them, I'm sure!
Omg I have been hand-drawing all of my maps for my D&D parties until dungeon fog
this hair is **chefs kiss** fantastic
Algorithmic contributions such as likes, comments, and shares! Great video!
I like how in both your "NPCs you can steal" videos you showed one brunette, one with black hair and one with white hair. Intentional or not, that was a nice touch.
contributing to the robot currency
Honestly your ad integration skills are stellar, they're so fun and engaging every time
PLEASE MAKE MORE OF THESE HOLY HELL
I love these. Keep them coming
These are amazing! And quick thought, the princess is not the real princess, switched at birth?
That sounds like a really fun plot rabbit-hole to send your players down!! Where's the real princess, and does SHE have the second sight? Lots to explore there!
Your hair looks amazing!!
Well done! The sponsorship embedding is such a treat. I loved it. Again ... well done.
And all four characters are in the notebook.
And at least Francis has both her arms, unlike the last map maker I saw.
Poor Tyreok (is that how you spell it?)
Warlock patron "The Algorithm "
Great video! Fun and inspiring!
I’m a huge fan of just how they look lol!
That was really well done :-). those be very useful characters in a campaign I think. Been a long time since I've played. You could also totally mess with the DM by trying to get NPC to join your party LOL.
When you were talking about Tilly, my jaw actually dropped. This is so creative! I love it!
I love the love we're getting for Tilly, but honestly my favorite character is the deceitful princess Valra. I adore her whole deal. I guess it's because I'm a heavily politically oriented player & DM, but damn Valra is rad.
Tilly is totally giving me the American McGee's Alice in American horror Wonderland Psyco death stare.
I admit that I usually go AFK during sponsored video commercials... but not for Ginny D's. Being silly and entertaining, and putting time and effort into the commercials, WORKS. Your advertisers will notice the higher returns...
Here are three sidekicks that you may borrow:
Albrecht Singlestone, a Dwarf bard/sage. His iconic greeting is, "Buy us a drink!". If your party is stumped with too many clues, Al can solve the quest with his Theory of Relative Generality.
Badonka Donk is a beautiful Elf with expertise in Performance and Persuasion. If an NPC just won't give up the info your party needs, then Badonka can loosen their lips with nothing more than a bedroll and an hourglass. Nudge, nudge, wink, wink.
Tink Wildweed is a Halfling that loves to craft common magic items. His favs are a sword that casts Faerie Fire, a Ring that casts Find Familiar and a pouch of "mystic tobacco" that casts Minor Illusions. The last item also comes with a box of munchies. Happy New Year!
01:25
To me, Clover Whitthorn is an absolute gem, and I'm in the midst of writing up a divergent(( and hopefully intriguingly complex? ))story wherein she -- unbeknownst to her -- is certainly its crux, but quite possibly(( much to her incredulity and consternation/dismay )) _also_ its **unforeseen* key protagonist...
Clover: "How can I possibly win the duel tomorrow?!"
Fighter: "I have some skill with a blade and I'd be happy to provide lessons in the craft."
Monk: "I can also teach you how to better fight unarmed, so you won't be doomed if the sword's knocked out of your hand."
Artificer: "And I can make a truly unique sword for you."
Wizard: "And I have magical access to a time-dilated pocket-dimension. You can train for months in there before the sun's rise tomorrow."
Cleric: "Guys, this is all actually unnecessary. I had a chat with Lady Redolfo and convinced her to become a Nun of Pelor, thus breaking off her betrothal to pursue a celibate life in a convent."
Rogue: "Well this saves me the trouble of poisoning her breakfast porridge tomorrow morning."
Honestly, from my perspective, these have a bit of an issue. They are TOO good of characters! No, seriously. They're so well developed, and specific, that these aren't' just 'drop in' NPCs...these are people you use an entire PLOT ARC around.
Which is awesome, and cool, and now I want to use them. Tilly especially.
Hmmm.... Interesting that Clover drops her accent and goes full British when throwing the bar tender under the bus..... Anything you want to say about the British, Ginny? Hmmmm? Hehehe.... Good video, thanks. Insta-inventing characters is pretty tough, especially when the players unexpectedly engage them more than expected and suddenly that zero level NPC needs to be at least a level 5 "somebody". Playing games like Cyberpunk and Rolemaster I learned a long time ago to keep a few sheets of random skills, attributes etc - oh, Vampire RPG was great for Talents and Flaws - but basically 5 or 6 A4 pages of cheat sheets where you can roll a D20 or percentile on the fly and make up the character as you are speaking. If you're quick minded enough to have a basic character sheet on hand you can actually flesh them out as you go (don't bother with a full sheet unless you have to). Those cheat sheets? Personality, Education, Addictions, current / past lovers, guile etc... you can get all of that in one drop of 10 dice, assigning a dice - but not score - to each. Insta-character and you have the option to make them "proper" later. Back to my oringinal point... I guess its true what they say about the international community always associating the British with being the bad guy..... hehehehe. (You're welcome)
I love these NPCs!! They have a nice range of story moods. I'm already thinking of possible ways their stories might unfold... :)
also, lol "robot currency" XD
Another thing I'd recommend is to keep old NPCs when a game wraps... reduce (work), re-use and recycle (NPCs). Any player who complains gets to bring in a stack of ten (10) interesting NPCs that might be encountered in the world. Make sure they know upfront that you may change and rewrite things about the NPCs, to include affiliation, motivation, alignment, gender, or background without notice... that Overpowered Cheese of an NPC they're hoping might make things easy and profitable for them might just make things easy and profitable for the villain, but hey, your players might be willing to pull some weight to make the world more interesting.
I said this about the person who is the Dm for the Dungeon Dudes games and I will say it about You, Ginny D! You should Totally become a character actor! You would make a FORTUNE!!!
What I expected: 3 NPCs
What I got: 3 NPCs complete with compelling plot hooks with multiple avenues of resolution
You are a creative FIREHOSE of inspiration and support for gaming! Thank you so very much for sharing all this and I will be using these SOON!
Absolutely loved these characters, Ginny! Thanks for sharing them with us.
Quick question: as a DM, how quickly/easily can you come up with characters? I find I have to create ones with deeper personalities away from the table, but it's usually the grumpy ol' coot that my players pester first.
Cool!!! More videos please, this is amazing inspiration for me trying to start my own campaign. Especially loved Tilly the barmaid, i might tweak her a little, like perhaps, unwillingly engaged to a vampire (yes, i played CoS, loved the campaign) or maybe a werewolf. Would that be okay? Or do you have any other tips to help an aspiring DM?
Love all three ideas....I'm new at DM'ing and not very good at it but I try. I will use these NPCs at some point of my campaigns. At this point I just play D&D with my kids. It's hard to find players where I live. Then when I do it's about a hour drive to where we play. Keep those videos coming. Best Wishes Ginny.
Well, Tilly in concept is certainly flexible - I can think of a few ways to implement her into *Through The Breach* (tie-in RPG to Malifaux, think Weird West meets Victorian Horror with a dose of steampunk). Stick her in a saloon in a small contract town and replace the ettercap with some sort of monstrous creature from the Bayou. Or a tavern on the edge of Malifaux City's quarantine district and the creature's an undead of some form.
This is really helpful for me! I’m running my first campaign as a dm and decided to go with my own home brew world, having interesting NPC ideas has been a struggle
Thank you!!!
I'm building my first D&D campaign and Tilly, Clover and Valra will be put into my game. Thank you very much for this :)
5:50 I'll make sure no paladin nor clerics are in my group before I try this.
We tend to be a little _PURGIE_ with our faith based PCs. -I blame WH40k-
D&D NPC/Quest idea: a double whammy! Old Cynthia and Daisy. Old Cynthia is an old halfling who's descended from a long line of reclusive witches. She works as a healer in the middle of town and is always taking visitors either for work or for chatting, but she rarely leaves her house, preferring instead to hire the local adventurer's guild to gather ingredients for her from the local forest. She has a dog named Daisy who is a very sweet little brown Pomeranian and very docile, but also curious. One day Daisy escapes and Cynthia needs someone to go and get her back. She insists that only high-level adventurers should go on the quest and is offering a ridiculously high amount to get her back. If the PCs are at least level 10 or lie about being a higher level, she'll give it to them, and tell them to be very careful because Daisy gets herself into trouble sometimes.
What she doesn't tell them is that Daisy's collar is a powerful warding amulet called the Eye of the Storm, and it protects the wearer by drawing in chaos and absurdity and then redirecting it whenever it's about to harm the wearer. About to shoot Daisy with a bow and arrow? A Purple Wyrm comes up from below your feet and swallows you whole. About to hit Daisy with a sword? A portal to hell randomly opens up and swallows your sword and possibly you. Just walking around? Too bad! A war between Mechanus and Limbo has started and it's happening right where you're walking. It's an heirloom worn by Old Cynthia's ancestors for centuries, and it's protected them from harm but also isolated them from the rest of the world, and Cynthia decided long ago that she wanted to have friends and so put it on Daisy for safe-keeping and has kept Daisy in her house surrounded by Runes and Abjuration spells to limit the Eye of the Storm's power in the house. That's why Cynthia hired high-level adventurer's to get her back.
I have a table of effects, but I need to work on it so that it's a little more interesting than "a thing appears and attacks you, roll initiative" 99 times and then one interesting thing.
This was such a fun video! Although creating NPC's on the fly hasn't been a big problem for me thusfar, I am so glad that this video exists to spark more variation in the types of NPC's I make. I'm definitely using a figure like Tilly at some point!