What is an NPC?
NPC stands for non-player character. It’s any character in a game that none of the players controls.
NPCs in tabletop RPGs
In a tabletop RPG like Dungeons & Dragons, each player controls one character. The game master plays everyone else: the innkeeper, the guard who won’t let you in, the villain, the person who sells you a rope. Those are all NPCs. They are the other people who live in the world.
A good NPC wants something. The innkeeper wants the rowdy party out before closing. The guard wants a bribe he can pretend wasn’t one. Players remember them for years because of that, not because of their stats.
NPCs in video games
The idea is the same in video games. An NPC is a character the game controls: a quest giver, a shopkeeper, a villager repeating the same line. The difference is that a video game follows a script, and a game master can improvise.
What NPCs are for
- Giving the players information or a quest.
- Selling them things, or refusing to.
- Getting in their way.
- Making the world feel like it has people in it.
Why every shopkeeper is an NPC
Every party needs supplies, and somebody has to be on the other side of the counter. That somebody is an NPC, played by the game master, who exists to sell rope and then step out of the story.
Dungeon Shopkeeper turns that around. You’re the NPC. You sit behind the counter, size up the adventurers coming through the door, and work out what you can sell them. It’s a board game, so there’s no game master and no homework.
Questions people ask about NPCs
What does NPC stand for?
NPC stands for non-player character: any character in a game that no player controls.
Who plays NPCs in D&D?
The game master, called the Dungeon Master in D&D. They voice every NPC the party meets, from innkeepers to villains.
Is an NPC the same as a monster?
Not quite. Monsters are usually run by the game master too, so they count as NPCs, but most NPCs are ordinary people who aren’t out to fight you.
Can a player play an NPC?
In most TTRPGs each player has a single character and the game master runs the NPCs. Some games let players voice an NPC for a scene. In Dungeon Shopkeeper, the board game, you play the shopkeeper NPC all game.
New to all this? Read TTRPG vs board game, or see the rest of TTRPGs explained.