When PCs are involved with politics they will seek out NPCs to assist them. People need staff - no one can do it all. It’s hard to manage a starship manufacturing company while also playing an officer of the Awesomeness space pirate ship. You want to make it possible for your players to do both, which requires delegation. This does present a number of challenges for the GM but also opportunities - NPCs are your most valuable tool.

One important note, players invariably take their responsibilities seriously. They might not always make the right decisions but they will try to make the right decision. This is important to remember - your players are trying, so definitely challenge them but don’t do something that will seriously discourage them. There is a difference between fiction and roleplaying. Sure it’s entertaining when the hero of the story discovers that a character he trusted was all along an enemy, yet if you do that with PCs you better have given the PCs some clues before it happens. If you play the NPC business manager of the party as straightforward and honest for a dozen adventures and then have him take off with all of their money - you’re cheating. Be fair to your players. When we run adventures we’re hitting the highlights. When you have a four-hour session that covers four days of game time then every hour is a proxy for twenty-four hours. You’re not roleplaying all the myriad encounters with a NPC throughout that period, you’re doing the ‘best of’ overview. Players expect what they see and experience in that one hour to be indicative of the other twenty-three hours. Just keep that in mind.

Let’s consider an example. The PCs have saved the kingdom for the dozenth time and the Queen grants them manors and titles. The PCs intend to continue adventuring as their full-time profession so they must appoint people to manage their manors and duties. The GM needs to provide some options, ideally setting them up before this moment, and then assess their choices and resulting implications.

So consider one PC has a deadbeat brother who’s been studying to be a wizard for years with little success, a squire that has long been loyal to him, and someone who has been managing the manor for many years serving the previous lord. Whoever the PC chooses will reflect the PC’s priorities for the manor. Players can be rather innovative with these decision. For example, the PC might decide to name his brother the seneschal for the manor but leave the experienced manager in place, while assigning his squire to keep an eye on both of them. That’s often how PCs operate. I cannot stress the number of times I have given three options, often very different ones, for hiring NPCs and all of them are hired. When this happens pat yourself on the back as you presented NPCs who were all appealing for recruitment. That’s the goal - not to present two terrible choices and one good choice, which is unfair to the players and yourself. Something to note is that players adjust their priorities based on their characters and settings. Thus in a feudal fantasy setting PCs will favor relatives or loyal retainers, even incompetent ones, as this is a built-in assumption of these settings. These same players in a modern or sci-fi setting will completely ignore family and favor people more on merit and their inherent skills. Obviously, there is some give and take here but this is fairly accurate from my experiences. Keep this in mind. The recruitment process reveals a lot about PC priorities and management strategies. You will want to bring this to the front so you have a better idea how to adjudicate the efforts of the hired NPC. So back to our example, the PC has a manor and is selecting someone to manage it. Various candidates are trotted in. One speaks of being even-handed with the peasants, another pledges that the PC will get his due from his manor regardless of the circumstances, and the other has a lot of innovative ideas to improve crop yields and productivity. Listen to the PC’s questions of these NPCs and if you’re lucky the PC will discuss the decision with another PC or NPC. This will reveal to you the priorities of the PC.

Once there’s a NPC in place to manage an operation you need to decide how that NPC does in managing the operation. This might be a dice roll but it’s probably better if you just make the decision. Ask yourself some questions. Is the NPC qualified for this position? Does the NPC bring in some advantage or disadvantage to the operation? Is the operation going to have good or bad year? Think about it and make a decision on how it should play out. Now comes the hard part - you need a problem or two the NPC will have to punt to the PC. These are hard decisions, the best have a moral, political, and economic twist. Here’s an example - the village chaplain has gotten a serving girl pregnant but won’t acknowledge the child as his. The NPC wants the PC to tell him what to do about this. Here’s a scandalous conflict between the manor and the church with real consequences for people. Tough decisions for the PC is what you want, and if the PC comes up with a brilliant solution then reward the PC. Remember you’re only showing a small moment of time during a session. The solution to this problem you should assume is reflective of dozens of other decisions the PC makes. Related to this is to not use up everything you have. If you have three good problems then use one or two and save the rest for next time. Pace yourself.

The last point I want to make is that you need to keep good notes. Not long notes, good notes. It might be a number of sessions before the PC gets back around to his manor and the NPC managing it. You want a few words to remind you of the personality of the NPC. You don’t need a lot details. You could have: Geoff, former squire, laughs a lot and is very superstitious. Then some additional notes about prior decisions and pending issues. Keep it simple and useful.

That’s some initial thoughts on NPCs.