New GM needs help: Improv

TIFunkalicious

Told true, I'm not a stranger to roleplaying. My dad brought home the first DnD for my older brothers after he picked up roleplaying while in the army. I've been playing in these family games as well as sessions with my brothers' friends. But now I'm in college and my siblings are across the country. I had experimented with running games in the past years of jrhigh/high school with lukewarm success, usually using modules or free adventures off the web. They played along, but just didn't seem as enthused as I remember being, and I was afraid to bring forward my full spirit into the game for adolescent fear of judgement.

I didn't really cared what we played. And I finally found a setting that my players could get into and that's Shadowrun:4E. The world clicked with Ghost in the Shell, the Matrix, Neuromancer, etc. and was easier for them to get into than Dungeons and Dragons.

So I traded swords for guns; magic for cyberware, commlinks, and, well, magic; dragons are still there too...point is I now have players excited about a system and a setting, all ready for me to weave some narrative and action.

But I have a problem as a fledgling Game Master. Members of my family are traditionally DM in their respective groups, and I've landed the same job more or less cause I've put in the most time to understand the mechanics. So rules aren't the problem. Stories in Shadowrun are straightforward, and even when twisting or mysterious are still easy to imagine. So my stories aren't the problem. It's the NPCs and the REST of the world. I don't like to impose decisions on the players, so they will inevitably talk to someone, enter a building, or take a route to their objective that I didn't plan for. Not every guard has a pre-written monologue, and not every executive has a description. It's futile to try and detail every corner, but I want to be able to give them SOMETHING for their curiosity.

TL;DR

I need to give flashes of character in the unprepared corners of the city. What does an experienced GM do when given the task of improvising a short scene or character? What can I do to improve?

"You need more experience" is an acceptable answer, I understand if what I really need to do is derive it from years of gaming, and continue running games with my head high, but I can tell my players get bored when I have nothing to give them and must take game time just to think of something.

Rainfall

Random character generator. Make a list of character personality traits, vocal quirks, and physical quirks(12-20 strong, each.) They meet a new person, roll 3 dice, and you have a character!

Also, write background world notes. What's the big news headlines? Some celebrity gossip, etc, goes a long way to building character, and it's easy enough to steal from your local free paper's gossip page and change a name or two.

That way, random NPCs encountered actually have something to say.

Improv takes a lot of practice, but some casual note-taking turns it from 'mind is blank what do I do?' to 'put a spin on these words I wrote based on the character I just rolled.'

Garret Dorigan

Rule of thumb until you get used to it is if the NPC isn't going to be memorable, don't try to make them be so. If the guy who just came out of the Ware Doc's lab is just going to confirm that, yes, that's the Ware Doc's lab and disappear, don't worry too much about him. He's a joe schmo sinned, he's going to be very similar to all the other joe schmo sinneds you'll find in the area.

Now the Ware Doc? That's where you think up a hook. But overall, just give yourself a fallback. The people in this part of Seattle are more gregarious. This part? Boorish. This part? Etc...

Alistair Hutton

Get a list of names on a sheet of paper. Usually the playtesting list in the rulebook has a good list of quirky names.

Every time the players decided to engage with a nameless NPC pick the next name off the list (you may want to split it into male and female names) and note down the NPC next to the name. Let the name guide what kind f personality they have. Boring name, boring person.

Or you could combine with the advice above and pre-roll some character quirks for each name so that for improv is more prepared.

Detharin

One of the key things I try and always remember for any NPC is to know what they do on their days off/when the runners are not around. Are they sim junkies? Do they never miss an Urban Brawl game? Heavy drinkers?

10 seconds of "What do you need man its the third quarter and Scrumby just got the ball, make it fast" go along way to make players remember NPCs. Pick any random hobby, and have the NPCs mention it. People like to talk about themselves, NPCs should be no different. Also if you are talking contacts these should be created with your players, ask them how tehy met this person, ask them to provide details. Spending points for a buddy for life should cause them to work a bit.

Man i really should finish the writeup of the last shadowrun game i did that i started on the thesixmouths forums.