Timothy Collinson wrote:

<<snip>>

> Well I suspect this [using TV and movie characters, with serial numbers filed off] is fine for on-the-fly games, or a regular group
> where you've got loads to prepare and little time, but the adventures
> I'm putting together are (hopefully) for publication so I can't really
> take that route.
>
> And yes, I can just make it up, but as I said, I was trying to reduce
> the strain by having some of the thinking automated.  Which is largely
> why we have rules in the first place!

Well, instead of automating the process, you could always crowdsource
the task of generating NPCs to the TML. ;-)

I assume that NPCs for your adventures will be generated using the
Mongoose Core Rulebook.  If that's the case, I'm sure that the combined
membership of the TML could provide you with plenty of suitable NPCs.
All you would need to provide is the parameters (and, perhaps,
acknowledgement in any published adventure)....

Parameters might include TL, age, sex, profession and number needed:

Examples:

TL-13, ages 22-50, sex Any, Police Officers, 4 needed
TL-10, ages 60+, sex Any, Disabled Veterans, 3 needed
TL-12, ages 18+, sex Both (50/50 ratio), professions Any (generic
citizens), 8 needed

As an additional advantage, we could provide you with whatever details
stood out to us while generating the character.  You could then use that
to help flesh-out the NPC in question.

What do the rest of y'all think of this idea?  What additional
parameters might Mr. Collinson need to provide?