Here's some more old school AD&D plug and play stuff - this time a selection of randomly generated human groups, straight from the Monster Manual

A band of 140 BANDITS (highwaymen)
Currently they are laying in wait
BANDIT Chief: Gonsalvo, a 10th-lvl Fighter (hp 49)
Lieutenant: Tollanuir, a 7th-lvl Fighter (hp 24)
Bodyguards: 6 2nd-lvl Fighters (hp 9,13,10,14,11,9)
Clerics: Aldahararon, a 6th-lvl Cleric of Abbathor (hp 25) and a 3-lvl Assistant, Borochoth (hp 14)
Wizard: Edlicknitz, an 8th-lvl Magic User (hp 29)
3rd-lvl Fighters: 7(hp 13,17,19,9,20,16,22)
4th-lvl Fighters: 5(hp 20,29,18,16,18)
5th-lvl Fighters: 4(hp 27,28,38,34)
6th-lvl Fighters: 3(hp 46,28,34)
Treasure:
Potion of Clairvoyance,
Rod of Absorption (36 charges)
Human-sized Chain Mail +1
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A band of 59 RAT BERSERKERS with a fleet of 4 Longships. They are hauling their booty back home.
Chief: Skalla-Gjuki Bjarnisson the Deep-Minded, a 10th-lvl Fighter (hp 49, Axe + Spear (1-8/1-6))
Subchiefs: 2 6th-lvl Fighter Subchiefs, Yngvar (hp 36) Axe + Spear (1-8/1-6) & Eyvind (hp 29) Sword (1-8)
Clerics: Geitir, a 7th-lvl Cleric of Loki & 1 4th-lvl Assistant (hp 10)
Special Followers: Audun,a Wererat (hp 19)
SHIELD BROTHERS
1st-lvl Fighters: 6 (hp 10,4,2,4,8,7)
2nd-lvl Fighters: 3 (hp 6,13,11)
3rd-lvl Fighters: 2 (hp 16,7)
4th-lvl Fighters: 1 (hp 31)
5th-lvl Fighters: 1 (hp 31)
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A band of 170 BUCCANEERS on shore leave
BUCCANEER CAPTAIN:  Stuttering Seberddru, an 8th-lvl Fighter (hp 50, axe (1-8))
Lieutenant: Blind Shadrach, a 7th-lvl Fighter (hp 40, axe (1-8))
Boarding Party: 3 4th-lvl Fighters (hp 25,19,13, swords & handaxes (1-8/1-4))
Ship's Doctor(s): Portsider Einar, a 2nd-lvl Cleric of Ares (hp 7)
Ship's Mates: 3 3rd-lvl Fighters (hp 9,8,10, light crossbow (1-4))
Ship's Officers: 2 5th-lvl Fighters (hp 36,28, sword (1-8))
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A MERCHANT CARAVAN
Currently they are traveling/marching.
Merchants: 10 0-lvl Normal Men (hp 3 each)
Drovers: 10 0-lvl Normal Men (hp 3 each)
Pack Animals: 60 mules
Mercenary Captain: Gromel, a 7-lvl Fighter (hp 39)
Mercenary Lieutenant: Damballah, a 6-lvl Fighter (hp 30)
Mercenary Guards: 12 2nd-lvl Fighters (hp 11,5,9,11,12,10,10,4,11,12,8,8)
Mercenary Troops: 80 1st-lvl Fighters (hp 6 each)
Paychest: 2,000gp 200pp and 11 gems (100gp each)
Trade Goods: total 30000gp including trunks of iron ingots worth 350gp each
& bags of raw wool worth 12gp each
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A band of 64 TRIBESMEN from a SPIDER clan
They place elaborately carved totem poles and are zombie masters.
Chief: Witchdoctor/Chief Motuha-Mataeula, 8th-lvl Magic-User (hp 29)
Shamans: 2 6th-lvl Clerics (hp 21,17) & 6 4th-lvl Clerics (hp 18,12,21,16,18,18)
Braves: 6 3rd-lvl Fighters (hp 14,6,14,14,21,29)
Servants: 5 Juju Zombies (HD 3+12 26,24,22,25,24)

And spellbooks for the 2 Magic-Users

Edlicknitz' Spellbook
Level 1 -Alarm, Animate Rope, Chill Touch, Grease, Hypnotism, Identify, Read Magic, Magic Missile, Protection from Good, Charm Person, Push, Ventriloquism
Level 2 -Darkness, Levitate, Ray of Enfeeblement, Web
Level 3 -Hold Person, Lightning Bolt
Level 4 -Polymorph Other, Fire Shield

Witchdoctor/Chief Motuha-Mataeula's Spellbook
Level 1 -Read Magic, Chime of Release, Charm Person, Affect Normal Fires, Ventriloquism
Level 2 -Ghoul Touch, Skull Watch, Darkness 15' Radius, Stinking Cloud
Level 3 -Blink, Flame Arrow
Level 4 -Fear, Polymorph Other

Thanks for these, very inspiring.

Do you just make up the names, or is there a list somewhere?

Hmm, sorry, not as impressed. Needs some included background - Right now they're just wandering monsters.

Hmm, sorry, not as impressed. Needs some included background - Right now they're just wandering monsters.

Whoop, double-post, sorry.

QuoteDo you just make up the names, or is there a list somewhere?

While I use Tablesmith for the raw output, I've completely ditched all of the default tables that come with it and built my own from scratch. The names tables particularly took a lot of fiddling to get them to churn out Gygaxian-sounding names without the typical fantasy name bullshit.

Narf...I thought you put me on ignore after I aired my opinions about the LDS. Anyways, FYI, these ARE random/wandering monsters. These groups were generated strictly according to the 1e AD&D Monster Manual guidelines which can be a real chore to work through manually (1 in every 30 orcs is a 2HD Leader for example). Personally, I prefer a very freeform sandbox campaign world with no story-arc or 'balanced encounters'; similar in many ways to the Judges Guild Wilderlands setting. To do this kind of thing right, it demands lots and lots of pregenerated encounters that will generally only be developed in-play, if at all.

Oh, I've got you on mental ignore for LDS issues, but I don't hold resentment very long. It's just too much work.

In this case, you got my honest opinion, independant of the name attached to the post.

I wonder why the groups are so big - it doesn't seem like they'd be useable against normal-sized parties.

They're so big because of the Monster Manual guidelines - Dwarves clock in at 40d10 for example. The idea seemed to be to allow the DM to create tribes, lairs & settlements rather than just single encounters. Personally, I scale the numbers down depending on the situation. 40d10 dwarves is a whole army or settlement. 4d10 dwarves is a mining crew. 1d10 dwarves a militia patrol. 1d4 dwarves a small adventuring party. The place where these numbers come in handy is when deciding how many upper-level characters to include in a group and how to scale treasure according to the encounter. A 'Type A' treasure is a massive hoard of coins, gems, jewelry and magic items. Presumably, a mining crew (roughly 1/10 of a full tribe) would possess around 1/10 of that treasure.

OTOH, if a party did decide to take on one of these groups, it would be more than enough challenge to build a whole adventure around. Sure, goblins only have 1-1 HD. But there are 400 of the little fuckers.