Proactive Players and how to make them

Hi Veeky Forums
I've tried to get my players involved in a sandboxy campaign, tiring of the previous two campaigns we've played (GM'd by others) which were pretty much completely linear.
I didn't skimp on prep; I have a starting area with moving factions, developed NPCs, different locales to go to, and took cues from the session zero PC concepts.
I also asked the players to come up with defined goals for their characters (i.e. become a great X, attain noble status, etc) and split those up into sub goals they could pursue. There are things I've left in the setting to help them along, and I'd be receptive to any plans they come up with outside those I've seeded.

The problem is that they all just listlessly drift from occurance to occurance and drink their money away in-between. The random encounter table I made for travel has generated more interest than anything else.

I'm losing the will to live here, Veeky Forums pls help. How do I get my players to drive the plot a bit?

Veeky Forums pls help

>How do I get my players to drive the plot a bit?
Drugs and/or waifus.

You can't. At best, you will have ONE proactive player who drags the rest in his or her wake. But as far as I can tell, that kind of go-getter in absence of an obvious path to take sort of player is born, not made. And if you have them, sandbox or not, they'll be looking for things to do, or rushing to meet your sorts of challenges instead of waiting for an NPC to outline a plan for them or whatnot.

Coax them into it with a scripted beginning that seems like they are choosing what happens. Railroad them at first without them knowing and then take off the tracks and momentum should keep it going

Welp, shit.
We're ten sessions in.

My usual suggestion is to play a couple of sessions of some kind of GMless rpg. In those sorts of games everyone has to share control of the game pretty equally so it's much more obvious if one person is doing all the work, do that until they start to contribute more. Then hopefully when you go back to the usual style of game they'll have gotten out of the 'story is the GM's job' mindset and will be willing to take on some larger-scale decisions.

This is also my advice for railroady GMs.

We played a session of Everyone is John once, and it was an absolute trainwreck. Any other possibilities for "shake up" games?

Everyone is John is always a train wreck. In my experience, it's normally a fun train wreck but that depends on everyone having a similar sense of humor.

You could try One Last Job. My group's played that lately, and whilst it's been dominated by the typical proactive players we found it fun to keep basically inflicting any and all plans onto the quieter players, to force them to act.

Put LSD in their drinks.

>The random encounter table I made for travel has generated more interest than anything else.

Then have them travel more to fulfill shit they've already roped themselves into, and point blank ask them "Where will we be travelling to next?" and give them locales that are (supposed to, according to their Lore or equivalent checks) aligned with their characters' goals.

I mean, everyone just mechanically went after their objectives. It was like John was taken over by four slightly-different borg collectives.

Oh, you're playing with autismos. Then your current situation can't be helped.

As previous anons have said, proactive players are mostly born, not made

However, I can think of one in-game way to motivate them:
crippling, painful, soul-crushing debts.

Their characters have to keep taking jobs, else they'll default and get their shit repossessed and their legs broken

This doesn't work in the games people actually play (D&D and derivatives), because characters are unbelievably wealthy by normal peoples' standards by the time they reach level 2.

I like forsooth, but that's because my group just plays it as improv time.

You either drive the plot or let them play in the sandbox at their leisure. It's pretty simple, trying to do both means alternating between one and the other.

And the whole bit with coming up with "defined goals" is shit. Probably the reason why the encounter table draws more interest because it engages everyone at once. GMs need to learn that jacking one PC off to tell their story at a time is terrible and will always result in a lapse of interest among PCs who simply couldn't care less.

The story is the GM's job, it's not a mindset.
You may as well of suggested another system altogether, why go back to a system that requires a GM?

Just because their wealthy doesn't meant they aren't in debt.

Maybe, but "lol you start off deep in debt so you'll have to throw your money at it instead of buying things that help you stay alive in combat" is a That DM move.

Then make the debt so big that throwing spare change from regular adventures is doing nothing. Only nabbing the fucking big score can help you, and nabbing that is the point of your adventure.

Expecting them to find common goals, or take interest in one another was too much.

Fuck, man. Feels bad.

The absolute best players ar ones who have goals and actively work toward them; and the ones who can step out of the spotlight and help another character look awesome or explore their backstory.

Those players are rare and precious.

Well, shit. Never mind.

On the debt idea: the PCs are currently trying to keep a business going, but they don't really seem interested in it. Just "we find some stuff to sell, keep things ticking over" in every port.
Getting them to tell me what they might want to trade in, or think about where to take it, or doing anything different to others is like pulling teeth.

I really feel like they're just looking for me to put a wise wizard with a quest in the next pub, but I'm SICK of that game structure.

Sorry, I was a different user than the one you replied to, offering a different perspective. That's just how I feel, and what my experience has been. Whether it's doable depends on your players, and to a big extent, on the system

Some I can think of (Burning Wheel/Mouse Guard/Torchbearer, and Stars Without Number/Spears of the Dawn come to mind) explicitly tie advancement to proactively coming up with goals. The issue though is that it can go one of two ways. Either they take that carrot and the system supports the type of campaign you want to play... or they find it goes against their inclinations too much, and they stop having any fun.

I'd ask them about what sort of campaign they prefer, honestly. Communication is the answer to 90% of Veeky Forums issues. If the random encounter tables are what they enjoy, then you might have to accept that's the sort of game your group wants to be playing.

Sounds like someone doesn't know how to GM
>throwing money at thing that help you stay alive in combat
>implying it's going to be a good game if the GM is letting you buy magic items instead of working them into the setting such that the players will find them, or at least hear about them, as needed

Also, the Blues Brothers.

You are strangely attached to the concept of a GM in D&D. You know the dice don't combust if you follow the user's advice, right?

> Communication is the answer to 90% of Veeky Forums issues

This. Sounds like OP got focused on the game he wants to run over the game the players want to play.

You gotta get that balance, yo.

You're trying to run a sandbox game with obviously non-sandbox players. Well done.

I was 100% open about the kind of game I wanted to run, there were other option son the table, other people could have GM'd.

I didn't know, anons. I just didn't know.

>Those players are rare and precious.
Let's be fair: young people with genuine, self-determined ambition are rare and precious.

Too many of my players don't save their money to rent their own place, to buy their own car, so on and so forth. Some don't even have a good suit for themselves.

C has nothing to do with A and B, or even future savings, but okay, gramps.

Well it could be that they thought they knew what they wanted but when it came to game time they didn't realize how much you were going to expect from them.

Just drop something big and important and they'll go do it.

I've been playing a long time, and this is the way it is.