As a GM, what can I do to accommodate for players with murderhobo tendencies and generally do destructive shot for no reason? I want to try to adapt the game to their playstyle, but I'm not sure how to.
What are some tips/methods to adapt to murderhobos?
Have they been briefed or is the game kinda sandbox-y?
Megadungeons. It honestly makes it so fucking easy for a DM too
>no intrigue
>smaller amount of role play, meaning less dynamic NPCs (by number, not in general)
>the game becomes Cowboy from Full Metal Jacket: "there's the enemy, kill em" so you don't need shit tons of locale
It'll get old eventually, but enjoy it while it lasts
That's probably the easiest kind of player to accommodate. If they look or seem bored, throw a fight at them. A bandit raid, a dragon attack, a bar fight, whatever.
I don't see why you'd want to cater to this type of player, because it will turn your game into nothing but a slog of combat scenarios with some light flavor text in between as you try not to go more than four sentences without losing the murderhobo's attention.
Be literal bandits. Gather up a band of rogues and renegades and terrorize the local authorities in the name of profit.
Send them on a mission of sabotage behind enemy lines. You could give them a set of targets like castles to take over, people to assassinate, wagon trains to disrupt.
Or they could be the bad guys and start up a bandit camp.
They've been briefed. The game isn't very sandboxy.
My DM said fuck you all of you are in a arena. My group was cancer anyway
There's actually a way to change them.
Ask them to actually play something like Baldurs Gate or similarily complex cRPG. It's weird how often your table-top murderhobo chooses to be a fucking goody two shoes diplomancer in those games. Ask them why they've chosen to play like that. If they'll say something like "combat got boring after a while", cockslap them with the obvious parallels to your situation.
So far it worked twice.
Enticing rewards and some punishment from time to time.
I give +1 to 2 to players for certain things for a brief period when players are IC and not being assholes. When you equate following the rules with bonuses, people will follow the rules to "win" more.
Sometimes someone has to die to reinforce mortality however.
That's also a good way to incentivise being a bit less of a dick at the table. Small adjustments to the amount of EXP you dish out will also go a long way. Been the least of a fuckwit? Have a +10% EXP as a reward. The third session in a row when you act like a complete maladjusted moron? Have a -10% penalty.
Run a game set in a yugoslavia-style breakup of a nation
Having the same problem man. Characters just stab everything and shoot everything including each other. Ramp up the punishments. Story time.
Began as sandbox west marches in a random frontier town that was somewhat peaceful had a few issues but not glaring ones.Party saw some wolf tracks followed them and found a wolf hide out, wolves actually talked and haven't done anything, wolves were actually fey, nope stabby stab. Harvest cold iron just in case to be prepared against the fey, then dive a local dungeon, encounter more fey trying to rescue their own, stabby stabby the NPCs. Few days go by they go out drinking one night, fey take advantage, steal the children, ruin the crop, impregnate some girls. Town is now at their throat. One character tries to start a riot against the mayor to allow them to hole up in the estate, mayor persuades everyone to relax and sweet talks them down, player then shoots the mayor.
My "accommodations" for my players are as follows:
You can murderhobo, the odds will begin stacking against you, and so will the coins on the table of whoever brings you in dead or alive.
Everytime you die you take a -1 level penalty to your next character.
Being ill prepared and just stabbing everything will lead to harder fights as the enemy may be prepared.
Injuries, plain and simple fight recklessly and without thought will acquire you injuries some of which will give you penalties.
Look, I'm not opposed to murderhobos it is a fantasy realm, my PCs can do whatever they want. I simply tell them, dying has negatives so pick and choose your battles wisely, criminal records and bounties are things to. Piss off the Fey, or demons, or whomever enough they will make your life a living hell whether you be good guys or bad guys. And lastly you will not be able to muscle your way to being BBEGs on pure murderhobism unless you have godlike dice rolls and prep. Which they have neither.
You got two options, one is megadungeon/diablo 2-like slog through hordes of monsters with an overarching goal like "kill Diablo"/"kill end-boss"/"save princess". Do this if you're a GM that loves violence and has a good knack for creating battlefields. No two combats should ever be the same or feel the same; have them fight in the mud, in the waist-deep water, in tall grass, on cliffs, on ramparts, in small rooms or big ball (the victorian dancy thing) halls. Have them fight different amounts of different foes, mindless, smart, cowardly, aggressive, vengeful (the villain proclaims how you killed his brother). Have the villains shittalk and let the heroes banter back, have the enemies up on balconies/cliffs, force the heroes to retreat sometimes, beat them up and leave them unconscious sometimes...
Combat can be fantastic, but if you prefer diplomacy and story, you'll get hella tired hella fast; it's up to you if you'll suffer these axehead players.
Two is their actions having consequences.
this is incredibly well thought out and great.
But it will lose you some of the more immature players because they like winning and solving problems with pure violence.
A fun part of violence escapism is that you can't use it in real life, or you're facing regret at the very least, and prison time/death at the top. We've all had thoughts of how we'd perforate some dickbag's car with automatic fire or crack a rude fuck's skull open, and we can't do that IRL, so video games/rpgs can give us a small vent there.
There's a chance your players might mature up, and if that happens, you're blessed.
>introduce a reasonable powerlevel ceiling
>bounty hunters become frequent when the PCs destroy the wrong stuffs and leave witnesses
Tell us more about this group of murderhobo players you intend to bring together and run this experimental campaign on.
Not to bitch about them but to give us an idea of the kind of players and likes you are working with.
>yugoslavia-style breakup of a nation
I was born in 1999. Can you explain this please.
Also wasn't the whole reason Yugoslavia broke up that it was a state that failed to instill a strong sense of nationhood in the people it had power over? That's the only thing I know about it.
By "can't muscle your way to being BBEG" do you mean "can't become BBEG by being murderous assholes alone" or "can't become BBEG"?
If the majority of your players are not murderhobos then under no circumstances should you accommodate the murderhobo.
I let a 4 year campaign fall apart because of my desire to treat the most unreasonable and inconsiderate party member's needs as equal to the other players'. Don't make my mistake.
Tell us more.
I mean this might be too obvious, but what about just ignoring or outright denying their actions? I know the idea is to let players play in your world. But when the murderhobo says "I attack the innkeeper with my bow" can't you just say "No, you don't, if you kill random NPCs then I can't advance the storyline"
Either make a dungeon crawl type of adventure to accommodate their play style, or make them pay for their random destructive actions ( being hunted by law enforcement, bounty hunters, paladins, etc ) if you want them to rethink their murderhobo actions.
I would let him kill the innkeeper and then have the party be lynched by an angry mob and thrown in jail. Then I would accommodate the story around that.
Can't become BBEG by being murderous assholes alone with no plan. Unless of course the dice bless them.
As said before it is fantasy world, you can be whomever and do whatever. Just do not go crying to me about how I am being ruthless and power DMing when you are being hunted down by paladins and bounty hunters for slaughtering a whole town.
See, I would allow that but would shift the story on how it goes after that. Kill the innkeeper, great now getting resources and stuff is difficult for that dungeon you were suppose to go to because you've attracted the fuzz. Maybe the innkeeper was a retired badass monk and catches the arrow, beats the shit out of the ranger who shot him and he gets thrown in prison. There are always consequences to actions whether the actions were good or bad. Bad guys evolve and adjust to the good guys over time why can't cities and towns to murderhobo adventurers who think they're hot shit.
This guy gets it.
My biggest gripe with DnD is many people now treat it like skyrim or any other RPG where you can kill everyone and still save the world. If you ask me to make a fantasy world you can escape into I am going to make it as believable as possible, and that includes how cause and effect works.
Just run oldschool "dungeon master vs players" dungeons for em, the kind where rushing blindly in meant death, kill em enough but make it obvious it's their fault for running on autopilot and trying to embody the murderhobo meme. Do it in such a way that they feel absolutely no malicious intent from them. Alternatively load them down with crunch. Every action they do requires a roll. Deathklok the fuck out of the campaign, as brütal as possible. They want murderhobo? Welcome to grimwood, yonder is the castle, the villagers all have an agenda and the flayed corpses of the last band of murderhobos are outside the town gate. They don't give a fuck about setting or story, it's a power trip. Take that power away subtly, subvert their intentions. Killed a whole dungeon? the townsfolk are pissed, adventurers challenging the dungeon was their source of revenue. They want blood and guts, make them spill their own whenever possible.
>party comes into town
>innkeeper tell you there's an abandoned castle filled with monsters and riches, in the middle of the woods, many adventurers go in and never come back, yada yada
>party goes there, murderhobo everything and clear the dungeon of all its treasures
>BBEG of the dungeon ends up being a wizard who has an agreement with the townsfolk to maintain the castle as a dangerous dungeon to attract adventurers
>he transforms each party member into a monster and place in them a curse that prevents them from leaving the dungeon
>the rest of the adventure is the party trying to find a way to break the curse while being attacked by constant waves of adventurers that want to kill them and steal their loot
>the players fail at trying to explain to the adventurers that they're actually humans who were cursed because the adventurers are all murderhobos who jump into combat at the first sight of them
...
mindfucked