Why is combat a staple of most tabletop RPGs?

Why is combat a staple of most tabletop RPGs?

Because pacifism doesn't have enough rules.

Because violence is exciting.

Because it's fun

Because it's simple and measurable.

spbp

If I want to roleplay diplomacy I can join a model UN or something.

Because they evolved out of wargames

Because you're supposed to slay evil, not negotiate a resettlement contract

but turn-based violence is boring.

For you, maybe.

Nobody wants to roll on your random blowjob table, Doug.

Because combat is the staple of real life, most of the effort humans take in politics, philosophy, economy, science etc. is to stop the most ripped dudes from clobbering to death the people they disagree with and doing as their please.

When violence gets boring to you, it means you matured beyond such primitive amusement.
Or that you need to step it up with ultraviolence!

Combat is also a staple of most vidya as well

combat needs rules dedicated to it because it's high lethality and hard to handle by just RPing it.
This means that the rulebook dedicates disproportionate amounts of space to combat, so people who read the book assume it's /about/ combat.

A lot of games (most WoD, dark heresy, call of cthulhu and so on) put lots of mechanical space into combat, but playing the game as intended you shouldn't be fighting much.

I suspect OP is making the mistake of conflating 'D&D' with 'Most tabletop RPGs'.

Because emotions aren't for insecure/empty people.

Because it's the go-to way to introduce exciting conflict into a story.

Because high stakes are dramatic, and combat basically equals high stakes.

Because fighting in real life is illegal and dangerous.

Honestly I'd say because that's just really how things are. Like d&d came out, a giant dungeon crawler rpg, and most things after it didn't pause to think about shaking up the formula to much.
It's kind of a shame. I don't really think it 'needs' them more then anything else. I played pretend fights on the playground and in the backyard all the time as a kid, no dice or statsheets involved, and it went plenty of fun. I figure if you want rules in the first place why not have rules for everything. Thankfully there are at least a few rpgs with good subsystems for social influence, investigation and larceny, crafting, large scale business running and so on. Hope it catches on more

>Because fighting in real life is illegal

You need to live somewhere else

If you dont like it you can play mythic rome and get sentenced to death if you kill someone