Experienced DM needs more experience...give me your ideas!

I've been DM'ing a new group for the last year. It's been a lot of fun. It's quite a mix of playing styles though, but we all have been working well together.

After talking to one of the players about the pace of the game, he mentioned that sometimes it feels like they are fighting NPC's for no reason or he has no clue what's going on as far as the plotline/backstory is concerned.

I'm not the type of DM that just throws out random encounter after random encounter. My encounters always have a reason behind them. Even my "random" encounters are pre-planned so it makes sense. Even if it's as simple as a beast guarding his territory. The problem I've noticed is that all 4 of the players don't really interact with the bad guys in social situations. I like to roleplay a lot, but when I try to roleplay with the bad guys, these players don't really respond. They pretty much know a fight is going to happen anyway, so they just want to get to the fight I guess. It's to the point where even if they obviously have a chance to ask questions, they choose to wack on the NPC instead simply because he has the opportunity to get xp. I think they're doing that because killing for the XP is funner than talking their way out of an encounter for the XP.

So then I attempt to roleplay during the fight. I'll have the bad guy start making off-hand remarks in hopes the PC's will say something like, "What do you mean?", "What are you talking about?", or "Why do you want us dead?", or things like that. Usually all I get is, "Would you shutup!", or "Uh, yeah, ok...well I move around him to get a flanking position". There's a new joke at the table now about how their motto is "kill first and use speak with dead later"...and that's IF they care to ask the now dead NPC what's going on.

They rarely roleplay with NPC's in general. If they do, it's usually straight to the point in regards to their objective. So I figured these players just want to plow through adventures and focus on combat a lot more. So that's what I started doing; providing more combats. But then this player commented about the gray areas in the adventures and how he doesn't learn what's going on like he did in another campaign. He admits those players actually asked questions about what's going on though.

I would love to be able to make everything clear to the players without being lame about it. I install NPC notes in the game for clues, I have NPCs make side comments about the situation as a hook to get players to respond, and I have NPCs straight out give the PCs objectives and reasons why they are doing this. But as far as the players knowing why the bad guys are doing anything or why people seem to randomly attack them; they have no clue.

What can I do to spice up the game with the roleplaying so the scenarios don't seem so pointless? It's really hard for me to get into a roleplaying situation when the players aren't really responding to me. I'm not sure what else I can try doing.

I just talked with my DM about this one the other day. He usually lets us know when we get the killing blow on someone, and he's okay with us changing the result from dead to mortally wounded. Nobody can actually do anything to save them, but can still get in a few last words before they croak. Seems like a nice compromise.

Maybe this is just me, but my first impulse is to say, "You know, people can get into a lot of trouble killing people indiscriminately, even declared enemies."

It seems to me that if your encounters are that easy to anticipate, then even though you probably don't realize it, you are not that different from your players. The game is a series of combats... in your case, you simply want to have more talking involved. I can totally imagine a group of players adapting to that style, and if they don't feel comfortable trading barbs with the enemies or have much interest in interrogating their attackers, why should they waste time with half-hearted attempts at talking?

I have three recommendations. First, have things happen that don't make immediate sense. Second, give them the opportunity to kill someone and come to strongly regret it later. Three, send them into a situation where they must successfully negotiate with an NPC who could kill them easily. If they act like gibbons, the NPC kills one or more of them, probably in the first round.

Do those three things, and they will suddenly become a lot more interested in the reasons behind why events happen.

^^^^ I like idea 2... That's a good one, I'll have to remember that.

I had a group like that... I was running an evil campaign, where they were sent to overthrow the major powers in a region. (Or at least be agents in this plan.) One of them kept murdering all the plot hooks though. Every time. "[name of employer] is a monster! You know not what he plans! You cannot imagine! Spare me, and I'll tell you all I know!" <stab, thud>

This basically eliminated the most important parts of the plot for the campaign. I run a mostly consistent world between campaigns, so given that what went on was such a large event, they saw evidence of it in the next campaigns. Of course, they had no idea what it was, and I wasn't talking, which really made them curious. I was pleased to find that they were a lot more thorough in the next one, and actually pieced together most of the plot.

I'm not sure if you can really apply this to your campaign though. Maybe throw in something strange, that happened as a result of their characters ignoring what was going on, or some major clue they overlooked. Some major destination they were going to where things were supposed to happen being wiped off the map, assassins that know all their weaknesses, their magic items going missing, someone taking the cleric's holy symbol and tome just before combat... This stuff might be difficult to do in a linear campaign though. There's also always the tried and true employers or benefactors turning against the party too, which forces them to talk to people because they suddenly find themselves without any allies.

One thing you might try is using a "sleeper" - and it sounds like you have a good candidate already. Feed your interested player some information prior to the game, specifically to be used in the game - questions, backstory, event knowledge, whatever. Anything to give him a direction at some point in the game to kick off some roleplaying. Then reward him for it, both in game (with information) and after the game (with XP). That will (or should) trigger your other players to take notice.

Alternately (or in conjunction) setup an encounter they can't reach (or win) without gaining information from otherwise-killable NPCs. If they don't get said information, then make sure they miss out on the big treasure trove ... and that they know that they missed out, and why. (If you're feeling generous, give them an alternate way to get it ... if not, let some other group come along and get the trove.)

Does the one player interested in the plot ask questions? Does he get shut down by the others? That could be a real problem, if they aren't even willing to let someone else do what they enjoy.

Recommendations:

1. Talk to all of your players. You might discover that most of them really don't care about anything except what to kill next. Find out if they are willing to let others have their fun through a little investigation or roleplaying.
2. Have the PC of the one interested player meet some NPCs in a bar, or on the street or something where they can learn some information. Maybe even do this offine, perhaps by e-mail, during party downtime.
3. Don't make every NPC be XP fodder. Do they ever meet a barkeep or a fence who has info, but isn't a "bad-guy?" You might even consider having PCs lose XP for killing important NPCs who are not combatants.
4. Come up with adventures that are some kind of mystery to solve, and hacking your way to the end won't do it.
5. When appropriate, give larger XP awards for success by talking or roleplaying through an encounter.

Run Redhand of Doom.

The NPCs are useful for providing some information about what is going on and if the tendency is to shoot first and ask questions later, then the situation generally gets harder for the PCs because 'information' from the NPCs tends to help deal with future situations or clearly point out what should be done next.

If the party fails to capture warlords and minions to extract information, the adventure just gets that much harder.

Redhand would be a good adventure to illustrate to the players the value of gathering information and taking prisoners instead of putting everyone they meet immediately into the dead book.

Need more experience? Kill something near your CR.

Time to bring out the best kept secret in d20

http://www.scratchfactory.com/Resources/SwashCards.pdf

Use these.

The catch is that the bad guys get some too. Since you'll be adding more flair to the game, the bad guys can always get in an opportunity to narrate their evil pan (e.g. "Before I kill you Mr. Bond....") or some last words, or an improbable escape. The players won't mind as much because they'll have neat tricks of their own.

SavageRobby said:

One thing you might try is using a "sleeper" - and it sounds like you have a good candidate already. Feed your interested player some information prior to the game, specifically to be used in the game - questions, backstory, event knowledge, whatever.

Click to expand...

His PC died and he brought in a new PC last session. I could probably do something like this pretty easily. It would maybe get him more involved in the backstories also if he has information that the other players don't have. So maybe that would also get the other players more involved in backstories if they are trying to figure out what his PC knows.

Thornir Alekeg said:

Does the one player interested in the plot ask questions? Does he get shut down by the others? That could be a real problem, if they aren't even willing to let someone else do what they enjoy.

Click to expand...

That's what's weird. He doesn't really seem to socialize with NPC's very strongly so I was surprised to hear that he wanted more from the game. The time I had a major NPC meet his PC and threaten him into doing a job for him; the player's roleplaying went sort of like, "Uh, ok, whatever you say, I'll do it" and then out of character he would make fun of the NPC because of the NPCs race (Gehreleth). The NPC wasn't bland, and he was evil. So I thought the player would be interested in this situation for his rogue PC to be involved in. It was supposed to be very personal, but it ended up being pretty mundane. He just wanted to kickstart the next adventure.

Another player does ask NPC's a ton of questions, but it'll be the most random NPC. She likes to interact with NPCs that she's curious about, but it'll have nothing to do with the story. I might make a passing comment about a teenage peddler outside the tavern they are going in and she'll be curious about why he's a peddler. So she'll start asking questions about his parents, what he does for fun, & how much money he earns a day". Then when she realizes other players look bored, as a last resort she might say, "Do you know anything about Pit Fiends raising a Red Wyrmling on the first layer of Baator?" If I can get away with it, I might take that opportunity to pass along info the party could use. But usually the NPC she talks to would only know what's going on in the tavern next door and nothing about something on another plane

Also, you know as a DM it's hard to tell what the players are getting from your game. They actually do quite well with investigating scenarios. They do ask a lot of questions for that type of adventure. It's just the adventures where they get pulled into a situation where NPC's are reacting around them that the players seem to not figure it out. They'll go to new locations and be "randomly" attacked by multiple types of people, then they realize bad guys are doing something strange but they don't necessarily know what's going on. Then they kill some people they think are BBEGs, and that's it. Then they loot and leave and then wonder WTF that was all about