D&D 5E DMs: How do you handle purely combat-focused groups?

[SteveC]

This is a pretty interesting problem, and one I can sympathize with.

As others have already said, you need to start with some good conversation and being direct. I think 99% of problems that people have with gaming can be solved just by talking things out. Maybe that percentage is a little high, but it's up there.

The problem seems to be that most of your players are hyper focused on combat, and the combats aren't just that exciting for them. I can understand that problem because I don't find 5E combats to be particularly exciting in and of themselves.

You have to remember that there really is a sizable part of the D&D audience who come to the game for the combat, and that's pretty much it. If your play style isn't okay with that you have to see if you can come to a compromise or switch to a different GM or even a different game system.

I enjoy the role-playing parts of the game tremendously, but I also enjoy the tactical challenges of a good combat. My solution to that is to play different games: I play Shadows of Brimstone for the tactical challenge and the builds and leveling up mini-game, and with a traditional RPG for a story and character development.

Maybe that's the solution: play different games for different things. If you can do something like that, you might find that your group is worn out by all the combat and looking for something else. Alternatively you might find that you need another group.

No matter what, tell 'em what's going on and talk it through.

 

[CM]

As others have mentioned, create situations where the non-combat resolution might end up being more rewarding. Perhaps instead of wiping out an enemy it can be turned into an ally against an even greater foe? This came up in my game recently. A random encounter with a lone, angry stone giant ended up with the party recruiting him to aid in an attack on the barbarian raiders who killed his pet saber-tooth tiger's cubs.

Create a delicate situation which requires peaceful communication. Perhaps the party encounters a supposedly enemy faction who are in the middle of negotiating a non-aggression or even mutual defense pact with the locals. The party could find themselves in hot water from both sides and end up as fugitives.

Make sure your important NPCs are memorable. Each one should have some kind of hook that triggers a positive or negative memory in the players. My Icewind Dale campaign's party has been traveling with an old dwarf woman named Gerti who is a retired guard captain. She's a smartass who holds her own in battle and carries herself with a swagger that's memorable to the combat-focused players in that group.

Be sure to take baby steps. Most of the players I know are about 2/3 combat-oriented and 1/3 story/RP/exploration-oriented (myself included). That said we do have sessions with little to no combat from time to time where we still accomplish a great deal, usually investigation or exploration. The recent Murder in Baldur's Gate and Legacy of the Crystal Shard adventures this group played through both primarily featured antagonists who are human and where unprovoked violence (especially MiBG) would make for a bad choice. The party frequently had to achieve their goals through negotiation and investigation. Despite (or perhaps due to) the sometimes limited opportunity for combat, I think these are some of the best adventures I've run in years.

<ramble off>

 

[Herobizkit]

In the OP's situation, I feel the character who ragequit is the same character who equates 'game' with 'winning'. You see these kinds of players all the time in WoW during group dungeons/raids, especially now that groups can be randomly formed on the fly; the group gets into the dungeon, party wipes for whatever reason, and the offended player leaves the group in disgust because he didn't 'win' on his first go.

Difference in WoW and Tabletop, of course, is that the offended player can pop into a new group, and a new player with the same 'role' (Tank/Heal/DPS) will pop into his place as soon as one is available to do so.

In 5e, wanting to be superheroes out of the gate is hard because as others have said, for the first 3-4 levels, characters are basically bums in the campaign world. I would expect that RPG players in this day and age expect their in-game counterparts to be able to take more than 1-2 hits before collapsing and not whiff on 50% of their attacks.

Good news is, now that the guy who seems to have caused the most trouble is gone, you can nurture the hangers-on and teach them good RP habits.

 

[Celtavian]

I can't imagine constant combat with no role-playing or other elements. Wouldn't even feel like an RPG at that point. The verisimilitude would be absent. Might as well play a video game for repetitious combat. Hope you can find a better group or help the group your with learn to enjoy role-playing.

Sometimes I have to force a few of my players to role-play. I literally force the issue by talking to them with an NPC. I make it natural like they have met someone in real life they must talk to. I make them talk and make the NPC react to their replies. Once you get them engaged in conversation, they usually loosen up, especially if the conversation is entertaining. I love forcing conversation around the table. Sometimes the PCs get aggressive. If that happens, I literally have the NPC ask if they intend to murder him or her. If so, his relatives or associations will most assuredly take the matter up with the authorities.

If your players aren't role-playing, give them no choice. Don't do so by telling them. Just make an NPC talk with them, so that they have to reply to progress. I do that all time.

If someone is hiring them, then have the hiring NPC interview them. Get an idea of his personality and have him ask shrewd or antagonistic questions such as "Are you an honorable man?" If the PC answers "Yes," then have him ask "What makes you so honorable? What quests you have you undertaken and who might I inquire with concerning your honor? If I'm going to a pay a man well, I want to know he's worth the coin." If they try to pull the typical "I don't need you. Find someone else." Have the NPC say "Sure enough I will. I'm paying quality coin. If you feel you can find better, then be about it. Good day." Just like a real interview. If they choose to end in combat, I guess you'll have your next adventure: your PCs on the run from the law or vengeful relatives.

 

[pming]

Hiya.

Hmmm...."How to train new players in 6 easy steps!" ...

Step 1: "Let the chips fall where they may" (re: start rolling ALL dice rolls in front of them and resist the urge to try and 'modify' the encounter to be balanced). If you get 4 natural 20's during a combat and it kills one PC and gets two of the others into single digits...tough noogies.

Step 2: Explain to them that simply "finding a cleric to raise their BFF's" isn't a matter of "We go to town, spend 1,000gp, and get Bill raised". If they want someone raised, they have to do it themselves, or earn it from an NPC.

Step 3: Get them to invest in their characters. Mentally and emotionally. (see Step 5, below) Get them to the point where they really, truly do not want their PC to die. If death is an easy fix (see #2), they don't need to worry about it.

Step 4: MAKE NEW PC's START AT LEVEL 1 REGARDLESS OF EVERYONE ELSE! (or, at the very least, not higher than level 3...imho).

Step 5: Try and find attributes that the players value (re: loyalty, bravery, bloodlust, vengence, etc), and start introducing NPC's that embody that. For example, my group tends to value bravery (but not plain-ol'-stupidity; innocent stupidity...yes...but regular day-in day-out stupidity...no way). In the Starter Set, in Phandalin, there is a halfling woman who has a son named "Carp". I made Carp young and brave...but almost totally oblivious to the actual danger of "adventuring". I played him as very gung-ho for "heroic adventuring"...I also had him follow the PC's into the "hideout of the bad guys". The PC's found him in one of their backpacks on more than one occasion...in the middle of the dungeon while they were resting. My players (and their PC's) grew very fond of Carp to the point of being, well, parental. I have a feeling they would have probably done just about anything to keep that little guy safe...including sacrificing themselves. The only way to really get your Players to invest into NPC's like that is to play up to the PLAYER's morals and values. The odd (good!) side-effect of this step is that the player will become "attached" to his characters attachment to the NPC...thus, making the player more invested in his PC (see Step 3, above).

Step 6: Now that your players know that death is but a few natural 20's away, that getting raised isn't simply a matter of having the coin, that their "really cool character" may die and then they have to start all over again from level one, and that some NPC's really are "kinda cool" and worth saving/risking...well, uh, I guess off you go then! Problem solved.

You're welcome.

PS: Well, this is my approach whenever I get a new player that has "CRPGMMO'itis"...it's never failed me yet! (er, wait, yes it has; twice... still, twice in 34+ years of DM'ing is pretty good, no?)

^_^

Paul L. Ming

 

[DaveDash]

I've been playing D&D for years and I'm over roleplaying. I now actually find it hard work.

I run a game where roleplaying is completely abstracted. It's summarized by "The NPC says this, or asks you do to that" and the players respond not in roleplaying, but as players. They're also allowed to metagame.

We play D&D for the sandbox game, not the roleplaying aspect.

I've seen this kind of thing summarised as challenge based vs story based play in other threads here. I enjoy the challenge based side of things, which is predominately tactical combat, but problem solving and exploring also come into it. Trying to 'encourage' me to play in any other way, such as the advise from many in this thread, just simply isn't going to change that.

You need to have an open discussion and do not try and manipulate them in game. Ultimately if you cannot have fun playing the game the way your players enjoy, and they potentially cannot have fun the way you enjoy, then there isn't really an easy solution except to find a new group.

I can't imagine constant combat with no role-playing or other elements. Wouldn't even feel like an RPG at that point. The verisimilitude would be absent. Might as well play a video game for repetitious combat. Hope you can find a better group or help the group your with learn to enjoy role-playing.

To the contrary there are video games out there that weave an amazing tale much better than 99% of any DM I have known, seen, or heard of. I find it much easier to get fully immersed in a video game than sitting around a table, or at my computer, talking to Dan and Fred.

The reason D&D can be appealing over video games is not strictly for roleplay, but for a true sandbox experience that you cannot experience in any video game.

 

[Celtavian]

I've been playing D&D for years and I'm over roleplaying. I now actually find it hard work.

I run a game where roleplaying is completely abstracted. It's summarized by "The NPC says this, or asks you do to that" and the players respond not in roleplaying, but as players. They're also allowed to metagame.

We play D&D for the sandbox game, not the roleplaying aspect.

I've seen this kind of thing summarised as challenge based vs story based play in other threads here. I enjoy the challenge based side of things, which is predominately tactical combat, but problem solving and exploring also come into it. Trying to 'encourage' me to play in any other way, such as the advise from many in this thread, just simply isn't going to change that.

You need to have an open discussion and do not try and manipulate them in game. Ultimately if you cannot have fun playing the game the way your players enjoy, and they potentially cannot have fun the way you enjoy, then there isn't really an easy solution except to find a new group.



To the contrary there are video games out there that weave an amazing tale much better than 99% of any DM I have known, seen, or heard of. I find it much easier to get fully immersed in a video game than sitting around a table, or at my computer, talking to Dan and Fred.

The reason D&D can be appealing over video games is not strictly for roleplay, but for a true sandbox experience that you cannot experience in any video game.

What do you even mean by a sandbox experience? Constant tactical combat is not a sandbox experience. Absent role-playing, you're not doing much but shifting numbers. Plenty of video games accomplish that aspect of the game fine.

I weave a tale better than any video game I've yet played. My players tend to agree. I've made players fight at the table over imaginary women. I've made a player a nearly leap across the table and physically attack me in anger while playing character. I've made players love their characters. It is not at all because of tactical combat, but because I made them feel like heroes in an epic tale with all the tools available in D&D, role-playing was a major aspect.

How you could have fun playing a king or a knight without the story elements that make those titles mean something is beyond me. I don't see the fun in it.

To each his own. I would grow weary of "sandbox" combat. I must have role-playing elements to feel like I'm playing a real character rather than a set of numbers. Do you even bother naming your character? Or do you choose names like video game players choose since it doesn't matter? Your character says "DaveDash17" or "Screwthemallhard4" like I see in many fantasy video games. I'm assuming you don't even bother with a background of any kind? If your group is happy doing that, I guess who can complain. Sounds boring as all hell though. I can't even imagine what your gaming stories are like. Must be all about lucky dice rolls. Most of ours are amusing role-playing anecdotes.

 

[aramis erak]

What do you even mean by a sandbox experience? Constant tactical combat is not a sandbox experience. Absent role-playing, you're not doing much but shifting numbers. Plenty of video games accomplish that aspect of the game fine.

I weave a tale better than any video game I've yet played. My players tend to agree. I've made players fight at the table over imaginary women. I've made a player a nearly leap across the table and physically attack me in anger while playing character. I've made players love their characters. It is not at all because of tactical combat, but because I made them feel like heroes in an epic tale with all the tools available in D&D, role-playing was a major aspect.

How you could have fun playing a king or a knight without the story elements that make those titles mean something is beyond me. I don't see the fun in it.

To each his own. I would grow weary of "sandbox" combat. I must have role-playing elements to feel like I'm playing a real character rather than a set of numbers. Do you even bother naming your character? Or do you choose names like video game players choose since it doesn't matter? Your character says "DaveDash17" or "Screwthemallhard4" like I see in many fantasy video games. I'm assuming you don't even bother with a background of any kind? If your group is happy doing that, I guess who can complain. Sounds boring as all hell though. I can't even imagine what your gaming stories are like. Must be all about lucky dice rolls. Most of ours are amusing role-playing anecdotes.

One can play D&D entirely by the rules and never ever get into character, and yet still have a compelling narrative of the events afterwards. The same, however, is true of most wargames and all highly tactical RPG's.

Note also: the roleplaying aspects of OE are entirely outside the actual rules; if you didn't learn by apprenticeship from one of the more narrative groups, one could easily be running it as a complex character scale wargame rather than a narrative-focused game with wargame combat. In fact, in my youth, that's how it looked when I read Dr. Holmes' Basic D&D. (I was already a wargamer by grade 6; it was the lens through which I came to D&D.) I didn't play it until a year later, when John and Brian grabbed me and took me to Andrew's game... and it became a radioplay with mechanics.

 

[GSHamster]

What do you even mean by a sandbox experience? Constant tactical combat is not a sandbox experience. Absent role-playing, you're not doing much but shifting numbers. Plenty of video games accomplish that aspect of the game fine.

"Sandbox" does not refer to combat. It's a reference to your actions changing the world. I.e. most videogames have limited support for your choices changing the world, because all possible outcomes needs to accounted for by the designers ahead of time. D&D, on the other hand, is very good at this because the human DM can react to the player's actions and change the outcome on the fly.

 

[Rhenny]

Sometimes I have to force a few of my players to role-play. I literally force the issue by talking to them with an NPC. I make it natural like they have met someone in real life they must talk to. I make them talk and make the NPC react to their replies. Once you get them engaged in conversation, they usually loosen up, especially if the conversation is entertaining. I love forcing conversation around the table. Sometimes the PCs get aggressive. If that happens, I literally have the NPC ask if they intend to murder him or her. If so, his relatives or associations will most assuredly take the matter up with the authorities.

If your players aren't role-playing, give them no choice. Don't do so by telling them. Just make an NPC talk with them, so that they have to reply to progress. I do that all time.

If someone is hiring them, then have the hiring NPC interview them. Get an idea of his personality and have him ask shrewd or antagonistic questions such as "Are you an honorable man?" If the PC answers "Yes," then have him ask "What makes you so honorable? What quests you have you undertaken and who might I inquire with concerning your honor? If I'm going to a pay a man well, I want to know he's worth the coin." If they try to pull the typical "I don't need you. Find someone else." Have the NPC say "Sure enough I will. I'm paying quality coin. If you feel you can find better, then be about it. Good day." Just like a real interview. If they choose to end in combat, I guess you'll have your next adventure: your PCs on the run from the law or vengeful relatives.

I agree totally with this. Roleplaying needs to be learned and fostered especially for new players who are not used to taking on another persona. Exercise the roleplaying muscles and players become better at it.

I'd also suggest that they watch a video of a game that has roleplaying in it. Check out some on youtube and find one, or a part that has what you think they would benefit from.

Use inspiration to also reward people who do play to their character outside of combat.