I'm bored with it all.

[On Puget Sound]

Games like Ars Magica or the World of Darkness series, where the rule set strongly rewards background and storytelling, might be more up your alley. Ars Magica in particular encourages the playing group to share the DMing, which can be fun.

Remaining within D&D, one option might be to create a group with a shared background so that they are a team with a common goal from the beginning. "You are all dwarves from the citadel of Rusthome, a once-great city that has fallen on hard times." This lets you at least steer the slayage along a story that all the characters will have some motivation to care about.

 

[timbannock]

Yeah, I recently ran a story where I created the basic character concept and history for 5 or 6 differente characters, intertwined them, and then had the players choose which one they wanted to play. They got to add in name, gender, looks and personality.

Anyway, it was meant to be a short-term story arc (with future possibilities), and it was refreshing for me to already know the gist of the characters, but still give the players the customization aspect. It's been fun so far (it'd be moreso if our sessions weren't limited to 2-3 hours, which sucks).

 

[Pbartender]

Here's the thing...

You need to provide situations where combat is not the best option. You need to make it painfully obvious to the players that combat is not the best option (give clues to whichever character has enough of the most pertinent skill). And you need to include reasonable consequences for resorting to violence in these situations. Provide rewards for using alternate methods of solution.

Now, you'll have ideas about what the best alternate method is... diplomacy, retreat, avoidance, etc... but be receptive to whatever plans your players are making. If they're coming up with intenvtive and imaginative ideas, humor them and adjust your plans accordingly. If they are having trouble, give them mild hints to lead them into useful plans of action (again, use whichever character has a pertinent skill as an excuse).

If they pass an encounter using non-combative methods, be sure to award them experience as if they had defeated their opponents in combat.

 

[Kid Charlemagne]

I've had success with putting the PC's in a situation where fighting is a really bad idea, and where talking might get them some useful info on their enemy so that later on they can beat them up. The most recent that comes to mind was a dinner invite where someone the PC's knew was up to no good tried to recruit them to her cause - and invited another enemy of the PC's to dinner for the same purpose. Lots of back and forth role-playing, and finally a nice cathartic fight when she finally decided that the PC's were a lost cause.

 

[Aramax]

Call of Cthulu all the way would cure your ills!

 

[Jack7]

When a particular method of approach becomes boring either to me or my players, then I simply find out what they like in real life (assuming I don't already know), what interests them in real life, and then write that into gaming scenarios.

Yes, role playing is very important, but so is storyline. As a matter of fact the best character role-play most usually occurs during the best plotted adventures.

And if the subject matter of the storyline construction is designed around already intrinsic personal interest(s) then the response to a plot, and the response to combat revolving around such a plot is very much more interesting and very much more intense than simply, "go here, fight orcs, get treasure."

Yes, another type of game may help but if that game also does not generate storylines and plots of interest to both the players and yourself then that will not really be an improvement, it will just be a different version of the same thing.

You'll find what really interests your players in what most interests them about real life.

Then write scenarios and adventures to reflect those interests.
Maybe during a break from running the game, you practice plotting and designing based on player and personal interests.

Good luck.

 

[roguerouge]

Let me recommend two adventures, if you do retrain these players of yours. First, take a look at my backstage murder mystery in the 3E Adventures section of the Wiki for this site. If you're looking for something that will electroshock players out of hack and slash, I recommend the Paizo adventure best described as survival horror meets murder mystery: Hangman's Noose (paizo.com - GameMastery Module U2: Hangman's Noose (OGL)).

Good luck...

 

[Leif]

I'm bored with it all.
Go here. Fetch this thing. Kill this guy. It's all the same thing over and over.
Whenever I watch a film or read a book it's always a lot more interesting. There are characters with personalities and character flaws. There is intrigue and betrayal. There is evolution and dynamic. Not in terms of leveling up. I'm talking about characters that evolve and change and learn life lessons.
I almost never get that out of a game I'm running. I try to entice the players with political intrigue and they just charge in swords and spells swinging. I try to play horror-suspense and they respond with assault rifles.
I've grown complacent, so I just give them what they want. Stuff to pwn and phats to loot.
But I'm getting tired of it. I want to run a game just once where the players aren't thinking about their attack bonuses. Where the idea of stepping into combat is a dangerous and foolhardy endeavor. Where they are willing to stop for a moment and think, "What is my character's motivation?"
Maybe it's me. I think a lot of the time that I'm not clever or original enough to motivate the players with things other than carnage and gold. Maybe I'm being unrealistic and there really isn't anything besides these things.
What do you think?

Far be it from me to even hint about contradicting kinem (he is one of my dms, after all), but here's another suggestion: If you can stand the slowness/delays of play-by-post, then start a game like you want here at ENWorld. In your recruiting thread, specify that you want role-play-intensive play and little emphasis on combat. Here, I find, you get pretty much exactly what you ask for. Once you gain a little experience with a game like this, you'll probably be better able to pull it off in your face-to-face game. Good luck.

 

[TheNovaLord]

try something with pirates

POTSM or something

pirates loves to kill things and take their stuff
their are dead easy to get into character for
they are dead easy to fill in back stories for and give lots motivation
you can sneak in political intrique and romance without the party knowing!!
eventually someone will have a bigger boat than them and will teach them the error of their ways....

 

[Sanzuo]

Thought I'd post an update here.

Well I started feeling a little bit better about about my 4ed d&d game. (Might be the prozac.) I started making my own npcs using a slightly modified version of the "Monster Generation" rules in the back of the DMG and it's led to some interesting ideas, though it still seems like a grindy game system to me.

We played a game of Warhammer Fantasy Roleplay the other night. I really enjoyed it. I like how bad desicions on the players' part can lead to character death pretty quickly. I'm still in a bit of a rut as far as epic campaign ideas go. Though I'm pretty inspired for some Dark Heresy. For the Emperor!