My Players wont Roleplay

[TheFlameofCorellia]

Hey all, im a DM at D&D for about 6 months now. Weve been running a campaign in a custom created world, and its been working pretty well, except for one thing. While they have expert tactics(they use flanking, formations, support etc.) and good charecters, I cant get them to roleplay. They solve situations like they are in the real world. For example, we get to a hallway, and at the end in a 6x5 wooden door, with a doorknob. Then a player says, "We open it". Then they walk in, and are approached by a small group of goblins, with bloodlust in their eyes as they slowly approach the heroes and he says, "I attack one". Any help is appreciated.

Adam

 

[adriayna]

How are you doing experience? I've found that in groups that don't role-play, take away most, if not all, of the experience they normally get for killing monsters. Hand out RP experiece based individually.

Some DMs do this in the form of poker chips. There are several variants on this, but the easiest one is for you as a DM to have a stack of poker chips handy at the table. When one character does something RP wise you deem worthy of experience--you throw the character a chip. This will be an instant reward for those players who are making attempts and sets the stage for others to RP better to gain exp chips.

Another variant that I've used in the past (but may not work in your case) is to give the players chips themselves to give out, or to let the players vote collectively on the "best role-player" of the night.

Finally, just put the players in situations where there is literally no way to get around the situation without RP. If you give some of the details of your campaign, I'm sure people here could help you come up with some ideas.

 

[francisca]

First of all, welcome to the boards!

On the topic at hand:

1) Offer XP awards for good roleplay.
2) Ask each player to describe his/her character's life before becoming an adventurer. Where did they grow up, do they have family, etc.. Then reward them by using that information to help them out in some way. Also make sure you use that info to build tension by using their background as plot points. (Sister is kidnapped, hometown razed by goblins, etc..)
3) Get them out of the dungeon once in a while. In my experience, roleplay suffers a bit during dungeon crawls because the problems at hand require more of a tactical, calculated approach, rather than a thoughtful, interactive "warm and fuzzy" method.

Good Luck!

 

[Laurel]

Hey all, im a DM at D&D for about 6 months now. Weve been running a campaign in a custom created world, and its been working pretty well, except for one thing. While they have expert tactics(they use flanking, formations, support etc.) and good charecters, I cant get them to roleplay. They solve situations like they are in the real world. For example, we get to a hallway, and at the end in a 6x5 wooden door, with a doorknob. Then a player says, "We open it". Then they walk in, and are approached by a small group of goblins, with bloodlust in their eyes as they slowly approach the heroes and he says, "I attack one". Any help is appreciated.

Adam

Unfortunately there are cases of people who do not like nor want to role play. They will if forced, but that is not what makes the game fun for them. I only caution, so that you don't end up forcing something on your players....
Moving on to a possible solution: Putting them in situations where they have to talk with NPCs instead of just killing/attacking them may help. My current DM works off the extra XP as a reward for good role playing, and this seems to be working for us.

 

[Wulf Ratbane]

How are you doing experience? I've found that in groups that don't role-play, take away most, if not all, of the experience they normally get for killing monsters. Hand out RP experiece based individually.

Some DMs do this in the form of poker chips. There are several variants on this, but the easiest one is for you as a DM to have a stack of poker chips handy at the table. When one character does something RP wise you deem worthy of experience--you throw the character a chip. This will be an instant reward for those players who are making attempts and sets the stage for others to RP better to gain exp chips.

Another variant that I've used in the past (but may not work in your case) is to give the players chips themselves to give out, or to let the players vote collectively on the "best role-player" of the night.

Finally, just put the players in situations where there is literally no way to get around the situation without RP. If you give some of the details of your campaign, I'm sure people here could help you come up with some ideas.

Been at it six months? Good start!


Now... If you want to kill your game, follow the above advice.

More practical advice is to either run the kind of game your players WANT to play (and judging from your description it sounds like they just want to kick down doors and kill bad guys), or find new players who want to play the kind of game you want to run.

I'm not saying that it can't be done (convincing non-RPers to RP) but experience has taught me that you're most likely just going to create a game that's a drag for everybody involved... you and your players.

Remember that the point of all of this is to have fun. Don't waste time and frustration trying to put square pegs into round holes. Let your players have fun. If you absolutely positively won't enjoy yourself unless your players are roleplayers, you need to find new players. You can do it now, or you can do it later when your current players drift away from your game because you aren't giving them the gaming experience they are showing up for.

Wulf

 

[ThoughtBubble]

I would definately say try talking to them. Perhaps you can even try an investigative/social adventure (one evening, with a climactic fight or two) to see how it goes. Just be sure to forewarn your players that that is what you're trying first.

An alternate route is to slip it in during combat. My current arch-nemisis is a body hopping undead who particularly dislikes one party member. She took his eye the first time they fought. He promised to take one of hers in response. He's come back twice, each time they say something like:

"I'm here for that eye."
"You havn't gotten it yet! Come and get it!"
"Heh. Very well. Left or right?"

The final thing that helped at the table with a previous group is that I just started running with things the players said ooc when appropriate. This wasn't picking out the insulting things they said, but rather jumping on the appropriate intra-party monologues as said speech. They were annoyed at me, but it worked.

 

[DM_Jeff]

Poker and Ham

First, the idea of using poker chips is a good one. Borrowed that from a DM friend of mine and it works like a charm...but since my PCs do good roleplaying anyway, I allow them to be handed out for good in-character jokes, good strategies or ideas, or excellent combat maneuvers.

On to roleplaying, over the years I have had a few who were either intimidated or not interested. The two best ways I combat this:

1) Roleplay my heart out as DM. Ham up the monsters, describing their maneuvers and shouting insults or challenges at the characters in the heat of battle.

2) Really ham up the NPCs, one of which will always seem to target the un-roleplaying PC with a bunch of personal questions I ask in-character.

The result is this sets the 'theme' of the table, and everyoine slowly starts getting into it. Lead, they'll follow.

-DM Jeff

 

[adriayna]

The ideas I posted worked well for me in the past with a group of mostly new-to-RPGs players. I've used the same method with groups of experienced players who have some RP problems (i.e powergaming, players who play "themselves" or the same character over and over again), and again found it to be pretty successful. But it really does depend on your group.

 

[DaveMage]

Some people really love the tactical nature of the game and really do not enjoy the role-playing aspect. For others, it's reversed, and some like a balance.

If you like the people in your current group (personally) and use D&D as a fun time to spend together, then fit your style to theirs. If you are very serious about your game and playing it in a different way than your players like, then find new players.

I suggest you have one session that involves no combat at all and see what happens. One of my favorite things to do is bring the party (usually 5th level or greater) to an ancient oracle or shrine and give each of them 1 wish (within the parameters of the wish spell). It's amazing how long it can take people to decide how to word something as "simple" as a wish.

Alternatively, put them in a position where the monster(s) they face is (are) too powerful for them to overtake by combat, and let them try to cut a deal with their opponent(s). Their opponent can begin the encounter by saying something like "Give me one reason why I shouldn't kill you?"

 

[Lamoni]

For example, we get to a hallway, and at the end in a 6x5 wooden door, with a doorknob. Then a player says, "We open it". Then they walk in, and are approached by a small group of goblins, with bloodlust in their eyes as they slowly approach the heroes and he says, "I attack one". Any help is appreciated.

Adam

It could very well be that they haven't had any experience with role playing in those situations. I mean, if you know you are going to end up attacking and killing the goblins, why bother talking to them? Why discuss how you open a door? If they played alongside someone who did know how to roleplay these situations, the players could catch on, but a better idea is to just have more situations where roleplaying is the only option. Have a PC arrested for a crime they didn't commit. They'll have to roleplay to get them free... unless they want to just break him/her out of jail and flee the town. If they do the latter, you will be able to judge more accurately if the players really are avoiding role-playing or if they are doing so out of lack of good role-playing situations.