RPG Evolution: What if I just kill him?

Image courtesy of Pixabay.​

We've heard the term before: "murderhobo," player characters that lead a nomadic existence defined by indiscriminate violence and a lack of social ties. These PCs are not merely a choice but a symptom of a deeper cognitive disconnect: the assumption that an NPC's authority is derived exclusively from their hit point total or combat statistics.

Where do murderhobos come from? In my weekly Dungeons & Dragons library game that's open to the public, I've discovered they're out there, and I have a better of idea why.

The Digital Legacy​

My encounters with murderhobos usually happen after the second game, when a player has gotten comfortable enough to ask. In-game, an authority figure tells them what to do (usually a sheriff or judge), and the player asks a simple question: "What if I just kill him?"

The murderhobo does not emerge in a vacuum. Though it's existed before video games were common, it surely nowadays comes from the digital sandbox. In most computer role-playing games (CRPGs), players are conditioned to interact with the world through a binary interface. An NPC can be classified as a Static Quest Giver, often rendered unkillable by the game’s code—the aforementioned plot armor—or an Enemy, whose sole purpose is to be reduced to zero hit points for experience and loot. This binary creates an interesting dynamic where players only respect what the software forces them to respect.

When these players move to the tabletop, they often test the limits of the Dungeon Master’s world by attempting to kill low-level authority figures, such as town guards or local magistrates. If the DM has not established the institutional weight of these characters, players assume that a weak stat block implies a lack of importance.

The Hit Point Hallucination​

A core tenet of the murderhobo's logic is the Hit Point Hallucination: the belief that the capacity to take damage is the ultimate measure of an NPC’s worth. Historically, hit points have always been a nebulous abstraction. Since the original rules, they have represented a combination of physical durability, luck, and the will to survive. As the rules have evolved, particularly in the 2024 revision, this abstraction has been clarified to include "stamina, resilience, and endurance".

When a player looks at a king with 10 hit points and a dragon with 500, they often conclude that the dragon is important and the king is not. This ignores the reality that hit points do not determine effectiveness in battle until they reach zero. A king with 1 HP can still command an army to fire a thousand arrows. The fallacy lies in treating hit points as meat points rather than a narrative resource.

The core of the murderhobo problem is the belief that the player is the only "real" person in the world. In a collaborative narrative, the NPC's reality is maintained by the DM and the shared imagination of the group. If the party kills a beloved NPC, they are not just "clearing a mob"; they are destroying a piece of the shared world that everyone has invested in.

But to be clear, there has to be a world in the first place. A player can't be blamed for threatening every guard when they've been eyeballs deep in dungeon monsters for weeks. Conversely, if the game is hack-and-slash only, this may well be acceptable (there's a visceral thrill in playing a chaotic, violent campaign, though it probably doesn't last long) and as long as that's the goal of the campaign and everyone agrees, being openly violent can be fun.

Most times though, it's one player who is new to the game or gets bored with it, reacting to the lack of stimulus or the frustration that their character can cast miracles, but they have to listen to this (surely low level) NPC. Depending on how resilient the DM's campaign world is, they might not be wrong to think they can get away with it too. When players know that the world reacts logically to their actions—that killing a shopkeeper leads to the closure of the shop, the loss of a supply line, and a permanent Hostile attitude from the merchant's guild—they begin to see the world as a persistent entity rather than a disposable playground.

The Authority of the Shared Dream​

The murderhobo mindset can be a mismatch of expectations for those who have not yet learned to trust the DM or the world. Authority in a TTRPG is not a number; it is a story. It is the collective agreement that the king’s decree matters, that the merchant’s life has value, and that the party’s actions have weight. Conversely, not killing everything should matter; this means rewarding non-combat solutions, making NPCs feel like living people with goals and fears, and using the 2024 Influence rules to show that Charisma is just as powerful as a +1 longsword.

"Can't I just kill him?"

Sure, I respond with a smile. "But then you have to deal with the consequences." And that's usually enough to make the player change their mind.

Your Turn: How do you deal with murderhobos?

 

[MGibster]

With respect, no. It comes from the basic power fantasy that a person with power can impose their will upon others. Our real world rather sets us up to recognize that threat of force is the basic instrument of imposing compliance with the rules of society.

This I believe is the most salient answer. D&D is essentially a male adolescent power fantasy. Not that killing random NPCs is a requirement for power fantasy fulfillment.

 

[Scott Christian]

I am currently running a game where the players are all 30-40 millenial guys, all cousins, who wanted to try D&D. The player that brought it all together is my personal trainer, FWIW.

Last night in our 3rd session of Storm Kings Thunder -- their collective very first D&D campaign outside of BG3 co-op -- they went full murderhobo. They had found some guards from Nightstone and taken them along, and things were going great. But due to circumstances, those guards witnessed the party being exceptionally brutal to some goblins and the guards decided to thanks them for their help and make an exit. The party wasn't having it and they went "medieval" on the guard NPCs.

I am not terribly worried about it. It is their first D&D game, coming off a notoriously murderhobo friendly CRPG (not that that is the only way to play BG3, but it is viable) AND they are a bunch of young dudes. I am sure at some point they will perform some actions that suggest some serious consequences. But I am not interested in wagging fingers. One of the best parts abut D&D is being able to do what you want and see what happens in response.

I will step aside the landmine that says they are just "young," and therefore, can't understand that it is a group game. Of course by what you said, they all were in cahoots. Ok. If that is the case, how does that work with an adventure path? (To be fair, this is about the best adventure path there is to be a murder hobo.) I am curious where you see it going?

 

[Reynard]

I will step aside the landmine that says they are just "young," and therefore, can't understand that it is a group game. Of course by what you said, they all were in cahoots. Ok. If that is the case, how does that work with an adventure path? (To be fair, this is about the best adventure path there is to be a murder hobo.) I am curious where you see it going?

My goal here is to let them get their legs and then one of them GMs and I ride off into the sunset. So I don't see it as a long term problem. IF the game lasts long enough for it to matter, I will bring the in-world consequence hammer down as appropriate to the choices they make.

 

[Maxperson]

Maybe.

If the system or setting is designed such that there's very few levelled or mechanically-powerful entities other than the PCs (and the players know this) then once the PCs get a few levels under their belt, if they decide to go rogue there's really nothing that can stop 'em.

And if the DM then has to invent a bunch of high-level types, which otherwise don't make sense in the system/setting as presented, to act as a guardrail on the PCs and impose those logical consequences, that's DM fiat all day long.

What games are like that? I've never played in one or run one.

 

[Maxperson]

Yes system design can very much limit the GM's options for consequences and will very much do that when that system's edition shift removes the PC's need to get and maintain things like regular gear updates or even a structure to rest up in.

Once the players know that their PCs don't need anything from the NPCs in the world where they face those purely hypothetical and entirely undefined "consequences" that you keep calling on others to create for your point to work it leaves the gm with a scenario where the world and those in it have very little room to push back with your hypothetical consequences without the gm invoking execution or imprisonment->make a new PC by fiat other than simply refusing to provide any adventure content even when those players decide to murder and loot the town or something on the grounds that said town is hostile and unwilling to speak with them.

So make your case instead of expecting others to invent the hypothetical consequences you think check the box you are claiming is available. Once you do that it becomes possible to explain why it isn't as great as you are painting it to be

That's NOT fiat. That's narrating the results of the PCs actions.

Players: "We rob a bank."
DM: "The guards are now hunting you to get the gold back and take you in for murdering everyone in the bank."

That's not fiat.

Fiat is Matt Mercer saying that the PC that isn't with the party has the item they need when the players can't remember if he has it or one of the group that is present has it, just because it will be more fun that way.

Logical consequences =/= Fiat.

And note, I never said that the DM would just announce the imprisonment and death of the PC with no rolls or anything. If that's what you are assuming, you're way off base.

 

[Maxperson]

I'm sure a legal concept like mens rea or guilt in absentia would emerge in a fantasy legal system to take refusing to be resurrected into consideration.

I very much doubt it. The murderer wouldn't get off just because the dead doesn't want to come back. Murder and the punishments for it are more for the living people deprived of the dead loved one than the dead person. Not to mention that dead people don't pay taxes or produce goods, so society as a whole suffers in multiple ways when someone is murdered and doesn't come back.

If the soul doesn't want to come back, can you even say that a wrongful execution was a miscarriage of justice? "Kill 'em all and let god sort 'em out" may be a legitimate moral argument if heaven is real and god is good.

Yes I can say it was wrongful and a miscarriage of justice. It isn't all about the afterlife. It's mostly about life. Especially since the murderer can't know if the person will really go to heaven or not. Hell is real, too.

 

[tetrasodium]

That's NOT fiat. That's narrating the results of the PCs actions.

Players: "We rob a bank."
DM: "The guards are now hunting you to get the gold back and take you in for murdering everyone in the bank."

That's not fiat.

Fiat is Matt Mercer saying that the PC that isn't with the party has the item they need when the players can't remember if he has it or one of the group that is present has it, just because it will be more fun that way.

Logical consequences =/= Fiat.

And note, I never said that the DM would just announce the imprisonment and death of the PC with no rolls or anything. If that's what you are assuming, you're way off base.

What the heck? Here I thought you would try to describe an actual consequence rather than see you describe the adventure hook kicking off OotA. "Guards are hunting you" is only a consequence once the guards finish the hunt and credibly arrive with force capable of mattering.

As to your effort to invoke Matt Mercer, don't be absurd.

Spoiler: Multiple timestamped videos why

Mercer can say "the guards are hunting you" without needing to secretly replace those guard statblocks with a squad of pit fiends backed by liches riding tarrasques or something because the threat is backed by the player's regular paycheck.

 

[Maxperson]

What the heck? Here I thought you would try to describe an actual consequence rather than see you describe the adventure hook kicking off OotA. "Guards are hunting you" is only a consequence once the guards finish the hunt and credibly arrive with force capable of mattering.

Why on earth would you think consequences would mean fiat that the group can't avoid? What you describe as an adventure hook is in fact a consequence of that action that could result in jailing and/or execution.

As to your effort to invoke Matt Mercer, don't be absurd.

Spoiler: Multiple timestamped videos why

Mercer can say "the guards are hunting you" without needing to secretly replace those guard statblocks with a squad of pit fiends backed by liches riding tarrasques or something because the threat is backed by the player's regular paycheck.

I don't know what you're talking about. I gave a very real fiat example from Mercer that I heard yesterday while listening to campaign 3. None of it involved guards hunting the group or videos on bad player habits. It was exactly as I stated it. An example of fiat.

 

[tetrasodium]

Why on earth would you think consequences would mean fiat that the group can't avoid? What you describe as an adventure hook is in fact a consequence of that action that could result in jailing and/or execution.

I don't know what you're talking about. I gave a very real fiat example from Mercer that I heard yesterday while listening to campaign 3. None of it involved guards hunting the group or videos on bad player habits. It was exactly as I stated it. An example of fiat.

You haven't described an event of consequence that carries weight with a player who doesn't care if they kick off the next adventure by killing some guards after killing this here inconvenient NPC not giving in.

Worse is the fact that you are presently yourself as some advice giving sage telling people to do better with making actions have consequences and can't even envision your hypothetical example of a consequence far enough ahead to reach the point that causes deterrence in the player even when told that you described an adventure hook. Once you can identify the difference between the two and describe a consequence there might be room for discussion about the problems with your dismissive call for actions to have "consequences"

 

[Maxperson]

You haven't described an event of consequence that carries weight with a player who doesn't care if they kick off the next adventure by killing some guards after killing this here inconvenient NPC not giving in.

Why would you assume that the guards would lose? Clearly the authorities aren't going to send weaklings. Hell, they might even be another group of adventurers there to collect the new bounty. Or an evil authority might send assassins. The PCs could win. Or they could lose.

Fiat =/= the PCs will win no matter what. Being able to lose is not fiat.

Worse is the fact that you are presently yourself as some advice giving sage telling people to do better with making actions have consequences and can't even envision your hypothetical example of a consequence far enough ahead to reach the point that causes deterrence in the player even when told that you described an adventure hook. Once you can identify the difference between the two and describe a consequence there might be room for discussion about the problems with your dismissive call for actions to have "consequences"

No. Worse is you presenting an inability to even know what consequences are. A consequence isn't something completely unavoidable, though sometimes it will be. A consequence is something that results from an action, and it doesn't always have to be bad, though it very often is.

Here's another example. A consequence of trying to climb a crumbling wall face is that you could fall. Falling could kill the character. If a fall happens, that would be a consequence, even if the PC in question has feather fall memorized and a slot available. Sometimes consequences can be mitigated. Sometimes not, and then splat.

Or maybe it's just that you don't understand what fiat is. You're definitely not understanding something with this discussion.