Sociology of the murderhobo

[Max_Killjoy]

I suggest you either drop the pretentious intellectualism, and focus on what can be of practical use to a game or else you get a lot more footnotes and more rigorous citations. Right now the essay is in an unhappy place between blogging and a term paper, where it doesn't work well as either.

You also should go back through the essay and strike out any words that don't add meaning. There seems to be a brain of some worth behind this essay, but its muddled behind walls of excessively ornate verbiage.

And I say that as a writer that is infamously verbose and bombastic.

For example, pare down:

"To a known extent, the imperative to keep the focus squarely on the PCs, and, on the other hand, the need to embed them within a larger social environment which is replete with particular institutions, hierarchical orders, histories, and symbolic systems point in contradictory directions."

To something more like:

"The imperative to keep the focus on the PC's, and on the other hand the need to embed them in a larger environment replete with social institutions, histories, and legends point in contradictory directions."

And this:

"Allowing for a little oversimplification, we might say that each approach is informed by a distinct fantasy aesthetic (both of which influenced fantasy gaming in important ways)."

To this:

"Each approach is informed by a distinct fantasy aesthetic that greatly influenced fantasy gaming."

We live in the era of postmodernist word-salad.

See also, the Sokal Affair... or perhaps "Pomobabble: Postmodern Newspeak and Constitutional "Meaning" for the Uninitiated" as published in the Michigan Law Review...

 

[empireofchaos]

This seems to miss touching on the nature of the relationship between players and GM, which I think plays a rather important role spurring on murderhobo-ism. A few folks have touched on the "NPC Betrayal" as a cause to view all NPC's with mistrust, but I think it runs deeper than that. It's not a mistrust of any particular NPC or even all NPCs; it's a mistrust of the GM. This is most often caused by one too many NPC betrayals, but can spring from any preponderance of evidence (real or imagined) that the GM is out to get them. When the GM is treated as (or acts like) an adversary of the PCs (and by extension their players), then all of the GM's creations become adversaries. Note, this doesn't just mean their NPC's; it also means their setting, their world, is the adversary. And no part of it can be trusted. This, I think, is the most important cause behind murderhobo-ism.

That's true. But it means that if a DM wants to have a world that PCs can respect, they need to develop the NPCs with care, also. It also means that PC actions to finish off all enemies, or to torture captives for information, will not be forgotten.

 

[LordEntrails]

Sorry empire, tried to read but was too hard on my eyes.

 

[empireofchaos]

Sorry empire, tried to read but was too hard on my eyes.

My condolences.

 

[Iron Sky]

My thoughts on what really sets PCs apart from most NPCs in games (especially Hack-and-Slash, combat focused ones like D&D) are:

a) PCs will leap to violence as a solution at the drop of a hat with little to no thought of the outcome. Sociopathic or self-moralizing.
b) They will fight while outnumbered, injured, in a terrifying, dangerous environment with no hesitation - in fact, these things are often claimed to make the fights "more interesting". Bad-ass or crazy (or both).
c) They fear almost nothing - demons, undead, dragons, giants, abominations, gore, pestilence, sorcery... they take it all in stride with nary a flinch. Stupid, delusions of immortality, fanaticism, or a combination.
d) They will suddenly commit 100% with no hesitation to all manner of absurd, dangerous actions: leaping chasms, swinging on ropes, chases through heavy traffic on untamed beasts, starting duels, lighting things on fire, tinkering with unknown and/or unstable contraptions, wading through sewers, hunting down man-killing beasts... the list goes on and on. Adrenaline junkies.

Put it together and you have sociopathic, fearless, fanatical adrenaline junkies. And these are (usually) the good guys.

In my campaigns, the world reacts to PC because of these qualities instead of the default assumption that these are normal traits or people somehow don't notice these tendencies.

• I'll have NPCs run when injured and retreat when they see the fights going against them.
• Survivors of PCs' arbitrary violence (or their friends, kin, or organizations) return to make the PCs' lives harder in the future, while people they show mercy on or help will return to aid them.
• People are shocked, terrified, inspired, or intimidated by the PCs' willingness to kill or die trying right here, right now at the drop of a pot helm.
• Tales quickly spread of the PCs always running towards the scary, dangerous stuff that every sane person is running away from.
• They are feared (or used) by the establishment for their willingness to suffer and put themselves in harms reach for what they believe (or whatever gives them a rush).
• They attract groupies who see them as heroes, outlaws, symbols, or rebels, drawn to their lack of fear and inhibition and willingness to act boldly now rather than cautiously plan and deliberate.

I figure this behavior boils down to each player's knowledge that no matter how attached to their character, no matter what their time investment or how much they like whomever they are playing now, if that character dies they can just "roll up a new toon" that they'll probably enjoy just as much and who - in the interests of game balance - will be just as powerful or sometimes more powerful due to the ability to play builds that only become optimal at higher levels.

Witness the vast disparity in player behavior in the FPS Counter-Strike where players only get one life per minutes-long round versus most other FPS where death is a three-second wait. In CS - especially in newer players - you see cowardice, panic, hesitation, freezing, and other tactics of self-preservation that almost never arise in their consequence-less kin.

Compare that to FPS where players charge heedlessly to their deaths like war-lemmings and I think you have the kernel of where murder-hoboism originates.

 

[Celebrim]

In my experience, true 'murderhobo' behavior is fairly rare. As often as you do see it, you also see a player who is constitutionally unable to play as anything but a virtuous self-sacrificing soul, devoted to the cause of good and paying careful attention to the consequences of their action.

Both extremes are rare. But what you do see all the time, and as the majority behavior, that often ends up amounting to much the same thing in the long run, is the idea that it's never worth making any sort of sacrifice or taking any sort of risk for an NPC - except perhaps for a few loyal retainers who can be treated much like possessions (and even then, only in the same way that they'd take a risk for treasure and possessions). These players play their PC's in a heroic stance, but they will only do "good" if it doesn't cost them much. As long as good is profitable, rewarding, and gets them what they want, they are willing and even eager to play the hero.

But the moment it begins to cost them to be good, and they have to risk their own interests to advance some good cause...
The moment it becomes troublesome to be merciful....
The moment it puts them at risk of loss to be courageous on behalf of others....
The moment that they have to be patient with others mistakes....
The moment showing compassion really means a sacrifice....
The moment that forbearance might mean losing something they want...

At that moment the knives come out, and its the PC's for the PC's.

The dominate alignment I observe in PC's is Chaotic Neutral. They aren't actively bad. They'll even passively oppose evil, in that if you put evil in their way they'll prefer to fight it than good. But they are basically in it for themselves. They'll do good because doing good makes them feel good about themselves, but only if doing good doesn't cost them something more tangible. Some PC's will have more good tendencies than bad, and some the reverse but they are largely CN. Parties will tend to cluster around that alignment with a smattering of Neutral, Chaotic Good, and Chaotic Evil. Sometimes you have that one guy in the party who is an outlier - NG or LG - and if you do, he tends to be picked on as naïve, simple, and not "getting it".

More than "good" what I find players hate is "duty". Players hate having obligations.

At tables where true murderhoboes are the norm, what I tend to find is that "the GM is Satan." That is to say, in that GM's world he is effectively a malevolent force that always turns everything against the PC's. Whatever the PC's do, the circumstances always perversely turn against them. Everyone in the GM's world is inherently treacherous. A mook, if spared, will ALWAYS suicidally avenge himself on the group that had mercy on him, even if he knows he has no chance of winning, merely to be minor thorn in their side. Ever NPC always is stabbing the PC's from Hell's pit. No good deed goes unpunished in a very literal way. In these circumstances, murderhoboes become murderhoboes out of essential self-preservation.

For me, the hardest thing I can do is trying to incorporate players from tables like that, trained as they are to see me as the Adversary and the world as illogically brutal and treacherous. There own expectations become a self-fulfilling prophesy, because their own ruthless treachery becomes the lens through which everyone else in the game world sees them.

 

[Ralif Redhammer]

Yeah, the two guys in my group that tend not to go the murderhobo route tend to be the ones that are recipients of the mostly good-natured ribbing.

As for players hating obligations, I’ve definitely seen that. In the last campaign I ran that failed, I used both the cost of living rules and set the campaign within the boundaries of etiquette and societal dictates. The players hated the cost of living expenses so much. As the campaign devolved, I became increasingly frustrated and adversarial.

It was hard for me to shake that attitude and recover, but I did. That being said, the murderhoboism in the group predated the events of that campaign.

Parties will tend to cluster around that alignment with a smattering of Neutral, Chaotic Good, and Chaotic Evil. Sometimes you have that one guy in the party who is an outlier - NG or LG - and if you do, he tends to be picked on as naïve, simple, and not "getting it".

More than "good" what I find players hate is "duty". Players hate having obligations.

 

[Celebrim]

My condolences.

While I agree that Gord the Rogue and Aragorn call for very different ideas of what it means to be a fantasy protagonist, I can see a couple of huge problems with your claim that the competing forces of rugged individualism and societal structure and obligation pulling in different directs create the "sociology of the murderhobo"

First, your theory would seem to make PC behavior based on rejection of the societal strictures in favor of the rugged individualism, placing them at odds with society. But in practice we see that different players even at the same table engage in "murderhoboism" to different degrees. The theory works as a theory, but doesn't explain the situation we actually observe.

Secondly, both GRR Martin and JRR Tolkien produce a story set in a world of feudal obligations, yet the way that their protagonists navigate these obligations and try to achieve success within the world greatly differs. This suggests that merely having a deeply structured world in no way guarantees that there will be a particular moral code held up by world to stand in opposition too. We would expect players trying to emulate the deeds of the different characters in different stories to be significantly different regardless of the campaign world they played in or its strictures.

Thirdly, there are much simpler and less torturous explanations for player behavior than what you offer.

Finally, although much of your essay is good, if overly wordy, this line is complete bunk:

Tolkien presented the marriage in the Return of the King as an echo of a peaceful Nordic religion, which had become displaced by violent Viking myths in the imagination of 19th century ideologues.

Have you ever read a Viking edda? I assure you that Tolkien had.

 

[Flexor the Mighty!]

I thought murderhobos were simply PC that had no real ties to the game world outside their lust for violence and loot and walked the earth getting loot from evil races via violent persuasion? You know, the type of PC in a beer and pretzels game that is focuses on dungeon bashing instead role playing personal interactions and all that.

 

[Nagol]

I thought murderhobos were simply PC that had no real ties to the game world outside their lust for violence and loot and walked the earth getting loot from evil races via violent persuasion? You know, the type of PC in a beer and pretzels game that is focuses on dungeon bashing instead role playing personal interactions and all that.

You can drop "from evil races" from your description to get a better fit I think. PCs that had no real ties to the game world outside their lust for violence and loot and walk the earth getting loot via violent persuasion.

As I posted above, it is a symptom with multiple causes. Beer and pretzel games typically focus on the characters as pawns. Adversarial DMs force the players to keep all others at arms-length for self protection. Worlds filled with helpless and hopeless characters breeds apathy and nihilism.