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<blockquote data-quote="Celebrim" data-source="post: 7301610" data-attributes="member: 4937">I don't notice a sharp distinguishing line there.&nbsp; When I use the term 'murderhobo' I've always understood it to mean what you call 'mercenaries'.&nbsp; Perhaps that's because being a student of Medieval history, I've always associated 'mercenary' with being the lowest of the low and worst of the worst in the medieval society.&nbsp; Perhaps in my head, 'mercenary' differs from what's in your head the way the northern European 'Ritter' differs in connotation from the English word 'Knight' - knights are generally positive things that protect you from bandits, whereas 'Ritter' is a generally negative thing little better than a bandit.Suffice to say that if my PC's would &quot;kill anyone and anything for money&quot; (and XP), then I would consider them murderhobos par excellence.&nbsp; That is the defining trait in my mind of being a murderhobo.&nbsp; Everything else is just gloss.You stop having murderhobos when the players make decisions on what to kill and why with motivations beyond the acquisition of loot and XP.&nbsp; You stop having murderhobos when you run the sort of game where the PC's tell the boss, &quot;Keep your money.&nbsp; This job isn't worth it.&quot;&nbsp; because they've learned that the job is actually stealing medicine from children, or when they are hired to kill the lizard men but discover that the lizard men aren't the bad guys, or when the townsfolk hire them to wipe out the goblins and they discover its the townsfolk that have been robbing the goblins and started the whole mess and they decide not to slaughter a village that includes women and children.But if you have PCs whose sole motivation is loot and XP and nothing else matters because the players view the whole of the game as achieving a 'high score', then you have murderhobos.&nbsp;&nbsp; It doesn't matter if they are 'honorable' assassins that only kill for money, or 'honorable' mercenaries that only do the job and say things like, &quot;It's just business; nothing personal&quot;, that's still murderhobos.</blockquote>

[QUOTE="Celebrim, post: 7301610, member: 4937"] I don't notice a sharp distinguishing line there. When I use the term 'murderhobo' I've always understood it to mean what you call 'mercenaries'. Perhaps that's because being a student of Medieval history, I've always associated 'mercenary' with being the lowest of the low and worst of the worst in the medieval society. Perhaps in my head, 'mercenary' differs from what's in your head the way the northern European 'Ritter' differs in connotation from the English word 'Knight' - knights are generally positive things that protect you from bandits, whereas 'Ritter' is a generally negative thing little better than a bandit. Suffice to say that if my PC's would "kill anyone and anything for money" (and XP), then I would consider them murderhobos par excellence. That is the defining trait in my mind of being a murderhobo. Everything else is just gloss. You stop having murderhobos when the players make decisions on what to kill and why with motivations beyond the acquisition of loot and XP. You stop having murderhobos when you run the sort of game where the PC's tell the boss, "Keep your money. This job isn't worth it." because they've learned that the job is actually stealing medicine from children, or when they are hired to kill the lizard men but discover that the lizard men aren't the bad guys, or when the townsfolk hire them to wipe out the goblins and they discover its the townsfolk that have been robbing the goblins and started the whole mess and they decide not to slaughter a village that includes women and children. But if you have PCs whose sole motivation is loot and XP and nothing else matters because the players view the whole of the game as achieving a 'high score', then you have murderhobos. It doesn't matter if they are 'honorable' assassins that only kill for money, or 'honorable' mercenaries that only do the job and say things like, "It's just business; nothing personal", that's still murderhobos. [/QUOTE]

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