I have a player who just wants to survive to carry on his people's legacy. How am i supposed to run a story where a player wont fight enemies for honor? he just wants to become efficient and survive. It affects the other players and the story because he won't take fights or pursue plot lines. any help is great!

Talk to him. Tell him that the game is about teamwork, and that combat is part of the game. Tell him that his type of character is counter to the spirit of D&D, ask him to just change that, he can still be cautious, but he has to try to move the story forward. If he changes, great. If he doesnt, maybe he isnt the right person for that game

Either that or make it part of the plot. Are there people after him trying to end his line for some reason?  Were his people somehow metaphysically implicated in some sort of omen or sign or important to some cosmic effort?  Was the BBEG told by some hack witch that "some-such peoples" would be his only downfall and so he made a point to exterminate them all but missed just one....the one who would eventually rise against him and strike him down?

He needs to answer one general question: "Why is your character out in the world adventuring?"

If he has no good answer to that, his character should settle down in a town or a city and live a mundane life.

There are lots of reasons to fight, not just honor, and actually survival is a pretty darn good one if you are cornered or ambushed (encounter design hint)

however if this is a player using role play to not engage and they are at odds with the party, I would remind the player that this is a cooperative game, and constant disagreement with the rest of the party/fleeing when they go into combat will usually result in the characters expulsion from the party very quickly (after all, using the same role play, the party’s not going to like it if a member doesn’t have their back in a fight)

Not all character concepts work for all parties. If your player has a character who will not work at all with the party, then ask why the character is in the party to begin with. If there's no answer, inform your player that D&D is a cooperative game built on collaboration and story telling, so if a character does not share the same goals as the party, it's probably time to settle down and roll up a new character.

Survival as a motivation rarely creates adventurers except in extremely hostile settings (post-apocalyptic, for example). It's fine for characters to have motives that differ from the party, but if it consistently results in different courses of action, such as avoiding all fights and not backing up teammates, that becomes a table issue. Fortunately, it makes sense in world why there might be a time when the party might pull aside the character and let them know that they're not part of the group and should look elsewhere for companions.

I agree with Voras that it doesn't seem to make much sense for this Character to be adventuring. They should be holed up somewhere safe.

This issue here isn't that they want to "carry on his people's legacy" - the issue seems to be that they're it as far as that legacy is concerned, and any threat to them is a threat to the Legacy.

So ... give them a wider Legacy, and put it under threat. They discover more of their people who are being harassed, persecuted, hunted by the adventure antagonists, for some reason.

Give the Character something larger than just themselves to protect in terms of Legacy: a tribe, a people, a nation, a family, etc. Let them maintain their motivation ( protect my peoples' legacy ) but allow them to be heroic, more selfless, protectors of that Legacy. That becomes their motive for adventuring.

Quote from Metamongoose >>

Either that or make it part of the plot. Are there people after him trying to end his line for some reason?  Were his people somehow metaphysically implicated in some sort of omen or sign or important to some cosmic effort?  Was the BBEG told by some hack witch that "some-such peoples" would be his only downfall and so he made a point to exterminate them all but missed just one....the one who would eventually rise against him and strike him down?

 his entire society was slain by rampant giants, its hard enough to manage that into the game. its like he just wants to kill giants

I agree too ... this character concept drags down the group,the plot line and also the fun.

The Character needs to decide how to live up the legacy. A Legacy can´t be lost in legends. Lore-Bards or Bards in general are interested in all kind of storys.... maybe he should target to spread the legacy to all loremasters in this realm.

For the Story, he would need to fight his memorys about this event. A Izanami-Event. He would relive the memory over and over again until he finds inner peace. It could be started with a Night Hag ,who feeds on fear and negative emotions and this night hag sees a pool of potential power inside his memorys.

I would try to write into the plot something about achieving immortality or respawning his people in some non creepy way. Come up with some ideas and then talk to him about WHY he is adventuring. What does he want to achieve, and make it clear to him that his character needs an active purpose rather than a passive one, which is what he has at the moment.

Maybe his ancestors appear in a vision and tell him they’re ashamed of his cowardice. They’d rather their people died out in a blaze of glory than be remembered as a not willing to take risks to do what is right and help their allies. 

If the PC refuses to engage, then he doesn't gain any reward. Just being in a party and sitting on the side avoiding conflict isn't getting anything done so doesn't garner any XP. Sure you can get a trickle from RP and solving puzzles, but the PC will miss out on combat XP if they don't fight. That's not picking on him or punishing him, it's simple fact. If you don't fight, you don't get better at fighting.

You could have him find a note in his pack saying, "The Shi'iari are coming." and don't tell the party who they are. Let the party investigate and search for clues. Do they want to hurt the party? Do they want to kill Jack? Are the coming to help? Is it the title of queens coming to marry him so he can renew his tribe? 

Make something up, but don't lay it all out.

I agree with Voras - "Why is the character adventuring?"

If their ONLY goal is survival then they would not adventure, it is a risky occupation.

However, if the character added the ideal that "only the strong survive" then they have to adventure since it is the only way they will get stronger.

The player also needs to figure out what challenges they will accept. It is fine if a character won't fight for honor, won't help others out of the generosity of their hearts ... there are a lot of characters/players who want the question "What is in it for me?" answered before they accept those challenges. This requires the DM adapting the encounters to motivate the particular characters.

Finally, as mentioned there is also meshing the characters into the party. Any party can work as long as the characters have some in-game motivation to cooperate and work together. If you have a character always hanging back, never helping, not being a team player, ever ... then in game and in character the rest of the party has no motivation to continue adventuring with that character and the DM should let the player know that the other characters would likely leave their character at the next town unless the player develops the character in a direction that helps the party. Not all character concepts are compatible with all parties ... especially if one of the characters is a loner that refuses to help. Why would any character choose to adventure with THIS asocial character?

Anyway, the situation likely needs a bit of out of character discussion with the entire party. You need to make sure that you aren't telling them how to play their character but just pointing out that not all character concepts work and every character requires some sort of motivation to go out and risk their lives with a bunch of others for glory, treasure or adventure.

I also agree with the consensus. Why is the character adventuring at all?

I see a lot of discussion on these forums and elsewhere online about what the DM should do to "provide hooks" into the campaign for the PCs and the work the DM should do to "get the PCs involved." And that's all fine, but...

... it is also up to the player to make up a character who will want to go out and adventure. Whatever complex or interesting story one might want to make up in the background, whatever personality one might give the character, the player is responsible to bring to the table a character who will want to be in the D&D game you are going to play. Not doing this gives the DM nothing to work with. 

This cannot all be placed on the DM's shoulders. The DM has a job at the table, but the players have one too. They need to bring to the table a character who will want to be an adventurer -- who will want to go on the sorts of adventures the table all agreed you would have in session 0. (Speaking of -- you did have a session 0, right?)

As DMs, we should not let players off the hook for bringing a character to the table who will logically not want to participate in any of the adventures or story ideas the DM and the other players have planned. Do not feel like every concept has to be approved. Do not let players railroad you into accepting a poorly-fitting concept because they are dying to play it. Try to say yes when possible -- sure. But when you see something like this, with a character who would logically not participate in the campaign, you have to put a stop to that.

How is it specifically affecting the gameplay?

I have a player running a cleric in my campaign who is all bluster and deception. He’s totally ineffective in combat as he’s always trying to make it look like he’s doing something useful even if it’s not.  “Show” always takes precedence over “substance.” He often casts Guidance and tells everyone he’s casting Bless or Aid, for example. Now, the players usually know what he’s doing, but the characters don’t. He's good at drawing attention to when it works and it ends up being quite funny even though it’s very suboptimal and the party regularly flirts with TPK. The point is, it’s very mechanically substandard, but everyone is having fun with it.

So I have a few leading questions: How is it affecting the gameplay? Is it role playing when you’d rather have a crunchy miniatures type experience? Is it a character who should retire from adventuring? Should he become a cautionary tale (the Samurai who fears dying in battle Most certainly will die in battle)? Is he comedic relief? Maybe the character needs to have an epiphany or the behaviour should become a condition to be overcome.

Talk to your player about  to the story arc and endgame they envision for their character assuming he survives. Maybe it’s not a good fit for D&D. Maybe there’s a hero’s journey in there somewhere.

Ultimately what are the consequences of the behaviour and are people having fun?

Quote from Greg >>

How is it specifically affecting the gameplay?

I have a player running a cleric in my campaign who is all bluster and deception. He’s totally ineffective in combat as he’s always trying to make it look like he’s doing something useful even if it’s not.  “Show” always takes precedence over “substance.” He often casts Guidance and tells everyone he’s casting Bless or Aid, for example. Now, the players usually know what he’s doing, but the characters don’t. He's good at drawing attention to when it works and it ends up being quite funny even though it’s very suboptimal and the party regularly flirts with TPK. The point is, it’s very mechanically substandard, but everyone is having fun with it.

So I have a few leading questions: How is it affecting the gameplay? Is it role playing when you’d rather have a crunchy miniatures type experience? Is it a character who should retire from adventuring? Should he become a cautionary tale (the Samurai who fears dying in battle Most certainly will die in battle)? Is he comedic relief? Maybe the character needs to have an epiphany or the behaviour should become a condition to be overcome.

Talk to your player about  to the story arc and endgame they envision for their character assuming he survives. Maybe it’s not a good fit for D&D. Maybe there’s a hero’s journey in there somewhere.

Ultimately what are the consequences of the behaviour and are people having fun?

 Two quick comments :)

1) In the case of the cleric you describe most groups and players I have played with just would not enjoy playing with such a character. This is especially true if the antics frequently lead to a near TPK. The players usually want to play and have fun. Most seem to consider almost dying on a regular basis to not be fun.

2) From a character point of view, after a little while the characters will know the difference between guidance, bless and aid. These spells have mechanical effects and it is likely that the players would notice their skills feeling sharpened, feeling better at wielding their weapons or feeling as if they can withstand more damage. At least after having experienced the effects of these spells a few times they could probably tell when they are affected by them. In addition, they can also probably recognize the verbal and somatic components that go into the spells themselves. After a while, the characters will say "Did he say he cast bless? That looked like guidance to me". Eventually, the party would realize that the cleric is not competent and any reasonable group of adventurers might choose to part ways with the incompetent cleric who comes close to getting them killed on a regular basis while looking for a suitable replacement. It is in the best interests of the characters to have the best party possible. Why would they adventure with a character that contributes little or nothing and simply takes part of the rewards?

Anyway, it is fine if your players are enjoying it for some reason, go for it. However, eventually the players and/or characters might reach the point of saying enough is enough to the cleric.

I think to make something like the ineffective cleric actually work in game-play, you want buy-in from the rest of the table. If the players are cool with it, characters can put up with almost anything. If the players are not cool with it, then there is a problem.

Quote from BioWizard >>

I think to make something like the ineffective cleric actually work in game-play, you want buy-in from the rest of the table. If the players are cool with it, characters can put up with almost anything. If the players are not cool with it, then there is a problem.

 
Absolutely. I guess the point I was making is that it worked for this table so just try and figure out what works for you table. 
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Quote from David42 >>

Quote from Greg >>

How is it specifically affecting the gameplay?

I have a player running a cleric in my campaign who is all bluster and deception. He’s totally ineffective in combat as he’s always trying to make it look like he’s doing something useful even if it’s not.  “Show” always takes precedence over “substance.” He often casts Guidance and tells everyone he’s casting Bless or Aid, for example. Now, the players usually know what he’s doing, but the characters don’t. He's good at drawing attention to when it works and it ends up being quite funny even though it’s very suboptimal and the party regularly flirts with TPK. The point is, it’s very mechanically substandard, but everyone is having fun with it.

So I have a few leading questions: How is it affecting the gameplay? Is it role playing when you’d rather have a crunchy miniatures type experience? Is it a character who should retire from adventuring? Should he become a cautionary tale (the Samurai who fears dying in battle Most certainly will die in battle)? Is he comedic relief? Maybe the character needs to have an epiphany or the behaviour should become a condition to be overcome.

Talk to your player about  to the story arc and endgame they envision for their character assuming he survives. Maybe it’s not a good fit for D&D. Maybe there’s a hero’s journey in there somewhere.

Ultimately what are the consequences of the behaviour and are people having fun?

 Two quick comments :)

1) In the case of the cleric you describe most groups and players I have played with just would not enjoy playing with such a character. This is especially true if the antics frequently lead to a near TPK. The players usually want to play and have fun. Most seem to consider almost dying on a regular basis to not be fun.

2) From a character point of view, after a little while the characters will know the difference between guidance, bless and aid. These spells have mechanical effects and it is likely that the players would notice their skills feeling sharpened, feeling better at wielding their weapons or feeling as if they can withstand more damage. At least after having experienced the effects of these spells a few times they could probably tell when they are affected by them. In addition, they can also probably recognize the verbal and somatic components that go into the spells themselves. After a while, the characters will say "Did he say he cast bless? That looked like guidance to me". Eventually, the party would realize that the cleric is not competent and any reasonable group of adventurers might choose to part ways with the incompetent cleric who comes close to getting them killed on a regular basis while looking for a suitable replacement. It is in the best interests of the characters to have the best party possible. Why would they adventure with a character that contributes little or nothing and simply takes part of the rewards?

Anyway, it is fine if your players are enjoying it for some reason, go for it. However, eventually the players and/or characters might reach the point of saying enough is enough to the cleric.

 
Things are approaching a head. They are still pretty low level, but are coming to realize exactly how much of a charlatan this guy is. I’m surprised they’ve put up with it this long.

It’s kind of a running gag. The point is that the party agreed to it. They are all having fun with it. It adds a lot of flavour, but you need that agreement for this type of thing to work. Everybody needs to have aligned expectations. As a player, this totally wouldn’t be my come of tea.

FWIW, I’ll add that he really comes through on the non-combat front as that’s what his spell selection is really tuned for. 

Regarding your second point, a character wouldn’t typically be hollering out in combat “I’m casting Bless!” or fireball or anything else like that (unless you’re the vampire from What We Do In the Shadows declaring “Bat!” every time he turns into a bat). The player does that. The character: “I raise my holy symbol towards the two fighters and utter a prayer. Go forth and battle evil!” The player: “I’m casting Bless.” The effects of these spells are actually pretty subtle statistically and the players have decided they can’t really tell the difference given the variance of combat (bunch of cryptographers). Soon, I think, but they aren’t done with it. 

I agree with this answer. In my eyes the character isn't an adventurer. Therefore create a new character or modify this one.