Hey everybody I'm a somewhat new DM with a serious murderhobo problem, any tips for keeping my players happy?
Need a bit more detail on what the problem is. There's two sorts of player that both may get lumped into 'murderhobo'
One is the player who just likes to fight lots of monsters. These people are easy to keep happy: give them lots of stuff tp fight.
The other is the player who kills everything in sight (monsters, merchants, guards, anything that gets in their way). You can give them what they want, but it tends to be an unpleasant game if you do, so you're probably better off just setting up the game so they aren't running into much that it isn't reasonable for them to kill.
Well, murderhoboes notoriously do not like civilization, and tend to make a mess of wherever they are. So, maybe the best way to prevent them from destroying civilization is for you to destroy it first!
You could start a new campaign, or a new story arc within your campaign, that starts with some massive apocalyptic upheaval that levels most of the civilized world. Something truly legendary, like maybe a massive asteroid impact on the planet, or the Tarrasque has awoken, or some Circle of Wizards has unleashed a devastating Cronenberg plague, or some elder god has fused their plane with ours, allowing hordes of extraplanar monsters to pour into our world. Whatever the premise you choose, be sure to keep one small glimmer of hope available somewhere. Maybe the rulers of one city vow to rebuild, but... first... they need people to go out and kill the threat.
So, the party is now stuck in a dangerous landscape filled with nothing but monsters (many of which are new and unpredictable (homebrew maybe)), and the party has either chosen or has been assigned the task of "Cleaning up this area". By "cleaning up" I mean "killing literally everything in sight". Of course, they're not the only group doing this. But it's a task so massive that it literally cannot be completed within anything less than a decade or so. So, the party gets to slake their endless bloodlust, but at the same time their actions are actually helping to make the world safe again for civilization to rise from the ashes.
Sometimes, to be the good guy, you have to be a little bit of a bad guy.
Hey everybody I'm a somewhat new DM with a serious murderhobo problem, any tips for keeping my players happy?
Need a bit more detail on what the problem is. There's two sorts of player that both may get lumped into 'murderhobo'
If it is most of your players, go cartoon on them. Everything starts a fight, include who gets the last chicken nugget. Did you have a session 0?
No Gaming is Better than Bad Gaming.
Well, murderhoboes notoriously do not like civilization, and tend to make a mess of wherever they are. So, maybe the best way to prevent them from destroying civilization is for you to destroy it first!
You could start a new campaign, or a new story arc within your campaign, that starts with some massive apocalyptic upheaval that levels most of the civilized world. Something truly legendary, like maybe a massive asteroid impact on the planet, or the Tarrasque has awoken, or some Circle of Wizards has unleashed a devastating Cronenberg plague, or some elder god has fused their plane with ours, allowing hordes of extraplanar monsters to pour into our world. Whatever the premise you choose, be sure to keep one small glimmer of hope available somewhere. Maybe the rulers of one city vow to rebuild, but... first... they need people to go out and kill the threat.
So, the party is now stuck in a dangerous landscape filled with nothing but monsters (many of which are new and unpredictable (homebrew maybe)), and the party has either chosen or has been assigned the task of "Cleaning up this area". By "cleaning up" I mean "killing literally everything in sight". Of course, they're not the only group doing this. But it's a task so massive that it literally cannot be completed within anything less than a decade or so. So, the party gets to slake their endless bloodlust, but at the same time their actions are actually helping to make the world safe again for civilization to rise from the ashes.
Sometimes, to be the good guy, you have to be a little bit of a bad guy.
Anzio Faro. Protector Aasimar light cleric. Lvl 18.
Viktor Gavriil. White dragonborn grave cleric. Lvl 20.
Ikram Sahir ibn-Malik al-Sayyid Ra'ad. Brass dragonborn draconic sorcerer Lvl 9. Fire elemental devil.
Wrangler of cats.
what if you make nonviolent npcs immposible to kill?
Give them lots of defenseless people that are loaded with cash and have the local constabulary totally open to bribes.
"Sooner or later, your Players are going to smash your railroad into a sandbox."
-Vedexent
"real life is a super high CR."
-OboeLauren
"............anybody got any potatoes? We could drop a potato in each hole an' see which ones get viciously mauled by horrible monsters?"
-Ilyara Thundertale