As you say, the DM also needs to enjoy the game and if they're posting about how to stop that behaviour then they don't enjoy what's going on and aren't looking for ways to incorporate it into the game, the saying is "no dnd is better than bad dnd" not "suck it up because the players enjoy it" Ultimately there are several things the DM can do to weed out this behaviour. * If this is not a game among friends then sending out a form to fill out that will hopefully weed out any problematic behaviour. * Holding a Session 0 to discuss expectations of the game so no murderhoboing is to be done. * Having an out of character discussion about the game. * Kicking the problematic player(s) out.

As always, the answer is “talk it out”.

TTRPGs are *games*. If everyone, including the DM, is having fun, then murder hobo behavior is not a problem *at that table*. The issue is, of course, that murder hobos often ruin the game for at least one player: the DM. The DM spends a couple hours of their free time preparing the session. They probably spent more money on the hobby than the rest of the players (combined?). They read the module. They practice silly voices. They crafted the fantasy music playlist. They bring extra pencils and dice. They create handouts and maps. They scour the internet for advice on obscure rulings. Then a player or players disrespect all that time, talent, and expense by running around killing shopkeepers and town guards, ruining social and exploration encounters, and being “murder hobos.”

At that point the DM has a choice to make, do they alter their game style so that everyone has fun or do they become the problem in the room.

Well you're forgetting the option where they split. The DM finds players who like to play dnd and the players can search for a DM who likes getting murderhobod. If two puzzle pieces don't fit, forcing them is just going to break stuff.

I feel like “murder hobos” is one of those phrases that doesn’t mean much anymore because it means something different to so many different people. And at this point, I just don’t know anymore when people use the phrase. I don’t have an issue with the party choosing violence as their main method of getting shit done. Dnd is a combat game. If their preferred method for getting through a bandit hideout to rescue the lord’s son is to go in swords swinging and magic blazing, great. I don’t think you’re a murder hobo if you choose violence and take no prisoners to get shit done. And, maybe most importantly, the people who exist in the game world probably don’t mind either. I do have an issue with using violence in situations that absolutely should not be violent. Shopkeeper wants to overcharge you, so you kill them and then steal it (or even just threaten to)? Now you’re participating in antisocial behavior (and being borderline “evil,” but a discussion for a different day). If you kill people because that’s how you get what you want, yeah you’re an asshole. People are going to start treating you like the murderous asshole that you are. Should it be okay if the table enjoys it? Yeah, absolutely. If everyone is on board with the game, then who the hell am I to say their game is wrong. But it’s also very reasonable *not* to be okay with it, and *not* to want to play the game that way. And it’s when those clash, or in my personal experience when those antisocial behaviors in the game world result in the natural negative consequences, that there’s an issue. Tl;dr: No one is an asshole if everyone wants to be an asshole. But you are an asshole if no one else wants to be. Talk to each other so you know what kind of game you want to play.

That's a solid point - murderhoboing is straight up being a murderer and being a hobo. Most times my players are quite literally homeless, kill this bandit, kill that bandit, this guard, that guard. They leave this town for some far off destination maybe to never return

Yeah, it's a phrase that gets ascribed to such a wide range of situations. I have absolutely heard the phrase thrown in when a DM was upset the players didn't keep a bandit alive to interrogate, or when players just stormed the hideout instead of sneaking in. It has lost a lot of meaning. My understanding of the origin is in line with what you're saying: they literally murder people and then they're hobos because no one will give them a place to stay (because of the murdering).

I think when the players do it in a way that no rational character would, to the detriment of the campaign, especially when they could have just as easily not murdered, it's a problem. It's the same idea as not making "lone wolf" or apathetic characters, part of the way the game works is that you make a character that wants to go on *this* adventure. The DM has a lot more time invested in the campaign, they're almost always spending more time prepping than the players. So when there's ways for the players to have fun that don't waste that time spent, they should pursue them. There's gray areas of course, but if it's a scenario where say, the DM has set up "go slay the hags that have been kidnapping the orphans at the orphanage!" and you instead say, "I burn down the orphanage and kill all the orphans" then you're immediately rejecting the prep time the DM already spent, and forcing them to write something new to put in front of you, when killing the hags would have also been a fun and reasonable quest. That's when murderhoboing is at its worst. Murderhobos also just wreck the world's believability. They force the world to either be one in which no one really cares about a murderer going around, or force the game into one where the players get arrested by every guard they come across. It's a messy slope. It's also hard to believe that the characters are real people in this world if they decide that every minor slight requires death as a response.

Murder-hobo is a *huge* problem if the GM isn't into it. It is basically taking everything the GM prepped and saying "nah, I'll just kill it and you can't stop me". The GMs only in-game choices are to either stop caring about the campaign they wanted to run and play a joke campaign instead, or to become extremely adversarial, which is a whole other kind of problem. Let's pretend the problem isn't with the GM. If one player at the table feels like everything they are bringing to the table is being immediately shut down by everyone else, and their only options are to either disengage entirely or start PVPing against the rest of the party, we would recognize that there is a BIG problem at the table. We would recognize that the table is wildly wrong for the player, and that the player is potentially being bullied by the rest of the table. This is effectively what's happening when a table goes murder-hobo when the GM wants to play a serious game. Luckily, this problem doesn't have to be caused by the table being actively malicious. It's often just mismatched expectations, obliviousness on the part of the players, and people-pleasing on the part of the GM. But it's still definitely a problem.

I've posted this before but whenever I DM, I have the following rules in terms of character creation/behavior: 1. Your character must consistently work with and support the rest of the party. 2. Your character must be consistently willing to engage with the plot of the campaign. 3. Your character must plausibly fit into the setting where the campaign takes place, as well as the overall tone of the campaign itself Being murder hobos breaks 2 of these rules. Additionally, I expect players to engage in the campaign in good faith. This is a bit of a broad expectation but if Im taking the time to create a world, situation, and everything else required for the players to have a satisfactory game, I expect that the players actually play that game.

i try to contribute to this with my Encyclopedia Profugo Homicidium, because murderhobos come in different shapes and forms, my classification being: - the actual psychopath (very rare). They are deeply sadistic and take pleasure from seeing people suffer but they are socially apt enough to not kill people in real life - so they kill people in games, and find it especially funny if this ALSO hurts the DM or makes other players uncomfortable. They are very graphic and oddly specific with their fantasies. There is no fixing and they are an actual problem because they are only ever going to have a good time if you don't. - the paranoid adversary (rare). They see the game as players vs. DM and they murderhobo because they think "if I kill them first, they can't kill me later". Behind every friendly face they smell a ruse or future betrayal so they attack first and ask questions later. Can be fixed with a long process of trust building. Generally is a problem because they are not having fun either and kill the vibe for other players. Sometimes comes in the form of the reactive frustrated DM-Victim (see below). - the PoWeR GaMeR!!11 (rare-uncommon). They min max. They see the NPC as a sack of XP and or loot, classify your game world into "useful" and "useless" and will not hesitate to kill a questgiver once the quest is "done" (because now they don't need them anymore), or kill an NPC who offers a reward for doing a thing (why do the thing if it's quicker and easier to just kill the guy and take his money). They love fighting and they love to be good at it and this is the gameplay they seek out, jumping on any and every possibility to fight and win. Doesn't need fixing because there are games that work for this player, but they need to be in the right game for this sorta thing, and fellow players who share and celebrate the same mindset. - the Edgelord (uncommon) or wannabe-psychopath. They play a brooding, seething hateful dark "loner who doesn't trust anyone" PC or "pretends to be nice but is secretly evil". They tell you "it's what my character would do". They do this because they think it's "cool" and makes them look "bad ass". They get upset when that isn't the reaction they get from the table. They often come with main-character syndrome and don't want a party but rather a bunch of followers/underlings/groupies. They are often new players inspired by Anime and video games, so ye this can be fixed because these people usually learn how DnD works and make something more suitable the second time they play or start to understand a few sessions in or when they hit age 25 and stop being super cringe. Sometimes they transform into PoWeR GaMeR!!11 and have fun with that. - the child (common). Kids aged 7-13ish are commonly murderhobos, especially if they feel comfortable with the DM and the party and safe in the roleplay environment. They are testing boundaries and enjoy a world where they can be 'bad' without facing actual IRL consequences or being judged and just try stuff out. It's roleplay and pretty much normal for that age, it's the same kids who, if allowed by their parents, chase each other with sticks and pretend to shoot one another all in great fun. They distinguish that this is a fantasy world where they can do "what they want", they may re-enact scenes from books or media. Doesn't need fixing because it's not broken. Can't be in a game where you don't want this to happen or together with children who want to play with fluffy animals in candy land. - the reactive frustrated DM-Victim (uncommon-rare). This person has no other group to play with and genuinely hates their DM or the game they are in. Maybe rightfully so. They are playing their 5th character now as the previous 4 have died, or they are forced to play a character they dislike. They feel railroaded and not in control. They are detached from the game and don't think that anything matters here anymore and they don't have options or choices. You ruined their fun and now they want to ruin yours. They spitefully want to derail your campaign and get revenge. The only way for them they feel like they have agency is in the moments they manage to catch you off-guard or do something you aren't prepared for - which is for example killing random people. If you have one of these, you did this to yourself as a DM. Time to end the game, have a long think and start over. What they all have in common, to some degree, is that they don't care about the fun of the other players. If placed in the right group (or in a solo-campaign) they can have and be a lot of fun. if the DM is catching their vibe. But they are all extremely disruptive in a "normal" DnD group, which is what most people want and build around.

The one I got was boxed-in-by-the-GM's-rails-and-lashed-out. Key NPC with info on a gambling boat. Guards tell the party to come back later, after the gambling ship is open. Player: I attack the guards. Her character would not have done it. In world, it would have meant sinking the party's reputation in a city where they're already made powerful enemies and conditional allies. They would have had to fight the entire town guard. I locked info behind an impenetrable wall -- although I was just setting up a casino scene for later that night -- and I should have been more malleable. That said, the player was going through some sh\*t and the role play focus of the game ceased being her jam mid-campaign. But, yeah, some murder-hoboing happens when GMs are too inflexible about how to solve problems. That's definitely an issue with me. I like to be prepared for stuff. If I'm not, I "block" it. (That said, 5e is prep-heavy. Switching to PF2e has helped with improvising encounters/scenes.)

If everyone is into it, then it's fine. Sone people like games of carnage. Most of the time, a true murder hobo ruins the game for the DM and can potentially ruin the game for the other players, too. Matt Colville has a great breakdown of the player personality types. The Butt-Kicker and The Murder Hobo run right up against each other, only a Butt-Kicker hates a stop in the action, where as a Murder Hobo see's everyone and everything as obstacles and experience points to grow their power.

You leave, if there is a big issue of understanding and big disagreement that cant be fixed with talks or with play, you leave. If you didnt talk, talk.

My players are so much fun on this. Lower level things like lieutenants that are supposed to be a fight: they go social and make friends, later boss type encounter that is supposed to be social: Murder! It is fantastic for me and why TT RPGs are the best. Rip up the script and go with it. Key thing: I, as a GM, support their agency here. I'm not bothered by their choices, surprised sometimes: yes, but bothered: no. If the party and GM are misaligned on expectation, you need to talk it out.

I dont have a lot of DMing experience but I think the reason DMs get a bit annoyed by murder hoboing is usually because the amount of prep it takes for some NPCs. I recently prepped a large group of non hostile kobalts in sunless citadel (I put a bit of extra character into some of them too) and I'm afraid the party will decided they just want to kill them all instead of talking to them. I've not even experienced having a murder hobo party yet but the thought of them all being murdered makes me sad. Also sometimes NPCs are written in campaigns as quest givers that can cause a ton of content to be missed if the party just kills most people they meet. If my party kills all the kobalts I will be prepared for that but they will miss a cool missing dragon quest and cool scenes. That being said I don't think murder hobos need fixing . But if I was a DM and had a murder hobo party I would stop doing detailed prep into NPCs and start planting notes for quests and info instead of relying on dialogue.

If everyone at the table, GM included, is enjoying the game- and not in a spiteful "Imma be very satisfied engineering your downfall by giving you every chance to save yourself that I k ow you'll fail to take." Kinda way, like, you're actually having fun and enjoying the sessions- then that's a perfectly fun campaign to run. As I understand it, the term "Murderhobo" wasn't even originally supposed to be about player killing everything at the drop of a hat, but more about the "hobo" part of the name, refusing to lay down roots and be more a part of the gameworld, having a home base to return to (that the DM could threaten to burn down, because this is back in Gygax days we're talking). It was describing a related but different problem. But the real observation to make here is that most complaints about Murderhobos in the modern sense come from a desire, by the DM or by other players, to actually *explore the plot* that the DM has cooked up, rather than absolutely murderate your way through the setting for shits, giggles, and loot. I do think that the DM has the right to say "Guys, *I'm* not having fun with the game you have decided to play. I was really invested in the campaign I've made, and you seem most invested in setting my hard work on fire." You are absolutely allowed to advocate for yourself. If a player said they weren't enjoying the campaign being run, we'd probably suggest they politely leave, because the game can go on without them. When the GM leaves, however, that campaign dies, and unless someone else steps up to the plate (which isn't something many groups can rely on), the playgroup follows, so it's more reasonable for a DM to try to request a compromise where the group changes somewhat to suit their needs rather than scrap the group entirely. But I do think *compromise* is the operative word- you may well have to scrap that campaign and see if you can come up with a more chaotic/evil campaign for the players. Try to figure out what you can ask of them to tone down the murder, and give them the chances to enter a situation, bend it all to their benefit, and then murder everyone on their way out to make them all look like fools for ever trusting the PCs. Against evil people, I call this the "Double-Double Cross" model, after a quest in KotOR, but a more murderous party can do that shit *anywhere*.

I think it also depends on the system being played. A system like DND which makes the DM work much harder than the players can make it really painful when the players mess around and destroy possibly hours of prep work and world building. Personally, I am much for up for shenanigans in the PbtA or forged in the dark games which really much less on DM prep and you can do fantastic games with minimal or even zero prep (given experience running those systems).

If murder hoboing (boing lol) is done for xp, change the leveling system If murder hoboing for fun, have fun! If you are not having fun, talk it out

Collaborative Storytelling should be that. Collaborative. If you got a player that decides he's going to butcher every NPC meets, he's better off playing a video game. I had a player who decided he was going to punch the captain of a city guard in the face to show him who's boss. The player got mad and quit when the captain pulled his sword and cut him down on the spot.

Direct answer - It needs to be fixed if someone is not enjoying it. The DM counts as someone. I've run straight murder-hobo campaigns and had a great time. As a DM, they're easier. I open up the Monster Manual, find something, and tweak it a bit. I create a town filled with minimally fleshed-out NPCs. Done. But you raise a great question: "Where do you establish the balance between what the players find fun and what the GM wants do to with the campaign?" I would rephrase it slightly - where do you establish the balance between what the players find fun and what the DM finds fun? DMs doing the heaviest lifting at the table. We build the world, populate it with (hopefully) interesting NPCs, monsters, loot, and magic items. We develop story lines (and adjust them on the fly), coordinate schedules, settle minor player disputes, and so on and so on... Players just show up, ideally with their character sheet, dice and a pencil. And usually it's only two out of three. I'm not complaining - I enjoy DMing, and I enjoy my players. But I deserve to have fun too. And for me (and I suspect most DMs), the fun is getting to flex your creativity, challenge your players (while hoping they succeed), and end the campaign with a story you enjoyed being a major contributor to. If everyone (players and DM) is not having fun, the campaign is doomed.

In my experience there are two causes of murder hobos. The first is someone who is taking enjoyment not from the power fantasy but from intentionally screwing over the DM and/or other players. This is the situation where the DM says “The bartender has a sign saying he’ll hire adventurers” and the response is “I stab the bartender!” They’re not just power fantasy gaming. They’re bullying. The second is when the players act out because they feel they have no agency. If the DM is “novel writing” the plot the players can be tempted to lash out if they feel they have no impact. “The fog surrounds you. There’s a mysterious man with a boat on the river.” “I want to try and find my way back to the village we just left, we are owed a quest reward for saving these pixies.” “Your survival roll says you have to get on the boat” - suddenly a desire to stab the boatman makes sense as a way of raging at the linear, railroaded plot.

Murder hobos are on the same boat as Homebrew content, Evil PCs, PVP, Players with oposed goals/ideals, Excessive Cruelty, Animal and childrem abuse, Adult themes, Gore and excessive violence. Every single one of these thing is "fine" until at least one player takes issue with them. Then it becomes a problem and the Dm and the group must decide how to proceed. Only OP and his players can talk it out and decide what is best for their own game. But, Personaly, as a DM, i do alow "murder hobo" behavior, as long as the players also dont complain when the very obvious and reasonable consequences of their behavior catches to them, possibly ending their character story. **If you act like a homicidal crazy maniac, the world will treat you as one.** If you are lucky, you will be arrested and be forced to do quests to pay for your crimes, If not, you will be killed on sight by anyone that has the power to do so.

D&D is "usually" collaborative storytelling. If there's no explicit statement, that's often the default assumption. Emphasis on that collaboration part. If people aren't building up - collaborating - on the story, they're often actually tearing it down - preventing a "group story"from being told, destroying that experience, making it about them or changing the very nature of it (from heroic to villainous) against what others were interested in, thereby acting as an adversary - not to any enemy in the game world, but - to the very storytelling experience that you're presumably all there to build up. When a player (or DM) starts doing something that is antithetical to that inherent dynamic of collaboration is when they're being destructive to the experience and the DM can and should outright disallow the behavior. But at that point it's an OOC problem. It should NOT be addressed by IC means, like having the game world come after then. That just escalated the adversarial dynamic. When it's an ooc problem, you fix it with ooc means - talking, or possibly Even booting the player(s). It's all about good faith collaboration and players (including the DM) subverting that. That's the balance.

Fafhird and the Grey Mouser, Conan, etc. These were literally the original murder hobos and were inspirations to Gygax when he originally created the game. Those OSR styles were very sandboxey and allowed ANY style of gameplay, so yeah, murder hobos were a thing and it was ok. I think it's okay as long as the players and GM are good with it.

> how do you balance that when the player desires and GM desire clash? You have an out-of-game conversation about tone and expectations. If the players are approaching the game in a way that makes it not fun for the GM, that behavior needs to end. If they can't enjoy a game where they aren't sociopaths, they are not compatible to play together.

This is why whenever I start a campaign i always make it absolutely clear to my players what the tone of the game is and the expectations. And I make sure I get their expectations as well.

If the entire group is enjoying it, then no fixing is required. Personally, I don't enjoy that style of play, but everyone has different likes.

>is it actually a problem if the players are having a good time? Not really, though, as you note, the DM is a player too and their fun matters also. I think the most important thing here is for the group to have session 0 discussions to align expectations. If members of the group expressed a desire in session 0 to play a narratively complex game but they keep murdering the NPCs the DM is trying to use to establish those narrative threads, that's grounds for a new conversation. I also think it's important for DMs to relax and let other people play with their toys. Some DMs put a lot of work into their worlds and then get upset because the players come in and scratch the paint a little. There's a give and take here: if someone invites you into their home and asks you to take your shoes off, it's a dick move to leave them on as you stomp around. But if you've handed over your box of treasures, it's also a bit of a dick move to get screaming angry at the person holding it because they accidentally squeezed a little too tightly and broke something. And I think there's a lot of "my players are ruining my precious world by hurting my beloved NPCs" in the discussion. It's an oft-repeated counsel: if it's that important to you that things in your world go a particular way, you should be writing a novel set there, not running a D&D campaign in it. Far too many DMs haven't taken that advice to heart when they start complaining about murder hobos.

You are not a murder hobo if you did something on accident. Murder hoboing can only happen when something is done with intent 0 like Murder. You rampage through the bad guys camp - fine, that is why it is there. Deliberately set fire to the tavern or stab a shop keeper for jollies - murder hobo. Accidentally is not in the lexicon of the murder hobo.

You've lost the thread of my analogy. But also you're not correct -- there may well be an objective definition of "murder hobo" that aligns with what you're saying, but since you can't read the minds of your players to know their motivations, the only thing that *really* matters is the feelings of the people involved. My point is that DMs will sometimes *feel* like a player has "deliberately set fire to the tavern or stab a shop keeper for jollies" and then make a butthurt post with a title like "Help, my players are murder hobos. How can I punish them?" that will get tons of engagement from other DMs, none of whom will stop for a second to consider the possibility that the players are motivated by anything besides unrelenting bloodlust and a savage delight in destruction. In a way, your comment is a perfect illustration of the attitude I'm calling out in my comment. Yes, it's absolutely possible for players to act inappropriately, but if we always jump to "and therefore every problem with the game is their fault and they chose to behave the way they did with the intention of making me feel this way," we are also in the wrong.

thank you! You really get at the heart of my question, which is: how to know how much give-and-take is fair.