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Another problem I've seen is the players just don't know what else to do. They attack just because they don't have a clue of what else would move the plot forward.Once, this happened to me. The players were confronted with a demonic horde led by a female general gone mad. They were unable to stop the horde, but they knew that there was a dragon that was the only creature in the world that the general would obey. For me, this clue was pretty obvious, but the players wouldn't realize that the dragon was their only hope (the horde was destroying a city and killing hundreds of innocent people so it wasn't just the PC's lives at stake). When I mentioned the dragon, a player immediately said: "That's it! The dragon! Let's kill the dragon! She loves this dragon, let's extract revenge on her by slaying this beast!". This surprised me, as the poor dragon wasn't even involved in the whole mess and by killing him they would ruin their chances of saving the innocent people that were at risk.

So I acted as the players' "Common sense". I said to one of the wisest PCs' player: "You don't see much point in slaying the dragon. In fact, it seems a rather foolish thing to do". By acting as their common sense, I was able to show the players that this wasn't time to do combat, this was time to ask for help against a n apparently unbeatable foe. So they did ask the dragon for help and everything was solved.

So what I am trying to say in this rather long example is: when the players attack because they are clueless, [you should] act as their clue!In general there are always brilliant characters in the group (the mage, the cleric, etc) and you can't expect the players to be so brilliant. So act as the common sense or consciousness of the PCs and see if they don't begin roleplaying when they realize it is the most efficient thing to do.


From: Scott P-M.

Johnn,

Here's what I do to encourage roleplaying among combat- focussed characters(/players): every once in a while, put them in situations where they are not the badasses. The reason players will feel no compunctions about charging immediately into the fray is because they don't feel like they are in danger when they raid the goblin caves or whatnot. Put them in a situation where they are made well aware that combat is going to result in an untidy demise. This will frustrate players if used excessively, but it will encourage players to communicate with their enemies, giving the GM more room to develop interesting, worthy opponents, rather than one-off cannon-fodder.