Murderhobo players

[Ronnocius]

I'm not sure if I'd call them murderhobos, but they are definitely a little too quick to kill. Some examples of what they've done:
- killing unconscious prisoners
- killing someone who was specified to be captured alive (the person was a commoner)
- challenging random NPCs to contests for money, and then attempting to kill them if they lose
- threatening random farmers (there is some backstory to this one)
So what is a fair consequence to happen, or should none happen at all. I am playing a game with my family and they are new to D&D. I don't want to punish them in the game but I want to have reasonable consequences. I have already tried settling it out of game.
They are also working for the town watch :smallannoyed:

EDIT: The alignments are a CN barbarian, and NG ranger and bard. The bard's player has been away for most of these, but she was here when they killed the prisoners.
I don't really want to run a game with evil characters, so should I ask them not to before the next session?

[WhovianBeast]

Sic paladins on 'em.

[Coffee_Dragon]

Murderhobo players? Call the cops police.

[Potato_Priest]

If there are literally any witnesses, they can lose their jobs.

Revenants are fun. If any of those people who they killed would particularly desire revenge, send them back as a revenant. (I'd modify the revenant a bit though, so they don't just keep coming back, maybe only one or 2 respawns)

[RumoCrytuf]

I'm not sure if I'd call them murderhobos, but they are definitely a little too quick to kill. Some examples of what they've done:
- killing unconscious prisoners
- killing someone who was specified to be captured alive (the person was a commoner)
- challenging random NPCs to contests for money, and then attempting to kill them if they lose
- threatening random farmers (there is some backstory to this one)
So what is a fair consequence to happen, or should none happen at all. I am playing a game with my family and they are new to D&D. I don't want to punish them in the game but I want to have reasonable consequences. I have already tried settling it out of game.
They are also working for the town watch :smallannoyed:

I said this once in a previous thread. *Ahem*

The tales of their Murderhoboness spread throughout the land. They become unwelcome in most towns and cities. Being forced to live in the wilderness. The Gods, seeing their evil actions, curse them with a run of bad luck. They're attacks become ineffective, they lose whatever charm they have. Realizing the error of their ways, they pray for redemption. The gods take pity on these pathetic mortals, and give the players a mission in which they are to redeem their actions. A mission not of violence, but peace. Should these adventurers redeem themselves, their curse will be lifted.

Either that, or summon Tiamat to roast them. ;)

[Fishyninja]

Sic paladins on 'em.

Lots of Paladins, High level Paladins

[Tanarii]

Sic paladins on 'em.Hahahaha I love it.

Release the Vengeance Paladins! :smallbiggrin:

(Doesn't quite have the same ring as Release the Hounds!, but it'll do.)

[Fishyninja]

hahahaha i love it.

Release the vengeance paladins! :smallbiggrin:

(doesn't quite have the same ring as release the hounds!, but it'll do.)

cry havoc and let slip the paladins of war!

[furby076]

Well, first start changing their alignment. BTW, I wouldn't bother telling them this. It happens, and unless they cast detect evil on themselves, there is no reason to tell them. If there is someone who worships a good god (cleric/paladin) then there are repercussions. Same thing for DRuids

Second, witnesses are a *****. Eventually word will get out it was them. Wanted posters, bounty hunters (aka, NPC adventurers), etc.

Third, life sucks when you walk into town and the local militia come out with weapons. Instead of being able to buy supplies, trade goods, get services, etc...you suffer

Forth, they start getting less lucrative adventures. Who wants to hire unpredictable jerks? On the other hand, evil warlords may want to start hiring them. But evil warlords may use them, and when time comes to get paid - betray the party.

Having an evil campaign could be fun, just make sure you are willing to have it.

[guachi]

The characters are clearly evil. If people know they are evil, you can have happen to them what you'd have good PCs do to evil PCs.

In my current campaign I told all players in session zero "no evil PCs. I'd be a bad DM for evil PCs."

[Lance Tankmen]

Nothing wrong with evil alignment PC but you can't be stupid about it

[djreynolds]

Who coined the phrase MURDERHOBOs? Its so strangely funny, and yet.. wrong... at the same time.

[Sicarius Victis]

Who coined the phrase MURDERHOBOs? Its so strangely funny, and yet.. wrong... at the same time.

Definition of hobo: a homeless person; a tramp or vagrant.

If you add murder to it, that's literally almost every PC ever.

Sadly, I don't know where the term first came from.

Honestly, I think Richard explained it best: "We have no residence. No home, no land to call our own. No steady source of income. We eat only what we find. We do a respectful amount of murdering. By the very definition, I believe we are hobos."

[Sabeta]

1) Any Good aligned organizations will stop associating with them. Even if they haven't been caught, the world of D&D is one where it's better to err on the side of suspicion. Your players were sent to bring somebody back alive, and they failed. Where the players go, they leave corpses behind. Even if these events weren't witnessed directly the NPCs can probably put the pieces together.

2) Allow the town to hire a formal investigator, probably a Paladin. Roleplay the Paladin incriminating them of murder, and see how it pans out. If they kill the Paladin, well guess what they've just condemned themselves to an evil campaign. They'll be swiftly thrown into the town jail by anyone capable, and failing that the Paladins will now be looking for them. They'll become fugitives just trying to make ends meet.

Basically, create consequences for their actions. The primary organization in my current campaign demands LG behavior of my players, but their reward is free food in town and free nights at the Inn. In addition, the badge they get automatically elevates their status to around that of Folk Hero, where people easily recognize them as good people and inherently want to trust them. It's gotten them all kinds of freebies like armor maintenance, occasional bonus xp, and free food from grateful NPCs. That doesn't stop one of my players from being Evil, but he's restraining himself severely because he likes the benefits.

[JakOfAllTirades]

I like the Revenant suggestion.

And the Paladin suggestion, too.

So... send in the Revenant Treachery Paladin!

(And ask me about the +3 Rod of Wedgies.)

[Hrugner]

Have the chief of police call them into his office and demand their badge and their gun. This force can't afford a bunch of mavericks who won't play by the books, and if he catches them in his city again he'll have them breaking up rocks by the side of the road. When they inevitably attack the chief of police the party discovers he was an illusion and they are all in the old city guard barracks that has been converted into a prison cell. The only way out is through a gate that leads to a demiplane of carceri consisting of miles and miles of corridors and prison cells. First they need to bypass the first gate which requires them to chain themselves together with nigh unbreakable, unpickable manacles. There are two other prisoners with them, pick some NPCs they really didn't like and they get chained in there too, one of them is politically important though.

Now they get to murder hobo, and you get to run Escape from New York.

[djreynolds]

Definition of hobo: a homeless person; a tramp or vagrant.

If you add murder to it, that's literally almost every PC ever.

Sadly, I don't know where the term first came from.

Honestly, I think Richard explained it best: "We have no residence. No home, no land to call our own. No steady source of income. We eat only what we find. We do a respectful amount of murdering. By the very definition, I believe we are hobos."

Its such a comical name, I wonder if players take offense to it, or revel in it.

That is too funny

[ChildofLuthic]

Its such a comical name, I wonder if players take offense to it, or revel in it.

That is too funny

I feel like murderhobo is more descriptive than offensive. Like if you're trying to play a hero, it's offensive as all hell. But if you're going around murdering people, then you don't mind that someone calls you a name that means you go around murdering people.

[Tanarii]

I feel like murderhobo is more descriptive than offensive. Like if you're trying to play a hero, it's offensive as all hell. But if you're going around murdering people, then you don't mind that someone calls you a name that means you go around murdering people.
I like the term herohobos for actually good aligned PCs that are questing and not just rolling bad guys for their loot.

Of course, that's the exact same excuse murderhobos use.
"What? Of course I'm on a quest. I got it from an official Quest Giver(TM) and everything! Now excuse me, you're standing between me and my loo... uh, reward."

[Fishyninja]

Have the chief of police call them into his office and demand their badge and their gun. This force can't afford a bunch of mavericks who won't play by the books, and if he catches them in his city again he'll have them breaking up rocks by the side of the road. When they inevitably attack the chief of police the party discovers he was an illusion and they are all in the old city guard barracks that has been converted into a prison cell. The only way out is through a gate that leads to a demiplane of carceri consisting of miles and miles of corridors and prison cells. First they need to bypass the first gate which requires them to chain themselves together with nigh unbreakable, unpickable manacles. There are two other prisoners with them, pick some NPCs they really didn't like and they get chained in there too, one of them is politically important though.

Now they get to murder hobo, and you get to run Escape from New York.

I like your ingenuity. I especially like the illusion idea.

To follow on from that you could bring out a scenario where the townspeople send them on a "quest" of powerful bracelets, maybe one or two sets. Your party obviously being murderhobo's would probabaly steal the bracelets but if they did not and they return the bracelets, they are gifted to the party. One person puts on both bracelets or two people get a bracelet each then BAM remove the illuision and Ala above post, unbreakable manacles, unpickable with an unbreakable chain between them.

You incapacitate them, and then the party has to try and find someone willing to break the spell on the equipment!

[Virfortis]

- Chaotic Evil Alignment Shift. It works every time, they will pretty much never be allowed in any major city because of magic charms guards wear that detect evil.

- Have a band of good aligned heroes out to stop them, min-max them to the core and throw in some special surprises. A Swashbuckler with the Alert feat can be a nasty response to an assassin rogue that insists he always goes first.

- Bounties, I cannot stress this enough. World consequences for murderhoboness has yet to fail me.

- Have one of the players loot a talisman of pure good, or hell have aforementioned party use it against the players at LEAST once. It has 7 charges you know!

[The Shadowdove]

Make it so everyone they murder bands together and becomes a small army of revenants. Instead of the single person going around being creepy and vengeful, you have a group causing horror story style mayhem in the party's wake as they look for their murderers.

This could effectively create an anti party. As the deceased have people who join in on their cause, maybe even relatives. Some of said relatives might take this opportunity to establish wealth and territory as the revenant army progresses.

Towns may begin turning adventurers away in fear of retribution and losing some or all of what they own as tax to the growing warband.

[M Placeholder]

I'm not sure if I'd call them murderhobos, but they are definitely a little too quick to kill. Some examples of what they've done:
- killing unconscious prisoners
- killing someone who was specified to be captured alive (the person was a commoner)
- challenging random NPCs to contests for money, and then attempting to kill them if they lose
- threatening random farmers (there is some backstory to this one)
So what is a fair consequence to happen, or should none happen at all. I am playing a game with my family and they are new to D&D. I don't want to punish them in the game but I want to have reasonable consequences. I have already tried settling it out of game.
They are also working for the town watch :smallannoyed:

Being too quick to kill is one of the defining characteristics of Murderhoboism, as someone who played an Elf Sorcerer that asked the rest of the party if he could kill a boatman that had just dropped them off on an Island and would ferry them back to the shore, then attempted to murder one of my own team mates by commanding my Raven familiar to attack him when he was not far from death, I have played one myself They are without a shadow of a doubt, Murderhobos.

Ideas

- The person that was supposed to be captured alive? Well, his adventurer cousin has found out, and is coming back to either get revenge or justice on the individual.

- Some of the townspeople have decided that the law is an ass, and hire a band of adventurers to track down the PC's and kick theirs.

- The head of City Watch asks his superior to send them to the frontier of the Kingdom/State/Principality, where they can fight Ogres, Orcs, Trolls and Murderhobo well away from his city.

[Mellack]

- Chaotic Evil Alignment Shift. It works every time, they will pretty much never be allowed in any major city because of magic charms guards wear that detect evil.



You are the second person to say something similar. How do you even detect alignment in 5e?

[Fishyninja]

You are the second person to say something similar. How do you even detect alignment in 5e?

Through the character's actions and behaviours. Indeed 5E does allow a large amount of leeway when it comes to interpreting alignment but it is the DM's role to track the parties alignment based on what they have placed on their character sheets.
Obviously a small transgression here or there is not a problem but continuous acts towards one type of alignment would cause a shift.

[Mellack]

Through the character's actions and behaviours. Indeed 5E does allow a large amount of leeway when it comes to interpreting alignment but it is the DM's role to track the parties alignment based on what they have placed on their character sheets.
Obviously a small transgression here or there is not a problem but continuous acts towards one type of alignment would cause a shift.

That is not really going off their alignments. As far as I can see, there is almost no way to easily tell good or evil people, especially as evil in not usually done in public. One poster talked about casting detect alignment; not in 5e. A robber could easily be barred for being a known thief, even though he is good alignment i.e. Robin Hood. It is very possible the players themselves wouldn't know the characters are evil.

[Fishyninja]

- killing unconscious prisoners
- killing someone who was specified to be captured alive (the person was a commoner)
- challenging random NPCs to contests for money, and then attempting to kill them if they lose
- threatening random farmers (there is some backstory to this one)


That is not really going off their alignments. As far as I can see, there is almost no way to easily tell good or evil people, especially as evil in not usually done in public. One poster talked about casting detect alignment; not in 5e. A robber could easily be barred for being a known thief, even though he is good alignment i.e. Robin Hood. It is very possible the players themselves wouldn't know the characters are evil.

The OP's characters are playing as the town guard, now I am going to assume, OP will have to confirm that the Majority of the players have put either Neutral or Good as their aligment (ranging from Chaotic to Lawful).

In the points the OP has put, especially killing unconcious prisoners......people who cannot defend themselves as an evil act and a known act. Also challening NPC's where money is the prize and then trying to kill them when losing is not a good act either and also where they are in a power position (as in being the Town Guard) that also makes them corrupt.

The only way they would be awarded for this behaviour is if the mayor/baron/noble/king who ruled the town was evil aligned.

[Ronnocius]

I should add that in-game, only some of these actions happened because I allowed the players to retcon some of them once they saw the consequences.

[DragonSorcererX]

I'm not sure if I'd call them murderhobos, but they are definitely a little too quick to kill. Some examples of what they've done:
- killing unconscious prisoners
- killing someone who was specified to be captured alive (the person was a commoner)
- challenging random NPCs to contests for money, and then attempting to kill them if they lose
- threatening random farmers (there is some backstory to this one)
So what is a fair consequence to happen, or should none happen at all. I am playing a game with my family and they are new to D&D. I don't want to punish them in the game but I want to have reasonable consequences. I have already tried settling it out of game.
They are also working for the town watch :smallannoyed:

EDIT: The alignments are a CN barbarian, and NG ranger and bard. The bard's player has been away for most of these, but she was here when they killed the prisoners.
I don't really want to run a game with evil characters, so should I ask them not to before the next session?

Sodomize their characters!

[Uzgul]

Your players seem to clearly like killing things. In my experience you have three basic options here:
1. Try to railroad them into being good people by harsh consequences to evil behaviour as most seem to suggest. Some players will eventually like being the good guys, some will hate you for railroading.

2. Run an evil campaign with everything that belongs to that. Why save the world, when you could conquer it? Evil and party evil campaigns can be a lot of fun, if everyone involved is fine with the consequences (including the possibility of pvp). But as you said, you don't want that, which is fine.

3. Send them on quests where their "qualities" are needed. Quest, where they are not supposed to show any mercy. E.g. wiping out an undead plague, destroying war camps of orcs, killing an evil dragon and his cult etc. In my experience murderhobos tend to enjoy some classical dungeon crawling more than complex social campaigns. The hardest part for this option is to create dungeons that are actually interesting.

IMO, you should just try out number 3 at least once. You could just have an npc come up to the party and give them a quest suitable for murderhobos, because he heard of their qualities. Just be sure that it's a quest, that makes killing a good act. That way you can still run a mostly good campaign, that murderhobos still enjoy. They could be considered good/neutral by some standards, but still be feared by townsfolk as they aren't nice people and known for slaying monsters. The officials might tolerate them because they are the lesser of two evils. After all, they might be in town just for downtime/shopping and spend the most of their (play-)time in dungeons.

Source: I dmed for murderhobos and played murderhobo PCs and to make murderhobos happy was never difficult. You just need to give them stuff to kill.

[Arkhios]

Hahahaha I love it.

Release the Vengeance Paladins! :smallbiggrin:

(Doesn't quite have the same ring as Release the Hounds!, but it'll do.)

Well, I dunno. Where I'm from, MP (=Military Police) are sarcastically referred to as Hounds, and if the military occupations were D&D classes, I'd definitely say MP count as Paladins.

So, Release the Hounds could in fact refer to paladins, in a sense :D

(fun fact: I served my time as an MP, and even I found the Hound reference hilarious)



Aaanyway, on the discussion at hand. Murderhobo's and Sociopaths walk pretty much hand in hand. Players of Murderhobo's are often a bit sociopaths, who care nothing about rules of decency, as long as they can do whatever feels "fun".

"So what if the tied-up commoner is helpless and probably has less hit points my weapon could deal even without my strength bonus. If it's funny, I'll smash his head! Besides it's only a game!"

Just my biased thoughts, but I find that distasteful and far from fun.

[Thrudd]

Just have the world and the people respond in reasonable, logical ways to the characters' actions. It's that simple. If they murder an innocent person in the woods and nobody is there to witness it, then nothing happens. They get away with it. This may change their alignments to evil. If they treat townsfolk badly and act like bullies, they will get a bad reputation in that town and people won't want to work with them or help them, or will act afraid of them and go to the other side of the street, etc. If they hurt or torture someone, that person will not like them, probably hate them, and might seek revenge if given the opportunity to do so without risking safety.
Same if they betray people, they will be disliked, untrusted, and possibly targeted for retribution in subtle or not subtle ways by those people.
However, this isn't a video game. Just because they do one thing to one person, or act evilly in one area, doesn't mean the whole world suddenly knows that they are bad guys and starts throwing rocks or sending cop cars after them. Be rational and think about what would happen realistically, how real people would react.

[furby076]

That is not really going off their alignments. As far as I can see, there is almost no way to easily tell good or evil people, especially as evil in not usually done in public. One poster talked about casting detect alignment; not in 5e. A robber could easily be barred for being a known thief, even though he is good alignment i.e. Robin Hood. It is very possible the players themselves wouldn't know the characters are evil.

Holy POOP batman! I saw the spell Detect Evil / Good, but didn't read the description, and just assumed it was the standard detection of evil/good. Why they name it "Detect evil and good" when it should be named "Detect extraplanar creature"

[FabulousFizban]

Looks like its time for you to run an evil campaign. If PCs start murderhoboing, there are consequences to killing. Bounty hunters, city guards, terrified townsfolk...

They dont get to participate in society anymore. "If your quarry goes to ground, leave no ground to go to."

[Tanarii]

If PCs start murderhoboing, there are consequences to killing.
This is really the best answer. Suggestions about force-changing alignment show a basic misunderstanding of the fact that D&D 5e Alignment is a tool for the player, so if they choose to just ignore it, that's their problem. It's not something that needs to 'change' based on player actions ... they either use the tool correctly or ignore the tool.

Instead, actions should have appropriate outcomes and consequences. It's entirely possible in some campaigns, where the players are either away from laws/civilization, more powerful than everyone else, and/or in a culture where their actions are appropriate, that they can get away with being murderhobos. Or it's possible that they won't. It's on the DM to decide what appropriate outcomes and consequences for player actions are, based on a variety of factors. That holds just as true for any action they take ... heroic, non-heroic, or anti-heroic.

[Temperjoke]

If you keep retconning for them to let them avoid the consequences that they've discovered for their actions, you're just diminishing the impact of the consequences. If you want them to change, you need to have them face the facts, otherwise they're just going to keep on as they've been. Based on what you've described, it seems more that they don't want to have to deal with details once the main objective is complete, so they take the easiest option, which is just to kill the target. One option could be just to change up the sort of quests/missions/campaign that you're running. Maybe you should give them some dungeon-type runs, where killing everything is a perfectly viable option, like opposing a goblinoid war horde? After enough times of doing nothing but killing, they may be more interested in running a more nuanced campaign again.

[BillyBobShorton]

Sick stronger, murderhobo-ier murderhobos on them. Take their stuff, kill a player. Basically be Negan. That should calm them down.

[Finieous]

Dungeons & Dragons is a game that works well for new (and often younger) players. In D&D, the "town guards" are NPCs and the town itself is surrounded by howling wilderness and dangerous dungeons full of monsters that threaten civilization. The PCs are "adventurers" who venture into the deadly wilds to make war on these monsters for fortune and glory. The players get to revel in the freedom and absence of constraint the game offers, and the setting provides a social framework for their murderhoboism.

Introduce new players to the game the way it was designed forty-plus years ago. Once they're more experienced, and perhaps the allure of murderhoboism fades, then perhaps you can experiment with different campaign concepts. Alternatively, you can ignore your players' signals that they'd rather be adventurers than law enforcement officers and focus the campaign on punishing their transgressions, but I suspect this will be less fun for all involved.

[Slarg]

If there are literally any witnesses, they can lose their jobs.

Revenants are fun. If any of those people who they killed would particularly desire revenge, send them back as a revenant. (I'd modify the revenant a bit though, so they don't just keep coming back, maybe only one or 2 respawns)

This. One of the most fun games I had in which I curbed Murderhoboing just so happened to have a Lich as the BBEG with the party completely ignoring the quest to take him down in favor of murderhoboing.

Well, as the Lich grew more and more powerful and his powers grew to cover a bigger and bigger area, all the people the group had murdered started coming back as revenants to kill them. They didn't stop killing people until it was too late (and I did give them warnings as to what was happening), but the game ended with the entire party being killed in a Last Stand Zombie survival situation with every zombie having something to throw back into the parties face.

Everyone loved the ending and the next game was *almost* murderhobo free.

[MrStabby]

A controversial Idea: reward them for being good.

They bring back prisoners - a ransom share is paid to the PCs, or a fraction of the bail bond. Not as part of the quest but an unexpected extra. Condition them that not killing things can be a reward.

Let prisoners let slip secrets - the location of places where Loot can be found, buried treasure etc..

The arch-mage persuaded/repaying kindness to help the PCs rather than being blackmailed/threatened shares some of their knowledge as a quest bonus.

Let the players get used to the idea that the "good" option has it's own rewards and leads to more interesting quests and better loot.

[MadBear]

I'm a really big fan of letting natural consequences (both bad and good) take their course.

Sure, they'd probably be run out of town, but that evil Baron in the next town might find their methods perfect for his needs. Let them realize and choose evil if that's really the route they want to go. The quests would probably be more dangerous with less aid (since their new boss wouldn't care so much about their lives). The quests would also lead to them doing really unsavory things (poison this innocent noblewomen/nobleman of the other town to help the boss gain power). Not to mention that you could count on eventual assassination attempts (since their new boss wouldn't want them to get too powerful).

They might eventually decide that this isn't the path they want to walk, and have to slog back through making reparations with all the people they wronged.

[CaptainSarathai]

Dungeons & Dragons is a game that works well for new (and often younger) players. In D&D, the "town guards" are NPCs and the town itself is surrounded by howling wilderness and dangerous dungeons full of monsters that threaten civilization. The PCs are "adventurers" who venture into the deadly wilds to make war on these monsters for fortune and glory. The players get to revel in the freedom and absence of constraint the game offers, and the setting provides a social framework for their murderhoboism.

Introduce new players to the game the way it was designed forty-plus years ago. Once they're more experienced, and perhaps the allure of murderhoboism fades, then perhaps you can experiment with different campaign concepts. Alternatively, you can ignore your players' signals that they'd rather be adventurers than law enforcement officers and focus the campaign on punishing their transgressions, but I suspect this will be less fun for all involved.

This, fo'sho'
---

Otherwise, run an evil campaign. It's seriously fun. Play fair (only use NPCs and Monsters) but play to utterly dominate the Party. I've done this, just threw out my notes and plans and said, "okay, you killed a guard. You are now wanted for murder. Go!"

It was actually a really fun campaign for everyone involved. Over time, as their "wanted level" grew higher, I started to do more and more things. Funnily enough, when the NPCs started using the PCs own tactics against them (murdering civilians, torching entire towns just to smoke out the PCs, torturing prisoners, etc) the PCs started to push back towards the "good" side. They started taking offense that someone would just burn all the men, women, and children in a town. Even though they had committed plenty of arson themselves.
Eventually, I had the PCs utterly desperate, and looking for medical aid, they actually got into a small town with only a militia for guards. The PCs were nursed back to health here, and couldn't afford to blow their cover with more murderhoboism. They grew attached enough to these NPCs that when the cops showed up, one of them actually turned himself in and said the others had died. The Paladins believed him, killed him, and then - because the evil of the party was seen as near Biblical - they made to burn the town just to be sure that no corruption had been spread.
At this point the PCs saved the town. From the first attack, any way. Knowing that more would come, the PCs went on the offensive, seeking to destroy the order of Vengeance Paladins sent to hunt them. It was a truly wild campaign.

[Potato_Priest]

This, fo'sho'
---

Otherwise, run an evil campaign. It's seriously fun. Play fair (only use NPCs and Monsters) but play to utterly dominate the Party. I've done this, just threw out my notes and plans and said, "okay, you killed a guard. You are now wanted for murder. Go!"

It was actually a really fun campaign for everyone involved. Over time, as their "wanted level" grew higher, I started to do more and more things. Funnily enough, when the NPCs started using the PCs own tactics against them (murdering civilians, torching entire towns just to smoke out the PCs, torturing prisoners, etc) the PCs started to push back towards the "good" side. They started taking offense that someone would just burn all the men, women, and children in a town. Even though they had committed plenty of arson themselves.
Eventually, I had the PCs utterly desperate, and looking for medical aid, they actually got into a small town with only a militia for guards. The PCs were nursed back to health here, and couldn't afford to blow their cover with more murderhoboism. They grew attached enough to these NPCs that when the cops showed up, one of them actually turned himself in and said the others had died. The Paladins believed him, killed him, and then - because the evil of the party was seen as near Biblical - they made to burn the town just to be sure that no corruption had been spread.
At this point the PCs saved the town. From the first attack, any way. Knowing that more would come, the PCs went on the offensive, seeking to destroy the order of Vengeance Paladins sent to hunt them. It was a truly wild campaign.

Sounds Awesome. Interesting that with evil/destructive NPCs, the players started to turn good. This adds evidence to my theory that most players just basically want to fight whatever the powers that be are.

[Stealthscout]

A controversial Idea: reward them for being good.

...

Let the players get used to the idea that the "good" option has it's own rewards and leads to more interesting quests and better loot.

You know, this is one of the best answers I have heard in a while.

A video game may be able to get away with not rewarding good behavior because it is designed to railroad you to the 'good' path (though it is more a 'what we wanted' path). D&D is very different because the players can do anything they want - including burning the plot to the ground with one decisive action.

I think in general there is far too little 'bonus' to playing the good guy in games. Or at least there is little difference between being the good guy and just a guy doing stuff. How often have we seen some of the following done by default for generally good characters:

Warm greetings by townfolk for no reason
Discounts at the local inn or tavern for a local hero
Lots of flirting from the ladies, because they known to be safe people
Quick access to powerful people when needed such as lords, moneylenders, or magisters without being disarmed since the party is trustable
Sponsorship and recognition by influential persons - no strings attached
Advantage on social rolls with any of the above without using inspiration or class abilities


Come to think of it, I have been far too lax in this respect. Good should come with some fringe benefits by default... maybe that is the root problem here too.