Balancing different player goals?

[HappyElf]

I think this is the forum for gaming advice, right?

So!

I am currently running a pathfinder campaign with four PCs. However, I've ran into a problem with them sort of splitting into two groups in terms of playstyle. Two of them are quite deep into the roleplaying side of things, giving their characters elaborate backstories and trying to explore the details of the setting and so forth. The other two are a lot more of the kick in the door, generic-knight-stabs-orc-and-wins-treasure school of play.

I'm fine with both these approaches and I think I can run a game with either but running them together is starting to lead to some problems- no-one's said anything but I can see the action-seekers getting bored when there's a talky scene or the roleplayers getting annoyed when there's a more dungeon crawly bit. There'll all good friends and none of them are problem players so clearly it's not worth asking anyone to leave or any other major changes like that but I also don't want half the group to be bored at any given time.

Any ideas for what to do?

[Piedmon_Sama]

Well if some of them want to interact with the setting and some of them want to hit the dungeon, my suggestion is you flesh out the dungeon. There's lots of possibilities for various factions to exist within a subterranean network of tunnels and caverns big enough to house its own ecosystem. Maybe your party can end up befriending the Orcs in room A3 and help them take out the Drow in room B6. Perhaps diplomacy and violence are needed in equal amounts to negotiate the dungeon? Perhaps there's too many Drow to take on directly but if their slaves could be incited to revolt, that kinda thing.

[Kelb_Panthera]

There's not much you -can- do in this partciular situation. You're going to have to hash it out with your group and find a compromise. You can try to split the time between the two playstyles and set things up to be able to switch rapidly between them but that's about it.

To that end, though, you might try a political campaign of the more medieval variety. It's easy to get into a fight when you're regularly in places you shouldn't be and need to make people disappear after figuring out who needs disappearing.

You might also get the hack-n-slashers' attention if you ask them what kind of things would get them more interested in the talky bits, even if it's just something to the effect of target selection for the kick-in-the-door bits.

[Jornophelanthas]

Well if some of them want to interact with the setting and some of them want to hit the dungeon, my suggestion is you flesh out the dungeon. There's lots of possibilities for various factions to exist within a subterranean network of tunnels and caverns big enough to house its own ecosystem. Maybe your party can end up befriending the Orcs in room A3 and help them take out the Drow in room B6. Perhaps diplomacy and violence are needed in equal amounts to negotiate the dungeon? Perhaps there's too many Drow to take on directly but if their slaves could be incited to revolt, that kinda thing.

Watch out, though, that this approach does not lead to conflict at the table if the hack-and-slashers try to kill everything that moves in the dungeons (regardless of the odds - if the DM put it in a dungeon, it must be beatable in a straight fight), while the talky-roleplayers will try to befriend everything that doesn't attack first (regardless of the context - if this sleeping goblin did not see us coming, it must be able to help us in some way).

Also, if you throw an orc/goblin at them who surrenders to them after losing a fight (where the PCs killed all the others), be prepared for a lengthy argument between players, where one group will want to kill it (without debate), while the other half will want to debate it to discuss the moral implications of harming an unarmed prisioner.

[Piedmon_Sama]

That's why you keep multiple factions in the dungeon. So they butchered the orcs? That's when the Drow approach the players about their Bugbear problem. Stay flexible and don't ever bank on any one encounter going "right." If the players (for whatever reason) refuse to negotiate with "evil" humanoids, you can always drop in an exploring Wizard NPC or a party of Elf huntsmen or whatever, someone who can give the PCs pointers and maybe remark on the history of this dungeon and what have you.

[LibraryOgre]

Also consider outside factions and what can be done. Make the roleplaying approach effective, but not always.

For example, in the Keep on the Borderlands, it's pretty clear that the humanoids are in factions. The hobgoblins and the goblins are allied, with the ogre generally siding with them, the orcs and the gnolls are allied, with the minotaur, bugbears, and kobolds being largely independent, and all under the priests.

I had a party that started playing to this. They took out the gnolls on their own, counting on the other group's relative ambivalence to them to let them do this. They stirred up the orcs against the goblins, bribed the minotaur into taking out the ogre, and generally used sneakiness, bribery, and charisma to whittle the fights down to something more manageable. They HAD to use main force at times, but a lot was accomplished by simply using their heads.

[SirBellias]

If they're not being disruptive and they aren't bringing it up, then it may be less of a problem than you think. A lot of my players aren't engaged the whole time, and they're perfectly fine with that. Though if you want to find a way for them all to be engaged, the above solutions sound like the best ways of mixing the two. In my experience, I typically end up running multiple games so the role players can role play and the hack 'n slashers can kick doors in, but I respect that that isn't a viable solution in most cases.

[Darth Ultron]

The ''roll play vs role play'' is a very common split between players in a group. If your lucky and have good players they will understand and accept that the game can't be 100% what they want all the time.

If you can break away from the classic straitjacket of making the game all nitty and gritty just like Ye Old Earth, there is a fun bit of spin you can do: combine the action and role playing.

So when you have some to a role play bit...you toss in action. For example, every shopkeeper has a pet demon, and to do business with them you must kill the demon. Even add in things like the price of the item they want to buy goes up every round they fight the demon.

You can do the same thing for skill checks or any other type of action type stuff.

[valadil]

I've been in many groups with that split. Some go well, some don't.

In one case the GM actually sat down with us and said something to the effect of "These players want to fight. Those players want to talk. I'll plan my sessions to include even parts of both." It seems condescending, but the reminder that sharing is something you learn in kindergarten went a long way to keeping the players from thinking the game sessions should entertain them 100% of the time.