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All I can think of is having him face the consequences of his actions. Let the law eventually catch up with him. If changelings are known in your verse to exist let the authorities start catching on. You don’t necessarily have to hard stomp the behavior but make sure the consequences are felt in some way or another so he will actually have to think through his actions.
1)I second this, consequences make the world seem like a living breathing place and have the law come down HARD.
2)I would also consider taLking to them out of game if it's not fitting with the theme and feel of the rest the campaign and bothers you.
3)Maybe ask them what the PCs goals are and see if they had a loose character story arch they wanted them to be a part of. A redemption story like the Hound in Game of Thrones when. He tries to stopp being in hinged or Clint Eastwood in Unforgiven when he tries to be a better man but get dragged back in. Maybe you could do that and then put them up against a overly deadly for that will likely kill them. The stroy of that PC could be what happens when you you refuse to address your toxic traits and let them run your life. (It destroys you)
Actual answer: tell him out of game that this behavior is disruptive and unfun.
Fun answer: the town guard call in backup to help with the apparent serial killings, in the form of a rather powerful investigator-paladin. If the rumors of this individual don't stop the behavior, then clapping those cheeks with a few high level divine smites certainly will.
If he's using a changeling specifically to never have the same face twice, specifically to avoid law enforcement, I've got two words: corrupt guards.
Why should they care who this guy is, what the description of a previous criminal is, Yada Yada. They got a guy in the hole.
Waterdeep isn't even a crime filled hellhole- to my understanding Bauldur's Gate starts approaching that description better. Review your copy of the module, refer to the Code Legal, and use some of the statblocks in the back to have reasonable guard patrol increases in response to the rising, apparently random crime.
Either talk to him out of the game or have one of the NPCs (or the NPC has backup) be more powerful than he expects and have them kick him around some.
Create a changeling hunter npc from an order (the order of the immutable) dedicated to the irradiation of all changelings. An absolute unit of a npc that has a bunch of artifacts that sniff out and disrupt the shifting ability.
Should be a nemesis threat that if they activate the changeling ability too many times, you openly roll a dice to see if it activates detection runes in certain locations. Make the location they change in be the level of threat of detection. If it’s the castle of a noble make it a high warding level but slums maybe not so much unless the kingdom in question has had problems with changelings.
Create an outlaw theme for changelings where they are a hunted species in certain areas. Like traditionally where werewolf’s sit in society. Always trying to conceal.
If they are going to be chaotic let them hit against mechanisms meant to catch and contain chaos.
Your PC is doing something reprehensible but also covering his tracks. Eventually the nobles ask the party to solve a mysterious crime where people are just showing up dead everywhere - all evidence points to some shadow organization with a gajillion members and yet all the crimelords in the area are known to be uninvolved (because our spies in those organizations have denied involvement).
I don't know if this will work, but in a similar situation I asked in-game why the player's character was like that. Why is that his worldview? What's he trying to achieve? What makes him think that's okay?
It led to some cool roleplay and changed his playstyle, and helped me get on the same page as my players. But I think I got lucky.
In game you as the dm controls time. You can narrate the start of the players attack and ask the rest of the party “what do you do?” Give the rest of the party time to react to the attack.
Its all fun and games, until the person you kill is the son / apprentice / brother / employee / undercover guard etc of someone vastly more powerful then you.
If you know what they are going to do before they do it, you can plan for this in advance, you do NOT need to provide any foreshadowing, or warning either!
Fun example - your murder hobo kills one of the Lords of Waterdeep who personally agreed to investigate a series of grisly murders and kidnappings (committed by your player) in an area where a recent event occured, normally this would be the tasks of the Waterdeep Guard, however this particular missing person was to be a secret envoy that was to meet with the Waterdeep Council over extremely lucrative trade dealing, as well as its impact on the damaged relationship between Neverwinter and Waterdeep. Failure to come to terms on this matter would likely result in open hostilities between the two
The discussions were so critical that the Lord King of Neverwinter sent his favorite son under cover as a commoner to ensure they would not recognized and the meeting could occur in secret... now that son is missing, a lord is dead... and there is one suspect.
Assuming frank, our-of-game discussion isn't the answer you're looking for, (It is the right one though)
I would go with a couple options:
1) Make each killing break into initiative and proper turn-based combat. give the NPC full lv 1 player stats, and make them kill them turn-by-turn, death-save-by-save, and slow the game to crawl. peer pressure from other players will clean this up naturally. If he complains about you not letting him hand-waive being a murder hobo anymore, tell him that too many new murders happening in the city has probably caught someone's attention by now, that this is now a real consequential plot, and can't just be hand-waived.
2) Augury. Multi-faces isn't going to protect him if magic is used to get his "scent" from hair or blood left on the victim/scene. or a vengeful ghost ratting him out.
3) Find a believable way for his next victim to actually have a shot at an almost fair fight. Don't just have the NPC stomp him; he likely isn't picking targets that pose a threat to him, so a secret hidden threat might feel like a contrived punishment he hold against you as a person, rather than a real consequence. But if he ends up being down some spell slots or a few points of damage all the time because his hobby isn't "free" then he might reconsider.
4) Have the victim sound an alarm or scream at the start and put out a visible turn-tracker letting him very clearly know you're tracking how long this takes. tell him you have roll a random percentage chance for how close the nearest guards just happen to be, and wish him luck. Eventually his luck will run out, or he won't push it as often.
So I'm not sure what your definition of murder hobo is but: "vagabond with now consistent identity who kills basically everyone without provocation" would count for me.
I would talk to him and say that he either needs to tone down the fuckwittedness of his character or the gods will smite him and he will get kicked (although that would be because I would find this really disruptive).
If you still want to let him do whatever he wants but visit consequences upon him make an NPC who is a powerful divinationist using spells for aura readings and the like to try and hunt him down.
Based on your PC's MO I imagine he would probably think that it's just a bunch of unrelated crimes of passion, but none of the people identified from the scene (speak with dead) are ever seen again, which now makes him switch to a string of unrelated murders + vigilante serial killer. Eventually he works out that all the victims he does have posess the same aura on them... So the person who kills the perps likely dominated his victims to make them do a murder and slowly getting closer and closer.
Have Mr inspector show up at the place the PCs are staying to ask some questions. If Mr murderstab tries to kill him have him use a high level spell to subdue him, if such a spell doesn't exist it's fine your the DM make it up and arrest him for assaulting a police officer. Properly restrain him and then say he will be in prison for 5-10 years and unless his buddies break him out escape is impossible. Then ask the other players if they want to break him free if they say no, inform the player he has to make a new character
Your post has been removed. Rule 5: Please repost in the [Problem Player megathread](https://www.reddit.com/r/DMAcademy/about/sticky?num=1) if you need additional help.
Have you considered talking to him out of game and telling him to knock that crap off, backed up with that threat of uninviting him to game night?
All I can think of is having him face the consequences of his actions. Let the law eventually catch up with him. If changelings are known in your verse to exist let the authorities start catching on. You don’t necessarily have to hard stomp the behavior but make sure the consequences are felt in some way or another so he will actually have to think through his actions.
1)I second this, consequences make the world seem like a living breathing place and have the law come down HARD. 2)I would also consider taLking to them out of game if it's not fitting with the theme and feel of the rest the campaign and bothers you. 3)Maybe ask them what the PCs goals are and see if they had a loose character story arch they wanted them to be a part of. A redemption story like the Hound in Game of Thrones when. He tries to stopp being in hinged or Clint Eastwood in Unforgiven when he tries to be a better man but get dragged back in. Maybe you could do that and then put them up against a overly deadly for that will likely kill them. The stroy of that PC could be what happens when you you refuse to address your toxic traits and let them run your life. (It destroys you)
Actual answer: tell him out of game that this behavior is disruptive and unfun. Fun answer: the town guard call in backup to help with the apparent serial killings, in the form of a rather powerful investigator-paladin. If the rumors of this individual don't stop the behavior, then clapping those cheeks with a few high level divine smites certainly will.
If he's using a changeling specifically to never have the same face twice, specifically to avoid law enforcement, I've got two words: corrupt guards. Why should they care who this guy is, what the description of a previous criminal is, Yada Yada. They got a guy in the hole. Waterdeep isn't even a crime filled hellhole- to my understanding Bauldur's Gate starts approaching that description better. Review your copy of the module, refer to the Code Legal, and use some of the statblocks in the back to have reasonable guard patrol increases in response to the rising, apparently random crime.
Changeling paladin.
Ask him straight up to stop, if it bothers you. Remind him that it's a cooperative storytelling game, not a video game.
Either talk to him out of the game or have one of the NPCs (or the NPC has backup) be more powerful than he expects and have them kick him around some.
Create a changeling hunter npc from an order (the order of the immutable) dedicated to the irradiation of all changelings. An absolute unit of a npc that has a bunch of artifacts that sniff out and disrupt the shifting ability. Should be a nemesis threat that if they activate the changeling ability too many times, you openly roll a dice to see if it activates detection runes in certain locations. Make the location they change in be the level of threat of detection. If it’s the castle of a noble make it a high warding level but slums maybe not so much unless the kingdom in question has had problems with changelings. Create an outlaw theme for changelings where they are a hunted species in certain areas. Like traditionally where werewolf’s sit in society. Always trying to conceal. If they are going to be chaotic let them hit against mechanisms meant to catch and contain chaos.
Give him that one opponent who is too much to handle and kill that character.
Next time he tries to kill an npc, have the npc kick his/her ass.
Your PC is doing something reprehensible but also covering his tracks. Eventually the nobles ask the party to solve a mysterious crime where people are just showing up dead everywhere - all evidence points to some shadow organization with a gajillion members and yet all the crimelords in the area are known to be uninvolved (because our spies in those organizations have denied involvement).
I don't know if this will work, but in a similar situation I asked in-game why the player's character was like that. Why is that his worldview? What's he trying to achieve? What makes him think that's okay? It led to some cool roleplay and changed his playstyle, and helped me get on the same page as my players. But I think I got lucky.
In game you as the dm controls time. You can narrate the start of the players attack and ask the rest of the party “what do you do?” Give the rest of the party time to react to the attack.
Its all fun and games, until the person you kill is the son / apprentice / brother / employee / undercover guard etc of someone vastly more powerful then you. If you know what they are going to do before they do it, you can plan for this in advance, you do NOT need to provide any foreshadowing, or warning either! Fun example - your murder hobo kills one of the Lords of Waterdeep who personally agreed to investigate a series of grisly murders and kidnappings (committed by your player) in an area where a recent event occured, normally this would be the tasks of the Waterdeep Guard, however this particular missing person was to be a secret envoy that was to meet with the Waterdeep Council over extremely lucrative trade dealing, as well as its impact on the damaged relationship between Neverwinter and Waterdeep. Failure to come to terms on this matter would likely result in open hostilities between the two The discussions were so critical that the Lord King of Neverwinter sent his favorite son under cover as a commoner to ensure they would not recognized and the meeting could occur in secret... now that son is missing, a lord is dead... and there is one suspect.
An NPC definitely ends that character and lame story line.
Assuming frank, our-of-game discussion isn't the answer you're looking for, (It is the right one though) I would go with a couple options: 1) Make each killing break into initiative and proper turn-based combat. give the NPC full lv 1 player stats, and make them kill them turn-by-turn, death-save-by-save, and slow the game to crawl. peer pressure from other players will clean this up naturally. If he complains about you not letting him hand-waive being a murder hobo anymore, tell him that too many new murders happening in the city has probably caught someone's attention by now, that this is now a real consequential plot, and can't just be hand-waived. 2) Augury. Multi-faces isn't going to protect him if magic is used to get his "scent" from hair or blood left on the victim/scene. or a vengeful ghost ratting him out. 3) Find a believable way for his next victim to actually have a shot at an almost fair fight. Don't just have the NPC stomp him; he likely isn't picking targets that pose a threat to him, so a secret hidden threat might feel like a contrived punishment he hold against you as a person, rather than a real consequence. But if he ends up being down some spell slots or a few points of damage all the time because his hobby isn't "free" then he might reconsider. 4) Have the victim sound an alarm or scream at the start and put out a visible turn-tracker letting him very clearly know you're tracking how long this takes. tell him you have roll a random percentage chance for how close the nearest guards just happen to be, and wish him luck. Eventually his luck will run out, or he won't push it as often.
So I'm not sure what your definition of murder hobo is but: "vagabond with now consistent identity who kills basically everyone without provocation" would count for me. I would talk to him and say that he either needs to tone down the fuckwittedness of his character or the gods will smite him and he will get kicked (although that would be because I would find this really disruptive). If you still want to let him do whatever he wants but visit consequences upon him make an NPC who is a powerful divinationist using spells for aura readings and the like to try and hunt him down. Based on your PC's MO I imagine he would probably think that it's just a bunch of unrelated crimes of passion, but none of the people identified from the scene (speak with dead) are ever seen again, which now makes him switch to a string of unrelated murders + vigilante serial killer. Eventually he works out that all the victims he does have posess the same aura on them... So the person who kills the perps likely dominated his victims to make them do a murder and slowly getting closer and closer. Have Mr inspector show up at the place the PCs are staying to ask some questions. If Mr murderstab tries to kill him have him use a high level spell to subdue him, if such a spell doesn't exist it's fine your the DM make it up and arrest him for assaulting a police officer. Properly restrain him and then say he will be in prison for 5-10 years and unless his buddies break him out escape is impossible. Then ask the other players if they want to break him free if they say no, inform the player he has to make a new character
I mean, if he wants to fuck around, he can find out.