Advice needed on getting a samurai more involved.

[theredknight2111]

So I'm kind of a new GM running through carrion crown with my group. We are intending to take a break at the end of book 3 and we are a session away from finishing book 2.

Our party consists of a ninja, a paladin, a samurai, a fighter, sometimes (when he can be there) a barbarian, and a wizard. The paladin gets to act holy, the fighter is happy to just fight, the wizard is taking care of all of the knowledge arcana for the party, and trying to join the Palatine Eye. The ninja gets to be stealthy and acts as the party rogue.

What can I do to get the samurai involved? I was thinking of making him the party's sole werewolf in the next book, but to do that I feel like I would be denying the rest of the characters the ability to become a werewolf.

All in all I just would really appreciate suggestions about how to make his character more involved, because as it is the player is bored to pieces in a session.

[Tausra]

What's his back story? What are the player's interests? If it doesn't interest the player then the character won't bite

[Shaun]

This is almost always a player issue, not a character issue. Some players just end up at a table and don't really like gaming. Sometimes they regret the choices they've made for a character (I find this happens a lot with "fish out of water" type concepts). Sometimes they don't find the story interesting and sometimes they don't like how the GM runs the game. Sometimes they're completely fine and that's just how they act at the table; not everyone has the same level of investment or enthusiasm.

You basically just need to talk to him out of character. Tell him you noticed he seems to be bored or disengaged and ask him why. See if there's anything you could do different. Be prepared in case he tells you something you don't want to hear, but if there is anything you can do differently to get more buy-in from him, it's the only way you'll find out. Good luck.

[Crisischild]

From a historical role-playing perspective there's a good bit of overlap between a samurai and a paladin. They're both basically knights. Martial prowess, but also immensely respected by society as well as the ruling class. They both smash and do face things. So it's up to the samurai player to differentiate themselves from the paladin.