That is a 'chicken and egg' question, Jvt. The slugs, allegedly, find the pellets to be tasty so possibly are attracted to them. I only use them in the greenhouse where I know I get visits from snails and mice.

Yes you attracting slugs: they go for the cereal like smell of the pellets over everything else. You therefore put them at the edge of your border, away from the plants. The slime and dead/dying slugs is not that pleasant.

I used them last year for the first time along with practically everyone else on the allotment as they were a slug/snail explosion due the wet summer. These pellets can also damage other wildlife and I would only use as a last resort you could try nematodes but it’s expensive and they is a debate as to whether it works. If you want a physical barrier then I would use copper tape whenever possible or you could try old fashioned beer traps.

Heres a good tip for you, i tried this a few years back on the allotment and it did seem to work quite well, and that is chopped up Lavender and Rosemarry which i sprinkled round the base of the french beans, i do have quite a lot of lavender and rosemarry that which does help, as we know these two shrubs are never affected by slugs/snails so the powerfull scent seems to keep them at bay.

I find beer traps kill lots of beneficial insects like Ground Beetles. Never seen slug pellets kill anything else. The level of poison in them is so small Hedgehogs would need to eat something like 10,000 poisoned ones to die and Hedgehogs do not like slugs that much.