What to do about too many 20's

[cartejos]

As a player I feel as though my die rolling sucks. Rarely hit, skills never go how I want, I roll under 10 what seems like an inordinate amount of times. My group and I all joke about this.

But recently I started DMing and threw 6 kobolds at 3 PCs and rolled 4 nat 20s in the first round. Everyone looked at me like I was cheating. This kept going all night.
PC 1: "I have 7 HP"
Me: "Kobold confirms crit for... 6 damage"
PC 1: "Well I am gonna pop my health potion, back at 9"
Me: "I rolled another threat..."
PC 2: "I still got a couple potions"
Me: "They confirmed against you too"

Two of them started to seem like they didn't want to play and the other got upset with me.
I know the Threat/Confirm system is supposed to limit the crit damage for low level stuff cause they can't confirm all the time. But is there anything else I can do when a heap of 20s pile on the table at once?

[NecroDancer]

Maybe encourage rolling dice in the open.

[KillianHawkeye]

That's the game, dude. As we say at my table, you live and die by the dice. :smallwink:

That being said, irregular groups of results happen in random chance and, statistically speaking, they even out with the other possible results over the long-term.

[Troacctid]

This is why I don't use a DM screen. Some things need to be seen to be believed.

If you're attached to your screen, then consider either fudging the confirmation roll or just lifting the screen up to reveal the die result rather than announcing it verbally.

[Crake]

or just lifting the screen up to reveal the die result rather than announcing it verbally.

This right here. Make sure after you roll your dice, you keep your hands visibly away from the dice (not in view, just make sure your posture indicates your hands are away from your dice), then if players don't believe the roll, you can lift up the screen and show them, keeping your hands nice and far from the dice to guarantee you're not fudging. Either that, or yeah, just roll out in the open. When it comes to that final "last chance to live" moment, I usually pick up my dice and roll it in front of the players, so a) If they die, they'll know I didn't fudge it so they die, but equally as important b) so if they live, they'll know I didn't fudge it so they live.

In my experience as a player, feeling like you were saved by nothing but the DM's generosity feels pretty bad. More often than not I'd rather have died and dealt with the consequences, rather than survived in such an unworthy fashion.

[Elkad]

Roll in the open. Let it happen.

That said, a few things I do.

-con is death, not -10. Gives more buffer HP at low levels.

at low levels (1&2) don't give mobs high-crit weapons. Or even high damage ones.
Goblins with clubs doing 1d4,20,x2 are almost always survivable, even if the dice are hot. Worst-case they knock someone out. Even a CdG just means a DC15ish Fort save, not automatic death.

Split your encounter into a primary group, and some Round3 reinforcements. If the party is doing poorly, don't fudge the dice, just don't have the reinforcements (or less of them) arrive. (Note this also means if the party stomps the first group, you can add MORE reinforcements)

I pull the gloves off about L4. By L7 I've got brass knuckles on.

And remember, the dice will turn the other way. When someone rolls a x4 crit on the first swing vs your lovingly constructed BBEG, let them have the epic moment. Nevermind your carefully crafted plans. Let them throw high-fives around yelling "Boom! Headshot!"

[daremetoidareyo]

I don't let mooks crit. Including the PCs hired help. You need to be plot important to crit.

[Doctor Awkward]

First some notes on statistics:

"Critical" systems, both hits and fumbles, disproportionately work for the enemies more than they do the players.

Consider your party: 3 low-level players against 6 kobolds.

If everyone is a melee character, then on each of their turns the player has a 5% chance of rolling a critical hit.
For the party's entire round, there is a %14.3 chance of one of them rolling a critical hit

On the kobolds turn, they get twice as many attacks for a 26.5% chance of rolling a critical hit.

This translates into critical fumbles as well. Enemies have a statistically higher chance of getting a critical fumble. The reason why they are so bad for the players is because at the end of the combat the monsters are usually dead so their penalties no longer matter, while the players penalties keep stacking up.

As to what you can do about this, there are two schools of thought:

Method 1 is the dice fall where they fall. If someone dies to a critical then they die. If the players shoot the big boss in the face with a bow and he dies in round one that's the game. The disadvantage of this method is that it subjects the narrative to the whims of luck and chance. The advantage is that every single roll of the dice is exciting and can change the game in a moment.

Method 2 is the dice rolls suit he narrative. You hide the results and adjudicate the results based on whatever suits the story best. If you want a player to live, the bad guy "rolls a 1". The advantage of this method is that the players will get much more invested in their characters knowing they are likely to last the story. The downside is that dice rolls are largely trivial, because players know if you've fudged the results once you could be doing it at any time.

Neither method is better than the other, and most tables use some mix of both. It all depends on what works best for your group.

[Thurbane]

I often find I roll way more natural 20s as a DM than a player...

[Elkad]

I often find I roll way more natural 20s as a DM than a player...

I roll far more dice as the DM. Double or triple what an individual player does, so at least 10x as much as the rest of the table. So of course I see more 20s.

[Aetis]

If you are not comfortable with bunch of nat 20's, then just replace some of them with nat 1's.

I understand that some players prefer to play without being "rescued by the DM", but dying and rerolling characters can be a hassle, so...

[Knaight]

Just roll the dice in the open - in my experience that mostly gets people joking about how now you can roll high, if you're one of those players who has had an extended unlucky streak (I've seen similar jokes crop up when playing roll under systems).

[Thurbane]

I roll far more dice as the DM. Double or triple what an individual player does, so at least 10x as much as the rest of the table. So of course I see more 20s.

Even accounting for that, the 20s seem to be disproportionate. May be perception bias.

Have I missed something - did the OP say he was rolling in secret?

[Zombulian]

I don't let mooks crit. Including the PCs hired help. You need to be plot important to crit.

Heh I kinda like this.

[KillianHawkeye]

In my experience as a player, feeling like you were saved by nothing but the DM's generosity feels pretty bad. More often than not I'd rather have died and dealt with the consequences, rather than survived in such an unworthy fashion.

I agree pretty strongly with this. In my group, PC deaths are predominantly caused by splitting the party or by poor combat strategy or just plain taking a big risk that doesn't pan out. In other words, pure overconfidence.

Characters have to face death all the time. If my character meets a death that I totally earned myself, I don't want to be pitied and I don't want to be saved by the DM feeling bad for me. Especially not when I can legit get raised from the dead.

I understand that D&D is a game and a game that you can't possibly lose gets boring pretty fast.

[flappeercraft]

I don't let mooks crit. Including the PCs hired help. You need to be plot important to crit.

Plot armor is bad enough, now plot weapons are being distributed too. Are you kidding me.

I also recommend rolling dice in the open. Another good idea is to use digital dice rollers where results can't be fudged so you can show your players the screen if they don't believe you.

[johnbragg]

So your game and your planning is being thrown off by your monsters rolling insanely well.

A few ideas to toss out there, partially sparked by the guy who doesn't let mooks crit.

1. Players Roll All the Dice. The kobolds don't roll attacks, they just attack. The PC rolls defense (d20 + AC modifiers vs 10 + kobold's attack bonus).

2. Mooks roll 3d6. Much less swingy, but you still get to roll dice and have some amount of chance. A little more elegant than just arbitarily denying mooks the ability to crit (or fumble). Ordinary Mook is not going to do anything exceptional, either good or bad. (Don't act like you aren't using Natural 1's as fumbles, either)

[Zanos]

Hide modifiers, not die results. I roll everything in the open so there's never a question.

[Thurbane]

As a player I feel as though my die rolling sucks. Rarely hit, skills never go how I want, I roll under 10 what seems like an inordinate amount of times. My group and I all joke about this.

But recently I started DMing and threw 6 kobolds at 3 PCs and rolled 4 nat 20s in the first round. Everyone looked at me like I was cheating. This kept going all night.
PC 1: "I have 7 HP"
Me: "Kobold confirms crit for... 6 damage"
PC 1: "Well I am gonna pop my health potion, back at 9"
Me: "I rolled another threat..."
PC 2: "I still got a couple potions"
Me: "They confirmed against you too"

Two of them started to seem like they didn't want to play and the other got upset with me.
I know the Threat/Confirm system is supposed to limit the crit damage for low level stuff cause they can't confirm all the time. But is there anything else I can do when a heap of 20s pile on the table at once?

There doesn't seem to be any mention of hiding the dice or not rolling in the open?

Or am I missing something obvious?

[Telonius]

Have you checked to see if the die isn't worn down on one side? After a lot of use even the best ones start to get slightly skewed. If that's not it, just remember that some poor schmo is rolling a series of natural 1's as the BBEG proceeds to completely whiff all the attacks against the players.

[RNightstalker]

As a player I feel as though my die rolling sucks. Rarely hit, skills never go how I want, I roll under 10 what seems like an inordinate amount of times. My group and I all joke about this.

But recently I started DMing and threw 6 kobolds at 3 PCs and rolled 4 nat 20s in the first round. Everyone looked at me like I was cheating. This kept going all night.
PC 1: "I have 7 HP"
Me: "Kobold confirms crit for... 6 damage"
PC 1: "Well I am gonna pop my health potion, back at 9"
Me: "I rolled another threat..."
PC 2: "I still got a couple potions"
Me: "They confirmed against you too"

Two of them started to seem like they didn't want to play and the other got upset with me.
I know the Threat/Confirm system is supposed to limit the crit damage for low level stuff cause they can't confirm all the time. But is there anything else I can do when a heap of 20s pile on the table at once?

I KNOW EXACTLY HOW YOU FEEL...I started rolling three attacks at a time when my dervish got up to eight attacks in a round to save time...the total on three d20’s was FOUR!
Ironically I also started DMing again but the DM luck hasn’t returned...last time I DMed a long time ago I had to fudge stuff because a) I wasn’t good and b) half the party would’ve been killed in round two.

All that being said, there’s been a variety of good responses. If you don’t roll in the open I wouldn’t start now. If your dice are just shy of performing in front of others and your rolls suck again, that encounter you mentioned above will make you look real shady. Sometimes in poker you show the cards, sometimes you muck and keep them wondering. I would say your best bet is to show the next few times you get a bunch of 20’s so the players know you’re not bluffing or trying to get even.

[Fizban]

Have you checked to see if the die isn't worn down on one side? After a lot of use even the best ones start to get slightly skewed. If that's not it, just remember that some poor schmo is rolling a series of natural 1's as the BBEG proceeds to completely whiff all the attacks against the players.
I hear you can check your dice by floating them in some salt water. Been meaning to try it on mine 'cause I'm pretty sure my d6's are heavy on the 6's.

[Saintheart]

I hear you can check your dice by floating them in some salt water. Been meaning to try it on mine 'cause I'm pretty sure my d6's are heavy on the 6's.

"Been meaning".

Oh surrrrrrrrrre you have.

:smallbiggrin: :smallbiggrin:

[Fizban]

Hey, I offered to let the other players with the bad luck use them as well, and then DM had refused to take my suggestion of point buy in the first place. And that character barely used any d6's, free Maximize tends to obsolete them.

But seriously, I'm pretty sure almost all d6's are weighted to the 6, 'cause pips or script, both cut more plastic out. Unless you have super precision dice or something. Standard cheap d6's are probably all a bit high.


Eh, no reason to make a whole new post but also:

But recently I started DMing and threw 6 kobolds at 3 PCs
Incidentally, this is a pretty big potential problem even without the 20's. At low levels, particularly 1st, it doesn't matter how low the fractional CR is. Even a pile of normal rats can just AC tank through a bunch of attacks and get a bad number of hits in, especially against a small number of PCs. Kobolds may be advertised as CR 1/4, but anything that can roll attacks has a minimum amount of threat- that CR value is a lie. (Also, assuming the PCs were 1st level thats an EL "1.5" encounter vs a party of only "0.75" level compared to the expected 4 members). Without a Sleep or Burning Hands clearing multiple targets efficiently, that encounter ought to be pretty dang dangerous. Crits are just part of the ride.

[Crake]

There doesn't seem to be any mention of hiding the dice or not rolling in the open?

Or am I missing something obvious?

Well, if he was rolling out in the open, his players wouldn't be able to disbelieve the result of the roll, right? Thus he MUST be hiding the dice.

[Doctor Awkward]

I hear you can check your dice by floating them in some salt water. Been meaning to try it on mine 'cause I'm pretty sure my d6's are heavy on the 6's.


https://youtu.be/VI3N4Qg-JZM

[cartejos]

Actually, I don't use a screen. I roll them out in the open. It's not that the players don't believe me, it's that they're getting upset because of how often they would see the 20s. It just seemed to happen more than once a round.

[Thurbane]

Well, if he was rolling out in the open, his players wouldn't be able to disbelieve the result of the roll, right? Thus he MUST be hiding the dice.


Actually, I don't use a screen. I roll them out in the open. It's not that the players don't believe me, it's that they're getting upset because of how often they would see the 20s. It just seemed to happen more than once a round.

Same has happened to me as a DM. Even the most reasonable of players can take it personally if the DM rolls a barrage of 20s against them (we roll in the open too). I have had players beg or demand that I change dice.

[Elkad]

I have a 40mm-ish metal d20 a former player nicknamed "Big Thumper" for the sound it makes.

The players fear it. And I don't even think it's biased. It's just that I reserve it for special occasions. And the occasional bout of mini-crushing if it gets out of control.

[liquidformat]

Have you checked to see if the die isn't worn down on one side? After a lot of use even the best ones start to get slightly skewed. If that's not it, just remember that some poor schmo is rolling a series of natural 1's as the BBEG proceeds to completely whiff all the attacks against the players.

^^^ that would be me, I really only get useless 20's. We switched over to rolling a 1 outside of combat not being a auto fail just adding -20 mod to try and give me a fighting chance.

Also start suggesting players start adding a number to the end of their character's name each time they die and claim it to be a identical twin, triplet, quadruplet... and so on of the original. Turn the competition to see who can get the highest number into part of the game!(that person gets the participation metal... only that person!)

[mabriss lethe]

Remember that you don't necessarily have to use it for an attack. If you roll a whole bunch of nat 20s at once, have some of your mooks do something other than attack. Maybe make them impromptu hide checks, or aid another actions, whatever. Feel free to adjust the flow of action in mid combat. it makes things both more cinematic and more controllable. They still do something awesome to hinder the PCs, but it isn't directly to HP. One thing I also do to speed up combat is that I will preroll a bunch of d20 results and write them on a notecard. Every time I need to roll for something, I just check the first unused roll off the list and go to the next one. I know in advance if a string of really good or really bad rolls comes up and I can either fudge there or plan my rounds accordingly, but I never know what any particular roll will be used on until it happens, since a lot of my rolls are also in reaction to what the players are doing, and players are notorious for going off the rails.