Immunity to fudged dice

[valadil]

This is inspired by Immunity to Rule Zero.

One of the bigger disagreements I've seen in forums is whether or not the GM should alter the results of dice to fix the story (for values of "fix" equal to repair/make better as well as to determine or decide the story in advance). I don't want another argument thread about the merits or horrors of fudging, but...

If you were presented with a game where you could choose the GM's fudging policy for your character, would you a) play in this game, potentially with people whose characters had a different fudging policy, and b) what would you pick?

By fudging policy for your character, I mean that it goes both ways. If the GM crits on you 4 times in a row, the fudger would change some of those in non-lethal hits while the purist would die. But if you tried an instant kill spell on the BBEG in the first round, the fudger would have his spell resisted, but the purist would have a chance at cutting short the climax of the game.

[Killer Angel]

Interesting, but..
To have a chance of not be detrimental to the game, fudging must be veiled in a cloak of mistery.
Once you are certain that the DM will fudge for someone, the fun is spoiled.

[kyoryu]

Fudged dice are generally used if the DM has a pre-determined result in mind.

In which case, why roll the dice? While I'm pretty old school, and dice-fudging by the DM is about as old school as it gets, I've revised my opinion.

If you're fudging dice to protect players from the consequences of their actions, then, in my opinion, you're cheating players of some of the fun of the game.

If you're fudging dice because you've put the players in a no-win scenario, then you should rethink your scenarios - players should have enough agency that if they're in a "no-win" scenario, it's either due to their actions, or is escapable in some way.

If you're fudging to force a particular dramatic arc, then you're too attached to that arc and are, again, forcing the game a certain way and robbing your players of agency.

At any rate, I've reached the point where I do my rolls in the open. I like it better that way.

[valadil]

Interesting, but..
To have a chance of not be detrimental to the game, fudging must be veiled in a cloak of mistery.
Once you are certain that the DM will fudge for someone, the fun is spoiled.

I agree, but I'm anti-fudging. I've had players complain to me that I should fudge more often, even when I was fudging every other roll. It's not how I like to play, but some people want to win and the concept of having to earn their win stresses them out. But who am I to say they shouldn't play that way if it's what they want?

[kyoryu]

I agree, but I'm anti-fudging. I've had players complain to me that I should fudge more often, even when I was fudging every other roll. It's not how I like to play, but some people want to win and the concept of having to earn their win stresses them out. But who am I to say they shouldn't play that way if it's what they want?

My solution is simple: They can play that way with another DM :D

[Rallicus]

I've had players complain to me that I should fudge more often, even when I was fudging every other roll.

Wait, what? Every other roll? Why the heck were your players using dice anyway, they may as well have just done some sort of freeform roleplaying.

I don't fudge my rolls. Ever. I may throw the players a bone if they've got bad luck on their side (ie: a non-intelligent creature being easily taunted by another player, or an enemy taking a full round to boast about how bad they're beating the party), but I never fudge rolls. Oh, you got hit by a max damage 3x crit? Big freakin' deal, if your character is dead then hope for a raise dead or roll up a new character.

So I guess what I'm saying is: my players would never have to worry about a feat like this, because fudged rolls never happen in my games.

[valadil]

So I guess what I'm saying is: my players would never have to worry about a feat like this, because fudged rolls never happen in my games.

Every other roll may have been an exaggeration, but it was still the height of my fudginess as a GM. I've since reformed.

In that case then, would you fudge for a player who wanted you to? I'm mostly interested in what would happen with a group of mixed fudgers rather than the GM setting the policy.

[demigodus]

I prefer not to have the rolls fudged, or the monsters' stats/abilities changed mid-combat to accommodate the PC's. I have had a character I worked nearly a dozen hours making die in round one of the first combat of the session, about half an hour into game because of this before. Yes it sucked, but I prefer to have a chance of failure, even horrible failure, then to go into an encounter knowing victory is guaranteed.

Naturally, I hate having stuff fudged against me, as I hate it being fudged in my favor. If we are pulling out the dice, the results should be random, not predetermined by plot/DM fiat.

[Killer Angel]

I agree, but I'm anti-fudging.

I recognize some of the reasons behind the pro-fudging.
IMO, the need to fudge can be eliminated by luck points, used both by players (avoiding death due to critical, and so on) and the DM (avoiding a failed save by the BBEG in the first round). Of course, you must be careful to not run out of luck points, otherwise...

[Venusaur]

I have, but only because I was playing with newbies. Way easier if they don't get killed on their first session.

[Rhaegar14]

I will admit, as a DM, I do fudge the dice from time to time, but only when I feel I have to do it to keep the game fun. For instance, I threw a CR 11-12 Green Dragon at a 6-man party of level 8 PCs on a boat, thinking they could take it. Oh how wrong I was; I actually ended up having to pull a deus ex machina to save the campaign from a total wipe, because they just couldn't fight the thing.

I never fudge rolls to protect my NPCs though; only to help the players.

[kyoryu]

I will admit, as a DM, I do fudge the dice from time to time, but only when I feel I have to do it to keep the game fun. For instance, I threw a CR 11-12 Green Dragon at a 6-man party of level 8 PCs on a boat, thinking they could take it. Oh how wrong I was; I actually ended up having to pull a deus ex machina to save the campaign from a total wipe, because they just couldn't fight the thing.

I never fudge rolls to protect my NPCs though; only to help the players.

And that's the kind of scenario where it might make sense to fudge dice - you've removed all agency from the characters. They have no way to choose whether or not to engage the dragon, and no way to escape the combat. Since they didn't make the "fatal" decision, it's somewhat unfair to ask them to live with the consequences.

(If, of course, "take boat through dragon-infested waters" was but one of many options, then the point doesn't quite stand).

[Othesemo]

Fudging is a useful tool that should be used only sparingly. The dice don't lie, but sometimes, they're just flat out wrong.

[Vitruviansquid]

My players know that I never fudge rolls.

Even when I'm fudging them.

That's the point of fudging, isn't it? >_>

[137beth]

And that's the kind of scenario where it might make sense to fudge dice - you've removed all agency from the characters. They have no way to choose whether or not to engage the dragon, and no way to escape the combat. Since they didn't make the "fatal" decision, it's somewhat unfair to ask them to live with the consequences.

(If, of course, "take boat through dragon-infested waters" was but one of many options, then the point doesn't quite stand).

I agree. Fudging is a sort of deus ex machina that you can pull off without alerting your players. But it is only appropriate to use if you made a mistake. Any other time, and fudging is cheap.

[DrBurr]

I fudge dice at least once a session if I'm DMing mostly because I have traitor dice which like to crit when I'm behind the screen and miss when I'm a player, I've actually rolled 4 crits at once so to keep my player's from accusing me of fudging in my favor I usually just reroll the dice or declare them misses

Other than that I will be nice occasionally and fudge a roll to not take out a player whose has been incredibly unlucky, and I do tend to fudge them if the Fighter is ripping through the line to quickly

Really I just try and keep the game fun and getting slaughtered, feeling cheated or being bored are all things I try and prevent from occurring at my Table

[Doug Lampert]

Every other roll may have been an exaggeration, but it was still the height of my fudginess as a GM. I've since reformed.

In that case then, would you fudge for a player who wanted you to? I'm mostly interested in what would happen with a group of mixed fudgers rather than the GM setting the policy.

I would not. The PRO fudgers in this thread are unanimous that fudging only works when its secret. How can it be secret if it's at player request?

Never mind the fact that most GMs are probably a LOT worse at keeping fudging a secret than they think they are. Everyone knows obvious fudging is bad because we've all seen obvious fudging in action, this despite the fact that appearantly every single GM that fudges is an expert at hiding it from his players!

IMAO the best way to not let anyone know you fudge dice is to roll in the open and to not fudge. Given unanimus agreement that the game works better when the players think there's no dice fudging going on, and given that I can run a game fudge free, I simply don't see the temptation to fudge. Roll in the open and take the dice as they lay.

If I need the cavalry to come over the hill badly enough I can often arrange that without cheating at dice, I control the entire frigging world except the PCs, if I can't manage a small random element in actions directly involving the PCs then it seems to me I'm doing a pretty poor job of it. Similarly if my BBEG goes down at the first shot then maybe he wasn't so big and bad in the first place, I'll do better next time, I'm not the side limited to finite resources.

DougL

[Lord_Gareth]

I am anti-fudging, but I'd have to disagree with rolling the dice in the open, Doug, for one reason - secret rolls. I use a soft, cushy dice roller that muffles the sound of the dice hitting it so I can make secret checks for spotting clues, surprise, enemy attacks from ambush, etc.

[Doug Lampert]

I fudge dice at least once a session if I'm DMing mostly because I have traitor dice which like to crit when I'm behind the screen and miss when I'm a player, I've actually rolled 4 crits at once so to keep my player's from accusing me of fudging in my favor I usually just reroll the dice or declare them misses

Other than that I will be nice occasionally and fudge a roll to not take out a player whose has been incredibly unlucky, and I do tend to fudge them if the Fighter is ripping through the line to quickly

Really I just try and keep the game fun and getting slaughtered, feeling cheated or being bored are all things I try and prevent from occurring at my Table

You know, two of my players still regularly discuss a game decades ago with another GM where a "routine" patrol encounter resulted in a TPK of a long running group due to a series of GM crits and PC fumbles (old Runequest was the system). They think it was an aweinspiring session and remember it over a decade after that GM left town.

I'll bet they're glad he didn't know that rolling in the open and letting that happen was a bad thing. Even at the time, it's not a catastrophy, roll up new characters and start a new campaign.

[kyoryu]

I am anti-fudging, but I'd have to disagree with rolling the dice in the open, Doug, for one reason - secret rolls. I use a soft, cushy dice roller that muffles the sound of the dice hitting it so I can make secret checks for spotting clues, surprise, enemy attacks from ambush, etc.

Yeah, the only dice I roll in the open are ones where the players know exactly why I'm rolling - combat checks, things like that. "The orc's swinging at you" is hardly a secret.

I also roll dice on occasion for no reason, and mutter over the results.

[Lord_Gareth]

You know, two of my players still regularly discuss a game decades ago with another GM where a "routine" patrol encounter resulted in a TPK of a long running group due to a series of GM crits and PC fumbles (old Runequest was the system). They think it was an aweinspiring session and remember it over a decade after that GM left town.

I'll bet they're glad he didn't know that rolling in the open and letting that happen was a bad thing. Even at the time, it's not a catastrophy, roll up new characters and start a new campaign.

My first character, WAAAAAY back in 2e, was a bard that managed to die 18 times in the span of one IC month. Still one of my favorite characters ever.

[Doug Lampert]

I am anti-fudging, but I'd have to disagree with rolling the dice in the open, Doug, for one reason - secret rolls. I use a soft, cushy dice roller that muffles the sound of the dice hitting it so I can make secret checks for spotting clues, surprise, enemy attacks from ambush, etc.

Bah humbug. The ambush or suprise they'll know about in seconds, it's the characters not the players who are surprised.

As for clues, if your players can't keep out of character knowledge separate then just have them roll every ten minutes or so and say "you don't see anything" till they learn better. About the third time the villian gets away or has a perfect ambush set because they were taking 20 searching the wrong hallway they'll figure out that this isn't good. Keeping out of character knowledge separate is a useful skill for a roleplayer.

If something MUST be secret then simply sit there rolling dice every few minutes and don't tell them what its for or even if it is for anything. Or ask everyone for a set of three perception checks at the start of the session and use them as appropriate.

[Katana_Geldar]

I sometimes fudge to save my players, but the one time where I fudged to avoid a character death the player insisted on a reroll.

He lived, as I rolled my damage badly. As all I had to do was roll a 2 to hit him.

[Asheram]

This is a point where... it all depends on the DM.
If I trust the DM, then he can do all the fudging of dice and Rule Zero as he wants, as long as he has the players entertainment in mind.

[NichG]

Here's a type of fudging that hasn't been mentioned: fudging to avoid boring results. For example, monster treasure. The trick here is that the DM could just say exactly what the treasure of an encounter is, but wants to add some randomness to spice things up with the chance of a weird item they wouldn't think of otherwise. If the dice keep saying 'no magic items', or 'another +1 sword', the DM may well fudge the result and reroll till they get something they consider interesting. This is sort of a different situation since its not like there are rules that say that all treasure must be generated randomly. Because its a variable outcome roll, it also lives between 'if you had a result in mind why did you roll' and 'take what the dice say', since you're basically using the dice to select from the filtered list of 'interesting, randomly generated item'.

Another example would be effects that teleport the target to 'a random plane' (accompanied with a chart).

But since we've brought up the point of 'if you had a result in mind don't roll', would people be satisfied with that policy taken literally? Namely, if the DM just said 'I'm not going to roll for this because it I don't want you to die', or alternately 'I'm not going to roll for this because I want you guys to go to Acheron and this is a convenient way to get you there'. For me at least, I'd rather not know when the DM is fudging since that way I can suspend disbelief and come away with a story of 'wow, that was a ridiculous sequence of events!'.

[cfalcon]

DM can't fudge dice. The DM can say anything happens and it does. Mostly you use the dice to determine this, but you are by no means bound to it.

[TheThan]

I’ve always felt that it’s alright to fudge the dice when the DM makes a big mistake, such as miscalculating the difficulty of an encounter, or just plain hot dice. Especially at low levels, players characters tend to be very squishy, so that is more than likely when you’ll end up doing most of the dice fudging. Really though, a lot of fudging comes down to the scenario. That’s a pretty hard thing to figure out, when dice fudging is “good” and “bad”.

My opinion is that “good” dice fudging only happens to keep the campaign rolling. For instance, to avoid a TPK, or to get the re-occurring BBEG away from the players so he can show up later (and even then, sometimes when the pcs get the BBEG, then they’ve got him and you’ll need to work something else out later), that sort of thing. Bad dice fudging is when the DM does it to “protect” his players, keep his players on edge (fudging missed attacks into hits) or to keep them on the DM’s plot tracks.

I understand that a lot of people are anti-fudging, they have their reasons. I personally view it as just another tool in the DM’s arsenal, a tool that just like any other, needs to be wielded with precision and care.

[Rallicus]

In that case then, would you fudge for a player who wanted you to? I'm mostly interested in what would happen with a group of mixed fudgers rather than the GM setting the policy.

No, I wouldn't. Mainly because I don't want certain rules to apply to only certain players. I guess I can see where you're coming from, though. Some people undoubtedly want to develop their characters and good/bad dice rolls get in the way of that.

That's just not how I run games, unfortunately for those players. Several people have expressed interest in being part of my games and have laid out extensive descriptions and intended decisions for their characters, even before being accepted (one of which was the catfolk equivalent of Drizzt, in terms of mary-sue-ness). I told them how I run my games and they dropped out, which is fine by me.

Fudging just once ruins the entire point of even having dice. Why have them as a neutral factor in your storytelling if you can adjust it to suit your needs whenever you want?

I've been fortunate enough to gather up players who aren't afraid to have their characters die. During a near-TPK a few weeks back, I remember them discussing casually how they were all going to die. Like it was no big deal. One player even had a new character in mind.

Luckily the proceeding damage rolls were low and the enemy even rolled a fumble (1 and then a miss on a character's AC), so that gave the group just enough opportunity to drop him. It was lucky.

Had I fudged the dice, the outcome would have already been predetermined and, as far as I'm concerned, the whole thing would be pointless and stupid.

It's actually a little bit discouraging to see how many people fudge rolls in their games. I wouldn't want to be a part of these games personally, but that's just me, and I seem to be in the minority here.

[cfalcon]

You are probably assuming a "no-failure" environment, or one where the DM forces the plot to go according to a certain path and the PCs ultimately can't change it. I doubt very much that is all that common. I would also not want to play in an environment where I couldn't die to hot DM dice, and as a DM I don't pull punches.

That being said, on principle, you simply can't fudge dice as DM. It's your world.

[Rallicus]

That being said, on principle, you simply can't fudge dice as DM. It's your world.

I think that's a horrible way to look at it. I don't think rule 0 should apply in any way, shape or form to dice rolls. I feel that dice rolls should be a separate and untouchable by both the players and the DM.

Again, that's just me.