I know a player is cheating, what do I do as DM?

[Hedoaen UrdWed]

Here's my problem.
I know that at least one of my players is cheating, possibly 2.
The first took more damage than he has hit points (something I realised after the game when collecting the character sheets from the floor-gah, the table would have been better). He didn't fall unconcious he just kept walking around and fighting...I plan to keep track of the player's hit points and damage, but I am unsure of what to do when I spot another dicrepancy (ie: he should be dead or at the very least in negatives or maybe just unconcious at 0 hit points). Should I tell him he should be unconcious or dead and how would I go about this?
The second player never rolls below 15 on his d20. By the law of averages this just can't happen! The player hasd a habit of hiding his roll with his hand or picking up the dice to see it (I think he turns it as he picks it up to get a better number). This player rolls high when he wants and low when he wants and he knows the rules quite well (sometimes better than me and we have had issues when he hasn't taken my ruling on an issue as final).
Does anyone have any solutions or advice I could use in the next game on the weekend?

[Mirage_of_Deceit]

Kill off the one you know is cheating by making him fall into a pit and as for the guy who always rolls high I suppose you could do the same.

[Xuincherguixe]

It might be that he's expecting you to keep track of hit points.

As far as dice rolling goes, YOU'RE the one who should be rolling the dice too.

[Mirage_of_Deceit]

Well sure, you could do that if you don't enjoy drinking the blood of the innocent

[Xuincherguixe]

We'll they're cheating so you can hardly drink their innocent blood.

[Mirage_of_Deceit]

Blood, Innocent blood, what's the difference?

[Dervag]

Platelet count.

[Xuincherguixe]

Good point. Not like there's a difference in flavor anyways.

[Quietus]

Good point. Not like there's a difference in flavor anyways.

I beg to differ.

http://www.giantitp.com/comics/oots0474.html


Mmm, Gouda.

[Zincorium]

Well, there are two ways of going at it that I've found have a reasonable chance of solving the problem.

One, the obvious, confront them. If you can't bring up your concerns and have them treated seriously, then you aren't going to be able to DM with them long term. Tell them it makes you unhappy and you'd rather they play the game by the rules everyone else is. Remember to make it about you and the other players rather than some purity of the game nonsense, if they're your friends that's going to mean more.

Secondly, compensate for it/ignore it. It's a bad trend, sure, but the key point of D&D as opposed to board games or computer games is that one person cheating doesn't mean that everyone else is disadvantaged. As DM, you have almost complete control as to types of loot, encounters, and circumstances. You can make it so the person who's ignoring hit points has conditions other than death to worry about, like paralysis and sickness, while the person who fudges rolls gets worse equipment and gets (subtly) targeted by the majority of monsters. Use your influence to keep everything on an even keel, make sure the non-cheating players are happy, and you can ignore a lot.

[brian c]

First thing you should do is point out what you're noticing to each player, individually (and in private).

For the guy who too too much damage, just tell him you noticed that; maybe he thought you were keeping track, maybe he has the Diehard feat and you're forgetting it, or maybe he just added wrong. Try to be aware of how many hp each of your players has at all times, and if this happens again then you might want to take some action (ie: kill him off, or give him cursed items at least).

For the high roller, just don't let him cover the dice with his hand. I'm from the school of thought that players should roll their own dice, even for saving throws, just to give them something to do and feel involved. Tell him clearly that any die roll that you can't immediately see the result of doesn't count and must be re-rolled; that goes for everyone, whether their hand was over it or it fell of the table or whatever. Just roll your dice in the middle of the table where everyone can see. The guy might just be extraordinarily lucky, you never know. Don't come down too harshly yet.

[Thinker]

Kill off the one you know is cheating by making him fall into a pit and as for the guy who always rolls high I suppose you could do the same.

You mean the players, right?

It might be that he's expecting you to keep track of hit points.

As far as dice rolling goes, YOU'RE the one who should be rolling the dice too.

You think the DM should be rolling all the dice?

Make sure the one who should have been unconscious knows the rules about such things and keep track of it. Tell him when he goes down. Make the one who fudges rolls roll them in the open.

[ClericofPhwarrr]

Keep track of players' hit points yourself. They can keep track if they want (and should, lest they make poor tactical decisions), but your count is final.

As for the second player, have everyone roll their dice in the center of the floor/table, where everyone can see the result. If need be, you should call out the number before he picks it up and can lie about it. If he makes a fuss about it, ask him what he's worried about. ("You're not cheating, what's the problem?")

Remember that as DM you have the final call on everything. If you're sick of a player correcting you, just tell him that you're not doing it that way in your campaign/setting. He's free to adjust the rules if he DMs, after all.

[Edit:] Ninja'd!

[Rachel Lorelei]

Remember that as DM you have the final call on everything.

Uh, no. As the DM, you're running the game. You're not suddenly the owner of the gaming session. "The DM is God" is rarely a particularily helpful mentality.

[Dairun Cates]

Uh, no. As the DM, you're running the game. You're not suddenly the owner of the gaming session. "The DM is God" is rarely a particularily helpful mentality.

If by "rarely a particularly helpful mentality" you mean, "your players will lynch you in your sleep", then I wholeheartedly agree.

Seriously though, As GM, you are supposed to remain mostly impartial. Don't directly confront them about it, but calmly and rationally bring up the HP thing. As for the dice rolling, he could be lucky, but it's best to find a way to check around the issue. A pretty good one is to have people roll in a dice cup face down on the table. You can use the excuse of dice falling off the table, and it puts him in a scenario where he has to reveal rolls to the entire table.

[Raum]

1. Talk to them, not the public.

[Seffbasilisk]

Uh, no. As the DM, you're running the game. You're not suddenly the owner of the gaming session. "The DM is God" is rarely a particularily helpful mentality.

She makes a very valid point. It's a cooperative storytelling game, key word cooperative.

I'd advise taking the one who took too much damage aside and speaking to him about it, then have everyone every few turns in combat let you know thier HP (also helps with fudging so you don't kill the weaker ones)

As for rolling dice, keep yours behind the screen (so you can fudge if need be), but all others must be visible, and if you don't see the roll, it doesn't count, and re-roll.

[PMDM]

Here's an easy solution.

1) Ask the player his HP count every 5 minutes.
PC: Why do you keep asking me that?
DM: Why do you keep cheating?
2) New die rules. Let the die stand. Never pick it up, until the die number is called out.

[Xuincherguixe]

You think the DM should be rolling all the dice?

Well, okay, maybe not all the time. But unless you're reasonably confident in the trustworthiness of players then yeah.

It may be that it's being done over instant messenger. And there are no actual dice. I was in a situation like this for awhile. I think if we had been cheating the DM would have noticed.


Still, one of the reasons why it pays to use a client with a built in dice roller.

[Matthew]

Don't allow them to monitor their own Hit Points. Do that yourself, you don't even need them to know how much Damage they have taken. Implement a "if I don't see it, it doesn't count" policy. As Raum says, though, this is a trust issue and needs to be dealt with 'in house' if it gets much worse.

[Dervag]

Don't allow them to monitor their own Hit Points. Do that yourself, you don't even need them to know how much Damage they have taken.

Yes, you do, unless you really really enjoy screwing the party over.

How seriously injured a character is would be something that the character should know, just as they know roughly how strong they are and what kind of armor they're wearing.

You can keep track, but it's pathological DMing not to tell them, especially if they can't be expected to know how much damage the monsters are dealing on a hit.

[Dairun Cates]

Honestly extreme measures should really only be taken when you're 100% sure the players are cheating intentionally. There's still a shadow of a reasonable doubt, and while you're probably right, the players that aren't cheating will start to resent you for your attitude.

[Matthew]

Yes, you do, unless you really really enjoy screwing the party over.

How seriously injured a character is would be something that the character should know, just as they know roughly how strong they are and what kind of armor they're wearing.

You can keep track, but it's pathological DMing not to tell them, especially if they can't be expected to know how much damage the monsters are dealing on a hit.

Hah, hah. I didn't mean you should use no flavour text, I meant you don't need to tell them the Hit Point total taken [i.e. "Bob, you took 7 Hit Points"]. Mind you, that's a fairly old school approach, so it might not wash.

[Chronos]

Tell him clearly that any die roll that you can't immediately see the result of doesn't count and must be re-rolled; that goes for everyone, whether their hand was over it or it fell of the table or whatever.

That just makes it even easier to cheat. He's going to keep hiding his roll, and if it's good, immediately reveal it, and if it's not, he'll wait for you to say it doesn't count. If, after you confront him privately about it and remind him you need to see the dice, he keeps doing it, then treat every roll you don't see as a natural 1. Yes, that's rough, but he can avoid it completely by following the rules of the table, and it won't take more than one call for him to learn.

The HP one is more likely to be an honest mistake, I think. He might have been expecting you to track hitpoints, or he might have just made a stupid arithmetic error. Ask him about it in private, but if he says that it was a mistake, give him the benefit of the doubt. But also start keeping track of everyones' HP, just to avoid any future problems.

[Gundato]

Also, if you don't want to kill the group, I suggest doing the following next session for hitpoint guy:

1. Go buy some sort of tokens (either check your local gaming shop, or just drop off at any arts and crafts shop and buy a sack of beads) and either print out a few of those player card things (or just use index cards). I suggest multiple colours, so that it is still viable after level one (ie. "blue is 100 HP, green is 10 HP, yellow is 1 HP, red for negative hitpoints).
2. Say that you got a really cool idea from the internet (or, if it is a group of relative newbies, that you were approached after a game and told that it is somewhat hard to keep track of all the crap with numbers alone) and that you want to try this system for keeping track of HP. It also has the added benefit of giving players something else to do/a more blatant indication of their health)
3. Make them use this.

With this, you look like a nice guy, and never have to confront said player. If it was an innocent mistake, then you are helping him. If it was more sinister, you have solved it in a way that doesn't involve causing resentment and the like.

As for die roller, do something similar:
1. Again, say you got a really cool idea/are helping someone keep track of all the dice/helping organize things by getting a piece of paper, a box, and a magic marker.
2. Draw a few squares, label them as the various dice (d20, d12, d10, etc)
3. Have everyone roll the dice into the box, and then return the dice to the appropriate box.

Again, you look like you are a nice (or weird) guy without confronting the player. By rolling into the center of the table, it means he can't hide crap.

Two (somewhat convoluted) solutions that help to avoid killing the group by offending/annoying people.

[Raum]

Yes, you do, unless you really really enjoy screwing the party over.

How seriously injured a character is would be something that the character should know, just as they know roughly how strong they are and what kind of armor they're wearing.

You can keep track, but it's pathological DMing not to tell them, especially if they can't be expected to know how much damage the monsters are dealing on a hit.

You're correct, but there is a difference between knowing how many hit points you've lost and knowing that you're "severely" injured. Mind, I don't want to be the GM tracking all the hit point totals, but it's not too hard to use a qualitative status in place of a quantitative one...I'd just prefer the player keep track and use the qualitative terms himself. It does require players you can trust though.

When it comes to cheating players, talk to them. Anything else is just gossip.

[Matthew]

Hmmn. I haven't found keeping track of HP totals to be very troubling, but I play mostly at Low to Medium Level. It's not that I don't trust the players to be honest, I just don't trust their Maths... Also, having 'crib' sheets helps me to understand how the combat is going.

[TheThan]

I think you should get a dice cup and make everyone use it. That way you’re making sure they don’t cheat you. Another thing is try to inspect his dice (discreetly) and make sure it’s not loaded or set with multiple 20s or something.

The other ideas are all good ideas (even the blood drinking ones), but I suggest if you go the bead route, don’t go the a gaming store, go to walmart (or the equivalent) or a dollar store and buy you beads there, much cheaper on the wallet.

I personally keep track of everyone’s hit points, and let them do their own book keeping, that way I know when I need to fudge dice rolls.

[ThorFluff]

Also, if you don't want to kill the group, I suggest doing the following next session for hitpoint guy:

1. Go buy some sort of tokens (either check your local gaming shop, or just drop off at any arts and crafts shop and buy a sack of beads) and either print out a few of those player card things (or just use index cards). I suggest multiple colours, so that it is still viable after level one (ie. "blue is 100 HP, green is 10 HP, yellow is 1 HP, red for negative hitpoints).
2. Say that you got a really cool idea from the internet (or, if it is a group of relative newbies, that you were approached after a game and told that it is somewhat hard to keep track of all the crap with numbers alone) and that you want to try this system for keeping track of HP. It also has the added benefit of giving players something else to do/a more blatant indication of their health)
3. Make them use this.

With this, you look like a nice guy, and never have to confront said player. If it was an innocent mistake, then you are helping him. If it was more sinister, you have solved it in a way that doesn't involve causing resentment and the like.

As for die roller, do something similar:
1. Again, say you got a really cool idea/are helping someone keep track of all the dice/helping organize things by getting a piece of paper, a box, and a magic marker.
2. Draw a few squares, label them as the various dice (d20, d12, d10, etc)
3. Have everyone roll the dice into the box, and then return the dice to the appropriate box.

Again, you look like you are a nice (or weird) guy without confronting the player. By rolling into the center of the table, it means he can't hide crap.

Two (somewhat convoluted) solutions that help to avoid killing the group by offending/annoying people.

Personally i'd keep track of the HP myself, on every one, all the time, never letting them see the number, but instead describing thier wounds as they take em.
And as for the Dice, the above idea is good, though my personal solution is that you get a felted box, and just demand that every die be tossed in there.

[Dean Fellithor]

make the gods pelt packets of Mentos at the cheaters (to death), the other characters are now featured in a Mentos Commercial.


"Mentos...the Hell-raiser"