Fudging is not your friend

Umbran · Oct 9, 2012

Ladies and Gentlemen

Start making it personal, and we start removing people from the thread. Watch it.

I suggest *EVERYONE* consider if what they are typing is clearly stating "in my experience" as opposed to "I think anyone who does other than my personal preference is wrongitywrongwron, with wrong sauce".

S'mon · Oct 9, 2012

Hobo said:
I can't speak for all GMs. That's only how I ever use it. And that's all that I've seen called for in this thread so far as well.

You can take it that other people are also discussing their own personal experience, not accusing you.

Cor Azer · Oct 9, 2012

FireLance said:
(And, as previously mentioned, my favored approach is never to rule out the possibility of fudging, but to try and set things up so that you never have to fudge in the first place. )

Ditto

Except the "previously mentioned" part.

I have all sorts of tools at my disposal, even if they don't get used. Throwing it away seems so... Final.

JRRNeiklot · Oct 9, 2012

Stormonu said:
Don't try to twist my words, please.

Sometimes I don't agree with the results of the dice. I will change them when that occurs, and I will not be dissuaded otherwise.
[/COLOR][/B]

If a possible result is unacceptable, it shouldn't be possible to begin with.

Desdichado · Oct 9, 2012

S'mon said:
You can take it that other people are also discussing their own personal experience, not accusing you.

Interpreted in that light, the pro and con sides of this discussion are talking completely past each other, and not to each other at all. I interpret it that we're talking about the merits and problems of the concept more in general, since... well, since otherwise, all we're doing is telling gaming stories to each other.

I don't feel personally accused of anything. At the same time, creating an exaggerated position to illustrate the supposed problems in a practice isn't very convincing. Neither is a false causality, an "if X then Y must happen", nor a false motivation, "if X happens it must be because of Y." I couldn't care less if you or JustinAlexander, or anyone else, thought I was the most infamous railroad tycoon since Cornelius Vanderbilt, that doesn't change the fact that associating fudging and the GM's Precious Plot syndrome is not an association that stands up under any serious scrutiny.

I also think it's worthwhile in a discussion about the merits (or not) of fudging that it's worth pointing out that bad examples of fudging gone wrong is more a condemnation of doing something badly than it is of doing it at all in the first place. I can come up with all kinds of personal examples from my own gaming "career," or the stories I've heard from my group, of things that went badly. Often, so badly that they proved to be campaign enders, and we had to start over with something else just to get away from the egregious mistake. But that isn't a condemnation of the practice, generally, but of doing it badly.

Because otherwise, my short-lived Dark•Matter game where the PCs got a hold of an alien superlaser and used it to draw a gigantic image of a hand giving the earth the finger on the surface of the moon could be seen as a condemnation of the idea of a sandbox-style game. Fer instance.

Of course, you could simply strongly prefer a game where fudging is not tolerated. I can hardly gainsay that, because that's your preference. But when you start to say things like fudging is what happens when the GM wants to protect his plot, then I'll have to say that no it isn't. Or at least, no it isn't necessarily. There could be all kinds of reasons to fudge. In my experience my GMs don't really have a plot, regardless of propensity or not to fudge anyway.

Umbran · Oct 9, 2012

JRRNeiklot said:
If a possible result is unacceptable, it shouldn't be possible to begin with.

This weekend, Space X launched the first commercial cargo capsule to the ISS. They had a malfunction in one of the rocket's engines, and it shut down. The rocket recalculated on the fly, got on a new, slightly different trajectory, and continued its mission.

If they had not built in processes and tools for unpredicted failures, the mission would likely have been a loss.

We do not live in a magical world where all possible results are foreseen - or their impact in-context is understood until you get to the context. For those for whom this is an issue, there are tools to help manage stuff.

If your rocket is super-good, so it never fails in unexpected ways that you don't want, then you don't need the tools. That's awesome.

But that's *YOUR* rocket. Allow room for others to have other designs that need different tools.

Alaxk Knight of Galt · Oct 9, 2012

Umbran said:
If your rocket is super-good, so it never fails in unexpected ways that you don't want, then you don't need the tools. That's awesome.

My rocket never fails. And yes, it is awesome.

Crothian · Oct 9, 2012

S'mon said:
In the latter case the GM is lying.

In the former case (which is basically what happened in my game last night - several crits followed by several 1s) as long as the dice are properly rolled, out in the open, the players can see that it is the vagaries of fate, not the GM's railroad, that combines with player skill and PC ability to their ultimate success or defeat.

For me, the latter is a satisfying game experience. The former would be wholly unsatisfying either as player or GM.

Yes, but how do you really know? Even with dice rolled out in the open it is not like the players are always double checking the DM to make sure he's not lying. They are looking at their character sheet, reading a spell, deciding what they are going to do next, or just sitting on the other side of the table and would have to move to read the dice. Or do you micromanage the DM and treat him like a criminal by making sure the dice are what he says they are?

Heck, even with dice in the open it doesn't stop the DM from fudging. I roll and 8, everyone sees an 8 I say it is a hit and roll damage. I roll a 10 and say it did 22. The Players have no idea what the bonus to hit and damage are. With different opponents and different to hit and damage numbers the players don't know what is needed to hit them. Different combat maneuvers can offer an advantage or disadvantage so a DM can place in situational modifiers.

Alaxk Knight of Galt · Oct 9, 2012

Umbran said:
This weekend, Space X launched the first commercial cargo capsule to the ISS. They had a malfunction in one of the rocket's engines, and it shut down. The rocket recalculated on the fly, got on a new, slightly different trajectory, and continued its mission.

If they had not built in processes and tools for unpredicted failures, the mission would likely have been a loss.

We do not live in a magical world where all possible results are foreseen - or their impact in-context is understood until you get to the context. For those for whom this is an issue, there are tools to help manage stuff.

If your rocket is super-good, so it never fails in unexpected ways that you don't want, then you don't need the tools. That's awesome.

But that's *YOUR* rocket. Allow room for others to have other designs that need different tools.

In all seriousness though, unexpected outcomes and failure are valid, interesting, and often fun results.

I personally (just speaking for me and my own feelings on the matter, not judging the gaming of others) feel that fudging to create some DM desired outcome (either for the players or against them, for let's be honest, GMs can fudge both ways) robs the players of a certain amount of agency in the game (and in the worst cases is railroading - and no, I'm not accusing GMs in favor of fudging or railroading). If we as a gaming group have reached a point where the dice decide the outcome of the narrative, so be it.

I'll happily grant you that other GMs do not feel this way and run great games using the fudge (indeed, I used to be in this camp).

S'mon · Oct 9, 2012

Crothian said:
Yes, but how do you really know?

The GM knows, so obviously if I'm the GM, I know and it affects my enjoyment of the game.

If I'm a player and not aware of the GM fudging, then great.

If I'm a player and I become aware the GM is fudging, normally I enjoy the game less. There may be exceptions, I'm thinking of a typical challenge-based D&D game or similar. For a game that is not challenge-based, if the GM is going to fudge I would still like them to make that clear up front, though.

NB this is all personal preference and what I enjoy. Not claiming any Absolute Truths.