D&D 5E Do you want your DM to fudge?

[Pvt. Winslow]

That's not really fudging, it's winging it.

There's very little difference between not picking an AC, and then just deciding at some point in the fight that it's 16 vs. having the AC be 18, but never let the players know, and just decide that their 16 hits anyway so now the monster's AC is 16. Both are fudging. Though it seems like every time a Fudging thread pops up, eventually people start to pick apart the definition of fudging, and we find out everyone has a different interpretation of it.

I'll just say that for me, Fudging is any time a DM changes an outcome based on their own desires, and not the pre-established mechanics of the game or encounter. Turning a crit into a normal hit because you don't want to kill a PC is the DM's desire, not the outcome of the dice. Increasing the HP of a monster that started at 100 to 200 because you aren't happy with your boss fight being so easy, is DM desire, not mechanics.

Coming up with an on the fly encounter is definitely not fudging. Like you say, reskinning, changing damage amounts and HP or AC is fine. Once the fight begins however, if you decide to change those stats mid-combat, that's definitely fudging.

 

[NotActuallyTim]

Fudging isn't fudging until you realize you should have brought your brown pants.

 

[ccs]

There's a reason we had DM screens back in the day.

Yes, they contained all kinds of oft needed charts right in one place.

 

[cmad1977]

Yes. Absolutely not!!
... Maybe?

 

[n00b f00]

I'm for fudging. As a player or a GM I'm not into free form, but I'm not into dice rolls being sacred. If a fight is dragging or too fast, if a PC is going to get one shot crit, if an important role misses by 1.

Then, I'd it fits your table, fudge it. Now if it's a pretty regular thing, maybe something else needs to change. But occasional fudging bothers me not at all, I actually prefer it.

 

[Illithidbix]

Yes.

If it suits the style of game the DM is trying to run and the players want to play in.
Esp. for games that focus more on the characters or overarching story.

Other times (esp. one offs or short campaigns) we gleefully accept the rule of the dice and the brutality it offers.

I've always understood every TT RPG has assumed the GM will at some points fudge the roll, ignore the rules or decide what happens without rolling dice.

D&D has also been potentially problematic that it's low levels where single dice rolls can easily swing things, which suit some people, but not others.
However everytime a roll is fudged it does bring into question why the DM rolled it/asked for it to be rolled in the first place.

It sometimes seems that DMs feel that there need to be dice rolling, skill checks and combat encounters in games because... games involve dice rolling, skill checks and combat, rather than them serving any greater point in the game.

3E and 4E are also kinda anomalies in tabletop RPGs because they introduced the idea of "balanced combat encounters" as a tactical challenge, which didn't really exist to my knowledge, in prior editions of D&D or most other roleplay games. Combat normally is there to present a sense of threat, not necessarily victory.
To this extent arguably they kinda encourage a "let the dice fall" so not to deprive players of a genuine victory. 5E *sorta* still is in this camp, whilst sometimes reaching back to the older ways.

 

[Shadowdweller00]

I'm personally more concerned about -where- the DM chooses to fudge. I usually roll out in the open as DM. Saves a bit of bad feelings when chaos invariably seems to be picking on people. I do not support undercutting the PCs or making foes last "just a bit longer" at all. But to avoid inexplicably freak character deaths; or when that one player has a run of bad luck and the enemies somehow save against their spells six rounds in a row, I'm all for minor adjustments.

 

[AaronOfBarbaria]

I prefer my DMs to learn ways to accomplish what fudging can accomplish that don't involve the DM deceiving their players, which I have found most DMs are nowhere near as good at as they think they are.

 

[UngeheuerLich]

I think that ultimately, DMs that Fudge are doing so to try to make the game more enjoyable for their players. I can appreciate that sentiment, if only because I've been in games without fudging where my character has died unclimactically and left me doing nothing for the rest of the session (such as literally being killed by "rocks fall, you failed your reflex save and die")

Despite that, I still no longer Fudge as a DM today, and prefer my DM to not Fudge when I play. I believe that part of learning to DM well is learning how to design proper challenges for your players, how to tailor the deadlines of an adventure to what they're comfortable with, and how to advise them of their choices and help mitigate death by dumb when possible.

I leave off with an anecdotal story about fudging that likely killed it for me. I was a halfling barbarian who specialized in throwing axes and had hair that covered my whole body. I was the fighting shrew. We were in an adventure where a city was overrun by undead and we needed to find the source of this Curse. Those who were bit turned, and we were running out of time. We fought our way to a castle where a mage and his black Knight lackey were orchestrating the whole affair, and had a climactic battle. I nearly died several times, and the Knight in particular hit like an ogre and took all of us to finally take down.

By the end of the adventure we all felt good about ourselves and really enjoyed it. Later, I was hanging out with my DM and we talked about the game. Then the strangest thing happened. He was a relatively new DM, and he admitted to me he didn't actually use stats in the adventure. He just went by what we rolled. If we rolled what he felt was high enough, we hit, if bad guys rolled well, they hit. He just arbitrarily decided damage, and went with his gut.

It destroyed my fond memories of the adventure. I no longer felt like we were heroes who saved a city. I no longer felt like my character was a killing machine of 3ft stature. I felt like I had been along for a ride of DM whim, like my choices didn't matter, only how the DM felt. It sucked, because before I knew that, I loved the game.

Now I'm not saying what my DM did was the norm for fudging. I know he was a particularly ham fisted proponent of fudging and isn't what people usually consider when they think of the term. But in my case, I vowed to never simulate that style of game. I wanted the Dice rolls and player decision to matter.

To me, that means no fudging.

So a very enjoyable story that was fun and felt awesome was spoiled because the DM didn't use exact numbers? You rolled high and did damage. He rolled high and did damage. Low attack no damage. HP appropriate, else you would have noticed.
It may not be my preferred style of play, but your decisions and rolls did matter even more than usual, because they were not spoiled by rolls that miss closely although you rolled high, which could have just frustrated you.
Maybe power gaming was useless in such a game because a little +1 here and ther didn't matter.

He should maybe not have told you, was his only error, because if he didn't know the system it was the best he could do to make an enjoyable adventure.

I had another story where I really enjoyed the game... the best story ever. And when I asked how long the DM prepared his intrigue story, he told me that he just prepared the first encounter and didn't even know that it would be an intrigue story. He reacted with his gut feelings and went with our ideas. I still remember that story. You remember yours. So maybe just accept that it was fun.

In 5e and 3e there are tools btw. In 3rd edition ot was called the dm's best friend. A flexible +2 bonus you used to increase or decrease the roll or the DC by circumstance. In 5e there is a close miss section. Both tools can be used by the DM to not have anticlimatic endings. Both are fudging the roll, but they are sanctioned by the DMG. That is about the fudging I use. And sometimes I award advantage after a botched roll and call it inspiration. That is because If I feel that the PC should succed, I think inspiration should have been given anyway and I always forget that rule. A second chance is a good middle way between ourright fudging and not.

So long story short: the dm has tools that can be called fudging. Use them and its fine.

 

[Sunseeker]

Lets put it this way: I want my DM to create a fun, challenging and engaging game, and I don't particularly need to know what he does to accomplish that end.