Does your DM hide their rolls?

[Infiniti2000]

I roll behind the screen because that's where my stuff is. I hide my stuff not because anyone wants to cheat, but because I don't want anyone inadvertently looking at maps, names, or stats or anything.

It's actually eye-opening in a way to see that so many people have to "roll in the open" so that their players don't accuse them of cheating. I'm glad our group doesn't require a similarly level of proof of integrity.

 

[Nifft]

so many people have to "roll in the open" so that their players don't accuse them of cheating

Really?

Huh, -- N

 

[Nebulous]

I don't usually hide rolls, i put them down in the open, but i cheat behind the scenes in ways the players can't see, such as cutting hit points or attack bonuses or stuff like that. But i don't cheat often, usually just when a fight is taking too long, or I can tell it WILL take too long which is usually the case.

 

[Imaginary Number]

Personally, I think that rolling everything in the open is ideal, but that it often doesn't work well in practice. The problem is the information asymmetry between the DM and the players: as the DM, I know what the monsters' attack and damage bonuses are, whether one monster has a magical +3 weapon that the others don't, whether a hidden spellcaster is buffing some of the monsters but not others, etc. Any player who is paying attention can figure these things out pretty quickly if I roll in the open, which is why I usually don't.

 

[Mirtul]

If you hide the rolls you might as well play it full storytelling... and storytelling is not a game in my opinion. It's some sort of drama art.

The only reason to hide the rolls is to have the option to fudge the rolls in one way or another...

That pretty much tells the players that if they die, it is not because fate wanted them to die... it is because you as DM wanted them to die.

I don't play with DMs that hide the rolls for that very reason.

 

[Ryujin]

Not true. It also adds to the tension of a situation. If you don't see the dice roll then you don't know whether the opponent needs a 6 or a 16 to hit you. You get descriptions rather than the mechanics. For those of us who prefer a little immersion, it's a preferable situation.

And I reserve the right to cheat, in response to catching a player cheating, without making it obvious to everyone at the table.

 

[Amaroq]

Yeah, what Ryujin said: dramatic tension and hidden information.

I don't want my DM to write the monster's AC down on the white board so that I know what it takes to hit ... and I don't want to know whether the monster just hit my tank fighter twice because it rolled an 18 and a 19, or because it hits me on a 6 and I'm in real trouble.

 

[cpd_trigger]

I always roll behind the screen. Actually, I've got a dice rolling app I use that lets me keep track of multiple modifiers for large groups of monsters without having to do the math every single time. It also keeps track of the last 20 rolls, so if there is any question about me fudging, I can prove that's not the case. I did have to prove to my players that it was genuinely random, but when they were satisfied, they were more then happy not to know what was happening behind the screen. We're all about the mystery of the game.

 

[Flipguarder]

I can't imagine Mirtul plays with friends, because to mistrust your DM so inherently would indicate a pretty terrible friendship imo.

 

[Blackbrrd]

I can't imagine Mirtul plays with friends, because to mistrust your DM so inherently would indicate a pretty terrible friendship imo.

The temptation to fudge the dice is really strong. I know my players trust me as a DM, but I could still understand it completely if one of them asked me to start rolling in the open*. I have fudged the dice on occasion so it would have been quite justified.

*As noted in an earlier post, I have started rolling in the open and liked it.