Do you "save" the PCs?

[Fifth Element]

... and this is where you take a long leap I cannot follow. Surely they can think you are wrong, if you are allowed to think you are right.

Since we're talking about a game of make-believe, I submit that anything like this must necessarily be a matter of personal preference. My personal preference in how I and my friends pretend to be an elf causes no harm to anyone, and simply cannot be "wrong". It is simply one of many possible ways of playing.

To say it's wrong is disrespectful. To say it's actually harmful goes beyond that.

I can think I'm right (in the sense of my playstyle being a valid one) without thinking you're wrong, since any number of playstyles are valid ones. They're not mutually exclusive.

 

[Fifth Element]

There is no more a winner in pinball, Pac-man, or any similar solitaire game.

There are high scores in pinball and Pac-man, whereas there are no XP leaderboards that I've ever seen. Solitaire games are a different animal; they'd be similar to a solo D&D game.

In any case, how on Earth do you imagine this to be an argument for the necessity of "fudging"?

That's not my argument. There's no necessity to fudge in D&D. But there's nothing wrong with it either.

Or a joystick, eh? Playing Chess against a computer doesn't count, even if it can beat the world champion? Solving a Chess, Go, Sudoku, crossword, or other puzzle is no accomplishment?

They are different, again because there is a specific goal there. There is only one solution to a particular Sudoku or crossword puzzle.

In other words, all of us who take such pleasure in playing a game without "fudging" are "plainly wrong?"

No, not at all. I'll be clear, since some seem to be missing it.

I consider fudging to be a perfectly valid way to play the game; one of many valid ways to play the game. I have never said playing your way is wrong. "Your" side (perhaps not you specifically, I don't recall) have argued that "my" way is simply wrong, should not be done, and can even be harmful if you do it.

If you want to play without fudging, more power to you. I know that some people like to play like that. But if they tell me I'm just plain wrong for not liking the same, I will refute that.

 

[billd91]

I'm not so sure this is a "normal" game. In fact, I'd go so far as to suggest that if you go 20 "typical" sessions with only 1 character death, your game is atypical. Either it isn't geared toward dangerous adventuring type activity, or the DM avoids difficult challenges or, more likely, you're already fudging (which then makes fudging with a newbie a "normal" session). The dice alone are going to demand a sacrifice every few sessions, IME, if not more often.

Careful with your assumptions. Players can get pretty good at avoiding death even in a combat-heavy game (perhaps especially in a combat-heavy game) once they get enough hit points to survive a single greataxe crit and have the sense to stock up on healing supplies.

If you're seeing a lot more deaths than 1 every 20 or so sessions, perhaps we should be assuming something about you or the people you play with. That makes no less sense and is no more obnoxious than making the assumption that a DM seeing few deaths is "more likely" already fudging the dice.

 

[pawsplay]

Since we're talking about a game of make-believe, I submit that anything like this must necessarily be a matter of personal preference. My personal preference in how I and my friends pretend to be an elf causes no harm to anyone, and simply cannot be "wrong". It is simply one of many possible ways of playing.

To say it's wrong is disrespectful. To say it's actually harmful goes beyond that.

I can think I'm right (in the sense of my playstyle being a valid one) without thinking you're wrong, since any number of playstyles are valid ones. They're not mutually exclusive.

So let's take this idea to it's conclusion. Since we're talking about a game of make-believe, I submit that anything someone else thinks about your personal preferences is a matter of preference. What someone thinks of your play style causes no harm to anyone, and simply cannot be "wrong." It is simply one of many possible opinions about paying. To say it's wrong is disrespectful. To say it's actually harmful goes beyond that.

I'm pretty sure that boat won't float. In any case, calling your playstyle inferior is not the same as calling it invalid. I've had inferior pizzas; that doesn't make them not-pizzas. The everyone-is-entitled-to-their-opinion position, in addition to being uncomfortably amoral to my tastes, inevitibly leads to contradiction.

I think fudging is a perfectly valid approach to certain GMing problems. I don't think it's bad, per se. However, I think other things are better. In any situation, I would prefer to solve the problem in another way, and I am convinced that in the vast majority of situations, I can. Someone else may have a different opinion, surely informed by their own thoughts and experiences. I completely respect that opinion. However, I remain rooted in my own opinion, and any time I am asked, i will say the same thing: My advice is not to do it.

 

[pemerton]

D&D is just as competitive.

<snip>

The rules are for the most part clear, as is the object (stay alive at the end of the day).

This is not the only possible goal of D&D play.

 

[Reynard]

If you're seeing a lot more deaths than 1 every 20 or so sessions, perhaps we should be assuming something about you or the people you play with. That makes no less sense and is no more obnoxious than making the assumption that a DM seeing few deaths is "more likely" already fudging the dice.

Emphasis mine.

Really? We need this to turn into a fight? To what end? Why not just discuss?

 

[Raven Crowking]

It's never okay to go through an intersection when the light is red...your analogies are quite weak here.

It is always okay to go through the intersection when the light is green; it is never okay to go through the intersection when the light is red. (Well, actually both of those statements are false -- there are circumstances under which it is not okay to proceed through the green, and where it is okay to go through the red....) Likewise, it is always okay to devise the set-up as you will, and never okay to fudge die rolls.

My analogy is weak only because it is a rebuttal to a weak argument, intended specifically to make that weakness obvious.

Yes, because there is a defined goal in chess: to win, using the specific rules of the game. It makes a terribly poor analogy for D&D, of course, which neither is competitive nor does it have a single defined goal.

I can play chess to try to engineer your win; I could then claim that chess is neither competitive (as I am trying to make you win), and that it doesn't have a single defined goal (as I have just made a new one).

Again, neither would make my behaviour acceptable.

Even Gygax suggested that fudging may be called for at times.

I know. In this instance, IMHO, Gygax was wrong.

Are you suggesting that the DM should be able to predict a bad run of luck? Since it's luck, it can change at any time. Consecutive natural 1s can be followed by consecutive natural 20s.

There's no reason to think that a bad run of luck will continue, and lead to a PC's death. How is either the player or the DM supposed to predict that? Your "proper" solution involves the DM predicting the future. That's not a viable solution.

In any edition of D&D, a "run of bad luck" means a reduction in survivability. When setting up a newbie area, the DM should make certain that the creatures/hazards encountered therein are of the kind where there are multiple decision points prior to death.

So, in this case, a "run of bad luck" need not be predictable, prior to character death, to be responded to.

This was the situation I was dealing with. Player stupidity and GM stupidity both shouldn't result in fudging.
Because they'll both be there in normal play.

Well, we agree here.

But in this case: Okay, they have a run of bad luck, and die. You say "wow, you were really unlucky"
They go "uh-huh". They don't realise just how different the game normally plays out, because they have no frame of reference, they're a newb. To them, this is how the game plays out.

And this is sometimes true.

There is a good reason, in D&D, as the game normally plays out, to get used to the idea that you will not always win.

You will note that I recommended that the GM then provides "normal" context.

I will further note, as I did above, that the GM did a poor job of setting up a newbie area if the challenges encountered killed the newb due to a run of bad luck, and withdrawal prior to death could not have been suggested.

And you can't really know they're losing until they actually do so. My first 4e GMing experience, with new players, they thought they were dead meat in the boss fight. Some of them were preparing to flee. Then, they hit the dragon with an immobilising attack, ongoing damage, and a forced move. Boom, it was dead before it recharged it's breath weapon.

I think it is pretty fair to say that you can tell whether the PCs are:

1. In good condition to go on,
2. Hanging on a thread, or
3. Done like dinner.

I accept that this might be harder to know in 4e, because of the way the resource management paradigm has changed. However, I do not accept that, even in 4e, it is impossible to set up a newbie area that allows you to know these things.

AFAICT, that is what D&D Encounters is all about.

I think the core foundation to your opposition to fudging and "saving" the PCs, is that you think damage is being done.

I do.

Nor does something have to give you cancer to do you harm.

Nor does my opinion alter how you play your game, unless you should happen to decide that you agree with me. If you do not agree with me, then does my opinion do you harm?

Since we're talking about a game of make-believe, I submit that anything like this must necessarily be a matter of personal preference.

Every game is a game of make believe. Including chess, baseball, whathaveyou. If you accept that my tricking you into thinking you are great in chess is harmful, then the "game of make-believe" argument is inconsistent, at the very least.

To say it's wrong is disrespectful. To say it's actually harmful goes beyond that.

Pawsplay already did a much better job of answering this than I am capable of doing.


RC

 

[Hussar]

/snip

EDIT: Let's take this a bit further. I want you to "stick with" chess, so I continually engineer the games so that you will win. You feel a real sense of accomplishment because you don't know I am doing so. What happens to your self esteem once you play against someone else, who doesn't consider it a favour to engineer your victories? What happens when you discover that, far from being a great player, you've been trained to make moves that cause opponents to easily defeat you? How do you think you would feel about those chess games we played then? How do you think that the average person would feel?

Again, this does no one a favour, except the GM, who gets to hide his or her errors, and that (usually) only for a while. Perhaps Susy will have moved when she discovers what you have done, and you will not have to explain why you did it to her.



RC

Bold and underline mine so it doesn't get missed yet again.

Show me one single time that I stated anything about constantly or consistently fudging? You keep building the house of straw that fudging once or in one encounter, or heck, even in one adventure is the same as constantly weakening every encounter.

 

[Hussar]

D&D is just as competitive. You compete against the monsters, the traps, and most importantly, yourself, much like other games or sports. The rules are for the most part clear, as is the object (stay alive at the end of the day).

I would go so far as to say that if this is the only objective in your games, you might want to consider broadening the palette a bit. This is only true if your game revolves around nothing but combat.

I feel it would be worthwhile to state that i'm in the process of wrapping up a 3.5 -> Pathfinder game after four years, playing from level 1 to level 19, involving an epic quest to defeat an eldritch evil. One of the PCs has been with the group since the beginning, and all have a substantial history within the campaign, to say nothing of the thick, thick folder I have of campaign notes. Challenges have ranged from roving packs of fiendish worgs to assaults on powerful dragons to court cases. If you think my philosophy is antithetical to good stories, continuity, or long-lived campaigns, I urge you to set that misconception aside.

Never said anything about you. I said, the lesson that I took from high lethality and PC turnover was that I should never really bother engaging in the setting or the character because, well, why bother? I'll just be rolling up another character in a couple of weeks anyway.

I note you only mention the one character that survived. How about the other ones? Are they as engaged in the campaign as your one survivor? How long did they survive? Were they creating new characters every four or five sessions, or did they survive for long periods of time.

Because, if they did, then my point about character turnover does not actually contradict you.

 

[Raven Crowking]

Show me one single time that I stated anything

Hussar, what makes you think I am talking (in the bit you quote) about what you stated? Or, for that matter, what anyone stated?

What you quote was intended to help build a general case, in which specific cases could then be addressed. So long as "cheating causes no harm" is the predominant meme of the discussion, there is no way to discuss or describe harm done. It is dismissed.

By demonstrating that cheating can cause harm, and by then examining how and why that harm is caused, as well as what that harm is, one can then determine whether or not it applies (and to what degree) in a secondary case.

That is the purpose of the quote you pulled: It is a direct counter to the argument that cheating can cause no harm, because it is "just a game".

You keep building the house of straw that fudging once or in one encounter, or heck, even in one adventure is the same as constantly weakening every encounter.

Not at all.

Just as in the chess example, I don't need to plot to make you win if you are actually winning, the fudging GM has no need to fudge unless his expectations for how the encounter will play are somehow thwarted. Because fudging goes both ways: making an encounter easier to get the outcome you want, and making an encounter harder to get the outcome you want.

What if it was a player cheating once or in one encounter, or heck, even in one adventure? What is the relationship between that and cheating constantly in every encounter?

My overwhelming experience is that a person who cheats to get the outcome they want tends not to cheat just the one time. Especially not if they feel it is "okay" the cheat anyway.

Does your experience differ? If so, would you like to buy a bridge?


RC