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Dice Fudging and Twist Endings
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<blockquote data-quote="tabletopreloaded" data-source="post: 8956377" data-attributes="member: 7040229"><p>I don't see the dice as binding in any way. I see them merely as one of many tools for storytelling, not a foundation of the game <em>per se</em>. To me, the foundation of my game is the story we want to tell and the gameplay we'd like to have along the way. As a heavy homebrewer, my games can often be very different compared to their original system. This is partly because I feel no allegiance to dice in a particular game system. If the players and I want the game to proceed in direction X, I'd rather cancel an inconvenient roll outright than find a way to nullify it. Public DM rolls just add another set of hoops for me to jump through in order to run the game that we all want to play. In a word, dice are just a means to an end at my table. Maybe this is where we differ.</p><p></p><p>Granted, it might be entertaining for players if they could watch their DM roll for combat. But just as I don't like declaring difficulty class in D&D because it reduces the challenge to mere statistics, I don't like declaring rolls publicly because it invites metagaming into my decisions as a DM. I've only altered outcomes a handful of times, but I don't regret any of them. I do regret the circumstances that <em>led up</em> to those dice rolls, but that's a topic for another day <img src="https://cdn.jsdelivr.net/joypixels/assets/8.0/png/unicode/64/1f61b.png" class="smilie smilie--emoji" loading="lazy" width="64" height="64" alt=":P" title="Stick out tongue :P" data-smilie="7"data-shortname=":P" /></p><p></p><p>So yeah, I guess I do prefer fudging over forced improv. But I don't see it as deceiving my players. The way I see it, I don't owe the dice or any other part of the game a strict application of the numbers. I do owe my players and myself a story that's entertaining for all of us, a fun story that doesn't have added twists forced into existence via one or two awkward dice rolls. And as long as I'm rolling for damage, contests, and everything else behind a screen, my players know that what happens is ultimately under my review. I'm upfront about it, so I don't see any deception--not any more than is typical of DMing, anyway.</p><p></p><p>Side note: I liked what you did with the dragonborn cleric, but I don't see how it relates to dice rolling. Improvising on the fly is great--and you handled that tough situation quite well!--but I don't want to feel <em>obligated </em>to cook up a workaround whenever that rare, inconvenient roll comes up. No problem whatsoever with improvising for a new direction that players venture. Just a little less forgiving for unruly dice that push the game somewhere that I'm really not feeling, haha</p></blockquote><p></p>
[QUOTE="tabletopreloaded, post: 8956377, member: 7040229"] I don't see the dice as binding in any way. I see them merely as one of many tools for storytelling, not a foundation of the game [I]per se[/I]. To me, the foundation of my game is the story we want to tell and the gameplay we'd like to have along the way. As a heavy homebrewer, my games can often be very different compared to their original system. This is partly because I feel no allegiance to dice in a particular game system. If the players and I want the game to proceed in direction X, I'd rather cancel an inconvenient roll outright than find a way to nullify it. Public DM rolls just add another set of hoops for me to jump through in order to run the game that we all want to play. In a word, dice are just a means to an end at my table. Maybe this is where we differ. Granted, it might be entertaining for players if they could watch their DM roll for combat. But just as I don't like declaring difficulty class in D&D because it reduces the challenge to mere statistics, I don't like declaring rolls publicly because it invites metagaming into my decisions as a DM. I've only altered outcomes a handful of times, but I don't regret any of them. I do regret the circumstances that [I]led up[/I] to those dice rolls, but that's a topic for another day :P So yeah, I guess I do prefer fudging over forced improv. But I don't see it as deceiving my players. The way I see it, I don't owe the dice or any other part of the game a strict application of the numbers. I do owe my players and myself a story that's entertaining for all of us, a fun story that doesn't have added twists forced into existence via one or two awkward dice rolls. And as long as I'm rolling for damage, contests, and everything else behind a screen, my players know that what happens is ultimately under my review. I'm upfront about it, so I don't see any deception--not any more than is typical of DMing, anyway. Side note: I liked what you did with the dragonborn cleric, but I don't see how it relates to dice rolling. Improvising on the fly is great--and you handled that tough situation quite well!--but I don't want to feel [I]obligated [/I]to cook up a workaround whenever that rare, inconvenient roll comes up. No problem whatsoever with improvising for a new direction that players venture. Just a little less forgiving for unruly dice that push the game somewhere that I'm really not feeling, haha [/QUOTE]
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