D&D 5E DMs, how do you fudge?

[DEFCON 1]

My most common fudge is to kill off monsters when they drop to like 1 or 2 HP after a fairly substantial attack. If a PC nails a monster for like 35 points and the creature ends at 1 HP... I'll occasionally just pull him from the board if there are still like quite a number of other creatures in the battle. To me, it wastes a player's time and energy to be the one who has to use their turn to poke the monster for 1 HP when a normal attack from them would do like 20 or more. To me... the HP number of each monster in the book is an "average", and so the idea that there will be some that are less than that number makes all the sense in the world. The fact that I didn't stat out which ones they were prior to the fight and instead made that call in the middle of battle doesn't matter to me at all.

My other votes were fudging dice rolls in favor of the PCs and also in favor of the monsters, but those are admittedly much less frequent. If I do it, it's usually because I've like missed on like eight attack rolls in a row (usually against normal odds) and I'll just turn another miss into a hit against a PC just so there's a semblance of the encounter being meaningful (even though it ain't gonna be in the end). In truth we all know mechanically that the results of the battle are already a foregone conclusion, but dramatically it gives the encounter a bit of a jolt. I can usually get a very good sense from my players when them throwing a shut-out is awesome for them, and other times when the cakewalk they are experiencing seems unearned and kind of pathetic. So I'll try and boost things here and there if I think they would rather it seem a little more important.

 

[Arilyn]

D&D is the only game I've ever fudged rolls, and I've run a fair number of different games. When I do fudge, it's to mitigate bad dice streaks. The d20 is very swingy and I don't want characters to die because the monster rolled a string of 20s, while none of the players could get over a 4. This was 3rd and PF. 5e has buffers built in, so I don't actually fudge anything in D&D anymore, except occasionally having a monster drop a bit early when it's getting late and there's no way the players will lose. I will occasionally remove an encounter if players seem tired or add one if they are getting restless for some action.

So, used to fudge dice rolls a bit in 3e. Don't have to in 5e. Never an issue in other systems.

 

[Mercurius]

Rarely, but yes. Like DEFCON said, when a PC hits a monster to almost-but-not-quite-zero, I will narrate that out as a kill-shot.

Another example would be if it is a major combat and an NPC kills a monster, I might drop it to 1 HP instead, and give the killshot to the upcoming PC.

I'm sure there have been other instances, but that's what comes to mind.

 

[Sorcerers Apprentice]

If I realize I've unintentionally designed an encounter that's too deadly, I might have the enemies choose decidedly non-optimal tactics, or reduce their HP somewhat on the fly. Otherwise I prefer the to let the dice speak for themselves.

 

[payn]

I sometimes will give an NPC enough HP to last one more round if I think it will give a better experience. Though, I do this very sparingly.

 

[Lanefan]

My only question is why this poll was positioned as 5e-specific when the question really is edition-agnostic.

 

[payn]

If I realize I've unintentionally designed an encounter that's too deadly, I might have the enemies choose decidedly non-optimal tactics, or reduce their HP somewhat on the fly. Otherwise I prefer the to let the dice speak for themselves.

I run a lot of published modules. Sometimes I run into the above. I spend a good amount of time online looking for GM experience from folks who have ran them. I have sidestepped numerous pitfalls this way.

If you are making your own adventures obviously this is much more difficult to do. Though, you can probably still get great advice online by running your ideas across folks.

 

[Arilyn]

I'm noticing, in this admittedly small sampling, that GMs who do fudge do it sparingingly and to improve table play. So I think the idea of GMs starting down a slippery slope to constant fudging may not be a common phenomenon.

 

[CleverNickName]

All of my rolls are visible, whether I'm playing in person or on a VTT...so it's tempting to say "I don't fudge," but that's not really the truth.

I may not fudge my rolls, but I might fudge the targets. I'll bump the DC up or down for skill challenges, I'll tweak the armor class and equipment of monsters, that sort of thing. Usually these adjustments are in an upwards direction to account for hyper-optimized characters.

I don't do this all the time...and when I do, it's never on-the-fly. The enemies won't suddenly gain 50 hp, and their AC isn't just going to inflate because I want to drag the battle out. Instead, the next group of monsters might be wearing better armor and carrying shields, or those hobgoblins might get replaced by bugbears. (Or both.) I don't think this counts as "fudging" though, since I'm making changes to the adventure as a whole, not individual situations. But others might disagree.

 

[el-remmen]

I'm not much of a fudger, though I used to be. Nowadays I roll in the open (basically since we went back to face to face post-pandemic zoom sessions), and even though 9 times out of 10 the players don't even look to see what I rolled, they could if they wanted to.

I have occasionally pumped up a big bad's hps when I realized the number I chose was not sufficient for a challenging encounter.

Now, when it comes to tactics I might "fudge" for the opponents in terms of just trying to play out a sub-optimal but still reasonable choice they might make based on what is obvious to them or what they assume.