Do you "save" the PCs?

[Piratecat]

When people start tossing out "arrogant" and "liar," they're inches from having the thread shut down. I strongly suggest you pursue another line of conversation to discuss your points.

 

[Benimoto]

If I look down at a die and say "I rolled a 10" when the die is plainly showing a 20, I am being dishonest. Whether the game engine confers that authority is immaterial. The same holds true if I say "It hit for 5 damage" when the dice are showing a critical for 20.

Well let's put some nuance in the situation. Let's assume that this is not a game where the PCs have normally have access to the monster stat blocks or current monster hit points. Which kinds of scenarios would you, or the other posters in the thread find acceptable?

1. You, as the DM, have decided that the necromantic power in the room gives the skeletons within the ability to regenerate 15 hit points a round. After a few rounds, it becomes apparent that if the PCs can win at all, it will take hours to resolve. Without announcing the change, you reduce the amount of regeneration to 3 hit points.
2. Same as above, but you announce it, attributing it to one of the PCs actions. "As you bring a holy symbol near the evil altar, the necromantic energy in the room dims!"
3. You want your villain to be powerful and menacing, so you give his main attack the ability to crit on a roll of 16-20 for 6d8 extra damage. His first crit, on a natural 20, kills a PC. You decide to immediately remove the extra critical range.
4. Same as above, but instead of being your own creation, the villain came from Dragon magazine or the Monster Manual.
5. Same as #3, but you did not immediately decide whether to remove the extra critical range. You've just rolled a 17 against a PC you know has 5 hit points left. You announce a normal (non-critical) hit and roll normal damage.
6. You are running a one-shot adventure with your normal group, but at a much higher level than you normally play. Your players have been bragging about how optimized their characters are all week. You decide to add 2 extra monsters to each planned encounter. As the first combat breaks out, it becomes apparent that the players barely know what their characters abilities do, and are actually less effective than normal. You remove the extra monsters from future combats.
7. Same as above, but you remove the extra monsters from the present combat by sneaking the figures off the table when no one is looking.
8. Same as above, but instead, you announce that the extra monsters are joining another, nearby battle with some NPCs that the players are not expected to participate in.

I guess the point of the above examples is that as a DM, you are responsible for designing the scenario, and sometimes you make mistakes. You typically only have one chance to correct the mistakes, and that is right at the table, as you play.

 

[Jeff Wilder]

Well let's put some nuance in the situation.

Honestly, there's not much nuance for me. If you decide to use a game's random outcome-determination method, but after seeing the result you decide to change it, that's where my line is. I don't do it, and I don't want to play in a game where it's done.

If you don't want to abide by a random roll, don't roll. Or make the roll with different parameters. It's that simple.

As far as I'm concerned many of the other things you describe, or that have been described upthread, are exactly what I use as alternatives to altering the die roll. IMO and IME, altering the die roll (or rolling in secret, which leads to the players assuming you're altering die rolls) leads to the players believing that the DM is going soft on them or to the players believing that the DM is adversarial. IMO and IME, neither one of those is fun or good for an RPG.

This is where Raven Crowking and Ariosto and I part ways (I think). Because I don't have any problem, as DM or as player, with a DM altering an encounter -- in effect, changing the rules, which from then on will be adhered to -- because the DM screwed up in designing or vetting an encounter. (Similarly, I don't have a problem with a DM "winging" an encounter or an entire adventure. Well, except that it's usually inferior to a prepared adventure.)

By contrast, I will not alter a fair encounter (not necessarily "evenly matched," because "fair" and evenly matched" aren't always the same thing) that turns out differently than I might have expected because of player choice and/or dice rolls. And I do not want a DM doing that when I'm a player.

Again, really not much nuance. It comes down to this, for me:

"If you've decided that something should be determined randomly, stick with it. If you're not going to stick with what you roll, then why the hell are you pretending you want things determined randomly? Just declare the outcome and be honest with yourself and your players." (Which, not to belabor the point, is exactly what M&M has built into the system.)

 

[Fifth Element]

"If you've decided that something should be determined randomly, stick with it. If you're not going to stick with what you roll, then why the hell are you pretending you want things determined randomly?

Maybe you want it to be almost completely random? But not necessarily totally random? Is that not just as valid?

 

[Ariosto]

I guess the point of the above examples is that as a DM, you are responsible for designing the scenario, and sometimes you make mistakes. You typically only have one chance to correct the mistakes, and that is right at the table, as you play.

1. I run D&D, not Mortal Kombat. Unless it's a one-shot, I'm not designing the kind of scenario that's a matter of running characters through a gauntlet of combats. If it is a one-shot, then we really aren't going to get all broken up over imaginary massacres.

2. In my campaign, it's generally up to the players where their characters go and what they do. The characters that survive and thrive tend not to get into pointless fights, and it would be pretty unusual for there to be any incentive to fight skeletons.

3. The rules I use are pretty transparent, and I can handle basic maths.

4. There is no entitlement to survival, much less victory. If a giant could make like Tiger Woods with your head, then it's your responsibility to make better use of what's in that dimpled ball. Your goals and methods are your own choice. You can't eliminate risk, but you can manage it and weigh it against potential rewards.

 

[Ariosto]

Maybe you want it to be almost completely random? But not necessarily totally random? Is that not just as valid?

Not only is it valid, but weighted probabilities are a whole lot more common than complete randomness. In fact, things are typically so far from completely random that only a finite sub-set of all possibilities is actually on the table.

 

[Fifth Element]

Not only is it valid, but weighted probabilities are a whole lot more common than complete randomness. In fact, things are typically so far from completely random that only a finite sub-set of all possibilities is actually on the table.

I agree, I think. My point was that another arbitrary line was being drawn, such that DM fiat and complete randomness are the only two possible means or resolving things.

 

[Ariosto]

Because I don't have any problem, as DM or as player, with a DM altering an encounter -- in effect, changing the rules, which from then on will be adhered to -- because the DM screwed up in designing or vetting an encounter.

I've got no problem, either, if I agree that there is a screw-up warranting such a change. There's a whole lot less in the way of such warrant in the games I like to play and run than in one of those strings of DM-determined "combat encounters" in which it is assumed that plunging headlong into a fight is not only a guaranteed good idea but basically incumbent on us if we're gonna have a game to play tonight.

Basically, "fudge" is just the icing on a cake that is a long, long way from what I want in D&D. It might still be better than no D&D, though.

 

[Umbran]

Upon reconsideration, I no longer feel anything will be served by speaking on the matter further. Post removed.

 

[Jeff Wilder]

Maybe you want it to be almost completely random? But not necessarily totally random? Is that not just as valid?

Give me an example? (I'm pretty sure I already covered what you mean with my suggestion to "make the roll with different parameters," above, but I'm not positive.)