Everybody Cheats?

Gary Alan Fine's early survey of role-playing games found that everybody cheated. But the definition of what cheating is when it applies to role-playing games differs from other uses of the term. Does everyone really cheat in RPGs? Yes, Everybody Gary Alan Fine's work, Shared Fantasy, came to the following conclusion: Perhaps surprisingly, cheating in fantasy role-playing games is...

Gary Alan Fine's early survey of role-playing games found that everybody cheated. But the definition of what cheating is when it applies to role-playing games differs from other uses of the term. Does everyone really cheat in RPGs?

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Yes, Everybody​

Gary Alan Fine's work, Shared Fantasy, came to the following conclusion:
Perhaps surprisingly, cheating in fantasy role-playing games is extremely common--almost everyone cheats and this dishonesty is implicitly condoned in most situation. The large majority of interviewees admitted to cheating, and in the games I played, I cheated as well.
Fine makes it a point of clarify that cheating doesn't carry quite the same implications in role-playing as it does in other games:
Since FRP players are not competing against each other, but are cooperating, cheating does not have the same effect on the game balance. For example, a player who cheats in claiming that he has rolled a high number while his character is fighting a dragon or alien spaceship not only helps himself, but also his party, since any member of the party might be killed. Thus the players have little incentive to prevent this cheating.
The interesting thing about cheating is that if everyone cheats, parity is maintained among the group. But when cheating is rampant, any player who adheres slavishly to die-roll results has "bad luck" with the dice. Cheating takes place in a variety of ways involving dice (the variable component PCs can't control), such as saying the dice is cocked, illegible, someone bumped the table, it rolled off a book or dice tray, etc.

Why Cheat?​

One of the challenges with early D&D is that co-creator Gary Gygax's design used rarity to make things difficult. This form of design reasoned that the odds against certain die rolls justified making powerful character builds rare, and it all began with character creation.

Character creation was originally 3d6 for each attribute, full stop. With the advent of computers, players could automate this rolling process by rapidly randomizing thousands of characters until they got the combination of numbers they wanted. These numbers dictated the PC's class (paladins, for example, required a very strict set of high attributes). Psionics too, in Advanced Dungeons & Dragons, required a specific set of attributes that made it possible to spontaneously manifest psionic powers. Later forms of character generation introduced character choice: 4d6 assigned to certain attributes, a point buy system, etc. But in the early incarnations of the game, it was in the player's interest, if she wanted to play a paladin or to play a psionic, to roll a lot -- or just cheat (using the dice pictured above).

Game masters have a phrase for cheating known as "fudging" a roll; the concept of fudging means the game master may ignore a roll for or against PCs if it doesn't fit the kind of game he's trying to create. PCs can be given extra chances to reroll, or the roll could be interpreted differently. This "fudging" happens in an ebb and flow as the GM determines the difficulty and if the die rolls support the narrative.

GM screens were used as a reference tool with relevant charts and to prevent players from seeing maps and notes. But they also helped make it easier for GMs to fudge rolls. A poll on RPG.net shows that over 90% of GMs fudged rolls behind the screen.

Cheating Is the Rule​

One of Fifth Edition's innovations was adopting a common form of cheating -- the reroll -- by creating advantage. PCs now have rules encouraging them to roll the dice twice, something they've been doing for decades with the right excuse.

When it comes to cheating, it seems like we've all been doing it. But given that we're all working together to have a good time, is it really cheating?
 

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Michael Tresca

Michael Tresca

Gibili

Explorer
Though this is not necessarily your intention here, this does get wheels turning in my head. Skills, particularly social and knowledge skills, are sometimes used as a way to reflect abilities that characters may have that players don't and as a way to overcome being required to roleplay (i.e., mind-reading) against the GM. But is there a way to provide such mechanical safeguards for player characters without needing a skill system? I can already brainstorm several systems where this may apply, but I would need to further hone the nature of my question first.
Ooh yes, this is always a tricky one. Let's face it, a lot of the fun of RPGs is playing someone you are not and doing things you as a person are not capable of, physically, mentally, socially etc. I can't think of any system I've played over the years that doesn't require some sort of skill system to allow this, so I'd be interested to hear what conclusions you come to.
 

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Maxperson

Morkus from Orkus
Ooh yes, this is always a tricky one. Let's face it, a lot of the fun of RPGs is playing someone you are not and doing things you as a person are not capable of, physically, mentally, socially etc. I can't think of any system I've played over the years that doesn't require some sort of skill system to allow this, so I'd be interested to hear what conclusions you come to.

He's probably going to cheat. ;)
 

Les Moore

Explorer
I'm not sure I'd call that 'cheating' (just like several of the examples given in the article don't constitute 'cheating' for me), but it's definitely something I don't like. In my games RAI always beats RAW, and since I'm the GM, I'm the final arbiter about what's intended and what isn't.

I always discourage my players to visit or read the so-called "Character Optimization Boards". As I like to point out, it's not possible for a player to gain any advantage by abusing unintended cheese. The reason is that a player can never 'win' against a GM: If players start to overdo it and optimize their characters too much, all they'll achieve is that I'll be designing correspondingly harder encounters for them.
Players are better served spending their creative energy to create a fun character with a believable and interesting background and personality traits.

IME, there is always a way to develop a trait, or advantage, over time, with work and character molding. But I have to agree there are things which can't be built into a character at the outset, which must be optimized, by feats, skill, magic, in essence,
a player's resources, as they rise through the levels. The more resources they expend, the better the optimization of the
development.

The interpretation of RAI from RAW, IMHO will almost always be arbitrary. One can even argue that RAW is important, because
it negates the more obvious surface intention of itself.
 
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Wulffolk

Explorer
I have not read pages 2-26 of this thread, so I don't know if these opinions have already been expressed.

Essentially, any game that places so much weight on random chance encourages players to find ways to improve their odds. The more random the game mechanics the more likely people are to try to cheat the system. D&D has always been far too random, in my personal experience and opinion. I have gone through phases of accepting D&D as a Role- Playing "GAME", with no cheating and minimal investment in the story or character. I have also gone through phases of playing D&D as a ROLE-PLAYING Game, in which I become heavily invested in the story and the characters which encourages more "cheating" to avoid ridiculous circumstances ruining things.

I very much lean towards the role-playing and story-telling elements of RPG's, especially as the decades have progressed. I make extensive use of house rules to mitigate the randomness of the "game" while still leaving an element of chance. This greatly reduces the need to "cheat".

Short version . . . Randomness is fun for games of chance with no emotional investment. Logic and consistency is better for building stories and character's to become emotionally invested in.
 

Lanefan

Victoria Rules
Though this is not necessarily your intention here, this does get wheels turning in my head. Skills, particularly social and knowledge skills, are sometimes used as a way to reflect abilities that characters may have that players don't and as a way to overcome being required to roleplay (i.e., mind-reading) against the GM. But is there a way to provide such mechanical safeguards for player characters without needing a skill system? I can already brainstorm several systems where this may apply, but I would need to further hone the nature of my question first.
Social skills and knowledge skills are two different things, with different issues and possibilities.

First, knowledge skills. The problem with codifying knowledge skills into specific areas a la 3e is that it far too strongly implies complete lack of knowledge outside these areas and utterly demolishes the idea of a jack-of-all-trades unless you've got a zillion skill points to spread around, which most classes don't.

Far better to scrap 'em. Build a very few class-specific knowledges e.g. arcana into those classes that need it, and de-formalize the rest. Some obscure bit of religious history: everyone roll d20. Clerics and Bards need only roll very well, anyone else if it's not a 20 (or 1, depending on edition) don't bother telling me about it. (obviously, in this example if the obscure bit of history pertains to a deity or pantheon that has a Cleric in the party, the roll is considerably easier for that character)

Second, social skills. For my own part I'd prefer to see players roleplay - or at least try to - even if it involves going "against" the DM. The problem with any sort of formalized mechanical system for this is that a significant proportion of players (and, sadly, some DMs) immediately want to use it as a shortcut: "Oh, screw all the talking, I'll just roll to see if I convince him or not". The only way to excise this sort of thinking from the game - which would be my preference - is to remove* those mechanics.

* - or better yet, never have introduced them in the first place; but it's too late for that.

I don't believe that players or PCs need 'mechanical safeguards', to use your term, in a general sense. The DM does, however, have to take into account the attributes (good or bad!) of the PC(s) doing the talking when coming up with the responses from her NPCs, and divorce that from her own opinion of the player at the table.

Lanefan
 

aramis erak

Legend
Most boardgames are competitive, which makes it a bit different case.

About half the games I've played in the last year are PVB, not PVP.

But it makes no difference, either way — it's the fundamental character flaw it reveals. I don't like to deal with cheaters.
 

aramis erak

Legend
There's no poll to be had out of this. Rule 0 makes the DM arbiter of all things above the rules themselves. Therefore no, they can't cheat.

What they can do is create an environment where people can have fun, or not.

If the former, they'll have a long run. If the latter, it'll be over soon. It self moderates.

KB

Rule 0 differs by game system. Many don't have the Gygaxian one ("The GM can change the rules as he sees fit"); a smaller set have a very different one ("Don't be a dick"), and a few have a counter-gygaxian ("The group can change the rules by consensus")...

Many don't even mention a rule zero equivalent.

Of course, Gygax's Rule Zero was essential for dealing with the incoherent Gygaxian Spew that was AD&D 1E. Almost no one ran it RAW, because various important bits were buried as asides in entirely the wrong chapters.
 



aramis erak

Legend
Is it a double standard that the DM can create encounters, but the players can't? Is it a double standard that the DM awards experience, but the players can't? Is it a double standard that the DM creates the adventure, not the players? It seems to me that you are failing to understand that the role of DM comes with abilities that the players don't get.......like fudging dice.

Yes, it absolutely is, and one that is near-fundamental to the method.

that said, I've played games with weak-GM - games where players can create/introduce encounters the GM must now run - and games with shared GMing (where GM of the moment rotates).

Both of those radically change the feel of the game.
 

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