D&D General If they thought they could get away with it...

[J.Quondam]

There's no way to answer this poll accurately or that it's representative of people I've actually played with.

On the other hand, this is just a forum survey, not a scientific poll for a research project. I assume it's being asked just because a fellow poster is vaguely curious, not because they're trying to delve some deep truth about D&D demographics for publication in an academic journal.

It's funny thing I've noticed around here especially last few years. Rather than just engaging a poll in good faith, there are an astonishing number of posters who'd rather burn their time picking it apart and arguing how pointless it is, or how biased it is, or how they absolutely cannot ever at all answer because reasons.

Criminy, people. It's just for fun, on a forum about a game. Stop taking things so seriously.

 

[Clint_L]

I don't think it is picking the poll apart to preface your answer with "this is a really broad question so any answer will be highly context dependent." I suspect the first thought most of us had on reading it was "How do I answer this?" Then we chose whether or not to take the time to engage as best we could. In my case, I wanted to support the OP and so I gave the most honest answer I could, but felt I had to clarify that this was still a generalization.

 

[Warpiglet-7]

On the other hand, this is just a forum survey, not a scientific poll for a research project. I assume it's being asked just because a fellow poster is vaguely curious, not because they're trying to delve some deep truth about D&D demographics for publication in an academic journal.

It's funny thing I've noticed around here especially last few years. Rather than just engaging a poll in good faith, there are an astonishing number of posters who'd rather burn their time picking it apart and arguing how pointless it is, or how biased it is, or how they absolutely cannot ever at all answer because reasons.

Criminy, people. It's just for fun, on a forum about a game. Stop taking things so seriously.

When I was a kid I missed a joke on the bozo the clown show. It got funnier when I was reminded of it as a big kid.

Bozo would talk to little kids in the audience and engage them in conversation.

“So do you ride the bus OR buy your lunch?” Of course there were variations of this—-two non exclusionary possibilities.

Kids would stammer because they both rode the bus AND bought their lunch. The big joke.

In good faith I answered that my friends don’t cheat but I would not put it past randos. I think it is ok to qualify answers if this is really a conversation.

 

[iserith]

I expect players to push the rules to their absolute limit to seek advantage, as that's a normal behavior in a game in my view, but I believe most people are honest (more so than we give them credit for), so I would not expect them to cheat.

 

[not-so-newguy]

Definitely would not cheat, might exploit.

I based my vote on our current group. We're all a little older and understand that cheating will ruin any game. Most of the others don't understand the rules well enough to exploit, but it does happen. TBH I would be the one most likely to exploit the rules since I understand them better than anybody else at the table.

In the past, I've played with some extreme Rules Lawyers who would argue nearly everything. Bleh. I'd rather do something else with my free time than argue about rules over an Elf game for hours.

 

[Oofta]

On the other hand, this is just a forum survey, not a scientific poll for a research project. I assume it's being asked just because a fellow poster is vaguely curious, not because they're trying to delve some deep truth about D&D demographics for publication in an academic journal.

It's funny thing I've noticed around here especially last few years. Rather than just engaging a poll in good faith, there are an astonishing number of posters who'd rather burn their time picking it apart and arguing how pointless it is, or how biased it is, or how they absolutely cannot ever at all answer because reasons.

Criminy, people. It's just for fun, on a forum about a game. Stop taking things so seriously.

Based on the OP's comments in other threads, I am probably assuming a motivation for the poll.

But that doesn't mean that if you're going to post a survey like this, it can't be constructed better. Because to me, it's not would some players cheat, it's what percentage? What percentage are going to use exploits? Maybe that's 0% for some people, maybe it's 50% or higher. That to me would be an interesting poll. If you play for long enough and with enough people, you're going to see a very wide variety of behaviors. That's why I don't find the wording of this poll useful

 

[Clint_L]

Oh yeah, I didn't answer "exploit." Again, super subjective because what I consider an "exploit" might just be "using the rules to their maximum efficiency" from another perspective. I don't waste much time arguing in these situations; I just make a ruling and move on with the game. This is a like it or lump it situation, IMO.

 

[aco175]

I see I voted with the majority in that players do not cheat, but may exploit loopholes. I see it a bit like Magic cards. Some cards are ok, but then a new series comes out and and now one of the ok cards works great with something in the new series. Keep multiplying this and some cards are either super cool, or broken depending on how one looks at it.

I kind of see things as fine the first time and then it starts to look like exploiting. Some of the feat and spell combos begin to feel overpowered to what the norm should be. Kind of Tipper Gore and pornography.

 

[Tonguez]

Exploit the rules? Is that optimising? Id say exploiting the rules is legit player strategy. Im narrative first so often the rules exploit me

 

[bloodtide]

Roughly 50% of all players cheat, and roughly 50% will try to exploit...though it's not the same for both groups as many players that would exploit, would "never" cheat".

Basically, I have found humanity in general to be: Always does the right thing always no matter what(25%), Always does the wrong thing no matter what (25%) and sits in the middle, mostly doing what is right with maybe an exploit and maybe maybe a cheat if they get a great opportunity(50%). So that is 75% you need to keep an eye on: this is why rules and laws even exist.

A vast majority of people only interact with others for one base reason: An Ego Boost. Most people lead dull lives and are 'put down' by nearly everything....they would privately think to themselves that they are a 'looser'. They are desperate for an ego boost: for someone to say how great and wonderful they are or anything nice. But they are unwilling to put in any work to get the praise. They love games as games can "prove" how great they are and give a huge ego boost.

Except when they play a game.....it does not just automataclly happen. Lots of times the game is too hard for them, or too complex for them, or even just beyond their understanding or abilities...or worse things. Not that they would ever admit that. The problem is, they don't get to feel great and don't get the ego boost if they just "play the game".

This leaves only one option for them: cheat. And you see it in nearly every game. Maybe it starts with a 'ok' exploit, but chances are to goes right to cheating.

 

[Staffan]

I don't see anyone in my current group-and-a-half cheating. Exploits is a matter of definition – is it an exploit to multiclass bear totem barbarian with circle of the moon druid in order to get the hit point sponge to eat all other hit point sponges? Or are we talking things like 3e's "I jumped so well they made me king" combo (I don't recall the exact combo, but it had to do with a feat that let you substitute another skill roll for Diplomacy because you were so impressive combining with ridiculous jump bonuses for things like high speed and the jump spell)? I've definitely seen the former, but the latter is mostly something we point at and laugh.

 

[EzekielRaiden]

There's no way to answer this poll accurately or that it's representative of people I've actually played with.

There are two different answers that both accommodate this position.

And then aggregating our responses as a representative sample, which makes the distinction meaningless.

You seem to be presuming certain kinds of intent with my question. I don't think this is accurate, but time will tell.

How are you defining "exploiting the rules"?

I am intentionally not doing so. I could, and indeed I do have a personal definition. I consider it irrelevant and indeed counterproductive to share any such definition at this time. I wish to know how ENWorlders evaluate the statement. This isn't about generalizing to the public. It isn't about making some grand statement. I know I can't get that answer here (or, indeed, much of anywhere.) I would need a massive survey campaign and tons of money, neither of which I have.

Yes, but do you regard that as an actual exploit or just playing by what the rules say? I suspect most people draw that line in different places.

As noted above, I do have an opinion. I consider it counterproductive to share that opinion at this time. Perhaps, in a week or two, after the votes have largely settled, I will give my own personal perspective. I don't want it to taint the results. I genuinely wish to know how you (and others) feel about it, whatever YOU consider to be "cheating" or "exploiting."

assume it's being asked just because a fellow poster is vaguely curious, not because they're trying to delve some deep truth about D&D demographics for publication in an academic journal.

It is slightly more than just vague curiosity, but yes, I am quite well aware that this tells me very little in a broad or scientific sense.

Exploit the rules? Is that optimising? Id say exploiting the rules is legit player strategy. Im narrative first so often the rules exploit me

See above. I am choosing not to specify. Each respondent should use the meaning they think best.

 

[EzekielRaiden]

Based on the OP's comments in other threads, I am probably assuming a motivation for the poll.

But that doesn't mean that if you're going to post a survey like this, it can't be constructed better. Because to me, it's not would some players cheat, it's what percentage? What percentage are going to use exploits? Maybe that's 0% for some people, maybe it's 50% or higher. That to me would be an interesting poll. If you play for long enough and with enough people, you're going to see a very wide variety of behaviors. That's why I don't find the wording of this poll useful

There isn't anywhere near sufficient options to ask for the percentage which people believe players cheat and the percentage which they believe players will exploit (again, leaving the definitions of these terms, "cheating" and "exploiting," open to respondent interpretation.) If I could either (a) ensure every single respondent actually gave a response to two different polls (and thus ask the questions separately), or (b) had unlimited breadth of options or some way to ask more than one poll question in the same thread, I'd do it. As it is, I attempted to do what I thought was the most effective thing I could with the limitations of the format provided. If you consider that nefarious or problematic, well, I apologize. I was genuinely trying to do the best I could with a very limited system. If you believe you can do better with the limitations we've got, do it, you have my full support. I would see your new poll as complementary to my own (and if you do as I did, and ensure that votes are public, we could even directly compare the responses to get even more accurate information.)

 

[Lanefan]

My vote is based on more recent data: exploit yes, cheat no.

We had some cheaters a long time ago. Note the "had" in there; between peer pressure, requirements to roll in front of people, and DM enforcement those people wandered off before too long.

 

[Benjamin Olson]

Of all the people I've played with I've really only see out and out cheating in small children. I'm sure there are adults who cheat outright, and I suppose if you include every ambiguous cheating-adjacent behavior (like being much more likely to bring up rules mistakes you made when it benefits you, or re-rolling dice that encounter any interference but not so often when they come up really good) as "Cheating" then the number of cheaters grows quite a bit, and I'm sure the population of people who might, in some rare and high-consequence situation, cheat is certainly vastly higher than the number of people who will cheat under normal circumstances, so I suppose if you take an "anyone who might ever concievably cheat is a cheater through and through" stance you will see a lot more cheaters in the world than I do.

But if I was playing with someone who was so prone to cheating that I felt like I had to keep an eye on them, and they weren't under the age of 12 or so, I would not continue playing with that person.

 

[Oofta]

There isn't anywhere near sufficient options to ask for the percentage which people believe players cheat and the percentage which they believe players will exploit (again, leaving the definitions of these terms, "cheating" and "exploiting," open to respondent interpretation.) If I could either (a) ensure every single respondent actually gave a response to two different polls (and thus ask the questions separately), or (b) had unlimited breadth of options or some way to ask more than one poll question in the same thread, I'd do it. As it is, I attempted to do what I thought was the most effective thing I could with the limitations of the format provided. If you consider that nefarious or problematic, well, I apologize. I was genuinely trying to do the best I could with a very limited system. If you believe you can do better with the limitations we've got, do it, you have my full support. I would see your new poll as complementary to my own (and if you do as I did, and ensure that votes are public, we could even directly compare the responses to get even more accurate information.)

It would have been easy to give people percentages

• The percentage of people that cheat is common, nearly 100%.
• Quite a few people cheat, more than half.
• Some people cheat, but not that often, less than half
• A few people cheat, 10% or less.
• I've hit a few bad apples now and then, but it's rare. Probably 1% or less.
• I've never had anyone cheat.

I'm not sure I want competing thread and I'm going on a road trip to get out of the snow and cold for a bit. Then again, I also don't really care all that much.

 

[EzekielRaiden]

It would have been easy to give people percentages

• The percentage of people that cheat is common, nearly 100%.
• Quite a few people cheat, more than half.
• Some people cheat, but not that often, less than half
• A few people cheat, 10% or less.
• I've hit a few bad apples now and then, but it's rare. Probably 1% or less.
• I've never had anyone cheat.

I'm not sure I want competing thread and I'm going on a road trip to get out of the snow and cold for a bit. Then again, I also don't really care all that much.

If that were the only question being asked, then yes. It is not. I think the contrast between cheating and exploiting is relevant. To ask both questions simultaneously in this way would require 36 (your six options squared, since we would need every possible combo of A-F and 1-6) plus two more for the "not enough info" and "my answer isn't included here, I will explain" options. The forum software isn't coded to permit 38 different poll choices.

As an aside, despite being extremely strongly opposed to cheating (and, I hope, having high standards about what is acceptable behavior), I genuinely believe people are incorrectly assuming "cheating" is perfectly well-defined while "exploiting" is not, purely based on conversations from this very forum. (E.g., many people consider it impossible for the GM to cheat, even if they knowingly and intentionally break the rules they have claimed to agree to abide by. This clearly indicates that "cheating" is not as universally agreed as people think, hence my desire not to narrowly define it.)

 

[pemerton]

Ever since I started GMing as an adult playing with fellow adults (so a bit over 30 years ago) I've taken it for granted that players will help identify broken rules or exploit in systems that are vulnerable to them (back then it was Rolemaster, which is list-based with lots of semi-discrete subsystems that can interact in strange ways).

These days I mostly play systems where this isn't a problem.

The idea of players as cheaters or even "rules exploiters" is pretty foreign to me.

 

[Stormonu]

I have caught players cheating (reading the module we were going through WHILE AT THE TABLE, marking the Moon card in a Deck of Many Things, "Misreading" die rolls or scooping up dice before they thought I've seen them, changing ability scores and other stats between sessions), threw one person out of my game once because of it being blatant and the other players being so irritated by it they asked me to remove the player. Most of this was during High School or early college. Most of the people (with that one exception of the expelled cheater) I play with now have been pretty scrupilous, though every so often there's been the temptation for a player to want to change a die result they didn't like.

 

[Lanefan]

If that were the only question being asked, then yes. It is not. I think the contrast between cheating and exploiting is relevant. To ask both questions simultaneously in this way would require 36 (your six options squared, since we would need every possible combo of A-F and 1-6) plus two more for the "not enough info" and "my answer isn't included here, I will explain" options. The forum software isn't coded to permit 38 different poll choices.

It isn't? Can't be far off; I've seen polls with over 30 choices before.

As an aside, despite being extremely strongly opposed to cheating (and, I hope, having high standards about what is acceptable behavior), I genuinely believe people are incorrectly assuming "cheating" is perfectly well-defined while "exploiting" is not, purely based on conversations from this very forum. (E.g., many people consider it impossible for the GM to cheat, even if they knowingly and intentionally break the rules they have claimed to agree to abide by. This clearly indicates that "cheating" is not as universally agreed as people think, hence my desire not to narrowly define it.)

Probably best, then, if we just look at player-side actions here; particularly as while both DMs and players can cheat (in principle anyway, if not by true RAW) only players really ever look for rules exploits.