If you were the GM, would you accept this behavior?

[Sejs]

They had all the stuff written down on their character sheets, but they sprang their move on the gm after the fact. How would you respond to this?

They had it all planned out and documented ahead of time, just not showing me the cards?

Cool! Good one on 'em.

As long as they can show their work and prove they didn't just ret-con it into existance after the fact, I'm perfectly fine with that sort of thing.

Supprising the DM is just dandy as long as there's no cheating involved.

 

[cattoy]

Here's a test, how many RPG's from before 2000 had some sort of Search or Spot rule?
AD&D2: yes - Find/Remove Traps
AD&D1: yes - Find/Remove Traps

Espionage (HERO) 1983 - concealment skill

 

[Imret]

In answer to the OP: Not a lantern archon's chance in Nessus would I allow it, and I'd give them three options. Either everybody forgets they just said that and in future they involve the GM in the game, I pack up my notes and let them tell each other the rest of the adventure (since they don't need me), or we step back in time and resolve this idea.

"Alright, so...where did you get the bombs? You made them? Ah. Give me some Demolitions rolls, then. We'll get to the concealing, planting, wiring, and detonating them later, provided you don't blow any rolls. I'm going to be nice and say you've been working on these during down time...no? Alright, you've been bomb-making in the jeep. Take a penalty."

The GM is there to translate player actions into world outcomes via the rules, and vice-versa; if he's removed from the loop, it's just the players narrating and he might as well go home.


On Janx's sub-topic, Cyberpunk 2020 included an Awareness/Notice skill. And with those combat rules, it was your life-or-death skill a lot of times.

 

[BroccoliRage]

I wasn't there myself; I wasn't even a part of that group. But my best friend at the time told me a story years ago (prolly in 1986 or 87) that really weirds me out when I think about it.

There was a game called Twilight 2000 that had come out a couple of months before. I don't know if my friend was in this particular game or just heard about it in turn; but basically, the players went into this city, traded, and left; then told the gm that the city pretty well blew up, because they had left bombs in many of their trade items.

They had all the stuff written down on their character sheets, but they sprang their move on the gm after the fact. How would you respond to this?

i wouldnt allow it. if you didnt tell me it didnt happen. i dont care what you have written down, you have to tell me you put bombs in your gems. thats how it is. call it plothammering if you want, but if you change something on your character sheet that refers to equipment you damn well better tell me.

 

[barsoomcore]

Uh, I always inspect my PCs character sheets before play. Pretty sure I would notice "Bomb", and ask some questions.

But if it were a game where acquiring big honkin' bombs was just a matter of laying down the cash, and if it were a game where setting bombs to go off was automatically successful, and if it were a game where lying, disguising, positioning and triggering were all automatically successful, then yes, I'd allow it.

Otherwise these people are on crack.

 

[Darkness]

By telling them that if they don't tell the GM in real-time, it doesn't happen.

That's my take as well.

Adding to Janx' test:
Legend of the Five Rings

 

[Chimera]

I wouldn't allow it, partly because of the "us vs. DM" approach but mostly because the lack of information means I didn't get to check and see if anyone detected the bombs, which would have completely changed the scenario (esp. if someone detected a bomb while the PCs were still in the city). And I would definitely take a break and talk to the players about the roles of DM and players in the game and why taking the approach they did leads to much bad unfun.

Bingo. My thoughts exactly.

You didn't tell me.
Or I would have made checks to see if they were detected.
So it didn't happen.
I'm not happy with this.
Change your approach.

 

[LostSoul]

I would allow it, yeah. I'd have to allow the NPCs to have rolls to see if they detected things though.

This wouldn't be a problem in a well-designed system.

 

[AegisKelt]

I wouldn't allow it. Reason is they didnt tell me ahead of time that they were stashing the bombs into the trade goods, therefore it never happened. So when they would have told me, "Pretty much most of the city was blown up." I would say, while looking at their character sheets, "Yes the bombs DO go off, but of course since you never actually told me you stashed them in the goods before they were traded, they are still in your packs when you detonate them. Time to roll up new characters."

Of course shame on the GM for not looking at the sheets ahead of time too, but if players want to play us vs dm, I can oblige no prob.

 

[Man in the Funny Hat]

They had all the stuff written down on their character sheets, but they sprang their move on the gm after the fact. How would you respond to this?

There are no secrets from the DM. EVER. Suppose, just for the sake of argument, that the first place they walked into actually had a bomb/explosives detector. It was written in the description of the place in the adventure notes for some obscure reason but the DM never bothered to mention it because there was no reason for the PC's to know.

The only reason to withold information from the DM - particularly on major world-affecting activities like leaving bombs all over a city - is when the players simply have no idea what the DM's purpose is in even being at the table. The DM adjudicates EVERYTHING. Even if the players want to assume that nothing that they intend to do would, could, or should be counteracted the DM knows things about the world and everyone in it that the PC's do not. The players purpose is never to PREVENT the DM from fulfilling HIS basic purpose.

Would I actually allow it? My default reaction would be definitely not for the reason noted above. The players simply do NOT have the right or the in-game ability to keep the DM in the dark from the meta-game view. In other words, just because the players can keep it secret from Duane, the DM, doesn't mean that whatever their characters are doing is just as transparent and unstoppable. The ability to keep ME in the dark doesn't mean the dice and other things no longer apply to what they're keeping me in the dark about. But it might depend on if it actually mattered in the campaign, if there were any good reason why it even MIGHT have failed (how many chances to detect/notice the bombs were there not just when they were initially "placed" but in the entire time after the PC's walked away?) and whether that might actually be a better opportunity for running adventures than whatever I had actually intended, and so forth.