Menu
News
All News
Dungeons & Dragons
Level Up: Advanced 5th Edition
Pathfinder
Starfinder
Warhammer
2d20 System
Year Zero Engine
Industry News
Reviews
Dragon Reflections
Columns
Weekly Digests
Weekly News Digest
Freebies, Sales & Bundles
RPG Print News
RPG Crowdfunding News
Game Content
ENterplanetary DimENsions
Mythological Figures
Opinion
Worlds of Design
Peregrine's Next
RPG Evolution
Other Columns
From the Freelancing Frontline
Monster ENcyclopedia
WotC/TSR Alumni Look Back
4 Hours w/RSD (Ryan Dancey)
The Road to 3E (Jonathan Tweet)
Greenwood's Realms (Ed Greenwood)
Drawmij's TSR (Jim Ward)
Community
Forums & Topics
Forum List
Latest Posts
Forum list
*Dungeons & Dragons
Level Up: Advanced 5th Edition
D&D Older Editions
*TTRPGs General
*Pathfinder & Starfinder
EN Publishing
*Geek Talk & Media
Search forums
Chat/Discord
Resources
Wiki
Pages
Latest activity
Media
New media
New comments
Search media
Downloads
Latest reviews
Search resources
EN Publishing
Store
EN5ider
Adventures in ZEITGEIST
Awfully Cheerful Engine
What's OLD is NEW
Judge Dredd & The Worlds Of 2000AD
War of the Burning Sky
Level Up: Advanced 5E
Events & Releases
Upcoming Events
Private Events
Featured Events
Socials!
Twitch
YouTube
Facebook (EN Publishing)
Facebook (EN World)
Twitter
Instagram
TikTok
Podcast
Features
Top 5 RPGs Compiled Charts 2004-Present
Adventure Game Industry Market Research Summary (RPGs) V1.0
Ryan Dancey: Acquiring TSR
Q&A With Gary Gygax
D&D Rules FAQs
TSR, WotC, & Paizo: A Comparative History
D&D Pronunciation Guide
Million Dollar TTRPG Kickstarters
Tabletop RPG Podcast Hall of Fame
Eric Noah's Unofficial D&D 3rd Edition News
D&D in the Mainstream
D&D & RPG History
About Morrus
Log in
Register
What's new
Search
Search
Search titles only
By:
Forums & Topics
Forum List
Latest Posts
Forum list
*Dungeons & Dragons
Level Up: Advanced 5th Edition
D&D Older Editions
*TTRPGs General
*Pathfinder & Starfinder
EN Publishing
*Geek Talk & Media
Search forums
Chat/Discord
Menu
Log in
Register
Install the app
Install
The
VOIDRUNNER'S CODEX
is LIVE! Explore new worlds, fight oppressive empires, fend off fearsome aliens, and wield deadly psionics with this comprehensive boxed set expansion for 5E and A5E!
Community
General Tabletop Discussion
*TTRPGs General
Player fudging in RPG's.
JavaScript is disabled. For a better experience, please enable JavaScript in your browser before proceeding.
You are using an out of date browser. It may not display this or other websites correctly.
You should upgrade or use an
alternative browser
.
Reply to thread
Message
<blockquote data-quote="Celebrim" data-source="post: 403430" data-attributes="member: 4937"><p>Piratecat: You're right of course. It's my first poll. I didn't realize multiple answers was an option.</p><p></p><p>As far as the multiple answers go, I think it is a pretty rare player who hasn't fudged a dice at one time especially when he was young and rolling up stats or making saving throws with a beloved character.</p><p></p><p>I don't suppose that I'm being very subtle. I wanted to prove that players cheat, ask whether it harms the game, and discuss what a DM can do about it if it does. Alot of my point here is that while I've often been very close friends with my players, I've seen groups that have been gaming together for years where one or more individuals cheat as a matter of course. Most of the time it drives the DM to abstraction, and most of the time the player that is cheating is the sort of player that always feels he has to be the center of attention, always has to be the best at everything, and always wants to argue with the DM about rules issues. I frankly don't know where some DM's get the patience for that. I can't put up with it for long. My first responce is to take him aside privately and say something to the effect of, 'Look, I've been keeping track of your initiative and you haven't rolled less than a 15 in the past 20 rolls. The odds of that are somewhat less than the odds of winning the state lottery, so I don't want to hear about it. Either find a fair dice, start reporting what you actually roll, or find somewhere else to game because if this keeps up either I'm going to start cheating on my dice until you get the hint or I'm going stop inviting you over period.' My second responce is to publicly call him out. My third responce is ... well... I've never had to go so far.</p><p></p><p>I don't think it is possible for an impartial DM to trust all players implicitly, whether you have played with them for a long time or not. And I think it is rather foolish to not be on gaurd against cheating before a new player has proven himself. Everyonce in a while it is worth it to let a player cheat rather than kill a character due to bad luck (though better still to avoid arbitrary 'save or die' effects), but if the cheating is consistant it usually will wreck a game. DM is simply an alternate title for referee and one of the things you have to insure is that there is an environment of fair play and no favoritism. If you are overlooking the cheating on player is doing, then you are in essence playing favorites with the cheater to the detriment of everyone in the party who is not cheating.</p><p></p><p>As a player as well as a DM, I have to say that it doesn't feel too good to have your player always struggling where as other characters glide right through everything because their player is essentially 'taking 20' every time he needs it. And it doesn't help if the DM scales up the challenge to compensate, because that just leaves your character more irrelevant during play.</p><p></p><p>A good DM, IMO, watches as many dice rolls as he can and otherwise removes as many temptations and oppurtunities to cheat from his players as is possible. I don't think that it is a coincidence that so many people are pointing out that people who cheat usually don't enjoy the game. I think that most people would cheat would enjoy the game better if they weren't cheating. Afterall, it seems to me that those that cheat consitantly, are usually trying to prove how capable you are through the success of your character, but how can you be satisfied with your success if you know it wasn't founded on your skill? </p><p></p><p>And I should in all fairness say that alot of groups that cheat consitantly do so because a former DM burned them in some way, and cheating was the only way to stay alive in his usually rather arbritary DM-centric games. Once they realize you are going to be fair and impartial and let them contribute to the game, alot of players will stop cheating on their own.</p><p></p><p>So, in closing, I think if a DM trusts players too much, the result can be a game that develops some serious problems in a hurry. If the only purpose of the game is to get together and talk it probably means nothing and stopping the cheating would probably be more trouble than it is worth. But, much as I enjoy hanging out with my friends doing any varaity of things, when I get together to game I expect there to be a certain emphasis on playing the game (which isn't to say that an occasional OOC joke isn't appreciated).</p></blockquote><p></p>
[QUOTE="Celebrim, post: 403430, member: 4937"] Piratecat: You're right of course. It's my first poll. I didn't realize multiple answers was an option. As far as the multiple answers go, I think it is a pretty rare player who hasn't fudged a dice at one time especially when he was young and rolling up stats or making saving throws with a beloved character. I don't suppose that I'm being very subtle. I wanted to prove that players cheat, ask whether it harms the game, and discuss what a DM can do about it if it does. Alot of my point here is that while I've often been very close friends with my players, I've seen groups that have been gaming together for years where one or more individuals cheat as a matter of course. Most of the time it drives the DM to abstraction, and most of the time the player that is cheating is the sort of player that always feels he has to be the center of attention, always has to be the best at everything, and always wants to argue with the DM about rules issues. I frankly don't know where some DM's get the patience for that. I can't put up with it for long. My first responce is to take him aside privately and say something to the effect of, 'Look, I've been keeping track of your initiative and you haven't rolled less than a 15 in the past 20 rolls. The odds of that are somewhat less than the odds of winning the state lottery, so I don't want to hear about it. Either find a fair dice, start reporting what you actually roll, or find somewhere else to game because if this keeps up either I'm going to start cheating on my dice until you get the hint or I'm going stop inviting you over period.' My second responce is to publicly call him out. My third responce is ... well... I've never had to go so far. I don't think it is possible for an impartial DM to trust all players implicitly, whether you have played with them for a long time or not. And I think it is rather foolish to not be on gaurd against cheating before a new player has proven himself. Everyonce in a while it is worth it to let a player cheat rather than kill a character due to bad luck (though better still to avoid arbitrary 'save or die' effects), but if the cheating is consistant it usually will wreck a game. DM is simply an alternate title for referee and one of the things you have to insure is that there is an environment of fair play and no favoritism. If you are overlooking the cheating on player is doing, then you are in essence playing favorites with the cheater to the detriment of everyone in the party who is not cheating. As a player as well as a DM, I have to say that it doesn't feel too good to have your player always struggling where as other characters glide right through everything because their player is essentially 'taking 20' every time he needs it. And it doesn't help if the DM scales up the challenge to compensate, because that just leaves your character more irrelevant during play. A good DM, IMO, watches as many dice rolls as he can and otherwise removes as many temptations and oppurtunities to cheat from his players as is possible. I don't think that it is a coincidence that so many people are pointing out that people who cheat usually don't enjoy the game. I think that most people would cheat would enjoy the game better if they weren't cheating. Afterall, it seems to me that those that cheat consitantly, are usually trying to prove how capable you are through the success of your character, but how can you be satisfied with your success if you know it wasn't founded on your skill? And I should in all fairness say that alot of groups that cheat consitantly do so because a former DM burned them in some way, and cheating was the only way to stay alive in his usually rather arbritary DM-centric games. Once they realize you are going to be fair and impartial and let them contribute to the game, alot of players will stop cheating on their own. So, in closing, I think if a DM trusts players too much, the result can be a game that develops some serious problems in a hurry. If the only purpose of the game is to get together and talk it probably means nothing and stopping the cheating would probably be more trouble than it is worth. But, much as I enjoy hanging out with my friends doing any varaity of things, when I get together to game I expect there to be a certain emphasis on playing the game (which isn't to say that an occasional OOC joke isn't appreciated). [/QUOTE]
Insert quotes…
Verification
Post reply
Community
General Tabletop Discussion
*TTRPGs General
Player fudging in RPG's.
Top