D&D General [rant]The conservatism of D&D fans is exhausting.

[Hussar]

I don't think it's an answer of convenience. Degree is the difference between a tap and a punch, or a glass of water and a swimming pool, or an ultralight and a 747 jumbo jet.

My last post had a question mark at the end because I don't know how "setting element" was used in your discussion, so I was was guessing. My guess was along the following lines.

Suppose I had a homebrew setting and as part of its history elves disappeared 10,000 years ago and since that time that has not been a single sighting reported. Elves are gone from my setting, and there is a critical reason for them to be gone. Changing that is going to be a crapton harder than deciding to hit the party with 4 orcs instead of 6.

That's the point though. The disappearance of the elves is an established fact of the setting. Fair enough. It's not in flux. It's a fact of the setting, same as... Waterdeep exists in the Sword Coast. Once it's established, it's no longer in flux.

But, that's not the issue is it? No one is saying DM's should be changing established information. But, it has been repeatedly stated that in any sim or sandbox game, nothing is in flux once the game starts. The DM is forbidden in these games from changing stuff - if that town exists in Hex 2023, then that town must always be there. And it must be a town. It cannot be a village or a city. It must be exactly as the DM has outlined it to be. Nothing can be in flux.

But, now, apparently, everything that hasn't been previously established is actually in flux and may be changed at any time.... so, basically the last five hundred pages or so of this thread has just gotten ejected out the window.

 

[EzekielRaiden]

This example does not match what I described. If a poker tournament's rules expressly state that telepathy is allowed, it can hardly be cheating to use a device to read other people's minds to win that tournament. Even though one might criticise the wisdom of the tournament organizers in formulating that rule.


Technically speaking, it would not be cheating. One could criticise my wisdom in joining a tournament without knowing all the rules.


While cheating might not be simply breaking an explicit rule, it certainly isn't following them!

The term for using a rule to gain illicit benefits by following it is "exploit"... but fudging, at least in the latest D&D text, isn't for the benefit of the DM. It's done only in service to players.


I don't take that meaning from the text. The text reads

you could ignore a Critical Hit to save a character’s life. Don’t alter die rolls too often, though, and never let the players know when you fudge a die roll.​

On surface it doesn't offer a motive beyond "save a character's life". However it is a subsection "DM Die Rolling" in a section "Respect for the Players". The section is framed thusly

Your players need to know from the start that you’ll run a game that is fun, fair, and tailored for them; that you’ll allow each of them to contribute to the story; and that you’ll pay attention to them when they take their turns. Your players also count on you to make sure an adventure’s threats don’t target them personally. Never make players feel uncomfortable or threatened.​

​

The placement and framing strongly imply that fudging will be done out of respect for the players in order to let them contribute to the story, have fun, and enjoy a tailored experience in which they never feel uncomfortable or threatened. If you think those motives are better satisfied another way, then the rules offer an alternative

Rolling dice in the open demonstrates impartiality—you’re not fudging rolls to the characters’ benefit or detriment.​

​

Although to my reading, the latest DMG leans more toward than against DM partiality toward the players. They ought to be fans of the characters, collectively. I take the text as an expression of that along traditional lines; without agreeing that it is the best means to that ends. I don't impute unethical motives where there is evidence to the contrary... rather I take the design to be concerned for the player experience (with reasoning @Enrahim has articulated.)

Fudging is, by its very nature, not running a fair game. It is, by intent, a bias.

 

[clearstream]

D&D isn't a game to everyone. Some people treat it as fictional creation experience.

Do you mean D&D alone, or TTRPG generally? I'll assume it's the latter (just because the former in the absence of the latter would seem incoherent.)

I like the notion of destabilising the argument (re: cheating) through setting D&D outside of games as such. Presumably with some accompanying argument that says, notwithstanding that D&D isn't a game on this account, it is still possible to cheat and altering the result on dice will still count as cheating. Although I suspect it would entail some extended rabbit-holing to get there, as well as a rather resolute position against a longstanding ontological norm.

Suffice to say that given the fictional creation is playful and structured, at least in part, by rules, I count D&D a game. If you don't, then I admit I'm curious, but not hopeful, about the arguments you will put forward to get there.

 

[clearstream]

Fudging is, by its very nature, not running a fair game. It is, by intent, a bias.

There are too many problematic implications around what may properly count as a rule or a game, for me to engage with the "by its very nature" line of argument.

But as to bias, yes, I think DM in D&D is intended to be biased toward the players. At the same time, that bias is not intended to make the game unfair. In fact, fudging seems most strongly motivated by reestablishing fairness.

 

[Maggan]

Fudging is, by its very nature, not running a fair game. It is, by intent, a bias.

But an encounter can be unfair to the players, due to bad design. Me changing it on the fly could make it fair to the players.

 

[Hussar]

But an encounter can be unfair to the players, due to bad design. Me changing it on the fly could make it fair to the players.

And, frankly, again, there's a million ways to bias an encounter. Just off the top of my head:

• Do monsters "focus fire" - each monster uses all its attacks on a single target or do they spread out?
• Do monsters use tactics?
• Do monsters fight to the absolute last HP or do they run away/surrender?
• Do monsters start using more group oriented tactics like Assisting each other or grappling?
• Magic can do all sorts of weird things to encounters.

Just like anything else in D&D, the DM has so many tools in the chest to influence the game that "nudging the dice" is probably one of the most clumsy of them. There are just far, far too many other options out there. If the encounter is too easy? Well, I guess a couple of stragglers stumble into the encounter to beef it up. Or, we just don't worry about this encounter being too easy because, well, there's always the next one.

At what point is it "fudging" or just "playing the game"? There's no real answer to that.

 

[AlViking]

Heh. Funny how things are "in flux" before initiative is rolled, but, changing setting elements is off limits. How can things be in flux and carved in stone at the same time?

Are you really that desperate for a gotcha?

Details like the exact number of enemies is in flux until the encounter starts. Just like other myriad small details of what the characters will encounter as I've explained before.

Edit - removed a sentence that could have come across as more sarcastic than necessary.

 

[Lanefan]

How do your players feel?? Would they rather you be impartial and TPK them or fudge things so they live?

I think they'd rather things never get to the point of my having to make that choice.

In fairness, though, I really do think they'd prefer the impartial option were it to come to that.

 

[AlViking]

I suppose. I think that answer's a bit convenient though. "Everything is in flux, except for the things I don't like to be in flux" is hardly a very satisfying axiom for game design.

See, I have zero problem with the idea that everything is in flux up to the point where it is introduced to the table (initiative is rolled). I fully support that idea. But, I was told that things being in flux was the antithesis of sandbox play. Which kinda leads to my confusion. If things are "in flux" then doing something like adding a cook to the kitchen is perfectly fine - after all, who or what is in the kitchen is "in flux" until the door is opened. Rolling random encounters are perfectly fine because everything is "in flux" until it's established at the table.

I love playing this way.

But, we've just spent the last four or five hundred pages of posts absolutely denying that things can be "in flux" in a simulationist and/or sandbox game.

So, you'll have to pardon my confusion here.

There are many ways to play a sandbox, a lot of people use random tables.

But just to expand a bit (and because it's early and my brain is still waking up) I don't remember ever saying everything is locked down. I have a good overview of who's who, what's where and things that are in motion. But of course I have to regularly invent things like the butcher the baker and the candlestick maker because for some reason the players think the butcher is responsible for the murders and selling parts to the other two.

Improvisation is a critical skill for sandboxes, not sure where you got any other idea.

 

[Hussar]

Improvisation is a critical skill for sandboxes, not sure where you got any other idea.

Oh, I don't know. Could be the endless complaints about adding in a cook to a kitchen.

Or maybe the endless complaints about players trying to add things to the setting.

I mean, if improvisation is a critical skill for a sandbox and for simulation, then, suddenly, all those meta-game style mechanics are back on the table. What's the difference between "improvising" a cook in the kitchen and adding a cook to the kitchen because of a failed skill roll?

It's not about a "gotcha" moment. It's about the fact that the goalposts have been on roller skates all the way along.