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

[Micah Sweet]

That depends upon the game.

It's stated in the game text that DM can alter rolls if they choose, so doing so cannot be cheating in D&D, just as altering adversaries midsession cannot be cheating in Daggerheart. On the other hand, it would be cheating in any game that places GM within the rules as a player and lacks such text.

Technically correct, although not every version of a D&D style game tells you it's ok to fudge in the text.

 

[Hussar]

Also, the town is in flux and cannot be exactly as the DM outlined it, because the DM is not God. He cannot get every detail, NPC, animal, pet, cobblestone, etc. written down such that there's nothing he needs to create on the fly. See my example with the farrier waaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaay upthread(this thread is long). The Forgotten Realms, by far the most detailed setting I can think of, still hasn't detailed out even 1% of the setting. That's a lot of flux.

That's been my point all the way along though. I'm not the one insisting that setting changes cannot be done. Of course they are done. We all do them. Everyone admits that we do. I just find the distinction that some justifications for changes is acceptable and others aren't. It's okay to add in an NPC to the town as needed - not because the town necessarily has that NPC, but, because the players asked if there was a particular kind of NPC there and it makes no real difference either way, so, add in the NPC. Cools. We're adding details to make the game more interesting.

But, I've just been told that that's absolutely off the table. You MUST NOT add in setting details to make the game more interesting or to move the game forward. That's "fail forward" and all sorts of bad DMing practices. The fact that we all do it and think absolutely nothing of it gets ignored of course, but, hey, we must never change the details of the setting to "move the game forward".

 

[Maxperson]

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.

Nobody has complained about adding a cook to the kitchen. It's the method described in this thread that doesn't work for traditional play. And we have repeatedly said that we have to add details to the setting, because the DM cannot do it all in advance. It's not possible.

 

[Maxperson]

With all respect, when the opposition and the referee are the same person, "fairness" should not have been on the list of qualities you expect from the game.

Just look at some of the NFL games!

 

[Maxperson]

If I draw the implications correctly, then I think you are right in saying we should be critical of treating everything not ruled out by a game text as ruled in. When similar debates arose around Advanced Squad Leader text, a principle was developed labelled "COWTRA" (concentrate on what the rules allow).

On page 17 of the latest DMG there is text for DM to do it. There is no comparable text in Core for players to do it. Thus the two aren't on equal footing insomuch as the rules allow. That's setting aside that DM gains no benefit for themselves by doing it, whereas players could.


Following the rules is near-universally accepted as making it not cheating. Are you thinking instead of the DM exploiting that text to illicit ends?

Right. I mean, the rules also don't rule out a sword strike setting off a localized nuke if you hit something with it. Nowhere do the rules say ONLY a d8 damage from a long sword.

Plus, the rules give the DM the ability to step outside and above them, but do not do the same for the players. He's the only one who can add, subtract or change the rules that are written in the books.

 

[Thomas Shey]

It might not be irrational or hypocritical, but, it is pretty thin. After all, it's not like the DM is asking permission beforehand.

There's no reason they couldn't; nothing stops someone from going "I'm sometimes going to fudge a little when something's gone off the rails. Do you want me to just do it visibly?"

I agree that's probably uncommon, but in most cases its because its taken as a given that doing that quietly is part of the GM's job (again, to make it clear, I don't think that's a good assumption, but we have the gaming culture we have, not the one we want).

I seriously doubt any DM in their session 0 straight up tells the players, "Hey, from time to time, when I feel it's appropriate, I'm going to fudge die rolls. I'm not going to tell you when, but, I am going to do it". I'm pretty sure what the response from the players would be and it likely wouldn't be very positive.

I would find it statistically nearly certain that a few do. I also find it similar certain that its rare. And I've seen enough people who don't want the illusion pulled back that I suspect in most of the cases when people do (since this is likely to be from a GM who is generally straightforward) that what they'd likely get was a nod and a move on.

Because, once you've made it clear to the players that you might, at any point in time, whenever you feel it's "appropriate" over rule the dice and any time you do it, you will not tell the players, you lose a fair bit of trust at the table. After all, they never know when you will do it, so, that makes every roll suspect.

I think you're assuming all of them care. That's likely projecting pretty strongly.

 

[Thomas Shey]

We actually do have at least one person on this forum--IIRC in this thread, but I fear I no longer remember specifically whom--who has point-blank told me that yes, they do in fact tell their players that they may, on fairly rare occasions, fudge rolls if they feel that doing so is genuinely in the group's best interest. Their players have apparently been mostly fine with that.

Yeah, even if something is uncommon, its a mistake to assume it doesn't exist at all in the gaming populace as whole. I've seen people say they've never seen players bring up rules mistakes the GM is making or they disagree with that worked to their advantage (i.e. rules arguments that work against their own interests) where I've not only done so in the past, I was at a game table where essentially the whole player group did.

Assuming something is an outlier can be a fair assessment with the data one has. Assuming its nonexistent is reaching beyond not only your available data, its probably reaching beyond any possible data one can have in these situations.

 

[clearstream]

Technically correct, although not every version of a D&D style game tells you it's ok to fudge in the text.

3e has

Do you cheat? The answer: The DM really can’t cheat. You’re the umpire, and what you say goes. As such, it’s certainly within your rights to sway things one way or another to keep people happy or keep things running smoothly. It’s no fun losing a long term character who gets run over by a cart. A good rule of thumb is that a character shouldn’t die in a trivial way because of some fluke of the dice unless he or she was doing something really stupid at the time.​

​

4e has

Rolling behind the screen lets you fudge if you want to. If two critical hits in a row would kill a character, you might want to change the second critical hit to a normal hit, or even a miss. Don’t do it too often, though, and don’t let on that you’re doing it, or the other players feel as though they don’t face any real risk—or worse, that you’re playing favorites.​

​

AD&D has

Now and then a player will die through no fault of his own. He or she will have done everything correctly, taken every reasonable precaution, but still the freakish roll of the dice will kill the character. In the long run you should let such things pass as the players will kill more than one opponent with their own freakish rolls at some later time. Yet you do have the right to arbitrate the situation. You can rule that the player, instead of dying, is knocked unconscious, loses a limb, is blinded in one eye or invoke any reasonably severe penalty that still takes into account what the monster has done. It is very demoralizing to the players to lose a cared-for-player character when they have played well. When they have done something stupid or have not taken precautions, then let the dice fall where they may!​

Expert (Mentzer) has

The DM may choose a number within the given die range rather than roll for the amount of damage, number appearing, etc. This may be necessary to allow for a more enjoyable game; heavy damage early in the game may spoil some of the fun.​

 

[Maxperson]

That's been my point all the way along though. I'm not the one insisting that setting changes cannot be done. Of course they are done. We all do them. Everyone admits that we do. I just find the distinction that some justifications for changes is acceptable and others aren't. It's okay to add in an NPC to the town as needed - not because the town necessarily has that NPC, but, because the players asked if there was a particular kind of NPC there and it makes no real difference either way, so, add in the NPC. Cools. We're adding details to make the game more interesting.

But, I've just been told that that's absolutely off the table. You MUST NOT add in setting details to make the game more interesting or to move the game forward. That's "fail forward" and all sorts of bad DMing practices. The fact that we all do it and think absolutely nothing of it gets ignored of course, but, hey, we must never change the details of the setting to "move the game forward".

1. We aren't really changing the town so much as adding to it. Yes that does change it in a manner of speaking, but we're not going to suddenly say that city hall isn't there when it previously was. We might add in an aid to the Mayor, though, if we forgot to give him one or if it's likely he has multiple aids and didn't give him enough.

2. The reason for the addition isn't making things more interesting. The reasons will be things like necessity, realism, forgot to add it, didn't even know something like that belonged in the town and learned it when the player asked, etc.

3. #2 said, if there are 4 acceptable ways to add the thing in and 1 is interesting and 3 are not, it's perfectly okay to pick the interesting one as a secondary consideration, because it is still a game that we are playing to have fun.

4. Fail forward is a method that can be used for sandbox play, but may or may not used depending on things like the DM is more traditional or just doesn't like it, or does like it. That's why a version of it is in the 5e DMG as an optional rule.

 

[Thomas Shey]

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.

The latter depends on what definition of "fairness" one is using in a given context.