THIS is why I roll in the open...
- Thread starter Rel
- Start date
youspoonybard
First Post
I roll in the open, and it has paid off big for me, twice.
In the final encounters of two separate campaigns, I've had very close encounters where the PC's were only able to pull stuff off with lucky ones and twenties.
While I don't remember the specifics of the first one too much (it was a while ago), the party Sorceror had to close a portal, which took a special spell that had a casting time of one minute. With all of the other party members down, it fell to the party's Dragon Disciple (temporarily turned into a real dragon) to try and keep her focused on the spell. An enemy mage pounded her over and over again, and the dragon was desperately trying to keep her from being damaged (Resist Energy spells and the like), and both were down to single-digit hit points before they were able to close the thing (all those d6's from those spells were this close from sealing their fates).
More intense, however, was the showdown another group of mine had. It involved a Balor that the PC's had accidentaly set forth into the world. Things were looking rather poor for the PC's - the Sorceror had been killed by the initial Fire Storm, and even the Monk and the Rogue had failed their Reflex saves, so the whole party was hurting. The Balor was having fun with Power Word: Stun (hit the Fighter and the Monk), and Confused the Rogue. Needless to say, things were looking poor.
That's when the crazyness started.
I rolled high on the percentile first, which caused the Rogue to go after the stunned Monk. Sneak attack would have wasted him, but he miraculously rolled low on his attack roll, and missed the guy. Balor stunned the Fighter again, and the next round, the Rogue rolls an Act Normally (10% chance). Desperate, he whips out a scroll he has and makes a quick UMD check.
Rolling a natural 20, he *barely* penetrates the SR check, and tries to Baleful Polymorph the Balor into a frog. Okay, I thought. It will only fail on a natural 1.
Out in the open, my players shouted with glee, as the dice comes up 1. The Balor is frogged. Unfortunately for the players, he passes his will save, and dispels the frogging next turn, but not after the Monk has recovered from the Power Word: Stun.
The Monk tumbled over to the far side of the demon, and then it's the Rogue's turn again. Confusion roll - Attack the nearest creature - now the Balor (30% chance). He now flanks with the Monk, and gets his sneak damage.
The Balor decides to take a more direct approach, and starts attacking furiously with his weaponry. Instead of gasps of defeat, though, each roll brings a hearty cheer from my players, and the Balor fails to hit the Monk (who is not an AC monk - it was very poor rolling).
Several rounds of combat later, the Rogue never hits an ally while under the confusion effect - even though he rolled to do so a couple times, he always rolls low on the attack rolls. The Monk gets in a few hits on the Balor, including one lucky crit. And just when the Balor has mopped up the two vailant heroes, the Fighter is freed from the stunning effect.
Grabbing the Holy Cold-Iron javelin that was the party's only hope against the beast, the Warrior described his action - "I charge at the Balor and stab him with the Javelin". Well, the Demon got an attack of opportunity from the charge - and missed with another natural one.
With this one last chance, the Dwarven fighter thrust the weapon into the Balor's body...and rolled a natural 20, followed by a confirmation.
Even though the Fighter and the rest of the party was killed in the death throws of the mighty outsider, I have never heard such cheering and enthusiasm in a game session before. It had been an incredible sequence of lucky rolls for the party - and they knew that I wasn't fudging anything to help them out.
After a game like that, you could not convince me to roll behind a screen.
In the final encounters of two separate campaigns, I've had very close encounters where the PC's were only able to pull stuff off with lucky ones and twenties.
While I don't remember the specifics of the first one too much (it was a while ago), the party Sorceror had to close a portal, which took a special spell that had a casting time of one minute. With all of the other party members down, it fell to the party's Dragon Disciple (temporarily turned into a real dragon) to try and keep her focused on the spell. An enemy mage pounded her over and over again, and the dragon was desperately trying to keep her from being damaged (Resist Energy spells and the like), and both were down to single-digit hit points before they were able to close the thing (all those d6's from those spells were this close from sealing their fates).
More intense, however, was the showdown another group of mine had. It involved a Balor that the PC's had accidentaly set forth into the world. Things were looking rather poor for the PC's - the Sorceror had been killed by the initial Fire Storm, and even the Monk and the Rogue had failed their Reflex saves, so the whole party was hurting. The Balor was having fun with Power Word: Stun (hit the Fighter and the Monk), and Confused the Rogue. Needless to say, things were looking poor.
That's when the crazyness started.
I rolled high on the percentile first, which caused the Rogue to go after the stunned Monk. Sneak attack would have wasted him, but he miraculously rolled low on his attack roll, and missed the guy. Balor stunned the Fighter again, and the next round, the Rogue rolls an Act Normally (10% chance). Desperate, he whips out a scroll he has and makes a quick UMD check.
Rolling a natural 20, he *barely* penetrates the SR check, and tries to Baleful Polymorph the Balor into a frog. Okay, I thought. It will only fail on a natural 1.
Out in the open, my players shouted with glee, as the dice comes up 1. The Balor is frogged. Unfortunately for the players, he passes his will save, and dispels the frogging next turn, but not after the Monk has recovered from the Power Word: Stun.
The Monk tumbled over to the far side of the demon, and then it's the Rogue's turn again. Confusion roll - Attack the nearest creature - now the Balor (30% chance). He now flanks with the Monk, and gets his sneak damage.
The Balor decides to take a more direct approach, and starts attacking furiously with his weaponry. Instead of gasps of defeat, though, each roll brings a hearty cheer from my players, and the Balor fails to hit the Monk (who is not an AC monk - it was very poor rolling).
Several rounds of combat later, the Rogue never hits an ally while under the confusion effect - even though he rolled to do so a couple times, he always rolls low on the attack rolls. The Monk gets in a few hits on the Balor, including one lucky crit. And just when the Balor has mopped up the two vailant heroes, the Fighter is freed from the stunning effect.
Grabbing the Holy Cold-Iron javelin that was the party's only hope against the beast, the Warrior described his action - "I charge at the Balor and stab him with the Javelin". Well, the Demon got an attack of opportunity from the charge - and missed with another natural one.
With this one last chance, the Dwarven fighter thrust the weapon into the Balor's body...and rolled a natural 20, followed by a confirmation.
Even though the Fighter and the rest of the party was killed in the death throws of the mighty outsider, I have never heard such cheering and enthusiasm in a game session before. It had been an incredible sequence of lucky rolls for the party - and they knew that I wasn't fudging anything to help them out.
After a game like that, you could not convince me to roll behind a screen.
helium3 said:
Actually, there is a big difference between being the key guy and being the man-in-charge. team leader and critical for plot not the same and all.
But, i do manage to get across to the players, so far at least, that the stories and plots put everyone as the "this time its personal " and vital-to-the-plot-guy roles and these will vary as time goes on and be shared. its not uncommon for two perople to be key during this arc and two others be key in the next and back and forth.
So, as long as everyone learned some sharing skills, and doesn't expect to fill the vital role all the time, it tends to work out.
ThirdWizard
First Post
Crothian said:
So you could still fudge, if you are inclined to do so. If you're going to fudge, you're going to fudge, and open rolling only clears up certain aspects of it. Not that fudging is bad. I don't do it because I don't want to, that's all. Not that open rolling is bad, but I think it should be done for other reasons than honesty with the players.
fanboy2000
Adventurer
In my d20 Future game last night I used the "Players Roll all the Dice" option from Unearthed Arcana, which is essentially rolling in the open. I instituted two rules: 1. Players couldn't spend action points on Defense Rolls. 2. Defense rolls were only for ordinaries, not heroic (or, rather, villanous) NPCs.
TheAuldGrump
First Post
Heh, I prefer rolling in the open, my players want me to roll behind the screen so I can cheat...
The Auld Grump
The Auld Grump
Gentlegamer
Adventurer
Seen or unseen, let the dice fall where they may.
Gentlegamer said:
Or, optionally, figure out the way that works best for your group, and do it that way, and try to ignore anyone who declares that the way you've decided is best for your group, based on the type of game you and the players want, the psychological makeup of the players, and the story requirements of the game you and the players have agreed to run, is somehow invalid because you aren't following a rule in their game. Then, when they follow up with, "Do whatever you like, but I will never sit at your table," breathe a quiet sigh of relief and, if possible, avoid replying with "Deal!"
For the record, I have players who are on the record as asking me never to fudge to save their characters, and players who are on the record as preferring not to die in random encounters or non-major-plot battles, and would feel frustrated, and not in a good way, if it happened. I try to accomodate both.
I agree with:
a) The notion that there is no such thing as complete impartiality. Fudging the dice is one way to change things, but so is picking the monster's attack strategy, deciding how many monsters will show up in the next area after this fight is done, and coming up with the story elements that the players will react to are all forms of fudging. Realistically, based on the content of many of these games, the GM has to be at least somewhat partial, or the world would have ended sometime after the third session. "Yeah, I didn't want to fudge things by having the evil lich lay in wait until you were 15th level, so I rolled randomly for when he would wake up and start raising monsters to make evil spawn, and it turned out that he woke up last month. And he summoned a wraith, who made a bunch of spawn wraiths, who then made a bunch more spawn wraiths, and, well, this world has just been destroyed, but if you like, I can show you the completely non-fudged roll I used to wake up the lich."
b) The idea that players' characters would know what the bad guys were rolling, and what their ACs were, at least to a point. Unless there's a compelling monster-specific reason not to (the monster has defenses that are subtle and are designed to mess up players who think they're hitting), the guy who has dedicated his life to martial combat knows whether he just swung well or poorly, and how well he'll have to connect to get through the scaly armor of the thing he just attacked. That guy also knows how skillfully a monster is swinging at him. So I have no problem, in 95% of my fights, letting the players know what defense they're aiming at after the first few attacks.
Bloodstone Press
Explorer
I roll in the open, mainly because it makes for exciting encounters, as described in the first post about the rogue/cleric.
Plus rolling in the open can really intimidate the players. I love the look on their faces when they see me roll a 6 or an 8 for an atack roll and I say "Hit."
Plus rolling in the open can really intimidate the players. I love the look on their faces when they see me roll a 6 or an 8 for an atack roll and I say "Hit."
