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
*Dungeons & Dragons
Dice Fudging and Twist Endings
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="GrahamWills" data-source="post: 8970774" data-attributes="member: 75787"><p>Apologies; if it works for you and your players and harms no one (all of which appear to be true), it is a fine and fun way to play! I meant to use weird in the sense of "unusual" not "outlandish", but you are right to call me on it; sorry for being insulting.</p><p></p><p>I do however feel that you are characterizing the opposite approach as bit extremist though:</p><p></p><p>I don't think most GMs who make subject decisions in combat do so arbitrarily, as you are indicating. They do so for reasonable reasons, which include (1) realizing they made a mistake and fixing it (2) adjusting to real-world needs (3) adhering to the game genre.</p><p></p><p>An example of (1) from last month is when I didn't notice that a level 6 monster was actually both double-strength and large, so it was 4x as dangerous as it should have been, making my design of an encounter flawed as I had added 3 of them. To fix that, I changed the monster's attack to do half damage. Perhaps most GMs don't consider this fudging, as the initial design was an error, so it's a fix, but I don't want to put words in your mouth. Is this something you would do? Or maybe you would solve this another way? Whichever, I don't feel it it's arbitrary or enforcing a GM's planned outcome.</p><p></p><p>An example of (2) is from last week, when we were past our end-time, but the combat was effectively over. I had the enemy run away earlier than their description indicated they would. Again this does not feel arbitrary. You could argue that the "result I wanted" was to be finished in time, but the impression your quote gives is that I am looking for the outcome <em>of the encounter</em> to be whatever I wanted. Am I correct there, or do you consider things like "trying to finish on time" as reprehensible behavior where the GM is forcing their desired outcomes on others?</p><p></p><p>An example of (3) is also from last week. In this campaign, we had set the genre to be one where character death was expected, especially at big occasions. This was a big occasion, and the players were having a much easier time of it (mostly randomly through drawing easy battle encounters) so I deliberately took out some potential trivial encounters to make the mix harder and increase the chance of character death. I do not feel this was "arbitrary", but rather exactly the opposite! You could argue that it was to get a result I wanted, but since that was the agreed-on result we all wanted, I'm not sure your second designation fits either.</p><p></p><p>I'm also interested in your statement that when a GM helps your character, you feel your "tactics, planning and actions during the encounter don't <em>really</em> matter." For me, it's the <strong>exact opposite</strong>. If I identify a dangerous foe, tactically interposing myself, as the best defender, between them and the party, and showing planning by getting the cleric to buff my AC, then if the GM rolls 4 straight crits as the enraged ogre kills me, THAT is when I feel that nothing mattered. If the GM instead says "wow that's too unlucky. The ogre is so excited by his first three successes that his last attack only does enough to knock you out" then I feel that my tactics, planning and actions during the encounter have been rewarded by the GM. The dice make my tactics not matter, the GM fixes that and makes it matter by overriding the dice.</p><p></p><p>For me the is maybe the most interesting of the "fudge scenarios" -- when a player has done all the cool, fun, clever things they should and the dice just kill them. For me, this really makes me feel like all my activity was pointless. Much more so than if the GM subjectively makes a call to reward my skilled play, overriding the dice. The GM you appear to describing seems to regularly override the dice not to fix errors, not to allow people to get to bed on time, not to compensate for terrible luck, but to enforce an in-game outcome they want. I agree that I don't want to play in that game, bit I would submit that this is not very common.</p><p></p><p>In fact, I might almost call it "weird" <img src="data:image/gif;base64,R0lGODlhAQABAIAAAAAAAP///yH5BAEAAAAALAAAAAABAAEAAAIBRAA7" class="smilie smilie--sprite smilie--sprite1" alt=":)" title="Smile :)" loading="lazy" data-shortname=":)" /></p></blockquote><p></p>
[QUOTE="GrahamWills, post: 8970774, member: 75787"] Apologies; if it works for you and your players and harms no one (all of which appear to be true), it is a fine and fun way to play! I meant to use weird in the sense of "unusual" not "outlandish", but you are right to call me on it; sorry for being insulting. I do however feel that you are characterizing the opposite approach as bit extremist though: I don't think most GMs who make subject decisions in combat do so arbitrarily, as you are indicating. They do so for reasonable reasons, which include (1) realizing they made a mistake and fixing it (2) adjusting to real-world needs (3) adhering to the game genre. An example of (1) from last month is when I didn't notice that a level 6 monster was actually both double-strength and large, so it was 4x as dangerous as it should have been, making my design of an encounter flawed as I had added 3 of them. To fix that, I changed the monster's attack to do half damage. Perhaps most GMs don't consider this fudging, as the initial design was an error, so it's a fix, but I don't want to put words in your mouth. Is this something you would do? Or maybe you would solve this another way? Whichever, I don't feel it it's arbitrary or enforcing a GM's planned outcome. An example of (2) is from last week, when we were past our end-time, but the combat was effectively over. I had the enemy run away earlier than their description indicated they would. Again this does not feel arbitrary. You could argue that the "result I wanted" was to be finished in time, but the impression your quote gives is that I am looking for the outcome [I]of the encounter[/I] to be whatever I wanted. Am I correct there, or do you consider things like "trying to finish on time" as reprehensible behavior where the GM is forcing their desired outcomes on others? An example of (3) is also from last week. In this campaign, we had set the genre to be one where character death was expected, especially at big occasions. This was a big occasion, and the players were having a much easier time of it (mostly randomly through drawing easy battle encounters) so I deliberately took out some potential trivial encounters to make the mix harder and increase the chance of character death. I do not feel this was "arbitrary", but rather exactly the opposite! You could argue that it was to get a result I wanted, but since that was the agreed-on result we all wanted, I'm not sure your second designation fits either. I'm also interested in your statement that when a GM helps your character, you feel your "tactics, planning and actions during the encounter don't [I]really[/I] matter." For me, it's the [B]exact opposite[/B]. If I identify a dangerous foe, tactically interposing myself, as the best defender, between them and the party, and showing planning by getting the cleric to buff my AC, then if the GM rolls 4 straight crits as the enraged ogre kills me, THAT is when I feel that nothing mattered. If the GM instead says "wow that's too unlucky. The ogre is so excited by his first three successes that his last attack only does enough to knock you out" then I feel that my tactics, planning and actions during the encounter have been rewarded by the GM. The dice make my tactics not matter, the GM fixes that and makes it matter by overriding the dice. For me the is maybe the most interesting of the "fudge scenarios" -- when a player has done all the cool, fun, clever things they should and the dice just kill them. For me, this really makes me feel like all my activity was pointless. Much more so than if the GM subjectively makes a call to reward my skilled play, overriding the dice. The GM you appear to describing seems to regularly override the dice not to fix errors, not to allow people to get to bed on time, not to compensate for terrible luck, but to enforce an in-game outcome they want. I agree that I don't want to play in that game, bit I would submit that this is not very common. In fact, I might almost call it "weird" :) [/QUOTE]
Insert quotes…
Verification
Post reply
Community
General Tabletop Discussion
*Dungeons & Dragons
Dice Fudging and Twist Endings
Top