# Can the GM cheat?



## airwalkrr (Apr 17, 2013)

I recently learned that two people whom I thought were my friends decided not to game with me because they felt I was fudging dice and "cheating" as the GM. They didn't tell me this, I had to find this out from a third person. Personally, I find that cowardly, but that's not the discussion at hand.

Did I fudge dice and alter numbers on the fly? Absolutely. The campaign was such that the player characters were grossly imbalanced (as I allowed the players the freedom to play whatever type of character they wanted to play) and I often made things more difficult on the player characters who were the most powerful. It was also such that the story was far more important than numbers. We weren't playing an incredibly well-balanced system. During role-play situations, things were fine as I could give everyone their chance to shine through role-playing interactions. But when combats arose, I had to do things to make certain characters feel relevant, especially when the players themselves (particularly those with the least powerful characters) were at a loss of what to do to feel effective. Incidentally, the two players who left the game had characters who were leagues ahead of the other characters. Think about the difference between a 20th-level character and a 3rd-level character in D&D. That's how far apart the power-level was. But as I said, this game was not about power or balanced combat. In fact, combat was a side-story, usually limited to climactic, cinematic-style encounters. I never felt beholden to dice in such a game. And I never once killed a player character or forced a player character to suffer negative consequences as a result of my fudging. But did I cheat? No, I feel I did not. The GM cannot cheat.

I am not sure what to make of these players, as the situation might be related to something else (especially since I had to hear this from a third person perspective). But I have to honestly ask, is it possible for a GM to cheat? If you are a player, do you care if a GM changes rules behind the screen? My opinion is that the story trumps rules (and dice) all the time unless the campaign is specifically designed as a tournament-style challenge.


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## Morrus (Apr 17, 2013)

Rule 0. The GM cannot cheat.*

That's not to say that the GM cannot be unfair or unreasonable.  Or that specific groups may have different social expectations which transcend the game rules. Always best to be clear with those you game with.

*To clarify, I mean "is unable to cheat" because if the GM does it, it is legal. But it still might be dumb or unfair. Fudging the occasional die roll is well within the scope of acceptability, as is creating encounters on the fly, designing NPCs, creating worlds, and a million other things that a GM is empowered to do but could easily do unfairly.


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## Ahnehnois (Apr 17, 2013)

I look at a DM as a benevolent dictator. Do you have infinite power, including the power to fudge outcomes? Yes. Could you abuse that power? Yes.

That said, this sort of example doesn't jump out at me as being abusive.


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## Mishihari Lord (Apr 17, 2013)

The DM cannot cheat.  

However if the social contract at your table is "no fudging" then you shouldn't fudge.  This is a good reason to talk to your players and get a consensus on their expectations of how the game will run.



Morrus said:


> Rule 0. The GM cannot cheat.




Then Rule 0.1 is "Never admit fudging."

I usually look on fudging as a failure to design encounters properly.


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## Kingreaper (Apr 18, 2013)

If you claim not to fudge, and you do fudge, you're cheating.

If you never make that claim, it's less clear but I tend towards "let the dice fall where they may". If you know what outcome you want, don't roll for it.
 If the party's imbalanced, find a way to deal with that that doesn't involve you having to decide who gets to succeed and who fails.

Because if you're fudging very often, then you're basically controlling the outcome, and the dice rolls are just a lie.


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## Mark Chance (Apr 18, 2013)

The GM might not be able to cheat, but that's no excuse to lie.


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## TMRose (Apr 18, 2013)

At times it the DM duty to cheat.

 If  the players are playing their hearts out and everything going well Do I let some cannon fodder bad guy knock off a player just because I rolled that 1  in in 1000 crit? Or if you suddenly find the encounter is going bad or too easy to stay the course?


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## Michael Silverbane (Apr 18, 2013)

Some players prefer not to have the dice or encounters altered. Those players generally consider such activity by DMs to be cheating.


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## Umbran (Apr 18, 2013)

The GM can cheat only insofar as he can break the rules of the social contract under which everyone agreed to play.

If the players agreed to Rule 0, well, then he really cannot cheat at the game rules (he can cheat in other, social ways, perhaps, but not by fudging dice).

If the players specifically rejected Rule 0, and the GM goes forth under that agreement, well, then fudging is cheating.

If you didn't discuss this, and you and the players had different ideas of what rules were in force, well, that's a grey area.  A common grey area.


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## dd.stevenson (Apr 18, 2013)

airwalkrr said:


> I recently learned that two people whom I thought were my friends decided not to game with me because they felt I was fudging dice and "cheating" as the GM. They didn't tell me this, I had to find this out from a third person.




I think the salient point is that they *felt* you were fudging dice rolls. The key to successful DM fudging is that it has to be invisible to the players. 

In most games, the practical fudging questions are "how much should the DM fudge?" and "how should the DM conceal his/her fudging?". If things got on to a point where your players felt their best move was to make up an excuse to stop playing in your games, then these are the questions I suggest you examine.

Course, their problem could be a fundamental misunderstanding about the game's social contract; but IME these sorts of situations are more rare.


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## airwalkrr (Apr 18, 2013)

I feel I was pretty clear with rule 0 throughout the campaign. Hence my surprise to hear about this.

In most of my campaigns, I don't fudge at all. I have a screen up, but that is just to keep the players from metagaming enemy combat bonuses. This campaign was special. I attempted to create a world where the players were heroes who were nigh-unstoppable. Even the weaker heroes always had some sort of "luck" on their side. And the dice didn't really matter. But it is fun to roll dice. And it is fun to see that maximum damage roll and see the villains fall over in dismay.

I don't know what the issue really was. I think the players just didn't like my GMing style or something. I am just trying to make sense of this.


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## timASW (Apr 18, 2013)

Meh, not enough information to say. Sometimes the GM fudges a few things in almost any campaign. Sometimes the GM fudges a lot. 

Usually i dont fudge at all but in my last campaign 3 players were on the extra's board at the casinos, a situation not uncommon in las vegas that basically means you have to be 24/7 on call or get knocked way down the list for people who are going to be bumped up to full time. When they all turned out we had 7 players and when none made it we had 4. They would not all show or not en masse either. 

So I designed encounters for 6 people and usually had to fudge a little one way or another because it was rare for everyone to be able to show. 

Cheating? I dont think so. Ignoring dice rolls just for story? I wouldnt like it as a player but thats because I have to feel like every fight is one we might lose to really get into it as a player. I wouldnt call it cheating or quit over it but I would probably drink more and mess around more rather then taking the campaign too seriously.


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## Obryn (Apr 18, 2013)

If the system requires the DM to fudge rolls in order for it to function properly and remain fun for all participants, there's an issue with the system, not with the DM.

-O


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## Morrus (Apr 18, 2013)

Mishihari Lord said:


> I usually look on fudging as a failure to design encounters properly.




Perhaps.  But IMO it's better than blindly continuing with the broken encounter or stopping/interrupting the game.


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## delericho (Apr 18, 2013)

airwalkrr said:


> But I have to honestly ask, is it possible for a GM to cheat?




Is it _possible_ for the DM to cheat? Absolutely. Whatever game you're playing almost certainly has rules (either those in the books or those agreed by the group around the table). If the DM breaks those rules, he's cheating.

Is it _permissible_ for the DM to cheat? That's going to depend a great deal on the group. Some groups of players will demand a no-fudging policy because they want the challenges to be 'fair' - both in that that way they know the DM isn't deliberately out to get them, and also that they'll know that when they win it's a real victory (rather than because the DM decided to let them win). Other groups will have no issue with the DM changing rolls, rules, or whatever else on the fly.

Personally, my _preference_ is for a no-fudging policy to apply to the game, but I wouldn't insist on it. YMM (and is quite likely to) V, of course.



> My opinion is that the story trumps rules (and dice) all the time unless the campaign is specifically designed as a tournament-style challenge.




I'm always a little uneasy about "story trumps rules" as a justification for fudging. Because that suggests that the DM has a clear story in mind, which can (but, importantly, doesn't have to) lead to railroading and other forms of abuse. If the DM truly has a fixed story in mind, I'd generally rather he just write it up and email it to me.

But I feel it's important to restate: I consider that a warning sign, not a deal-breaker. Because just as I've seen that approach lead to problems, I've equally seen it turn out just fine.



TMRose said:


> If  the players are playing their hearts out and everything going well Do I let some cannon fodder bad guy knock off a player just because I rolled that 1  in in 1000 crit?




Probably. It's those freak results, both for and against, that will give the players stories they'll tell and retell. The PCs are expected to win just about every combat they ever get involved in - and they'll generally not bother telling you about that time everything went exactly as expected.



> Or if you suddenly find the encounter is going bad or too easy to stay the course?




If the encounter is too easy, then in general you absolutely should let the result stand. Let the players have their win, and bulk up your _next_ encounter. Remember, you can always get another bad guy.



Obryn said:


> If the system requires the DM to fudge rolls in order for it to function properly and remain fun for all participants, there's an issue with the system, not with the DM.




I tend to agree with this. Although with the caveat that some systems are good fun apart from a few bits that just don't work right (very few games get as much playtesting as 3e, and it turns out that that's not the most robust of systems, so what does that say about the rest?). So it often is worth the DM patching up some stuff on the fly, rather than seeking for a non-existent "perfect system".


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## pming (Apr 18, 2013)

Hiya.

 Can a DM "cheat"? Hmmm...yes, sort of. Ex: Player says "My character leaps across the pit!"...DM replies, "Hmmm. No. You don't. I don't want your character to do that." That is cheating because the DM is breaking the rule that the PC is under the players control unless something else is at play (e.g., controlled PC or somesuch). Other than that...no, not really.

  That said, players _can feel cheated_. Quite easily, actually.

  Having read the OP's initial post, for me, if I were a player in that game...yeah, I'd feel cheated. If the DM is looking at a monsters stats and it says it does 1d6 with a claw, but then the DM announces "You, PowerCheracter#2, takes 10 points of damage" because PC#2 has lots of HP's compared to the other's...that's bad. That's one of the worst things a DM can do, IMHO; change rules based on "whim" because the DM is under some sort of delusion that "his story trumps all".

  So, here are some specific points I'd like to, um, point out, that may have given the players the feeling of "being cheated".



> The campaign was such that the player characters were grossly imbalanced (as I allowed the players the freedom to play whatever type of character they wanted to play) and I often made things more difficult on the player characters who were the most powerful.




  Ouch! If an average monster is fighting the PC's, and said average monster is significantly weaker when it attacks the weak PC, but it is significantly tougher when it attacks the strong PC...that's pretty close to dead on "DM is cheating" material. A monsters AC, for example, should remain constant...not go up or down based on whom it was fighting.



> But as I said, this game was not about power or balanced combat. In fact, combat was a side-story, usually limited to climactic, cinematic-style encounters




   Then why "fudge" dice in the first place? If combat was secondary, so what if Player A has a helluva time, while Player B walks all over everything? If the characters and the stories were that engaging and important, then that shouldn't matter. I've had players of both extremes in my campaigns at one time or another. The "storyteller" player could care less if the "powergamer" player was kicking ass, and vice-a-versa. If the system is at fault (which I think you mentioned), change the system...don't change the rules willy-nilly, character to character.



> My opinion is that the story trumps rules (and dice) all the time unless the campaign is specifically designed as a tournament-style challenge.




   This tells a lot. Obviously, to the two players, "story trumps rules/dice all the time" is a deal breaker. I think that they may have been ok with it if it "wasn't so obvious" to them. But it was obvious you were "fudging" numbers all the time. Rules are there so players have a baseline expectation of how the world works. If the DM is going to "pick numbers" to balance everything out, then why not just have everything be a simple coin toss? If a player invests heavily into a characters combat prowess, he *should* expect to be significantly better than someone who didn't put much of anything into combat prowess. To do otherwise is to cheat the player out of his expectation of play.

^_^

Paul L. Ming


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## sabrinathecat (Apr 18, 2013)

Only as a last resort. Honestly, this shouldn't be necessary. I did recently offer a player the chance to have his character brought back by accident. (They were fighting a necromancer, PC was a revenant. Necromancer was animating bodies as a minor action. What better way to annoy the other intruders than by animating their dead comrade. Backfire! The PC is back with 1HP. Player didn't like that idea.)

The characters are that unbalanced? What game system was this?


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## Jhaelen (Apr 18, 2013)

pming said:


> If the DM is going to "pick numbers" to balance everything out, then why not just have everything be a simple coin toss? If a player invests heavily into a characters combat prowess, he *should* expect to be significantly better than someone who didn't put much of anything into combat prowess. To do otherwise is to cheat the player out of his expectation of play.



Something like this, I guess.
Personally, as a DM I've been fudging from time to time. But I fudged without favouring particular pcs or players. If an encounter was in danger of becoming too easy or too difficult, I'd adjust the monster stats on the fly. But these changes affected all pcs / players equally. Fudging selectively strikes me as unfair.

The OPs reasoning was to use fudging to correct the imbalance in the pcs' power. This makes me wonder how this imbalance came into effect. Was it that some of the pcs had started playing earlier and newcomers were forced to start at a lower level or was it because some pcs had died (maybe several times) and were forced to start from scratch while the other players continued playing their high-level pcs?

This would be where I'd apply other corrective measures: Don't penalize new players or players whose pcs died more often than others. Let them join play at a power level similar to the others. Imho, that's a lot better than trying to fudge to achieve a similar result.


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## Callahan09 (Apr 18, 2013)

Can the GM cheat?  It depends on what the table agrees to prior to the game in my opinion.  If the table agrees to play the game as the GM decrees, it's his world and we are all just living in it, then the GM cannot strictly speaking "cheat" because the interpretation and application of rules begins and ends with the GM.  That said, the GM can be inconsistent or unfair and that can be frustrating to the players, but it isn't cheating.

If the table agrees to follow certain rules, then it becomes a gray area.  It is perhaps a little cheaty to go against the rules as agreed upon.  But at the fundamental level, being a GM is about deciding what happens in your world and with the adventurers in your world.  Even in a strict interpretation of a ruleset there will be instances where the official rule doesn't adequately explain how to deal with a situation.  The ruleset will even have a built in mechanism for the GM to decide what to do and says that this is within their rights and abilities as the GM.  So even then, is it cheating?  Possibly not.

What your responsibility is as a GM is to provide a fair and consistent referee to the action and give your players an enjoyable session.  But if your players are not enjoying themselves you can only do so much to accommodate them before you alienate other players in the group or god forbid destroy your own enjoyment of the session.  

In this case it sounds like the two players who left would have demanded that they be allowed to be overpowered in comparison to the other players, which would be a case of accommodations to that end destroying the enjoyment of the other players at the table who hasn't optimized their characters.  I think in this case it becomes a matter of who should be more willing to accept the other side's argument.  The more powerful players should definitely be more open to letting the game world be evened than the underpowered characters should be willing to accept their characters being insignificant!  Therefor your balance shift seems perfectly fair to me.

Perhaps you could have tried more to keep the powerful players from leaving the group, though in my opinion it seems they were just being bratty about not being able to be the super powered characters they tried so hard to be... But in any event perhaps you could have worked ways into the sessions to reward them for optimizing characters that they could feel powerful to wield, while still keeping the overall game balanced to include the weaker characters as important pieces as well? 

In the end I don't really know how unreasonable the guys who left were truly being.  But do I think you cheated? No.  Maybe you could have done more creative things to keep the balance without destroying those guys' sense of power they so obviously wanted.  Maybe not and this was just a group of players too disparate to all enjoy a game together.  I don't know.


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## delericho (Apr 18, 2013)

Callahan09 said:


> If the table agrees to follow certain rules, then it becomes a gray area.  It is perhaps a little cheaty to go against the rules as agreed upon.




I'm surprised by this. I would have thought it was very clearly 'cheaty' to go against the rules as agreed upon. After all, _they're the rules that are agreed upon!_



> But at the fundamental level, being a GM is about deciding what happens in your world and with the adventurers in your world.  Even in a strict interpretation of a ruleset there will be instances where the official rule doesn't adequately explain how to deal with a situation.




Now that, of course, is a rather different matter. If the rules don't cover something, of course it will necessarily be up to the GM (perhaps in cooperation with the players) to come up with a suitable ruling. That's part and parcel of the game, because there will _always_ be holes.

But there's a difference between "making a ruling to cover a hole in the rules" and "directly violating the rules as agreed". If the group (including the GM) agrees that the GM won't fudge dice rolls, and then the GM rolls a '7' and declares it as a '17', that's pretty clearly cheating, IMO.

(It's probably worth noting, though, that I don't expect too many groups to actually have that conversation. Certainly, I've never been in a group to discuss the matter, nor have I heard of a group to do so (excepting online discussions). It seems to be one of those topics where everyone just brings their own assumptions of what's going to happen to the table, and most of the time it's a non-issue. But in that very small minority of cases where it becomes an issue, suddenly it's a _massive_ issue because people were working from differing assumptions. (c.f. Paladin threads))


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## Janx (Apr 18, 2013)

airwalkrr said:


> I don't know what the issue really was. I think the players just didn't like my GMing style or something. I am just trying to make sense of this.




I thought there was sufficient data in your prior posts to deduce it.

The players who quit had the most powerful PCs in the party.  Anytime you have players with significantly more powerful PCs, those players probably value power in the game over anything else (aka power gamers).

You directly neutralized them during combats, which goes against the kind of game a power gamer wants to have.

That is why they left.  Game style preference mismatch.


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## Umbran (Apr 18, 2013)

delericho said:


> I'm always a little uneasy about "story trumps rules" as a justification for fudging. Because that suggests that the DM has a clear story in mind, which can (but, importantly, doesn't have to) lead to railroading and other forms of abuse. If the DM truly has a fixed story in mind, I'd generally rather he just write it up and email it to me.




A GM can use fudging to push a predetermined story, sure.  But even "story trumps rules" doesn't really suggest what you think.  For example, pacing is a major part of story, and fudging is one of the best darned tools around for pacing management.  Fight numerically a foregone conclusion, but only after a half-hour of grind?  Fudge it, get it over with, and move on!

Which is to say, presence of a shovel does not imply that the guy wants to bury a body.


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## delericho (Apr 18, 2013)

Umbran said:


> A GM can use fudging to push a predetermined story, sure.  But even "story trumps rules" doesn't really suggest what you think.  For example, pacing is a major part of story, and fudging is one of the best darned tools around for pacing management.  Fight numerically a foregone conclusion, but only after a half-hour of grind?  Fudge it, get it over with, and move on!




Fair point.

That said, I consider that "numerical foregone conclusion/half-hour of grind" combination to itself be a system issue (and it's a classic complaint about 4e, though I've also seen it recently in 3e with regenerating trolls and PCs lacking fire attacks). If it truly is a half hour of meaningless grind, then it's an indicator that combat (or at least some combats) just isn't swing-y enough - there should be at least the possibility of that 1-in-1000 critical hit changing things up. (Though as I said in my previous post, sometimes system issues are best handled by the DM smoothing them, because the rest of the game is worth it... and of course, there is no perfect system.)



> Which is to say, presence of a shovel does not imply that the guy wants to bury a body.




Indeed. I said... *Edit:* Oops. No I didn't. My apologies.


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## billd91 (Apr 18, 2013)

I'm generally in the camp that the GM can't cheat - by definition. He may violate the trust or goodwill of his players, but since there's a wide variety of things that may do either of those, even adhering to the letter of the rules, I wouldn't lump all of that as cheating.


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## Umbran (Apr 18, 2013)

delericho said:


> If it truly is a half hour of meaningless grind, then it's an indicator that combat (or at least some combats) just isn't swing-y enough - there should be at least the possibility of that 1-in-1000 critical hit changing things up.




Well, this is the thing with pacing - in D&D, for example, there probably is the *chance* that the critical hit changing things up, sure.  But how long do you want to wade through things to find out if it will?  In "story first" terms - there is dramatic value in that chance event, should it happen.  But there's also dramatic value in keeping the pace up.  It becomes, basically, an exercise in risk management.



> (Though as I said in my previous post, sometimes system issues are best handled by the DM smoothing them, because the rest of the game is worth it... and of course, there is no perfect system.)




Yah.  This is the basic thing.  The system isn't perfect.  The GM isn't perfect.  The Players aren't perfect.  Sometimes, just making adjustments on the fly can be a good choice of action.


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## Man in the Funny Hat (Apr 18, 2013)

DM is... mostly free to fudge unless it's been agreed otherwise, and once again we see how important it is to discuss with players prior to beginning the campaign what they expect from the campaign and how the DM intends to run it.  This issue is the result of a lack of communication.  The DM didn't explain his "story trumps all" approach.  Players didn't explain their dissatisfaction with it when they experienced it.

Personally I believe that it's not only the DM's right to fudge it's the DM's JOB to fudge - but not anytime, anywhere.  It requires judicious use.  That DM fudges best who fudges least.  In a game where the DM is making arbitrary decisions constantly in order to keep some PC's down and lift others up then it's going to show.  The players whose PC's are being kept DOWN are going to react negatively and react most strongly.  They would have every right to do so.  In a game where the DM has expressly allowed any and every type of character to be created, to then turn about and by repeated actions demonstrate that, no, in fact any and every character is NOT being allowed, players have every right to object in the strongest possible terms including packing up and leaving.  They should have, however, attempted to discuss it rather than just walk out.

I think the problems started with the very idea for the campaign.  Allowing characters who are effectively 20th level to mix with characters who are effectively 3rd level and then fudging to make them equally challenging is like... trying to race NASCAR cars against riding lawnmowers and expecting the NASCAR drivers not to notice and complain about never being able to shift out of first gear while the lawnmowers are having JATO rockets strapped on to them.  What other result could you have possibly expected?

A campaign that had such disparate characters _might _work I suppose, but no version of the game is designed for it.


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## GameOgre (Apr 18, 2013)

I think the DM is just another player of a game. Granted this particular player gets bagged with most of the work and the vast majority of the responsibility but if that person didn't love those things they wouldn't do it.

The DM agrees to a set of rules just as much as the other players do. Just because the dice don't go the way you want is no reason to (Fudge) them any more than its ok for any other player of the game to (Fudge) them.

If you are not happy with random results in your shared fantasy game then why use them? If you are happy with random results then why not use them?

People who fudge dice rolls but still proclaim they want the randomness of dice rolls make me laugh.

When I'm DMing I don't care what the roll is,I use whatever comes up. Sometimes that has cut our fun short,sometimes it has added tons of fun.

It's random.


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## Umbran (Apr 18, 2013)

GameOgre said:


> If you are not happy with random results in your shared fantasy game then why use them? If you are happy with random results then why not use them?




The logical flaw in your argument is simple - your phrase it as digital, two choices, all or nothing.  Either you should *always* use the random results, or *never* use the random results.  As if a full range of "sometimes" are not also among the options.


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## Rune (Apr 18, 2013)

What is cheating in this context?

Does it mean altering the rules and/or misrepresenting dice rolls on the fly?

Or does it mean being unfair?

In the first case, _most_ systems have an expectation that the GM can or should do so as the situation warrants.  In such cases, doing so _cannot_ be construed as cheating, _solely_ on those merits.

_However_, being unfair is _always_ cheating, even if done within the parameters of the established rules.  Moreover, it is detrimental to the maintenance of the trust-covenant that bonds a GM and his/her players.  Without that, no amount of adherence to, nor deviation from the rules of the game will matter.


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## Oryan77 (Apr 18, 2013)

I'm in the boat that says the DM can cheat, but he still has to be fair when he's cheating.

Do you have any specific examples of a moment that you cheated that may have been noticeable to these players? I would like to hear it before being critical about your "cheating".

Like others said, if a DM is going to cheat, it cannot be obvious. If it is obvious, then you are cheating in a negative way and the players have a right to complain about it.

From my experience, complaining about a DM cheating is usually the result of two things:

1. The person complaining is a powergamer who expects to never be challenged and to never fail. The DM cheats because he cannot challenge this PC without going out of his way to do so, and challenging him fairly will be unfair to the rest of the group. Usually the powergamer will complain whether or not the DM was obvious about cheating, and usually even if the DM didn't actually cheat. This is why I don't DM for anyone that will build PCs that are noticeably overpowering when compared to the other PCs. It's too much hassle to deal with.

2. The DM cheats in an obvious way because he's trying to railroad a situation or keep a prized NPC from dying. I stat out every single NPC that I will be using in an encounter. Sometimes even players that are not powergamers, but are whiners, will accuse me of "cheating" when I'm not. I've shown my NPC sheets many times to prove that I had "just the right spell" listed right there. I started doing this because I hated when my old DM would not prepare an NPC spell list and he would pull spells out of his butt in order to thwart all of my actions. *That* is what I consider cheating in a bad way.


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## GameOgre (Apr 18, 2013)

Umbran said:


> The logical flaw in your argument is simple - your phrase it as digital, two choices, all or nothing.  Either you should *always* use the random results, or *never* use the random results.  As if a full range of "sometimes" are not also among the options.




Cheating in a rpg is like cheating in a marriage.(insert smiley-face here) Either you do it when you can get away with it or you don't! Being faithful only when it suits your needs is dishonest! Unless you're in that kind of marriage!


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## GameOgre (Apr 18, 2013)

Rune said:


> What is cheating in this context?
> 
> 
> 
> ...




Just out of curiosity  where can I find the (fudging) rules/advice in the rules? What game and page? I always hear this said but don't think I have ever come across it other than as advice on blogs or even websites. Not saying it isn't there but I seem to miss it.


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## delericho (Apr 18, 2013)

Oryan77 said:


> Do you have any specific examples of a moment that you cheated that may have been noticeable to these players?




No, but I can provide an example of the reverse - an instance where the game was improved because I don't fudge and am known not to fudge.

I make my dice rolls in the open for any player who cares to see. The consequence of this is that I'm basically forced to let the results lie as they are, which has some negative effects (since my luck with dice is truly abysmal).

However, what this also meant was that when the dice fell against the players, and indeed fell in such a way that one of the PCs died, there was absolutely no question about the fairness or rightness of the result. Whereas had the game been open to fudging, the player might have argued that I'd fudged things to keep some other PC alive, and so should have done the same for his.

And the death of that PC improved the game in two ways. Firstly, it made for a better story as the rest of the PCs dealt with the loss of the character and the consequences thereof. And secondly, it demonstrated as nothing else could that IMC player characters _can_ die and that they can die even if the player doesn't do "something stupid".

(All that said, I will note that I'm _not_ claiming that this is the "one true way" to play. It's just one anecdote.)


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## delericho (Apr 18, 2013)

GameOgre said:


> Just out of curiosity  where can I find the (fudging) rules/advice in the rules? What game and page?




3.5e D&D DMG, p.6 under "Adjudication" for breaking the rules, and p.18 under "DM Cheating and Player Perceptions" for fudging dice rolls.


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## GameOgre (Apr 18, 2013)

Off to read! Thanks!


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## Oryan77 (Apr 18, 2013)

delericho said:


> No, but I can provide an example of the reverse - an instance where the game was improved because I don't fudge and am known not to fudge.




I don't make a big deal about rolling in the open or hiding behind a screen. Either way is perfectly fine to me and both have their pros/cons. I'm just not a fan of rolling in the open simply because I don't trust myself to always be accurate in my encounter designs. Rolling behind a screen gives me the ability to balance the game if I need to. I'm not perfect, so I don't want the players to suffer because of my mistake. That seems unfair to me.

I roll secretly for the same reason people roll in the open; to eliminate any need for arguments and to cut down on players complaining about fairness. Rolling behind a screen does not mean I'm catering to the PCs or taking advantage of them. It just means I have the option to keep an encounter balanced the way I want it to be balanced. Players are not immune to death just because I hide behind a screen. I've also seen plenty of crappy DMs that build overpowered NPCs, broken NPCs, don't understand the Challenge Rating system, misuse spells, or unfairly cheat (make up abilities/spells/items), and then think they are being more fair because they are rolling in the open. They are oblivious to their imperfections and think rolling openly means everything is legit.

The way you fudge your die rolls also depends on the type of players you have and the DMs ability running encounters. If a DM thinks he can just fudge die rolls willy-nilly, then he is mistaken. I think that is what a lot of "open-die-rolling" DMs think we're doing.


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## Umbran (Apr 18, 2013)

delericho said:


> However, what this also meant was that when the dice fell against the players, and indeed fell in such a way that one of the PCs died, there was absolutely no question about the fairness or rightness of the result. Whereas had the game been open to fudging, the player might have argued that I'd fudged things to keep some other PC alive, and so should have done the same for his.




In tournament, convention, or FLGS play, I can understand the desire for that security.

Me, I play with friends in my home.  If we didn't have the basic trust between us that I'd not play favorites like that, they wouldn't be at my table.


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## delericho (Apr 18, 2013)

Umbran said:


> Me, I play with friends in my home.




One of the relatively few disadvantages of gaming through a D&D not-quite-Meetup site is that I don't have that luxury. We of course try our best to vet people before they join games, and if there was anyone we thought would react badly then they would be ejected fairly promptly.

But the sad truth is that there's what I believe to be the case, and there's what I _know_. And until that first PC death, I didn't know how it would go down. (Turned out that the response was that we now have a "Wall of the Fallen", in which dead PCs from campaign play are given obituaries by their GMs, and are thus immortalised. So that's good.)

The other sad fact is that, given the opportunity to fudge that die roll to save the PC, I probably would have. Certainly, a few years back I would have without hesitation. But we've since discussed the event, and a few of the players (including the player in question) have said that they actually like that PCs can die. So, yeah, that's good.

But, again, that's purely a matter of what works for me. I don't claim that it's 'better', nor even that it would work for anyone else. This is most certainly an area where YMMV.


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## Umbran (Apr 19, 2013)

GameOgre said:


> Just out of curiosity  where can I find the (fudging) rules/advice in the rules? What game and page? I always hear this said but don't think I have ever come across it other than as advice on blogs or even websites. Not saying it isn't there but I seem to miss it.




I have an older reference than *delericho*'s

Advanced Dungeons and Dragons (1e) DMG, pg 110.  In the words of Gygax himself:

_"You do have the right to overrule the dice at any time if there is a particular course of events that you would like to have occur.  In making such a decision you should never seriously harm the party or a non-player character with your actions."_

So, the rule that the GM is allowed to fudge has been in the books since at least 1979.


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## Argyle King (Apr 19, 2013)

I prefer to let the dice fall where they may.

I make most rolls in the open.  However, if the roll I'm making is one which I don't feel success/failure would be obvious to the character, I do not make it in the open.

For example:  If a goblin is attacking a player, I make that roll in the open.  It's readily apparently to the target (the character) that the goblin can hit him.  On the other hand, a goblin were trying to sneak up on the party, I would not make that roll in the open, and I would likewise make a sense roll for the character in secret.  I don't want a dice roll to tip the player off to information that the character is unable to perceive.



Edit: In the rare event that I do fudge, I don't hide it from the players.  If the rules create a result which is nonsensical, I will briefly discuss such a situation with the players, and then make a ruling which I feel makes more sense.  Such a process is how house rules come about.  On occasion, I have also fudged when teaching new players, and I felt that a player made a choice based upon a faulty understanding of how part of the game worked.  In a case of that sort, I feel okay about stepping in because it was a lack of player knowledge and not in-game events which produced a situation.


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## Bagpuss (Apr 19, 2013)

I once had a GM that would always fudge to ensure no character ever died, he would often ask how many hit points you had left before rolling damage for example. It did make the game less enjoyable for me, because I didn't feel any risk.

So in the end I managed to conceal just how damaged my character was before getting into a fight. After rolling a series of attacks against my character he remembered to ask, when I answered -32, you could almost see the colour drain from his face.

Fudging is a fine line, even if done for the right reasons it can spoil a persons enjoyment.


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## JustinAlexander (Apr 20, 2013)

airwalkrr said:


> Did I fudge dice and alter numbers on the fly? Absolutely.




So what's your confusion here? The players don't like the way you run games so they don't play in your games.



Umbran said:


> The GM can cheat only insofar as he can break the  rules of the social contract under which everyone agreed to play.




Well, sure. But you can say the same thing about cheating at any game: If everyone silently agrees that the 5 year old can occasionally fudge their die rolls because that makes it more fun for them and it's not really worth arguing with them, then it's not "really" cheating. And if I occasionally fudge my dice rolls when playing _Monopoly_ because I think everyone at the table has more fun when the competition is really tight, well.... if we hadn't explicitly said I _couldn't_ do that, it's basically a grey area, right?

From any objective viewpoint, of course, it's still clearly cheating. (Yes, even if everyone at the table is OK with the cheating.)



Obryn said:


> If the system requires the DM to fudge rolls in  order for it to function properly and remain fun for all participants,  there's an issue with the system, not with the DM.




Not necessarily. It's not the system's fault if the GM overpowers an encounter they've designed. Or if the GM is fudging in order to enforce their railroad, that's not the system's fault, either.


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## Umbran (Apr 20, 2013)

JustinAlexander said:


> From any objective viewpoint, of course, it's still clearly cheating.




No, not *any* objective viewpoint*.  Quite the opposite, I'm afraid. 

The difference is an agreement _before the fact_.  If you agree before choosing the Top Hat that you're going to allow some fudging of dice along with having cash under Free Parking, then you're establishing house rules and it isn't cheating.   If you don't make that agreement, you should expect the assumption of the rules as written in the box lid, in which the dice roll must be taken as-is.

Of course, for D&D the issue is reversed.  The rules, at least as far back to 1e, _explicitly allow the GM to fudge_.  We already have citations on that.  It only becomes cheating to do so if you make an agreement before play that it isn't allowed.


*Especially as, by definition, there can only be *one* objective viewpoint.  Objective in this case means independent of individual thought, and perceptible by all observers.  If it isn't singular, it isn't free of individuality.


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## airwalkrr (Apr 20, 2013)

I don't even know why I started this thread anymore. Just thinking about it makes me upset. GMs can't cheat. They make the rules. If a player comes to a game with a GM who says "story trumps rules" then leaves the campaign because "the GM cheats" is just bull... you can fill in the rest. I guess I am just really ticked off at chicken---- players who are too afraid to say how they feel and instead leave a campaign to let it collapse.


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## airwalkrr (Apr 20, 2013)

Cheat: to deprive of something valuable by the use of deceit or fraud.

That's just such a strong accusation to make of someone. And within the context of a campaign which is driven by narrative and not dice, it is practically ridiculous as well.


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## Mishihari Lord (Apr 20, 2013)

Umbran said:


> I have an older reference than *delericho*'s
> 
> Advanced Dungeons and Dragons (1e) DMG, pg 110.  In the words of Gygax himself:
> 
> ...




Wow, I don't even remember that, and I played 1E for a very long time.  Thanks for bringing up a very key point.  That makes me wonder if the reason is fudging is so well accepted in RPGs while it is not elsewhere is because it was explicitly written into the most important RPG ever made.


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## Bagpuss (Apr 20, 2013)

airwalkrr said:


> I don't even know why I started this thread anymore. Just thinking about it makes me upset. GMs can't cheat.




Okay maybe by some definitions they can't cheat as such, but the can spoil the game by fudging (even in the characters favour), by arbitrary decisions that don't seem to follow the accepted rules, weighting encounters against the players repeatedly, or in favour of the players.

But yes they should speak to you an air their grievances before quitting and spoiling it for everyone, you should be given a chance to address their problems.


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## timASW (Apr 21, 2013)

airwalkrr said:


> Cheat: to deprive of something valuable by the use of deceit or fraud.
> 
> That's just such a strong accusation to make of someone. And within the context of a campaign which is driven by narrative and not dice, it is practically ridiculous as well.




Maybe its not necessarily the fudging itself, but the degree of fudging. 

Its all good to say our story trumps the dice, sometimes I GM that way, so I know what you mean. But theres a line between the story being the highest priority and players feeling like their playing out an ammy novelists story with no real choices. And those dice results ARE choices. 

I think its a matter of priorities, a GM should rate his priorities before his campaign, to himself even if to no one else. Things like fun, fear, drama, challenge, story, grittyness and gamism. 

If your story is at 10, your gamism is at 1 and fun is somewhere around a 5 your going to have issues with a lot of players. The same thing if the numbers are reversed. 

IME the ideal campaign has story at a 6, gamism at a 4 and Fun at a 9. The highest rating being fun means your going to have to watch your players reactions mid campaign and react to them, potentially changing your story/gamism, numbers or any other factor as the campaign progresses. 

Getting mad at people for having a preferred game style is not going to help anyone though.


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## JamesonCourage (Apr 21, 2013)

airwalkrr said:


> Personally, I find that cowardly, but that's not the discussion at hand.



This view alone might be a deterrent for me gaming with you. I know that there are good ways and bad ways to deal with someone (letting someone down easy, in any context), but from my experience, the type of people that judge people as "cowardly" for not participating in open discussion of issues are usually more aggressively confrontational. I don't know if you are (and I'm not saying you are), but if you tend to be confrontational at times, I don't blame less confrontational people for avoiding the unnecessary hassle. Again, not saying you are confrontational (I am; I just don't consider it cowardly when people don't want to deal with me).

But, this is a side issue, though I think I feel okay stating it based on this post: [sblock]







airwalkrr said:


> I don't even know why I started this thread anymore. Just thinking about it makes me upset. GMs can't cheat. They make the rules. If a player comes to a game with a GM who says "story trumps rules" then leaves the campaign because "the GM cheats" is just bull... you can fill in the rest. I guess I am just really ticked off at chicken---- players who are too afraid to say how they feel and instead leave a campaign to let it collapse.



[/sblock]
Seriously, if that's what it felt like when people disagreed with your preferences, I'd let you know (again, I don't mind confrontations). But I don't blame people who want to avoid you calling their opinions "bull" or calling them, as people, "chicken players." But that's me.


airwalkrr said:


> Did I fudge dice and alter numbers on the fly? Absolutely.



Okay. If they saw that as cheating, their views are justified, in my opinion, unless you explicitly expressed your way of running the game, which a later post indicates you did. However, I'm answering your general assertions here, and hopefully giving insight into their way of thinking; more on this below.


airwalkrr said:


> But did I cheat? No, I feel I did not. The GM cannot cheat.



I very strongly disagree.

Games have rules. Can you change them? Sure. Changing the rules is on the fly considered "cheating" to some groups. And, doing it to prop up some players and hurt others is fine; that works for some groups. However, if certain players don't agree with you about the type of game they're expecting, and you cheat to hurt them and help other players, then, yeah, I totally get why they walked.

Now, this is purely a social contract issue. "The GM cannot cheat" is acceptable at many tables (and it was voiced, explicitly, in the 3.5 DMG). But, for example, I tell my players "I won't fudge to save you, or to hurt you." If I then go on to fudge to save them (or hurt them), then I've cheated them. I've broken one of the rules they think the game runs by. This is also why I roll in the open; I have nothing to hide, and it's largely symbolic of that.

Now, my brother fudges events, dice, etc. when he runs his games. I know that he does, and I accept that. Sometimes, when I've lived through events, I question whether I should have made it (he doesn't always roll in the open, and sometimes enemies might start missing more often once I was low on HP). And, whether or not he fudged, that nagging feeling of "did I earn that victory?" kinda sucks. I mean, I want to know I earned that win, and now I just don't know. I even started playing more and more recklessly (but justifiably) to see if I'd lose a character (I didn't).

When it comes to my brother, I've learned to put the "did I earn that?" feeling on mute. Sure, it's still around, but it's not as important as engaging with things. Would I enjoy the game more if that question wasn't on mute? Definitely. But, I can play without it. And I had to learn to play that way with my brother. However, if your players don't like playing this way, then yeah, I get why they feel cheated. They want to earn things, and they have no idea what is earned and what isn't.


airwalkrr said:


> I am not sure what to make of these players, as the situation might be related to something else (especially since I had to hear this from a third person perspective). But I have to honestly ask, is it possible for a GM to cheat? If you are a player, do you care if a GM changes rules behind the screen? My opinion is that the story trumps rules (and dice) all the time unless the campaign is specifically designed as a tournament-style challenge.



This may have been the problem with the players, or with the table. Did you express this to them? If so, then no, you didn't cheat. You played by the rules that everyone knew about. If this is the case, it was a problem with the players.

If they didn't know this is how you intended to run the game, it was a table problem. There wasn't appropriate communication, and the players should have asked your preference / you should have told them yours. In your mind, you clearly aren't cheating, while in their mind, you clearly are. It's a failure of communication in regards to the social contract at the table.

Your "the story trumps rules (and dice) all the time)" outlook is fine, but is definitely not universal. I don't want to play in that style of game, generally. It's not terrible or anything (I like playing under my brother), but I definitely have no interest in it over knowing, for sure, that everything I have I completely earned. I want that feeling. It makes me connect to my character more. For me, it's an immersion issue; if I'm constantly getting pulled out of character thinking "should that hit have taken me down?", it's going to hurt my enjoyment of the game.

Again, your preference is perfectly fine. But, can the GM cheat? Definitely. Just depends on the social contract (what the group is playing at the table). As always, play what you like


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## Luce (Apr 21, 2013)

The phrase "story trumps dice" itself leaves some ambiguity. To some people this caries the implication that  at certain points rules will be ignored for creating dramatic tension, while the rest (majority) of the time the rules are not affected. I would parallel this view to being similar to  cut scenes and predetermined outcomes in video games. Certain villains  (eg. Kefka Palazzo) can only be defeated at scripted times and in other times will will get away no matter what. With the exception of those few individuals/scenes (eg. death of Alys in Phantasy Star 4) the internal consistency of the game is preserved. The story precedence does not invalidate the importance of the dice just supersedes it occasionally.
Coming from this position it is not hard to see IMO how some players can feel that their choices are being invalidated. I am not saying you have done something wrong or cheated, but at the same time I hope you can see that your words may have been misconstrued.


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## JustinAlexander (Apr 21, 2013)

Umbran said:


> No, not *any* objective viewpoint*.




I suppose we could go through all the the definitions of the word "cheat" and you'd say something like, "Ah ha! If we're talking about cheating in the sense of sexual fidelity, then clearly fudging dice rolls in an RPG isn't objectively cheating!" or "Ah ha! An RPG has no value, therefore it's not the same as a land swindle!"

But I'm just not interested in that sort of silliness.

More generally, I find arguments like "Mark can't cheat at _Monopoly_ if we all agreed that he can cheat" or "it's not changing the rules on the fly if there's a rule allowing you to change the rules on the fly" to be inherently circular and absurd.



airwalkrr said:


> If a player comes to a game with a GM who says  "story trumps rules" then leaves the campaign because "the GM cheats" is  just bull...




Didn't you kind of lose the ability to say "they knew it was going to be this way" when you said that you don't do this in most of your campaigns and that you didn't tell them you were doing it? Did you expect them to be telepathic about this sort of thing?

(I understand that you're now changing your story to claim that you _did_ tell them that, but I have to admit that this just blows your credibility in general for me.)


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## GameOgre (Apr 21, 2013)

I really think we can all agree on one thing. The question of can a DM cheat or not has everything to do with the unwritten (or sometimes written) rules of the individual table.

If the table rules say the DM has the right to alter dice rolls or even overrule game rules at that table,then he does.

If the Table rules say the DM will not alter dice rolls and can't overrule game rules without the ok of the players,then he can be guilty of cheating.

It's really as simple as that. 

Some DM's would probably insist on altering whatever they need to while some would find more of a thrill with letting the dice and game designers decide.

It's all good as long as the DM adheres to whatever the contract with his players is.


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## Elf Witch (Apr 21, 2013)

I can understand why you are upset. I would be to if players quit and didn't bother to tell me why. I kind of view it as cowardly. There does not have to a confrontational how about a simple email. The fact that they told other players knowing it would get back to you is just not cool. 

As for can the DM cheat yes they can.  To me a DM cheating is one who favors players over other players. Or changes the rules on a whim to get a desired outcome in their favor and then the next time the rule comes up changes it back so it is not in the players favor.

But fudging no I don't think that is cheating nor is changing a monster on the fly as long as you are being consistent and fair to the players. For example I have been known to fudge if in my judgement I have made a mistake and over powered the encounter or I can see that the players are frustrated and not having fun. Though I do it in a way that they never know. And I am honest and up front that I will use my judgement on if I need to fudge and I have no one say no yet or I won't play like that. 

I have also dealt with characters of different power levels and how I handle that is to plan an encounters that play to everyone strength. Though if it becomes a cake walk and the other players are not having fun then I do something to bring everyone more in line. 

Some of this is play style and from reading posts here some people hate any fudging that is fine for them I would not want them at my table nor would I want to play with a DM like that. I do think some take it to far and make it sound like DMs who do are some how horrible DMs. But in the end there really is no right way or wrong way to play. I think open communication is important and I think players or DMs need to speak up if there is an issue instead of blindsiding the group when they just up and quit without anyone realizing there is a problem.


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## delericho (Apr 21, 2013)

JustinAlexander said:


> I suppose we could go through all the the definitions of the word "cheat" and you'd say something like, "Ah ha! If we're talking about cheating in the sense of sexual fidelity, then clearly fudging dice rolls in an RPG isn't objectively cheating!" or "Ah ha! An RPG has no value, therefore it's not the same as a land swindle!"




Yes, but we don't need to do that. I'm afraid Umbran is dead right about what he says - the rules of D&D (in every edition since 1st, if not since before then) have explicitly given the DM the right to fudge dice rolls. Therefore, for a group to adopt a rule that the DM _can't_ fudge would, in effect, be a house rule. Which is fine, of course, but it really is a matter for the group to discuss and decide.



> More generally, I find arguments like "Mark can't cheat at _Monopoly_ if we all agreed that he can cheat" or "it's not changing the rules on the fly if there's a rule allowing you to change the rules on the fly" to be inherently circular and absurd.




Now here, on the other hand, I agree with you. It is indeed circular. I also don't think it's good for the game for DM's to be told by default that the can and should fudge things "if there is a particular course of events that you would like to have occur" (per DMG 1st Ed) - that sort of discussion really should be placed under "Advanced Techniques", or some heading of that sort, complete with a detailed discussion of when, why, and how a DM might choose to change things, and the consequences thereof.

Sadly, I fear that quote from the DMG (and similar texts, including the insistence that mere players not know the full rules) may very well have been responsible for a lot of bad DMing behaviours I saw back in the day - the whole "DM is king" mentality.

So, I don't think that that quote from the 1st Ed DMG is actually terribly good for the game. I wish, at the very least, that it had been presented differently. But... circular or not, bad for the game or not, _it is still what the rules of the game say_.


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## Greylond (Apr 21, 2013)

It's all about communication. At the beginning of a campaign the players and GM really need to understand the GM's style and intent for the game. People tend to think "Medieval Fantasy RPG" so therefore every one is the same style but MFRPGs differ in style and tone by a wide margin. From the "storytelling" style where most of the time PCs won't die and encounters are adjusted for the characters' skills and abilities(not to mention the tactical ability of the Players), to the other extreme of a GM who presents a world and simply adjudicates encounters as they happen and never changes a die roll. 

The Players really need to understand the GM but the GM also has the responsibility of understanding what the players want. 

IME, it's a fairly common problem. Miscommunication and situations like this have happened to just about every Player and GM I've ever known, including myself(more than once). I'd recommend trying to have a discussion with the players to find out what they liked, what they didn't like and if they are willing to work with you to make the changes that they would like to see to make the game fun.


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## airwalkrr (Apr 21, 2013)

JustinAlexander said:


> Didn't you kind of lose the ability to say "they knew it was going to be this way" when you said that you don't do this in most of your campaigns and that you didn't tell them you were doing it? Did you expect them to be telepathic about this sort of thing?
> 
> (I understand that you're now changing your story to claim that you _did_ tell them that, but I have to admit that this just blows your credibility in general for me.)



1) When I began this campaign, my D&D group, whom I have know for a long time and still play with) was not interested, because they were not interested in the game system or the fact that I wanted to run a more cinematic-style game where the rules do not matter much. So for this campaign, I only had one player cross over from my D&D group and I found four others, mostly people I had never met before for the new campaign. Over time we all became friends outside the game and started hanging out and doing other things as well as gaming. So I considered them my friends. But they also (with the exception of the one player who crossed over from my D&D group who never cared about dice in the first place) knew nothing of my DM experience with D&D, not did I ever talk about it much within the context of game rules. I was up front with the mostly-new group about this campaign's "story trumps dice" style from day one and reiterated it many times over the course of the campaign. There was no confusion, I promise you. 

2) I am not changing my story. This was a deliberate departure from my typical gaming style is all I ever said. And I was very upfront and open about that aspect of things. I met with every new player individually in a sort of interview style before the game for character creation and gaming philosophy discussion and asked if they had a problem with a campaign where dice are not always going to be followed and story is always more important. I reminded players at many points throughout the campaign that this was the type of campaign where they should feel free to try some crazy things because the cinematic nature of the campaign meant they would be less dependent on dice to succeed on these things. I also reminded them that my philosophy for this campaign was that story will always trump rules. I told them specifically that if I created what was intended to be a high-pressure situation, I would want them to find creative solutions to get out of it as opposed to brute-force methods involving dice. Then, other times, defeat of the enemy was a foregone conclusion that merely would have wasted time and not used up any significant resources. I was very clear that I would never play those situations out unless the players really wanted to. FINALLY, and most importantly, I began virtually every session with a reminder that rule zero was in place and that I was more interested in all of us telling a good story and having fun than being a slave to dice. I don't think I could have been any more clear.


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## Kingreaper (Apr 21, 2013)

Everything you've said, to me, indicates "We won't roll dice when story decides it" rather than "I'll roll dice and then ignore the results".

Which are very different things. 
I never ignore the dice once I've rolled them, but I'll often choose not to roll them as a GM when I feel there's an obviously desirable outcome.

I think both you and your players need to improve your communication somewhat.


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## airwalkrr (Apr 21, 2013)

Kingreaper said:


> Everything you've said, to me, indicates "We won't roll dice when story decides it" rather than "I'll roll dice and then ignore the results".
> 
> Which are very different things.
> I never ignore the dice once I've rolled them, but I'll often choose not to roll them as a GM when I feel there's an obviously desirable outcome.
> ...



Then help me understand, what part of "dice are not always going to be followed" is unclear. The players were specifically described as being unhappy about "fudging dice and cheating."


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## Kingreaper (Apr 21, 2013)

airwalkrr said:


> Then help me understand, what part of "dice are not always going to be followed" is unclear. The players were specifically described as being unhappy about "fudging dice and cheating."



When you take that one section entirely out of context, it's quite clear. It's when it's in the context of a big thing about how you won't roll in this situation or that because story trumps rules that it becomes unclear.

In the larger context it seems like you mean "I won't always bother with dice" not "I'll over-rule the dice".

Equally importantly "not always" suggests that ignoring the dice will be a rare thing. From what you've said, it wasn't.
How often did you actually fudge? Because fudging once every three sessions, and fudging 3 times a session, are very different things.


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## Jhaelen (Apr 22, 2013)

airwalkrr said:


> I met with every new player individually in a sort of interview style before the game for character creation and gaming philosophy discussion and asked if they had a problem with a campaign where dice are not always going to be followed and story is always more important.



Okay, this sounds more like the players in question should have declined playing in the campaign right away.
I guess they thought "Well, I don't really like this, but let's try it anyway, maybe it'll grow on me or maybe it won't be so bad after all...". If I had been in their shoes I wouldn't have had a problem with telling you that I didn't enjoy the gaming style after all and bowed out.


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## Shayuri (Apr 23, 2013)

If you made it clear the dice were not always going to decide outcomes, and that you'd be the arbitrator of when they did and when they didn't, then you weren't cheating. Cheating is when you break the rules, and it sounds like you made the ability to determine outcomes separately from dice rolls into a rule.

There are deeper issues here, about communication and game style and character generation expectations, and oversight...etc...but the simple question of whether or not you cheated appears to be 'no.'

Similarly, GM's typically reserve the right to do whatever it takes to keep a game moving, including cheating...so your titular question (Can the GM cheat?) can be answered 'yes.'

In my view.

That doesn't mean that any given use of a rule, or a cheat, is wise or correct...it just validates the philosophy that allows such behaviors. You still have to exercise judgement about when and how to use them.


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## Warbringer (Apr 24, 2013)

it's simply a matter of whether the table gives the DM authority to fudge. If not, then the game will end as Airwalker's did.


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## Salad Shooter (Apr 24, 2013)

Mishihari Lord said:


> Wow, I don't even remember that, and I played 1E for a very long time.  Thanks for bringing up a very key point.  That makes me wonder if the reason is fudging is so well accepted in RPGs while it is not elsewhere is because it was explicitly written into the most important RPG ever made.




Probably originally because of the story-based, and semi-collaborative focus of the game. 

I find fudging to be A-OK, personally. Most of my GM rolls are behind a screen. I'll kill PCs, when the dice say so and it won't be lame. I'll edit HP and stats on monsters on the fly - sometimes even the best configured encounter can go sideways when the players' dice -JUST- -WILL- -NOT- -BEHAVE- (you know what I mean...encounter 3 CR below the party, and they roll nothing but 1's). I will also roll out in the open on the really high stakes encounters, adds to the tension, I feel. I don't always do this - sometimes it's more fun to roll behind a screen, then look up at the players and grin (Maxim #37: NEVER, EVER Trust A Smiling GM). Depends on my mood.

Bottom line - if it's covered in advance, and done in such a manner to maximize both the GM's and the players' fun and enjoyment, cheat like it's going out of style. If someone isn't having fun, then it needs to be discussed. 

Is it cheating? Maybe. Should it be considered cheating? If done in such a manner to hurt the players themselves. Otherwise, I find the rules in RPGs to be more "guidelines" than anything. Just maintain a bit of internal consistency.


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## Zaukrie (Apr 24, 2013)

Wait, I can't be obvious? That is part of the fun sometimes. The goal at my table is to have fun. The rules facilitate that, but I do mot think anyone at my table us a slave to the rules. Obviously, not everyone agrees with that. That is why you all need to agree on your social contract before and during gaming.


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## gdonwallace (Apr 25, 2013)

That's quite the interesting question.

GM's and cheating.  

I think there is a balance that can be achieved.  If I have an encounter that I want to go a specific way, because of the story I have in mind, I might fudge a die roll or cause a certain event happen that could push things in the direction I want.  As a GM, I know how I want things to go.  Players are the complete unknown.  So a fudge to move things in a direction, I do it. 

Out right cheating, where I roll dice and then declare whatever I want.  I don't do that.  Sure there are times I REALLY want things to happen a certain way; but it doesn't always happen that way.  So I have to do what I can to keep things on the story line.  All that being said, as the GM I am here to present the game and re-act to what the players do.  I will let the dice lay where they will for the most part.  If a lvl 1 character picks a fight with a lvl 20 character and dies...so be it.  

Also, part of the problem was the difference in levels.  An encounter needs to balance the power of the PC's vs. the bad guy.  If you had players who's characters were that far apart in power; there is no way to have a balanced encounter.  If the pc's were closer in lvl, it would have been a lot better for everyone involved.


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## dd.stevenson (Apr 25, 2013)

Zaukrie said:


> Wait, I can't be obvious? That is part of the fun sometimes. The goal at my table is to have fun. The rules facilitate that, but I do mot think anyone at my table us a slave to the rules. Obviously, not everyone agrees with that. That is why you all need to agree on your social contract before and during gaming.




Not to get all pedantic on you, but I would categorize "deliberately obvious fudging" as DM rulings with a wry face. 

IOW, a ruling is when everyone knows Rule 0 has been invoked; fudging is when the players aren't meant to be aware that Rule 0 has been invoked. Or at least that's how I've always used the terms.


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## howandwhy99 (Apr 25, 2013)

A GM probably can, but a referee shouldn't. Think of it like this: Your players are in the Olympic high jump competition. You're the judge. You hold the bar and set it at exactly the right height for each attempt. That's what the referee's job in D&D is too. Of course the height/difficulty can change and it's understood to go up over the course of play. Now imagine if the Olympics judge dipped the bar just when the high jumper was in the motion of jumping. You know, because it's more fun when they clear the bar isn't it? I mean, what cruel tyrant wouldn't dip the bar?


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## airwalkrr (Apr 25, 2013)

I suppose where I failed was trying to create a narrative where interesting characters with vastly different capabilities were in virtual competition with the story. Superman is clearly the most powerful of the Justice League (some of you nerds might argue with that, but let's say for the sake of argument), yet he has his kryptonite, and other members contribute in different ways to create an interesting story. Teal'c was incredibly stronger and more resilient than the other members of SG-1, but Daniel Jackson had invaluable knowledge of ancient civilizations. There are other ways of creating "balance" in a story, and I guess that just wasn't what the two players who left wanted. They wanted a fair environment which was by-the-book and wanted to power game (although I didn't get that impression from them at first, it is becoming more and more clear to me now, especially after seeing one of them GM another game of which I was a member for a few sessions). The system didn't really lend itself to that, but I chose it for that reason. It allowed you to create virtually any kind of character imaginable from anywhere in any universe. I wanted that kind of Justice League style where characters of various strengths and weaknesses came together to form an interesting narrative. I guess they wanted to roll more dice.


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## Kingreaper (Apr 26, 2013)

I think if you want that kind of narrative, you'd be better off finding a mechanical way to support it.

Instead of fudging dice yourself, give the players some agency by letting them spend "story points" to reroll things, which are earnt by them roleplaying. Make sure you create the situation where Jackson's knowledge is invaluable, so that Teal'C and O'Neill don't just steal the show: and then let Teal'C and O'Neill take charge in combat.

Make "out of HP" not the same thing as dead, so that the non-combatants don't have to be saved by fudging, they just lose something if they fall in battle; maybe they're seriously wounded, or captured.


Fudging dice is a blunt instrument, and when used often it's bound to cause resentment eventually "you let me fail at that roll? Really? But it'd be so cool if I succeed" or "Why does he get to be the one who succeeds at picking the lock?" etc. 

You're essentially removing the dice, and taking all the power into your own hands. You need to learn to achieve your goals using subtler tools.


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## pemerton (Apr 26, 2013)

airwalkrr said:


> is it possible for a GM to cheat?



In my view, yes - if by "cheat" we mean something like "deliberately break the rules".

That would depend upon whether or not the GM was bound by rules, of course, but I prefer a system in which the GM is so bound.



airwalkrr said:


> My opinion is that the story trumps rules (and dice) all the time unless the campaign is specifically designed as a tournament-style challenge.



My personal concern with this is that most tables where this principle is applied don't let the players invoke it, only the GM.



Obryn said:


> If the system requires the DM to fudge rolls in order for it to function properly and remain fun for all participants, there's an issue with the system, not with the DM.



Agreed.



airwalkrr said:


> I wanted that kind of Justice League style where characters of various strengths and weaknesses came together to form an interesting narrative. I guess they wanted to roll more dice.





Kingreaper said:


> Fudging dice is a blunt instrument, and when used often it's bound to cause resentment eventually "you let me fail at that roll? Really? But it'd be so cool if I succeed" or "Why does he get to be the one who succeeds at picking the lock?" etc.
> 
> You're essentially removing the dice, and taking all the power into your own hands. You need to learn to achieve your goals using subtler tools.



Obviously I wasn't there. And I don't know what system you (airwalkrr) were using. But what Kingreaper says makes sense to me.

It may not have been that the players just "wanted to roll more dice". It may be that _they_ wanted to exercise some control over how things turned out, rather than have the GM decide the shape of the "interesting narrative".

Marvel Heroic Roleplaying is a system that may deliver what it sounds like you are looking for. Although it's just been cancelled, PDFs (and maybe books too?) are still on sale until the end of April.


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## Mallus (Apr 26, 2013)

Let me answer this by asking another question: what's the relationship between the rules (ie, the formal system mechanics) and the GM?

I've always seen the rules as _tools_ to help the GM adjudicate in-game situations. The GM _uses_ them, but isn't necessarily bound by them. A GM can modify the rules, override them, suspend them, add to the body of formal rules used (house rule), put ad-hoc, situational rules in place, etc. 

Put another way, the GM _is_ the rules. 

Even when a GM follows the formal rules strictly, each time they assign something like a situational modifier, they're inserting their judgment in the task-resolution process. For that reason, I don't see a lot of difference between giving a player +4 bonus to an action and just assigning by fiat a percentage chance to succeed, ie doing an end-run around the formal rules, when convenient and/or appropriate.

That said, I don't really like fudging. I'd prefer to add something to the rules than override a die roll. For example, if a PC fails a save and "dies", I'll give the party 1 round to "do something" to save them. Second chances not explicitly granted by the rules are fine, fudging, not so much.


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## ExploderWizard (Apr 26, 2013)

It all comes down to player expectations. If the game is presented as story first type of campaign, with the mechanics and dice subordinate to that and everyone is on board then fine. 

If the players believe that they are playing in a fair campaign, and whatever happens just happens then the GM absolutely can cheat. 

Either way, players have the right to know what kind of table they are at. Be up front with the players about whatever type of game you want to run and no illusionism or deception will be needed.


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## airwalkrr (Apr 26, 2013)

The most common technique I employed was adding hp to bad guys who otherwise would have been one-shotted by the two uber players, but if the bad guy was simply meant to die, if that was the bad guy's purpose, I let the dice decide the outcome, which was essentially a forgone conclusion. If the bad guy was meant to present a continuing menace, even if only a few sessions, I would add enough HP that it could survive a few attacks so that it could survive to harry the PCs for a while.

The second-most common technique I used was soft-balling a roll against the weaker players. I usually designed encounters with multiple aspects. There were bad guys for the uber players to fight and there were puzzles or skill-type challenges for the other players. Sometimes the weaker players would get involved in the fights though, and if that was what they wanted to do, I tried not to punish them. They would have a streak of "good luck," where the bad guys would mostly miss them or suffer minimum damage.

The least common method of "dice-massaging" or fudging was when what was supposed to be a particularly challenging encounter wound up being a snooze fest because of poor luck on part of the bad guys. I would either let the PCs kill the bad guys off early by letting the next attack kill them or force them to deal a little damage by fudging a good roll just to wake the players up. I never killed a player or gave them a debilitating disease or anything like that as a result of such actions.

90% of the time I followed the rules as written (at least as far as I interpreted things). I feel that's a pretty acceptable rate.

I don't consider any of that cheating, unfair, or wrong, especially in a story-centered campaign.


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## ExploderWizard (Apr 26, 2013)

airwalkrr said:


> I don't consider any of that cheating, unfair, or wrong, especially in a story-centered campaign.




Provided your players knew it was happening and were ok with it sure, no problem. 

If you did any of this and tried to hide it from the players......BIG problem.


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## airwalkrr (Apr 27, 2013)

ExploderWizard said:


> Provided your players knew it was happening and were ok with it sure, no problem.
> 
> If you did any of this and tried to hide it from the players......BIG problem.



See, this is a big issue I have. It is sort of a tangent because it doesn't apply to my situation. But I don't feel a GM should HAVE to make his common knowledge beforehand. The world is his, it should bend to his whim, and the players shouldn't be surprised by that. I am not saying, nor have I ever, that GMs are entitled to abuse their players. And I think player rolls should never be reversed or discarded. But if a GM desires a particular outcome. He ought to have the right to make sure it occurs. And no GM should ever have to explain that to his players. It should always be done with tact and with them. But I take issue with the fact that there are people out there who think that just because the GM fudges with out letting his players know that he is going to do it is a big problem. Unless the GM is a tournament referee or judge in such a case as may be at convention play or competitive play, there should never be a question of whether the GM has the right to fudge.

Again, this does not apply to my situation. I am aware of the current day atmosphere and feelings regarding fudging. So I do make my players aware if I will do so in the campaign. Nevertheless, I do not feel like I should have to, nor do I feel that "The GM is cheating" is a legitimate excuse for having a problem with the game. "The GM is cheating to make the game no fun for me in a personal way" is a legitimate reason, but the two are very different.


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## JamesonCourage (Apr 28, 2013)

airwalkrr said:


> The world is his, it should bend to his whim, and the players shouldn't be surprised by that. I am not saying, nor have I ever, that GMs are entitled to abuse their players. [SNIP] But if a GM desires a particular outcome. He ought to have the right to make sure it occurs.



I think you're right about the GM having that right; it's his game, and unless he gives some authority away, I agree with you. However, I think that a GM fudging (without informing the players) is potentially abuse of the players. I know I'd feel cheated if someone did this without my knowledge.


airwalkrr said:


> But I take issue with the fact that there are people out there who think that just because the GM fudges with out letting his players know that he is going to do it is a big problem.



I get that you take issue with it. But, have you seen how many people have come down on "it can be cheating" in this thread? And, in particular, my reasoning for that? It hurts my immersion, and it makes me feel like my in-game accomplishments aren't as valuable. It's damaging my enjoyment at the table, and it's potentially doing so while breaking the rules I agreed to play. (This wasn't the case in your game from the OP, but we're talking about the "tangent" now.)

It's not a "big problem" in that I don't trust you to run a fun game. It's that it inherently hurts my fun on a couple of different fronts.


airwalkrr said:


> Unless the GM is a tournament referee or judge in such a case as may be at convention play or competitive play, there should never be a question of whether the GM has the right to fudge.



Again, I pretty much agree with you about the GM's _right_ to fudge. I just disagree about whether or not it's "cheating".


airwalkrr said:


> Again, this does not apply to my situation. I am aware of the current day atmosphere and feelings regarding fudging. So I do make my players aware if I will do so in the campaign. Nevertheless, I do not feel like I should have to, nor do I feel that "The GM is cheating" is a legitimate excuse for having a problem with the game. "The GM is cheating to make the game no fun for me in a personal way" is a legitimate reason, but the two are very different.



Sorry that my problem with fudging (especially in my favor) isn't "legitimate" to you. All I can say is the reason on why it bugs me. And that's definitely legitimate. As always, play what you like


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## Kingreaper (Apr 28, 2013)

airwalkrr said:


> See, this is a big issue I have. It is sort of a tangent because it doesn't apply to my situation. But I don't feel a GM should HAVE to make his common knowledge beforehand. The world is his, it should bend to his whim, and the players shouldn't be surprised by that.



The world is his. The Player Characters are the players.

The Game is everyone's. The GM doesn't OWN the game, they run it.

If you start taking over the PCs, whether overtly or through continuous fudging, you are overstepping the role of a GM



> I am not saying, nor have I ever, that GMs are entitled to abuse their players. And I think player rolls should never be reversed or discarded. But if a GM desires a particular outcome. He ought to have the right to make sure it occurs.



This *never* needs to involve fudging; unless either: A) the GM fails to set up the scenario properly or B) The players make it their goal to ensure that outcome doesn't occur.

In case A, the GM is fudging to make up for their own failure to plan. I've done this, I'm not proud of it but I have.
In case B, the GM is fudging in order to render the players actions pointless. This is unacceptable.



> And no GM should ever have to explain that to his players. It should always be done with tact and with them. But I take issue with the fact that there are people out there who think that just because the GM fudges with out letting his players know that he is going to do it is a big problem. Unless the GM is a tournament referee or judge in such a case as may be at convention play or competitive play, there should never be a question of whether the GM has the right to fudge.



I disagree. The GM has no more right to fudge than the players do, unless agreed otherwise by the group.



> Again, this does not apply to my situation. I am aware of the current day atmosphere and feelings regarding fudging. So I do make my players aware if I will do so in the campaign. Nevertheless, I do not feel like I should have to, nor do I feel that "The GM is cheating" is a legitimate excuse for having a problem with the game. "The GM is cheating to make the game no fun for me in a personal way" is a legitimate reason, but the two are very different.



Too much fudging is the same as going "I'll decide the outcome of every challenge".

Even if you have permission to fudge, fudging is a LIMITED occurence. Fudge once every three sessions, and no-one will care except the most hardcore dice-fall-where-they-may. Fudge three times every session and most people will disapprove.

Fudge ten times a session, and you're playing the wrong game.


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## GameOgre (Apr 28, 2013)

If I am playing a game and the DM controls the entire world,all the creatures in that world but me,all the Gods and Powers,Everything that walks crawls or fly's in the entire universe,Why can't he play by the rules just like I have to?

Why does he feel like HE gets to ignore rules,ignore dice rolls and steer the outcome of game the way he wants? That's not a game,That is Storytelling.

I am not playing the game to sit and listen to his story. 

It's a game. One that he ALREADY holds all the power,he ALREADY sets up adventures and ALREADY controls what happens to a large degree.

If he is going to take that last step and remove chance from the outcome then count me out. Frankly,I would rather go read a book.

I don't want his help to save my character from a ignoble death. If I earned a death GIVE IT TO ME.

If I one hit killed your bad arse npc's GIVE IT TO ME.

The FUN of these games is that good planning by both DM and players can pay off. That sometimes it doesn't! 

Sometimes the dice are simply with you! Sometimes the Dice Gods laugh and curse your name!

Either way,it's fun.


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## hopeless (Apr 28, 2013)

The answer is yes GM's can cheat I even had one gm admit he did so because he thought certain players were annoying and I thought the way he did it was wrong by declaring each hit was a critical when there are other ways of handling it.

Oh that door you opened had a glyph on it, you have no idea where you are, whilst you're waiting here run this character and I'll get back to you once your character wakes up...

What annoyed me was when he deliberately misintrepretated rules to accomodate his decisions when he had an insanity glyph effect someone who couldn't even see the glyph and came across as particularly spiteful unless it was concerning someone he felt was important part of his gaming group.

I usually roll out in full view and if I fudge its because I run the game for the mutual enjoyment of the group not to "win" I've made some decisions that have been queried but I still listened.

In regards to the above would they have willingly accepted running a more appropriately levelled character if something separated their higher level characters from the rest of the party say a door that when opened sends the party to certain parts of the dungeon except being so obviously powerful the higher level characters discover they've been stuck on another plane and by the time they get back the other party has gained a few levels to even out the difference...

Would that be acceptable to your players if it was specifically to make the game more enjoyable to all of them or are they truly fixated on those higher level characters that you might be better off having the other create higher level characters of their own to accomodate the entire group?


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## Ryltar (Apr 28, 2013)

GameOgre, 

the GM should not fudge dice rolls or alter the rules to screw players over. I think no one is really contesting that point.

However, I want to provide you with a different perspective. The GM's burden is to create an enjoyable gaming environment for the entire party. And while I am an advocate for not overly pulling punches, I am also of the opinion that there are few things more disruptive to a story than continuous player deaths. You lose their background, you lose their plot hooks, which also often makes it more difficult for other players to immerse themselves in the story. During one of my campaigns, which started out as the players forced to work together by outside circumstances, 3 out of 4 players had their characters die, and their replacements just were not invested in the story to the same degree. (Trying to achieve this puts an additional burden on the GM, which is to come up with good plot hooks at any point of the story whenever someone's PC dies.) The result was that we abandoned the campaign.

What I am trying to say is that there is a middle ground between hand-holding and letting the dice fall where they may. I will fudge dice rolls whenever I feel that it is not just bad planning on the part of the PCs, but rather rotten luck with the dice that leads to a PC death - in the interest of story coherence and immersion. I will not fudge dice rolls when a player is falling victim to Darwin's law or whenever they decide to attack despite overwhelming odds.


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## GameOgre (Apr 28, 2013)

Ryltar said:


> GameOgre,
> 
> the GM should not fudge dice rolls or alter the rules to screw players over. I think no one is really contesting that point.
> 
> ...





I would argue that the responsibility for creating a enjoyable game environment is a player one and not really a good DM goal. The DM should optimally be impartial. He shouldn't help or hinder the parties pursuits and should act as a indifferent Judge or median by witch players can view the fictional world.

If I as a player decide to attack the kings guard the DM's responsibility to the game is to bring the matter to its natural conclusion. It would ruin our fun to have him suddenly alter the Kings Guard to make it a fitting challenge for our level ect. It's our dumb arses that decided to take on the Kings Guard at 3rd level! Or our call if we want to take them out at 17th. Either way I'm fine with the result as long as it isn't false. False really can only mean altered from what the DM thinks it should be to fit the party.

Some of the best games I have EVER played resulted in my characters death.

Some of the worst games I have EVER played resulted in my character continuing on.


It is not important if my character lives or dies. It is important to feel the thrill of danger,the joys of success and yes,now and then to feel the despair and agony of defeat. The thing is....in Pathfinder even Death is a lie. The End often means until later.

I do agree that too much death is a bad thing. 

Sometimes bad things happen for a reason though. Sometimes I need to be reminded to run away from some fights. Sometimes someone else needs to learn to do there job better in a fight. Death teaches us like no other teacher.

Rotten Luck as well as Outrageous fortune are equal opportunity visitors. If you curtail one from the table it weakens and lessens the fun.


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## Ryltar (Apr 28, 2013)

GameOgre said:


> If I as a player decide to attack the kings guard the DM's responsibility to the game is to bring the matter to its natural conclusion. It would ruin our fun to have him suddenly alter the Kings Guard to make it a fitting challenge for our level ect. It's our dumb arses that decided to take on the Kings Guard at 3rd level! Or our call if we want to take them out at 17th. Either way I'm fine with the result as long as it isn't false.




Absolutely. If the players attack the king's renowned champion (i.e. higher-level NPCs) at 3rd level, this is stupidity and warrants PC death.

However, consider the opposite scenario: 10th level PCs encounter level 2 bandits on the road. Due to a string of bad rolls, a PC dies in what you as the DM had planned as a random encounter to liven up a boring journey. Now, the position is certainly valid that even high-level PCs are not invulnerable and that bad luck can happen to everyone. However, neither does the PC want to lose his character nor does the DM want to lose the character and all his/her plot connections due to mere coincidence. Realistic? Perhaps, insofar as that is possible in a fantasy RPG. Good for the game? I would disagree. A situation like the above may not be a problem where resurrection is available, but depending on the tone of your campaign that is not always the case. In such a case, I would always let fun override pseudo-realism in my game.


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## GameOgre (Apr 28, 2013)

If 10th level pc's get wiped out from a minor bandit encounter then something is really wrong. Either the DM made mistakes or the party did. Some pretty major ones to. A few lucky rolls and a few misfortune ones isn't enough.

I would argue that in fact its HARD for a DM to kill pc's unless he truly doesn't understand the official encounter building system or the party makes major mistakes. My point with this is most PC deaths are due to PC mistakes.

Pushing on when to weak and out of resources is a major pc killer. In game player skill sets are gained over time learning how to keep the party alive. 

Overconfidence,so easily acquired with the official encounter building mindset,is another killer. Knowing when to run away is KEY for long term survival trait for any player with a DM who doesn't pull the punches.

The list goes on and on.

What seems at first glance like just a bad roll or mischance is more than likely the result of bad playing habits. Letting players live by altering the random outcomes of dice cheats both parties of the chance to learn from this,masks a problem within the game or encourages bad behavior that will ultimately lead to the DM having to fudge more and more. 

It could also be a DM who doesn't use the encounter creation system or doesn't understand it. Place my 1st level group against four Beholders and yeah either I'm gonna talk my way out with some of the best in character role playing you have ever seen or dead. Fudging the die roll wouldn't help the game in that situation.


Give me three good companions and I will beat Pathfinders encounter system time after time. Heck even two or three +3 encounters is doable. I'm nothing special. Most Pathfinder players could do it. Pathfinder is entirely set up to give us,the players huge edges. It's not a fair fight.


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## Ryltar (Apr 28, 2013)

GO, your experience obviously differs from mine - which is fine, but does not render my point less valid. I really think that we are making the same point, just phrasing it differently, FWIW .

I did not state that the Pathfinder encounter system was tipped against the PCs. I did not even contest that most character deaths are a consequence of stupid decisions on the part of the players (too true, in my experience). But situations can and do happen in which one failed save decides everything, or a string of 1's and 2's versus several high rolls from enemies can mean that a character goes from "just a scratch" to "dead and gone" in one round, despite all careful planning, despite all protective spells in place, despite wealth by level. And that has nothing to do with cheating the players, cheating yourself as the DM or even helping 'bad' playing behaviour to sneak in. It is just a consequence of the inherent randomness of the system.

Players want to be heroes, and they do not derive the least amount of enjoyment from failing miserably when even all their planning is for naught. If you run a beer-and-pretzels game, no problem, roll up a new character. But if you have a long-running, story-heavy campaign, being a stickler for letting the dice fall where they may is just shooting yourself in the foot if you are the DM, IMHO.


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## GameOgre (Apr 28, 2013)

Ryltar said:


> GO, your experience obviously differs from mine - which is fine, but does not render my point less valid. I really think that we are making the same point, just phrasing it differently, FWIW .
> 
> I did not state that the Pathfinder encounter system was tipped against the PCs. I did not even contest that most character deaths are a consequence of stupid decisions on the part of the players (too true, in my experience). But situations can and do happen in which one failed save decides everything, or a string of 1's and 2's versus several high rolls from enemies can mean that a character goes from "just a scratch" to "dead and gone" in one round, despite all careful planning, despite all protective spells in place, despite wealth by level. And that has nothing to do with cheating the players, cheating yourself as the DM or even helping 'bad' playing behaviour to sneak in. It is just a consequence of the inherent randomness of the system.
> 
> Players want to be heroes, and they do not derive the least amount of enjoyment from failing miserably when even all their planning is for naught. If you run a beer-and-pretzels game, no problem, roll up a new character. But if you have a long-running, story-heavy campaign, being a stickler for letting the dice fall where they may is just shooting yourself in the foot if you are the DM, IMHO.




I'm now going to shock and awe folks and agree with you.

My way of DMing/Playing does indeed ruin our fun from time to time. I will go further and say that I do see why others play differently and even point out that at times I am sorely tempted to dip into that play style.

Having the dice turn a otherwise awesome game into bloody chum sucks Wereshark arse.

I fault you and others not one bit for fudging things from time to time.

I just have found that for us,when taking the long road or big picture that we have more fun letting the dice fall and dealing with it. I can think of PLENTY times where taking the fudging path was heavily discussed.

Each time we decided against it. Said out farewells to a character or whole campaign and broke out the dice to roll up new guys.

I will tell you that we all find that it adds something special to a game/characters and campaign when it does work out. When it all falls into place there is nothing like it.

Even when it all goes down into chum it sometimes gives us stories to talk about for years and years.


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## billd91 (Apr 28, 2013)

GameOgre said:


> I just have found that for us,when taking the long road or big picture that we have more fun letting the dice fall and dealing with it. I can think of PLENTY times where taking the fudging path was heavily discussed.
> 
> Each time we decided against it. Said out farewells to a character or whole campaign and broke out the dice to roll up new guys.
> 
> ...




I have to say that's the best defense of leaving the dice fall where they may I've read, in no small part because it avoids any implication of badwrongfun play styles, GM manipulation, GM power trips, and moral failings. I've seen too many posts that are tantamount to going down those roads...


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## Mallus (Apr 29, 2013)

GameOgre said:


> Why can't he play by the rules just like I have to?



The simple answer is: the GM's goal (or job) is different from the players.

Roughly speaking, the players are out to _win_. To successfully overcome in-game the challenges and further their characters goals. The GM is out to _challenge_ the players, not to win (that's too easy, and also pointless). That said, this often means the GM _should_ play be the same rules as the players -- but not always, not necessarily.

And with complex system like D&D 3.5/Pathfinder (which I'm running now), it's important to recognize when the rules are mainly for the player's benefit -- specifically, I'm thinking of the complicated (and massive) set of character building/developing options. It's fun for the players to build/tinker with all those options. It's fun for them to display their system mastery. 

For the GM --well, GMs like me-- all those options are a big pain in the ass. The players have _one_ PC to lavish time one. I've got to create a steady stream of them over the course of the campaign. Books of pre-build NPCs like the NPX Codex help, as do sites like this, but I'm sure as hell simply going fudge some NPCs, just give them ballpark number that look right, because I'm not willing to spend the time to do all of them "by the book(s)".

Sure, I'm probably make the major, classed, opponents "legitimately". Mostly. Maybe.

I don't "cheat" to push a specific, predetermined outcome. It's just that my job as GM is fundamentally different. Plus, I don't get a lot of satisfaction from showing off my system mastery as GM -- well, I get little, from time to time. 



> Why does he feel like HE gets to ignore rules,ignore dice rolls and steer the outcome of game the way he wants? That's not a game,That is Storytelling.



I often ignore rules --especially the specifics-- simply to save time at the table. For example, I'll ballpark DCs instead of looking up the formal rule. Is that cheating? To me, it's a necessary time-saver. Part of good GMing is knowing when to sacrifice accuracy for speed-of-play.

Basically, not all fudging/rule-breaking is about steering the outcome/making the players into passive audience members. That's way too simplistic.



GameOgre said:


> I would argue that in fact its HARD for a DM to kill pc's unless he truly doesn't understand the official encounter building system or the party makes major mistakes. My point with this is most PC deaths are due to PC mistakes.



I think you're placing too much faith in official encounter-building rules. My experience is they're an... inexact science, at best. Helpful, but frequently prone to bad results and, in the end, no replacement for common sense and good judgement (which can include a bit of fudging...). 



> Pushing on when to weak and out of resources is a major pc killer.



Sure. But this assumes the dangers are all relatively static, ie that the PCs can control when they encounter danger, like in a traditional dungeon environment where the ludicrously well-behaved monsters stay in their appointed rooms. Once you open that design up, allow for more dynamic challenges, where dangers can seek the PCs out and bash down their doors, well, the whole "pushing on" thing becomes less true. 

It's also less-than-true in systems with rocket-tag combat, ie games like 3.5e/Pathfinder where PCs have offensive capabilities that far outstrip their defenses, and most PCs can be crippled/killed in a single round, especially by mid-to-high level.


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## ExploderWizard (May 1, 2013)

airwalkrr said:


> See, this is a big issue I have. It is sort of a tangent because it doesn't apply to my situation. But I don't feel a GM should HAVE to make his common knowledge beforehand. The world is his, it should bend to his whim, and the players shouldn't be surprised by that. I am not saying, nor have I ever, that GMs are entitled to abuse their players. And I think player rolls should never be reversed or discarded. But if a GM desires a particular outcome. He ought to have the right to make sure it occurs. And no GM should ever have to explain that to his players. It should always be done with tact and with them. But I take issue with the fact that there are people out there who think that just because the GM fudges with out letting his players know that he is going to do it is a big problem. Unless the GM is a tournament referee or judge in such a case as may be at convention play or competitive play, there should never be a question of whether the GM has the right to fudge.
> 
> Again, this does not apply to my situation. I am aware of the current day atmosphere and feelings regarding fudging. So I do make my players aware if I will do so in the campaign. Nevertheless, I do not feel like I should have to, nor do I feel that "The GM is cheating" is a legitimate excuse for having a problem with the game. "The GM is cheating to make the game no fun for me in a personal way" is a legitimate reason, but the two are very different.




Players have a right to know what kind of game they are signing up for. Managing expectations is part of being a GM. If the players are really wanting an honest game, and are more than willing to take thier lumps when deaths occur, how is cheating and engineering outcomes making things more fun for the players? If I was promised an honest game and the GM fudges to prevent my character from dying then the GM HAS in fact, made the game no fun for me in a personal way. 

If the players desire for a satisfying story is thier primary source of fun, then tinkering around behind the screen to get outcomes that suit the story isn't really cheating because the game is being conducted as the players prefer it to be. 

So the only badwrongfun in my opinion is not providing the style of game that was advertised. Promising one type of game and running another IS cheating.


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## GameOgre (May 1, 2013)

I don't think anyone is complaining about the DM making house rules or ignoring certain parts of the rules in general. If you want to roll a D6 for group Init,I'm fine with that as long as I knew that going in.

What I am talking about in the last post was: The DM rolled a D20 to hit me and isn't happy with the result(either way).

See it's all perspective. In all actuality the DM is a God and I am subject to his whim. I'm fine with that! Just keep the curtain up and don't let me see him doing it.

I know if you let the dice fall where they may the DM can still do whatever he wants. The Goblins running at you could number four or four hundred,it's all up to him. Just give me my illusionary dice rolling and keep the rest hidden behind the curtain.


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## Mark Chance (May 2, 2013)

In all actuality, the DM is just another person at the game table.


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## billd91 (May 2, 2013)

Mark Chance said:


> In all actuality, the DM is just another person at the game table.




He is... yet he isn't as well. His role in the development and unfolding of an RPG's events makes him a different person at the table. When six people amble up to the table and sit down, yes, everyone is just another player. But once someone's the screen monkey, that player takes on a much greater role and is no longer just another person at the game table.


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## Hand of Evil (May 2, 2013)

If you failed to state your GM policies, game concept and house rules from the start, then you failed and have learned from the mistake.  

You cannot expect your players to know how you do business without informing them.  And yes, GMing is a business, it is time and effort, it is work, planning, thought and has a cost, you as a GM are providing a service; running a game!  The players are your customers, you service them and you are judge by that service, just let them know what you are providing and your expectations from the get go.


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## Mark Chance (May 4, 2013)

Even when "someone's the screen monkey, that player" is still just another person at the table. My players aren't my customers. They're my friends, and prefer to treat them as such.


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## S'mon (May 4, 2013)

I think fudging on task resolution dice rolls is bad practice and I would not do it myself. Dice rolls as an aid to content generation are different, it's good practice to ignore silly/nonsensical results on such rolls.

That said, this is more about play style and expectations. Some players are ok with GM fudging, some are not, some even demand it (eg to keep their PCs alive), and it may vary by the game being played. If you are going to fudge I think you should tell the players up front at the start of the campaign, so that if they don't like fudging they know not to waste time on your campaign. Or if they demand fudging, they know not to play in a no-fudging campaign.


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## S'mon (May 4, 2013)

ExploderWizard said:


> Players have a right to know what kind of game they are signing up for. Managing expectations is part of being a GM. If the players are really wanting an honest game, and are more than willing to take thier lumps when deaths occur, how is cheating and engineering outcomes making things more fun for the players? If I was promised an honest game and the GM fudges to prevent my character from dying then the GM HAS in fact, made the game no fun for me in a personal way.
> 
> If the players desire for a satisfying story is thier primary source of fun, then tinkering around behind the screen to get outcomes that suit the story isn't really cheating because the game is being conducted as the players prefer it to be.
> 
> So the only badwrongfun in my opinion is not providing the style of game that was advertised. Promising one type of game and running another IS cheating.




I agree. I'd also say that the majority of players I know dislike GM fudging. One told me "I won't play with GM X again, I'm sick of him fudging to keep us alive". IME it is much more common for players to seek out no-fudging GMs, and GMs who fudge regularly tend to have trouble retaining players. But as I said, there are players who accept fudging and even some players who expect and demand it. Thus it is very important that pro-fudge GMs are matched with pro-fudge players. And this can only happen if GMs are upfront about whether they will fudge or not.


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## James Eisert (May 6, 2013)

GM fudge all the time. There is no way to do it sometimes. Role playing is about making a good story. When the dice kills off a main character or villain too early, it has to be rectified. I know that a lot of people like some boardgame with their role play, but the point is they live for those _stories_​ even combat stories over the board that are exciting. That excitement has to be manufactured. If you wit for chance, it will be a long wait. 

My suggestion is too keep the boardgame and roleplaying separate. That way players can play the boardgame without thought to what their character would do, because most boardgame heavy rpg's are not geared to compensate for "less than optimum" maneuvers, such as much roleplaying situations occur.

For this matter, I like my rpg's that are dice rolly and level uppy to be like Descent or D&D 4th ed. All boardgame, but with over the top bravado and role play acts AFTER the combat is done. Pure, indepth pure acting rpg's I give way to FUDGE and FATE (Starblazers and Legends of Anglerre)


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## S'mon (May 6, 2013)

James Eisert said:


> GM fudge all the time. There is no way to do it sometimes. Role playing is about making a good story. When the dice kills off a main character or villain too early, it has to be rectified.




You don't think the unexpected early death of a main character or villain can help generate a good story?


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## Jhaelen (May 6, 2013)

James Eisert said:


> When the dice kills off a main character or villain too early, it has to be rectified.



No it doesn't!
I disagree with just about everything in this post. But that's fine, since it's just about different tastes and preferences, right?


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## Campbell (May 6, 2013)

If you are going to roll dice and cannot accept an outcome of those dice that's pretty much a case of rules/group mismatch. If the rules allow for PC death and that's not an acceptable result than you are using the wrong rule set. At least that's how I look at it.


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## James Eisert (May 6, 2013)

S'mon said:


> You don't think the unexpected early death of a main character or villain can help generate a good story?




Seldom. It's usually anti-climatic. Luke Skywalker does *not *die to stormtrooper fire. I know he *could* in a dicey game. He could roll unlucky (or the stormtrooper could be very lucky), and yes, you could make a story around it, but it usually kills off more story than it generates.

Also, dice have a tendency to have this happen more than once in a campaign. If I did make a story arc about the random death of a character, I wouldn't want to do it twice.


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## S'mon (May 6, 2013)

James Eisert said:


> Seldom. It's usually anti-climatic. Luke Skywalker does *not *die to stormtrooper fire.




But Obi-Wan Kenobi dies! And the story goes on. I think most people find that unexpected events including NPC deaths can strengthen rather than derail the narrative, because in an RPG the narrative is created in play, not pre-scripted.


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## Umbran (May 6, 2013)

Folks,

We have had, in the past, threads on "GM cheating" and dice fudging that have devolved into folks beating their heads together for long periods for naught, amidst various folks flinging accusations of badwrongfun and such.  This is one of the subjects that often leads to what I have come to call "dichotomy wars" - some (occasionally arbitrary) line is drawn in the sand, and folks line up on opposite sides trying to browbeat the other into submission. 

It is okay to have an opinion on the subject.  It is even okay for that opinion to be pretty much set in stone.  But it'd be awful polite of you to be up-front about it, if it is so.  It would help us focus on constructive discussion, rather than allowing folks to beat against brick walls to the point of frustration.


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## Umbran (May 6, 2013)

S'mon said:


> But Obi-Wan Kenobi dies! And the story goes on.




Obi-Wan's death is not unexpected.  It's a fairly archetypal thing - the old master and tutor must be removed from the scene for the student to fully come into his own.  As a story construct, it is older than dirt.


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## billd91 (May 6, 2013)

James Eisert said:


> Seldom. It's usually anti-climatic. Luke Skywalker does *not *die to stormtrooper fire. I know he *could* in a dicey game. He could roll unlucky (or the stormtrooper could be very lucky), and yes, you could make a story around it, but it usually kills off more story than it generates.




Well, what you have to realize is that Star Wars was originally the story of Obi-Wan Kenobi and how he bring on a youthful ward to go on high adventure. A few sessions into the campaign, the GM had to shift focus...


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## James Eisert (May 6, 2013)

S'mon said:


> But Obi-Wan Kenobi dies! And the story goes on. I think most people find that unexpected events including NPC deaths can strengthen rather than derail the narrative, because in an RPG the narrative is created in play, not pre-scripted.




But much like Star Wars, Obi Wans death, although unexpected to the audience, is still scripted and on purpose. 

Don't get me wrong, I understand that you *can* make these things work, but I think it's the exception more than the rule.


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## S'mon (May 6, 2013)

James Eisert said:


> But much like Star Wars, Obi Wans death, although unexpected to the audience, is still scripted and on purpose.
> 
> Don't get me wrong, I understand that you *can* make these things work, but I think it's the exception more than the rule.




Do you actually pre-script the on-stage deaths of NPCs? Is there anything left to chance in your games, or is the story entirely pre-written?


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## Manbearcat (May 6, 2013)

Neither my players nor I play RPGs to "create a story".  We play RPGs to "see what happens."  Story emerges from our process of "seeing what happens."  I've always hated fudging.  I roll my dice right out on the table for everyone to see.  My screen (when I use it) is a quick-reference tool, not a curtain to hide mischief behind.  I've never been a player, but if I were, I would not play with a GM who fudges.

So can a GM cheat by fudging?  I would say yes.  If I were to do that, I would be cheating my players out of the impact and meaning of their decisions and the profundity of the outcomes of those decisions.  Further, I would be cheating all of us out of "seeing what happens"...because we already know ahead of time, and I'd just rather watch a movie or read a book instead as it will be "better" than any story that comes out of our play (and I think our play is quite good and yields rip-roaring RPG stories!).  

< Insert feel-good caveat about different strokes for different folks >


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## James Eisert (May 7, 2013)

S'mon said:


> Do you actually pre-script the on-stage deaths of NPCs? Is there anything left to chance in your games, or is the story entirely pre-written?





Nothing is written solid in a good RPG. And chance events DO happen. But timing is everything in a good story. The main point is that dicey events can ruin a better storyline in the long run, or one that has been going on for along time. Like a hero that wants revenge on an npc that has been evading the character for ages. His party meets the villan in what was to be a small encounter. A small fight ensues with the henchmen but one of the pc's (not the main pc wanting revenge) takes a shot at the vilian...scores a crit and kills him.

Now this would be no problem if they just met the villan perhaps, but this character was the bane of the one PC. It's like Superman killing the Joker. Batman fans would be ticked right? 

I'm not saying you can't make it work. And perhaps even in gritty RPG it would be just fine if the idea is that everyone dies a lot, I can see that style in 1st edition D&D style play. That's the way it was and it worked, but even then people did not talk about the level 2 or 3 guys they played with. It always was the EPIC characters that seemed to survive the odds. That does not usually happen without some divine intervention from the DM.


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## Umbran (May 7, 2013)

Manbearcat said:


> My screen (when I use it) is a quick-reference tool, not a curtain to hide mischief behind.
> ...
> < Insert feel-good caveat about different strokes for different folks >




Here's a question - if it really is different strokes for different folks, does it necessarily qualify as mischief?


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## JoshDemers (May 7, 2013)

I know I'm weighing in late in the game, but I think an important element is that the players need to feel like you, the GM, are on their side. I have been in very adversarial games and they are no fun. But when I'm playing a game and I feel like the GM and players are telling the same story, then there is a lot more that can be done and accepted. This can work even for "seeing what happens" sorts of games. The players still need to feel like the GM isn't out to get them, but is even rooting for them.

If the GM makes a roll with a result that is highly unlikely and thus derails the story, then I have no problem with that roll being ignored. Of course I don't want that to happen much - sometimes things go in unexpected directions. But there are also times when a story "feels" like it need to go a certain way. 

In the games I've been running recently, I have made an effort to have a lot more group input. I think that addresses your "different strokes" issue. Sometimes it is better to be above board about the "cheating" so everyone knows you're trying to keep the game interesting for everyone. It gets tricky when you have huge power disparities. All the more reason, I think, to get the group in on the behind the scenes stuff so ou have buy-in from the start.


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## Kingreaper (May 7, 2013)

James Eisert said:


> Nothing is written solid in a good RPG. And chance events DO happen. But timing is everything in a good story. The main point is that dicey events can ruin a better storyline in the long run, or one that has been going on for along time. Like a hero that wants revenge on an npc that has been evading the character for ages. His party meets the villan in what was to be a small encounter. A small fight ensues with the henchmen but one of the pc's (not the main pc wanting revenge) takes a shot at the vilian...scores a crit and kills him.



Personally, I don't think this is a time for over-ruling the dice.

The player chose to take a shot. They were clearly aiming to take the villain down, defeat him; taking the success away from them seems bad to me.

Changing the exact details, e.g. having the villain be disabled rather than dead, gives the player their success, while still allowing the guy with the vendetta his moment. Superman doesn't kill the joker, but he knocks him out of the fight, and then it's bats turn.


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## Manbearcat (May 7, 2013)

Umbran said:


> Here's a question - if it really is different strokes for different folks, does it necessarily qualify as mischief?




And here's an answer - If someone poses such a question as "can the GM cheat?", is it only polite to answer with ambiguity and hedging for fear of the answer of "yes" (and the corresponding reasoning) being too incendiary or strident to digest dispassionately?  Or, if someone poses that question in good faith (presumably looking for yes answers, and reasoning, just as they are for no answers), is it reasonable to divulge the philosophical disposition of my table as unequivocally "yes" and the reasoning of "it cheats players out of the meaningful impact of their decision-making on a strategic/tactical level and the corresponding narrative imposition that their decisions are supposed to drive?"  In this case, mischief as "misrepresenting the player's capacity for (i) meaningful impact via strategic and tactical decisions and (ii) corresponding narrative imposition" by the vessel of illegitimate fortune resolution and circumvention of the weight of PC build choices on that equation.  

Mechanically, that is my take and I stand by the reasoning.  Nonetheless, this is a leisure pursuit, so, naturally, different strokes for different folks is implicitly appended at the bottom of every post where an issue is presented that might yield discord within our hobby.  You can disagree and submit that the reasoning doesn't logically follow or disagree with the tenet as something that even matters to "pretend at being an elf" games.  If a person is one of those folks, then they surely wouldn't qualify it as mischief as they either disagree or it doesn't matter to them (irrelevant mischief is no mischief at all).  And I would still stridently, yet earnestly, disagree.


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## JamesonCourage (May 7, 2013)

JoshDemers said:


> The players still need to feel like the GM isn't out to get them, but is even rooting for them.



I don't fudge, and my players know, explicitly, that I'm rooting for them. I'm always a little apologetic when one of them dies (and it always matters in-game), but I'm not going to fudge it. I've had way too many cool things come out of deaths / setbacks for me to stop it, and I'm not about to fudge things when I know they like earning their wins.

I just had a player die fairly recently (5-6 weeks ago?), and the player was happy about it. He loved that character, and even feared that he'd lose interest in the campaign if the character died. His character was a berserker / paladin type of character (I don't play D&D, so this is the closest analog), and the city he was in had been attacked by a large force outside that had already destroyed the keep with magic. The general said that they would eventually lose the fight due to morale / inferior magic, and so my player sent his character out to duel the very powerful warrior leader (his power and prowess had been well-known for quite a while in-game). But, this guy was responsible for sacrificing a fellow knight to power his ritual to destroy the keep, and his brother (a powerful warrior) had killed this PC's squire and friend during the initial assault, and the bad guy was now getting ready to attack the town, kill everyone, and burn it down (killing tens of thousands of people).

So, he goes out and gets in a one on one duel with a much higher level character, and through good luck, lots of resources, and not backing down, he killed his enemy. However, he died a few rounds afterwards due to the wounds he had sustained from the fight, in the arms of his squire's best friend (a squire to another PC). The enemy force had been united under this warrior leader, and he was the one who knew the ritual magic, so they immediately started some minor infighting, but were organized enough to retreat. In the chaos, though, two hostage knights and a few other captured good guys escaped.

Out of game, the NPC was a level 16 warrior that could transform into a beast (and he did during the fight), and the PC warrior was only level 8. But, I didn't fudge the fight; the player (and PC) knew what he was getting into, and I'm not going to throw the fight. However, like I said, good luck and expending significant resources let him kill the bad guy before dying in his friend's arms (the best friend of the man he wanted to avenge).

I think this is a great story, and my player -while initially sad about his character's death- thinks so even more than I do. Sure, this could have happened if I fudged, but my players aren't stupid guys; we're all above average in smartitude (as many RPGers are), and they can pick up on signs of fudging. But, I rolled in the open, and I was consistent with his attacks. I even showed the player the bad guy's HP when a critical hit dropped the bad guy to 1 rather than 0 or below. But, the players know that the win was earned, and that makes my players (repeat: _my players_) so much more invested in the game.

In this regards, if I fudged things when they think I'm not going to, I'll be cheating. It's not what we agreed to play, and it's not what they're expecting or what they want.


JoshDemers said:


> If the GM makes a roll with a result that is highly unlikely and thus derails the story, then I have no problem with that roll being ignored. Of course I don't want that to happen much - sometimes things go in unexpected directions. But there are also times when a story "feels" like it need to go a certain way.
> 
> In the games I've been running recently, I have made an effort to have a lot more group input. I think that addresses your "different strokes" issue. Sometimes it is better to be above board about the "cheating" so everyone knows you're trying to keep the game interesting for everyone. It gets tricky when you have huge power disparities. All the more reason, I think, to get the group in on the behind the scenes stuff so ou have buy-in from the start.



I agree about being above-board about it. If you do that, I don't think it's cheating, and it can certainly make the game better / great for a lot of players / groups. I have absolutely no problem with other people doing it, but, personally, I don't like GMs fudging my stuff, and I don't like doing it as the GM. It's all just preference, though. Which boils down to -as always- play what you like


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## billd91 (May 7, 2013)

Manbearcat said:


> Or, if someone poses that question in good faith (presumably looking for yes answers, and reasoning, just as they are for no answers), is it reasonable to divulge the philosophical disposition of my table as unequivocally "yes" and the reasoning of "it cheats players out of the meaningful impact of their decision-making on a strategic/tactical level and the corresponding narrative imposition that their decisions are supposed to drive?"  In this case, mischief as "misrepresenting the player's capacity for (i) meaningful impact via strategic and tactical decisions and (ii) corresponding narrative imposition" by the vessel of illegitimate fortune resolution and circumvention of the weight of PC build choices on that equation.
> 
> Mechanically, that is my take and I stand by the reasoning.




Except that the dice can also take away any meaningful impact of player decisions because the random generation isn't affected by them. The odd of success might be improved, but in a single trial, any efforts spent to do so may fail, leading to no difference in outcomes from the player's point of view. Example: In the Council of Thieves game I ran, the witch PC tried to scry on a particular NPC. She didn't have any of his personal effects and didn't know him so her chances were low. Still, she had the crystal ball and was willing to give it a try. Her target made his saving throw so she failed. She wanted to improve her odds so she managed to get more information on him and a personal possession, all very useful for undermining his save. Now, suppose I still managed to roll a successful saving throw? How meaningful had her choices been? How meaningful would they appear to her? 

In order to *make* her choices meaningful (and reward a good plan), I resolved to edit that die had it come up with a successful save. That's partly how I see my job. As the GM, I exert editorial control of anything from my side of the screen (and that's a metaphorical screen, no literal screen necessary) from monster\NPC stats and actions to boxed flavor text, from traps and setting elements to, yes, dice rolls.


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## Umbran (May 7, 2013)

Manbearcat said:


> Mechanically, that is my take and I stand by the reasoning.




And it is a fine, if somewhat floridly written, response.



> Nonetheless, this is a leisure pursuit, so, naturally, different strokes for different folks is implicitly appended at the bottom of every post where an issue is presented that might yield discord within our hobby.




And it is only here where you wander into what my dad would call, "horsehockey".  

In a perfect world, perhaps it could be implicit.  Also in a perfect world, it would always be explicit, and the written word would convey all nuance of meaning we actually intend in a finite (and even small) number of words.  But, last time I checked, ice cream melted and fell off the cones, people still caught colds, and somewhere a rerun of "Who's the Boos" is playing, thus proving the world to be less than perfect.


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## S'mon (May 7, 2013)

Umbran said:


> Here's a question - if it really is different strokes for different folks, does it necessarily qualify as mischief?




It's mischief/cheating if the GM hasn't told the players that he will be fudging when he deems it appropriate. If he has told his players that he reserves the right to fudge in the interests of eg a good story, then it's not cheating/mischief.


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## Jhaelen (May 7, 2013)

James Eisert said:


> But much like Star Wars, Obi Wans death, although unexpected to the audience, is still scripted and on purpose.



Yes, but imagine for a second that the Star Wars movies were based on the adventures of a RPG group. Then the dice would have decided that Obi Wan died and Luke survived. It might have been the other way around and the story would have been just as interesting, just different.

Now look at the original Dragonlance books: They are actually based on an RPG campaign. When they started playing that campaign the players surely didn't know who'd survive until the end. It's only after the campaign has finished that you know it and can retell the story as if it had been scripted right from the beginning. 

Reading the novel you wouldn't be able to tell the difference, i.e. if it was scripted all along or if it was just the (random) outcome of how the campaign played out.

When playing a Star Wars campaign you don't play Luke who's destined to destroy the Death Star. You simply play one of several young adventurers, any of whom may turn out _after the fact_ to have been destined to destroy the Death Star. _Or_ the Death Star isn't destroyed by any of the pcs after all, and the story develops in a completely different way. To me, that's the whole point of roleplaying rather than reading a novel or watching the movie. If my character's decisions and actions cannot influence the story in any way I'd feel I'm wasting my time.


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## airwalkrr (May 7, 2013)

billd91 said:


> Except that the dice can also take away any meaningful impact of player decisions because the random generation isn't affected by them. The odd of success might be improved, but in a single trial, any efforts spent to do so may fail, leading to no difference in outcomes from the player's point of view. Example: In the Council of Thieves game I ran, the witch PC tried to scry on a particular NPC. She didn't have any of his personal effects and didn't know him so her chances were low. Still, she had the crystal ball and was willing to give it a try. Her target made his saving throw so she failed. She wanted to improve her odds so she managed to get more information on him and a personal possession, all very useful for undermining his save. Now, suppose I still managed to roll a successful saving throw? How meaningful had her choices been? How meaningful would they appear to her?
> 
> In order to *make* her choices meaningful (and reward a good plan), I resolved to edit that die had it come up with a successful save. That's partly how I see my job. As the GM, I exert editorial control of anything from my side of the screen (and that's a metaphorical screen, no literal screen necessary) from monster\NPC stats and actions to boxed flavor text, from traps and setting elements to, yes, dice rolls.



I think this is a great example of the benefits of fudging. I think it is absolutely acceptable to reward players for preparation and well-executed plans. Now I might perhaps still grant the NPC some benefit if he does indeed make his second saving throw, even if I decide to overrule the primary result. Perhaps he automatically notices the scrying sensor. Perhaps he just gets an inkling that something strange is amiss. But this kind of reward-based approach to fudging is great.

In the campaign I describe in the OP, dice were less important than the players coming up with creative solutions to problems. Many encounters could simply be brute-forced by the two super-human PCs. But the other PCs often came up with solutions which were, for lack of a better word, "cool." And when cool solutions are offered by the PCs, I often would not even require a die roll. Maybe the players with the super-human PCs resented this (although I gave them the same reward for their own "cool" solutions). But overall, the rules were just intended as a back-drop for what I wanted to be a cooperative story-telling effort. Again, I am coming back to the idea that the players in question simply weren't looking for what I was offering. I thought the interviews and explanation of my gaming philosophy for that campaign (I do run different types of campaigns, some of which involve no fudging whatsoever), but apparently it didn't suffice.


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## JoshDemers (May 7, 2013)

JamesonCourage said:


> I agree about being above-board about it. If you do that, I don't think it's cheating, and it can certainly make the game better / great for a lot of players / groups. I have absolutely no problem with other people doing it, but, personally, I don't like GMs fudging my stuff, and I don't like doing it as the GM. It's all just preference, though. Which boils down to -as always- play what you like




I think you have your answer there. If you believe that being above board isn't cheating, that seems to imply that not being so IS cheating. This thread shows pretty clearly that we all have our own "codes" that we follow. 

And so "yes," there CAN be mischeif when treating players differently if you aren't being honest about it.


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## Manbearcat (May 7, 2013)

I'm curious.  If the explicit social contract is in place such that the players at the table are ok with fudging behind the screen such that it isn't "mischief", then what is the point of rolling behind the screen?  Is there some inherent value to the theater of the ritual of "behind the screen rolling and verbalizing the outcome or revealing it like a magician" that would be diminished by, say, establishing a "GM mulligan (or 2...or 3) per session" and then rolling out in the open?


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## S'mon (May 7, 2013)

airwalkrr said:


> In the campaign I describe in the OP, dice were less important than the players coming up with creative solutions to problems. Many encounters could simply be brute-forced by the two super-human PCs. But the other PCs often came up with solutions which were, for lack of a better word, "cool." And when cool solutions are offered by the PCs, I often would not even require a die roll.




Neither would I - I'd say "Given your advantages you can Take 10 and succeed automatically". That's not fudging IMO. Fudging refers to changing the results of die rolls without informing the players that a particular die roll is being ignored/modified, yes?


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## S'mon (May 7, 2013)

Manbearcat said:


> I'm curious.  If the explicit social contract is in place such that the players at the table are ok with fudging behind the screen such that it isn't "mischief", then what is the point of rolling behind the screen?  Is there some inherent value to the theater of the ritual of "behind the screen rolling and verbalizing the outcome or revealing it like a magician" that would be diminished by, say, establishing a "GM mulligan (or 2...or 3) per session" and then rolling out in the open?




Presumably the uncertainty is beneficial? I once had a GM who said "I fudged like crazy to keep you alive in that encounter!" Yes, we knew that already - but saying so really rubbed it in. Don't do an EL+9 encounter in 3e and expect PCs to win!


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## Bagpuss (May 7, 2013)

Was Lando his replacement character? Guess the player left in a huff for a few sessions.


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## pemerton (May 8, 2013)

S'mon said:


> I think most people find that unexpected events including NPC deaths can strengthen rather than derail the narrative, because in an RPG the narrative is created in play, not pre-scripted.



Agreed.



Mallus said:


> Even when a GM follows the formal rules strictly, each time they assign something like a situational modifier, they're inserting their judgment in the task-resolution process. For that reason, I don't see a lot of difference between giving a player +4 bonus to an action and just assigning by fiat a percentage chance to succeed, ie doing an end-run around the formal rules, when convenient and/or appropriate.



To me, this is quite different from fudging dice. You are stating a chance of success (be it read out of a rulebook or stipulated ad hoc) and presumably the players can now spend their resources (items, spells, etc) to improve those chances - and then roll their dice!



S'mon said:


> I think fudging on task resolution dice rolls is bad practice and I would not do it myself.



Agreed. I think it is using dice for task resolution, but then _not_ using them, is the issue here.



billd91 said:


> In the Council of Thieves game I ran, the witch PC tried to scry on a particular NPC. She didn't have any of his personal effects and didn't know him so her chances were low. Still, she had the crystal ball and was willing to give it a try. Her target made his saving throw so she failed. She wanted to improve her odds so she managed to get more information on him and a personal possession, all very useful for undermining his save. Now, suppose I still managed to roll a successful saving throw? How meaningful had her choices been? How meaningful would they appear to her?
> 
> In order to *make* her choices meaningful (and reward a good plan), I resolved to edit that die had it come up with a successful save.



An alternative here is the Burning Wheel approach - the original die roll stands, and then the player generates enough bonuses to turn the initial failure into a success.



James Eisert said:


> Nothing is written solid in a good RPG. And chance events DO happen. But timing is everything in a good story.



This is why I prefer a system that reliably delivers good pacing by following the rules.



airwalkrr said:


> The most common technique I employed was adding hp to bad guys who otherwise would have been one-shotted by the two uber players
> 
> <snip>
> 
> ...



It really seems to me like you could benefit from a system that will deliver these sorts of results by following the rules, rather than requiring departure from them. As I mentioned upthread, I think MHRP might fit the bill.



Ryltar said:


> I am also of the opinion that there are few things more disruptive to a story than continuous player deaths.
> 
> <snip>
> 
> I will fudge dice rolls whenever I feel that it is not just bad planning on the part of the PCs, but rather rotten luck with the dice that leads to a PC death - in the interest of story coherence and immersion.



As a solution to this I prefer a system where rotten luck can't lead to PC death - eg because players have Fate Points they can spend to make their own luck.



Campbell said:


> If you are going to roll dice and cannot accept an outcome of those dice that's pretty much a case of rules/group mismatch. If the rules allow for PC death and that's not an acceptable result than you are using the wrong rule set. At least that's how I look at it.



Agreed.


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## Jacob Marley (May 8, 2013)

billd91 said:


> Except that the dice can also take away any meaningful impact of player decisions because the random generation isn't affected by them. The odd of success might be improved, but in a single trial, any efforts spent to do so may fail, leading to no difference in outcomes from the player's point of view.




I disagree. Information has value. That I increased my odds of success and still failed affects how I value that information in future decisions. Was I unlucky or is my current course of action more difficult than I thought? By fudging the die you are clouding the information and thereby making future decisions more difficult to evaluate. Which, in my experience, results in fudging begetting further fudging.

To use an investing analogy: if a company is providing me with faulty or misleading financials, how can I be certain in my evaluation of the company? I am forced to correct for the possibility that the information I have is inaccurate. Well, the same is true if I, as a player, discover that the DM is fudging the die. I self correct and assume that the encounters are, in fact, more difficult than the DM is representing. This results in a number of unintended consequences, namely, I act more conservative in my approach.


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## Jhaelen (May 8, 2013)

airwalkrr said:


> I think this is a great example of the benefits of fudging. I think it is absolutely acceptable to reward players for preparation and well-executed plans.



In such a case I simply wouldn't roll at all. If I as the DM have decided that the player prepared and executed the plan in such a brilliant way that I want to reward her in some way, I'll simply do so.
What's the point of rolling the dice if I've already decided about the outcome? This is, imho, not an example where fudging is required or beneficial.

A roll would only be necessary if, e.g. I wanted to randomize the degree of success. I.e. while success is guaranteed it might range from marginal (introducing minor complications) to exceptional (something beneficial beyond a simple success happens). However, in such a case you're generally better off granting an ad-hoc bonus to the roll that will ensure success.


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## ExploderWizard (May 8, 2013)

James Eisert said:


> Seldom. It's usually anti-climatic. Luke Skywalker does *not *die to stormtrooper fire. I know he *could* in a dicey game. He could roll unlucky (or the stormtrooper could be very lucky), and yes, you could make a story around it, but it usually kills off more story than it generates.
> 
> Also, dice have a tendency to have this happen more than once in a campaign. If I did make a story arc about the random death of a character, I wouldn't want to do it twice.




Not everyone plays rpgs with the intent of storytelling, so concerns of plot, pacing, etc. are meaningless. 



Umbran said:


> Here's a question - if it really is different strokes for different folks, does it necessarily qualify as mischief?






S'mon said:


> It's mischief/cheating if the GM hasn't told the players that he will be fudging when he deems it appropriate. If he has told his players that he reserves the right to fudge in the interests of eg a good story, then it's not cheating/mischief.




Yup. Fudge all you like, but if the players are duped into believing that it isn't happening then its pure mischief. 



Jhaelen said:


> In such a case I simply wouldn't roll at all. If I as the DM have decided that the player prepared and executed the plan in such a brilliant way that I want to reward her in some way, I'll simply do so.
> What's the point of rolling the dice if I've already decided about the outcome? This is, imho, not an example where fudging is required or beneficial.
> 
> A roll would only be necessary if, e.g. I wanted to randomize the degree of success. I.e. while success is guaranteed it might range from marginal (introducing minor complications) to exceptional (something beneficial beyond a simple success happens). However, in such a case you're generally better off granting an ad-hoc bonus to the roll that will ensure success.




Exactly. Good input from the player should be rewarded and if the plans are brilliant enough and there isn't anything unbeknownst to the player that would hinder success its ok to forgo rolling the dice and just declare a logical outcome. The game as a whole doesn't need to become a slave to random die rolls.


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## Umbran (May 8, 2013)

Manbearcat said:


> I'm curious.  If the explicit social contract is in place such that the players at the table are ok with fudging behind the screen such that it isn't "mischief", then what is the point of rolling behind the screen?




Well, say you aren't fudging.  Do you just plaster the monster stats out in front of the players before the fight begins?  No?  Why not?  If you are playing 100% by the rules, rolling in the open, why not just give them the exact monster stats too?

The basic answer is the same - that information would tend to influence the player's choices.  The characters don't have that meta-information.  The players have an easier time making in-character choices, rather than meta-game choices, if they don't have that information.


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## Manbearcat (May 8, 2013)

Umbran said:


> Well, say you aren't fudging. Do you just plaster the monster stats out in front of the players before the fight begins? No? Why not? If you are playing 100% by the rules, rolling in the open, why not just give them the exact monster stats too?
> 
> The basic answer is the same - that information would tend to influence the player's choices. The characters don't have that meta-information. The players have an easier time making in-character choices, rather than meta-game choices, if they don't have that information.




So its primarily to avoid metagame math extrapolation and the "fudge curtain" aspect is just a side effect.  That makes sense.

I'm not a "No" to your above rhetorical question so I'm not a good example of this.  I'm have 0 metagame aversion.  I have no problem with player's extrapolating math as they're eventually going to sort it out anyway in a round or two (at most).  I let them know their target numbers (defenses and DCs) immediately.  I have no problem with them using out of character logic to improve our/their experience and trust them to do so.  Sometimes in boss fights I want cool abilities to be a surprise (like a nasty aura or an action triggered by a condition) but for the most part, I want them to have all of the metagame tools possible to facilitate clear communication regarding mechanical resolution (to get it handled quickly and efficiently), rules interaction and fictional positioning from both their character and out of character perspectives.


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## Umbran (May 8, 2013)

Manbearcat said:


> So its primarily to avoid metagame math extrapolation and the "fudge curtain" aspect is just a side effect.  That makes sense.




A combination of that, and more generalized metagame strategizing, which can be less about the specific math, and more about higher-level expectations.



> I'm not a "No" to your above rhetorical question so I'm not a good example of this.  I'm have 0 metagame aversion.




Fair enough.  You got the logic, which was what mattered.


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## Manbearcat (May 8, 2013)

@*Umbran* 10-4


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## timASW (May 9, 2013)

Boy reading some responses in this thread make me wonder if I'm the only GM on this site that cant remember a single time in 18 years of running games when a player asked me about a social contract or whether I fudge dice before starting a game. Is this actually common where you guys play?


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## Oryan77 (May 9, 2013)

timASW said:


> Boy reading some responses in this thread make me wonder if I'm the only GM on this site that cant remember a single time in 18 years of running games when a player asked me about a social contract or whether I fudge dice before starting a game. Is this actually common where you guys play?




I've never been questioned about fudging dice. Maybe I'm good at not being obvious about it? I don't know how my players feel about it. I've never had a conversation about it with any player during my time. Nobody seems to mind what I'm doing, so I guess they don't care.

I'm not sure about social contracts. I guess I've had 1 or 2 players blow up at me when they'd come into an existing game with some sort of expectation and then find out after joining that things don't work like that when I DM. In these instances, I never debriefed them on my DMing style and what I find acceptable in-game. So the surprise may have irritated them. Then again, I have a feeling these players would have found something else to blow up at me about even if I did give them the run down. 

I would assume that any players that react negatively to any spoken or unspoken social contract are usually the drama queens that are always problem players in any group. I think it is less about the social contract and more about the person being a problem player to begin with.


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## Umbran (May 9, 2013)

timASW said:


> Boy reading some responses in this thread make me wonder if I'm the only GM on this site that cant remember a single time in 18 years of running games when a player asked me about a social contract or whether I fudge dice before starting a game. Is this actually common where you guys play?




I've never been asked by a player about fudging dice.  When I started my Deadlands campaign, I did ask my players if they cared if I fudged - none of them did.

"Social contract" is just a jargon way of saying, "the expectations or understanding for how we're going to play the game."  I wouldn't be surprised if in most cases it is taken for granted (the expectations are still there, mind you - if you don't talk it out, it will just be an implied or assumed contract).  We, however, have a whole jargon for talking about such stuff, because we talk about it so much.


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## S'mon (May 9, 2013)

timASW said:


> Boy reading some responses in this thread make me wonder if I'm the only GM on this site that cant remember a single time in 18 years of running games when a player asked me about a social contract or whether I fudge dice before starting a game. Is this actually common where you guys play?




No, players don't ask - but good GMs tell!  Eg when I'm posting a campaign pitch I'll usually put something like "I roll all dice in the open and let them fall where they may". I think this is good
 practice and like I said upthread, I think all GMs should be frank about their style. If I don't want to play in a fudging game I don't want my time wasted when it turns out the GM is a fudger. And players who require fudging shouldn't be lured into no-fudging games.
Whether or not GMs commonly do tell the players, they really ought to.

Edit: It's usually only an issue when you game with new people, in a long term established group there is 
usually a well established implicit social contract.


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## S'mon (May 9, 2013)

Umbran said:


> "Social contract" is just a jargon way of saying, "the expectations or understanding for how we're going to play the game."  I wouldn't be surprised if in most cases it is taken for granted (the expectations are still there, mind you - if you don't talk it out, it will just be an implied or assumed contract).  We, however, have a whole jargon for talking about such stuff, because we talk about it so much.




I agree with that. People assume a particular contract/GM style.
Playing at the London D&D Meetup, I think the most common expectation is that the GM won't fudge, followed closely by one that the GM may fudge at his/her discretion. I've rarely seen an expectation that the GM should/must fudge to keep PCs alive, but it did happen a couple times when I was running 3e in 2008-9, using converted Basic D&D adventures which are pretty lethal. One guy was furious at his 1st level Wizard PC being chopped up by the Bone Golem in B7 'Rahasia'; I came across him still complaining on the Internet several years later!


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## timASW (May 9, 2013)

Well that was interesting. When describing a campaign online I usually follow what other GM's were already doing here when i first got on meetup.com. Something like a paragraph or two about the sort of campaign and system(sci-ci, fantasy,steampunk, etc.) and then something about how gamist it is. The trend here in vegas is percentages. Like 60% roleplay/40% combat. Then I usually clarify that I prefer a small number of difficult combats to lots of little easy combats and close with "email me any questions". 

So far its worked pretty well. The biggest problem is that if the system says anything but pathfinder around here it takes forever to build a group. I'm pretty sure if I said it was a modern supers game using pathfinder rules it would fill up overnight, but mention mutants and masterminds and the post will languish for months. 

No one seems to give a fart about fudging or not. I do it sometimes for pacing or drama but I wouldnt say that because if they know I'm doing it it creates problems. I also roll dice on my phone though so i dont have to worry about anyone else seeing them.


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## Umbran (May 9, 2013)

S'mon said:


> I agree with that. People assume a particular contract/GM style.
> 've rarely seen an expectation that the GM should/must fudge to keep PCs alive, but it did happen a couple times when I was running 3e in 2008-9, using converted Basic D&D adventures which are pretty lethal. One guy was furious at his 1st level Wizard PC being chopped up by the Bone Golem in B7 'Rahasia'; I came across him still complaining on the Internet several years later!




I cannot speak to that specific incident, of course.  But if, for example, he's signed up for a four or six hour game, and he died in the first hour, disappointment is an understandable thing.  I'd not worry too much about the exact way that disappointment is expressed - the guy's upset, so maybe he says the GM should have fudged, but he's not in the best place to analyze the issue.


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## S'mon (May 9, 2013)

Umbran said:


> I cannot speak to that specific incident, of course.  But if, for example, he's signed up for a four or six hour game, and he died in the first hour, disappointment is an understandable thing.  I'd not worry too much about the exact way that disappointment is expressed - the guy's upset, so maybe he says the GM should have fudged, but he's not in the best place to analyze the issue.




He would have been ok if I had immediately stopped the game and had him bring in a new PC. But when the battle was still going on half an hour later and I hadn't let him bring in a new character, he flipped.


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## JamesonCourage (May 9, 2013)

timASW said:


> Boy reading some responses in this thread make me wonder if I'm the only GM on this site that cant remember a single time in 18 years of running games when a player asked me about a social contract or whether I fudge dice before starting a game. Is this actually common where you guys play?



I basically mention to any new players "I hold you to realistic consequences, I will kill you if the dice show up that way, etc." and then answer any questions they have about what I mean. Also, as a player, I've asked two GMs before not to fudge with me (a friend and my brother), but never not to fudge at all. So I know that it's explicit oftentimes when I'm involved, but I have no idea how widespread it is. As always, play what you like


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## timASW (May 10, 2013)

JamesonCourage said:


> I basically mention to any new players "I hold you to realistic consequences, I will kill you if the dice show up that way, etc." and then answer any questions they have about what I mean. Also, as a player, I've asked two GMs before not to fudge with me (a friend and my brother), but never not to fudge at all. So I know that it's explicit oftentimes when I'm involved, but I have no idea how widespread it is. As always, play what you like




Hmm, when I'm a player I dont ask about fudging at all. I trust the GM to do it if/when its best for the game and to do it seldom enough and subtly enough not to mess up my perception of the games events. Basically the same courtesy I expect of players. If it gets really obnoxiously obvious I might ask him to tone it down and let us live by the dice a bit more i guess but thats never come up. I didnt get to be a player too often until recently when I started switching off with another GM. 

I've noticed after spending a lot of years being behind the screen when I'm playing I find myself thinking a lot more about how to help the GM along and play along with where he wants to go and generally assist what he's trying to do then I did when I first started and only had experience as a player.


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## JamesonCourage (May 10, 2013)

timASW said:


> Hmm, when I'm a player I dont ask about fudging at all. I trust the GM to do it if/when its best for the game and to do it seldom enough and subtly enough not to mess up my perception of the games events. Basically the same courtesy I expect of players. If it gets really obnoxiously obvious I might ask him to tone it down and let us live by the dice a bit more i guess but thats never come up. I didnt get to be a player too often until recently when I started switching off with another GM.
> 
> I've noticed after spending a lot of years being behind the screen when I'm playing I find myself thinking a lot more about how to help the GM along and play along with where he wants to go and generally assist what he's trying to do then I did when I first started and only had experience as a player.



It's just a play style difference. For me, if I'm low on health and the bad guys miss (often or not), I start to wonder, "should that have hit me? Should I be dead or down right now?" It's impulse, and it hurts my immersion. That's why I've asked two GMs not to fudge stuff for me (but not to stop fudging altogether). I'm less picky about "coincidental" stuff happening, but fudging stuff to help me (or having a policy where you're willing to do that, even if you don't) can get under my skin, since I get pulled out of immersion.

But, I really don't mind other players / groups not adhering to that. And, I've also played with my brother in many campaigns that I haven't mentioned it in (and he used to fudge a couple times per session, I'd say). Mainly, for me, it's the policy that pulls me from immersion, not so much the actual fudging. Again, though, I don't mind other groups playing with it.

At any rate, I was just answering your question, by saying whether or not I bring it up as a GM / player. And in this post, why I do that, I guess (as a GM, I bring it up so people aren't surprised). I do agree with you that being a GM can definitely affect or change how you act as a player, though. And mostly for the good of the GM you're playing under. On the same note, being a player occasionally can really help you as a GM, too. As always, play what you like


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## timASW (May 10, 2013)

When it comes to fudging I generally fudge for drama and pacing. 

I dont do a ton of combats, I try to spend an hour or so of each 4-5 hour session in combat. But some sessions are much more combat heavy....

In those sessions sometimes players curbstomp every encounter mainly by dumbluck, and in those cases I will say some enemies hit that didnt and roll damage. Not in a way that will kill or seriously hamper the party, but in a way that gives that sense that "yes these guys are dangerous, we arent at a picnic". Which requires very few hits in all actuality. 

And sometimes the party gets in fights that should be winnable and over and over they are just getting hammered by repeated dumb luck. In those cases I might make some bad guys miss. Never that last shot that drops a character, that one lands. But if they've really been beat up that day I might make some hits miss and just narrate it in a way that seems dramatic (subdual damage is a good substitute). Again, hopefully not enough to make the difference between winning and losing, but enough to make the outcome seem much more on the hairs edge between them whichever way it eventually falls. 

And to be honest we all do it. That decision to have archers shoot at the tanks instead of the wizards? Yeah thats fudging. 

Intelligent archers would pincushion the guys in robes first. You start chanting? After the guy in robes dies your next no matter what your wearing. 

See someone wearing holy symbols? he dies after the wizards. Thats just basic logic. Unless your enemies are high enough level that they expect the cleric to be able to resurrect, then he dies before the wizards. 

Frankly unless your organized monsters are having 1 tough monster engage your tanks in face to face battle while everyone else ranges or tumbles to the back row your fudging. 

Its really just about how you do it.


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## SirAntoine (May 10, 2013)

You need to do what you believe your players would think is right in this context, and it wouldn't hurt to try to put yourself in their position.  Would you want a DM to fudge dice rolls and change the scenario at will?  How would you feel if that happened, especially if it happened after you and your friends "worked hard to get where they did, to have a chance to win".  Some players will find this unacceptable.  Players also know that their dice rolls can go badly or well for them, so why shouldn't they expect the monsters to face that?


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## JamesonCourage (May 10, 2013)

timASW said:


> And to be honest we all do it. That decision to have archers shoot at the tanks instead of the wizards? Yeah thats fudging.



(1) I don't see this as "fudging", but I do get what you mean.
(2) I don't do it. If the tank has a reason to be targeted, then they'll target him. If the others have a reason to be targeted (like being unarmored yet highly dangerous), then they should be expecting some arrows their way.


timASW said:


> Intelligent archers would pincushion the guys in robes first. You start chanting? After the guy in robes dies your next no matter what your wearing.



Yep, not too far off in my games. Though, to be fair, martial characters are very powerful in combat in my RPG, so they can effectively bodyguard / be extremely dangerous in their own right.


timASW said:


> See someone wearing holy symbols? he dies after the wizards. Thats just basic logic. Unless your enemies are high enough level that they expect the cleric to be able to resurrect, then he dies before the wizards.



Yep, I'd do that in D&D. Not going to target the tank "just because" or "because it's easier on the party" or anything. I'm going to think "what would this NPC do?" and then play them that way, even if it hurts the party and I bypass the tank.


timASW said:


> Frankly unless your organized monsters are having 1 tough monster engage your tanks in face to face battle while everyone else ranges or tumbles to the back row your fudging.
> 
> Its really just about how you do it.



No, it's not; It's just about how _*you*_ do it. But like I said, play style difference, etc. As always, play what you like


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## timASW (May 10, 2013)

JamesonCourage said:


> No, it's not; It's just about how _*you*_ do it. But like I said, play style difference, etc. As always, play what you like




Fair enough, but I think what I described is pretty much SOP for D&D games. When playing Dark heresy, mage, werewolf, call of cthulu or other games certainly things differ. But in D&D games and their derivatives even "the dice fall where they may" GM's will generally play enemy tactics in a way that favors the PC's.


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## S'mon (May 10, 2013)

timASW said:


> Fair enough, but I think what I described is pretty much SOP for D&D games. When playing Dark heresy, mage, werewolf, call of cthulu or other games certainly things differ. But in D&D games and their derivatives even "the dice fall where they may" GM's will generally play enemy tactics in a way that favors the PC's.




No, I play all my monsters according to their natures; my intelligent monsters intelligently ; they use tactics just like the PCs do. So typically their Soldiers will engage the PC Defenders & Strikers while their Artillery and Controllers try to take out the PC rear line. Skirmishers and Lurkers will also try to avoid the PC tanks and take out the PC Wizards & Clerics. Unintelligent predator animals will typically target a vulnerable looking PC to kill and drag off/devour, this can make them deadlier than intelligent foes since they are trying to get a meal not inflict a TPK they are more likely to inflict a kill and take away the body, preventing raising. My assassin-type monsters will usually coup de gras fallen PCs (possibly needing an Insight check to realise the PC is not dead yet). Some monsters may engage in suboptimal tactics if it's in their nature to do so, and NPC plans are not always perfect, just as PC plans can be weak. But I certainly don't play to keep the PCs alive. One reason I like 4e D&D is that I can go all-out to kill the PCs and yet they often survive!  My 'Punjar Saga' campaign did just have three perma-deaths in the last two sessions - one PC eaten by a snake that then swam off; two PCs killed by man-ape assassins and the survivors had to leave their bodies behind. Those were the first perma-deaths in the campaign though (8 sessions), and my Loudwater campaign has only had 6 perma-deaths in 40 sessions - a 4-PC TPK by goblins in session 1 and 2 PCs eaten by a black dragon ca session 32.


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## Manbearcat (May 10, 2013)

timASW said:


> And to be honest we all do it. That decision to have archers shoot at the tanks instead of the wizards? Yeah thats fudging.




While I don't agree that its mechanically "fudging", what you're describing is indeed a certain subset of "GM metagaming", which interposes the agenda element of "dramatic need or general fun where the rules fail to address one or both" between pure gamist play and in-world causal logic/process simulation. That reasoning lies at the heart of the GM-wrought NPC tactic resolution that you've addressed here in the same way "fudging" does for NPC fortune resolution.  They are both generally in the same "GM force" toolbox.  

This is one of the reasons that 4e is my edition-of-choice as below by S'mon:



S'mon said:


> No, I play all my monsters according to their natures; my intelligent monsters intelligently ; they use tactics just like the PCs do. So typically their Soldiers will engage the PC Defenders & Strikers while their Artillery and Controllers try to take out the PC rear line. Skirmishers and Lurkers will also try to avoid the PC tanks and take out the PC Wizards & Clerics. Unintelligent predator animals will typically target a vulnerable looking PC to kill and drag off/devour, this can make them deadlier than intelligent foes since they are trying to get a meal not inflict a TPK they are more likely to inflict a kill and take away the body, preventing raising. My assassin-type monsters will usually coup de gras fallen PCs (possibly needing an Insight check to realise the PC is not dead yet). Some monsters may engage in suboptimal tactics if it's in their nature to do so, and NPC plans are not always perfect, just as PC plans can be weak. But I certainly don't play to keep the PCs alive. One reason I like 4e D&D is that I can go all-out to kill the PCs and yet they often survive!  My 'Punjar Saga' campaign did just have three perma-deaths in the last two sessions - one PC eaten by a snake that then swam off; two PCs killed by man-ape assassins and the survivors had to leave their bodies behind. Those were the first perma-deaths in the campaign though (8 sessions), and my Loudwater campaign has only had 6 perma-deaths in 40 sessions - a 4-PC TPK by goblins in session 1 and 2 PCs eaten by a black dragon ca session 32.




The robust control, forced movement, and mobility elements of 4e allows the players the mechanical tools and opportunities to utterly dictate target acquisition, move enemies around the battlefield, and move around the battlefield themselves to acquire their own targets.  This creates a dynamic where a GM can feel free to go full bore and have those Archers focus fire the Wizard if they wish...and deal with the catch-22 of one or more Defenders' control elements (be it mark punishment or Defender intercession), a Striker's or Leader's immediate interrupt that protects the Wizard or punishes the Artillery unit (or both) for attacking the Wizard.  Or perhaps the Wizard has put a Slow Zone and a Damage Zone such that if those assembled Archers don't spend their full round just getting (slowly) out of there then they will pay for it dearly.  Etc, etc.  

As a GM, there is no "dramatic need or general fun where the rules fail to address one or both".  The rules don't fail to address the situation (the players are empowered with the control, forced movement, and mobility elements of the tactical interface) and the dramatic need and fun work themselves out without your intervention or massaging of the outcome (GM force)!  I can just spend my mental overhead on providing good color, good mechanical elements to interact with, and challenging situations for the players to deal with and put the onus on the players to properly dictate their own tactical outcomes (whatever they may be).

The less empowered players are to affect their own outcomes and the more squishy they are, the higher the temptation will be for "dice fudging" and "tactical massaging" lest you end up with a game of disposable PCs or PCs who don't act particularly heroic because "boldly facing danger" too many times equals "Bobfighter002".


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## S'mon (May 10, 2013)

Manbearcat said:


> While I don't agree that its mechanically "fudging", what you're describing is indeed a certain subset of "GM metagaming", which interposes the agenda element of "dramatic need or general fun where the rules fail to address one or both" between pure gamist play and in-world causal logic/process simulation. That reasoning lies at the heart of the GM-wrought NPC tactic resolution that you've addressed here in the same way "fudging" does for NPC fortune resolution.  They are both generally in the same "GM force" toolbox.
> 
> This is one of the reasons that 4e is my edition-of-choice as below by S'mon:
> 
> ...




I agree, good post. If I'm GMing uncoordinated orcs or goblin archers they might split fire amongst several PC targets; if I'm GMing drow they'll focus fire on the squishiest looking PCs. I agree about 4e PCs having the tools to negate enemy tactics, certainly by level 6 or so with reasonably skilled players. Kimberly (Lirael the Ranger) in my Paragon Loudwater campaign is always screwing up my attempts to kill her friends, she has all kinds of disrupting and distracting trick shot Interrupts to keep them alive.


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## pemerton (May 10, 2013)

timASW said:


> When it comes to fudging I generally fudge for drama and pacing.
> 
> <snip>
> 
> And to be honest we all do it. That decision to have archers shoot at the tanks instead of the wizards? Yeah thats fudging.



I personally see these as different things.

Deciding which PC the enemy engages - in a system that makes that distinction (Tunnels & Trolls doesn't, for instance, and 1st ed AD&D doesn't fully either) - is part of framing and adjudicating the scene. And it's transparent to the players. (And in 4e also partly under their control, eg via marking mechanics.)

Whereas fudging, to me, implies secrecy.

EDIT: I've just read  [MENTION=463]S'mon[/MENTION]'s and  [MENTION=6696971]Manbearcat[/MENTION]'s replies. I'm guessing that I'm a bit more "forceful" in my tactical metagaming than those two. When choosing what enemies do, I keep in mind ingame/fictional considerations (like the sort that S'mon emphasises) and "story" metagame concerns (like what would be fun/dramatic) and "tactical" metaagme concerns (how can I put more pressure on the players).

These aren't mutually exclusive, of course - often (i) and (ii) overlap, for instance, if a sworm enemy confronts a PC, because there is both an ingame reason for that enemy to attack that NPC, and it makes for good drama too; and often (i) and (iii) overlap, because intelligent enemies will try to maximise their tactical abilities. But I have a tendency to let the metagame considerations do a fair bit of the leading here - I can retcon in the fiction if I fell like I have to!

EDIT to the edit: For clarity, generally when I'm metagaming NPC/monster tactics I'm not doing it to softball things, but to hardball them. In 4e I find the game tends to work better when you push the players hard.


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## Manbearcat (May 10, 2013)

pemerton said:


> EDIT: I've just read   @_*S'mon*_ 's and   @_*Manbearcat*_ 's replies.  I'm guessing that I'm a bit more "forceful" in my tactical metagaming than those two.




I may not have conveyed precisely what I was meaning because:



pemerton said:


> EDIT to the edit: For clarity, generally when  I'm metagaming NPC/monster tactics I'm not doing it to softball things,  but to hardball them. In 4e I find the game tends to work better when  you push the players hard.




is exactly what I meant.  I don't "save the wizards from the archers" or "softball" encounters or "massage enemy tactics" to prevent Bobwizard001 turning into Bobwizard002 every other session.  I make it as difficult as I can, comply with the the rules, stridently regard fortune resolution, and keep the genre-relevant tension on the PCs in any encounter I do (remember the burning inn encounter from some time ago?).  I don't worry about my players' HPs, surges, defenses.  I generally go for the kill and try to do things that make sense, are fun, and cause the situation to change.  Obviously, you're having to make catch-22 decisions all the time in 4e and I'll mix those up to keep it fresh.  I don't want to just violate marks or control effects (triggering damage) all the time as I want to allow those PCs to flex their control muscles as well as their damage by proxy of control violation.  However, I violate them aplenty and get intentionally whacked for it (because its sensible in the situation or it would just be fun for my players!).  In other words, this:



pemerton said:


> When choosing what enemies do, I keep in mind ingame/fictional considerations (like the sort that S'mon emphasises) and "story" metagame concerns (like what would be fun/dramatic) and "tactical" metaagme concerns (how can I put more pressure on the players).
> 
> These aren't mutually exclusive, of course - often (i) and (ii) overlap, for instance, if a sworm enemy confronts a PC, because there is both an ingame reason for that enemy to attack that NPC, and it makes for good drama too; and often (i) and (iii) overlap, because intelligent enemies will try to maximise their tactical abilities. But I have a tendency to let the metagame considerations do a fair bit of the leading here - I can retcon in the fiction if I fell like I have to!


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## timASW (May 10, 2013)

Manbearcat said:


> While I don't agree that its mechanically "fudging", what you're describing is indeed a certain subset of "GM metagaming", which interposes the agenda element of "dramatic need or general fun where the rules fail to address one or both" between pure gamist play and in-world causal logic/process simulation. That reasoning lies at the heart of the GM-wrought NPC tactic resolution that you've addressed here in the same way "fudging" does for NPC fortune resolution.  They are both generally in the same "GM force" toolbox.
> 
> This is one of the reasons that 4e is my edition-of-choice as below by S'mon:
> 
> ...





Rules forcing the archers to be punished for targeting the back line are even worse. Thats just hardcoding the GM fudging element into the game.


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## Manbearcat (May 10, 2013)

timASW said:


> Rules forcing the archers to be punished for targeting the back line are even worse. Thats just hardcoding the GM fudging element into the game.




Its not "rules that force GM to do something."  Its PC build tools and mechanics that create a catch-22 for the GM; do what you want to do and you suffer a penalty and/or something bad may happen...or do what the player is imposing upon you and not suffer any penalty beyond "not doing what you want to do".  That is just the definition of "control" tactically and then eventually can yield operative conditioning.  It happens in sports, martial combat, child-rearing, and the process of societal restraint all the time.  

Further, its the same sorts of things we've had for melee control since 1e, just extended for a wider breadth of tactical options for PCs to affect all zones of combat; eg, a Ranger firing an interposing arrow, splitting an enemy archer's arrow in half, triggered upon the enemy archer loosing an arrow/bolt at a companion...or a druid summoning a fiery hawk that hounds an enemy archer, attacking him if he fires off another arrow.  Pathfinder has a few of these things built into feats like Combat Patrol.


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## timASW (May 10, 2013)

Manbearcat said:


> Its not "rules that force GM to do something."  *Its PC build tools and mechanics that create a catch-22 for the GM; do what you want to do and you suffer a penalty and/or something bad may happen*...or do what the player is imposing upon you and not suffer any penalty beyond "not doing what you want to do".  That is just the definition of "control" tactically and then eventually can yield operative conditioning.  It happens in sports, martial combat, child-rearing, and the process of societal restraint all the time.




Those are rules, sorry but they are rules, and they are forcing the DM's action. 

Of course I personally think the entire marking concept needs to die in a fire, slowly and painfully. And not just in D&D, in MMO's where they originated as well.


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## S'mon (May 10, 2013)

pemerton said:


> EDIT to the edit: For clarity, generally when I'm metagaming NPC/monster tactics I'm not doing it to softball things, but to hardball them. In 4e I find the game tends to work better when you push the players hard.




I think that varies by level - Mike Shea said "Be Kind to them in Heroic. Be even-handed in Paragon. Be a bastard in Epic" - or words to that effect. And I definitely see the difference now my Loudwater PCs are 12th level; stuff that would have threatened them before (even accounting for level-ups) in Heroic, just gets slaughtered in Paragon. They are very robust and have tons of tricks to pull on me. 
We recently had a fight where they killed 39 enemies -http://frloudwater.blogspot.co.uk/ - the XP value put it at EL 17, taking account of there being 7 PCs - and they just slaughtered those poor Zhents.


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## Kingreaper (May 10, 2013)

timASW said:


> Those are rules, sorry but they are rules, and they are forcing the DM's action.



I take it, then, that you disagree with the following things that prevent DM's focusing on the wizard:

Opportunity Attacks
Limited Range (eg. Orcs with swords only being able to hit things next to them)
Protective spells (eg. invisibility, flight, etc.)
Warriors being able to stand in the way.


Marking is just another way of representing the ability of a combatant to keep another pinned down. It is not the same thing as "aggro" in MMOs.

Indeed, in D&D 4e, if you don't bypass the defender occasionally as the GM you're probably not playing your monster's intelligently.


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## pemerton (May 11, 2013)

[MENTION=83870]Kingreaper[/MENTION], nice reply, can't XP sorry.


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## Manbearcat (May 11, 2013)

pemerton said:


> @_*Kingreaper*_ , nice reply, can't XP sorry.




I can.  Covered.  The bold/italicized part "Its not rules_* that force the GM to do something*_" was the operative part of the sentence.  Not that they are rules/mechanics.  That is a given.  Its the implications of the presence (or lackthereof) on play.


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## timASW (May 11, 2013)

Kingreaper said:


> I take it, then, that you disagree with the following things that prevent DM's focusing on the wizard:
> 
> Opportunity Attacks
> Limited Range (eg. Orcs with swords only being able to hit things next to them)
> ...




thats a ludicrous comparison barely worth responding too. 

Being able to physically interpose yourself between a squishy and an enemy is nothing at all like a ranger or something similar being able to magically take an instantaneous shot outside of his turn when an opponent attacks that can only be targeted at that opponents arrow. 

its stretches credulity that you would be capable of actually confusing the two as being somehow similar. Fortunately the little thought experiment that led to these sorts of things has been left in the dustbin of gaming history and we're moving on to good ideas.


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## Kingreaper (May 11, 2013)

timASW said:


> thats a ludicrous comparison barely worth responding too.



No, it's really not.
The problem is, you don't have a clue what marking is, as you've just demonstrated.



> Being able to physically interpose yourself between a squishy and an enemy is nothing at all like a ranger or something similar



1) Rangers aren't defenders. They don't mark. 
2) In fact, there are no ranged defenders whatsoever.




> being able to magically take an instantaneous shot outside of his turn



3) OMG! Opportunity attacks are MAGIC!

Opportunity attacks are exactly like mark attacks, they're an extra attack gained due to your opponent provoking it by improperly defending themself.



> when an opponent attacks that can only be targeted at that opponents arrow.



4) There is no such power.

The closest power the ranger has is the ability to shoot an opponent while that opponent is aiming; thus taking advantage of the distraction.


Your description isn't a parody of the content of 4th ed, it's a parody of a parody.


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## Umbran (May 11, 2013)

Kingreaper said:


> But I'm guessing that criticising what's actually *IN* 4e would require you to expose yourself to the books. And you can't do that; you might accidentally like it or something.





We can do without the snark.  Really.  It never helps.  It does not convince the other guy you are right, you know, and it makes you look like you're personally unpleasant to folks who disagree with you.  So, really, take a pass on it next time.  Thanks.


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## Kingreaper (May 11, 2013)

Apologies, I should have kept to attacking the arguments; rather than the source.


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## timASW (May 12, 2013)

Kingreaper said:


> No, it's really not.
> The problem is, you don't have a clue what marking is, as you've just demonstrated.
> 
> 
> ...




Sorry but I was responding to a 4e PLAYERS examples upthread. Apparently you all have a hard time understanding your own game when giving hyperbolic defenses of it. 

Do continue quibbling over minutia in a game I think sucks though. I'm sure you'll convince me with the next post how world of warcraft aggro is really a good thing in a table top game. Maybe Mike Mearls just needs to read a few of your posts and they'll rethink doing a complete 180 from 4e because of its utter awesomeness. 

No doubt he just forgot how it really works, I mean he only wrote half of it. That sort of thing can slip your mind.

*Mod Note:*  See my post below.  ~Umbran


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## Kingreaper (May 12, 2013)

timASW said:


> I'm sure you'll convince me with the next post how world of warcraft aggro is really a good thing in a table top game.



I wasn't arguing that WoW style aggro was a good thing in a tabletop game (although there are board games that have it, where it works quite well) because, as I've demonstrated, 4th edition didn't have WoW style aggro.

WoW style aggro decides who the critters attack. Marking doesn't, it just makes it harder to attack others... like opportunity attacks.

I'm not even going to argue that marking was a good thing. 
I liked it, and it served a purpose (making detailed tactical combat work better); but a lot of people don't even like the style of combat that makes it useful.

I'm just trying to correct your erroneous understanding of what it involved.


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## Manbearcat (May 12, 2013)

@*timASW* @*Kingreaper* Not that it matters as the conversation has moved away from the main topic (and toward utter futility), but these sorts of effects were the Ranger intercession effects I was invoking (now citing); the first one easily enough being narrated as a Ranger's arrow intercepting an enemy's arrow with his own (the negative to hit basically always yielding a miss) and the directional shrapnel of the exploded enemy arrow being the damage portion of the effect.  We've done just that in my game to great cinematic effect.  The second just being interception of an incoming attack (be it melee or missile, what have you) and absorption of most (or all on occasion...which could then be narrated as intercepting and shattering an arrow to pieces) of the incoming force.  The second two are other arrow tricks that the Rogue/Ranger has used in our game to good effect (saving an ally from a fall with a timely arrow and redirecting an ally's attack toward success, respectively).


[sblock]







> WotC 4e
> 
> *Disruptive Strike*
> _You thwart an enemy’s attack with a timely thrust of your blade or a quick shot from your bow._
> ...



[/sblock]


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## Umbran (May 12, 2013)

timASW said:


> Apparently you all have a hard time understanding your own game when giving hyperbolic defenses of it.




*Yes, but apparently you have a hard time figuring out that two posts after someone gets warned about snarkiness is a really poor time to engage in it yourself.  So, I'm not sure you're in a position to criticize at the moment.  

Folks, address the logic of the post, not the person of the poster.  Don't make it personal.  If you find you can't resist when you post, we suggest you walk away from the discussion until you can.*


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## Blackbrrd (May 12, 2013)

airwalkrr said:


> Did I fudge dice and alter numbers on the fly? Absolutely. The campaign was such that the player characters were grossly imbalanced (as I allowed the players the freedom to play whatever type of character they wanted to play) and I often made things more difficult on the player characters who were the most powerful.
> ...
> Think about the difference between a 20th-level character and a 3rd-level character in D&D. That's how far apart the power-level was.




I don't think what you did here is ok. Why have the players roll the dice when it won't have any effect* on the combat? It would feel like playing a computer game with somebody using an aimbot. Pointless. I wouldn't want to play in a game like this.

I have no problems with the occasional fudge, but I do feel it has to be the exception. I actually prefer making it easy for the party to ressurect a character instead of fudging the dice roll that killed him. If I want a certain outcome for a situation, for instance the party thief sneaking up on a guard and I want him to succeed, I don't ask him for a roll, I just tell he succeeded.

*Assumed as there is no way any dice rolling will let a level 3 character be relevant in a game with level 20 characters.


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## billd91 (May 12, 2013)

Blackbrrd said:


> I don't think what you did here is ok.




Not really your call. If his players are OK with it, that's that.


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## Kingreaper (May 12, 2013)

billd91 said:


> Not really your call. If his players are OK with it, that's that.



This thread was started because his players *weren't*​ okay with it.


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## Blackbrrd (May 12, 2013)

Kingreaper said:


> This thread was started because his players *weren't*​ okay with it.




Yeah, I am not saying you can't play a game where you disregard the dice, I am saying it's something I would avoid.

I do think that as a GM, if you are going for a cinematic game where the dice doesn't decide the outcome of a combat (you fudge a large percent of the dice rolls), I think it's better to just skip the dice altogheter.

I have played with a couple of DM's that fudge the dice a lot in combat, and I really dislike it. There are several techniques to handle badly created encounters that are much better than dice fudging.  This is how I do it:

Encounter too easy:
- Just let the critters die and make the next one harder. Players like to have their characters beat up the mobs.
- Add a few more HP to the mobs in the encounter (20-50%)
- Add reinforcements that arrive during the battle

Encounter too hard:
- Let the party suffer a setback, but be a bit lenient with helping them back on track after the combat.
- Reduce the amont of HP of the mobs in the encounter (20-50%)
- Have some help arrive in the form of random mobs, NPC's the players helped earlier or the like
- Introduce terrain effects the characters can exploit'
- Let the monsters start fighting between themselves, with one side enlisting the help of the PC's.

My current DM who does fudge a bit too much actually pulled the: "Help from previously helped NPC's come to your assistance" fudge a couple of sessions ago. I know he did it because we were in trouble, but it was totally plaucible and the player characters were still the heroes and it still felt as our decisions where the ones that mattered.


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## Blackbrrd (May 12, 2013)

Oryan77 said:


> This is why I don't DM for anyone that will build PCs that are noticeably overpowering when compared to the other PCs. It's too much hassle to deal with.



If you don't have anything against the player except for his overpowered character creation, why don't you just tell him to create something a bit less optimal to fit the power level of the other characters? 

When I start a new campaign, I usually have a vision of how I want  the campaign and what sort of characters will fit. I talk this over with the players and we agree on a set of guidelines* for the character creation. We run the occasional "overpowered" campaign, sometimes we run a campaign where it works out better if all the characters are more or less shady and sometimes I want to run a campaign for "good guys". Planning a little before the game starts stops a lot of problems occuring during the game.

*Not detailed, more like: don't make anything OP.


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## vonhist (May 13, 2013)

Apologies if this ends up as a double post.
This is one of the issues with not placing restrictions on character creation. Some players
will power game if you let them.


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## timASW (May 13, 2013)

Theres nothing wrong with powergaming. I dont restrict my players character creation in the slightest. Never have. I run a sandbox game, i create situations, its up to the players to decide how to deal with those situations and if that involves diplomancy or a combat monster chopping everything to bits then fine. Actions have consequences and the campaign is the story of the journey the players are on as they go from adventure to adventure. 

Nothing about powergaming detracts from that in the slightest.


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## pemerton (May 13, 2013)

timASW said:


> Being able to physically interpose yourself between a squishy and an enemy is nothing at all like a ranger or something similar being able to magically take an instantaneous shot outside of his turn when an opponent attacks that can only be targeted at that opponents arrow.



As Gygax explained in his version of AD&D, the world of D&D is not a stop-motion world. The turn sequence is an abstraction.

Opportunity actions, swift actions, immediate actions, reactions etc are all mechanical devices intended to break down that sense of stop-motion action, and to foster verisimilitude. They're n more "magical" than a fighter's bonus attacks in AD&D (which certaintly don't represent the ability to strike multiple times per minute - as Gygax explains, everyone is already assumed to be striking multiple times per minute, and that's all abstracted into the roll to hit).



timASW said:


> I'm sure you'll convince me with the next post how world of warcraft aggro is really a good thing in a table top game.



I don't play WoW, but as I understand it "aggro" is an AI targetting algorithm.

Marking is closer to an "unluck" token - the player of the marking PC has placed a token on the marked creature, which means that the GM suffers certain consequences (a penalty to hit, exposure to an additional attack from the marking PC, etc) if s/he has the marked creature undertake particular actions. What marking corresponds to in the game is highly variable - for paladins and swordmages it is often magic in the literal sense, but for fighters and warlords (who get some marking effects) it can be the sort of stuff that [MENTION=6696971]Manbearcat[/MENTION] describes upthread, or even sometimes pure metagame, as an "unluck" token would be.


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## Majoru Oakheart (May 15, 2013)

Blackbrrd said:


> If you don't have anything against the player except for his overpowered character creation, why don't you just tell him to create something a bit less optimal to fit the power level of the other characters?



I've had this suggestion given to me before and I've tried it.  It depends on the system, of course, the more unbalanced the system the worse the problem.  However, my experience has been that when you tell someone that their character is overpowered and they need to design something more in line with the group, they end up coming back with a character only slightly less powerful than they made last time....or exactly as powerful even though the player will insist that they REALLY tried to tone down their powergaming.

I once tried this with a player who I kept denying characters from, he went through 6 characters before we jointly agreed he had absolutely no idea how NOT to powergame.  I basically had to say "You can't put anything more than a 16 into any of your stats.  You can't multiclass, you can't take any Prestige Classes.  You must be a race out of the players handbook." and with those restrictions he still ended up being the most powerful character in the group.

It's especially bad when you have a group that's fairly split between powergamers and non-powergamers.  Either you have to convince 2 or 3 players to stop powergaming or you have to convince 2 or 3 players to START powergaming(which normally doesn't work either because handing a player who doesn't like to powergame a powergamed character ends with them not using their abilities effectively and therefore aren't really powergamed).


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## S'mon (May 15, 2013)

Majoru Oakheart said:


> It's especially bad when you have a group that's fairly split between powergamers and non-powergamers.  Either you have to convince 2 or 3 players to stop powergaming or you have to convince 2 or 3 players to START powergaming(which normally doesn't work either because handing a player who doesn't like to powergame a powergamed character ends with them not using their abilities effectively and therefore aren't really powergamed).




I like it that 4e lets me play with powergamers and non-powergamers in the same group, and the powergamers' PCs are no more than about 50% more powerful than the least optimised PCs. Pre-1e D&D (B/X etc) is also mostly pretty good at minimising opportunities for huge power disparities, but with 3e it takes a lot of work if you want to avoid 'Angel Summoner and the BMX Bandit'.


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## Majoru Oakheart (May 15, 2013)

timASW said:


> Theres nothing wrong with powergaming. I dont restrict my players character creation in the slightest. Never have. I run a sandbox game, i create situations, its up to the players to decide how to deal with those situations and if that involves diplomancy or a combat monster chopping everything to bits then fine. Actions have consequences and the campaign is the story of the journey the players are on as they go from adventure to adventure.
> 
> Nothing about powergaming detracts from that in the slightest.



It depends what you are going for.  Most stories are designed to invoke emotion of some sort.  As a DM, you are still a story teller.  You create the situations your players encounter.  Your decision to make the shopkeeper meek and shy vs overbearing and domineering invokes a very different story, very different reactions, and very different emotions.

Just like whether the players are powergamed or not can affect their reactions to situations just as much.  Take the following situation:

The villagers come up to the PCs and beg them to free them from the tyrant wizard who lives in the tower on the hill.

Non powergamed characters may realize that they don't have the ability to defeat the wizard in combat so they start a rebellion and recruit an army to try to defeat the wizard.  This process might take days or years to accomplish.  They come up with a plan to lure the wizard out of the tower and face their army.

Slightly powergamed characters may realize that they don't need an army to defeat the wizard, they can do it themselves.  So they go to the tower and fight their way through the traps and puzzles the wizard has set up over a couple of weeks of play before finally defeating the wizard in a difficult combat where they nearly die.

More powergamed character might just teleport directly to the wizard and skip his traps and puzzles before killing the wizard in the first round of combat before he gets an action.

Even more powergamed characters might simply disintegrate the entire tower and the wizard inside of it without getting close.

Each of those stories might be more or less satisfying for the players and the DM involved.  And you want the DM to enjoy the game that is being played.  A DM who becomes dissatisfied with the story his game is generating might simply decide to stop running the game because it doesn't bring him the joy he wanted.

Not every GM can dispassionately sit back and say "Well, whatever happens happens".  Many GMs(me included), end up often saying "Well, that didn't go the way I wanted it to at all...it wasn't very satisfying or fun."

If I spent a week coming up with cool puzzles because I want the players to try to solve them and I get satisfaction from seeing their process as they come up with the solutions to them....then any storyline that sees them bypassing all of the puzzles is one that makes me unhappy.


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## Majoru Oakheart (May 15, 2013)

S'mon said:


> I like it that 4e lets me play with powergamers and non-powergamers in the same group, and the powergamers' PCs are no more than about 50% more powerful than the least optimised PCs. Pre-1e D&D (B/X etc) is also mostly pretty good at minimising opportunities for huge power disparities, but with 3e it takes a lot of work if you want to avoid 'Angel Summoner and the BMX Bandit'.



I used to agree about 4e...but as time goes on, 4e is suffering from the same problem(though to a lesser degree).  I can't run 4e anymore without getting just as frustrated.  My last game of 4e went something like this:

Player 1: "I charge, when I charge I turn invisible giving me combat advantage.  I get +1 from charging, +3 for having combat advantage with a light blade, and with the rest of my bonuses that gives me a +29 to hit.  I do 75 damage."

Me: "Well, the enemy has a 27 AC...so I guess you hit on a -2.  He has 98 hitpoints so that bloodies him in one attack...which is way too powerful.  He attacks back.  I roll a 15...with a bonus of +18, that makes 33.  But since you are invisible, he gets -5.  That's 28.  You have an AC of 34...I guess that misses...even if you weren't invisible...and I rolled well.  *sigh*"

Player 2: "My turn!  I hit AC of 23!  That misses I suppose"

Player 3: " I hit AC 26!  I guess that misses too."

Player 4: "I hit AC 28.  I hit.  I do 23 damage."

Me: "So, let me get this straight....75% of your damage comes from a single PCs...this seems kind of dumb."

Each book that came out added more and more corner cases where the rules had weird interactions.  Now I have one player who threatened to stop playing if he wasn't allowed to be a Hybrid or multiclass character because he felt that single class characters just weren't powerful enough.


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## S'mon (May 15, 2013)

Majoru Oakheart said:


> I used to agree about 4e...but as time goes on, 4e is suffering from the same problem(though to a lesser degree).  I can't run 4e anymore without getting just as frustrated.  My last game of 4e went something like this:
> 
> Player 1: "I charge, when I charge I turn invisible giving me combat advantage.  I get +1 from charging, +3 for having combat advantage with a light blade, and with the rest of my bonuses that gives me a +29 to hit.  I do 75 damage."
> 
> ...




I do limit sources, of course, and I'll nerf individual overpowered elements. That made no difference in 3e since the imbalance existed in the PHB classes and across a wide range of stuff. With 4e I typically say "These books, no Dragon Magazine"; but I currently have an open-source 4e campaign that has had no major problems so far. One player is a bit of a powergamer, but he's also the one who keeps losing PCs. Never considered allowing Hybrids.

If a player threatened to quit on me I'd say "Bye bye", but I've never seen that.


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## timASW (May 15, 2013)

Majoru Oakheart said:


> It depends what you are going for.  Most stories are designed to invoke emotion of some sort.  As a DM, you are still a story teller.  You create the situations your players encounter.  Your decision to make the shopkeeper meek and shy vs overbearing and domineering invokes a very different story, very different reactions, and very different emotions.
> 
> Just like whether the players are powergamed or not can affect their reactions to situations just as much.  Take the following situation:
> 
> ...




What you just described is classic railroading. Theres a problem and rather then allowing the players to solve it however they deem best the only allowed course of action is on that the DM will find "satisfying".  Thats not a good thing. 

A DM should be able to powergame with the best of them, if you play with characters like that just optimize your bad guys some more. 

And the most "satisfying" solution to the players will be the one they were able to decide upon themselves, control themselves, and use the abilities that they thought would be fun in character creation in the resolution of.


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## billd91 (May 15, 2013)

Majoru Oakheart said:


> Not every GM can dispassionately sit back and say "Well, whatever happens happens".  Many GMs(me included), end up often saying "Well, that didn't go the way I wanted it to at all...it wasn't very satisfying or fun."
> 
> If I spent a week coming up with cool puzzles because I want the players to try to solve them and I get satisfaction from seeing their process as they come up with the solutions to them....then any storyline that sees them bypassing all of the puzzles is one that makes me unhappy.




If this is a serious problem, then I would start to think that GMing is really not the role for you. A GM should really enjoy seeing the players succeed regardless of how they do it. If not, you may be too focused on your own 'precious encounters,' and by that, I mean you've put too much enjoyment or self-validation value on the specific encounters or puzzles you have created. GMing, given the way players run roughshod over any best laid plans, requires a bit more detachment. It's great when your encounters play out well, sure, but there's no guarantee of that and you have to let that go.


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## Blackbrrd (May 15, 2013)

Majoru Oakheart said:


> I used to agree about 4e...but as time goes on, 4e is suffering from the same problem(though to a lesser degree).  I can't run 4e anymore without getting just as frustrated.  My last game of 4e went something like this:
> 
> Player 1: "I charge, when I charge I turn invisible giving me combat advantage.  I get +1 from charging, +3 for having combat advantage with a light blade, and with the rest of my bonuses that gives me a +29 to hit.  I do 75 damage."
> 
> ...



Is this an actual example from play, or just something you made up? I can't remember the numbers being that different. Around a +5 difference between worst and best character is what I see in play. That's assuming people are doing very mild optimizing (starting with an 18 in their main stat).


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## ExploderWizard (May 15, 2013)

Kingreaper said:


> 3) OMG! Opportunity attacks are MAGIC!
> 
> Opportunity attacks are exactly like mark attacks, they're an extra attack gained due to your opponent provoking it by improperly defending themself.




I have come to the conclusion that in an abstract combat system such as D&D, opportunity attacks are needless minutae. Especially in situations where MAKING an opportunity attack per the rules would logically put the attacker in an even worse situation but it doesn't because the rules conveniently don't cover it. Sure I might be fighting 3 monsters at once in front of me, but hey, that guy behind me moved an extra step and he's gonna pay for it. "Excuse me front monsters, do be a dear and give me a moment to chastise your fellow back there"..... WHACK!....." Jolly good, now where were we?"

The whole business of making the attack on someone improperly defending themselves, often leads to the atacker having to do the same. This logically leads to a seesaw circle jerk of opportunity attacks until someone dies. 

The whole mess would work better if OA's were only available to those who actually had opportunity (not already engaged in melee). 



Majoru Oakheart said:


> It depends what you are going for. Most stories are designed to invoke emotion of some sort. As a DM, you are still a story teller. You create the situations your players encounter. Your decision to make the shopkeeper meek and shy vs overbearing and domineering invokes a very different story, very different reactions, and very different emotions.
> 
> Just like whether the players are powergamed or not can affect their reactions to situations just as much. Take the following situation:
> 
> ...




I have the most fun as a GM when the players are presented with options A, B, and C and instead they do Z. Finding out what happens next is what I find most satisfying about running campaigns. The GM is privy to much more information than the players so the joy of surprise and discovery is a precious commodity that is squandered away if the players never do anything more than jump through the hoops as presented. 

Epic stories are great, and every setting needs some. Its better IMHO to simply present them to the players as background and attempt to get thier characters to exceed or top them instead of following along in the creation of one already envisioned. 



timASW said:


> What you just described is classic railroading. Theres a problem and rather then allowing the players to solve it however they deem best the only allowed course of action is on that the DM will find "satisfying". Thats not a good thing.




QFT. 



billd91 said:


> If this is a serious problem, then I would start to think that GMing is really not the role for you. A GM should really enjoy seeing the players succeed regardless of how they do it. If not, you may be too focused on your own 'precious encounters,' and by that, I mean you've put too much enjoyment or self-validation value on the specific encounters or puzzles you have created. GMing, given the way players run roughshod over any best laid plans, requires a bit more detachment. It's great when your encounters play out well, sure, but there's no guarantee of that and you have to let that go.




Also this.


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## Mallus (May 15, 2013)

timASW said:


> What you just described is classic railroading. Theres a problem and rather then allowing the players to solve it however they deem best the only allowed course of action is on that the DM will find "satisfying".  Thats not a good thing.



But it's also a major part of classic TSR-era dungeon design -- "puzzle" rooms in which certain spells don't work, forcing the players to solve them without magic, or with a more limited selection of magic. 

It's not railroading so much as setting up a particular sort of challenge. This is important in a game where select characters can have the solution to almost every imaginable kind of challenging obstacle readily at hand, ie in their spellbooks. Arguably, its _more_ important in WotC-era D&D (well, in 3e), where the default assumption is the players have a much greater degree of control over the magical tools they're packing. 

Speaking as someone who DMs more often than he plays (but played more during the TSR-era), I have a lot sympathy for DMs and their pet challenges. DMs have to provide a steady stream of challenging situations. Frequently they crib them from books and films where the protagonists have a much more limited set of tools at their disposal. This can cause some friction. 

Sure, it's great when PCs solve a problem quickly with just the right spell/mechanically-defined ability. But not all the time. That way lies the too-easy campaign. It's a balancing act. And sometimes those balancing measures can look like railroading from a certain angle.


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## billd91 (May 15, 2013)

ExploderWizard said:


> I have come to the conclusion that in an abstract combat system such as D&D, opportunity attacks are needless minutae. Especially in situations where MAKING an opportunity attack per the rules would logically put the attacker in an even worse situation but it doesn't because the rules conveniently don't cover it. Sure I might be fighting 3 monsters at once in front of me, but hey, that guy behind me moved an extra step and he's gonna pay for it. "Excuse me front monsters, do be a dear and give me a moment to chastise your fellow back there"..... WHACK!....." Jolly good, now where were we?"
> 
> The whole business of making the attack on someone improperly defending themselves, often leads to the atacker having to do the same. This logically leads to a seesaw circle jerk of opportunity attacks until someone dies.
> 
> The whole mess would work better if OA's were only available to those who actually had opportunity (not already engaged in melee).




I dunno. I think the concept works better with a longer combat round abstraction than it does with a 6 second round because, I agree, it's a bit weird to see someone beset with many enemies spend the attention to hit (at full effectiveness) someone who moved funny within range and in such a short span of time. I'm just not entirely convinced any remedies to that, other than removing them entirely (which I'm also not keen on), would handle it well without being cumbersome. Maybe some kind of engagement capacity - exceed that and the character no longer can take AoO.


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## Majoru Oakheart (May 16, 2013)

timASW said:


> What you just described is classic railroading. Theres a problem and rather then allowing the players to solve it however they deem best the only allowed course of action is on that the DM will find "satisfying".  Thats not a good thing.



I disagree.  Railroading is often a good thing.  I disagree that it is necessarily railroading.  To me, railroading is removing all choices but one.  The PCs still have choices in my game, they are just constrained by the plot of the game.  They have their choice how to solve the puzzles in the tower, they are allowed to use all their resources to solve them and interesting solutions I didn't think of will be accepted and allowed.  However, they do not have the choice of simply skipping all of the puzzles.  Because that ruins the game for me.  If the game is ruined for me, I don't want to DM.


timASW said:


> A DM should be able to powergame with the best of them, if you play with characters like that just optimize your bad guys some more.



I disagree this needs to be done.  I don't have time to power game.  I have to come up with ideas for a plot, NPCs, monsters, maps for battles, and a lot more.  I simply don't have the time to also powergame.  Either way, I'm fairly good at power gaming.  But when I sit down at a table to run a game, I don't want to spent that time in prep.  I want to grab a monster out of the monster manual that the book tells me is of an appropriate difficulty and I want that encounter to work with any PCs that the players have made.

I have video games to play, TV to watch, time to spend with my gf, work to do.  I don't want to cut into any of that time in order to do prep on a D&D game.  If powergaming becomes a requirement to DMing, then I'm out.

However, even given that, I can't powergame as well as my players.  My mind just doesn't allow me to go there.  I have the same problem with making Magic the Gathering Decks.  If I come up with a card combo that will just destroy the other player...I immediately forget it and make up something more "fair" in my mind.  I don't have fun destroying my opponent.  When I make up D&D characters I normally stop at something powerful but "fair".  My players show up at the table with combinations of feats and powers from 3 different classes that when combined together lock enemies down from moving or attacking for any entire combat(making battles against thousands of year old lichs go like this "He takes fire damage, he gets knocked prone, he gets back up again, he's dazed, that's his action...go").  They come up with ideas that do 60 damage to every enemy on the board as a minor action(it's a really stupid combo by the way, and I eventually ruled against that one)


timASW said:


> And the most "satisfying" solution to the players will be the one they were able to decide upon themselves, control themselves, and use the abilities that they thought would be fun in character creation in the resolution of.



That's debatable as well.  More than once I've had a player come up with an idea that I allowed to work that simply destroyed an enemy without really fighting it.  The players felt cheated.  They expected the action to fail and then get into a fight because they wanted to use their cool combat abilities that they'd been itching to use for a while.  Instead, someone came up with an idea to outright win without a battle and the rest of the players WANTED me to say no or find some reason it didn't work because they wanted to fight.

Sometimes the easiest or most obvious solution isn't the one the players actually want to do.  Take my example above about the wizard's tower.  Some players may enjoy solving puzzles.  So if one PC says "Here, I've got the ability to destroy the whole tower with one spell...The wizard will die.  I cast it."  When I say "Sorry, the tower resists your magic as it has some sort of ward that protects it", then one player might be a little frustrated that his spell didn't work, but another might be happy because he wasn't cheated out of the experience of exploring the tower.


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## Majoru Oakheart (May 16, 2013)

billd91 said:


> If this is a serious problem, then I would start to think that GMing is really not the role for you. A GM should really enjoy seeing the players succeed regardless of how they do it. If not, you may be too focused on your own 'precious encounters,' and by that, I mean you've put too much enjoyment or self-validation value on the specific encounters or puzzles you have created. GMing, given the way players run roughshod over any best laid plans, requires a bit more detachment. It's great when your encounters play out well, sure, but there's no guarantee of that and you have to let that go.



Actually, I'm the DM...I don't have to let anything go.  That's the great thing about being the DM.  You control EVERYTHING in the universe.  Do I leave thing broad enough to allow the PCs to come up with any number of 20 or 30 solutions to the problem?  Sure.  Do I allow infinite solutions?  Unlikely.  If it seems completely unfair, or I feel would spoil the experience of playing, then I find a way not to allow it.

Basically I weigh "I don't have anything planned after this tower of traps and tricks.  I anticipated that it'd take about 3 sessions for the players to get through it, so I didn't think I'd need to plan beyond that.  I'm really bad at improvising.  I spent 3 hours mapping this tower and its traps.  If I allow them to destroy the tower, I'd either have to end the session immediately so I had time to come up with something else...or I have to just start making up plot on the fly.  Which always turns out poorly and with the players complaining that my game is boring.  So, it's either say no to blowing up the tower and giving them a little bit of disappointment in exchange for them likely having fun solving my puzzles for the next 3 sessions....or it's end the game here and telling them to go home early since we won't be playing tonight."

A couple of times when I REALLY didn't want to tell the players no, I actually posed the question to them outside of the game "Here's the situation, do you want me to allow this in exchange for not gaming today?" they've never said anything but "Oh...nevermind then, I don't even try that."

I also disagree that my entire job is to make the players happy.  I believe my happiness should be equal to theirs.  My job is to create a game that makes both them AND me happy.  If it requires sacrificing my own happiness for theirs, I don't want to DM.  None of them want to DM either.  We've discussed it many times.  If I step down as the DM, we stop playing D&D.  Everyone would much rather play the game with some restrictions to make the game more fun for me than not play at all.


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## timASW (May 16, 2013)

ExploderWizard said:


> I have come to the conclusion that in an abstract combat system such as D&D, opportunity attacks are needless minutae. Especially in situations where MAKING an opportunity attack per the rules would logically put the attacker in an even worse situation but it doesn't because the rules conveniently don't cover it. Sure I might be fighting 3 monsters at once in front of me, but hey, that guy behind me moved an extra step and he's gonna pay for it. "Excuse me front monsters, do be a dear and give me a moment to chastise your fellow back there"..... WHACK!....." Jolly good, now where were we?"
> 
> The whole business of making the attack on someone improperly defending themselves, often leads to the atacker having to do the same. This logically leads to a seesaw circle jerk of opportunity attacks until someone dies.
> 
> ...




Rather then going piece by piece I'll just say I agree with this wholeheartedly.


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## Majoru Oakheart (May 16, 2013)

Blackbrrd said:


> Is this an actual example from play, or just something you made up? I can't remember the numbers being that different. Around a +5 difference between worst and best character is what I see in play. That's assuming people are doing very mild optimizing (starting with an 18 in their main stat).



Yes, it's an example for play.  Though the numbers are likely slightly off since I'm working from about 1 year old memory.

However, I do remember the power gamed character needed a -2 to hit against enemies who were 3 levels above the level of the party.  I told him that he must be cheating or reading the rules wrong because there was no way to get that bonus to hit.  The game was balanced to not allow that.  Then he spelled out his character for me.  Which I don't remember ALL the details of now.  However, it was legal.  If a little...shifty.

Basically, he was a Pixie Hexblade whose hexblade weapon was a +3 proficiency weapon while doing 1d12 damage, while still being a Light Blade.  So, he had the feat that gave +3 to hit with light blades with combat advantage.  He had put a 20 in his prime stat, put a point into it at every level.  Then he took some feat that gave him a +1 to hit with...fire spells I want to say.  All his powers were fire spells.  He charged with every attack so he could get the +1 and combat advantage.  He also had another plus one to hit, can't remember from what.  This essentially gave him +6 to hit over the next most power gamed character in the group who had JUST maxed their stat and couldn't move to a position with combat advantage.

Then in my group there were at least 2 players who had absolutely no idea how to power game.  They'd started with 16s in their prime stat.  They still had +2 weapons while at 15th level...because they wanted cooler magic items than weapons.  That gave them about +5 to hit less than the powergamed people in the group and about +11 less than the super power gamed character.

This meant when I increased the power of enemies so that the super power gamed character needed a 3 on average to hit, the weak characters needed 14s.  It didn't help that they had poor luck.  One of them once went an entire session without rolling over a 12.  But it didn't matter that much since when they did hit, they did a 3rd of the pixie's damage.


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## timASW (May 16, 2013)

Mallus said:


> But it's also a major part of classic TSR-era dungeon design -- "puzzle" rooms in which certain spells don't work, forcing the players to solve them without magic, or with a more limited selection of magic.
> 
> It's not railroading so much as setting up a particular sort of challenge. This is important in a game where select characters can have the solution to almost every imaginable kind of challenging obstacle readily at hand, ie in their spellbooks. Arguably, its _more_ important in WotC-era D&D (well, in 3e), where the default assumption is the players have a much greater degree of control over the magical tools they're packing.
> 
> ...




No its absolutely railroading and I couldnt give a fart in the wind for TSR era dungeon crawls. 

Even if big dungeon crawls werent themselves boring and limiting (and they are) the ones from that era were particularly prone to horrible and often utterly logic breaking railroading. Especially the sort of random, nonsensical anti-magic fields you describe. They were just crutches for weak DM's to beat players over the head with in an age of adversarial gaming thats better left in that dim past. 

I've DM'ed a lot more then ran over the years and I have absollutely no pity for DM's pet challenges. I learned a long time ago that my pet challenges were more ego stroke then fun for the group and stopped doing it. Ever since then my games have run smoother, been enjoyed more by everyone and my own creativity went up leaps and bounds since I stopped shackling players to whatever outcome I had already decided was right and started making myself actually deal with their freedom. 

Theres a point when every would be GM has to decide if they want a game thats the most fun for the most people at the table or the most fun for them and hopefully the players like it too. This sort of railroady "challenge" is the latter sort of game.


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## Majoru Oakheart (May 16, 2013)

ExploderWizard said:


> I have the most fun as a GM when the players are presented with options A, B, and C and instead they do Z. Finding out what happens next is what I find most satisfying about running campaigns. The GM is privy to much more information than the players so the joy of surprise and discovery is a precious commodity that is squandered away if the players never do anything more than jump through the hoops as presented.
> 
> Epic stories are great, and every setting needs some. Its better IMHO to simply present them to the players as background and attempt to get thier characters to exceed or top them instead of following along in the creation of one already envisioned.



You and I enjoy different things.  I enjoy coming up with cool plots and interesting mysteries for the PCs to solve.  The enjoyment for me is watching their process AS they solve it.  How do they come up with their solution?  Does the grumpy dwarf get in the way because he doesn't like the Wizard and he's going to object to his plan just to be contrary?  How do they convince him to help?  Do they think to look up and notice the clue or do they have to solve the puzzle without it?  How many people will fall into the pit trap before they figure out the pattern of steps?  What will their faces look like when I tell them the gravity just reversed in the room and they are headed towards the spikes on the ceiling?  What ideas will they come up with in order to stop themselves?  I wonder how long it'll take them before they realize the guy who hired them is secretly the wizard who created the dungeon?  I wonder how much damage they'll take from the Beholder in this room?

All of that is stuff that makes the game fun for me.  They are all surprises to me.  They are all things that interest me.


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## timASW (May 16, 2013)

Majoru Oakheart said:


> I disagree.  Railroading is often a good thing.  I disagree that it is necessarily railroading.  To me, railroading is removing all choices but one.




Ahh heres the problem. Your wrong. Railroading is NEVER a good thing, and its not removing all choices. Its removing all choices but the ones the GM decided were acceptable when he made the challenge. Which is exactly what your doing. 

*Mod Note:*  Please see my post below.  ~Umbran



Majoru Oakheart said:


> The PCs still have choices in my game, they are just constrained by the plot of the game.  They have their choice how to solve the puzzles in the tower, they are allowed to use all their resources to solve them and interesting solutions I didn't think of will be accepted and allowed.  However, they do not have the choice of simply skipping all of the puzzles.  Because that ruins the game for me.





_Independence limited
Freedom of choice is made for you my friend
Freedom of speech is words that they will bend
Freedom with their exception_ 
  Metallica, wise men.....



Majoru Oakheart said:


> If the game is ruined for me, I don't want to DM.




Thats good. Until you change your mind set you probably shouldnt be DM'ing. 

*Mod Note:*  Again, please see my post below.  ~Umbran



Majoru Oakheart said:


> I disagree this needs to be done.  I don't have time to power game.  I have to come up with ideas for a plot, NPCs, monsters, maps for battles, and a lot more.  I simply don't have the time to also powergame.  Either way, I'm fairly good at power gaming.  But when I sit down at a table to run a game, I don't want to spent that time in prep.  I want to grab a monster out of the monster manual that the book tells me is of an appropriate difficulty and I want that encounter to work with any PCs that the players have made.




The level of powergaming a DM needs to do adds about 10 minutes to game prep. If you dont want to put that in you either need to play with complete newbs who havent read any of the books or railroad the hell out of a game and watch unhappy players get frustrated and drop or sabotage your game out of spite. 



Majoru Oakheart said:


> I have video games to play, TV to watch, time to spend with my gf, work to do.  I don't want to cut into any of that time in order to do prep on a D&D game.  If powergaming becomes a requirement to DMing, then I'm out.




To be completely honest the D&D players in your area are better off that way. No one deserves to have their limited free time ruined by a railroading GM who doesnt want to put in the effort to learn the rules well enough to allow the players freedom. 





Majoru Oakheart said:


> However, even given that, I can't powergame as well as my players.  My mind just doesn't allow me to go there.  I have the same problem with making Magic the Gathering Decks.  If I come up with a card combo that will just destroy the other player...I immediately forget it and make up something more "fair" in my mind.  I don't have fun destroying my opponent.  When I make up D&D characters I normally stop at something powerful but "fair".  My players show up at the table with combinations of feats and powers from 3 different classes that when combined together lock enemies down from moving or attacking for any entire combat(making battles against thousands of year old lichs go like this "He takes fire damage, he gets knocked prone, he gets back up again, he's dazed, that's his action...go").  They come up with ideas that do 60 damage to every enemy on the board as a minor action(it's a really stupid combo by the way, and I eventually ruled against that one)




Its a bit over-used online but you do know there are games other then D&D right? It really sounds like you want a rules light, narrative game. Which is fine, theres lots of them out there and some are really fun. But they arent D&D. Players sitting down to D&D have certain reasonable expectations which seem to be a complete 180 of how you want to play. 

Try something else. D&D isnt the right system for you to run. 




Majoru Oakheart said:


> That's debatable as well.  More than once I've had a player come up with an idea that I allowed to work that simply destroyed an enemy without really fighting it.  The players felt cheated.  They expected the action to fail and then get into a fight because they wanted to use their cool combat abilities that they'd been itching to use for a while.




Umm no. If they expected the idea to fail they would have tried something else. Players do understand action economy. 

Now if you allowed something outside the rules to work for no reason which bypassed the challenge they should feel cheated, because you cheated. It wasnt in the rules but you let it work. Otherwise I'm calling shenanigans on this story. 



Majoru Oakheart said:


> Instead, someone came up with an idea to outright win without a battle and the rest of the players WANTED me to say no or find some reason it didn't work because they wanted to fight.




So quit being such a slave to your stupid pre-written narrative and give them a fight. The big baddie is dead? So what? His minions werent paid goons, they were fanatically loyal adherents to his philosophy, and so were his ultra dangerous body guards who happen to come in just as he dies....... hard fight ensues. 

If you werent more concerned with keeping the game running exactly along the path you planned out in your head nothing you described would kill or even slightly derail a gaming session. 



Majoru Oakheart said:


> Sometimes the easiest or most obvious solution isn't the one the players actually want to do.  Take my example above about the wizard's tower.  Some players may enjoy solving puzzles.  So if one PC says "Here, I've got the ability to destroy the whole tower with one spell...The wizard will die.  I cast it."  When I say "Sorry, the tower resists your magic as it has some sort of ward that protects it", then one player might be a little frustrated that his spell didn't work, but another might be happy because he wasn't cheated out of the experience of exploring the tower.




In 20 years of running games I've learned a little secret about what players want. Are you ready? it will blow your mind and change everything........ 

ASK THEM WHAT THEIR CHARACTERS DO. 

Crazy right? I guarantee you though that whatever they tell you, is what they wanted to do. 100% sure to work, no mind reading involved. 

Also the one guy who loves the puzzles? Ask him to leave the game or get him a Soduku book, whatever. He's pissing everyone else off with his puzzles. 

They arent fun for the vast majority of gamers. Usually a "puzzle" is time for 3/4 of the group to get up to use the bathroom, smoke a ciggarette, call your girlfriend, order pizza, whatever it takes to kill the time until the one person still paying attention either solves it or gives up and the GM gives in.... or the players leave the stupid rail roady puzzle to go do something else entirely. Assuming you havent railroaded egress from the dungeon the way they came in into non-existence.


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## Majoru Oakheart (May 16, 2013)

timASW said:


> Ahh heres the problem. Your wrong. Railroading is NEVER a good thing, and its not removing all choices. Its removing all choices but the ones the GM decided were acceptable when he made the challenge. Which is exactly what your doing.



That's your definition of Railroading.  I've seen many.  Either way, I once again disagree that railroading is never a good thing.  I've been involved with Organized Play for years now.  I've seen over a thousand people show up to GenCon explicitly to play Living Greyhawk where they KNEW they were sitting down for a D&D game that could only end one or two ways because it was all prewritten by someone other than their DM.  They knew that the rules stated the DM wasn't allowed to change the adventure in the slightest....but they paid thousands of dollars to fly out to a convention just to play in those games.

Many of them ONLY played Living Greyhawk and didn't play in any home games because they liked the fact that the games had interesting stories.  None of them cared in the slightest that they were being constantly railroaded.


timASW said:


> Thats good. Until you change your mind set you probably shouldnt be DM'ing.



Wow.  Now you're just becoming insulting.  There's no need for that.


timASW said:


> The level of powergaming a DM needs to do adds about 10 minutes to game prep. If you dont want to put that in you either need to play with complete newbs who havent read any of the books or railroad the hell out of a game and watch unhappy players get frustrated and drop or sabotage your game out of spite.



Depends on the system how long it takes.  In 3.5e, it took me hours.  In 4e, the best way to "powergame" was to search through the monster manuals for monsters that work particularly well together.  It didn't take that long, but most often I was running prewritten adventures and the only real way to power game them was to increase the level of all the monsters.  Which was easy, so I was ok with that.

Though, I "railroad the hell out of the game" as you would say and I have players who get angry every time I cancel my game because something else comes up.  I have them begging me to run the game even when I'm sick because they enjoy it so much.

Your experiences aren't everyone's.


timASW said:


> To be completely honest the D&D players in your area are better off that way. No one deserves to have their limited free time ruined by a railroading GM who doesnt want to put in the effort to learn the rules well enough to allow the players freedom.



I know the rules better than any player at my table except maybe one.  We're both probably equal on the rules.  He's one of 2 really big power gamers at my table.  It's not a matter of "knowing the rules".  I don't have every ability from every paragon path or PrC or feat or spell memorized.  But I do know a lot of them.  I only look through those things when I make up a character for someone else's game.

I like concept characters, so I'll try to be the best ninja I can be by searching for feats and abilities that make be better at stealth and striking fast while staying hidden.  He just tries to make the character that destroys encounters the best.  He doesn't have a job or much of a life.  So he spends his time during the week between our games scouring the Char Op boards and making 30 different characters.  I wish I was exaggerating on the number.  Then he picks the best one and shows up to the game with it.

I tend to show up for the game going "Well, I know that they will be powergaming, just not sure how.  So I'll make the monsters 2 levels higher than I normally would to account for it." only to have them destroy the monsters without even blinking.

Also, I'll ask you again to stop with the insults.


timASW said:


> Its a bit over-used online but you do know there are games other then D&D right? It really sounds like you want a rules light, narrative game. Which is fine, theres lots of them out there and some are really fun. But they arent D&D. Players sitting down to D&D have certain reasonable expectations which seem to be a complete 180 of how you want to play.



I disagree.  I know there are other games, however, I have yet to run into someone who had an expectation of a game that wasn't prewritten.  It's rather the opposite.  When people sit down for a game of D&D, my experience has been that they are expecting that the DM either is running an adventure they've purchased from somewhere or has a book of notes written up about what will happen and we'll be playing through that.

I know when I sit down at a D&D table, my expectation is that the DM will entertain me with an interesting story.  The couple of times that DMs have attempted to run "sandbox" games with me in them normally ends up with me frustrated that the DM appears to be making me do their job.  When a DM doesn't give me a clear adventure hook with a clear goal, I get frustrated and normally end up leaving the game.  It feels like I'm accomplishing nothing:

"What do you do?"
"What do you mean, what do I do?  I'm in a bar, I'm talking to the rest of the party.  I drink some beer and I play some tavern games then I go to sleep."
"What do you do after that?"
"Umm, I ask people in town if anyone wants to hire some adventurers for a mission."
"No one wants to hire you.  What do you do?"
"I go back to the tavern and drink some more, I suppose until something interesting happens so I can go on an adventure."

When I sit down at a table, it's my expectation that the DM will hit us with a plot hook for the adventure he has planned and we'll follow that plotline.


timASW said:


> Try something else. D&D isnt the right system for you to run.



I don't know, I'm running games in the same playstyle as almost every 1e, 2e, 3e, and 4e adventure, along with everything put out for Living Greyhawk and Living Forgotten Realms, the two official WOTC campaigns.  I'm also following almost every guideline in the DMG from every edition.

Now, it's quite possible that the game is meant to be run in the exact opposite method of everything published by its creators.  Though, I doubt it.  I think D&D is the perfect game for running dungeon crawls through prewritten dungeons.


timASW said:


> Umm no. If they expected the idea to fail they would have tried something else. Players do understand action economy.



There is no action economy outside of combat.  I'm talking about situations like: Player: "Alright, the wizard is in the tower, right?  So, we get a barrel of gunpowder and explode it at the base of the tower, that should level the tower and kill the wizard."

Me: Crap.  It probably should take down the tower and that will ruin the adventure.  He's a wizard though, I know there isn't any spell in the book to give a tower protection from exploding barrels, but I'm sure someone probably developed a spell at some point.  Let's assume the tower is protected against that.  "It explodes but doesn't damage the tower."

Players: "Ahh, crap, he must have some sort of protection.  Wouldn't it have been hilarious if we bypassed the entire adventure by using a barrel of gunpowder?  I guess we go inside.  I was kind of hoping that wouldn't work so I'd have an opportunity to beat that wizard's face in personally."


timASW said:


> So quit being such a slave to your stupid pre-written narrative and give them a fight. The big baddie is dead? So what? His minions werent paid goons, they were fanatically loyal adherents to his philosophy, and so were his ultra dangerous body guards who happen to come in just as he dies....... hard fight ensues.



This requires a bunch of things to happen.  One, I now have to invent goons on the fly, which I hate doing because it requires me to pull out a book and search for some appropriate leveled monsters who have the right flavor which takes 10 minutes or so.  I hate pausing the game mid session because it ruins the flow.

Second, I absolutely hate when DMs change their plans on the fly unless absolutely necessary.  It smacks of railroading to me.  The DM wants a battle here, so rather than rewarding us for defeating the wizard easily, he is adding new monsters that didn't exist until after we beat the wizard.

When I found out that a DM was increasing the hitpoints of a monster every round simply because he didn't want the monster to die, I felt extremely cheated.  I feel the same way if there is a mystery and I find out the DM didn't even know who the murderer was until the end and was just planning on making it whoever we accused.

I much prefer a game where the DM knows how many enemies are in the dungeon and new ones won't appear just cause.


timASW said:


> If you werent more concerned with keeping the game running exactly along the path you planned out in your head nothing you described would kill or even slightly derail a gaming session.



It depends on what you are looking for in a gaming session.  If I get to the wizard after a year campaign trying to raise the army to defeat him only to finally face him in combat and the roof falls on his head and kills him because of a stray arrow...well, I'll feel cheated.  Even if his minions show up and are nasty powerful.  In fact, it's likely we'll spend the rest of the game complaining that the wizards minions were way more powerful than he was and how stupid that is.


timASW said:


> In 20 years of running games I've learned a little secret about what players want. Are you ready? it will blow your mind and change everything........
> 
> ASK THEM WHAT THEIR CHARACTERS DO.
> 
> Crazy right? I guarantee you though that whatever they tell you, is what they wanted to do. 100% sure to work, no mind reading involved.



The last time we did nothing ask what people wanted to do, we ended up in a tavern hitting on the tavern wench for 4 hours.  It wasn't fun for me at all(and I wasn't even DMing that game, I was one of the players).  I wanted to get on with an adventure of some sort.  But the DM didn't want to move on until every player had finished doing what they wanted to do in the tavern.  There were 4 players and 2 of them were REALLY interested in hitting on women in the tavern and were concerned with the appearance and personality of the women they were taking up to their rooms.  I almost didn't show up next session.  Luckily, it eventually because a fairly standard dungeon crawl with a lot of puzzles and battles, so the game got better.


timASW said:


> Also the one guy who loves the puzzles? Ask him to leave the game or get him a Soduku book, whatever. He's pissing everyone else off with his puzzles.
> 
> They arent fun for the vast majority of gamers. Usually a "puzzle" is time for 3/4 of the group to get up to use the bathroom, smoke a ciggarette, call your girlfriend, order pizza, whatever it takes to kill the time until the one person still paying attention either solves it or gives up and the GM gives in.... or the players leave the stupid rail roady puzzle to go do something else entirely. Assuming you havent railroaded egress from the dungeon the way they came in into non-existence.



Some people don't like puzzles.  Some do.  But I'd say it's certainly not 3/4 of people who don't like puzzles.  Your preferences aren't everyone's.

The above has not been my experience with puzzles.  Most of my players get into them and really work at solving them.  Nothing but puzzles gets old, so I try not to overuse them.  However, I find that most of the game turns into a LOT of combat.  Too much, especially in my group of powergamers who built their characters for the express purpose of doing as much damage as possible and defeating enemies as quickly as possible.  We need a break from the monotony after a certain point.  Or at least I do.  There's only so many hour and a half long tactical war games I can run before I need some story.


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## Blackbrrd (May 16, 2013)

Majoru Oakheart said:


> Yes, it's an example for play.  Though the numbers are likely slightly off since I'm working from about 1 year old memory.
> 
> However, I do remember the power gamed character needed a -2 to hit against enemies who were 3 levels above the level of the party.  I told him that he must be cheating or reading the rules wrong because there was no way to get that bonus to hit.  The game was balanced to not allow that.  Then he spelled out his character for me.  Which I don't remember ALL the details of now.  However, it was legal.  If a little...shifty.
> 
> ...




Your math on the Pixie Hexblade looks correct, interested in seeing how he get to charge and get combat advantage every attack. The math for the unoptimized character looks to be a bit off though. 16 vs 20 = -2, +2 instead of +3 weapon = -1, for a total of -3 vs regular optimized characters that never get combat advantage.

Anyway, your point still stands, +6 vs -3 = 9 point difference between best and worst, or 7 point if they get combat advantage.


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## Jhaelen (May 16, 2013)

timASW said:


> Your wrong. Railroading is NEVER a good thing, and its not removing all choices.



Actually, _YOU_ are wrong. Why? Because this is a simple matter of preference. Hence, thanks for letting us know about your opinion, but there's really no need to get worked up about it! 

I know many players that prefer being rail-roaded to 'free' sandbox play. They behave like a fish out of water if you tell them they're free to do whatever they want. They generally need gentle guidance (and sometimes pretty broad hints) in order to facilitate any kind of progress in the game. They have a hard time coming up with motivations or with things to do with their pcs unless you lead them subtly (or not so subtly).

One thing I do agree with you, however, is that I don't much care about the 'classic' adventure style. Almost all of the old adventure modules (at least for D&D) are vastly overrated.


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## pemerton (May 16, 2013)

billd91 said:


> A GM should really enjoy seeing the players succeed regardless of how they do it. If not, you may be too focused on your own 'precious encounters,' and by that, I mean you've put too much enjoyment or self-validation value on the specific encounters or puzzles you have created.





timASW said:


> What you just described is classic railroading. Theres a problem and rather then allowing the players to solve it however they deem best the only allowed course of action is on that the DM will find "satisfying".





timASW said:


> its absolutely railroading
> 
> <snip>
> 
> my games have run smoother, been enjoyed more by everyone and my own creativity went up leaps and bounds since I stopped shackling players to whatever outcome I had already decided was right



I don't have exactly the same approach to play as  [MENTION=5143]Majoru Oakheart[/MENTION] describes in his post, but I don't see that what he's said about _challenges_ requires the PCs (or players) being shackled to a pre-decided _outcome_.

The comments on living campaigns and the like are one thing, but as far as the desire that the players _engage_ the wizard's tower via their PCs, rather than just blow it up, is concerned, this is just a preference for the GM to frame scenes rather than having the players frame their own scenes. Marvel Heroic Roleplaying encourages a type of "in media res" framing that makes what Majoru is describing look pretty tame by comparison! But from the fact that the PCs are framed into a trap-filled tower rather than the players having the option to frame themselves into an exploded tower with a dead wizard, we can't tell anything about what the outcome will be.

Of course some people don't like games with such hard scene-framing, but that is a matter of personal preference. It's got no bearing on the quality of their RPGing.


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## pemerton (May 16, 2013)

ExploderWizard said:


> I have come to the conclusion that in an abstract combat system such as D&D, opportunity attacks are needless minutae.



I can see the case for this, but it applies equally to multiple attacks of all sorts.

Conversely, in so far as you think that multiple attacks in (say) AD&D work as a way of upping the combat output of fighters in a way that integrates well with the rest of the system, you can look at the function of OAs, immediate actions etc in the same way. For instance, in my experience of 4e OAs and immediate actions are a major way for fighters, rangers and sorcerers to lift their DPR.

Of course they are more fiddly than the old-fashioned multiple attacks. But on the flip-side, they also do a good job of introducing more dynamism into combat, breaking some of the stop-motion vibe.


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## ExploderWizard (May 16, 2013)

pemerton said:


> I can see the case for this, but it applies equally to multiple attacks of all sorts.
> 
> Conversely, in so far as you think that multiple attacks in (say) AD&D work as a way of upping the combat output of fighters in a way that integrates well with the rest of the system, you can look at the function of OAs, immediate actions etc in the same way. For instance, in my experience of 4e OAs and immediate actions are a major way for fighters, rangers and sorcerers to lift their DPR.
> 
> Of course they are more fiddly than the old-fashioned multiple attacks. But on the flip-side, they also do a good job of introducing more dynamism into combat, breaking some of the stop-motion vibe.




Actually they introduce more stop than motion. No one wants to move or even scratch thier rear if it will provoke an OA. The combination of the threat of OA and needing to remain rooted to gain full attacks help keep combatants from moving dynamically unless addressed by house rules. 

I prefer running lighter systems where move and attack is more friendly. The way I run B/X, there is only a consequence for withdrawing or fleeing melee combat, not for moving around within it.


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## Umbran (May 16, 2013)

timASW said:


> Ahh heres the problem. Your wrong. Railroading is NEVER a good thing, and its not removing all choices. Its removing all choices but the ones the GM decided were acceptable when he made the challenge. Which is exactly what your doing.







> Thats good. Until you change your mind set you probably shouldnt be DM'ing.





Folks, the phrase, "there is no accounting for taste," in its original form, means that there's no clear mathematics or predictability for taste. People like what they like.  And that may not be what you like.

It then follows, that absolutes... usually aren't.  "NEVER" should be used rarely when describing how to run a game.

And nobody here gets to tell others whether or not they should be running games.  Quite frankly, you don't have the cred to make that assertion.  You are not that wise and knowing.  I don't care who you are.  It's pretty darned rude.

Please leave space for people who play in ways you might not like yourself.  Show respect for your fellow posters.  Follow Wheaton's Law.  Those are not difficult rules to follow, so we expect you to abide by them.  Please remember that as the discussion continues.

Oh, and remember that we no longer have the "threadban" feature - it was lost in the hack.  That means that if we find you're leaning too heavy on folks, rather than take you out of one conversation, we take you off the boards for a while....


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## timASW (May 17, 2013)

Majoru Oakheart said:


> .... long nonsensical, rambling defense of railroading which claims most people like it




Why dont you start a thread in the general D&D section about whether railraoding is a good thing or not? That should get you a couple hundred people in short order telling you it sucks, Then hit RPG.net, Giants in the playground and just for the hell of it the WoTC boards and start the same threads? 

Maybe after a thousand people tell you how bad an idea it is you'll accept it. Its been established wisdom for about 15 years now, but just ask a bunch of people if you have such a hard time believing those of us in this thread who tell you its not good?


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## timASW (May 17, 2013)

pemerton said:


> I don't have exactly the same approach to play as  [MENTION=5143]Majoru Oakheart[/MENTION] describes in his post, but I don't see that what he's said about _challenges_ requires the PCs (or players) being shackled to a pre-decided _outcome_.
> 
> The comments on living campaigns and the like are one thing, but as far as the desire that the players _engage_ the wizard's tower via their PCs, rather than just blow it up, is concerned, this is just a preference for the GM to frame scenes rather than having the players frame their own scenes. Marvel Heroic Roleplaying encourages a type of "in media res" framing that makes what Majoru is describing look pretty tame by comparison! But from the fact that the PCs are framed into a trap-filled tower rather than the players having the option to frame themselves into an exploded tower with a dead wizard, we can't tell anything about what the outcome will be.
> 
> Of course some people don't like games with such hard scene-framing, but that is a matter of personal preference. It's got no bearing on the quality of their RPGing.





Arent you usually the one talking about how important it is that players have "agency" to control what happens in the game?


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## timASW (May 17, 2013)

Jhaelen said:


> I know many players that prefer being rail-roaded to 'free' sandbox play. They behave like a fish out of water if you tell them they're free to do whatever they want. They generally need gentle guidance (and sometimes pretty broad hints) in order to facilitate any kind of progress in the game. They have a hard time coming up with motivations or with things to do with their pcs unless you lead them subtly (or not so subtly).




I've heard about these players who love being railroaded online before but never seen one in real life. They're like bigfoot, everybody has a friend with a cousin whose seen one once...... You never do see people in gaming sites actually saying "i'm always a player and I love having my freedom of choice towards problem solving arbitrarily restricted for the DM's fun" 

It would be fun to see one someday, maybe we'll actually track down one down. I should pitch it to animal planet, I'll go on right after their bigfoot show but instead of wandering around the woods claiming every animal howl is a bigfoot I'll go to organized play games, conventions and drop in on home games posted online and interview everyone. It would make a great season finale if we actually found one.


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## pemerton (May 17, 2013)

timASW said:


> Arent you usually the one talking about how important it is that players have "agency" to control what happens in the game?



I talk about my preferred playstyle, yes. That includes GM authority over scene framing.

As I said in the post you replied to, [MENTION=5143]Majoru Oakheart[/MENTION] is talking (as best I can tell) about GM authority over scene framing - he's made it clear he wants player authority over _resolution_.


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## pemerton (May 17, 2013)

ExploderWizard said:


> Actually they introduce more stop than motion. No one wants to move or even scratch thier rear if it will provoke an OA. The combination of the threat of OA and needing to remain rooted to gain full attacks help keep combatants from moving dynamically unless addressed by house rules.



The house rules I use are 4e. There is no such think as "full attack" in 4e, and combats are very mobile.


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## billd91 (May 17, 2013)

pemerton said:


> I talk about my preferred playstyle, yes. That includes GM authority over scene framing.
> 
> As I said in the post you replied to, [MENTION=5143]Majoru Oakheart[/MENTION] is talking (as best I can tell) about GM authority over scene framing - he's made it clear he wants player authority over _resolution_.




Isn't that just looking at the "railroad" at a different level? You railroad the scene and let the players decide how to resolve. But what about taking a step farther out? That's more the level timASW and I are talking about. Letting the players essentially frame the scene, not just the resolution. 

I think that's really the main difference here. The level at which the GM decides the players have control.


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## timASW (May 17, 2013)

pemerton said:


> I talk about my preferred playstyle, yes. That includes GM authority over scene framing.
> 
> As I said in the post you replied to, [MENTION=5143]Majoru Oakheart[/MENTION] is talking (as best I can tell) about GM authority over scene framing - he's made it clear he wants player authority over _resolution_.




Those are contradictory goals. You cant tell people "guys go ahead and solve this problem anyway you like, its your game and you have authority over how you do it. As long as you dont do X,Y or Z which are perfectly legal by the books but I dont like. 

Thats like taking a girl to a nice restaurant and saying "dont worry you can get anything you want, as long as its an appetizer, or fish, but no salads or wine. And keep the desserts under 5$. But its all about you tonight. "


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## Umbran (May 17, 2013)

Let me put it this way - if this thread turns into browbeating about how some particular ill-defined technique or tool is wrongity wrong wrong, with wrong sauce, then perpetrators will get a vacation from the site.  

State your case, if you will, in a polite and civil manner, respecting the other people and their personal likes and dislikes, and respecting that maybe, just maybe, the entire world does *not* play the game the same way you like it, but still somehow manages to have fun.  

That's the last time we should see a warning here, about pretty much anything, so don't expect a warning for anything more.  Thanks, all.


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## FickleGM (May 17, 2013)

My wife prefers railroading. She states this openly and proves it true through play. She has big feet, but is no mythical creature. She's also played in games with multiple people on ENW, including portraying Calamity Jane in a game where Umbran portrayed H. G. Wells...not that he would be able to comment on her preference for being railroaded, but he can verify her existance.


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## Manbearcat (May 17, 2013)

billd91 said:


> Isn't that just looking at the "railroad" at a different level? You railroad the scene and let the players decide how to resolve. But what about taking a step farther out? That's more the level timASW and I are talking about. Letting the players essentially frame the scene, not just the resolution.
> 
> I think that's really the main difference here. The level at which the GM decides the players have control.




Universally and contiguously?  I mean, I give PC's limited scene-framing authority in my games by way of either outright authoring of the scene-opener or using me as a proxy for their authorship (where they have explicated to me the situation, its implications and much of the color).  However, we don't do this contiguously by any stretch of the imagination.  

Utter nullification of GM as primary scene/situation-framer is a very different game than traditional D&D (regardless of iteration) so I'm not sure * railroading is really at issue there (as it really shouldn't manifest with such techniques/systems).  Unless, of course, you're referring to player-side scene/situation-framing authority as:

GM:  You're in X town.  What do you do?
Player:  Do they have any taverns?
GM:  They have N, Y, and Z taverns.
Player:  Y tavern sounds like my kind of place.  I go there.

Therefore, while the scene/situation that unfolds in Y tavern is the proprietary creation of the GM, and the decision to go to Y tavern was relatively arbitrary (meaning informed by little more than whim), the decision to go there was still the player flexing their autonomy.  So, by-proxy of their whim of Y over N or Z taverns, they have framed the impending scene in Y tavern?

I'm with pemerton on the definition of railroad.  Its what I've always perceived as orthodox/classic usage and is specifically referring to the willful short-circuiting of player resolution of a situation by a GM in order to maintain absolute creative control of the forward momentum and trajectory of the narrative.

_** Railroading *_- A technique of scene,  setting, and/or story design/preparation in which the GM has prepared a  rising conflict/climax and maneuvers or otherwise determines that  character activity inexorably leads to this scenario.


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## pemerton (May 17, 2013)

billd91 said:


> Isn't that just looking at the "railroad" at a different level? You railroad the scene and let the players decide how to resolve. But what about taking a step farther out?



Well, this relates to different aspects of [MENTION=5143]Majoru Oakheart[/MENTION]'s posts from the particular ones I commented on (eg it relates to his discussion of Living Campaign scenarios).

At the "different level", the issues seem to be - who decides whether or not a particular scene is going to be framed, and when is that decision taken?

My preferred approach is that the decision about "which scenes" is driven by the whole table via more-or-less informal consensus eg I as GM will ask "OK, so you spend the rest of the day getting your stuff together and then at evening head out to XYZ?", or the players will debate what they should do and then say "OK, we're going to go to XYZ to do ABC." Some game systems are much more formal about this, of course.

In a Living Campaign scenario of the sort Majoru Oakheart describes, or in a typical event-driven module, the decision about "which scene" is taken by the GM/module author. I personally don't like that sort of play, or AP play mor generally, but if others do (and Paizo's sales suggest they do) then that's no skin off my nose!

As to _when_, my preference is - after the previous scene is resolved. Thus, the new scene gives expression to the consequences and upshot of the previous, resolved scene. This is the basic characteristic of Forge-style narrativist play as I understand it. It means that the plot of the campaign is not predetermined, but unfolds as a surprise to all involved.

In a typical event-based module, the "when" question is answered differently - all the important scenes have been framed in advance of play taking place. And Majoru Oakheart's description of the Living Campaing adventures fits this description too. It's not my preferred style of play, but once again the fact that others enjoy it is no skin off my nose.

If we turn from event-based to location-based modules, we can see that many are really just event-based modules in another guise - eg those with only one meaningful paths through the dungeon. This involves predetermination of the scenes by the module author, and the only way that the players can exercise authority over _which_ scenes is by leaving the dungeon, and therefore (perhaps, depending on the broader practices and expectations of the play group) having nothing exciting for their PCs to do.

The Alexendrian, in his essays on "node-based design", argues that a multi-path adventure (whether the interlocking event nodes that he talks about, or a slightly more traditional dungeon with multiple viable pathways) means that "the players are being offered the driver's seat". In the examples he presents, however, the basic elements of all the scenes have been predetermined by the GM. The efect that the players have is (i) to change the sequence in which the scenes are framed, (ii) to determine, via the action resolution mechanics, the outcome of the scenes, and (iii) to affect, but in a micro- rather than a macro-way, the framing of later scenes by reference to the resolution of earlier scenes. What the Alexendrian doesn't discuss is the possibility that the resolution of an earlier scene might mean that some new scene _hitherto unthought of_ by players or GM should be framed.

However railroady you think the Alexandrian's approach is (and he clearly thinks it isn't), I don't see that Majoru Oakheart is talking about anything significantly more railroady. For instance, nothing that Majoru has said precludes setting up the pre-authored events in a node style, or designing a dungeon with multiple pathways so that the players get to choose in what sequence they encounter the puzzles/traps/monsters.

In addition to the "who decides which scenes, and when do they decide that" questions, there is the question of who actually gets to frame scenes. D&D is not uniform in this respect. At low levels the answer is almost always the GM, becuase players have no metagame scene-framing authority and don't have the ingame capablities via their PCs to frame or reframe scenes. At high levels the answer is more varied, though - the players of fighters and thieves are often in much the same position as when their PCs were lower level (though clever use of thieving skills can change that); the players of spellcasters, though, while still lacking metagame scene-framing authority, often have significant ingame resources that can frame or reframe scenes. Teleport and its ilk are well known examples; divination spells too; and Majoru Oakheart, with the example of distintegrating the wizard's tower, has pointed out that disintegration (and its cousins like Transmute Rock to Mud) can also be instances of this.

My own preference is for GM authority over scene-framing. Of course the GM should take suggestions and listen to what the players want; but in the end I think the players have a conflict of interest if they get to frame their own scenes: a fun game tends to require scenes which push back hard against the PCs, but the players have an incentive to make life easy for their PCs, and so will tend to softball when framing their own scenes. Majoru noted this phenomenon himself, when he said that his players are often glad when their attempts to softball things (eg by disintegrating the tower) are thwarted, because it's more fun to actually have to engage the challenges rather than bypass them.

My own preferred solution to this issue is to remove those PC abilities that give the players scene-framing capabilities. 4e largely does this. Majoru Oakheart's solution is to ad hoc in reasons why those abilities don't work (eg via stipulating that the tower is warded against disintegration). That's a bit fudgy for my personal taste, but if you still want disintegration spells in the game for different sorts of reasons (eg in a fight in a cave, using disintegrate to blast a stalactite loose so it impales your enemy isn't softball scene-framing, it's just good old gonzo action resolution) it might be the easiest way to go. (I know from personal experience with Rolemaster that the other path, of leaving disintgrate in the game but then making disintegrate wards a standard element of the action resolution system, is a lot of work relative to the payoff.)

As I've said, though, the GM being the one who exercises authority over scene-framing has little to do with railroading, because it tells us nothing about outcomes. The issue there, as I've tried to indicate above, is whether or not the scenes that will be resolved are determined in advance, or in the course of play. And while Majoru's preferences in this respect differ from mine, they don't strike me as very radical, or - as I've indicated - even as being that different from what the Alexandrian advocates in his own much-touted, allegedly-non-railroading "node-based design".




timASW said:


> Those are contradictory goals. You cant tell people "guys go ahead and solve this problem anyway you like, its your game and you have authority over how you do it. As long as you dont do X,Y or Z which are perfectly legal by the books but I dont like.



They're not contradictory at all. If the players make it clear that they are hunting down Orcus cultists, and then I frame a sequence of scenes in which (i) they discover a cultist cave with stairs at the back and choose to descend them, and (ii) they arrive, at the bottom of the stairs, at an ancient temple of Orcus, then the players have got the scenes they want, but they haven't frramed them. I have. Hence - to give an example - I'm the one who gets to decide that, inside the temple, is an altar that will dominate PCs and turn them on their friends. (Fuller details here.)

As to whether X, Y and Z are legal by the books, and hence shouldn't be removed - as I observed above, there are magical abilities in high level (pre-4e) D&D that can be used both for action resolution and for scene-reframing. Working out how to handle them is an important part of GMing high level D&D. My preference, these days, is just to excise them. (I did this in a long-running Rolemaster campaign, which is near enough to D&D in this respect at least; 4e does it; Burning Wheel, which I hope to run once my 4e campaign finishes, does it too.) Majoru Oakheart is just using a different approach. I'm pretty confident that when it's not about scene-reframing but actin resolution within a scene, Majoru resolves disintegratioin in a completely orthodox fashion.


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## Jhaelen (May 17, 2013)

timASW said:


> I've heard about these players who love being railroaded online before but never seen one in real life. They're like bigfoot, everybody has a friend with a cousin whose seen one once...... You never do see people in gaming sites actually saying "i'm always a player and I love having my freedom of choice towards problem solving arbitrarily restricted for the DM's fun"



Well, I should imagine there are plenty of things you've never seen in real life. I daresay it's somewhat strange to disclaim something on that premise alone.

As for animal planet: Tell them, they're invited to our next gaming session! Apparently, we have a couple of bigfoots in disguise in our group. Who'd have thunk? 
Actually, apparently one of my ancestors must have been a bigfoot, too. Because, you know, sometimes I enjoy being railroaded, too: It can be relaxing to not be expected to take the lead and press ahead with the action. Instead you can lean back and simply enjoy the ride. Works best with a serving of beer & pretzel. Maybe you should try it some day


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## Majoru Oakheart (May 17, 2013)

pemerton said:


> Majoru Oakheart is just using a different approach. I'm pretty confident that when it's not about scene-reframing but actin resolution within a scene, Majoru resolves disintegratioin in a completely orthodox fashion.



This is the key to what I'm talking about stated better than I could.  I want the scenes to be framed by the DM both when I'm DMing and when I'm playing.

I want to know that the DM has a plan as to what will happen next and isn't making things up as he's going along unless he/she is REALLY good at it.  Basically, I want to know there is an overarching plot to tie the adventure together.

I'm not a fan of meandering through whatever random ideas the players come up with.  Doing a random scene in a bar then a random scene with one of the PCs parents, a random scene with a street urchin, etc. without any narrative connection between them is frustrating for me because I can't see why each scene has "meaning" in terms of the overall plot.

I feel it's the DMs job to....act as a director/editor, skipping the unimportant parts of the story in order to move to the scenes meaningful to the plot.  I expect the DM to come up with that plot as well.  In other words he chooses which scenes we participate in.  Although those scenes are often created based on what has happened in previous scenes, and therefore have player input.


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## Majoru Oakheart (May 17, 2013)

Blackbrrd said:


> Your math on the Pixie Hexblade looks correct, interested in seeing how he get to charge and get combat advantage every attack. The math for the unoptimized character looks to be a bit off though. 16 vs 20 = -2, +2 instead of +3 weapon = -1, for a total of -3 vs regular optimized characters that never get combat advantage.



Well, I believe it was +2 weapon instead of +4...though my memory may be failing me.  But, yes, you are essentially correct.

As for the combat advantage.  He didn't charge every round.  However, he had 2 different encounter powers that could turn him invisible.  So, for 3 rounds(the initial charge then 2 following rounds) he was nearly guaranteed Combat Advantage.  If he killed a monster, he could then charge another one and get Combat Advantage again.

When I originally complained about how broken his character was, his defense was precisely that: "But, I can only get combat advantage for 3 rounds every combat, after that my attack bonus is high...but I no longer hit on a 2.  Most of the time I hit on a 3 or 4."  I had to point out that most combats lasted 3 rounds and so it was nearly infinite.  Plus, being able to hit consistently on a 4 or higher even against Elites and Solos seemed unbalanced to me to begin with.

When I raised the level of monsters so their defenses were higher, the rest of the group became unable to hit and got frustrated.  Then the D&D Next playtests started coming out and I decided it was best to put my 4e game on hold while we tested D&D Next instead.

In theory, we will go back to that 4e game after I'm done running the Isle of Dread from the playtest.  I have no idea what my solution will be to his character.  I keep putting off the end of Isle of Dread because I really don't want to have to deal with it.


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## pemerton (May 17, 2013)

[MENTION=5143]Majoru Oakheart[/MENTION], I'm glad I did a reasonable job of interpreting your posts and didn't put too many words into your mouth!

I think as both GM and player I like a bit more player-driven stuff in the game then you've described in your posts, but I certainly agree with you that the GM has a pretty important role!

Like you, I'm not interested in random hanging-out-in-a-bar stuff: if I want to just hang out in a bar I can do that in real life, I don't need to RPG it!

And if my players have their PCs start talking to random street urchins, I'll pretty quickly make those encounters non-random - one of my priorities as a GM is to try to link story elements back to the main themes and concerns of the players (which in my current campaign is Orcus vs Raven Queen, Gods/Law vs Primordials/Chaos, and cosmological lore vs Vecna/secrets). By linking up the backstory, and setting up secrets to be uncovered, I let the players be surprised by things while still having them help drive the basic themes/focus of the game. And we get to find out the actual plot together, through play.

Anyway, rather than telling each other how we _should_  play, I think it's more interesting to talk about how we _do_ play and then think about what sorts of mechanics, techniques etc work well or poorly for those different appraoches, and learn stuff that we mightn't have come up with on our own!


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## Majoru Oakheart (May 17, 2013)

pemerton said:


> [MENTION=5143]Majoru Oakheart[/MENTION], I'm glad I did a reasonable job of interpreting your posts and didn't put too many words into your mouth!



No problem, you did a great job.  Sometimes I'm not so great at explaining myself.


pemerton said:


> I think as both GM and player I like a bit more player-driven stuff in the game then you've described in your posts, but I certainly agree with you that the GM has a pretty important role!



I like when players have some input as well.  I admit, I am currently playing in a game where the DM certainly seems to want to incorporate our input into the game more than many other DMs I've had and it's been a lot of fun.

It's a 4e game and I decided to play a Ninja(Assassin-Executioner).  I don't like my characters to be 2 dimensional so I read the background he wrote up about his world and discussed it briefly.  Originally he didn't really think his world had "Ninja" and was a little apprehensive about it.  But we came up with the concept of a group of ninja who work similarly to the ones from Wanted, who kill people but only because they believe they are fated to die and we are simply instruments of fate.

That organization has begun to be involved in the plot and it's been a lot of fun to see it happen.  In many of my previous games I would have to ask "Where would I have trained to become a ninja and they would explain my character's likely background to me.


pemerton said:


> And if my players have their PCs start talking to random street urchins, I'll pretty quickly make those encounters non-random - one of my priorities as a GM is to try to link story elements back to the main themes and concerns of the players



I'm kind of torn about this.  On one hand, I agree with you.  On the other hand, I...Hmm, it's hard to put into words.  I like knowing that things were planned out in advance as I mentioned above.  The idea that a street urchin who had nothing to do with the plot before hand suddenly does because I talked to them...feels wrong to me.

I think it would be fun to play in that game as long as I was unaware that "the plan" was changing on the fly.

I think it's because of my many bad experiences with DMs allowing players with poor creative skills to drive an adventure or with bad improv skills making things up on the fly.  I find most people can run a good adventure if they sit down and think about it for a while and the write down:  "Mayor is secretly a doppleganger.  He is a worshiper of Tharizdun.  He wants to drive the entire city insane by poisoning the water supply.  So far he's been testing it on a watering hole only used by street urchins."

So, when you talk to a street urchin and they are insane, you feel good that you've made a good decision and you've talked to the right person.

If the poisoning of the street urchins was an idea that the DM came up with on the fly simply because I spoke to a street urchin and the DM felt that this would be a good way to relate it to the plot, then it seems....unfulfilling to me.  Instead of getting a clue because I made a good decision, it feels like the DM would have fed us a clue regardless of what we did.


pemerton said:


> Anyway, rather than telling each other how we _should_  play, I think it's more interesting to talk about how we _do_ play and then think about what sorts of mechanics, techniques etc work well or poorly for those different appraoches, and learn stuff that we mightn't have come up with on our own!



I'm in 100% agreement with this.  There's no wrong way to play.  I have preferences on what I like or don't like.  However, it doesn't help to tell other people they are wrong.


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## pemerton (May 17, 2013)

Majoru Oakheart said:


> I am currently playing in a game where the DM certainly seems to want to incorporate our input into the game more than many other DMs I've had and it's been a lot of fun.
> 
> <snip>
> 
> ...



I like to run my games in this sort of way, with player input into world building especially via the story elements associated with character creation and advancement.



Majoru Oakheart said:


> I'm kind of torn about this.
> 
> <snip>
> 
> If the poisoning of the street urchins was an idea that the DM came up with on the fly simply because I spoke to a street urchin and the DM felt that this would be a good way to relate it to the plot, then it seems....unfulfilling to me.  Instead of getting a clue because I made a good decision, it feels like the DM would have fed us a clue regardless of what we did.



I agree that my style, which is a bit more improv than I think you would like, doesn't really work for mystery-style play.

It can do _reveals_ - the PC does some dramatic thing like pulling of Vader's helmet, and then we all see he's Anikin - but that's a bit different from collecting clues to work something out.

Rather than clues to mysteries, I drop in clues to story/thematic linkages - eg when the PCs fought a chained cambion, it lamented the way it had been treated by its sister. This wasn't a _clue_ in the mystery-game sense - it's not like the players have to work out who the cambion's sister is in order to make progress with the game - but more an opportunity they could pick up on to draw links to other events that had happened, and might happen in the future. As it happened they didn't really follow up on it, and so it's a little bit of colour that's gone nowhere to date, though it's one thing in the back of my mind to bring back out when a future opportunity (you might say, the right street urchin!) presents itself.

If the players do pick up on it, and work out what their relationship is to the sister, and how that fits into their broader PC goals/concerns, then I'll start to drive the whole thing (the relationships, the significance of the chaining, etc) harder.

I don't know if that makes any sense.


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## Viking Bastard (May 17, 2013)

FickleGM said:


> My wife prefers railroading. She states this openly and proves it true through play. She has big feet, but is no mythical creature.




Yeah, one of my players clearly prefers it as well, though she probably wouldn't agree with it if you asked her. She even gets frustrated at the other players for going off the rails, ruining "the DM's magnificent plan" (despite having it repeatedly explained to her that I encourage this behavior and that I have no magnificent plan, simply vague ideas that I adapt to the evolving fiction). That the others players are rewarded for this behavior perplexes her.

Incidentally, she is also the only player who shows any ambition for game mastering--to play out her own magnificent plan--and by far the one who pays the most interest and attention to setting stuff.


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## Mallus (May 17, 2013)

timASW said:


> I've heard about these players who love being railroaded online before but never seen one in real life.



Example #1 - the players who enjoy Pathfinder Adventure Paths. I don't have exact numbers, but Pazio built an entire, successful business around them.

Example #2 - the players who enjoyed the classic TSR-era tournament modules, many of which included micro-level railroading like the puzzle rooms I mentioned. Again, I don't have exact numbers, but these modules aren't considered iconic because of their unpopularity.

So two groups of gamers, neither small. Do you require more?


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## Majoru Oakheart (May 17, 2013)

pemerton said:


> I don't know if that makes any sense.



That makes perfect sense.  I don't think our methods are ALL that different(though slightly).

I guess to me, I'm worried about a situation like occurred in the new Battlestar Galactica series.  The whole thing looked like this huge, planned out story arc with lots of interwoven threads.  I was impressed that they planned out the plot so far in advance.  I'm not a good enough writer to do something like that, but I love watching shows and playing in games with people who are super organized and can do it.

Then I watched the special before the finale of BSG where they revealed that they had mostly been making the show up on the fly.  That they didn't have any idea what was going to happen, they'd just write in vague references to things then figure out what they meant later.  That kind of ruined the show for me.

I like large, cool plots that manage to have a lot of foreshadowing.  That's why Babylon 5 is my favorite show ever.


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## billd91 (May 17, 2013)

pemerton said:


> As I've said, though, the GM being the one who exercises authority over scene-framing has little to do with railroading, because it tells us nothing about outcomes. The issue there, as I've tried to indicate above, is whether or not the scenes that will be resolved are determined in advance, or in the course of play. And while Majoru's preferences in this respect differ from mine, they don't strike me as very radical, or - as I've indicated - even as being that different from what the Alexandrian advocates in his own much-touted, allegedly-non-railroading "node-based design".




Actually, I think it does involve no less of a railroad than the node model because there is at least one outcome you've taken off the table - avoidance of the scene. That's one thing Alexander's node model has over your scene-framing with respect to railroad prevention. PCs can skip nodes. 

Ultimately, in either case, you've got a GM prepping and presenting the encounters. In this debate, either you present it as part of scene-framing or, like in Alexander's model, you prep situations and see where they go.


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## billd91 (May 17, 2013)

Viking Bastard said:


> Yeah, one of my players clearly prefers it as well, though she probably wouldn't agree with it if you asked her. She even gets frustrated at the other players for going off the rails, ruining "the DM's magnificent plan" (despite having it repeatedly explained to her that I encourage this behavior and that I have no magnificent plan, simply vague ideas that I adapt to the evolving fiction). That the others players are rewarded for this behavior perplexes her.
> 
> Incidentally, she is also the only player who shows any ambition for game mastering--to play out her own magnificent plan--and by far the one who pays the most interest and attention to setting stuff.




Sounds to me like she wants to experience someone else's storytelling and setting, with some modest participation, while the others want to be the ones telling the story with their pro-activity. I fear she'd get *really* frustrated if she was GMing for the other players who tend to go off the expected path.


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## randomeric (May 17, 2013)

Majoru Oakheart said:


> Then I watched the special before the finale of BSG where they revealed that they had mostly been making the show up on the fly.  That they didn't have any idea what was going to happen, they'd just write in vague references to things then figure out what they meant later.  That kind of ruined the show for me.




When I discovered this, I had a pleasant "Ah, ha!" moment.  This is how I run my games.  Right now I am running Dungeon World using my own Of Gods and Relics game world of Malaforcia.  Dungeon World itself requires a lot of, "now that you have rolled some dice, tell us how that result came about."

After a while (many gaming sessions), you can look back and see how the "plot" wound it's way over the river and through the woods to get where it is.

My players have started on the island continent of Artis, as part of the Oscillian war effort to conquer the known world.  Something very significant has changed and the Oscillians are pulling out.  Fast.

Most of the characters are from other races (Phyxia, Chartay, Slovenia, Aagmir, or Auch-mach) and were conscripted as the Oscillian army marched across Malaforcia.  One of my players is Oscillian and came along for his own reasons...

The characters (and other non-pure Oscillian units) are the last to leave the shores of Artis.  They are tasked with defending the position until the rest of the army has left.  They find out rather quickly that they are essentially being left there to fend for themselves with no way off.  Left to die.

The plot reveals itself as they make friends and enemies, look for a way off the hostile island continent (or decide to stay and look for ancient treasure and relics), seek revenge, or make some other path to fame and fortune.

Every group is different, as is each player.  I have one guy playing a druid.  Right now the freedom to change shape into a myriad of animals is keeping him very entertained.  No larger plot necessary.  One player is playing a female Chartayan warrior (female dominated society) and this has written 5 pages of background.  Plot arcs will arise from that.  Everyone else is somewhere in between.

To get back to the fudging issue, it was John's last game session (he winters here in Florida, but summers back up north).  I wanted to make sure he had some good fun.  He is playing a wizard and just got the fireball spell.

Jungle raptors were attacking and he fireballed them once before they were on the party.  As it was his big new spell (and I realized the group needed some more quick damage to avoid heavy losses) I said, the gods have seen fit to grant you a one time MMO like use of the fireball, but you WILL suffer a consequence (dungeon world 7-9, success with consequence) no matter what you roll.

He went for it, rolled 2 d6 for damage and rolled two 1's!  I insisted he roll again as that was simply not allowed.  He ended up with 8 or 10 points of damage, the raptors were in flames, and fun was had by all.

I fudged.  Out in the open, and really gave the player a choice more than outright fudged.  But I did that purely because it was the right thing for the sake of fun.  And since I gave him a special use, it would be totally not fun to then have a poor result and be stuck with it.

My goals when I run a game is that everyone has fun, participates, and leaves looking forward to the next time we play.

I'll fudge for that.  I will NEVER fudge to ruin that.

Most of the time it takes care of itself.  Sometimes you have to nudge it along a bit.

We are building a story together, but the real chance of failure makes it feel real.  Never take that away with fudge.  But you can take away the "we just got screwed by the dice."  Unless it feeds into the plot arc.  ;-)

This got way longer than I had intended.

Great discussion.

Play on everyone!


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## ExploderWizard (May 17, 2013)

Majoru Oakheart said:


> This is the key to what I'm talking about stated better than I could. I want the scenes to be framed by the DM both when I'm DMing and when I'm playing.
> 
> I want to know that the DM has a plan as to what will happen next and isn't making things up as he's going along unless he/she is REALLY good at it. Basically, I want to know there is an overarching plot to tie the adventure together.
> 
> ...




The player type that prefers railroads isn't a myth. For the most part a lot of casual players fall into this category. It isn't so much a strong preference for such a playstyle as it is apathy towards doing anything else. These players don't mind being led through scenes of the GM's choosing because the alternative means having to come up with goals and motivations of thier own. I have found myself playing in some campaigns this way. I just wanted to roll some dice, and play through whatever the GM felt like making up. 

So I can see the desire of some players to kick back, and let the GM direct, and frame scenes. It is a style thats very easy on the players, especially busy players who really only have time to think about the game during actual play time. 

The thing missing from such campaigns is active player involvement and investment in the campaign. When the action is purely player driven, there is an energy and intensity that makes the campaign become more alive. 

Although tabletop games and video games are different animals, this videogame analogy should serve to illustrate difference in campaign styles:

#1  Your character is in a star fighter or similar ship. In this portion of the game the AI pilots the ship over several areas of enemies. You operate the lasers, and drop bombs as you fly over these areas. 

#2 Your character is in a star fighter or similar ship. Your mission is to fly over and destroy enemy targets. You pilot the ship ,operate the lasers, and drop the bombs. 

In the first instance, the scene is framed for you. The targets can only be attacked as the framing permits since you do not have control of the ship. Within that framing you decide how to attack the targets and what ordinance to use. You cannot decide what targets are first or how much time to spend on a particular target. 

In the second instance, you decide when you take off, and where you will fly. You can attack the targets in any order you wish, fly by and attack them each a bit at a time, or even crash your ship into one. You are in control of your destiny. 

Which game would be more engaging? 

This doesn't mean that player driven games must be completely directionless. The GM is still the lens through which players see the campaign world and information to act on still needs to be provided. The central "story" or plot of the campaign simply becomes what the players decide to focus on instead of a GM provided focus. First and foremost, such a player decided focus requires interested and invested players. If the whole group prefers to just sit back and follow the GM's story then a player driven game will never get off the ground. 

Matching expectations and knowing your play group are the keys to happy gaming.


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## Mallus (May 17, 2013)

ExploderWizard said:


> The player type that prefers railroads isn't a myth. For the most part a lot of casual players fall into this category. It isn't so much a strong preference for such a playstyle as it is apathy towards doing anything else. These players don't mind being led through scenes of the GM's choosing because the alternative means having to come up with goals and motivations of thier own.



That's probably true for some more casual players. But the appeal of more heavily scripted campaigns isn't limited to them. Like I posted earlier, Pathfinder Adventure Paths sell very well. As did the earlier generations linked module series and mega-dungeon campaigns. 

There's another appeal to them (outside of a lack of motivation on the player's part): they resemble the classic quest novel structure where the protagonists get swept up in events outside their control, and become heroes in the process, often by following a set of directions (like a prophesy), ie Bilbo & Frodo. There's always been a segment of the D&D audience that wants to re-create their favorite epic fantasy novels.  



> The thing missing from such campaigns is active player involvement and investment in the campaign.



In my experience, this isn't true. For the record, heavy-scripting isn't my preferred way to the DM, but I've seen it work enough times to know those kinds of campaigns can produce memorable PCs and fond memories (which are great ways to measure player investment). 



> Although tabletop games and video games are different animals, this videogame analogy should serve to illustrate difference in campaign styles:



My go-to video-game analogy involves comparing Besthesda-style CRPGs like Skyrim/Elder Scrolls with Bioware-style games like Mass Effect.

In an Elder Scrolls game, you really get the sense of being in a fantasy world you are free to explore (and loot/murder). But you don't really get the sense of being a great _story_. Or if you do, it's the great story of a wandering kleptomaniac/murderer who can create really interesting small-scale "stories" -- usually by cleverly arranging the emergent behaviors produced by the game AI. But these don't amount to plot in the traditional sense. They're something else -- more like amusing anecdotes. 

In a Mass Effect game, you get the sense of being in great (well, I think so) science fiction _story_ -- because of all the scripting/plotting, scene-setting, ie direction, dialog, and voice-acting-- but this comes at the cost of feeling like you're free to explore to world presented to you (because, frankly, you can't). You're stuck with the designers story, and less amusing emergent behavior-scenes. 

Both styles of game are cool, and produce heavily-invested players. Neither represent a "magic bullet" in terms of game design. And both approaches have their heavily-invested fans.


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## ExploderWizard (May 17, 2013)

Mallus said:


> That's probably true for some more casual players. But the appeal of more heavily scripted campaigns isn't limited to them. Like I posted earlier, Pathfinder Adventure Paths sell very well. As did the earlier generations linked module series and mega-dungeon campaigns.
> 
> There's another appeal to them (outside of a lack of motivation on the player's part): they resemble the classic quest novel structure where the protagonists get swept up in events outside their control, and become heroes in process, often by following a set of directions (like a prophesy), ie Bilbo & Frodo. There's always been a segment of the D&D audience that wants to re-create their favorite epic fantasy novels.




This always circles back to player expectations. Do they want to participate in an epic story or do they want to game out whatever happens win or lose? Making sure everyone is in agreement with the group concensus and that the group knows what type of experience to expect, is more important than the merits and flaws of either style.


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## LostSoul (May 17, 2013)

billd91 said:


> Actually, I think it does involve no less of a railroad than the node model because there is at least one outcome you've taken off the table - avoidance of the scene. That's one thing Alexander's node model has over your scene-framing with respect to railroad prevention. PCs can skip nodes.
> 
> Ultimately, in either case, you've got a GM prepping and presenting the encounters. In this debate, either you present it as part of scene-framing or, like in Alexander's model, you prep situations and see where they go.




I don't understand this.

Scene-framing is part of node-based design.  When the players encounter a new node, the DM frames that node as a scene.  Scene-framing isn't anything special; it's just one player (usually the DM) telling the other players what's going on in the game world.  You can frame one railroaded scene after another, or prep a situation and frame scenes based on the player's choices.

I think you're talking about something else when you contrast scene-framing with node-based design, but I don't know what that is.


----------



## timASW (May 17, 2013)

Mallus said:


> Example #1 - the players who enjoy Pathfinder Adventure Paths. I don't have exact numbers, but Pazio built an entire, successful business around them.
> 
> Example #2 - the players who enjoyed the classic TSR-era tournament modules, many of which included micro-level railroading like the puzzle rooms I mentioned. Again, I don't have exact numbers, but these modules aren't considered iconic because of their unpopularity.
> 
> So two groups of gamers, neither small. Do you require more?




AP's are absolutely NOT railroading. You need to read one before you claim that. They lay out a series of places and interconnected events that players may or may not interact with in pretty much anyway they want. AP's are almost the definition of a good sandbox.  Theres a story going on in the background and how they deal with it or if they choose not to deal with it at all is almost entirely up to them in most AP's. 

And yeah sorry but the % of gamers around right now who started back in TSR is smaller then you think, and even out of those of us who did (AD&D here) very, very few of us ever went within a country mile of a tournament adventure without modifying it so heavily you would barely recognize it playing it through. Or we did sit down to play it and hated it. We played it sure, didnt mean we liked it. 

Those adventures are often Iconic because of a mix of rose tinted nostalgia from our youth and/or as much for what they did wrong as what they did right.


----------



## timASW (May 17, 2013)

Jhaelen said:


> Well, I should imagine there are plenty of things you've never seen in real life. I daresay it's somewhat strange to disclaim something on that premise alone.
> 
> As for animal planet: Tell them, they're invited to our next gaming session! Apparently, we have a couple of bigfoots in disguise in our group. Who'd have thunk?
> Actually, apparently one of my ancestors must have been a bigfoot, too. Because, you know, sometimes I enjoy being railroaded, too: It can be relaxing to not be expected to take the lead and press ahead with the action. Instead you can lean back and simply enjoy the ride. Works best with a serving of beer & pretzel. Maybe you should try it some day




Wheres your game? I'll bring the camera and we can do some interviews with all these players who love railroading.


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## Viking Bastard (May 17, 2013)

billd91 said:


> Sounds to me like she wants to experience someone else's storytelling and setting, with some modest participation, while the others want to be the ones telling the story with their pro-activity. I fear she'd get *really* frustrated if she was GMing for the other players who tend to go off the expected path.




Yeah. I know. We'll see how that goes.

What I find most interesting is that the players were all gaming virgins before our campaign, yet have diverged this way--latched onto different features of my (somewhat muddled) narratively drifted simulationist DMing style.


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## timASW (May 17, 2013)

pemerton said:


> They're not contradictory at all. If the players make it clear that they are hunting down Orcus cultists, and then I frame a sequence of scenes in which (i) they discover a cultist cave with stairs at the back and choose to descend them, and (ii) they arrive, at the bottom of the stairs, at an ancient temple of Orcus, then the players have got the scenes they want, but they haven't frramed them. I have. Hence - to give an example - I'm the one who gets to decide that, inside the temple, is an altar that will dominate PCs and turn them on their friends. (Fuller details here.)




Thats not what we're talking about though, we're talking about the GM putting together an anti-cultist dungeon crawl and the players saying "I dont really care what the cultists or doing, i have no interest in that". Or something like "my character doesnt like dungeons, they are full of traps and spells and its dark and as a human I cant see for crap. I'm not going down there, those cultists have to come out sometime. Lets camp and hide here by the entrance and kill them when they come out to do their nefarious deeds instead" 

And the the DM says "I dont think those would be fun, so your going in that dungeon, rolling your D20's for traps and working out my puzzles or I'm taking my books and going home"


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## FickleGM (May 17, 2013)

Someone should have defined railroading for the rest of us before stating that it is never a good thing.

I was confused into thinking that we were discussing the generally accepted definition of railroading.


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## Umbran (May 17, 2013)

timASW said:


> I've heard about these players who love being railroaded online before but never seen one in real life.




Shall we begin making a list of things that you have never personally directly witnessed, but exist regardless?  That list will be long.  

I'll start:  An individual atom.  The bottom of the Marianas Trench.  Radio waves.  The far side of the Moon....

Once this list is made, you can ask yourself why you accept the existence of so many of these other things, but reject this one.


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## timASW (May 17, 2013)

Umbran said:


> Shall we begin making a list of things that you have never personally directly witnessed, but exist regardless?  That list will be long.
> 
> I'll start:  An individual atom.  The bottom of the Marianas Trench.  Radio waves.  The far side of the Moon....
> 
> Once this list is made, you can ask yourself why you accept the existence of so many of these other things, but reject this one.




You dont Know I've never seen those things. ROV's can go pretty deep underwater now.


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## FickleGM (May 17, 2013)

Personally. Directly. Witnessed.


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## timASW (May 18, 2013)

FickleGM said:


> Someone should have defined railroading for the rest of us before stating that it is never a good thing.
> 
> I was confused into thinking that we were discussing the generally accepted definition of railroading.




Is there one?


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## timASW (May 18, 2013)

FickleGM said:


> Personally. Directly. Witnessed.




Hundreds, possibly thousands of navy submariners, scientists and interns to scientists have seen the bottom of that trench, you have no idea if I am one of those thousands or not. And "witnessing" radio waves could very easily be sitting in a control room for a radio station and watching the graphs of them go up and down as you speak and play songs. Millions of people have seen those. 

 Sounds like your making a statement based on what you think someone means or has experienced. I hear that making broad statements based on reading peoples minds is frowned upon here.


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## FickleGM (May 18, 2013)

Okay, I personally don't require your validation, but it is fun to participate in various discussions. I do find it odd that you would imply that players who prefer railroading don't exist because you've never seen them. Now, I don't know if you've personally and directly witnessed any of those things Umbran listed. Maybe you have. Maybe if everyone on this forum listed every possible thing in the universe, we'll find that you've personally, and directly, witnessed each and every one.

I'm going to go out on a thin very thin limb (risking being banned for the audacity of this accusation) and say that you have not personally, and directly, witnessed everything in the universe. How that might effect the credibility of your claim regarding the nonexistence of players who prefer railroading is anyone's guess.

I'll pray you're correct though, because my wife's lies are very upsetting and I am looking forward to using your infallible proof to finally put an end to her falsehoods.


----------



## FickleGM (May 18, 2013)

timASW said:


> Is there one?




I believe that "taking away player choice at some level" is generally accepted. The level at which that choice is restricted becomes the topic of debate. By adding "or I'm taking my books and going home", you've narrowed the definition into an area that not everyone would agree to.

In addition, by questioning if there is a generally accepted definition of railroading, you've put your own assertions in doubt.


----------



## timASW (May 18, 2013)

FickleGM said:


> I believe that "taking away player choice at some level" is generally accepted. The level at which that choice is restricted becomes the topic of debate. By adding "or I'm taking my books and going home", you've narrowed the definition into an area that not everyone would agree to.
> 
> In addition, by questioning if there is a generally accepted definition of railroading, you've put your own assertions in doubt.




No I havent. 

Its very simple when talking to gamers what sounds more likely?

That game was awful, he railroaded the  out of us 

or 

That was an awsome game, we were told where to go, and how to work, all day each day


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## pemerton (May 18, 2013)

billd91 said:


> I think it does involve no less of a railroad than the node model because there is at least one outcome you've taken off the table - avoidance of the scene.



The players can avoid the scene at the metagame level, by disputing the GM's framing ("That's crap - can't we do this other thing?"). But once framed, they have to engage the scene via their PCs, yes.

The metagame approach to scene-avoidance was of course discussed at great length in the recent "Surprising the GM" thread. (Does  [MENTION=22779]Hussar[/MENTION] want to come back in on that?)


----------



## pemerton (May 18, 2013)

ExploderWizard said:


> I can see the desire of some players to kick back, and let the GM direct, and frame scenes.
> 
> <snip>
> 
> The thing missing from such campaigns is active player involvement and investment in the campaign.



The standard "indie"-game model (Sorcerer, BW, HeroWars/Quest, etc) is the GM framing scenes in response to player-signalled cues and or player-built backstory elements. These are the poster-children for active player involveent and investment in the campaign.



timASW said:


> Thats not what we're talking about though, we're talking about the GM putting together an anti-cultist dungeon crawl and the players saying "I dont really care what the cultists or doing, i have no interest in that". Or something like "my character doesnt like dungeons, they are full of traps and spells and its dark and as a human I cant see for crap. I'm not going down there, those cultists have to come out sometime. Lets camp and hide here by the entrance and kill them when they come out to do their nefarious deeds instead"



Who says we're talking about that? [MENTION=5143]Majoru Oakheart[/MENTION] didn't say antything about this.



timASW said:


> AP's are absolutely NOT railroading. You need to read one before you claim that.



Unless I'm badly misinformed, the classic AP sets the villain from the start.

And what are you purchasing? A whole lot of pre-written scenes.


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## FickleGM (May 18, 2013)

timASW said:


> No I havent.
> 
> Its very simple when talking to gamers what sounds more likely?
> 
> ...




"More likely?"

That wasn't an absolute. I think progress has been made.

As someone who hears stuff more in line with your second statement, though worded slightly less at a slant, even I'll admit the first is more likely.

Yay! Agreement.

This is so much better than where we started, when we were led to believe that railroading is NEVER a good thing and that the people who enjoy railroading don't exist.

That was a fun trip...not quite a railroad, per se, but it did lack in options.


----------



## timASW (May 18, 2013)

FickleGM said:


> Okay, I personally don't require your validation, but it is fun to participate in various discussions. I do find it odd that you would imply that players who prefer railroading don't exist because you've never seen them. Now, I don't know if you've personally and directly witnessed any of those things Umbran listed. Maybe you have. Maybe if everyone on this forum listed every possible thing in the universe, we'll find that you've personally, and directly, witnessed each and every one.
> 
> I'm going to go out on a thin very thin limb (risking being banned for the audacity of this accusation) and say that you have not personally, and directly, witnessed everything in the universe. How that might effect the credibility of your claim regarding the nonexistence of players who prefer railroading is anyone's guess.
> 
> I'll pray you're correct though, because my wife's lies are very upsetting and I am looking forward to using your infallible proof to finally put an end to her falsehoods.




Well I've played with hundreds of people over more then 20 years and while I've definitely seen players who dont care about driving the story themselves that doesnt mean the want the DM to tell them they cant do X,Y, or Z perfectly reasonable and legal according to the rules solutions to the problems that come up. Usually it means they're happy to sit back and let another PLAYER drive the direction of the story while they go along with the group.


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## timASW (May 18, 2013)

pemerton said:


> The standard "indie"-game model (Sorcerer, BW, HeroWars/Quest, etc) is the GM framing scenes in response to player-signalled cues and or player-built backstory elements. These are the poster-children for active player involveent and investment in the campaign.
> 
> Who says we're talking about that? [MENTION=5143]Majoru Oakheart[/MENTION] didn't say antything about this.




Actually its exactly what he said. His example was a wizards tower full of traps and puzzles that he worked hard on and the players wanting to use magic or some other method to blast the whole thing down from the outside instead of going inside and messing with all that. 

Which as a GM I can see being a bit disappointing. But the answer isnt to railroad the players in a way that they absolutely have to go into the tower or your throwing a fit and going home.  

The answer is not to waste your time designing a ton of things in an adventure that players are just going to want to avoid and get annoyed by and instead spend that time building open ended places and encounters that the PC's can engage in lots of ways or not engage at all and your not emotionally invested in that particular encounter or location as the GM.  



pemerton said:


> Unless I'm badly misinformed, the classic AP sets the villain from the start.
> 
> And what are you purchasing? A whole lot of pre-written scenes.




Sure they set up a villain and his plans. Doesnt make it a railroad at all. The AP's say that Villain X is doing nefarious thing Y at location Z and here's his timeline. If you follow all the clues exactly, focusing exclusively on chasing towards that villains plans here's the chain of events you will encounter. 

But they are also full of well written, interesting locations that the players can deviate from the pre-ordained path and explore and possibly find other adventures in anytime they want. 

Thats a sand box with a metaplot. Not a railroad.


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## FickleGM (May 18, 2013)

I don't dispute your experiences. I can be a pendantic jerk, though, and claims involving absolutes are a trigger. Claims that I can disprove by looking at evidence to contrary sitting across the room from me make me absolutely giddy.

I read Majoru Oakheart's post and thought that I would not like that game, which agreed with your take. But then, your post made me feel like I made a Royal Flush on the River, and I knew which side I was taking.


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## Manbearcat (May 18, 2013)

GM dice-fudging in a classic railroad (skip to 30 seconds).

[video=youtube;RjOqaD5tWB0]http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=RjOqaD5tWB0[/video]


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## S'mon (May 18, 2013)

Majoru Oakheart said:


> Basically I weigh "I don't have anything planned after this tower of traps and tricks.  I anticipated that it'd take about 3 sessions for the players to get through it, so I didn't think I'd need to plan beyond that.  I'm really bad at improvising.  I spent 3 hours mapping this tower and its traps.  If I allow them to destroy the tower, I'd either have to end the session immediately so I had time to come up with something else...or I have to just start making up plot on the fly.  Which always turns out poorly and with the players complaining that my game is boring.  So, it's either say no to blowing up the tower and giving them a little bit of disappointment in exchange for them likely having fun solving my puzzles for the next 3 sessions....or it's end the game here and telling them to go home early since we won't be playing tonight.".




Always prepare at least one extra session's worth of material. Also, have one or two events/encounters prepped to use if and only if the group go off your expected track. 
Then you won't be forced to railroad your players or threaten to quit, and hopefully they will no longer think your game is boring.
Because right now frankly this does not sound great.


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## FickleGM (May 18, 2013)

Another thought for Majoru...

When creating encounters (puzzles, traps, challenges, combats, interactions, etc.) try to keep the "core" as generic and modular as possible, then wrap it in aspects of the session. If your players avoid it, that "core" can be used another time.

Railroads that I find acceptable are those that limit plots, not actions.

I prefer to run one-shots and episodes over continuous timeline continuity. I do, however, also like to give a session synopsis prior to the game, so the players can hop on the train or let me know they aren't interested.

Do I like rails? Yes, to the extent that I gladly stick with established plot (as a player) or do my best to establish accepted plot (as a GM). Of course, this doesn't take place in a vacuum...giving and soliciting feedback is important.

Relating this back to the topic of the thread... No, I don't think a GM can cheat, but a GM can cross the line and lose his players. When I set out from the train station, I try my best to allow as much freedom as possible and to react to developments, not control them.

The only time I alter this approach is with my one-on-one games with my wife, in which I may fudge and remove choices in order to provide what she wants. When she is playing in the other three games, she plays by each group's preferences.

Now, this post has rambled from advice on using modular encounter design to my railroading techniques to GM cheating to when I allow myself to fudge. I suppose it beats multi-posting.


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## pemerton (May 19, 2013)

timASW said:


> Actually its exactly what he said.



No. He never said that his players didn't like the dungeons he designed. In fact [MENTION=5143]Majoru Oakheart[/MENTION] said his players prefer engaging the dungeon to blowing it up with disintegrate, and are therefore happy when he (as GM) informs them that their PCs attempts to circumvent it via disintegrate fails.



timASW said:


> The answer is not to waste your time designing a ton of things in an adventure that players are just going to want to avoid and get annoyed by



I'm sure that's good advice but I don't see how it bears upon what Majoru Oakheart described upthread. He never said anything about his players being annoyed.

He actually described a fairly standard feature of high level D&D play (and other gonzo fantasy games, like Rolemaster, have the same issue) - that the PCs have abilities that make it rational for them to act in ways that can make the game less than maximally entertaining at the table (disintegrating towers, scry-buff-teleport, etc - the worst example in my own RM games was "completing" whole adventures within the scope of future-oriented divination, and once a successful approach had been identified within the scope of the divination then declaring that it was undertaken by the PCs for real).



timASW said:


> Sure they set up a villain and his plans. Doesnt make it a railroad at all. The AP's say that Villain X is doing nefarious thing Y at location Z and here's his timeline. If you follow all the clues exactly, focusing exclusively on chasing towards that villains plans here's the chain of events you will encounter.
> 
> But they are also full of well written, interesting locations that the players can deviate from the pre-ordained path and explore and possibly find other adventures in anytime they want.
> 
> Thats a sand box with a metaplot. Not a railroad.



For me, what I notice is that the locations are pre-specified. The NPCs are all pre-specified. The players have basically no authorship role, and if they try to choose their loyalties or response to situations then the whole package more-or-less falls apart.

Of more-or-less zero interest to me, and not at all what I would think of as a player-driven game.



S'mon said:


> Then you won't be forced to railroad your players or threaten to quit, and hopefully they will no longer think your game is boring.



You may have misread the post you quoted - it is only when Majoru Oakheart starts improvising that his playes complain about boring games.


----------



## Mallus (May 19, 2013)

timASW said:


> AP's are absolutely NOT railroading.



They're prewritten campaign arcs --ie, stories-- that take PCs from 1st to 18th level. That's railroading. The overall direction of the story is predetermined. If that's not included under the definition of 'railroading', you need a bigger definition! 



> You need to read one before you claim that.



I have. Skull & Shackles (which, from I gather, is considered, along with Kingmaker, to be one of the more sandbox-y APs). I was going to use it for my current Pathfinder campaign, but it was too much of a railroad (mind you, I don't think railroading is bad, per se, but I have more fun running bespoke adventures that go where they go, without a predetermined course).

Skull & Shackles _depends_ on the players choosing to _stay in the Shackles_, ie that region. If they decide to say, do something entirely reasonable like take their ship and sail off to explore the world, then the whole thing collapses.

I also played in the tail-end of a Pathfinder Kingmaker campaign. It's the same thing, the players are tied to the Stolen Lands. If they try to move on/do something else, it all goes up in smoke. 

AP's _depend_ on the players consenting to be railroading along the AP's given meta-plot. How are you not seeing this?



> They lay out a series of places and interconnected events that players may or may not interact with in pretty much anyway they want.



So long as they interact with _those specific events in those specific places_. In 3 level-appropriate chunks. For the next 18 levels. 

Compared, to say, to the campaign I wrote --from scratch, as I we went along --for my long-running 3e campaign, APs look terribly confining, ie railroad-y. 

Maybe I'm just used to homebrewing everything? 



> We played it sure, didnt mean we liked it.



So the classic TSR adventures are classics because we didn't enjoy them? There's something special about gamer-logic, I'll give you that! 



> Those adventures are often Iconic because of a mix of rose tinted nostalgia from our youth and/or as much for what they did wrong as what they did right.



Don't play the nostalgia card. It's a losing hand. You might not look back on TSR-era material fondly, and that's cool. But don't think for a minute you can talk anyone else's experiences. A few months I ran one of my groups through part of the Slavers series. Nothing rose-tinted about it. Just a few hours of present-day fun.


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## Viking Bastard (May 19, 2013)

I haven't played or read any of PF's APs--so I cannot speak of their quality--but I know I'd generally pick any 1e module over anything produced by WotC.

White Plume Mountain has definitely been the high point of our 4e game, and none of us were even born when it came out.


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## S'mon (May 19, 2013)

pemerton said:


> No. He never said that his players didn't like the dungeons he designed. In fact [MENTION=
> You may have misread the post you quoted - it is only when Majoru Oakheart starts improvising that his playes complain about boring games.[/QUOTE]
> 
> That's what I meant - if he prepares
> ...


----------



## SkidAce (May 19, 2013)

Mallus said:


> AP's _depend_ on the players consenting to be railroading along the AP's given meta-plot. How are you not seeing this?




Railroading = being forced, in my definition.  If the players choose to follow a storyline plot, its not railroading.

I believe I understand your point, predetermined locations, predetermined foes, etc.  But that would mean any advanture with any background info on who done it, could be considered a railroad.

There are in my opinion three major "angles".

1. railroading, forced into a path.
2. freeform, make it up as you go along based on PC actions.

Between those two extremes lies most adventures...i.e option 3.  framework, interacting as the players choose with the plot.


Bottomline; its not a railroad to say, the evil dragon is trying to take over the globe and you must stop him, thats a fact of the world in play.  How you do it is up to the PCs.  APs show the most common method or logical solution based on the background facts.

Or should I change the foe to an aboleth based on the PCs interest, and if I don't would keeping it as the dragon be railroading.  I would think not, but this is an honest question searching for understanding of your views.


----------



## Mark Chance (May 19, 2013)

timASW said:


> Bottomline; its not a railroad to say, the evil dragon is trying to take over the globe and you must stop him....




The word "must" makes the statement a railroad.


----------



## timASW (May 19, 2013)

pemerton said:


> No. He never said that his players didn't like the dungeons he designed. In fact [MENTION=5143]Majoru Oakheart[/MENTION] said his players prefer engaging the dungeon to blowing it up with disintegrate, and are therefore happy when he (as GM) informs them that their PCs attempts to circumvent it via disintegrate fails.




According to him.. but thats crap. If the players are asking about every way conceivable to destroy the thing from outside rather then going into it its because they dont want to go in it. If they did they would have just walked up to the door and gone in without all the hallabaloo about destroying the tower. 

*Mod Note:*  Please see my note below.  ~Umbran




pemerton said:


> For me, what I notice is that the locations are pre-specified. The NPCs are all pre-specified. The players have basically no authorship role




Thats like saying everything in Eberron is a railroad because the book for it has maps, NPC's and city descriptions. Its absurd. Players dont need authorship in the Geography of the campaign world or the major NPCS's who live in it. 


, 







pemerton said:


> and if they try to choose their loyalties or response to situations then the whole package more-or-less falls apart.




This is just completely false. 




pemerton said:


> You may have misread the post you quoted - it is only when Majoru Oakheart starts improvising that his playes complain about boring games.



yeah.... according to him. But I dont ever remember seeing a railroading GM say "my players hate when I railroad but I do it anyway". Thats just not how it works. The railroader convinces himself that its better for everyone as an excuse for his poor behavior. You have to talk to the actual players in that game to see what they really think about this.


----------



## timASW (May 19, 2013)

Mark Chance said:


> The word "must" makes the statement a railroad.




I would say it has an implied assumption that you dont want to live in a world the evil dragon runs. If you dont care, well then you dont have to stop him obviously.


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## timASW (May 19, 2013)

Mallus said:


> stuff about AP's.




AP's dont in any way collapse if you go off them. Take the shackled campaign you were talking about for instance. It doesnt in any way collapse if the players sail away, or not any more then any other location based adventure does. Because thats really what your complaining about. If they decide to just leave the location then no location based adventure is gonna work. thats not railroading. They can still go away and do other things, they have full freedom of choice. That particular plot just doesnt advance without them engaging with it. 

If they sail away, they sail away. You still have some very well written location and NPC material to use for that part of the world if they come back. And you probably have a timeline for whats going to happen in their absence (i havent played that one). 

So say for instance they want to go pirate hunting instead with their ship, or be pirates. Either way. So what? Throw a quick session of pirate based fun at them and then when they come back to claim their rewards or sell their loot you let them know whats happened in the meantime and see if they want to check it out and get back on the AP. 

And if not, then you can reliably run any sort of adventures out of those locations and with those rich NPC's as your backdrop.


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## Manbearcat (May 19, 2013)

Mark Chance said:


> The word "must" makes the statement a railroad.




I don't think that is correct.  All that is happening in the above statement is an "if, then, therefore" surmise related to the stakes and whether the outcome is logically tenable for party that would have to endure it.  "If" the dragon takes over the <city, nation, world> "then" you will suffer <all of these losses that are invariably untenable>, "therefore" its reasonably assumed that you _will_  (eg must) act to prevent it.

GMs make these sorts of deductions from player queues (backstory, build choices - distinctions, beliefs, aspects, etc - or overt actions in game or dialogue out of game) all the time and attempt to create content by putting the PCs in situations or pressuring them with adversity that will challenge those GM surmises born of player queues.  Presumably, these situations will oftentimes lead to foreseeable player action and outcomes (but not always).  

A railroad is an "All Roads Lead to Rome" scenario whereby no matter the player micro (or macro) choice, no matter the outcome of the mechanical resolution, these events _will _unfold...these situations, content, rising conflict _will _manifest...and then inevitably resolve themselves in _this _fashion.


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## FickleGM (May 19, 2013)

timASW said:


> yeah.... according to him. But I dont ever remember seeing a railroading GM say "my players hate when I railroad but I do it anyway". Thats just not how it works. The railroader convinces himself that its better for everyone as an excuse for his poor behavior. You have to talk to the actual players in that game to see what they really think about this.




You do have an interesting way about you. We are not allowed to question whether or not you've been to the bottom of the Marianas Trench, but it's okay for you to show absolutely no respect for Majoru's opinion or experiences.

Railroading, especially as Majoru portrayed it in his game, can't be tolerated and is a true sign that Majoru is a corrupt tyrant who tortures his group and cannot be believed or trusted. His group must be freed from his influence and the only way to see through Majoru's wicked lies is to ask his players.

There are other things implied by your last few posts, but I'm just going to ignore those things.


----------



## JamesonCourage (May 20, 2013)

timASW said:


> pemerton said:
> 
> 
> 
> ...



Well, you're wrong. It's pretty obvious that he knows his group better than you do.


timASW said:


> If the players are asking about every way conceivable to destroy the thing from outside rather then going into it its because they dont want to go in it.



As pemerton pointed out, they didn't do that. They said:


			
				Majoru Oakheart's players said:
			
		

> Players: "Ahh, crap, he must have some sort of protection. Wouldn't it have been hilarious if we bypassed the entire adventure by using a barrel of gunpowder? I guess we go inside. I was kind of hoping that wouldn't work so I'd have an opportunity to beat that wizard's face in personally."



They didn't try everything they could to destroy it, and not go inside. They tried one thing, and then went inside, and were glad they got to. 


timASW said:


> If they did they would have just walked up to the door and gone in without all the hallabaloo about destroying the tower.



Except, of course, what you're describing isn't what happened at his table.


timASW said:


> Its absurd. Players dont need authorship in the Geography of the campaign world or the major NPCS's who live in it.



I totally agree with you, here.


timASW said:


> yeah.... according to him.



Right? But, you saying railroads are bad is only according to you. Should we discount that, or should we all take one another at each other's word as far as our own tables and are own preferences go?


timASW said:


> But I dont ever remember seeing a railroading GM say "my players hate when I railroad but I do it anyway". Thats just not how it works. The railroader convinces himself that its better for everyone as an excuse for his poor behavior. You have to talk to the actual players in that game to see what they really think about this.



Yeah... according to you. As always, play what you like 



Manbearcat said:


> I don't think that is correct. All that is happening in the above statement is an "if, then, therefore" surmise related to the stakes and whether the outcome is logically tenable for party that would have to endure it.  "If" the dragon takes over the <city, nation, world> "then" you will suffer <all of these losses that are invariably untenable>, "therefore" its reasonably assumed that you _will_ (eg must) act to prevent it..



I know that if my GM told me that this was the case for the campaign, I'd certainly see that as a railroad. The plot has been chosen, and now I must follow this course of action. It's not "there's a bad dragon, and there are consequences; how do you respond?" It's "and you respond by defeat the dragon." And that's certainly a railroad in my book. Mind you, I'd probably buy-in if the GM told me that from the start; I recently started a brief campaign as a player with the up-front knowledge that I'd have to protect a single individual (NPC) with the other PCs, while we fought against the emperor. I'm okay being railroaded, as long as I buy into it. But, it's definitely a railroad.


Manbearcat said:


> A railroad is an "All Roads Lead to Rome" scenario whereby no matter the player micro (or macro) choice, no matter the outcome of the mechanical resolution, these events will unfold...these situations, content, rising conflict will manifest...and then inevitably resolve themselves in this fashion.



I agree with this to a large extent. I just consider "you *must* fight the dragon" as a required course of action to be part of that. As always, play what you like


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## SkidAce (May 20, 2013)

Mark Chance said:


> The word "must" makes the statement a railroad.




If you chose to play that adventure, then its not a railroad.  The focus of my thought was the fact that it was a dragon.  Thats the point I was trying to make, but I used a poor word.  Replace it with "can" or "should".

What I'm tryin (poorly) to say is, if you desire to participate in an adventure, there will be some established facts that are not railroads, but just fixed plot points.


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## SkidAce (May 20, 2013)

timASW said:


> I would say it has an implied assumption that you dont want to live in a world the evil dragon runs. If you dont care, well then you dont have to stop him obviously.




Thanks.


----------



## Manbearcat (May 20, 2013)

JamesonCourage said:


> I know that if my GM told me that this was the case for the campaign, I'd certainly see that as a railroad. The plot has been chosen, and now I must follow this course of action. It's not "there's a bad dragon, and there are consequences; how do you respond?" It's "and you respond by defeat the dragon." And that's certainly a railroad in my book. Mind you, I'd probably buy-in if the GM told me that from the start; I recently started a brief campaign as a player with the up-front knowledge that I'd have to protect a single individual (NPC) with the other PCs, while we fought against the emperor. I'm okay being railroaded, as long as I buy into it. But, it's definitely a railroad.
> 
> I agree with this to a large extent. I just consider "you *must* fight the dragon" as a required course of action to be part of that. As always, play what you like




I think you've loaded the scenario with some stipulations that are not inherent.  In this case "fight".  You can "deal with the dragon problem" in whatever way you see fit and the ensuing game can be about that.  Or you can "not deal with the dragon problem" to your greater peril and the ensuing game can be about that and the inevitable repercussions.  Nonetheless, when "very bad stuff will happen generally" and perhaps "stuff charged with specific material relevant to the backstory which you have devised" is the situation presented by the GM, presumably, if the game is to have any predictive quantity and coherency, you will be provoked to one degree or another and respond in a myriad of ways in line with that provocation.

Further, if such a case is a railroad (which I disagree with that depiction), then I'm not sure I understand how you assimilate PC backstory information and make offers that reliably hook your players nor do I understand how you create situations/adversity that reliably provoke them.

I have a Paladin/Hospitaler Theme/Demon-Slayer Paragon Path/Legendary Sovereign Epic Destiny whose background was defined by the inheritance a place in a demonic cult from his parents, being slain by the cult and resurrected as a Revenant, fleeing his homeland and becoming part of an order of Knight Hospitalers and fighting for a God of Justice, Protection and Sacrifice and having the following three Distinctions as core internal motivations:

_- "I let the scourge into my homeland...I will drive it out."

- "The sick, the sullied and the down-trodden shall not carry their  burden alone.  I will take on their miseries and protect them from the  vile inequities of the world."

- "Station is a vessel for the advancement of justice, benevolence, and  mercy.  It is manifest destiny that a man of honor who understands this will  rule."_

Is it "railroading" if I put him in situations that directly challenge those 3 things; eg  Sanitariums with the afflicted being exploited by the demonic scourge, the power behind the throne of his homeland being an Abyssal Lord?  It seems that by your estimation it would be as those challenges, referenced by those PC build elements and backstory elements, should have predictive value...in this case engagement by the Paladin player.  

If true, is the only "non-railroad" a game that has no breadth or focus of PC backstory or has no GM-offered material specifically meant to challenge those player cues?


----------



## pemerton (May 20, 2013)

S'mon said:


> That's what I meant



OK - I see.



Viking Bastard said:


> White Plume Mountain has definitely been the high point of our 4e game, and none of us were even born when it came out.



It would be cool if you started a thread about this on the D&D sub-forum.


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## JamesonCourage (May 20, 2013)

Manbearcat said:


> I think you've loaded the scenario with some stipulations that are not inherent.  In this case "fight".  You can "deal with the dragon problem" in whatever way you see fit and the ensuing game can be about that.



The example that was used in this thread, and your reaction, was as follows:


			
				timASW said:
			
		

> Bottomline; its not a railroad to say, the evil dragon is trying to take over the globe and you must stop him....





Mark Chance said:


> The word "must" makes the statement a railroad.





Manbearcat said:


> I don't think that is correct.



So, I'll just say I disagree that I've loaded the scenario with some stipulations that are not inherent, and thus the rest of your post in regards to my own. As always, play what you like


----------



## pemerton (May 20, 2013)

timASW said:


> Thats like saying everything in Eberron is a railroad because the book for it has maps, NPC's and city descriptions. Its absurd. Players dont need authorship in the Geography of the campaign world or the major NPCS's who live in it.



Says who? There are whole RPGs, after all, built around the assumption that the players _will_ have authorship of the geography of the campaign world and/or of the major NPCs who live in it - Burning Wheel is one well-known example.

My own approach is something of a middle path - I told my players that I wanted to run a core 4e game; they built PCs which related to various pre-authored story elements, like the Raven Queen, and the dwarves who freed themselves from the giants, and Corellon and the Feywild; and they also authored some important elements of the campaign, like secret societies, and dwarven culture, and towns destroyed by humanoids. And when I have framed scenes for them, the backstory I have drawn is the backstory that _they_ chose to make relevant in the game. So, for instance, in my game Avandra, for practical purposes, barely exists as a god - perhaps her name has been mentioned once or twice during play. Whereas the Raven Queen - who is worshipped and served by three of the PCs - comes up multiple times in every session.



SkidAce said:


> I believe I understand your point, predetermined locations, predetermined foes, etc.  But that would mean any advanture with any background info on who done it, could be considered a railroad.
> 
> <snip>
> 
> Or should I change the foe to an aboleth based on the PCs interest, and if I don't would keeping it as the dragon be railroading.  I would think not, but this is an honest question searching for understanding of your views.



My own approach would certainly be to change the dragon to an aboleth, based on player interest as expressed via metagame talk plus PC background and play at the table.

When I use modules, I use particular encounter areas or vignettes rather than the whole module from go to woe, and I either choose a module whose theme and story elements fit what my players are interested in, or I revise and repurpose what is there.

Your comment about "any adventure with background info on who done it could be considered a railroad" is interesting. As I think I mentioned upthread, my preferred approach makes mystery gaming hard - because I am constantly toying with backstory and its realisation in play to respond to the expressed interests of the players, and to maintain pressure on the things they care about. Whereas a traditional mystery RPG more-or-less presupposes a stable backstory.



timASW said:


> They can still go away and do other things, they have full freedom of choice.
> 
> <snip>
> 
> So say for instance they want to go pirate hunting instead with their ship, or be pirates. Either way. So what? Throw a quick session of pirate based fun at them and then when they come back to claim their rewards or sell their loot you let them know whats happened in the meantime and see if they want to check it out and get back on the AP.



What is striking to _me_ about this is that "freedom of choice" is being expressed purely in ingame terms - the PCs can go where they like - but has no metagame meaning, because what the PCs will encounter is being decided by the GM based, presumably, on some pre-given background. And then when the PCs "come back" the situation they encounter has also been pre-determined by the GM based on a pre-given timeline.

For me that is not really a player driven game. It's a predominantly GM-driven one.



Manbearcat said:


> You can "deal with the dragon problem" in whatever way you see fit and the ensuing game can be about that.  Or you can "not deal with the dragon problem" to your greater peril and the ensuing game can be about that and the inevitable repercussions.



For me, I want to know where the "dragon problem" came from.

If the player have built dragon-slayer PCs, or paladins of Bahamut, etc, then I would think that evil dragon tyrants are fair game (like undead and Orcus to my Raven Queen-focused players). Or if everyone agrees that the dragon tyrant game sounds like fun, then that is not a railroad. (One variant of this - the "Burning THACO" approach - involves the GM going through his/her stack of old D&D modules, reading out the back blurbs and the intro blurbs to everyone until they agree on one that looks like fun, and then having everyone build PCs with Beliefs, Relationships etc tailored to that module.)

If the players just turn up and get told by the GM, "OK, this game is going to be about the dragon tyrant and your potential struggle with it - otherwise sorry, we haven't got a game" then I personally think that's closer to a railorad.



SkidAce said:


> If you chose to play that adventure, then its not a railroad.



For me that's not enough. I mean, if my friend wanted to run an AP and I though I could have fun dicing and talking my way through it, I might sign up even though I know in advance it's going to be a railroad.

The thing I'm interested in is not whether the players choose to participate in the game. It's who gets to author the dominant story elements, and determine the plot, of the game. Hence I'm not especially attracted to the traditional sandbox either, because it is still the GM who determines the bulk of the story elements, and the significance they have within the fiction.



timASW said:


> According to him.. but thats crap. If the players are asking about every way conceivable to destroy the thing from outside rather then going into it its because they dont want to go in it. If they did they would have just walked up to the door and gone in without all the hallabaloo about destroying the tower.
> 
> <snip>
> 
> I dont ever remember seeing a railroading GM say "my players hate when I railroad but I do it anyway". Thats just not how it works. The railroader convinces himself that its better for everyone as an excuse for his poor behavior. You have to talk to the actual players in that game to see what they really think about this.



As  [MENTION=6668292]JamesonCourage[/MENTION] noted upthread,  [MENTION=5143]Majoru Oakheart[/MENTION]'s players didn't ask about every conceivable way to destroy the thing from outside.

As far as whether or not Majoru Oakheart is misdescribing his own game, I trust him more than you as a witness of what is happening at his table.


----------



## Manbearcat (May 20, 2013)

pemerton said:


> For me, I want to know where the "dragon problem" came from.
> 
> If the player have built dragon-slayer PCs, or paladins of Bahamut, etc, then I would think that evil dragon tyrants are fair game (like undead and Orcus to my Raven Queen-focused players). Or if everyone agrees that the dragon tyrant game sounds like fun, then that is not a railroad. (One variant of this - the "Burning THACO" approach - involves the GM going through his/her stack of old D&D modules, reading out the back blurbs and the intro blurbs to everyone until they agree on one that looks like fun, and then having everyone build PCs with Beliefs, Relationships etc tailored to that module.)
> 
> If the players just turn up and get told by the GM, "OK, this game is going to be about the dragon tyrant and your potential struggle with it - otherwise sorry, we haven't got a game" then I personally think that's closer to a railorad.




If that is the case (eg - the players have no input on the content that will be dealing with before the game begins), then I would definitely agree that its "closer to a railroad".  I think I'm inclined to go with "something akin to a railroad".  But my definition of railroad is associated with in-game techniques and the effect on play; the subversion of meaning of player choice and action resolution and the utter enforcement of metaplot upon play.  I've seen that happen while the game's pre-established content is tailored to player cues so the two phenomenon can be mutually exclusive.  In a one-off step on up game, you can run a short, challenging adventure (with shallow PC build tools and no PC backstory to go on) where folks just show up with Bobfighter001 etc and just tackle the challenges.  There you can have fully legitimized player choice and action resolution that has meaning, affects micro-outcomes and perturbs the macro-outcome wildly (such that all roads don't lead to Rome).  I'm not sure I'd call that a railroad.  Something else I think.

A long-term campaign with no player input on the pre-establishment of the ensuing content should have a term applied to it for ease of communication.  I'm just not sure railroad is it.


----------



## SkidAce (May 20, 2013)

pemerton said:


> My own approach would certainly be to change the dragon to an aboleth, based on player interest as expressed via metagame talk plus PC background and play at the table.
> 
> When I use modules, I use particular encounter areas or vignettes rather than the whole module from go to woe, and I either choose a module whose theme and story elements fit what my players are interested in, or I revise and repurpose what is there.




I do the same.  I think we might be closer in style than I thought.

When I change the dragon to the aboleth, it can be based on player input, prior to the campaign starting (for the most part*).

Once they have given their inputs, I dont railroad them along a story, but the framework of who, what, why, etc stays the same.  They interact as they see fit.  Or not.

And the world adapts based on their actions and results.  I have an entire desert lost to chaos in my world because of characters interactions.  I didn't (and didn't want to) railroad that result.  They chose not to "block" this from happening (short version).



* on occasion since my players are smarter than me, they come up with a logical connection in a plot or series of events I didn't think of ahead of time, so I incorporate that.


----------



## SkidAce (May 20, 2013)

pemerton said:


> What is striking to _me_ about this is that "freedom of choice" is being expressed purely in ingame terms - the PCs can go where they like - but has no metagame meaning, because what the PCs will encounter is being decided by the GM based, presumably, on some pre-given background. And then when the PCs "come back" the situation they encounter has also been pre-determined by the GM based on a pre-given timeline.
> 
> For me that is not really a player driven game. It's a predominantly GM-driven one.




I had an epiphany (I hope).


Players or Characters!

Players modify my campaign world all the time.  Things change based on input, "geographies" get modified etc, they choose the plot ahead of time.  So its a very player driven game.

Characters can only affect stuff within the framework.  They deal with the plot.  (and their actions have consequence and benefit)


I know there are systems that don't "divide" agency like that, but at least I have a glimmering of why some of us disagree.


Neat


----------



## Umbran (May 20, 2013)

timASW said:


> According to him.. but thats crap.




Saying, "I know what his players want better than he does, even though I have never met them, and certainly not ever played the game with them," is pretty darned arrogant.

When you've gotten the Amazing Randi's million-dollar prize for proving you can read the minds of people you don't know, then maybe you can make such assertions.  Otherwise, you really ought to back off on claiming knowledge of others you don't really have.


----------



## pemerton (May 21, 2013)

Manbearcat said:


> In a one-off step on up game, you can run a short, challenging adventure (with shallow PC build tools and no PC backstory to go on) where folks just show up with Bobfighter001 etc and just tackle the challenges.  There you can have fully legitimized player choice and action resolution that has meaning, affects micro-outcomes and perturbs the macro-outcome wildly (such that all roads don't lead to Rome).  I'm not sure I'd call that a railroad.



I agree that's not a railroad. It also relies on fairly hard scene-framing - the players aren't really free to have their PCs just wander off and do stuff, as there will be no game unless they plunge headlong into White Plume Mountain (or whatever). What's distinctive about that sort of game, I think, compared to what at least some of us on this thread seem to have had in mind is that _plot_ and _story_ aren't really meaningful issues at all, from the point of view of the players of that game. It's all about the crunch!

So in the sort of game you described, fudging the dice would probably be the number one sin on the GM's side of thing.



SkidAce said:


> I had an epiphany (I hope).
> 
> 
> Players or Characters!
> ...



I'm definitely focused on _players_. If the characters are free, but everything they can deal with is established solely by the GM, I see that as pretty railroady.

Conversely, if the GM is scene framing fairly hard, but the content of the scenes reflects suggestions/requests/general vibe generated by the whole table, I don't count that as railroading even if the PCs have little or no choice (eg they wake up in a prison cell and have to try and bust their way out).

4e removes a lot of PC capability that earlier versions of D&D had that undermine GM scene-framing authority (eg teleport as the classic one). But for me that is a change that is neutral on the "railroad-ometer", because from knowing only what the PCs can or can't do I haven't learned much about what influence, if any, the _players_ are exercising.



SkidAce said:


> Once they have given their inputs, I dont railroad them along a story, but the framework of who, what, why, etc stays the same.



I change my background framework as I go along to respond to _player_ signals. So the players can influence the background and the focus of play other than via the agency of their PCs.

But once a bit of fiction has been established _ingame_, then it's fixed.

One issue I'm interested in is mechanics that permit the players, via their PCs, to impose _finality_ other than via combat. This is a big part of a game like Burning Wheel (with its Duels of Wits) or Marvel Heroic RP (with its mental and emotional stress tracks, and its rules for complications), but not really a big part of traditional D&D. I run skill challenges as establishing finality - once the challenge is resolved, if the PCs won then the players have imposed their will on the fiction and I, as GM, am bound by that. So, for instance, if the skill challenge resulted in an NPC giving their word, then I have to stick to that. I can't just change my mind and have the NPC go back on its word because I think that would be fun.

On at least one occasion, too, my players have appealed to this principle of finality to help interpret a particular scene - the PCs got in a fight with an enemy in public, after they had goaded him into attacking them (via a successful skill challenge). When the issue came up of how the onlookers responded, one of the players reminded me that part of what the players had achieved via their successful skill challenge was to make it clear that the NPC was the bad guy. This had become part of the established fiction, so I wasn't then able to disregard it and narrate onlooker NPCs who thought the PCs were the bad guys.


----------



## timASW (May 21, 2013)

pemerton said:


> I agree that's not a railroad. It also relies on fairly hard scene-framing - the players aren't really free to have their PCs just wander off and do stuff, as there will be no game unless they plunge headlong into White Plume Mountain (or whatever). What's distinctive about that sort of game, I think, compared to what at least some of us on this thread seem to have had in mind is that _plot_ and _story_ aren't really meaningful issues at all, from the point of view of the players of that game. It's all about the crunch!
> 
> So in the sort of game you described, fudging the dice would probably be the number one sin on the GM's side of thing.
> 
> ...




This post has actually yielded great insight into your method. 

Its totally opposite of mine, but I can definitely see that it has its benefits. 

My method is to try to focus the entire campaign through the characters perspective, and have the players input be through the characters words, actions and choices. 

Out of character I probably only ask for meta game feedback every 4 or 5 sessions from the group. For the rest of it I prefer that energy to be focused on in-game actions and RP


----------



## Manbearcat (May 21, 2013)

pemerton said:


> So in the sort of game you described, fudging  the dice would probably be the number one sin on the GM's side of  thing.




To be sure.  Its a, maybe, 1c "sin" in my sort of  game though as although my table is heavily _story now_, it is not remotely exclusively so.  _Step on up_ is a deep undercurrent of our creative agenda (such that for all intents and  purposes, 1a is as important as 1c) of our long term 4e game.



pemerton said:


> I agree that's not a railroad. It also relies on fairly hard scene-framing - the players aren't really free to have their PCs just wander off and do stuff, as there will be no game unless they plunge headlong into White Plume Mountain (or whatever). What's distinctive about that sort of game, I think, compared to what at least some of us on this thread seem to have had in mind is that _plot_ and _story_ aren't really meaningful issues at all, from the point of view of the players of that game. It's all about the crunch!




Certainly.  Not lets move just a wee bit down the continuum from totally shallow, disposable PCs and step on up in WPM (or whatever).  Lets say there is a modicum of pre-game coordination; the PCs agree to be from a particular region, each standing for one particular institution of the region which implicitly infuses them with a strong sense of detached (from a formal collective) nationalism.  Nothing strongly fleshed out.  Just a wee bit of player buy-in constituted as a gentleman's agreement amongst the players and the GM.  That's it.

GM presents some cliche, tried-and-true ominous threat to that informal collective (extra-planar invasion, insidious threat from within, OMGDRAGON, what have you) which works off of a reasonable inference borne of that shallow buy-in above (and perhaps shallow PC build tools to support it).  The inference being "the players have reason to act and thusly will engage with the offer in some capacity" much like I would think you would have an expectation of your players to "fight goblins when presented with a goblinoid threat."

Railroad?  

I say no.  Not if All Roads Don't Lead to Rome; the mechanical resolution is authentic, the decision-points dynamic, and the player choices legitimately influential in shaping outcomes toward, away from, orthogonal to any inexorable, pet metaplot or setting device.


----------



## Jhaelen (May 21, 2013)

timASW said:


> You find a group of 5 or 6 people who all sit down at the same table each week and all really love to be rail roaded and get them on camera saying so and I'll apologize.



Considering how this thread is progressing that would be futile. I suppose part of the problem is indeed that you are somehow set to believe that the term 'railroad' can only ever be used to describe a bad thing. To quote Mallus:


Mallus said:


> They're prewritten campaign arcs --ie, stories-- that take PCs from 1st to 18th level. That's railroading. The overall direction of the story is predetermined. If that's not included under the definition of 'railroading', you need a bigger definition!



Mallus' definition of railroad apparently matches mine.
To me 'Railroading' doesn't mean to deny the players any kind of choice. That's would be an extreme outlier. Perhaps I should have adopted the term 'framing'. I didn't since I'm not sure about the definition of 'framing'.

E.g. our DM once ran an adventure where we traveled on a large river boat along with a bunch of npcs. Then during the first night of the journey one of the passengers was murdered and our pcs were asked to help with the investigation. It was pretty obvious to everyone involved what we were expected to do, so we played along. I'd say we were railroaded into continuing the journey and trying to convict the murderer, but maybe you'd call it differently.
The adventure was very well executed but also very 'scripted'. Our choices were basically limited to those involving this investigation. It was also a lot of fun. It was one example where I didn't mind being rail-roaded because I know it would be all but impossible to run such a scenario if everyone was allowed to do whatever they wanted.

In our D&D 4e Dark Sun campaign we are in the lucky situation to have two DMs. One of them favours sandboxing and the other prefers railroading. I think we definitely get the best of both worlds: Some of the time we are free to do whatever we want but we still get to engage in elaborate, partially scripted roleplaying encounters that would be all but impossible to pull off by improvising. Imho, there's a time for both.

And that's probably all I have to say on this topic (which is btw. not exactly what this thread was originally about).


----------



## pemerton (May 21, 2013)

Manbearcat said:


> Railroad?



Probably not, but I still want to know a bit more about actual play.  For instance, if the PCs' nationalism never becomes important except as a more-or-less freestanding motivation for engaging the GM's threat, that is going to register a bit on my "railroad-ometer".

 [MENTION=6688858]Libramarian[/MENTION] and I talked about (what I think is) a related matter a while ago: adventures in which the goal is to rescue the princess, or the chalice, or the slaves, or whatever, but the adventure itself doesn't engage with or express this goal in its details - so the dungeon, challenges etc could all just be ported from one adventure to the next. (This is, as I understand it, the true meaning of a "MacGuffin".)

I don't know that I want to say such an adventure is a railroad, but it's a _something_ that doesn't enthuse me very much. I prefer player choices to inform not just their PCs' motivations, but the actual content and texture of the fiction that unfolds during play.


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## Manbearcat (May 21, 2013)

@*pemerton* Good stuff there and I agree across the board.  

If the  nationalism is just a wink, wink, nudge, nudge, say no more, say no more  (a bit of color contrived solely to legitimize the GM threat), rather  than something that thematically guides play, then "in play" there will  be "something akin to a railroad" going on...even if there is player  buy-in (they will just have to have agreed to the railroading...which certainly happens as there are many testimonials to the affect of enjoying such play).  That would transmute the "shallow" nature of the buy-in (with respect to its actual effect as thematic guide in play) into "irrelevance" and move  it backwards on the continuum.  Further, like you, that is 



> _something_ that doesn't enthuse me very much. I prefer player choices to inform not just their PCs' motivations, but the actual content and texture of the fiction that unfolds during play.




If authentic mechanical resolution  is then subverted, player choice illegitemized, key decision-points to  upend the metaplot away from Rome circumvented...then I think we're  formally at a railroad again.


----------



## SkidAce (May 21, 2013)

You guys are taking it to another whole level of intellectual discourse.   Neat.


----------



## Elysia (May 23, 2013)

It depends on expectations, and what kind of game you want to play.  If you're playing with a number crunching, numbers and hit points are everything sort of crowd, or you're playing in a tournament or competition of some sort, then yes, you could probably cheat.  That being said, it's an rpg, ughhh... you know... a _role_ playing game.  The main idea really out to be providing a fun experience for all of your fellow role players; setting a scene, character development, excitement, fantasy.  The dice are there to provide structure, and see that there's some 'fairness,' not create a penal colony.  

Perhaps you and your group need to figure out how you like to play, and then just make it clear to newcomer's that you play that way. not to be mean, but you're probably better off without them, if you played their way, the game would get bogged down with rules and numbers, and that's really not the fun part anyway.


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## Shingen (May 24, 2013)

It seems like this is the kind of thing that can be headed off by discussing it up front, as people tend to have very different expectations.


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## Majoru Oakheart (May 24, 2013)

S'mon said:


> That's what I meant - if he prepares
> (a) ahead - what will happen after the current adventure and
> (b) laterally - something to use if the players deviate from expected actions
> Then the players will have freedom of choice, without the game becoming boring due to poor GMing.
> It doesn't take a lot of extra prep, just enough that he doesn't get the deer-in-headlights look whenever they go off-script.



I likely do.  I generally prepare for most things the PCs can accomplish within the boundaries of the adventure I'm running.

If they decide to entirely ignore the boundaries of my adventure and do something else...well, it's likely I have nothing planned.

My players and I have a social contract to stay within the bounds of the adventure.  Our social contract basically consists of this:

1. You will play a character who will not kill or hurt the other characters on purpose.  No PvP, it causes bad feelings and we don't want it.  Write at least a luke warm loyalty to the rest of the group into your character background.  Even if it's as simple as "My character trusts these people and doesn't really know why."

2. When the majority of the group decides on something, your character may argue for a while but he/she will either eventually relent....OR you will roll up a character who will go with the decision of the majority.  The DM doesn't want to run 2 adventures: One for you and one for everyone else.  Everyone else doesn't want to wait for you to complete your solo adventure either.

3. You will not attempt to derail the adventure.  If it is apparent the adventure is about exploring the Caverns of Madness(or whatever), you will not attempt to run as far away from the Caverns as you can and never return.  The DM spent time and effort to write up the adventure(or worse spent real money to purchase it).  By showing up at the table, you are agreeing to play the adventure.  If you find the concept of the game so boring that you don't want to play, that's fine but then leave the group entirely.  Don't stay in the game complaining about how boring it is or how you don't want to explore Caverns.  Feel free to bring it up to the DM and maybe he'll scrap the adventure and write something else....provided the other players feel the way you do.

A couple of times in the past when people have broken the social contract it has caused bad feelings for a number of people.  For instance, I(many years ago) made up a character who was the most mercenary character in existence.  He tool Chaotic Neutral to a whole new level of "I care about no one but myself.  Tell me how this benefits me and I'll do it, otherwise screw off."  The DM wrote this whole storyline about how the entire royal family except the princess was killed an an assault by an evil and cruel nation and conquered.  We happened to be in her chamber when the assault happened and managed to get her to freedom.  Then she started asking us to raise an army and get her kingdom back.  My character refused based on the fact that there was nothing in it for him.  The DM got super angry about it because his adventure required us to help her.  The DM nearly kicked me out of the game until I agreed to switch to a character who was good aligned and wanted to help because it was the right thing to do.

At first I was kind of annoyed that I wasn't allowed to roleplay the character I wanted to play.  As time went on, I realized that everyone but me was having fun just playing the adventure the DM had planned and it was for the best that I just retired that character.


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## Majoru Oakheart (May 24, 2013)

timASW said:


> AP's dont in any way collapse if you go off them.



Most APs are written in such a way that you might as well not use the AP if you go off them.  Sure, you have a list of NPCs.  Sure, you have a list of locations.  However, if the PCs go elsewhere and never come back all of those are likely useless.

Also, a large number of these sort of adventure's timelines amount to "when the PCs get here".  Take, for instance, the mega adventure Return to the Temple of Elemental Evil.  The adventure had the villains attempting to release Tharizdun who would then lay waste to the world and destroy everything.  They are doing a ritual to release him.  However, the book basically says the ritual can take as long as you want it to.  Generally, to build urgency, you should always remind your players that the end of the world could happen any day now to make sure they stay focused on the adventure.  However, the idea is to never have the ritual finish...because the PCs will stop it before it does.

If they choose to avoid the adventure, it's perfectly plausible that none of the locations or NPCs described in the adventure will be used at all.  It's plausible that the cultists finish their ritual and destroy the world.  However, it could take years and might only complete after your entire adventure is complete.

Of course, the adventure pretty much assumes the PCs follow the adventure as written.  It is rather linear.  If you are playing the adventure, you are pretty much following the tracks exactly as written.  If you choose to avoid it, you aren't playing the adventure at all.  Meaning you've just wasted the money it costs to buy it.


timASW said:


> So say for instance they want to go pirate hunting instead with their ship, or be pirates. Either way. So what? Throw a quick session of pirate based fun at them and then when they come back to claim their rewards or sell their loot you let them know whats happened in the meantime and see if they want to check it out and get back on the AP.



It's this exact situation that I'm trying to avoid when I "railroad".  Sure, it's plausible that the characters might want to become pirates.  However, I purchased an AP because I liked the storyline behind it and liked the situations presented in it.  I also liked the fact that it made up all the encounters for me so I don't have to put in the work to write my own.  I'm lazy.  I don't want to do work if I can have someone else do it for me.

So, I'd likely do everything in my power to prevent them from simply becoming pirates and having to write a new adventure.  It would first start with the subtle, hinting that something important is going on and trying to pique their interest in it.  If they showed a complete willful disregard for the adventure a couple of times in a row, I'd drop out of character and simply say "Hey, I don't have a pirate adventure planned.  I have a cool story here that I'm sure you guys will enjoy if you follow it.  However, if you really don't want to play it then I suggest starting over with a new adventure.  Maybe one of the other adventures I bought would be more to your liking.  If you don't want to play any of the adventures I bought, well then...Anyone else want to DM?"

I don't think of myself as a human holodeck that just serves up anything people ask for.  I think of myself as a writer of an interactive story where the plot is written by me but the players get to decide their reactions to the events unfolding.


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## JamesonCourage (May 25, 2013)

Majoru Oakheart said:


> So, I'd likely do everything in my power to prevent them from simply becoming pirates and having to write a new adventure.



I just tell my players. I have one player in particular that used to continuously try to change the parameters of my game. I homebrew everything, so I'd get a map of a couple huge regions, lay out the social status of different areas, etc. But, this one player would always want to go off the map (even though he'd have thousands of miles to work with), invent flying machines or gun powder when I said they weren't part of the campaign, etc.

He just liked the idea of completely revising the setting that I wanted to run, and mostly on whimsy. I always told him "no, you can't discover that." His "why not?" was always answered with a "because I'm not going to run that" or "I don't want gun powder in my game" or "I don't have that area of the map done" or "why not this section of the world?" He always relented, but sometimes he would really cling to ideas (though I did let his inventor make a gliding 'machine', for example, and I would eventually expand the map).

But yeah, I'm not about to run something I have no interest in. And, that means I'll straight up tell them "you can't do this if you want me to run it" from time to time. Which is rare, but less so with one particular player... Anyways, I'm great at improv, but leaving the region just to leave isn't something I'm interested in (if there was a good reason, then sure), and changing the setting (in drastic ways) into something I'm not interested in running isn't going to work for me, either.

I don't quite think of myself as a "writer" in regards to GMing (though I am a writer), and my game isn't an "interactive story where the plot is written by me", I definitely get where you're coming from, and essentially do the same (though I don't really try to hook them before addressing them). We're all here to have fun together, but I'm not about to run something that I don't think is fun for me. As always, play what you like


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## Umbran (May 25, 2013)

JamesonCourage said:


> I don't quite think of myself as a "writer" in regards to GMing (though I am a writer), and my game isn't an "interactive story where the plot is written by me", I definitely get where you're coming from, and essentially do the same (though I don't really try to hook them before addressing them). We're all here to have fun together, but I'm not about to run something that I don't think is fun for me.




Yeah, and you're not doing anything wrong there.  In even the most sandbox game there is. the sand is in a _BOX_ - a defined space.  You're free to work in it as you please - but it is a space, and it is defined, and it's only basic cooperation to stay within it.


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