This guest post by TT forum moderator and veteran GM Patrick Benson (AKA VV_GM) comes at the topic of fudging die rolls from a new angle, with solid results. Thanks, Patrick!
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The topic of fudging die rolls seems to be one of those hot button issues that bring about heated debate amongst gamers. Why is that? Is it really that big of an issue whether or not a GM fudges a die roll?
It is not as if someone will be physically harmed as a result of the GM’s decision to ignore the rules and go against the roll. On the other hand, choosing not to fudge die rolls does not mean that the players and GM are mindless slaves to the system either. To fudge or not to fudge is just a decision as to what tactics a GM should use. Yet this relatively minor point seems to unleash ferocious attitudes amongst some gamers.
Perhaps the issue is not with fudging die rolls itself, but with what fudging die rolls implies about what is actually happening in the game. Whether or not you fudge die rolls is an indicator of what you are trying to accomplish at the table. Are you playing a game, or are you playing a sport?
Obviously all RPGs are games, but for the purpose of this article we are focusing on the mental attitude that a player or GM is bringing to the table. First we need to define what a game is and what a sport is:
• Game: An activity providing entertainment or amusement; a pastime.
• Sport: An activity involving physical exertion and skill that is governed by a set of rules or customs and often undertaken competitively. (For our purposes we will drop the “physical exertion” part from the definition of a sport.)
Going by the definitions given above a person who views an RPG as a game can easily justify fudging dice rolls if it adds to the entertainment value that the RPG is providing him or her. The rules and the system are merely methods that are used to provide the entertainment they seek. A roll of the dice or a rule that conflicts with this goal should be ignored so that the game may be as entertaining as possible.
Yet if the person views the RPG as a sport he or she has a very good reason to oppose the fudging of die rolls or the ignoring of a rule. The sport needs the rules to be observed to maintain the challenge and competitive factor that the person playing a sport desires. A player or GM cannot test his or her skills against the system and the other members of the group without the fair and level playing field that the rules and rolls provide.
Regardless of what side you are on in how you play RPGs, it will benefit you to know what the other members of your group are playing when they sit down at the table. The person playing a game may not enjoy a night of rolling dice and crunching numbers while testing strategies and tactics. The person playing a sport won’t be satisfied with waving away the rules and decisions made based on personal interpretation of the scene instead of the established framework of the system.
As both a GM and a player you need to understand the motivations of others in your group. You don’t have to agree with them, but you need to recognize that they exist and that they are valid to the person that holds them. If all of the members of your group are on the same side then you can begin to tweak your game to achieve the maximum effect that all of you are striving for. If there are conflicting reasons amongst players as to why they play RPGs then take a moment to work out the details of how you will handle those conflicts. Perhaps combat will be done by the book, but social situations will be handled with a focus more on role-playing than on stats and rules.
In the end it doesn’t matter if you are playing a game or a sport, but that you work out the best approach that allows everyone to play at the same table.
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Thanks, Patrick!
For more TT discussion on the topic of fudging rolls, see Fudging Die Rolls, a blog post from 2005 that provoked a heated conversation, and the now-closed forum thread Fudging revisited.
What do you think of Patrick’s analogy?
Excellent points all around. Personally, I’ve always been of the mind that a GM is entitled to fudge a die roll or two if doing so will promote a more fun game. Whether or not people regard it as game or sport, however, suspension or reality is at stake. A GM who opts to fudge a roll must do so convincingly enough that the players don’t know it happened. That way you never lose the fun sense of risk involved. If you think the GM will change a roll to save your character, you’ll never be on the edge of your seat.
As the analogy itself goes, it doesn’t represent play model play modes very well for me. There are two big assumptions being inappropriately made, I believe. The first is associating competitiveness with fidelity to the rules. The other is that fudging is (or can be) a tool which makes the game more entertaining.
(I also just can’t bring myself to call Monopoly a sport. This analogy would seem to take almost everything we call a game and make it into a “sport,” as almost everything out there – from Settlers of Catan to Go Fish – is competitive and has rules which aren’t subject to negation on the fly by one participant. It really only allows RPGs to be “games.”)
By my phrasing, I’ve identified myself as one who lies in the “no fudge” camp, so I’ll just continue writing from that perspective. There’s nothing about competitiveness that requires of people a commitment to the consistent application of the rules. People playing to “win” are just as likely to want a fair and even playing field as they are to want to twist rules in their favor.
There’s nothing about fudging that makes it a tool of entertainment, but we need to say what fudging is. It’s not just changing the rules to better suit the game and the participants – that’s houseruling, and it’s not a very contentious topic. Fudging is the GM secretly altering the result indicated by die rolls (or retconning the situation to achieve the same effect). It’s fudging for GMs and usually just called “cheating” when other players do it.
To think of fudging as helping to make the game entertaining requires that the GM knows the short and long-run tastes of the players. The raging warrior scores a critical against a major monster right in the beginning of the battle that should kill it, but the GM secretly turns this in a regular hit (or increases the monster’s hit points, etc.) so the fight will last longer.
Who does this entertain? It might entertain the GM himself, of course. Does the player running the warrior end up happier with the result? What about other players? Do they end up more entertained at the end of the night because the fight took 30 minutes instead of 2?
What if the player knows the GM fudged the roll? The first time they rolled 22 it was a hit – but the second time it was a miss. Now is the player entertained? Players can get frustrated when they find their characters’ abilities are being arbitrarily nerfed or enhanced.
Sarlax – All your points are very good ones. I wrote the article with the intent of showing that different GMs and players bring different desires and attitudes to the table. RPGs are definitely not sports, but the analogy was meant to show that some players/GMs such as yourself will not be satisfied with things like fudging die rolls. A different group of players and GM might not care.
For me gaming is first and foremost a social activity. I’m hoping that this analogy will help others evaluate the social situation at their tables better.
It is quite as Sarlax said. Many people see D&D as a game designed for entertainment, but fudging die rolls does not seem to add to that entertainment for them. Luck, chance, and risk are fun. It can be less fun when a GM alters the probabilities everyone originally agreed on to make your character more or less likely to die.
Nice post, Patrick.
I think Sarlax brings up a good issue about DM credibility.
Speaking as a veteran player, if you know your DM occasionally fudges, you are right to wonder whether or not that Troll cut your head off fair and square. Even more, you also have basis to wonder why the DM didn’t choose to fudge and save you in that particular instance.
I can think of very good arguments for a DM fudging in isolated cases. However, I think it has far-reaching (and often unintended) effects upon the game for a long time thereafter.
As such, I think the DM’s decision of whether or not to fudge should be approached very seriously.
Also, this needs to be said: A DM is fooling himself if he thinks the players don’t know the difference. We might not call you on it, but we know.
As usual, a good post and good comments all around.
I think another important consideration when “to fudge or not to fudge” is flexibility of the story. It’s one thing to adjust course because the fighter got a critical that ends the battle early, it’s something completely different if that same battle is early in the campaign and against the BBEG. 😉
If the GM — and the players — are excited about the possibility of having to drastically modify the impending course of the story due to the random results of dice, then by all means, don’t fudge! But if the GM has some things that “have to” happen to keep things on track, then some marginal adjustments might be in order. Heck, I recall reading somewhere around here the suggestion that, “If something has to happen, don’t roll at all.”
Of course, a counter-argument to this is “don’t plan your game so that things have to happen,” but I’d offer that we’re not all that good at improv.
I’m solidly anti-fudging when I GM, but there’s at least one crack in the facade: in my group’s current Stargate game, I’m 99% sure that our pro-fudging GM has fudged stuff, and I don’t mind one bit.
That’s due in large part to the fact that he has an excellent handle on when to fudge. In combat, he usually tells us the AC we need to hit — no fudging there. We’ve had some dramatic successes, but we’ve also had at least one very dramatic failure — and there was definitely no fudging in the latter case.
At least for me, he’s struck the right balance, which I’d characterize under Patrick’s analogy as “part game, part sport.” I can’t speak for either of the other players (one of whom is Sarlax) on how well they like his approach, or for our GM on whether he sees things the same way.
I’ve said most of this before, so I’ll be as brief as my verbose self will allow: 🙂
1. I think the basic premise of the OP is flawed the same way that nearly all such discussions of no-fudging from the opposite perspective are flawed. And this is what (mildly) irritates me the most about the fudging crowd. It’s not whether you fudge or not. I don’t really care. Rather, it’s the seeming inablity to understand that *not fudging* can be done to advance the story, provide entertainment, etc. In fairness, I don’t see how the fudger could know such things, unless they also spent considerable time playing with no fudge (and all that entails). I think the discussions are so contentious because most people find a way they like, they do that, and they never change. I happen to have a broader perspective, I think, because I have enthusiastically played almost the whole range, at one time or another.
2. The appropriateness or not of fudging is often pushed for reasons that have squat to do with the question. For example, you can run a very low death game with no fudge, if you are willing to put in the necessary house rules. (And no, these don’t have to be complicated or ornerous.) If you are good enough at probability to know that N deaths are inevitable after X fights, given a certain system, then you are also good enough at probability to change the system to reduce N to an acceptable number. Or you can fudge it. (Or do some combination.) What you shouldn’t do is delude yourself that fudging is the only way out.
In my view, the degree to which one fudges, and the effects on the players, are highly variable based on player skills, attitudes, etc. I will never fudge with my current group again, because when I fudge they will game me. (They otherwise are very good at separating character/player knowledge and other aspects of roleplaying.) I’ve run other groups where fudging would be no particular problem, and I might fudge with such a group if I didn’t want to bother fixing the system instead.
3. In the long run, there is no such thing as completely hidden fudging by the GM. Plus, even the suspicion of fudging is enough to produce some bad effects–if the players are the kind where it matters. Contrawise, if the GM fudges so little as to not get caught, then fudging isn’t very important in that game, is it? So it would be better to simply be open about whether the fudging will happen or not, even if you intend (for reasons of pacing, immersion, or whatever) to disguise the fudging at the time.
4. There are (at least) two kinds of story games, and fudging is only a positive for one of them. If you want the story to go in a predefined way, then you may indeed want to fudge at certain moments. In a lot of systems, you can’t have a story where the farm boy will become king 10 years later unless you guarantee that he not die irrevocably. Since in a lot of game, “an acceptable level of death” is greater than zero, even house rules may not bail you out here. And it would seem pretty silly to make up special rules for this case, if the level of death is otherwise just fine.
On the other hand, if you want the story to be the record of what emerged during play, then the only real reason to fudge is the unwillingness or inability to make appropriate house rules. You’ll have to weigh the cost of getting those house rules against the fact that fudging in that game is going directly counter to the stated purpose of play. And here is the really key part of this point in regards to the current topic: Some people are not entertained by gaming stories where the farm kid will become king, but are entertained by gaming stories where a farm kid *just might* become king if lucky, skilled, and audacious enough. Of course, “just might” also means that he could also end up in a ditch somewhere, too. 🙂
5. Finally, note that fudging discussion cuts across all GNS, GDS, and other theory distinctions. It’s possible to have a higly “challenge-oriented” game where some things simply aren’t considered acceptable and the group is unwilling or unable to house rule in a way that will fix it. What I call “minimalist fudge” elsewhere often falls into this camp. It’s possible to have a very “dramatic” or “character-driven” game where the rules support that kind of play with no fudging required. There may be a high corrrelation between people who prefer certain style and the amount of fudge, but it’s a correlation of preference, not a cause and effect link.
“Heck, I recall reading somewhere around here the suggestion that, “If something has to happen, don’t roll at all.—
This is the absolute, critical component of a zero-fudge game. You must internalize it to run successful zero-fudge. (You can run pretty good minimalist fudge simply by being good with house rules.)
“Of course, a counter-argument to this is “don’t plan your game so that things have to happen,†but I’d offer that we’re not all that good at improv.”
I’m not that good at improv. I plan all my games so that nothing in particular has to happen. It’s merely a GM skill, like any other GM skill. Some people will be better at it than others, but most people can get considerably better at it with practice, if they want to. In fact, I’d say people good at improv are probably at a disadvantage when it comes to developing such skill. Improv is a way of covering when that skill fails. If you are really good at improv, you don’t get as much practice, unless you consciously train yourself. If not good at improve, you’ll get plenty of practice. 🙂
To re-quote: “Heck, I recall reading somewhere around here the suggestion that, ‘If something has to happen, don’t roll at all.’ ”
That about sums it up for me. If your primary antagonist is going to battle the heroes in the first game of the series but must escape, don’t save him go my diminishing the PCs. Bill conceived of the Sir Gathan as an expert long-swordsman, so don’t be surprised if he can kill the villain with a nice roll and his Smite Evil ability.
The villain should get away not by deus ex machina but by being a villain – his minions swarm in at the last moment while he flees, or maybe he uses doubles to fight any battle which he might lose.
A more general rule might be: Never design your campaign so that it can be undone by a single event.
Hmm. This is one of those heated topics. I myself will never reveal to my players if I have fudged or not. I won’t weigh on one side or another of the debate. Why?
Whether you fudge or not players should not know about it. Sure it is a game, and the Game Master will always be making concessions for the players. If you were playing totally realistic to the situation, then the “adventure” into an old cave full of unintelligent monsters would have no locks for the thief to pick. The quiet night mission into a mansion would have no “chance” encounters with the guards outside for the warrior. The analogies are pretty base here, but the point is that Game Masters often change, add, or remove things so that all players get a chance to have some impact.
However, the players should never, ever, ever know when you have done that. The players want to go out and have a blast with their characters. They don’t want to think they were ever “handed” anything. If they specifically knew that some element was made just for them, then it doesn’t feel like their character is challenging the world. It feels like they are being mollycoddled through it.
The same goes with fudging. A player can feel mollycoddled. It is hard as a Game Master to allow something that is going to have as much chance of killing the player’s fun as well. Character death can definitely be one of those things that kills fun for a player. So what do you do?
Well you fudge or don’t, just don’t tell the players. You can change some element of the encounter, which some might consider fudging, to allow (as the post said yesterday) victory despite defeat. Still NEVER EVER TELL YOUR PLAYERS.
(John Arcadian) Whether you fudge or not players should not know about it.
This is one of the reasons I stopped fudging. I didn’t like not being honest with my players (even if the dishonesty was for their benefit), and I didn’t like what fudging rolls felt like when I did it. It’s largely an emotional response to something that seems like it should be a logistical or otherwise non-emotional issue — which is kind of weird, now that I think about it.
For me, the easiest way to make clear that I wasn’t fudging rolls was to make all of them in the open. When I roll behind the screen, it’s for things like enemies observing the party in secret, where a high or low roll can send a signal (and I don’t fudge those, either).
I agree with John that if you fudge don’t tell. I do fudge in games with groups where I know the players won’t care. In combat I don’t fudge at all when it comes to the player’s rolls (killed my main baddie in the first round? sucks to be me for the moment), but I might fudge my own rolls or just pretend to roll if I sense that a player is going to be really upset with the consequences. I prefer players who take that sort of thin stride, but some don’t and I might give them a break if I think I can salvage their evening by doing so.
In the end, I don’t have a problem with fudging if it works for the group. If it is an issue don’t do it. But I still wouldn’t use it a lot even with a group where it would be considered okay. I go with a 50/50 rule – if I fudge this roll then the next is straight.
I think there a lot of good points being made here. I know that fudging was the example I used in the article, but the article really isn’t about fudging. It is about identifying what your players are after using the “game vs. sport” analogy.
So what kind of situations other than fudging apply to this distinction? For me it includes adventure design. A group of players wanting to play a “game” probably wants a rules light adventure with a lot of rock star moments. A group of players playing a “sport” might want challenges designed to push them to the limit.
Whether or not you think your players will know that you fudge, the will know, or at the very least suspect. As for the “character death” side issue, I already answered that.
Keep in mind that fudging is not merely what you do, it is intent. Fudging and improvising are not the same thing. Let’s use an example. The GM has a (rather boring for sake of example) set piece encounter with 4 goblins. As the party approaches, he decides that there are really 2 goblins. Is that fudging?
It’s a trick question. You can’t tell from that information alone. Why did the GM *really* make the change?
One player went home, his character poofed out, and the GM intended the challenge to be based on the number of characters? Probably not fudge, except in the strictest sense of the term. (I wouldn’t even do that, but I use in-game mechanisms for such adjustments.) One character is comatose, and the party left him in a hidden cave and pressed on.? This is borderline, since the party could have turned back. Party all beat up and the GM wants “an exciting fight” with no deaths? Blatant fudge, but less likely to cause trouble or be noticed than keeping the 4 goblins and having them mysteriously be unable to hit. But let’s not stop there.
GM looks at his notes and realizes that he totally messed up this encounter, when it should have been two goblins all along? That’s called improv in the aid of fixing a screw up. GM realizes that the group only has 45 minutes to play, and around the corner from the goblins is an encounter that will provide a much more satisfying ending for the evening? That’s improv with an eye towards pacing. Party has been parlaying with every goblin in site, GM is tired, and just can’t come up with 4 more interesting goblin personalities right now? That’s call expedience. 🙂
I think the real key here is that “more interesting” is not the same thing as “more difficult”.
“So what kind of situations other than fudging apply to this distinction?”
VV_GM, I find it impossible to answer your question. Fudging doesn’t apply to that distinction. I’ve never met anyone personally (out of hundreds of gamers) that plays for what I understand you to be calling “sport”. And in my experience, the players most wanting the “rock star moments” are the ones most likely to want some fudging.
I think people who have never run minimal fudge or zero fudge talking about how it works is like the Forge personalities talking about simulationism. It may occasionally lead to gems, but mainly it clouds the issue and drags a whole lot of stuff into the discussion that has nothing to do with reality. An interesting question is why those who don’t fudge are so all-fired convinced they know why others do not. 🙂
I’ll start with a real-life anecdote.
One day, on an excursion to the beach, a group of friends and I decided to play beach volleyball. In the spirit of having fun, we decided not to keep score. That soon degenerated into no rules at all, with everyone just basically lobbing a ball around with a big net in the middle. After a few minutes, I walked away. When asked why I wasn’t participating, I said that it wasn’t any fun.
My friends fell into two camps. One group sided with me. They enjoyed showing off their skills in the game, but it was meaningless since “playing sloppy” was not only allowed, but encouraged. What was the point of trying if nothing mattered?
The other camp was upset. The point of the game was for a few friends to run around and have fun; just enjoy the time spent without competing or judging each other. By insisting on rules, I killed that atmosphere.
While I’d probably use different terms that VV GM, I agree with his point. I know players that just enjoy being in character; they don’t want chance dice rolls to spoil the fun of immersing themselves in it. I also know players that enjoy building characters to be able to overcome the challenges they face. They’d feel cheated if their careful planning ultimately didn’t matter.
What does matter is striking the balance; identifying who you have at the table and running adventures in a way that gives each player most of what he or she wants without invalidating what others want.
(Crazy Jerome) here is the really key part of this point in regards to the current topic: Some people are not entertained by gaming stories where the farm kid will become king, but are entertained by gaming stories where a farm kid *just might* become king if lucky, skilled, and audacious enough. Of course, “just might†also means that he could also end up in a ditch somewhere, too.
And thus the discussion wanders into gamist vs. simulationist play, or whatever the right terms are.
Keeping it in layman’s terms, and building on some of the more recent comments: you need to understand, as the GM, what kind of game your players want. After playing GURPS I realized I am not a simulationist. I longed for the unrealistic-but-easier-to-succeed D&D combat I’m now playing again. At first I felt guilty about wanting a game-ier system, but eventually I realized that was mostly because my friends at the time were all simulationists. Me, I don’t like “losing.” I blame video games and save re-loads. 😉
“While I’d probably use different terms that VV GM, I agree with his point. I know players that just enjoy being in character; they don’t want chance dice rolls to spoil the fun of immersing themselves in it. I also know players that enjoy building characters to be able to overcome the challenges they face. They’d feel cheated if their careful planning ultimately didn’t matter.”
Here’s the point that a bunch of you keep missing, though. It’s the elephant in the living room: I know players that just enjoy being in character, and they can’t do that when the GM is bailing them out by fudging. It’s not about overcoming challenges in a gamist sense (1). Rather, it’s about metagaming intruding into the game in a way that people don’t want (2).
Fudging is metagaming. That’s not my only objection to it, but it’s one that seems to get missed a lot, for some reason. I might be playing a character that does no “careful planning” at all. If you don’t let him experience the consequences of his actions, then you are denying me the ability to play that character as envisioned.
I’ll agree that I’ve never heard of a zero fudge game where the players didn’t embrace the real possibility of failure as a desired, positive aspect of the game.
(1) Technically speaking, I believe that gamist play requires that you fiddle with your character’s abilities in some way in order to overcome the challenge. It could be how you build. It could be how you manipulate your powers. However, in any kind of play you can also overcome challenges using your wits or by strategic or tactical placement of your character based on *roleplaying* decisions. That is, your *character* really wants to kick butt and take names. Of course, these aren’t mutually exclusive in theory, and are probably often together in practice. But they aren’t the same thing, conceptually, at all.
(2) Note that I have no objection to metagaming in the abstract. We do certain kinds of metagaming all the time, ourselves, and we like the kinds we use. No one would call our group terribly “immersive”.
“Fudging is metagaming. That’s not my only objection to it, but it’s one that seems to get missed a lot, for some reason.”
That’s because fudging isn’t metagaming.
Metagaming is all about using knowledge that you have but your character doesn’t; fudging is knowing a result but disregarding it. Both are forms of cheating. If I catch a player pretending that his rolled “6” is a “16,” I don’t call him a metagamer, I call him a cheater. Ditto when I catch a GM doing it.
While I can see the argument that a GM fudges for metagame reasons (such as “I need this PC to survive because it’s important that he be around for the climax”), I find it difficult to call a GM a “metagamer,” because a GM always considers a character/scene/session/adventure/campaign from a broader perspective. That’s just being a GM.
going back to what sarlax said, i change the rules in monopoly to make it more FUN, isn’t that what a game is all about?
and its NOT CHEATING if it makes the player happy and the other players are ok with it
(godcomplex) and its NOT CHEATING if it makes the player happy and the other players are ok with it
That fits right in with what I saw as VV’s central point: If everyone’s on the same page about game/sport, social contract style, then all is well. But technically, fudging is cheating — just a widely accepted and very useful form of cheating. 😉
Walt C – Your anecdote about the volleyball game is exactly what I was trying to express in the article. What one person considers fun is not going to be fun for everyone. You have to take that into consideration when you are the GM. You should use the tactics that produce the most fun for everyone at the table.
Now a lot of people have commented that fudging is wrong, and causes problems. I see the points being made, but I don’t agree with them because my own personal experiences negate them. I’ve run games where I fudged that were a lot of fun for the players, and I’ve run games where I didn’t fudge anything and it was a lot of fun for the players. The same can be said for when I was the player myself.
Does this make fudging right? Quite frankly I don’t care. If fudging is wrong, then I have had fun doing things the wrong way. So what? I still had fun, and even more important is that the individual members of the group had fun.
So why were those experiences, whether there was fudging or not, fun? Looking back the conclusion that I come to is that the group as a whole was of the same mindset as to what they wanted out of the game, or there were agreed upon compromises so that the game could be as enjoyable as possible despite conflicting styles.
To me the whole “Fudge/Don’t Fudge” arguement is kind of ridiculous. If a group is okay with the GM fudging and enjoy the game, why change it? If a group enjoys not fudging, why change that? I think that the TV show American Idol is silly. My wife watches every episode. Who am I to tell her what she should do to enjoy her evening because I don’t like her choice in programs? To me fudging falls right into that category. Are you having fun with your game? Then you are doing it right. Case closed.
A lot of the time when I read an argument for or against anything involving gaming I tend to think that the what the author is really saying is “This is what I like, so it is right.” and that kind of thing just doesn’t fly with me. That is why I try to write my articles as approaches to be tried out, and not absolutes that dictate how gaming should be. I think it excludes new people from the hobby, and is really just a bad attitude for life in general. The first part about what someone likes or dislikes isn’t the issue, it is the second part about being right. Two different people playing in the same game can have totally different experiences even though the “right” approach was used. Since I know that such a situation is possible, how can there be a right way to play RPGs? The action at the table is so subjective to the individual that I truly believe there is no right way to game.
So if you can’t stand fudging by all means don’t do it. If you think fudging is the only way to play, go ahead and indulge yourself with it. Just don’t tell me it is the “right” way. I’ve been in enough games with enough players to know better than to try and define how someone else should have fun.
Anyhow, it was fun to write the article and read the comments. I’m glad it got as large a response as it did.
I’ve been pro-fudge and anti-fudge, and now I’m somewhere in the middle: I fudge very rarely and only when it will be more fun. I try to avoid situations where fudging may be necessary, but I cannot see all possibilities in a game.
FWIW: Sometimes I fudge by fiddling with the numbers (“this boss critter is going down fast; I’ll give him 20 more hit points”). Sometimes I fudge by misreading the dice (“the party’s been playing really smart; it would suck to have a lucky goblin detect them now”). On average, I guess I fudge about once every four or five sessions.
Regardless, I will always fudge to cover up my mistakes when they are detrimental to the group (“wow, I really miscalculated the CRs here, and might wipe the party with a random encounter… I’ll have to adjust on the fly”). I do this maybe once a year.
However, when fudging becomes a “regular thing”, you’re not running a good game. I think we can all agree that fudge is a very strong spice.
Now that you know where I’m coming from… Has anyone else noticed that fudgers really don’t care if you fudge or not, but the anti-fudgers often seem offended that other people fudge?
CJ and others have properly noted that good game customization and planning are great substitutes for fudging, but I’m frankly not good enough, and don’t have enough time to figure out all of the possible consequenses of the current “in-game” situation to run that way.
Yes, I’ll customize the game and try to create situations where one bad roll won’t stop the story, but since when do the players actually follow my lead? 😉 Fudging is like an air bag: I don’t want to use it, but it’s there just in case.
Hohumm.. I came to see if Martin had justified closing the previous fudging thread and what do I see? It is now on the frontpage! Bit hypocritial, 🙂 . It is represented from single ‘side’ of the conversation and has almost nothing to do with the points of the other ‘side’.
It is really curious how pro-fudge people fail to see the point being made by CJ and sarlax and even me in the closed thread, and instead label them as easily offended idealists who just don’t know shit. Consider non-fudgers as peers and then read and think what they are trying to convey. And give examples Where it Does Not Work, instead of conjectures of this sort.
Not fudging has nothing to do with:
* Relying on dice to provide story
* Ruining the story by random mishaps
* Arbitarily killing characters
* Conjectures
* Not allowing story-oriented game
* Powergaming
* Tactical D&D fights
And it really has nothing to do about viewing the game as sport. I could equally well say that it is the distinction of player oriented vs. gm:s premade-golden-plot oriented. (and it would even be bit less incorrect)
VV_GM said: “Has anyone else noticed that fudgers really don’t care if you fudge or not, but the anti-fudgers often seem offended that other people fudge?”
I notice the same thing on forums where they post cheat codes for video games and stuff. Those who don’t like it, don’t think anyone should do it. I think the philosophies are similar, because some people see fudging as a type of cheating. In a lot of single player video games, I will use cheat codes to make it more fun. Take some of the droll out of endless leveling up a character, or killing some of the time-wasting elements. That is a single player game though. That kind of stuff I would be hugely opposed to in an MMO, as well as when I’m playing fighting games with friends.
The concept can be drifted to games. The anti-fudgers consider it cheating, and it a way it might be. You are certainly modifying the game difficulty on the fly. The pro-fudgers consider it improv, and in a way it might be. You are modifying the situation to meet a previously unknown element. As a Game Master I think the big thing is seeing how your players feel about it.
oh, VV_GM, I know you meant this thread to be more about sport vs game, but it is like mentioning politics or religion in polite conversation. Fudging is a big red button. 🙂
Given that I’ve written the next guest post about cheating, I want to make my position on fudging clear.
Fudging is cheating. Whether you choose to fudge is, as VV_GM originally stated, dependant on your players.
I currently run two games. I’m more apt to fudge in one than the other because of exactly that, the composition of my players.
And I don’t see anything wrong with having a different style for each group.
(Annoyed Discordian) Hohumm.. I came to see if Martin had justified closing the previous fudging thread and what do I see? It is now on the frontpage! Bit hypocritial, 🙂 . It is represented from single ’side’ of the conversation and has almost nothing to do with the points of the other ’side’.
The thread and this post having nothing to do with each other, apart from sharing a topic. We’ve talked about fudging on TT before, and we’ll probably talk about it again — it’s an interesting subject, and it tends to provoke great discussion with lots of viewpoints from different perspectives.
It is really curious how pro-fudge people fail to see the point being made by CJ and sarlax and even me in the closed thread, and instead label them as easily offended idealists who just don’t know shit. Consider non-fudgers as peers and then read and think what they are trying to convey.
Up until your comment, there had been zero disrespect shown in the comments on this post. There’s nothing at all wrong with being passionate about the topic, but there’s no need for this kind of invective.
It’s interesting how heated this whole debate can become.
Speaking of respect: Fudging, unless explicitly stated by the DM, is a kind of deception. Of course DMs employ deception all the time. However, fudging is a kind of deception the players might not be cool with. Personally, that’s why I don’t like it.
Everyone has good points from both sides.
However, I am sure we all can agree on one thing: Honesty is ALWAYS a best policy. Thus, if a DM wants to fudge, I think his players deserve a heads-up before play. Otherwise, they might assume he doesn’t, and thus could be offended when/if fudging is discovered.
John Arcadian – Yep. It is so in the category of religion and politics. It is the gamer’s Roe vs. Wade. 😉
But I must point out that you quoted Telas and not me.
Mark – I agree with what you said. When the players know and agree that it is okay for the GM to fudge if it is done for the purpose of heightening the experience it isn’t cheating. I ask my players now if they want me to fudge in order to tweak the game to their liking, otherwise it is a straight game. When you fudge without that consent it is cheating. When you have that consent it is taking advantage of a tool that all have agreed is at your disposal.
It should also be stated that many games encourage result manipulation (giving you a higher total), usually through some type of action/hero/force/drama/etc. dice/points, as a stop-gap measure.
Many games also allow for risk-removal in some situations: A good investigator in a d20 game could probably take 10 and get the most out of a Search check; if he spent the time to take 20 he’s pretty assured of getting it.
“It should also be stated that many games encourage result manipulation (giving you a higher total), usually through some type of action/hero/force/drama/etc. dice/points, as a stop-gap measure.”
This kind of codified system may end up being fine for both sides. I believe Spycraft (gack!) has a mechanic in which the bonus points PCs receive are matched by a similar pool for the GM. It’s assumed that the GM is always abiding by the rules (no cheating) but that he can spend his points to modify things as drama calls for it.
The recent Expedition to Castle Ravenloft features another option. When playing the game in which action points are used (such as in the Eberron setting), the antagonist gains his own action points to spend whenever a PC spends one and still fails his action.
These kind of approaches get towards correcting the problem I have with fudging: they help restore fairness. If the players can modify the game in the same fashion as the GM, there isn’t a problem.
VV_GM, Telas, oops.
The day is long,
the mind is tired,
“And miles to go before I sleep,
And miles to go before I sleep.” – Samuel Coleride, uh I mean Robert Frost 🙂
“Now that you know where I’m coming from… Has anyone else noticed that fudgers really don’t care if you fudge or not, but the anti-fudgers often seem offended that other people fudge? ”
No, I’ve noticed that non-fudgers are offended by the partronizing way that fudgers tell us why we do what we do, and don’t listen to us when we correct them. If you’ll read very carefully in the previous posts, you’ll see that. Fudge or don’t fudge. I don’t care. (I repeat myself here, note.) Don’t come onto a message board and try to explain how non-fudging works, if you don’t know. If you haven’t tried it, seriously, THEN YOU DON’T KNOW.
I’ve also noticed that, with a few exceptions, fudgers rarely answer any argument made against their points. Now, this could be because we non-fudgers are not explaining ourselves very well. Thus I’m growing increasingly more blunt in an effort to get your attention, as in YOU DON’T KNOW WHAT YOU ARE TALKING ABOUT. Do I have it now? 🙂 Perhaps some of you would like to answer the points that I and others have made, or ask for clairification, if we aren’t clear?
The irritation comes because, if you take the fudgers take on non-fudging seriously, the obvious conclusions one would derive from that are rather unflattering to most non-fudgers. This is why Discordian is ticked.
Also, Fudging is metagaming, because metagaming is not soley concerned with the separation of player and character knowledge. Failure to do so is one very common form of metagaming. Metagaming is, literally, anything you do that supports the framework of gaming, that is not internal to the game itself.
I think it’s practically impossible to play a RPG without some metagaming. You pick the ones that work for you, and you avoid the ones that have too much baggage.
And despite my blunt language, I’m not angry with anyone here. Don’t get me wrong. It’s a useful discussion. But my suggestion is that non-fudgers concentrate on telling us why you fudge, and you let us non-fudgers tell you why we don’t. Deal?
I believe many of us who may fudge have explained our reasons for doing so. I think it is a valid tactic that a GM may use to heighten a situation, or ensure a player’s enjoyment if done well.
If done poorly it will take away from the enjoyment of the game, but that can be said of many things.
What I don’t get is why people from both sides of the debate seem to think that the other side “doesn’t get it”. I’m a very succesful person considering my background making six figures in a highly technical and competitive field. This is due to my ambition, work ethic, skills, and intelligence. Why is it assumed that I don’t get the points being made here? I don’t agree with them, but I do understand them.
Again, this is something that I see happening on both sides of the debate. If the non-fudgers find what the fudgers points are to be unflattering, well the opposite is probably true as well.
I’ve come to the conclusion that it isn’t even worth debating anymore here at TT. Both sides have made good and bad arguments, but so much crap has been thrown in to the mix that now I just don’t care. Fudge? Don’t fudge? Who gives a f***? If it works for your group do it. If you want to try something new and find that it works better, great.
GMs that aren’t firmly on one side or the other should experiment with fudging and non-fudging and come to their own conclusions, and they should invlove the group with those experiments. And whatever the end result is for your group that works best is what you should go with.
I fudge on Fridays but I don’t on Sundays. Which side am I on in this debate? LOL
“Also, Fudging is metagaming, because metagaming is not soley concerned with the separation of player and character knowledge. Failure to do so is one very common form of metagaming. Metagaming is, literally, anything you do that supports the framework of gaming, that is not internal to the game itself.”
If that’s the definition you want to use CJ, I’m not going to argue with you. You originally asked why most people miss that fudging is metagaming, and I was answering that point. Most gamers, I suspect, don’t use a definition of metagaming that would include fudging.
Then again, I could be totally wrong 🙂
CJ and others,
Not to feed the flames, but that’s my quote. 🙂 If you’ll check the post it’s in, I address your comments specifically and mention that I was once anti-fudging. I don’t consider myself an absolutist either way, but I do accept that there are appropriate times to fudge (just as there are appropriate times not to fudge).
I’ll repeat myself here. Yes, it is possible to reduce or cut off the “need” to fudge by proper game design and implementation. However, I am frankly not that good of a GM to predict every possible situation which may arise, so I leave the door to fudging open.
And in re-reading this page and the fudge-related forum pages before, I definitely think that the “purists” view fudging as some kind of a sin, judging by the language they use to describe it – cheating, metagaming, dishonest. I don’t think a single fudger has mentioned that the non-fudgers take up their tactics, but many of the non-fudgers have strongly suggested that the fudgers stop fudging.
But that’s just my humble opinion, and I’ll readily admit that it is not exactly objective. 😀
Respectfully,
Telas
I’m solidly anti-fudging when I GM, but there’s at least one crack in the facade: in my group’s current Stargate game, I’m 99% sure that our pro-fudging GM has fudged stuff, and I don’t mind one bit.
I’m pro-fudge; I view my job as to provide an entertaining game for all parties. I’ll happily fudge a roll for a player who’s had a horrible string of bad luck in an evening, nothing seems to go his way, and is clearly not having fun. I’ll fudge for story to make the encounter more memorable. I typically fudge in the player’s benefit. Rarely I’ll fudge against them, and typically only to add an element of uncertainty.
That’s due in large part to the fact that he has an excellent handle on when to fudge. In combat, he usually tells us the AC we need to hit — no fudging there. We’ve had some dramatic successes, but we’ve also had at least one very dramatic failure — and there was definitely no fudging in the latter case.
While I do fudge in combat sometimes, it’s only things that I can control: the NPC misses so that the PCs can get the glory of taking down the Big Bad, etc. I don’t fudge “static” things like Defense ratings so that a hit one round mysteriously becomes a miss, etc.
I believe that any good story (and game) must have the element of risk. I’m fine to let characters die through circumstances or poor choices, but rarely due to a string of bad rolls from faceless NPCs. I’ve had that happen to me in play and it’s not fun.
We game to have fun and I’ll do anything to achieve that, including fudging a roll when necessary. As of yet (20+ years of RPGs), no complaints. 😉
To get back to the Sport vs. Game division:
Back in the early eighties, a friend was asking our gaming group about D&D, and we explained it to him. He asked, “How can you win?”
Our responses varied from “There is no winner in RPGs” to “You win by surviving”. To the later, the non-gamer summarized: “So you have to kill them”. He then went on to say how if he was DM he’d just attack with demi-gods, immaterial ghosts, invisible men, what have you, in order to kill the characters.
Eventually we came to a consensus among the gamers in the conversation that the DM can’t win in that sense. Then the non-gamer said, “Then it’s not a game. Games have winners and losers”.
Some time later, the guy tried gaming for a few sessions. He wasn’t a half-bad player, but he didn’t stick with the hobby, preferring wargames. (Detail: He hated chess.)
We can understand Patrick’s point whether we accept his definitions or not. I think we’re all in the hobby to have fun, whatever our personal tastes regarding remaining faithful to the rules.