As a GM / DM / ST  I never find myself wanting to fudge a roll before I make it.....

Only when I roll like a roll that just comes out of now where and it says everyone dies for little to no reason.

Can we get an option to fudge a roll after it's made?

In reply to Azraile (msg # 1):

Delete it and recreate the roll save now you fudge it.

oh i thought they could see the deleted message

It's a "secret roll" entry, only GMs can see it.

Thanks for the info! I also thought you can only fudge before the roll.

(To clarify, it helps me decide not to join any other games on RPOL as a player, but that's really useful!)

Why would this make you not join games?

The same thing happens in real games too, and this is an important GM tool, but it becomes rather pointless if everyone knows when the GM is doing it.

It is before (or in a way; during) the roll.  GMs cannot edit rolls.

Speaking from experience roll fudging can be very important to keep the game running smoothly. What if the big bad gets a few 1's in a row? Would you like to finish off an important boss by sheer dumb luck? Or on the flip side the gm could fudge important rolls made for the players in order to stop a tpk.

Does it really matter why it makes me decide one way or another? I just said thanks for an information that's important to me.

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Spoiler text: (Highlight or hover over the text to view)
(If you insist, because the GM fudging rolls lowers my fun to the negative levels).

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Yes, but deleting the roll and re-making it with the fudging option would be as good as fudging after the roll, right? It could be spotted before the edit, but PbP is all about asynchroneous playing.


Let's just say my experience is the exact opposite, but this isn't the right sub-forum for such a discussion AFAICT.

I wonder how many GMs actually fudge rolls (or don't). I never have used the mechanism.

I have to say, I've never fudged a roll on here, but I also don't generally play games that require a lot rolling, so it could just be a matter of dice-rolling volume. In my tabletop games, I tend to be very obvious about fudging, so I don't think it's pointless if everyone knows I'm doing it. I tend to only fudge in favor of not killing the players, and then only for newbies. Our core group has kids that we've introduced to roleplaying games so when they have a good idea and then roll terribly, we usually as a group decide to fudge it a little. I'd also fudge if a character KO/death would be terribly embarrassing, like say, a barbarian or fighter in D&D being killed by a kobold (and not a beefed up kobold).

In those cases, there's rarely any complaints about the fudging and that's probably the sort of thing that those of you who are pro-fudging are used to. But, I imagine that there are GMs out there who fudge for different reasons and some of those reasons might ruin the fun for certain players. Or, there may be players who are strictly anti-fudging on principle. There is a purpose for rolling dice and that purpose is somewhat invalidated by any fudging. The dice are supposed to keep everyone honest. Fudging is basically the opposite of that, even for the right reasons.

And I apologize for all that somewhat off-topic stuff. I'm going to go play with a dice roller now and delete a bunch of rolls just because I know I can.

The GM can't cheat. They run the game, what they say goes, thus cheating not possible.

However, I fudge things to keep my players balanced with each other, my super optimizer player doesn't leave everyone else feeling useless, but you can't tell players you are favoring one over another because they get angry about unequal treatment, it doesn't matter to them that they are being unequal themselves, because they don't believe themselves to be unequal or unfair.

Besides, balancing the players is part of the job, but in general if the players don't feel a risk of failure, most won't be satisfied (though many won't really know why)

This message was deleted by a moderator, as it was moot, at 08:32, Fri 06 June 2014.

You are correct that as a player you wouldn't be aware, but other GMs will be able to see the "GM_whoever removed 1 roll(s) from the log" entries.

So if it's some kind of arena game or something where GMs look after different teams then the cleared rolls are audited and other GMs will be aware.

If it's just you as a player worrying about the GM then I wonder if the absence of this one feature would put your mind at ease, there's just so many ways for a GM to manipulate things to how they want them to go (and that's before they even touch a die).  If a GM is willing to go to the effort of clearing a roll and doing it again then I can't imagine there isn't much they wouldn't do!  It'd be a shame if you let this one thing overshadow the dozens of fantastic features we've got here, because I think this issue stems from the GMs you have (had), not the site!

First, apologies for mentioning the rules. I'm kinda new here and am used to forums where such calls are within the rules.
And since an admin is asking me, specifically, I figure I can answer:).
So, I'll try to answer you with maximum details. Being sick might also have something to do with that decision, so prepare for the wall of text!


So, am I supposed to ask the GM to make me a co-GM? Doesn't sound like a good idea.


No. A GM can suck without fudging rolls.
But the presence of the feature means that I prefer being a/the GM, unless I'm treating the game as a freeform one to begin with;).
(I don't often join freeform games these days, but I do treat some games as freeform. These are mostly homebrew systems).


Yes, there are. I agreed with it above. It is just more likely to be obvious if fudging isn't an option - or rather, it will become obvious faster. There's no way you could keep a long-term game without it becoming obvious of someone is paying attention. Some people don't care and wouldn't pay a token of attention, and if they notice, they still don't care.
And more power to them, but I don't like that. There is a reason why not all games are equally attractive to all players, right? Similarly, some GMs and some players just don't mesh...not even "well", but don't mesh at all.
Case in point, a GM that's hell-bent on manipulating the game and me; Me as a GM and a player that wants to be lead through a story-line with big shining arrows "Plot Is There" appearing on crossroads.
(Yes, I'm speaking metaphorically, and using over the top ways of communicating my meaning. Hope you'll forgive the sick guy who isn't even writing in his own language).


Well, here's where I say "huh"? I didn't say that at all!
Quite the contrary, I've been considering moving one of the games I'm running to RPoL because of all the features. They are indeed nice!
(Though probably not - the emerging storyline is near its completion, and I think the group wouldn't like registering).


There's no issue, as far as I'm concerned. This thread is just informing me about the best way to use RPoL for my gaming habits. It's not the hammer I thought it is, but I have my use for a wrench, too.
That is why I said "thank you" to the previous post - it was useful to me.
Of course the site isn't responsible for the habit of some GMs (even GMs that are otherwise good ones/mesh well with my style) to fudge rolls. And I'm actually glad they can do that if it helps their games!
And we know in advance I'm not going to do it in the game I run (currently only one). It's that simple.

However, about the implication on the GMs I've had... Please don't, that's funny (other people have tried the same argument in a similar discussion, and it still means "what is wrong with you, did you get burned or what?").
No, I haven't got "lasting damage" from such GMs, and can enjoy such a game just fine - for a limited period of time. I just don't see the point in doing so, or at least not often.
If anyone has got lasting scars between me and the GMs I didn't like, I'm pretty sure it's them. Why, I managed to reform one of those that tried the whole control-the-story-fudge-if-necessary and turn him to my style of GMing...by being a player:D! (I don't have the time for this these days - it was several years ago).
Basically, I've got a term for what I do do to GMs that fudge dice or otherwise try to control the fiction when I decide that just playing a session and not showing for more isn't the best choice. The term is "torpedoing the GM's game" or more politely, "wrenching the game from the GM's hands and giving it back to everybody". I prefer the first term, though, for descriptiveness.
As you said yourself, there's so much you can do before any dice touch the table. And this goes both ways.

So, why am I against fudging? There is more than one reason, actually.

1) Let's start with the deprotagonization issue. To this end, I'm going to semi-quote Ron Edwards.
"There is inherent contradiction between the idea that people can play the main characters when it's someone else deciding what happens to them". (Quoting "Sorcerer" from memory, here - the reason I remember is is that I laughed a lot after reading it. It is so true it was funny).

2) The second reason was mentioned in the thread. "There is a purpose for rolling dice and that purpose is somewhat invalidated by any fudging. The dice are supposed to keep everyone honest. Fudging is basically the opposite of that, even for the right reasons."
Yes - if I want to go diceless, I'll run freefrom, or pick a diceless system. If I'm using dice and rules in combination, fudging wouldn't be on the table. (In most narrative systems, that includes following the rule rule that if you can't think of an interesting result for both succeeding and failing, there isn't a roll - which prevents the need for fudging in the first place).
But otherwise, what's the point of the latest 300-pages rulebook? If optimisation is going to be equaled down to the average/lowest common denominator with fudging, as stated in the thread (never seen that one, myself, just using it as an example), what is the point in creating a character in a detailed system? We could as well be using Over the Edge, or Vivid 4.0 and just writing "Noble+3, Swordsman+4, Guts 4, Big Nose 3, Quick Reflexes 4, Street Poet 4: Following my lady's wishes, Punishing people for offending my nose, Being righteous" on my character sheet? And I mean that this is my whole character sheet in the scare quotes, and everything I need in order to play the bloody Cyrano De Bergerac? (Mind you, I like simple systems for more than one reason. I also like much more complicated systems, just for different reasons. What I don't like is using a complicated system that allows for optimisation, when there's no point in doing so. We could save an hour or so from character generation, and likely dozens of hours solitary reading, and actually use them for something worthwhile - like playing the game, or going to the movies, if that's an offline group).

3) My third objection is based on the quality of the fiction the game generates. I find almost invariably that the fiction is improved by not fudging. It's what Apocalypse World calls "keeping the fiction raw". In this game, you don't hammer the fiction in a pre-conceived shape. Sure, you could try - but do you really think you can by yourself beat the fiction resulting from the common efforts of everybody at the table, and the game's designer? And you lose the spontaneity of rolling with surprising results. If the fiction is better without the dice, why are we rolling them, at all? We can just replace them with random tables if they're just for unimportant parts of the game*, and decide the important parts ourselves! We could do that before playing MtG or a boardgame, if we get bored with storytelling.
And yet most games that have more rules for combat than for non-combat activities tell you that the combat chapter is important because those rules determine whether the character is going to live...
On top of thst,snd this ties with the first point, if you're sure that your single-person efforts in creating fiction beat the efforts of everybody at the table, including yourself why are those people at the table? Because you're still one of those people, it means that consciously or subconsciously, you consider the net contribution of everybody else to be less than zero*.
If I believed that, I'd be searching a new group, not wasting these people's time while acting as the vastly superior storyteller.
And BTW, if you agreed with some people to have the system mediating between theirs and your contributions to a story, not using those rules is called cheating. It can be fine if everyone is on board with that (like people that are used to that one player in a card game that always tries to sneak a peek at other people's hands), but if you know that anyone objects and are still doing it? Then it is cheating, yeah, sorry to break it for you.

*(For those that don't follow - if X>X+Y, then=> Y<0,
where
X-your contribution, and
Y=contribution of everyone else or the contribution of the system you're using).
OTOH, I can use a system's unexpected results to drive the story in unexpected directions. In fact, these are often the best stories.
The enemy is rolling a string of 1s.
The PCs either care for a movie-style fight, or they don't. If they do, they can stop back and say something like this.
"Today isn't your day, Inigo, old enemy?"
"Seems so."
"Well, let's take a breather."
Bingo, you have a Worthy Enemy...which wasn't in your storyline, was it? Have you thought of it?
And this wouldn't necessarily screw the players. If you're playing a genre where this is appropriate, like swashbuckling, you probably have some kind of resource to reward them with.
OTOH, maybe the players just want the guy dead. Well, the PCs are the protagonists, right? So when the dice are giving them a lucky break, it's not my job as GM to take it away (nor to spare them if the dice are screwing them, but let's run with the example from the thread).
So, they kill a major enemy, and remain unbloodied, giving the enemy no mercy, no space to breath, and no chance.
Great! Badass! What do you think the NPCs around thought?
And how can this impact them both positively and negatively?
Knowing the answers to this is my job as a GM. For basically everything else, I can refer to a system.

So yeah, I'm against fudging as a matter of principle. I usually try not to explain why, but since you asked...
Well, here's why:D!

In reply to AsenRG (msg # 15):

Talking of inherent contradictions, I sure wish in real life I knew what percentage I had to complete every action I ever attempted, and that I had someone willing to fudge the rolls in my favor every now and again.

The entire idea of roleplaying is a fantasy -- a cooperative collaboration of creative effort -- and the dice just give the illusion of reality and control, when in fact all they do is add a different type of metagaming.  They are probably the best a "game" can do to generating statistical continuity to satisfy our hunger for suspension of disbelief, but that's what it is:  a game.  And in a PBP, the social element of sitting around the table hoping for a number (like gamblers around a craps table) is missing, and with it the "fun" element of not fudging rolls also dissipates.

In real life, my rolls get fudged all the time, and usually not for the better. :)


So back to the point, I typically just use Secret Rolls or unmodified rolls as GM because rarely do my players know all of the modifiers or effective rules like I do, in particular in my own structured universe that they chose to play in.  Adding a Fudge Rolls feature just adds another unnecessary layer of illusion and metagaming that can easily be overcome through other methods if that is the preferred style of play, but we shouldn't kid ourselves:  rolling dice and knowing the outcome and statistics ahead of time is itself a type of metagaming.

So it looks like I'll be adding "Do you have a problem with fudging rolls" to the list of questions I ask players to avoid unwanted entries to my games.

You don't know roughly how far you can jump, how fast you run, or similar activities you have presumably done before? I find that hard to believe, but so be it. Maybe it's a contradiction to you, but you aren't everybody.
It's not a contradiction to me, and it would be even less of a contradiction to a PC. Most GMs, myself included, don't manage to convey as much information as the human senses do convey to the brain every second.
Apart from notice rolls, I hide no modifiers, and find that it only reduces the contradictions.

I have a term for that too.  Unfortunately the rules of the site prohibit its use in public forums.

So, as a player in a game, and not privy to the GMs private notes, plans, etc... what makes you think you have the right to decide for everybody that you should disrupt the flow of the game (simply because it doesn't suit your preferences)?  The other players might be perfectly happy with the situation.  I also not that your reasons for doing this have expanded from fudging the dice, to include pretty much anything else you decide you don't like - "otherwise try to control the fiction".  Sorry but "control the fiction" is another way of saying, "run the game", IMO.

Also I should point out that, "wrenching the game from the GM's hands and giving it back to everybody" isn't really an option here, where the GM has total control of every aspect of their game - including removing and/or editing your posts, and deciding whether or not you can even communicate with the other players, or just booting you without further discussion.  Basically, you can't do anything unless the GM agrees to it.
This message was last edited by the user at 17:57, Fri 06 June 2014.

In reply to AsenRG (msg # 18):

Those are not things for which you roll dice in an RPG; those are part of your character's traits.  That's a totally different thing. ;)

The rolls are, for example, how far you can jump when the floor under you is made of pebbles, you are being shot at, and your pants are on fire.  That's where dice, uncertainty, and modifiers come in.  In real life, we simply don't know the statistics for every uncertainty and can't base decisions on such statistics, but instead on our gut feeling, courage, and a very vague understanding of possibilities based on our knowledge of our traits.  It's a much less scientific approach than in the games, and certainly open to fudging from all directions.

In reply to bigbadron (msg # 19):

That's a very good point.  By way of example, I had a player do this to me, and I found it amusing--and even enjoyed being held accountable to every rule and roll, as it was a learning experience for me.  But my players threatened to leave because THEY did not like it.  So the disruptive player had to go, even though I, as GM, didn't mind so much.  In the end, a game is a community effort with the hard calls being made by the GM.

The best thing to do if there is lack of trust or enjoyment is simply to find another game.

Steelsmiter, that would be a smart move.


See this last line? It tells me you're not thinking about the same thing I mean. Because what I tend to do pretty much requires you to get the other players on board:).
So I'm not doing this in spite of the other players. I'm doing this with the other players*. Sorry if your experiences with those other players prevented the efficient communication here and hope you understand my point better now, despite the language (which I warned you is over the top in my previous post).

*And that only when a single player forgets that he or she is just one of the players. In fact, that usually doesn't happen even then, as I tend to leave instead - or I simply do not join the game in the first place.


Did you skip most of my previous post, after reading one po? See the first point, conveniently numbered with 1, then the third one.
Yeah, "control the fiction (single-handedly)" is pretty similar for me as well. Except to me it translates as "ruining the game".


Thanks, but I knew that already. And I didn't actually need other reasons on top of the fudging options in ordrt to avoid joining games as a player;).



In reply to Heath (msg # 20):

"Those are not things for which you roll dice in an RPG; those are part of your character's traits.  That's a totally different thing. ;)"
And in order to do them, you roll dice against your traits. Whether the floor is made of pebbles is largely secondary - you can still estimate your odds. Actually, most people have a harder time to actually estimate their odds given an exact percentage, IME.

In reply to Heath (msg # 21):
Again, if only the GM is making the hard calls, what are the players for? The easy calls:D?
But yeah, I pretty much agree that players and GMs should be on the same wavelength. Which probably means you agree with my solution, as stated in the thread.