Bill

When I DM, i take a combined approach: I roll all my dice behind the screen, but I leave the most important ones in the open. For example, in a combat I roll all the attacks, initiatives, etc behind the screen. But when the encounter gets to a critical point where a spellcaster tries a desperate spell, and the success of the whole encounter depends on the success of that spell, then I roll the salvation on the open. That way, everyone can jinx the roll and participate. And the result is a surprise, even for me.

No fudging rolls of allowed
Yes, for the GM who dislikes responsibility, this is an advantage. “I didn’t kill the player, the die roll did.” “Oh, the red dragon shows up just like the random encounter chart says.” “Darn the luck…the Big Bad made his save for the third time in a row. Too bad for you.”

I don’t get the mindset that fudging rolls is a bad thing. How is gently nudging the story, so that everyone can have a good time, bad? Mostly, I think it appeals to those who don’t want the burden of being responsible for their games. It’s much easier to just point and the dice and divest yourself of the results. You’ve spent hours or days crafting an interesting and challenging adventure with memorable NPCs…you really going to just leave it to fate to determine the outcome?

The comment was made that the “temptation” to fudge rolls is greater with rolls behind the screen. So? Again, why is this bad? If missing the secret door is so bad, then why have them roll in the first place?

Gets everyone involved
If getting people looking at the GM’s die roll is “getting them involved” then that game needs help.

Adds drama to important rolls
No it doesn’t. Another popular fallacy. Once that 1 comes up, there’s no drama. Nothing you say or do takes the players to a moment where they question the results. They, in essence, tune out everything from that point. They already know the result and you’ve lost them. This engenders a playstyle of totally focusing on the mechanics at the expense of drama. This is about as dramatic as playing russian roulette — it’s great until you lose.

You want to know what’s dramatic? Rolling the dice in that suspenseful moment, looking up at the eager group of players, waiting to hear you describe the results, not knowing if they live or die. Everyone is focused on your every word, waiting for the description. Time seems to stop for a moment. That’s drama.

Oh, and you really think you’re sure you know when the GM is fudging rolls? I’d bet not. I’d challenge my players to identify when I’ve fudged rolls.

Players know they’re getting a fair shake
How, exactly? Because the all-powerful, all-knowing GM who has limitless resources rolls in front of them? Underscoring how helpless they are and have no control over the situation? Laughable. Actually, I find it insulting for that very reason. Rolling in front of the players essentially says, “here’s the roll, and there’s nothing you can do about it — or even myself at this point.” It reinforces that the “heroes” are just fate’s bitches. There’s nothing heroic or fun about a TPK where the party did nothing but be the victim of bad die rolls. (Yes, seen it happen.)

Role-playing is a game of trust. I trust the GM to craft good adventures and run a “fair” game, but I also trust them to exercise good judgement. If the guy next to me hasn’t made a roll all night, nothing is going his way and he clearly isn’t having fun, I’d much rather have the GM fudge a few rolls and make something happen for the player than toss fate in their face and dismiss it as bad luck. I don’t need to know “I’m getting a fair shake” — I don’t play with people I don’t trust!

Finally, to answer the question of whether I roll my dice in the open or not, I’d wager you know the answer by now. =)

If it bugs my players that I’m “cheating” or that they’re “not getting a fair shake” then there’s the door. If you don’t trust me enough to run an enjoyable game for everyone and tell a good story, then you should find another GM or play a computer RPG; the computer won’t fudge rolls either. =)

In my experience the vast majority of people I play with favor “hidden” rolls by the GM. I don’t know if that represents the population of gamers as a whole, however.

Sorry for the thesis and the passionate reply! =)

Abulia – I can see fudging rolls for the game’s sake, but if you’re going to fudge rolls because you’re afraid to leave it to fate to determine the outcome, then why roll dice at all? You’ve already decided the broader outcome of the story before the game even starts. It sounds like to me you need to forgo using dice altogether and just arbitrarily decide the outcome of every dice roll. I think I’ll hit the PC this round. I think I’ll have the vampire fail his save against the player’s Fireball. That’s why there are dice in the game. Chance.

True, fate has something to do with the game and drama is something that is somewhat linked to this ordeal of dice rolling.

But as a DM, I do view myself holding some kind of responsibility to both the game and the players. I will never leave the entire game to be decided by a roll of a die.

I roll almost everything behind a screen. Not because I like fudging the die, but because I like to keep my players on suspense. I sometimes roll the dice just to grab a small attention from them and I noticed that it keeps them focused on the game.

I think a DM should pay close attention to their game and players and decide for themselves how to conduct the dice rolls.

I mention the role of fudging rolls because it relates to a point that both Don (Abulia) and DM T brought up (in slightly different ways): letting the dice rule the course of the game. I don’t think anyone would argue that the dice shouldn’t help to decide the how things turn out, but there are times when they shouldn’t be in control.

So how do you get around that? I get around it by trying to make sure that encounters where the dice carry a lot of weight — like combat — are as thought-out as possible, and then by manipulating other things behind the scenes.

That’s why I mentioned that the ability to fudge rolls is just one tool in a GM’s kit — there are plenty of other ways to influence outcomes, like changing the nature of encounters, adding or removing elements on the fly, etc.

(And welcome to TT, Bill, Borghal and Raineym!)

…perhaps less appealing in a game with a strong narrative focus, where telling a good story is more important than impartiality.  

I have to disagree here. I find fudging is only helpful for a narrative focus when you’re using rules that don’t support the narrative focus you’re looking for.

For example, let’s take PC death as an easy one. If PCs shouldn’t die randomly in your game, you should either play a game where death isn’t random, or else make houserules to eliminate that.

Not random doesn’t mean “never happens”, for example, in HeroQuest you can be reduced to Dying, which, depending on the group, either puts the life/death of the PC into the player’s or the GM’s hands, but never is it a random roll that actually carries you to Dead. Dying could be “in a coma for months” or it could be “holding on as lifeblood leaks out”, but it’s never an accidental thing like instant-critical-oops-you’re-dead. The PC is only dead after someone declares it so- not because the dice said so.

Fudging rolls has become a standard practice because most games support outcomes in random rolls that don’t jibe with even their OWN concept. That is- if we’re playing 4-color comics-code superheroes, it doesn’t fit that one person gets shot in the head and instantly dies.

Fudging has also become standard practice as a way for GMs to railroad actions, which goes into a whole other topic altogether.

Me? I’m against fudging rolls. If I’m going to override that roll anyway, why would I try to make the players believe otherwise?

Chris 

Posted by Chris

Rolling in the open removes that option from my bag of tricks. I’d prefer to have the option, even if I never exercise it. Plus, as I argued earlier, I believe it to be more dramatic to describe events, rather than have the players look at the roll before I’ve had a chance to describe what happens.

I’m not advocating removing chance  from the game; I’m advocating adding choice to the game.

(I can no longer post w/ my Blogger account? Ass!) 

Posted by Don

That certainly ties in with your posts on Deep in the Game for the past few weeks, and I see what you’re getting at.

Assuming, however, that a GM is running a game with a narrative focus that doesn’t have its rules geared to prevent random results from screwing things up, where would you stand on fudging rolls in that case?

(Don) (I can no longer post w/ my Blogger account? Ass!)

I’m trying to find an alternative to Blogger’s default comment setup — one that includes a comment box and doesn’t involve the default comment page. It’s caused a bit of weirdness, including listing you and Chris as anonymous for the above two comments.

So far, I haven’t found an alternative that I like, so I’ve returned things to normal.

Those are the types of problems you run into when you’re a sell out and “go commercial.”