lame. fudging is the sort of thing you grow out of.

one of those actual play podcasts had a cool format where they ran different one-shots, then the GM recorded a separate peek-behind-the-curtain commentary track for each game (someone, please remind me what this was called!)

nice people, definitely leaned more improv/storygames-y, but my god did the (obvious) fudging bother me.
>that dragon Jess killed? NO WAY did it only have six hit points left, haha! i just wanted to give her the chance to feel AWESOME when it was dramatically appropriate!

i don't want some Adam Koebel 'be fans of the players :-)' bullshit. i want an uncaring universe to explore.

>>97902936
>Adam Koebel
the uhhhhh plug the cord in the back the head orgasm, ..guy?

>>97902892
gay and lame
if you really have to play like that, just use threshold milestones.
>monster lost 1x life: it was a normal fight
>2x: tough fight
>3x: mighty
>4x: legendary
with that, you can "abort" the fight at any time and reward the group accordingly.
>the monster lost 3 times its life and a party member is down: GM lets the monster die with the next desperation attack by a player and hands out a mighty reward
it also helps you balance future encounters if your group gets a legendary kill too easily

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>>97902966
the very same!

all that Dungeon World stuff was the style at the time. /tg/, you told me to buy it and read it even if i never run it, because it's such a great book of fantastic advice. it'll change the very way you play dungeon games!

well, nah. i don't like it. it's really fun for one or two sessions, but it's so...sycophantic towards the players.
>Fighter, you don't just have ANY sword: this is YOUR sword!
it's like some animu power creep. if you just get a special snowflake sword on the character sheet, it stops being special. so then if there ARE magic swords in dungeons, they have to be special +1 (or i guess +2, in this case).

same goes for all the 'drama' stuff, right. i know i'm just quasi-schizophrenically bitching about Dungeon World, but 'ooo a dragon only has 16 HP! there are no specific combat rules! such is the game's mastery of encouraging dramatic SCENES as opposed to hacking away at meat sponges!'

/tg/, i want you to look me in the eye:
how many sessions of Dungeon World did you play before every fight turned into nothing but the Hack and Slash move?

>>97902892
Lame af

>>97902892
First and foremost, he is retarded for telling you that. If you're gonna pull a trick, at the very least you shouldn't reveal it to the audience.

This never happened.

>>97902892
I admit to fudging a combat ONE time... because I realized I'd accidentally statted it to be impossible. Although I didn’t fudge HP so much as have one enemy behave very suboptimally. I had them prioritize their own mobility over their defensive parts, IIRC, so that I didn't just turn off one of the PC's important combos that they were definitely just going to wipe without.

Teething problems of being a new GM I guess. Now the issue is that I tend to roll unholy strings of crits against random people. I've had three combats now where one PC just goes from 100 to dying before they can do anything.

>>97902892
Eh. I keep track of their hitpoints but will change it up or down if I think a fight is taking too long or is too easy. Especially in 5e, where combat can get sloggy as hell. If it's a foregone conclusion that the players are gonna win, I let a few enemies drop earlier than they otherwise woulda. If I've got an enemy I wanted to have do something cool, I'll let it even if the players shoulda killed it early.

All GMs fudge stats and dice some times. We think it's lame to do, and that the rare occassion where WE do it is the exception. The truth is that it's just another tool.

>>97902892
Well, he's a DM, so he doesn't need to run an actual game.

>>97902892
There's no real point in having combat rules if you're going to do that.

If I think the fight is basically over and the PCs have won I just have the enemy surrender of try to run.
If the fight was too easy, so what? Let the players have their win.
If the PCs get TPK'd, that's fine too. My last campaign ended with the PCs drowning while fighting lizardmen (Warhammer fantasy) and it was a memorable moment. None of my players complained, and everyone just thinks it's a funny memory.

>>97903289
Pretty silly take. I'm already the GM. I could choose to throw easy enemies at them that they can take no problem. I could coose to throw enemies at them that they have no hope of defeating.

I'm the GM. The only time I don't decide the outcome is when I don't want to.

>>97903289
>There's no real point in having combat rules
Didn't you read his post?
He said "DM", so there's being no point to having any rules at all is given.

>>97903359
If you already decided the outcome why bother with rules? You're just wasting the players time making them learn all those rules.

>>97903451
>If you already decided the outcome why bother with rules?
Who said I did? I think you missed something:
>The only time I don't decide the outcome is when I don't want to.
The GM decides whether an outcome will be random or not. What's in the cellar of the house you broke into? Maybe I roll on a treasure table, or an encounter table, or that's where I pre-planned that the gang is keeping the kidnapped target of the adventure. GMs decide whether to decide the outcome, or to leave it to chance. Including in combat encounters.

>>97903489
If you're not using hit points like the OP then why make the players roll for damage? Why make them learn the combat rules at all?
>b-but I'm not doing things like the OP
then why are you replying?

>>97903493
>If you're not using hit points like the OP then why make the players roll for damage? Why make them learn the combat rules at all?
I do that, sometimes. I said I did in my previous post here >>97903133, if you'd like to know my thoughts on the topic.

>Why make them learn the combat rules at all?
Because sometimes the cellar you break into gets a roll on a treasure table. Sometimes it gets a roll on an encounter table. Sometimes it's where the gang is keeping the kidnapped target of the adventure. As the GM? It's up to me to make those decisions.

>>97903503
So you're just making them learn the rules out of some sick twisted desire to waste their time I see.

>>97903514
>I see.
Apparently you don't, or are having some reading comprehension issues. As a GM, most of the time, you follow the rules. But there are times when choosing not to is the right thing to do to make the game better.

I used to fudge a lot of things when I started DMing, but now I let it ride. It's pretty terrifying to do that since I killed two PCs so far
>>97902990
So it would be a Yujiro Hanma fight, essentially.

Fudging rolls is the first sign that a GM will sooner or later railroad the entire game once he find the opportunity to do so.

>>97902892
That possibly the worst way anyone could run D&D or similar games. Attrition is meant to be earned, not handwaved.

>>97904115
In some way, I disagree. I ran a session last night (not D&D) where a player set up an entire attack from even before the combat started. Dude put on a Cultist robe. He succeeded in his check to get up close to the Cult Leader. His abilities give him bonus damage when hidden. He makes his attack. He rolls a 14 out of the 15 he needed to hit. Fuck that, he got it as far as I'm concerned. That shit was planned and we'll earned just for the dice to whiff by 1.

>>97904147
That's fundamentally different from just deciding that tracking HP at all is a waste of time.

>>97902892
If your group is having fun, then that's all that matters. The faggots ITT will argue otherwise, but that's because they have no games and no friends and thus don't know what a fun game feels like.

>>97902892
Why not run a system that doesn't require you do track HP? Why do people feel the need to to torture (I assume) d&d to do the thing they want instead of playing a game that just does that already, out of the box?

>>97904551
They don't know those systems exist.
The sheer idea of choosing another system evades large portion of D&D players, and the majority of those who can grasp the concept decide that it'd be too much work to read a rulebook.

>>97904656
That's fucking stupid.

I'd venture a guess that 85 percent of the people playing and running d&d right now would be much happier with savage worlds.

>>97902892
Lazy for doing that (Nothing wrong with being lazy)
Absolute retard for telling you

>>97902892
So what does he need players for?

>>97903107
So why are you using crits if they don't lead to the experiences you want from the game?

>>97903516
No. If you have to ignore the rules for the game to be good, the system is bad. Use a better one.

>>97904147
So why is that a problem? He missed or the attack was ineffective or the foe noticed him at the last moment and dodged away or any of a million other possibilities. That's just something that happened in the game. There isn't any particular way that events should occur.

>>97904551
Most of them have never even read the rulebook for the game they're currently playing. Why would they start reading now?

>>97904147
Why would you have him roll an attack at all at that point? He executed his plan, he kills the target, he shouldn't *need* to roll an attack. He shouldn't even need to roll damage, unless there is some kind of mitigating factor.

>>97905796
Because the target of an attack always gets either an active or passive defense roll. In this case, if he's unaware, you'd probably use the ambush rules, so he'd be denied his active defense.

>>97905814
But you ignored it anyway! "We have to roll because it says to roll, but I'm going to ignore the results because it doesn't fit the outcome I want." That's fuckin' retarded! The entire point of the rules is the arbitrate the game state when the outcome is uncertain. The player planned well and rolled well; the outcome it certain, they don't need to roll! If you're ever in a situation where you end up ignoring the roll, that means you didn't need to roll the fucking dice. You're the GM! You don't need the permission of the dice to act, as long you're doing it fairly and logically.

>>97905877
You know I'm not that other guy, right?

>>97905903
Don't really give a fuck, the answer is broadly applicable.

>>97905909
No, not really, since I didn't ignore the results of the roll. Since I used the results. Because, like I said, I'm not that other anon.

>>97905562
It's just like Plato's cave allegory where the cavemen are angry if you try to show them the real thing.

>>97904147
>He rolls a 14 out of the 15 he needed to hit.
a cultist in a robe he's standing next to? why did you even have it so high?

>>97904551
>torture d&d
>it's just a tweak of existing rules

>>97902892
Stale copypasta is stale

>>97905903
>You know I'm not that other guy, right?
How is that even relevant when you interject and get smacked for it.

>>97906090
It's relevant because you thought I didn't use the results of the roll. Which was wrong. fucking idiot lmao

>>97902892
For my purposes, lame.

I don't want the GM to be a sycophant for the player characters. I want the GM to be an arbitrator. When a GM does this vague impression of a difficult encounter bullshit, it essentially devalues anything the player does that isn't the equivalent of face-rolling across the keyboard in a video game. It rewards the least-creative, least-invested individuals over anyone else; the sorts of people who barely look at the rules of the game, and spend the entire session on their phone; the second-screen viewers of TTRPGs, if you will.

>>97906082
No, it's ignoring an entire system for no reason.

>>97905911
>I'm totally aloof and don't care.
>I posted just because, even though I have literally nothing to add.

K

>>97906214
You can just admit you didn't know who you were talking to bro, it'll be ok. lol

>>97906210
No more ignoring a system than having a player automatically hit in this scenario >>97904147

>>97902892
Lame, but only because he told you. You never break kayfabe.

>>97902892
Not good but not terrible. The unforgivable part is telling you. Playoids must be kept in the dark about these things.

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>ok we have all done something cool, monster has served its purpose, lets move on.

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I roll everything in the open, so you can determine for yourself the best decisions to make, and they really do affect things, so there's a reason for you to have attended the game.

>>97902892
I do that, but I will never confess it. For most DnD mechanics I simply eye ball most shit, and I will fudge, make shit up on the go and do whatever so the players have fun. And you know what, everyone has fun in my tables so I could not care less.

>>97902936
The more I've DMed the more a fudged, I grew out of being a nerd and a rules lawyer.

>>97914074
What's the point of playing at all? Why not just tell the players they win?

>>97914107
Socialization. Making friends, giving then a better story than the one that the autistic following of some made up rules could give them. If I want them to struggle I can make the monster inmortal temporarily, if I want them to breeze through I can do that too.

Whats the point of following the rules no matter the situation? Have anticlimatic ends? Turn my players into munchkins? Nah, fuck that. People have fun in my tables. Thats why I am completely booked as a DM and the other ones in my city struggle to find players. You should become a better DM anon.

>>97903004

When Conan got his atlantean sword, destined just for him, nobody gave a fuck.

>>97914223
You know you don't need a game to socialize right?

You're not playing a game, so why go to the trouble of all the game related stuff?

>>97914223
>normgroid DM pretends to run a "game" and doesn't engage with the rules at all
What's the point of this, to spend money on DnD crap nobody's actually using?

>>97914223
Well?

Do you think there are people who sign up to play a chess match and when they sit down to play, are like WHAT THE FUCK? WHY ARE YOU USING RULES? LET'S JUST LET THE ROOK MOVE WHEREVER WOULD BE COOL!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

What causes this brain damage in tabletop players?

>>97902892
He may be a good game master in general but he is a bad D&D game master.

>>97914768
You know that there are alternate rules for chess, right?

>>97914928
Cool, are you going to answer my question or keep pretending I asked something other than what I actually asked? Retard?

>>97902892
Very lame

Do spergs really not realize that ttrpgs are just a game of make believe? I, as the GM, can do anything to your characters at any time. I can just say
>you are all struck down by the gods for being gay and retarded, the end
and you can't do shit about it short of getting pissy and fucking off.

With this in mind, the rules were not created as some holy text to which all parties are beholden. They're just guidelines to give structure to the game of make believe, to make it more fun. As soon as the rules no longer make the game more fun, they ought to be ignored.

>>97914107
whatever the point might be, it probably isn't the dice

or to rephrase it into the same sort of post you made:

what's the point of playing at all? why not just throw some dice into a washing machine so they can roll around in there a lot?

>>97902892
Scripted combats, I've done a few of those. I never spilled the beans about it to my friends tho

Playcattle should never learn of what goes on behind the GM screen. Their fragile minds are not equipped for the blinding light of truth.

>>97915602
The rules are to keep the gm from doing just that. Its a social game and agreement, so there's nothing stopping you from that regardless, but that you went there with your example and see your role as an entertainer more than an arbitrator marks you as a shit gm regardless of rules.

>>97915632
except you don't need to fudge dice to rocks fall everyone dies, lol

if you fudge too little you're ashit dm just as you're a shit dm if you fudge too much

>>97915606
So you completely missed the point, then? Because that isn't equivalent at all.

>>97915644
Wrong.

>>97902990
That's just the same fudging with extra steps so you can pretend to lie to yourself.
THAT is fucking lame.

>>97917813
the only difference is found in your autism

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Yes DM I rolled a 20, no you don't need to see it, let me describe how I kill the boss now

kek mad

>>97914107
That's the correct response which ends this entire fucking thread.

>>97915602
Alright, well, it's not fun for me when I don't hit every round in combat. So we can just ignore the to-hit roll, right?

>>97918503
>>97915606

No, you aren't coming back from that.

>>97904147
>not D&D
Not sure about modern dogshit but I'd use the Assassination Table in the 1e DMG for that setup, not a normal attack roll.

>>97919108
How come? keep in mind this was about the big bads, not the average monsters. I guess they are more set pieces and plot devices than actual threats.

>>97902892
Storyshitter. And this thread is almost certainly about you, and not your DM isn't it?

>>97902892
> Is he brilliant or is he lame?
Everyone’s answer is going to be different. But I’d feel cheated upon learning that. Might even have to leave the party and find a different DM (or go back to being the DM) cheated.

>>97919313
There's nothing wrong with the big bads being plot devices, but it's unethical to tell the players that. They are under the assumption that they're playing a game.

>>97906080
Because 5E doesn't believe in modifiers

>>97902892
I would stop rolling dice and instead provide a cool visual description of how I kill every enemy, when I get "hit" I will provide a cool visual description of how I am reeling from the devastating strike but ultimately stand firm from sheer grit and determination.
If he wants to open roleplay storyfag then I'm game. If he insists I play a game he isn't playing, then he can fuck right off as I describe Trungor the Dragonraper tearing off his tiger striped loincloth, revealing a hard turgid cock, gnarled by the harsh northern winters, veins pulsating like a prowling beast erecting the thundering totem that maketh his mighty phallus as he rams roughly and forcibly into the fiery lizards molten cloaca, grunting not in lust but in sheer primal dominance as he mounts the scaled beast that for so long terrorized the village