Zak Sabbath said:
Zergonapal said:
Zak, Zak, if your players start sucking you need the monsters to suck equally hard or a random encounter that is supposed to be a simple challenge will turn into a TPK.
Does anyone want to explain to this gentleposter the several thousand things wrong with this or do I have to do it myself?
Here's my go at it.
But first let me contextualize myself. I've been playing and running games since 1984. Like most people back then, I started with D&D. But I quickly found Call of Cthulhu and nowadays I run GURPS almost exclusively (though I'll play a variety of things). GURPS character creation tends to result in detailed characters. My games are heavily focused on character development and RP. Players will spend hours and hours developing their characters. I generally do not use cinematic options in my games...which means combat is pretty deadly. And I never fudge.
Different GMs have different play styles. While I don't completely subscribe to it, The Forge divides up gamers into three types: Gamists, Narrativists, and Simulationists. Gamists focusing on the Game aspect of it: Resource Management, rules...people often think of D&D as a typical Gamist Game (think about the class/level system, the ways in which you had be plan out your character in gamist ways if you wanted this or that prestige class). Narrativists focus on doing what is best for the story, which might involve fudging so that players don't die at the hands of low-level NPCs...or making sure that someone dies at the dramatic ending. A number of the "indie" games out nowadays like Dogs in the Vinyard and often called Narrativist games. Simulationists create a game world and then try to emulate what would really happen in that world. Which means, for example, you could die unheroically if that is what would happen. But also, that the players are free to not follow the plot if they don't want to. GURPS is often considered a Simulationist game.
If using the GNS model, I am a simulationist. Fudging to keep players alive totally breaks my suspension of disbelief. It breaks the simulation. And it would really tick off my players. My players know that any combat is potentially deadly. They know there are consequences for every action. They know that the characters they are very invested in could very easily die...or be maimed. So, if they choose to enter into combat (which I also don't force on them), then they know they are really risking something. So my players are really good at talking their way out of combat, or manipulating the environment to their advantage. The tension any time the dice come out is amazing. That tension wouldn't be there if they knew some combats were less important than others. Every time you decide to get involved in combat with deadly force should be important...if playing in the sorts of games I tend to run (if I were to run a game with a different feel...perhaps a 1930s Pulp Cliffhangers sort of thing, I'd want a different feel. I still wouldn't fudge die rolls, but I'd make sure the players had the Luck Advantage and access to cinematic advantages that allowed them to turn the tables when they needed to).
Or...to be much shorter about the whole thing...and put it into a concrete example.
Set Up: Let's call it a gritty 1940s Noir game with the players being detectives and PC connected to the detective agency. So maybe we have 2 detectives, a secretary, and an investigative reporter. The detective and the secretary are walking down the street on their way to meet the other detective and the reporter at a bar to discuss their current case.
While walking they see an orphanage on fire with orphans trapped inside. What do they do?
In a fudging game they rush in and save all the orphans. Probably with little thought, because they know they aren't going to die saving some orphans. Either because they have a lot more hit points than fire normally does (gamist) or because they know this is not a dramatic plot moment (narrativist). So they save the orphans and are hailed as heroes. But are they really? For others yes. For me? No. If there really were no danger to their PCs...then it really isn't heroism.
In a non-fudging game, especially one without lots of cinematic rules (or one with maiming rules, etc)...the PCs are really going to have to decide if they really want to rush in there. Because if they do...they could very well die...or lose levels of attractiveness due to horrible burn scars, or get a broken leg...who knows what? So, knowing this...do they now run in? Maybe the detective decides he wants to knock on a house, use a phone and call the fire department. This leaves the secretary by herself. What does she do? The orphans are screaming?
As a GM...I don't know what she'll do. She may do nothing. Or she may decide to go in...really risking her PC's life. And maybe rather than just rushing in, she decides to take some precautions before she plunges in. Or maybe she has a dramatic moment with her detective boyfriend first before she plunges is. Then she runs in, with a handkerchief around her face. The detective waits outside, to afraid to face the inferno. What happens next? As a GM, I don't know...we see what plans the PC comes up with and what the dice say. But when all is said and done, if the PC saves some/all of those orphans...she will be a real hero....because she faced real risk. And the detective? Well, he's going to have to live with his choice as well.
My sort of game is not for everyone. But for the sort of game I run, fudging would ruin everything that we're doing.