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"Encounter Design does not stop when initiative is rolled" wise words of Matthew Colville

Fun fact: I was running “The Village of Hommlet” and there is a +1 shield that was swallowed by a giant frog. One of my players was upset to find that shield because he assumed I put the shield there to help him with his AC.

My players are so proficient at killing or not saving NPCs that if I didn’t conveniently add diaries and letters where ever they poked their nose in, they’d never even know there was a main, time based, quest to be done.

Adjusting encounter difficulty on the fly to keep the game enjoyable isn't cheating, it's smart DM'ing.

Since my group plays online using Foundry, all of our rolls are out in the open and in the chat box. The few times that I have accidentally left my rolls on private, the players are like, "We can't see your rolls! Oh No!" It's kinda funny because they become paranoid that something diabolical is about to happen. We also have a fun feature on Foundry that shows damage tick off like in a jrpg video game. It's fun to see, but it makes raising hp of enemies a bit difficult because "healing" shows a positive tick. They were recently fighting a group of vampire spawn and it was fun hearing the players panic as they saw the spawn regenerate at the start of each turn. So, if I ever have to increase an enemy's hp then my players will just assume it has healing or regeneration of some sorts

Instead of just boosting HP, when you realise your encounter is underperforming, another tip would be for some reinforcements to turn up. Swing the action economy in your favour and let the players work their way out of that problem.

I have used all of these, but has become very rare. I used these more in the past to cover my mistakes. I would suggest using these sparingly. Player's can see DMs influence the game, the more you can remove yourself from it and your Player's see you as just running the world. The more likely they are to see their decision impactful.

As a GM, my mission is to craft an enjoyable experience for everyone. Ergo, it's impossible to cheat because my mission is not to uphold any rules, only the objective of crafting a good experience for everyone is important. You learn to be better at it by mixing any sort of techniques: Roll openly or roll secretly Fudge the rolls or not Change the monsters stats in anyway Change the rules on the fly Give more opportunity to the players or guide them toward some pre-written railroad Apply rules that are fair or not, or harsh or not, that give an edge to the PCs or to the NPCs Whatever flies as long as the players have fun. I've fudge rolls on the open at times, not often though. And once, playing an RPG inspired by a sci-fi TV serie, i recreated the entire first half of an episode without my players realising it by rolling secretly and fudging every single roll, including theirs and over playing my "reaction" to the results to let them think they were really in trouble. When they realised that i put them exactly in this contrived situation that they just saw last week on TV, i can tell you it was one of the best rpg moments of my GM career. But as the AI said, don't do that all the time, knowing when to do it and when not to do it is the real art.

Everyday. Every day I cheat. I read the room, the players frustrations. I add encounters and locks and traps. Give clues and take away AC. Custom quest, custom campaign. It is all to make the players enjoy the game.

I agree with all the points that you’ve made. I particularly think that newer GMs should be given more leeway to do these things than more experienced GMs, but as long as the GM always tries to make the enjoyment of everyone at the table their highest priority, a little “cheating” is okay. They should remember that part of the fun is the challenge, the risk, and the consequences though.

I think the key point here is what you said in: 9:20 Some GMs think its so normal to cheat and metagame that they don't even hide it from players and that is when the fun goes out the window.

Excellent video, as always! Interesting observation about all 7 examples having in common the WHEN aspect of the GM intervention. I did not notice that before. Also interesting is this observation -- with the exception of dice rolls during the game, all the aspects we are talking about are decided by the DM prior to play. Very true. Which is one reason I have, on occasion, cheated. As a DM since 1978, I have seen many (far too many) times when I grossly over-estimated the power of the party or under-estimated that of the monsters (or both lol) and the players were facing doom through no fault of their own. Now, yes, in some cases they COULD run away, but that was not always true. I didnt want them to pay for my error. I would love to hear your thoughts on situations like that.

Sometimes when headed to a TPK it is time to look at why the characters aren't performing as well as expected. Sometimes it is just luck, but sometimes there is a reason. I just had a session where my players were headed to a TPK. It was looking really bad. I noticed one the reasons was the initiative order. Their highest damage dealer kept on being brought back to life, only to be taken down again each round before he was able to act. I paused the game, and gave the players a chance to dig themselves out of the situation by changing around their initiative order. It really made a big difference and sure enough, they survived just barely. I think they would agree that they earned the victory even though it was obvious I intervened.

I think the only instance of this that is bad is when it's done in a way that is obvious or the DM just outright tells the party. You have to treat this type of thing with the same adage that stage magicians have about never revealing their secrets. As long as you can keep the "magic" up so to speak, it doesn't matter how often you do it, so long as it's done in a way that does not tip off to the players that it's happening. I am 100% of the mindset that you briefly mentioned that the big sticking point seems to be WHEN the changes happen. If I decide before the session to add about an additional hit from the fighter's worth of damage to the monster's HP, no one bats an eye, but you alter it when the fighter drops it to 0 to give it one more hit's worth of HP for more drama / a better story and everyone seems to go crazy. If the players never know, it doesn't matter. If, from their perspective, it was always going to have that additional HP, then why does it matter when that HP was added? For all they know, you added it days before the session. Best example in my own games I can think of was my party was fighting a homebrew dracolich boss I made using the Giffyglyph Monster Maker (I use it for all my monsters and it honestly helps with being able to tweak on the fly a bunch because characters can't metagame the official stat blocks). It has a system for overkill attacks where it charges up for a turn to give warning and then unleashes a big devastating attack. Technically our drakewarden ranger killed it the turn he took right after the dracolich began its overkill attack, but I decided in the moment that it would be more satisfying to wait. With the overkill mechanic is a "weak spot" mechanic where there is something the players can attack and target that, when destroyed, does damage to the boss and stops the overkill attack. I decided in the moment that either 1) they destroy this weak spot on the dracolich, ending the fight, or 2) they flee the range of its overkill attack, it gets the overkill off, and then dies shortly after. It led to one of the best moments of the game where right before the dracolich's turn, the sorcerer was able to destroy the gem in the dracolich's forehead that it was gathering electrical energy into, which then subsequently killed the dracolich. I described a dramatic scene where as the gem shattered, the lightning turned on the dracolich, killing it, and it gave the sorcerer a much needed final blow compared to the ranger's many final blows. All in all, yes, I did it for selfish reasons. I wanted the boss to get off its big attack and at the end of the day that was my motivation for doing it, so I can't say it was for player enjoyment tbh. However, it ended up creating a high tension moment where the sorcerer was relying on his rolls to destroy the gem, otherwise the attack was going to go off, almost assuredly dropping anyone who was within range of it still to 0 hit points. It gave the character a notch in his belt and let someone else have a spot in the limelight for once. It taught me a bit about how properly handled mid combat alterations can make a better experience. And the key here is that I never told my players. They never knew that I had bumped its HP for the express purpose of ramping the tension and trying to let the boss get its big attack off. They just knew that the sorcerer slew this undead dragon that was about to down a couple party members if his rolls hadn't gone well. A magician never reveals his secrets. A DM never reveals his "cheating."

I added Gary the Intern in my campaign and indeed had to end him for he was too powerful! Him and another caster created a massive zone of Wild Magic, and the BBEG showed up at the end of the session and executed Gary the Intern with her Vorpal Sword.

I became a DM because a group of family/friends wanted to learn and play D&D, so I was volun-told to do it. I didn't mind, I bought a new starter campaign and we started. This was maybe two or three months ago. In one encounter in particular, I was having bad rolls and the team was owning the creature. However it was the first time they had encountered a creature that has a special effect and a multiattack that didn't just fall over after one round. I fudged the hit points on the creature and made the encounter go longer because they were still struggling to grasp the basics of combat. I told them after the session and they were fine with it because they too felt that it helped them. I even fudge rolls because I don't want them to feel too disadvantaged when I roll really well and I think I will still do it, I've been watching your videos on exhaustion and I really want to incorporate that into the games as well... So I have actually been designing a dungeon for New Players and New DMs because we all started from the beginning.... However... That is not how it will stay. Once I feel the group is a little more stable and understands... I feel like I want to cause some chaos

Sounds like an awesome book. Kickstarters end up becoming very pricey in Denmark where I live because of taxes, shipping and taxes on the already expensive shipping, so I hope it will be available in retail.

@Luke Did you fudge the dice roll in the pf2 game? You know I was going to ask.

One of the easiest ways to increase a monster's damage is to just give them 1 more attack. No need to change any modifiers or fudge rolls. Just roleplay it as the boss deciding to take the fight more seriously.

I think whether DM's should 'cheat' depends on the intention. if I miscalculate, and create an encounter that is unbalanced, and I fix it on the fly to make it fit the difficulty I intended, that's fine. If I decide the players aren't doing what I want them to do, and I change things to make them do the stuff I wanted (taking away agency), that's not so good. It's all nuanced, there aren't any clear cut "this is always bad, while this is always good', but the intention should always be "how can I create the best game for everyone" (and that includes the DM, so yeah, if I build an encounter and the players don't go interact with it, then sure, I can stick it somewhere else and adjust things so it works and I don't loose the prep...but I also don't force players into a specific course of action).

I’m new to DND I am thinking about becoming a DM what would be the best idea for the coins?

My players can roll for their health, so why can't I do it for my monsters? For regular monsters, I use the set average. For boss monsters, I usually have a range (i.e. 80-100 HP) and give them a specific health at my discretion depending on how the battle is going.

soooo... did Luke fudge the dice and let the rerolled characters live or were they all defeated again and then tossed into a sphere of annihilation?

In defense of the idea that *when* the DM makes these decisions can matter, we can make a comparison to Hangman. It is expected that the person running the game will choose a word before the game begins. It is fair game for them to pick a difficult word, or an easy word. But it is expected that the word will be fixed once the game begins, even though there's no way for the guesser(s) to know whether it was changed on the fly or not. If it came out that the word was being changed mid-game, I think there would be accusations of cheating, and fair ones at that. Now, obviously, there are differences between Hangman and D&D, and differences in why someone might change things on the fly. But I think this comparison at least shows that when these changes are made can matter.

Absolutely right. What has to be done, has to be done. But if a GM bends or breaks the rules the GM must not brag about it and keep it a secret if possible. And only do it go make the game better or less bad. Plus: Luke does not suck.

Gamemasters should always make sure the game is the most fun it can be; this takes a lot of knowing your players, their characters, and the story you all want to tell together. However the GM decides to tackle these problems is totally up to them; so long as they maintain that idea of fairness and fun.

I'd be willing to do all of these except 1. fudge dice. If I want a certain outcome, I won't leave it to a die roll. and 2. moving a dungeon once I have decided it is in a certain location. Moving NPCs, shops, etc. still worth considering.

Because when the GM does these things mid session, may undermine the chalange and player agency.

How can you cheat when you're not playing to win?

When I GM, I roll out in the open. One moment where I "cheated" a couple sessions ago was when a player did an astronomical amount of damage to an enemy and I bumped their hit points just enough for story reasons. Also, they're in a very deadly area and I'm dropping hints and gradually making things more stressful for them instead of saying, "This is going to be dangerous".

I'd think the rise of VTTs and online play would make it harder for GMs to fudge their rolls. They could probably sneak in a modifier here and there, but the players are going to see that Nat 20 on the tank down to 3 hit points.

My style of GMing is this: I have an idea for the adventure, I create a map (or use a map I find), choose a few enemies based on the adventures plot, and then set the players to it. I have not specific idea on how they get to the adventure location, i have only a rough idea of what the location looks like until they reach it, I always scale my enemies. So I take the base enemy in the monster Manuel and have stats that are slightly higher and slightly lower and then use them accordingly to the situation. I make the adventure as flexible as possible so the players can make many choices. However the dice are a no fudge area. So the world has flexibility, but the dice do not. It gives a lot of flexibility to me and the players but also the feeling that the reward or success is not a give.

There was a point in my campaign where the party was in the employ of a mysterious but powerful Duke, who assigned a conjurer to teleport them to and from their quest destinations (teleport and planar movement magic was outlawed in this setting). The condescending attitude that the conjurer would always have in front of the Duke, and the Duke's obvious frustration with it led the party to believe that he was secretly the Duke's son, who chose forbidden magic over his father's wishes to be a normal Lord. I hadn't really intended to develop the conjurer as much more than the "grumpy bus driver", but could see that the players had a better storyline than I did, so naturally swerved into it. When it was finally confirmed in a dramatic story beat that they were "right" all along, the sense of satisfaction was palpable, I'll never confess to them that it wasn't my plan all along 🤫

Player agency is really important. If an encounter might need rebalancing in the fly account for that ahead of time with planned monster behaviour. The enemy leader might call for help if too easy, or capture and ransom the players if too tough. A predator might decide eating one player is enough, and run off even though it is "winning".

I used to fudge dice and stuff to prevent player death. Now, I roll open and let the dice decide. I find that my players appreciate the open rolls and increase in difficulty. Now there is legitimate danger and chance of death.

I also dont like to change dice and dont do it. What i do is, to plan for reinforcments, but not exactle how much, only what could happen when X. So i leave my self a backdoor sometimes.

I'm with you on this. All of the "cheating" methods listed are tools in the GM's toolbox... except for dice fudging. That's actual cheating. And it's a deal breaker for me. If I find out a GM's been fudging dice, I'll leave that game (and table), because the most fundamental trust between players is broken: that we're all playing the same game. All of the other methods of "cheating" have real uses for course correcting on the fly. Dice fudging doesn't provide anything the other methods can't also give you. But it does mean the players are not playing the same game as the GM, and that's not a situation I care to waste time on. Dice fudging is what amateur DMs do. Those who make it part of their tool box are leaning on a crutch.

In a way it can be smart to think of "cheating" as just a compromise to make up for the fact that you don't really have time to "test" your session before you run it. Sometimes when DMs fudge a die or a result or say "rule of cool," i think that most often those were situations where players had strategized enough that an auto-succeed would have been a reasonable ruling. Conversely though, I think there are many times where a DM should simply try to give parties options to lower the stakes, but try to make a narrative based on the results of the mechanics. Part of the problem with 5e is that when everybody is healed to full* after every encounter, creating a balanced encounter can be problematic, though there are still death saves.

Your perspective is sound. Changing things on the fly will usually not be noticeable by players most of the time on any give occurrence. However, a DM that does this continually creates an effect where the world doesn't really seem gelled. Smart players (and most players are smart) start to realize that it doesn't matter what they do or how they plan because the GM will just react and it will mostly work itself out regardless of how they choose. TLDR: used too much, it destroys player agency.

I've had to adjust all of this stuff on the fly for all of these reasons. Avoid TPK, Keep the party on track, make the fight dramatic and interesting, mess up metagaming players who know monsters and look them up. And as a person good at improv it comes natural. Fudging the dice rolls during a game is a no-no tho, in my book. Good video Luke!

"Because frankly, my fingers are gonna get tired." -Things the bard never said during a seduction

Regarding allowing "the wrong answer" to work: This is a trap! When I design a puzzle, trap, or other scenario, I don't decide ahead of time what the answer is. I'm putting the thing in front of my players. It's up to THEM to figure out what to do with/about it. That's not our job! Our job is to determine if the players' idea(s) would work. The moment you arbitrarily decide the (usually only) answer is the moment you remove other options/player creativity from that encounter. Die rolls is something I do in the open so fudging is not an option. Nor do I think it SHOULD be (at my table). That said, I don't fault any DM for fudging if they deem it necessary (UNLESS they're doing it maliciously or to ensure a specific outcome that isn't "the PC's live"). But, at my table, it's known because of Session 0 that I will not save PC's from the dice. For the rest, yea, I use them and will continue to do so going forward. HOWEVER, as you said, I try to minimize how often it's necessary to do any of those things.

Thanks for this and all your other content. I really appreciate your advice and helpful tools. I find that I agree with and use around 90% of your advice. The other 10% I leave for my own flair.

I think the discourse over these issues is heavily influenced by emotion in a lot of GMs. I also think that there is a lot of "I can't understand or imagine how this could be effective, so it can't be effective" arguments from ignorance out there. My red flags in DM discussion are: 1) "never" do X thing because it's "cheating." 2) Historical revisionism (pretending that old modules say X when they really say Y) 3) Assuming the worst of those of us who disagree with a particular perspective. The truth is that each table will set its own parameters, and that means a different table may play very differently than you. Getting frustrated over other people enjoying things differently than you is insecurity.

There is a difference between changing something before the game, and changing something *in response* to player decisions or player dice rolls. The latter inherently removes some player agency.

If i create a puzzle i may have an idea of one way which it can be solved but if the players come up with a solution that works i always says thats the solution. because i am sort of lazy i also often reuse content that i intended for another location if they skip it. it might not be right away but if it works why create another encounter when i got a perfectly good one already done. also i never fudge dice roles. I did a couple of times when i first started but now i just try and fail forward. did you all your players fall uncsonscience great now their captured. did you just tpk your party for the second time in a row? guess your doing an afterlife arc and they wake up in the abyss or something. i role so my players can see the result.

I think the basic premise of this is a bit off. Cheating would be changing/breaking the rules to gain an advantage which further implies an adversarial relationship between the GM and party. Most games I've played in or run haven't been (or seemed at least) adversarial so I see much of this as narrative license rather than cheating. I also think the idea of a GM metagaming being cheating is a bit ridiculous, they are by definition "metagaming" when they create the environment, they must metagame while running the adventure.Knowing more about the environment and rules is a big part of the GMs job. Using the characters backstories as fuel and hooks for objectives in the campaign isn't cheating, it's good narrative creation for the campaign, feature not bug. I do agree with skynet on a couple of points though, changing locations and the like should be done very sparingly imo, and don't fudge dice rolls. If you don't allow the capricious fate of the dice you aren't running a game, you're telling a story.

I will rarely if ever fudge dice but the rest depends on what players do and what I think will improve the game/ story at that time

I may have used number 7 once just because one player managed to call what kind of BBEG of a one-shot is. Bit of a lead up, in the prewritten story Judoom in the David Tennant version Doctor Who core kit, one option to deal with said BBEG of the adventure mid way through is to use energy based stun guns that the players were given on the host it is occupying. Now the actual story, my players got to this point, stunning said host, with the clues that said BBEG absorbs energy. Just after the fact that they stunned the host and right when the players were to haul them off to “dispose” of the BBEG, one player realizes, and said out loud, that said BBEG absorbs energy. Now here’s the kicker, right after that he said that, I decided that the BBEG was “playing possum” even though the stat block and adventure doesn’t have anything against it.

I've fudged dice a few times in my current campaign, but my players are actually aware when I do. Basically, if something REALLY dumb, unfair, or just straight up anti-fun happens, I will actively say something like, "hey guys, I really didn't intend for this. None of you have done something critically wrong or dangerous and are just being severely punished due to a string of horrible luck. What do you all think about redacting [x] and saying [y] happens instead?" One example: I had a Gnoll Hunter perched in the open really far away from my players (like 300-450 feet). None of the 6 players looked that way to spot it, so I had it fire a warning shot at the driver of the party's caravan (a level 2 rogue who had never played D&D before and was just learning). I rolled a double nat 20 with disadvantage, then rolled max on all dice for damage (both the base and crit die) and therefore instantly killed the rogue from full health. Seeing as they did very little wrong and we were just learning, I explained what I had intended for the area and asked if the party was okay if I re-rolled the attack (which ended up hitting and damaging the rogue, which was fine with me). That's basically the only time I ever fudge dice. If I don't feel okay asking my players about it then I take that as a sign it would hurt the game experience if I fudged dice. As for taking player's ideas, in practically every other session a player will say something really cool about the game world or campaign and I just think to myself, "okay, that's getting integrated somehow even if I have to retcon some stuff you guys haven't learned about yet."

As long as my players are having fun, anything is on the table to me.

I'm totally getting down on that KS.

As a GM who "never" uses official adventures, I say the GM does not cheat, ever. Frankly, the idea can IMO only ever apply to GMs who play an official adventure. Because, as you said, in my own adventures the Dreaded Dungeon of Doom has always been there. Or the Dungeon they are currently exploring at point B (which is the DDD I had prepared) is not known as DDD but the TTT (Terrifying-Tunnels-of-Terror). So then I can remake the DDD for the next sessions, and of course even more sinister. One exception of cheating might be dice rolling. There are some rolls I do behind the screen, perception checks etc. and the players receive information in accordance with the roll. On the other hand, I often roll my combats completely open IF that roll is a deciding one. I find it increases the tension. In general, I see it as my duty to provide the best fun we all can have, the most dread and the most joy. And I will do whatever I can to ensure that. However, I do not like to change things, just as you said. Because I do have so many battle-ready dungeons, villains, villages etc. I can just open a box and place something. Besides that, why not have a session without major events, just time to RP and have one or two random encounters, events or points of interest.

Overall I agree with you: use them as less as possible. Actually, I would'nt even call most of those "cheating"... but I think that most of them are just a bit lazy ways to cover DM errors. As in the rusted armour example: if you don't want your fighter to have his armour damaged, why put those monsters there in the first place? And so on. I think that changing the plot or the npc behaviour is ok as it makes part of the campaing design even during the session, but moving entire dungeons as in the example may cause worldbuilding inconsinstencies (if not, no problem.. but maybe there are more elegant solutions?). Ignoring rules is one I particolarly despise (also because one of my old GMs cheated ignominously in that way and not for the sake of fun). If a DM needs to bend a rule to make things appen in the way he wants maybe he should rethink what he is doing or just lacks of immagination/mechanics knowledge: in high-magic games like dnd usually there IS a perfectly "legal" way to make things work. Also, often is used when players outsmart the dm and that is bad sportmanship: i mean, if they got you, they deserve a win! Fudging rolls is alway a dilemma... it doesn't feel right but sometimes is painful to see characters do nothing wrong but being endagered by bad rolls (also, I usually play AL modules and sometimes they are just not well balanced and I realize only at the moment). My compromise usually is to tranform some crits in normal hits to spare the blunt of the damage

So a good example of "cheating" is that my DM created another way to get into a locked room after my wife rolled a 1 on her Disable device check, we are playing Pathfinder 1. My friend and I then had to roll intelligence/linguistic checks to possibly be able to open the door. Which we rolled well and did. Had he not told us afterwards that he made thay all up we never would have been the wiser. Is that cheating? Better question did he lessen our enjoyment or remove challenge? I would say no, all he did was create another enjoyable way to get through the door. Btw it wasn't a door to anything plot related either, just some items and lore.

I try to avoid these as much as possible myself. I even installed a Foundry Module lately that plays visial effects that everyone can see depending on a hit, crit, miss or crit miss, so i can't really change the outcome of these rolls without everyone noticing it, because i figured i might have pulled a little too many punches in the past. It might or might not have killed a player character right away with a critical hit that i could have fudged into a hit or miss if it wasn't visible for everyone that this pc just got crit lol

I do not fudge dice rolls. I disbelieve the illusion of whuich number is on top.

Certainly a lot of these fall under the it depends but I would argue that changing the game rules in general should be discussed with players ahead of time though there are times where a GM may not know rules which can have a similar and detrimental effect. Sometimes if done out of the blue the players very well could feel cheated. One prime example of this I remember a session where we were dungeon crawling and we opened the door and saw way more enemies then us so we positioned ourselves in a manner where we bottle necked the door. Only for the enemies to run through our squares with the DM saying they're goblins their small! It was certainly clear the players were not happy about that especially something like that goes against RAW and our formation had RAW in mind.

During my homebrew campaign that ran for almost 3 years, I almost* never did any of these things. I do think that if a DM cheats a lot during the game session, it cheapens the experience and can break immersion if it's obvious. However, I totally agree that the DM has every right to adjust something on the fly to enhance the game.

Hmmm…that chapGPT voice sounded remarkably like…Luke!

I consider most of these minor admissions of failure, and my personal game is to see if I can play it straight. The exceptions are for past events (if I'm doing in-game mythology, I'm not going to roll for David's sling attack, he got a 20, leave it at that), or for story driving events (if I'm running Murder on the Orient Express, there will be a blizzard, weather table be damned). Otherwise, what will be will be, and my job is to respond accordingly.

I pretty much agree. The DM has the right to fudge things, but whenever I do it, I feel like a failure. It just happened in our last session. In the previous session, I thought the players had too easy a time of it, so this time I made a point of beefing up the opposition. I guess I over-compensated, because the PCs started getting smoked, and a TPK was imminent. I had some of the bad guys conveniently decide to retreat, but it was very obvious to the players that I was bailing them out, which made me feel like an even bigger failure.

I think if my players wanted me to obey the rules they should have suggested playing a board game instead.

The great feedback loop awaits us. ChatGPT learns from the content that content creators make, then content creators use ChatGPT to make content. In the end AI is going to learn from the content that it itself produces and humans just paraphrased and commented upon

Can my dwarf sword-and-board fighter get a 401k?

For me the rule is "never change things during sessions", the reason is that undermines the thrust of the players. An experienced player (like me) that also played a lot as DM will almost always be aware of the DM "cheating" in the ways described in the video. Maybe you can foul him once, you change a dice roll, he wont' notice, but changing 3-4 times in a combat? The experienced player will have "the gut feeling" that something is "wierd", and the dice rolls are the easier thing to "fake". Changing hp of the monsters? 99% will be noticed. Changing the plot? Almost the same. Players will have the feeling that they are irrelevant in the game, that their actions are useless and do not influence the game. It is awfull, and every time I had that feeling my reaction was always the same "this dm sucks and he's not worth a game with him". Learn to plan encounters and stories and DO NOT CHANGE THEM. If the players fail it doesn't matter, it's a game, you can always lose. If a session went wrong speak about it and try to improve AFTER. Remember you can foul only noobs, the others will be aware of what is going on. A game you can't influence is a game not worth playing.

It is just not possible for the DM to cheat.

One of my traditional 3 favorite Tempo changing to get players back on the storyline would be the Damsel in Distress, a child crying for help because one of their parents was taken by... or a wounded animal which led them to the next chapter of the mission when players lost track of the storyline.

I think I’ve done most of these. I do roll in the open though. I would love to ha 6% 401k match.

Other than fudging dice, I don't consider most of the examples given cheating, especially if the game is more fun as a result.

What about a DM creating a monster to specifically counter a particular PC’s abilities?

I had a gm who would always make a percentile roll hinder players even if they got the positive roll

As a player I would hate DM cheating until I became a DM myself. I'd find myself cheating accidentally by realizing I broke a rule but only after the session was over. Over time I'd learn to change encounters during the game than I originally intended, either because of what a player said or I think of a better idea at that moment than when I created the encounter. However, a DM should not make a combat harder if the players earn the easy way. If through tactics or clever play earlier in the adventure means a combat the DM intended to be hard is 'super easy, barely an inconvenience', let the players have their win. Knowing what they did made the combat easy is part of the fun.

Must be nice to have ChatGPT write your script for you.

When my first boss was about to die in the 2nd round of combat, I decided to measure his HP based on the tank's HP and the party's reaction to them dropping.

If I didn’t “cheat” TPK could be more common then “what’s your hp “

I've always called this game management. And it's great and a bit more fun for the DM when the don't have to adjust anything on the fly. But if you always "let the dice fall where they may" whether it's actual dice or other rules, then you obviously aren't there to tell a story, aren't a team player, and really can't be trusted as a DM or as a player. You and everyone are there to have fun, and if you're just gonna standby and let the story run into a brick wall and just end, then why are you even running the game? If you've made it feel like a challenge, and the players have had a lot of fun, then that's when the DM has "won" and you should take pride in having such a win

Sounds good!!

Some of these cheats sound like fixing poor game design. Like Plot kicks should never be behind dice rolls and Hirelings shouldn't outshine PC's.

Yeah, I've done all of the above. So long as it's seamless and you're providing a fun experience who cares.

Now I just wanna make a game full of puzzles with no solutions. Wait for the players to overthink each puzzle, roll a d4 for how many times they need to try fidgeting with stuff and that's the puzzles. Yes, I agree this is probably very stupid

In my opinion, DM's can't cheat. What they can do is to make the game fair or unfair for the players. The latter would be bad, the former would be desireable. I'm in total favor of DM's uising the session prep and the rules as guidelines, altering whatever s/he see fit to enhance the fun.

Fun over story. Story over rules

I wouldn’t call it cheating, but prudential judgement to help the game take it’s best possible form.

It is impossible for the DM to cheat. They might do things you don't like, sometimes to an extent you're better off just leaving the table, but they aren't cheating.

I don't see it as cheating, it's altering the game experience for the better. I make the game harder and easier at times to ensure everyone is having fun and the game is challenging and satisfying. Now if you balance things on the fly to just murder the players, yeah that's bad. But I don't do that, I'm not the best at balancing so altering things in the moment is for the sake of my players to have a fair experience.

My personal position of fudging roles - it's a viable option for DM to urgently shift balance when mistake were made and it's crucial to the game. It's "Break Glass in Case of Emergency" type of situation. But you can't use it every encounter or maybe even every game, because when players notice that, trust between you may break. Controversial opinion on the bottom. If you often need to fudge rolls and change HP of your monsters to save the game, your GAME SYSTEM (not you, as a GM) isn't very good. DnD shouldn't rely on DMs hastily fixing every other encounter to be playable. This is a very bad game design from the developers. And it's especially frustrates me that everybody now just assumes that it's fine to cheat. It's no longer Emergency Option, it's just everyday occurrence - which is very bad habit that DnD forced on their players.

The "why" is the real issue.

No fudging dice. A GMs role is to create an enjoyable scenario for their players. How the GM does it, well, that's up to the GM.

so your players wanna know DID YOU FUDGE LUKE? HUH DIDJA?

None of this is cheating. All of it is good GM’ing as long as it’s in pursuit of a good, fun, exciting session. Also, “almost never fudge dice” means you do fudge dice.

ChatGPT? Really? 😑

Thx🎉

First, I don't think any of the things on this list are really "cheating" on the GM's part with the exception of #1 and #2, fudging dice and changing monster stats mid fight. I don't do either of those things, and here's some food for thought on why, for all the folks commenting that they are acceptable. I think we can all agree that "railroading" your players is frowned upon right? Railroading would most commonly be described as removing player agency by making their decisions not matter, in other words, no matter what they choose to do, the things you, as the DM have planned, are going to happen no matter what. Now, it's safe to assume that every GM wants to create the most enjoyable game possible right? So, railroading by a GM is just the GM saying "What I have planned to happen is the most fun thing." But that's not cool right? Onto the topic of fudging dice and changing monster stats to make the combat more "fun" I argue then that, effectively, you are just railroading your combat. Doing it is no less onerous than railroading any other part of the game. You're saying "The way I envision this combat turning out is the most fun way, therefore, that's what I'm going to make happen" You're also removing player agency in a huge way. That way is during character building. Do your players get excited at level up when they choose an ability that gives them "+2 to damage when I'm doing X!" or something similar? "I now get advantage when I'm doing X!" But really, their +2 to damage doesn't mean anything when you change the monster's HP because it's dying too fast. That ability they were excited about getting that gives them +1 AC? Doesn't matter if you're changing the dice rolls. So yes, you are stealing a big part of player agency when you do these things. Lastly, let me say, as someone who both plays and DMs, you might think your players don't notice, but they do. And that's the worst part, because if they even so much as suspect it, you've lost that DM/Player trust.

It has very little to do with what they are doing *or* when they are doing it. It has almost everything to do with *why* they are doing it. And whether or not it's the correct thing to do depends mostly on the players you're running the game for.

Pkayer angency is paramount. The GM is an impartial referee. All seven violate both of these

....and use his 401k match as a negotiation lever....lfmao

So basically to chatGPT, a "source of creative output", being a creative GM is mostly cheating, ergo, ChatGPT is a cheater?

I would say gaslighting players is the worse especially when you remove already established and where cannon events that had roleplay done because of it for over 80 sessions. Or changing the story you already told to make a player wrong in the moment despite have go against what was already shown and cannon for 80 sessions . Its best just accept and use what got instead of ruining the game