If you’re fudging dice your experience at the table is dysfunctional. I know, you’re going to argue against that with a level of commitment that is impressive. The problem is it’s true. It does not mean you’re table isn’t having immense fun. It doesn’t mean your table even cares the dice rolls are being fudged. It doesn’t even mean fudging the dice isn’t the right thing to do at your table based on the dynamics.
No one is doing anything wrong.
It doesn’t change the fact the dynamic at your table that gives rise to needing to fudge the dice is rising from dysfunction.
The wrong argument
Every so often the wheel of ttrpg discourse rolls around to whether you should fudge the dice or not as a GM. Naturally, this falls into ideological arguments about whether it is the right thing to do for the fun of the game or the wrong thing to do because it betrays some founding principle on which the game is based.
The simple truth is both these stances are incorrect. Literally arguing who is right or wrong from the viewpoint of your play style isn’t going to get you anywhere because the reason behind your view isn’t shared by the person you’re arguing with.
Instead, you have to look at why fudging the dice is necessary. It’s always necessary you say? Well, that’s the rub, it really isn’t, it’s an outcome of three choices you’ve made. If you honestly believe it’s always necessary to fudge the dice you’ve literally accepted the dysfunctional at your table has to be true. That’s not the case, though you may prefer it that way.
Three pillars of dysfunction
The need to fudge dice is like a stool. A stool with three legs. If any of those legs is not in perfect alignment then the stool falls over, an incongruity is introduced and intervention is needed. This intervention is the need to fudge the dice.
Playstyle. You have to be aware of your playstyle, there is a bunch of them in infinite diversity in infinite possibilities but it’s hard to discuss an infinite spectrum so let’s keep it basic. If your goal is to have an intentional story from your game then different games are going to serve you better than someone who wants to challenge the players and have them rise to the occasion and their characters not die in the attempt.
System. The system you are using needs to support your playstyle. If it doesn’t the need to fudge the dice increases. The reason it increases is it keeps generating outcomes that don’t match what you want at the table as it’s not designed to deliver those outcomes.
Stakes. You have to have clear stakes set whenever you roll the dice. Stakes should be clear and all options should be interesting or at least be something the table is willing to entertain happen. If not you’re going to be back to fudging the dice again.
When the legs are too short
All it takes is one of these legs to be too short and you have a problem.
Let’s say you are aligned on playstyle and system. If you then fail to set the stakes correctly for dice rolls or fall into the habit of ‘just rolling’ you can easily find yourself getting outcomes that aren’t great and thus you fudge the dice. A simple example of this is putting key information behind a dice roll or deciding an outcome on failure where it suddenly becomes apparent the player or group wouldn’t take it well or it’s just banal. Set the stakes. Agree on the stakes. Then roll the dice.
Playstyle can be out of sync. If you’re looking for an intentional story it wouldn’t be that surprising if you find you have to fudge the rolls a bit if you’re playing a game of challenges, with a linear D20 and not the greatest odds on skill checks. That’s essentially Dungeons and Dragons. It’s why you fudge rolls. It’s why you might be making up the hit points. All of which is fine but let’s not delude ourselves it is not because of a gross dysfunction between playstyle and system.
The idea that fudging the dice is a storytelling tool is only true when the goal of an intentional story hits the wall of the system being misaligned with a side order of not setting stakes correctly.
Similarly, someone who wants the game to be about tasking the players to overcome various challenges and have their character survive the ordeal is going to be constantly fighting a system that operates at the level of the fiction and character death is effectively a player choice.
Why we don’t fudge
We don’t fudge the dice rolls and make them all in the open not because we think it’s the right thing to do on principle, but because there is literally no need to. A lot of the time we are playing games where the playstyle, system and outcome stakes are in alignment and clear.
Why would you hide rolls that are in perfect synchronicity with playstyle and system and have outcomes everyone agrees on are interesting however the dice fall? Hell, in some of the games we play the GM doesn’t even roll dice to fudge.
Do we never fudge? Usually when the system is out of step with our style of play and we’ve introduced dysfunction. I’m pretty sure fudging happens when we play Dungeons & Dragons it just tends to be on variables other than the rolls which are still made in the open.
And, Finally…
Fudging the dice is born out of dysfunction. Now, the dysfunction across playstyle, system and outcomes may be something you are happy with and you’re also happy with the natural need to occasionally fudge the dice as a result.
That is perfectly fine, it doesn’t happen to change the fact that if you had the three in alignment you’d not have to. The really weird thing is, and this is where RPG’s get really strange, it may turn out when they are in alignment you don’t like the results. This can be for numerous reasons. You like the setting of the game. You like being in the community of the game. It’s the only game anyone will play. The list goes on. And thus fudging the dice will never go away.
As someone who has the three things aligned though? It’s pretty sweet and there is no need to fudge the dice.