It helps greatly to join a regular online gaming group, rather than just randomly hopping into pick-up games.

OnlineGameDay, for example, is mostly That Other Game, but it's pretty active and generally if someone schedules a game there, it goes off. If you get a reputation for not showing up to games you signed up for, well, you stop getting accepted. The community there is sufficiently large enough that reputation matters, and generally there's always extra players waiting who can fill empty player slots.



-karma

Wow, and one post ago you were belly-aching about how someone else's opinion trumps yours?

sabs did say "I don't", not, 'it's a fact that…'. Everyone's so touchy. I was just teasing Fatum for calling sabs' earlier opinion "false".

Let's remember that everyone's posts are prefaced by, 'It is my personal opinion that:'.

Well said.

I like live, cause if it is online life is more like to interrupt and hey get you out of the house.

Besides you can't split a pizza, share dorritos and mountain dew in virtual space.

IMHO--of course.

I agree. For me, live is more fun. I've done both. Also, wow, we're so far off-topic.

I like live games because I enjoy hanging out with my friends every week. Catching up on stuff, reliving old stories and experiencing and playing a game. Its fun.

I like online games because I can really focus on my character, the way he talks and acts. That's stuff that I don't normally do in my live games because my friends aren't really into it. They sometimes are, but if we really got into our characters as much as on online games, it would be way too serious and not be as much fun.

Both have their pros and cons.

Well, to get things back on topic, what do you think about GM's changing a rule mid-stream? I'm not talking about house rules, which are declared in advance. I'm talking about blatantly changing a rule in the middle of a game.

I have no problem with it if it is correcting some kind of abuse. If player A came up with gimmick combination B that the GM and others did not spot, in play I see no problem with the GM saying yeah house ruling that so it doesn't work. I don't think players have some right to break the game because they found out a loop hole. There are obviously other situations where a rule-change is not kosher.

Depends what you call the middle of a game. I'm fine with it between two sessions, it leaves time for the players to change their character accordingly if they want to.

A lot of unspoken variables with that question. For certain things, such as "I'm changing the traning time to/from X to Y" isn't as much of an issue for me, though "you can no longer use Edge dice" might be.

It's irritating. Although it does depend on which rule, and how, and for what reason.

But really I feel that you should never change rules mid game. If you want to change a rule, you talk about it after the session, and before the next one.

I'm okay with the mid-stream rule change, assuming it was done for the betterment of the game (even if a player or GM gets dicked over by it). As long as the rule is consistent going forward and players get a chance to change their characters if they were abusing built to abuse it.

I really try to state up-front what I'm changing and how I'm going to rule, but when stuff comes up during the game, I'll try to make a decision right away and then by next session (which is usually a week), have a final ruling, whether it ends up being a new house rule or sticking to the majority interpretation of the book.

As always, the answer is 'it depends'. Maybe it's a change that makes the game more fun for everyone.

I do my best not to change rules mid-stream, or even mid-campaign. We are playing a rule in 4e D&D wrong and I refuse to change it in our campaign. I'll let it continue to work as we played it until our campaign ends (granted that is only 2 more pre-made adventures).

If I do change a rule, I try to discuss it with the players and give them a chance to change things about their character that are affected by the change.

I'm not sure how it would respond as I have only played a handful of short sessions of RPGs in the past decade or so.

god I'm going to use a 4e D&D example. For the wizard class they have a paragon path called blood mage and it has a power called blood pulse. (thankfully errataed) Basically it caused damage for every square you moved through. On the surface it seemed kind of powerful but okay. They people pointed out that larger size creatures take up multiple squares and for every square they move they move through multiple squares, and heck a push power is a form of movement, and you could easily push someone 4+ squares. If they take up 4 squaresx4squares =16 squares they moved through=crap tons of damage at like level 11. A player might have figured this gimmick out, and tries to use i in play. I have no problem with the GM house ruling it on the spot because it is obviously broken. I also have no problem if the GM deal with it for 4 adventures or whatever then says you know enough is enough that is out powering level 20 powers I am house ruling it. This is what I consider good in game rules changes.

Off hand I can't think of anything quite as extreme as this in SR4, but there can always be issues you don't anticipate that grate against how you run games. Sure you can try to adapt, but if you think oh direct combat spells are overpowered you may not want to end an otherwise awesome campaign just so you can insert a house rule.

Your example seems more like rules interpretation, not changing a rule. I will put my foot down about a rules interpretation to stop rules abuse in a heartbeat. That is the only time I pull out the 'I'm the GM' to stop an argument.

I'm also not sure what "changing a rule" is meant to mean.

Frequently, I've seen, in the middle of a game (and not just Shadowrun) a debate about what a rule actually means. When this happen a GM is frequently "clarifying" or "changing" a rule (often depending on one's point of view).

I've also experienced times when a GM needs to simply ignore a rule to keep the action moving. The amount of table time it takes to steal a snowplow is entirely up to how much handwaving the GM wants to do. Stealing the snowplow can be done in 5 minutes or 2 hours, depending.

It's also unfair (in my opinion) to actually expect the GM to know all the rules. Having to actually know Astral, Meat, AR, VR, and Entity (pilot/agent/sprite/spirit/etc) rules without having to look them up is really a lot to expect out of the person who also has to plan the adventure, including all that stuff the players manage to avoid doing. Because of all that responsibility and knowledge required, I don't fault any GM for making an on-the-fly decision with the understanding that if someone can actually find the rule for that case, the group may (or may not) switch to the correct rule on-the-fly.

As a metaphor, I'd compare the GM to being the World of Warcraft server. The main reason I'd compare them is that the GM clearly isn't the World of Warcraft server. The WOW server can't even meet the expectations of the average WOW player. Expecting the GM to meet those same expectations is simply unreasonable. As such, the GM needs to be cut some slack, at least as much slack as any of the players would like to be cut, only more because he's stuck with the hard job.

Actually no its not an interpretation. 4E D&D did an awesome job of labeling every type of modifier, movement, etc. The stat blocks of a power had pretty much everything you needed to know about the power. While yeas they had broken rules which they are constantly errataing to make the game better, they were rock solid on defining the terms of the game so you could know exactly what a power did, and exactly how it worked. It is something I want for SR actually, I really want them to getting into the nitty gritty of defining every term and how each term works and how they work in conjunction.

Yeah, D&D learned the hard way to make mechanics crystal clear. Their players require it. :/

I'm ok with trying a rule out for a session or two even if it dramatically changes my character.

Hah! I like it.

I prefer clear. I can still houserule a clear or unclear rule, but clear rules allow everyone who is coming to the table to be at the same rules understanding point. I think more conflicts occur not from bad rules, but form people having a different opinion on what the rules mean.

Yes, vague rules do allow players (even theoretically benevolent players) to annoy the hell out of each other and the GM with interpretations. Very clear keywords and things (Dodge Bonus, Competence Bonus, etc.) do save lots of time in consensus-building arguments.

What D&D taught me is that no game can survive munchkin expansions.
*cough* *runners companion*

This is a bit like saying: "I think it's unfair to actually expect a judge to know all the laws." If a judge doesn't have a firm grasp on the intricacies of the law, people suffer. If a GM doesn't know all the rules, or have a backup plan, his game suffers.

The median expected salary for a typical Judge/Magistrate in the United States is $143,628.
For that kind of money, I'll become a Shadowrun expert too.

What I'm seeing here is a trend.
This started out with you, Cain, claiming that a rating 6 device, no matter how cheaply priced, had to have a device rating 6, meaning response, system, firewall, sensors of 6. That's a pretty huge advantage for the players.
When people disagreed and explained why, you argued vehemently.
When it was pointed out that the rule interpreted your way, had repercussions for the players, you claimed that if a GM did that, it would be metagaming, the "worst form of GM cheating and asshattery" , "especially when a GM does it".
Then we got to the point of discussing the GM's plans and the plans the 5 players come up with and your conclusion was "if you [meaning the GM] didn't think of it, it's unfair to instantly develop a counterplan for it", making it a 5 brains against 1 brain competition, instead of an effort at cooperative storytelling.
And once you've established it's competitive you note that "I've discovered that going player-directed is a much more satisfying way to game". (i.e. it's a competition the GM is supposed to lose.)
"And you make it clear that this is how you think it should be for everyone since "this thread is meant to help sucky GM's learn what they're doing wrong".
And now you're expecting the GM to know all the rules, something that I've never seen a table expect of each and every one of the players and something that, for a GM's first game, is such a high bar as to actively discourage people from GMing.

Way back in the original thread, you told me "I really don't want to play in your games".

Thank you.

It's pretty easy to see the kind of game you want to play. I wholeheartedly support your effort to find such a game. I wholeheartedly encourage anyone who thinks games should be played your way to join you. I hope you find the kind of GM you are looking for. For me, that's what's great about RPGs as a hobby. There isn't just one right way. You can play the type of game you want to play and I can go to another table entirely.

And so do I.

You have chosen to take nearly everything that was posted by Cain in an adversarial manner and put competitive GM-versus-players spin on such arguments as he had made.

It is clear therefore to see that you wish to play in a game that would not be fun for anyone expecting to play in a game that has rules that are consistent and a GM that does not hold an adversarial attitude towards his players.

Indeed, in your own words, I wholeheartedly support your effort to find such a game. I also wholeheartedly encourage anyone who thinks games should be played your way to join you. I sincerely hope you find the kind of GM you are looking for. Certainly, that is what's great about RPGs as a hobby. It is evident that there is a right way for you to play. You can play the type of game you want to play while I enjoy playing Shadowrun.

With words such as "cheating" and "unfair", I can't see how to interpret what he says in a co-operative light. How does a GM "cheat" or be "unfair" in a co-operative storytelling game?

I have never witnessed a game where the rules were consistent and not houseruled. Nor have I witnessed a long term game where the rules didn't change over time. Many games have rule changes between editions, erratta, and in at least one popular case, the changes are monthly with the character builder having scheduled updates.

I want to sit at a table where there is a challenge for the characters to overcome. If you want to call that "adversarial", feel free. To me, that challenge is a basic part of the storytelling in "cooperative storytelling".

I have never met a GM who didn't have to make up something on the fly when the players went in an unexpected direction. I've never met a GM who started off with a complete knowledge of the rules. Excepting a GM, every GM, to be that prepared seems unreasonable to me. I'll sit at the table where the expectations aren't so high.

This discussion is going nowhere. Everything's been said and everything's been willfully misinterpreted by everyone else already. It's equal parts straw men and baiting the other people.

Well to be fair at suog, it pretty much always is adversial.
That just seems to be Cains posting style.

To answer Cain's most recent question...

I do pbp. If a ruling seems odd, I will put it to a vote immediately in the OOC thread, and apply it immediately. But it's not arbitrary. Changes BETWEEN sessions may be arbitrary, but that's between sessions.

Tabletop I'll generally stick with the rules during the session, then discuss after, unless it's a huge oversight in the rules, in which case I'll just have to balance between 'good of the PCs' and 'good of the story'. However, it's my policy that I will always rule favorably to the PCs on administrative stuff like this, unless it's *really* pressing.

I've usually found that a rules change, which I normally don't "process" until the next gaming session, where I have a week or two to come to forums, do internet searches and figure out a generally accepted approach, is usually not too big of a deal to my player by the time the next session comes up.

I'd say half the time, the situation never comes up again. The other half, they give me a positive or negative one-liner and make the needed correction on their side.

I also want to submit that there have been occasions when I tell my players that I never thought of the approach they are using. Just that little statement seems to give them a badge of accomplishment and gives me the go ahead to figure something out on the fly to handle the situation. I can't think of any instance where my players were upset that I made something up on the fly. They always feel that the "game" should react appropriately and as the GM, I try to do that. They have no problem calling me out if I make something up, on the fly, that they feel is completely unreasonable.

I think it goes a long way to not GM in a vacuum and let your players into your own story-crafting world. If that means you admit to cheating and the players are okay with it, so be it. If they get upset that you cheated, then I'd say next time you don't. Granted, I'm a "give the players what they want"-type GM, so YMMV.

Just my .02 Nuyen.......

1. I hate screens. They are an ever present symbol of a separation of GM and players and both consciously and subconsciously promote a GM vs. player attitude. It is a line drawn in the sand.

2. I do not care how long any of you have been gaming. It has no bearing on weather or not a person is correct on a given point. Doing something poorly or just plain wrong for a very long time is distinctly possible.

3. Fudging dice is wrong, maybe not cheating, but wrong. I do not care if you want a story to go a certain way. Then do it. Do not blow smoke up my bunghole by rolling dice behind your screen and pretending they mean anything. I am not so stupid that I can not tell when the all powerful GM is not actually adding the dice or writing anything down. Your BS skill is not as good as you think it is. If you need a scene to happen a certain way, just say so. "Ok people here is what happens." That's cool with me, it is just a narrative scene. However, if you as a GM choose to let the dice decide an outcome, then let them decide. If you roll dice and then decide you do not like the outcome, then you have just wasted everyone's time.

3.25. The only reason to ever hide a dice roll is to grant the roller the ability to alter the outcome.

4. Metagaming is a tricky area for a GM. GM's (and PC's) unavoidably do it. But it should not be abused. Just use what your character knows. That is what role-playing is. It is doing what your character would do, not what you would do. In the case of the GM, the NPC's are his characters. Role-play them, it can be fun. Knowing your PC/NPC just made the wrong decision for the right reasons can be a lot of fun.

5. Tailor making encounters for you PC's is not metagaming, but the responsibility of the GM. As long as they are attempting to create a challenge and not just prove that they can kill PC's.

6. I can smell a bad GM a mile away. And I am not just talking about gamer funk. I can walk around a con and spot them from across the room. Try it sometimes. You might be amazed at what you can observe just walking around the game rooms at a con. It is the closest thing to gaming into a mirror one can find. Want to be a better GM? Just observe and you will quickly find plenty of examples of what to do and what not to do.

3.25: Plenty of rolls are intended to function secretly; it works better if the players don't know that there was a roll at all.

That was way more than .02, buddy.

Indeedy. After all, we're supposed to make seekrit Perception checks for the team as they're wandering along, to avoid that whole 'I didn't succeed my roll I'm rolling Edge to make sure I see it' schtick.

I do believe that fudging dice is cheating...but I do it regularly.

Before I begin any campaign, I ask the players if they want to me roll dice openly. I have no issue doing so. Now, I always add that if I do that, then I am not going to fudge any rolls. Not a single time have the players asked me to take down the screen.

Sometimes I build a tough encounter and tell the players before hand that they are going to be in for a challenge. I do this to keep their focus and not autopilot themselves to a death. Sometimes, I make mistakes and make the encounter too powerful or too weak. I'd rather my players come away with a tough challenge then to feel like the GM is just all talk. I like them to feel defeat and overcome it...its fun.

So, I fudge rolls, sometimes to keep from killing a player, other times to keep from making the encounter a cakewalk. Its kind of like Madden AI Assistance or NFL Blitz. The end score is close and while yeah, you don't always get to blow your opponent out, when you win, its that much sweeter, even if I don't know just which plays were assisted or not.

And I am honest with my players, AFTER THE SESSION. If they think I fudged something and ask, then I will tell them. Sometimes its my mistake, other times just their actions that made things more or less difficult. If you are not willing to GM that way, or play in a game that is GMd that way, then why not just play an MMO, where the numbers are always final? Because that is what you are doing, making the results the final judge...

I don't like giving up that control or letting a random number ruin a story "just because". Now, if I were a malicious GM, this would all be a problem. Since I'm not, my players continue to show up and play, have a good time and when a campaign ends, ask me to run another one.

Aside: I have been running a Wushu-based play-by-post game where there really is minimal separation between the players and GM. As a GM, all I am really responsible for doing is setting up some parameters for success for a scene. But even in a rule-lite game with minimal GM separation, the players still want the GM to, well, be a GM and add some personality to the game, rolls and outcomes.

You may have a point there.

Ok now that is a classic example abusive Metagaming. The player knows it is there, so they abuse the rules mechanic to get the result they want.

And the solutions are simple.

1. Don't tell them the thresholds. ask, "Is that your final answer?" Then let them know if it was enough successes. And no backsies. And have them make frivolous checks. That way they never know which ones count.

2. If an opposed test, players roll first.

I never tell them the thresholds. Just the act of telling them can elicit this reaction at times - though it's fun as hell to waste their Edge like that sometimes, especially when you can craft a really creepy infiltration. I just prefer to randomly roll dice behind the screen at times so they think I'm just bored and whittling time away while they discuss 'teh planz' amongst themselves. Then I strike as the spitting cobra, and the Shoggoths come a-shamblin'.

If you want an open way of dice for opposed tests, have the GM roll first behind the "screen" then lift the screen after the player rolls. Otherwise the same accusations towards fudging the dice that can happen, can also happen about the number of dice the GM rolls. If he's rolling a lot, he can be accused of fudging the dice count up. If he's rolling few, he can be accused of fudging the dice count down.

The main reason I prefer not to run a zero fudge table for a public game is variable table strength. Until the game is in progress it's hard to judge the strength of the table. Discovering part way through that one player is either going to turn this into a cakewalk or a meat grinder is frequently not fun for everyone involved. In public store gaming, it can be worse because it's possibly for players to join/leave a game in progress and in doing so, the table strength changes.

The issues involved with home games are less. People are more predictable and everyone tends to know the strengths and weaknesses of the players and characters. And if someone has to go, it's a question of call the game and resume next time or adjust for the loss of the player.

By the GM not wanting to be co-operative. RPGs came outta wargaming which is very adversarial. Prior to the VtM craze the the GMs I met/played with came in two types
1. Its my story (ala your character doesn't really matter, the story will go on regardless of what you do)
2. GM vs Players, I will win all the characters are dead

Regardless of how stupid the idea may sound that is what a percentage of GMs are still like.

Experience gaming is experiential data. If I say "I've GMed this way for 10 years across 50 players", that's a larger sample size than most, and that does have weight.

Just saying.



Perhaps for you as a player. But I don't think what you enjoy has any bearing on the online group I run with, the games I run with my wife, or the games I run with my six-year-old. If you are a special-needs player, simply tell your GM. But assuming that one GM's style is 'wrong' is a little... limiting.

As a general rule, I'll fudge dice at least once for the first session of a player new to the system, and multiple times for players under 18, or players who make it clear they just want casual gaming. If you're a simulationist of a 'real man' roleplaying or a munchkin, obviously your needs are different and I'll adapt to it.

edit: Also, I will tell the players that (although sometimes I need prompting). The exception is if it's the huge, climactic final roll that decides if the campaign is success or not. When there's that much weight on one roll, and you've already been doing everything right, I'll fudge the roll and I'll lie to your face about it (depending on the player, of course). A whole campaign should ideally never come down to a single dice roll, and I believe that pretty firmly, so in that case, it doesn't. The dice roll is the illusion, the meta-game dramatic tool to make the moment feel tense and dangerous. The outcome is already determined by virtue of your spending 12 months doing this.



Or build suspense or for speed of gaming or for opposed rolls or for hiding your opponents stats or because I'm figuring out how many dice are appropriate while I'm rolling and I don't want you putting up a big stink because I rolled 6 dice when 4 is right or because...

I don't tailor anything - NPCs have the skills, abilities, knowledge and gear that makes for them to have in-game, no matter how weak or powerful the PCs are.

Disagree. When I GM, I typically make dice rolls in the open because, well, don't care too much and if the results aren't secret then the roll doesn't need to be. However, making secret dice rolls serve many purposes. Players don't always need to know the outcomes, and sometimes need to not know them. However, the GM may still want to make the outcome of the test random so as to not simply be railroading the event.

Is this a public game or a home game?

I ask because in a public game I don't know if the players are bringing dumpshock level characters or the starting characters in the book. The difference between the sample Face character in SR4 and the Pornomaner is huge. If I built NPCs in the middle, they would stomp the sample book characters and the dumpshock characters would have them for breakfast. I simply don't see how to make the game equally challenging for both sets of characters without fudging or publicly changing the table rating after I've had a chance to learn the skills of the players and the quality of the character builds.

I think you bring up something interesting about adventure design. I see two ways you can look at this. Lets say your running a special forces opposition team, you may want to just put their stats at what they should be and let them either stomp the pregens or get toasted by the pornomancer. The problem here would be keeping the game fun because you dont always want to get stomped and you dont always want to breeze through everything. That would be the "realistic" method. The other way is to just have it be fun yet challenging and dial it up or down dependent on the PCs. The problem here is if you have a pregen and a pornomancer in the same group its tough to dial it in right. Personally I tend to mix the two, I start out with the first but if my PCs are constantly getting stomped I dial it down a bit.

Well... What sort of a game do you want? If you want the PCs to generally succeed, you make things easier on them (and vice versa) edit - succeed without significant advantages or preparation.

That's definitely a GM problem, although it's also a system problem. A good GM will be able to balance whatever the party is composed of, but a good system will make his job easier.

I also hate GM screens and never use them. Instead I have all of the relevant tables and charts in a 3-ring binder that sits flat on the table in front of me. I never make dice rolls in secret, though I may roll the dice and not tell the players what the roll was for or even for which character the roll may apply. So even Perception checks need not be rolled in secret behind a screen. I keep copies of every players character and insist on having a copy before the game begins specifically so I can tailor the game to the characters. I don't, however, tailor the game world to the characters. If they decide to head in a direction I hadn't planned I will try to nudge them back on track, but if they insist on a new path then whatever opposition they encounter is more likely to be balanced by the world rather than their characters. In these situations they may sometimes encounter opposition above their ability to handle and sometimes the opposition may be a cakewalk and sometimes just like Goldilocks and the Three Bears it may be just right.

While I never actively seek to kill off a character, if a character does die (and it happens occasionally) I think it can actually add some good dramatic elements to the game and hopefully serves as a reminder to the other PCs that combat can be just as deadly to them as it is to the NPCs. I've also never in 25+ years of GMing ever ran a campaign in which the ultimate outcome was based on the result of a single die roll. Sometimes the campaign ends with all the characters celebrating at the local tavern and sometimes it ends with the survivors attending a funeral for a fallen comrade.