Every player of DnD can relate a story of a perfectly planned combat action or skill check that has failed simply due to a bad roll of the dice. As GMs, you obviously experience this much more frequently as you have to roll for every monster, NPC, and opponent you put into the game. In DnD, the dice are supposed to represent randomness and chance, or maybe luck or destiny, if that’s how you interpret things. But in the big picture, sometime a bad roll completely ruins an otherwise amazing gaming session. So sometimes, even though it seems like cheating, you need to flub a few rolls.
Now I’m not talking about just making up numbers or completely making up the result of a dice check. Remember that as GM, you are in control of the world your game is set in, and that includes being in control of random chance. This is an area of gaming that depends entirely on your judgement as GM. Some GMs are very strict and will not deviate from the results of the dice. And of course, the core element of DnD’s rules is based on the results of those dice. But in some cases, the story and overall game experience is improved if you make an exception to the rule.
The easiest example of this dilemma is when it comes to combat. There are dozens of times when, in the heat of combat, the monsters I control get a lucky shot off against my players and score a critical hit or land an attack with a devastating special ability. This absolutely makes combat encounters exciting for everyone involved. But sometimes my monsters end up rolling hit after hit and start heading towards a TPK. No combat should be without risks; if a player feels they are just floating through combat without the chance of getting hurt, the game stops being fun. However, the fun also stops when every party member is down to 5 hit points and the monsters are still going strong. In certain situations, you need to ease up on your players for the sake of keeping the game moving. If your party has to constantly backtrack to buy healing potions or resurrect fallen members, the story will never progress.
This is where your judgement as GM comes into play. If the combat in question is just a random encounter and the party is having a hard time surviving, maybe you should cut them some slack and lower that d20 roll to hit from time to time, or maybe calculate minimum damage on the hits that do land. But if you have your players in the middle of a climactic fight with an enemy they’ve been tracking for several gaming sessions, keeping the damage they suffer high just makes everything more dramatic. But both of these examples have a valid opposite argument. If you make random encounters too easy, your players don’t get a sense of a danger and drama from the world setting of your game. Additionally, if there is nothing to force them to manage their resources properly when out in the world, they will be overpowered when it comes to important moments for the plot and events won’t be as exciting as they possibly could be. And if in a dramatic fight with a recurring enemy, your players just get completely slaughtered, there will certainly be some hesitation when it comes to starting on the next leg of the story arc.
There is no easy answer to this debate. But it’s still something you need to be aware of as a GM.
For me, this decision boils down to two factors: story and entertainment. Keeping the plot moving is a key part of your job as GM. An overly-deadly combat encounter can grind progress to a screeching halt. But it can also motivate your players to make new tactical decisions and keep the game fresh. I enjoy a game where I am not just telling a story to my players, but am involving them in that story and sharing and adventure with everyone at the table. Sometimes, the results of the dice just don’t make for a good story. That leads right into entertainment. I don’t want the excitement my players have for a well-crafted plan to fall apart when one of them rolls too low. But I also don’t what them to breeze through every challenge without a sense of risk.
I try to weigh out my choice in this matter by looking at the events like a TV show or movie. In certain situations, you want the heroes to succeed at everything they attempt because it makes for that great action scene. And sometimes you want to see the gritty results of a failure because it makes for a more dramatic moment.
Remember too that this pendulum swings both ways. While sometimes you may want or need to flub a roll in favor of your players, sometimes you need to do it for the sake of your own side of the game. Maybe you planned a long encounter and customized a group of monsters to make for an exciting combat session. Then your players mow through them in 2 rounds with lucky rolls. Maybe you introduce a recurring enemy and he gets slaughtered in the first encounter with your party. Maybe you built an intricate dungeon maze and your players pull off an amazing result on a divination spell to bypass all of your traps. Of course, you never really want to completely shut down what your players are doing. If they exercise true ingenuity and demonstrate sound tactics, you need to reward them. But sometimes, you want the elements of your story to play out like you want them to. Sometimes you need an attack against your main villain to not be quite as deadly or you help him make that saving through he just barely failed.
It all goes back to making the game entertaining. Don’t let your players kill off a villain if you know you’ve got great plans for the next session with him. Don’t let them skip through a really well-made dungeon crawl if you’ve put hours into the details and have some discoveries planned that are key to the plot. You are the GM and you are in control. But don’t ignore the rules completely, it makes for bad time for everyone at the table.
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