I've briefly touched loosely on my team. Of note who come up often are myself the Envoy, our Soldier, our Mechanic, and our Operative. For the sake of things, our other two arw a Mystic and a Technomancer.
Now a few weeks back, our seating arrangement was rearranged and I caught our Operative cheating rolls. I saw him clearly roll a four, pull the dice in to read it, and claim his total was 26.
We were level 2. For context, as an Envoy my best skill is Intimidate with Skill Focus, Expertise, and a bioware enhancement for +2 (I know Skill Docus and Expertise don't stack as Insight bonuses, you default to whichever is better, meaning on my +1d6 if I roll <4 it defaults to +3). I cap out at +18 on a max Expertise roll, could have had +2 more from racial if I really had wanted to min-max it. This is my level 3 bonus, and even min maxed 4 would have capped 24.
This isn't the only instance. There's a pattern of rolling something super early, and announcing it a crit to the table as well.
When I found out, it bugged me, cause I thought back on it and pretty consistently all of his roll results are 20+. Even back when we were playing Pathfinder, so it left the seeds of doubt. I confronted our GM about it, saying I noticed and maybe keep an eye out for it. It was up to him what he wanted to do, and really as long as everyone is having fun, who really cares right?
Now I also discussed it with the rest of the table, learning essentially that I wasn't the only one to have caught him, but again it's not hurting. We're not playing against each other after all. So we essentially settled on all being aware of it, we're not happy and a little upset he has to cheat to have fun, but it's not hurting too much.
This week though, yet another player caught it, and it dawned on me how it is hurting the team. A few weeks ago I put up a thing about our Mechanic feeling like he was useless with the Operative around and it was pointed out that the Mechanic will get abilities to level the playing field. When you factor in the cheating though, what is a +2-4 difference in raw skill numbers is compounded by never rolling a failure. Any time that the group is asked for a skill roll, be it group perception or if we're hacking 2 systems or whatever, the cheater steals the show, and it compounds taking use out of our Mechanic. Our Mechanic has pretty much caught on and in skill sections is pulling out his 3DS because it's going to be a span of time with the Operative doing anything we would ask him to do.
The other instance is Starship combat, where our Operative is the pilot. From there the cheating is no longer just him and rolls not missing, he's cheating the whole table when our helm phase rolls don't score under 24. It's nice to have control of the combat by being able to position after, but as a result there is no threat to us when we call the shots. I think we have lost 1 Starship initiative roll ever, and it's because our GM has started waiting until the Operative announces our Piloting before letting him know what the enemy got (and even then, he's been fair, but he's got the screen and I wouldn't blame him for cheating back so that we have a bit more challenge and therefore fun).
So from here, the impact is becoming more obvious. I'm not sure what to do though. Should I talk again about it with the GM? Bring up the new impact it has? Or just let it go. As much as it bothers a number of us at the table, the one most effected (our Mechanic) has not to my knowledge raised any major complaint.
Also, the whole 'The GM may or may not be rolling behind a screen to cheat back' is super, super disturbing. If, and I recognize the 'if' part, your GM is made aware of someone cheating and decides that the way to handle that is to cheat back? Coin toss if I would stand up, point out both cheaters, and then turn in my character sheet and find something else to do with my time.
I perhaps worded that poorly as it was a statement in passing. When I GM games I have not been above lying to my players about rolls if it would add to the experience (or not kill them cheaply).
Example I had a 5e combat where a player was low, but he got min damage the previous round. He'd have won had he done a few more points of damage. My attack roll would have hit, killed him, and likely made the combat longer as his ally tried to res him only to give the low enemy a few free hits and likely a TPK as they continued to try and keep each other alive.
Rather than, I lied, said that the attack was a miss, and the table celebrated their brush with death near-victory. I acknowledge that a player doesn't want to hear I "cheated", but I recognize that in the name of fun it is sometimes necessary.
Comparatively, sometimes if I made an enemy with a really cool attack I want to show off, I may fudge a miss into a hit just once for that. Instill the fear, and make my players need to think about how to overcome the obstacle. It makes the victory all the more satisfying knowing what something was capable of compared to if it missed all it's rolls. Something that missed everything would feel like the encounter wasn't a challenge for the players, so unless they're the type who like an invincible steamroll they probably wouldn't have a good time.
GMs are there to tell the story, and I accept that they will bend rules to tell a good one for the players. That's what I meant, as I don't know if our GM would do that in order to increase the challenge. Not as a counter-player attitude.
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Dude. No. Nobody cheats at the damn table. Tell your GM its his/her/their call, but you're either taking the operative player aside and talking about it, or talking about it at the table in public. Whichever way it goes, the operative needs to stop cheating or leave the game.
I agree 100%. Cheating diminishes the game for everyone, including the cheater. There is no reason to cheat. I could *almost* understand cheating if it was a life or death situation for your PC, but even then cheating is completely unacceptable.
A large part of the game is feeling like your heroes earn their victories. As a GM, I enjoy giving the players difficult combats that cause them to doubt their chance of survival. They really have to think about their strategies, and every dice roll is full of anxiety. The table cheers when somebody rolls a high number, and the table groans when they see a low dice. But the PCs always manage to find a way to overcome their obstacles, and everyone at the table gets to feel accomplished.
Even 1 player cheating takes that feeling of accomplishment away from everybody else.
I would not allow anybody to cheat at my table. Somebody should talk to the cheating player, and that player should roll out in the open so that others can see. Their character is going to fail sometimes. That's going to be frustrating. But the frustration makes the victories so much sweeter.
GMs are there to tell the story, and I accept that they will bend rules to tell a good one for the players. That's what I meant, as I don't know if our GM would do that in order to increase the challenge. Not as a counter-player attitude.
Sometimes GMs can fudge rolls to enhance the story. Not everybody agrees that GMs should fudge their rolls. Generally, though, the GM is not cheating. They are reducing the randomness to tell a story.
Does he roll the dice and grabs it from the table right away? And why nobody calls him out as soon as they see it? I never let anything like that fly either as a GM or as a player.
Since the situation has pilled up this way, the GM should talk with the cheater outside the session and give him an ultimatum to stop the cheating or leave the group. What a pain.
Man, why bother rolling dice? Just let him announce that he succeeded in anything he tries and move on. Hah, maybe move on to some diceless system.
When my kids were little they would sometimes lie about their rolls. We created a public dice tray so that any roll could be observed by everyone and the total result had to be announced before the die could be touched. Now, years later, we're all digital, therefore dice cheating can't happen anyway. I recommend a public dice tray or going digital.
Most importantly, I recommend an open table discussion to address such concerns without calling anyone out specifically. Let the table know that cheating is a betrayal of the spirit of the game. Let everyone speak, and be respectful of all feelings and views.
Does he roll the dice and grabs it from the table right away? And why nobody calls him out as soon as they see it? I never let anything like that fly either as a GM or as a player.
More or less. He rolls close to himself, enough so he can pull his hand around in front to kneel in and read. Behaviour mildly normal considering that of 7 people at the table, 6 wear glasses (myself and the Operative included, though mine are for nearsightedness).
There are obvious tells to the cheating though. The hand coming around, the brief delay in answer. And his method accounts for the GM not seeing, not the player next to him. Plus again, the early rolling on occasion where I won't even hear his die hit the table before he pushes it out to show the result. Generally crits or 18+.
I tend to follow the action, so whoever's turn it is, I give them my attention. That first session I sat next to him rather than across as normal was first note, and last week's as I said a new player directly noticed. Sitting beside him again. His cheating has a blind spot no one has ousted yet.
Lastly, @Isaac, not too long ago your tune was along the lines of ‘The operative is too OP and my group kind of feels like quitting the game.’ Whether anyone is currently outwardly angry or not, that’s the effect this player has had by cheating. That’s a pretty damn big deal, I think.
Yes... You're right, and while I think the Operative class still plays some role in the problem (particularly in starship roles), the cheating is a significantly larger impact on things.
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Starship keelhauling.
I'm assuming this person is your friend, hence the reluctance to call the person out on the issue. Assuming the desire to avoid conflict/maintain social harmony is stronger than the drive to prevent the cheating, is there any reason the GM can't just ask everyone at the table to roll in a general area of the table where everyone can see?
Yeah, the players are all going to know why it's being done, but it does avoid explicitly calling anyone out and it causes minimal impact on gameplay overall.
I'm assuming this person is your friend, hence the reluctance to call the person out on the issue. Assuming the desire to avoid conflict/maintain social harmony is stronger than the drive to prevent the cheating, is there any reason the GM can't just ask everyone at the table to roll in a general area of the table where everyone can see?
Yeah, the players are all going to know why it's being done, but it does avoid explicitly calling anyone out and it causes minimal impact on gameplay overall.
On the nose, yeah. And that is our first plan. We drop a lot of dice off the table so we're using it as an excuse as to not make it an obvious singling out.
Should that fail, there's not much other choice. A call out and confrontation on it are a must. We didn't have an issue when it wasn't hurting anyone, but if it is it's worth confrontation.
And then finally, all else fails, we'd have to discuss the kick. He is our friend, but if needing to always succeed is more important than making sure everyone can participate... That's life.
A GM fudging rolls isn't cheating because it is within the rules of the game that the GM can do so, and because the role of the GM is to be the arbiter of everything- the rules exist to give the GM tools to arbitrate with, not to constrain the GM.
A player fudging rolls is bad because it disempowers the gms ability to fairly and effectively arbitrate everything, and because it removes the stakes and challenge from the game, and is unfair to the other players.
I was DMing Dead Suns for my party when I caught a player of mine cheating in one of the many combats. I caught him say that he rolled a natural twenty, when I watched the die land on something like a 15. Now I've had trouble with this guy before, he seems to want to do things like this when things hit the fan and it looks grim for the party.
What I did was I started watching him closely after that, and each time I caught him cheating (which was only once more after that event) I stored a "Natural 20" that a monster in a future fight gets to hit them with.
The problem with this is it doesn't really confront the problem and just leaves you on the side of a vengeful DM which never is the best idea, but I think in my case the point got through to him. I believe after the event was all said and done another player talked to him about the cheating and explained what happened and why it happened, and he's either gotten better at lying and hiding his rolls, or it stopped the problem.
To me its pretty simple and I don't care if he's a friend or not. Once a cheat , always a cheat .. its the way people are made. He needs to be booted out.. It is the GM's call on this.. If the GM feels its ok for a player to continually cheat like that , then personally I would leave the game myself. Cheating rolls ruins the game.