A rogue player in the game I'm running came up with an interesting way to cheat in a gambling den and I'm wondering how /tg/ would react to it. The player's logic went something like this:
>gambling den is likely full of cheaters, but there should be some honest players as well
>against honest players he could win via cheating
>against cheaters he would lose as they are more experienced and wouldn't get caught
>since he's a new guy most people eager to play with him would be cheaters
>he went along with this, playing perfectly honestly and starting to lose
>then he managed to slip some cards into play unnoticed in a way that didn't benefit him
>a few turns later he "discovered" the extra cards
>feigned outrage, made a huge ruckus, threatened to call the guards
>got the game cancelled
>from this point onward cheaters would avoid him since they don't want to deal with the risk
>honest players would be more likely to believe he's one of them
>now he's free to play the honest players and fleece them
I'm always worried about my players just fast talking me into accepting unreasonable ideas, but this seemed sound so I let it work.
>>43804340
I definitely think the idea is a clever one, and the player ought to get something for his idea, but his idea doesn't have to work out perfectly. While he might have scared away many cheaters, the most adept and undetectable may not have been cowed. Additionally, the threat of guard intervention doesn't work on everyone, as some of the cheaters might have bribed some of the guards or developed some sort of repor.
I definitely think this player's idea is a fun one. It's up to you how much you want to reward him for it. It depends on the kind of NPCs he's dealing with, which is something you control. Perhaps the cleverest cheating NPC saw his trick and became impressed by him. Perhaps nobody saw what happened and his plan worked flawlessly. Or perhaps it just failed and cheaters still think he's an easy target regardless.
>>43804340
That's actually pretty clever. Although giving him carte blanche over the gambling den is probably a bad idea, he definitely deserves some kind of payoff. Maybe throw in some minor conflict with the pit boss/equivalent later on down the road as an extra plot hook if you need one.
>>43804390
It's very early in the campaign and the group needed extra funds so it was a one-off thing with the rogue netting a large (but not unreasonable) amount of money. They probably won't visit that gambling den again.
I think the idea of some clever cheating NPC being impressed is a really good one though.
Thanks for the reply anon.
why are GMs so afraid of their players having fun?
>>43804774
Sometimes the fun of one player might be at the expense of another player.
Sometimes the fun of one player might be at the expense of another player in the forseeable future.
Sometimes the fun of a player makes the game unbalanced, as some other players are less good than the player having fun and the GM has to try and fix it somehow.
I doubt any Good GM would be afraid of the players having fun, rather them Not having fun because of his inability to balance things out smoothly during the game.
>>43804992
>posting an actual rebuttal instead of just "bait/10" and a monochrome drawing of a fish
Get the fuck out
I'm going forward with the assumption that it's a poker-like game of player vs player due to your description, and also because if he claimed the house was cheating they'd break his thumbs and throw him out.
Poker-like games are usually difficult to cheat at unless you're the dealer, and card rooms will have a designated dealer at every table to avoid potential cheating. It's possible to slip in extra cards, but the more players there are the more likely it is that you'll be caught because more of the deck will be in play. A ten-player table (not uncommon at all) will collectively see over half the deck every single hand, so you're hoping that the aces you slipped in weren't also in the hand of a guy who folded an ace-two before the betting started. You can slip some cards out and try to slip them back in later, but they tend to change dealers about once an hour and they verify that every card is in the deck when they do. I've never seen what happens when one is missing myself, but I can't imagine it's great.
So if cheating is easiest when you're holding the deck (seriously, it is) and you can't hold the deck at a card room, what's a cheater to do? Home games! The easiest way is to lose a bit of money to a potential rich fish in a small table game at a card room or casino, get invited to a home game full of rich casuals who don't notice the telltale signs of a mechanic working the deck and then absolutely bleed them dry. In a fantasy game this can be as simple as befriending a local nobleman, you don't have to spend as much time figuring out who's a slightly-dumb dentist or rich kid who inherited his money and can't do math.
>>43805270
The actual game that was being played was abstracted away since I as a DM don't know that much about gambling.
Plus the rest of the group didn't take direct part so we didn't want to spend too much time on it.
>>43805270
>card rooms will have a designated dealer at every table to avoid potential cheating
You're assuming a high degree of organization. If that's the case then I agree but this could also be more of a shitty back room situation.
As far as I'm aware it actually happened from time to time.
>>43805958
True, I was mostly writing based on my own gambling experiences. I avoided shady backroom games because if they're crooked then usually the whole place is crooked and there just to rob people who aren't in on it.
Again, this is all based on 21st-century gambling, no real idea how it went down in ye olde times because those guys weren't in the habit of writing things down.
>>43804340
Are you or your player Polish?
>>43806579
No, why?
>>43808013
Because it's an exact plot of a Polish song.
>>43808340
What?
Not Op, but I'm polish and this sparks my interest.
>>43810107
https://youtu.be/9qWBWKaur5g
