RIP - Gary Gygax

I just heard that Gary Gygax, co-creator of Dungeons & Dragons (and therefore the entire roleplaying game hobby and industry) has passed away at the age of 69.

Fittingly enough, today is “Gamemaster’s Day” recognized by a great many RPG websites and online retailers. So, a toast in honor of the original Dungeon Master himself, and the work he both created and inspired.

Thank you, Mr. Gygax, and farewell. Rest in peace.

[RPG Theory] Open Forum: Resolution Transparency

I’m woolgathering before leaving for the airport to pick up a friend who’s visiting us from out of town for a few days, and I’d like to pose a general question for readers of my blog:

What degree of “transparency” of action resolution do you prefer in an RPG? That is, how apparent should it be whether or not a character’s action has succeeded or failed, and why?

In a typical RPG, the players roll dice for their characters’ actions out in the open, and the results are fairly apparent: the players know the character’s relevant abilities and the result of the dice. The only real X-factors are the difficulty or modifier set by the GM. In some systems, even these are known (or the GM may choose to share them). The GM rolls dice for the actions of non-player characters, typically behind a screen or the like, so the players don’t know the results of either the rolls or necessarily the abilities/traits of the NPCs, although some players can and will figure them out from the available evidence. The GM has a fair amount of leeway to “fudge” results while remaining within the realm of credulous possibility.

If this is the mid-point, then the extremes would be:

1) Where all resolution must be out in the open and transparent; the GM makes rolls the same as any other player, open to player scrutiny and the only unknowns are the actual traits of the NPCs, and perhaps even they must be known (depending on how the resolution system works). Even if they’re not, players will pick up on them quickly. Or...

2) Where all resolution is hidden from the players and handled by the GM (much as some “secret” rolls are in mid-range games). All the players know are their characters’ traits; the outcomes of the dice are like a black box, and the GM has even more leeway to “fudge” results. The players are more heavily reliant on the Gamemaster’s interpretations of what “actually” happened.

What level of transparency do you prefer in your RPG experience, and why?