role playing gambling...

[RealmsDM]

just wondering how everyone handles "in game" gambling. do you actually play the game out, make a opposed roll, a bluff check? just wanna see ideas...

[Farcaster]

Hmm.. Gambling hasn't come up too often in my games. I suppose if it did, I'd probably use something like Profession (Gambler) to handle the minutia of the character making a living at it. Certainly, though, if we were talking about a high stakes game, I'd probably add some roleplay to it, Maverick-style, and I'd either use a combination of skills (bluff, sense motive, profession-gambling) or play an actual game of bones. Wizards has some dice games they came up with that you might check out at http://www.wizards.com/default.asp?x=dnd/arch/dg

[Ed Zachary]

just wondering how everyone handles "in game" gambling. do you actually play the game out, make a opposed roll, a bluff check? just wanna see ideas...

We've done that quite often. The character would gamble IRL with the DM being the house.

Putting in a game system in place in my opinion would be ridiculous and overkill.

Just role play real gambling.

[Moritz]

I've had a few players try be gamblers. They get a few skill points tossed into Bluff and like skills and think they're Maverick. When they've not taken into account that there are people who devote their entire lives to such a profession and can roll much better than them. And when they lose they whine and cry about how many points they have and I just shake my head and say nothing.

[Farcaster]

You might remind them that a high Sense Motive and Bluff can help them in more ways than just gambling. You can use it in anything from diplomatic situations to running a confidence scam. They are very useful skills, applied properly.

[Moritz]

I'd remind them, but remember, this is the group that still does stuff when warned not to OOCly and ICly.

[Skunkape]

We used to do in game gambling all the time when we played Boot Hill, course it was always cards. The way we handled it was to set up a normal poker game, where everyone who wanted in on the gambling sat at the table. Each player could attempt to gamble at anytime, using palmed cards etc, but if you weren't the dealer, it was harder to do, decreased your chances.

We didn't even bother to hide what we were doing taking the cards we wanted out of the deck. Boot Hill rules gave each character a gambling percentage that was rolled against by those involved. I don't remember the exact rules, but it was a % roll. I know my character only had a 1 or 2 % chance in getting caught, so most of the other players wouldn't gamble against him.

But we'd also gamble against NPCs played by the GM. I don't remember if we ever had us against the NPCs in a shoot out, but I'm sure we did at least once or twice over a hand of cards.

You could do something similar with DnD if you wanted to get some interaction into the game. Of course, certain games would be harder to cheat at then others. Games where the 'house' didn't allow the players to handle whatever method of gambling were used, for instance, roulette would be harder to cheat at since you would only be able to change where the ball came out through a spell or psionics and that would be fairly easy to detect.

But with some kind of card game or knuckle bones it might be possible to palm the cards/dice that everyone is using and switch them for your own. Those are a couple of fun ways to actually do a little role-playing when it came to gambling.

[RealmsDM]

i was thinking of a way to mix actually playing the game of chance & some role playing. the rogue of my group (who prefers the old school title of thief & backstab instead of sneak attack) wants to use his bluff/sense motive & slight of hand to give him the edge. i agree with him 100%, but how to translate that if we're actually playing
and with actually playing- man, that can be a time killer.

[Farcaster]

Well, you could work it as some sort of synergy bonus. Since the character would need to have a good understanding of the game he was playing, you could base it off of a Profession(Gaming) skill. Depending on the scenario, you could give a +2 synergy bonus to his profession skill for having a 5 in bluff and sense motive. As far as slight of hands, I'd probably favor having the character make that roll individually when he wants to cheat using Slight of Hand to make sure he wasn't detected. If he was successful, he'd still want to maximize his take from the bets, so, he'd still use Profession (Gaming) with the applicable synergy bonus.

Sound workable?

[spotlight]

I never was involved in an 'in game' gambleing scene, but I did have a character that once sat in on a NPC 'game of cards' and used his slight of hand score to make it appear that the npc we needed to get information from was caught 'cheating'. We barely managed to rescue him from a roomful of enraged miners. Yea Gods! So much hacking and slashing with out actually killing. THAT'S some roll play.

[Grimwell]

Whenever I've had players gamble in character, we gamble at the table. It is more fun than doing a skill check or luck roll, and adjudicating the results. When characters have the ability to influence the results, I just find a way to give them a cheat and roll with it.

[wizarddog]

Depends on the type of Gambling. Most of the descriptions are regarding poker with the use of bluff. When I created a Gambling Den scenario I discouraged the PC from gambling as it would always favor the house. They made Charisma Checks against various DC--the best being they may break even. If they truly want to make money they have to take profession (Gambling). A Professional gambler would be based on ranks and Skill Focus.

So a El 1 Expert at WS 18 + skill focus could have a +11 on Profession Gambling and earn from 6 to 16 gp per week. Not Chump Change for someone is technically not working a standard job.

[Mulsiphix]

Another vote for just RP'ing the real gambling game. As long as the gambling sessions aren't excessive. If you have a compulsive gambler in the PC ranks then you might want to consider something else lol

[gdmcbride]

How gambling is handled depends on the game's focus.

If it's just a brief aside, roll some dice, move along to the real story.

If the fate of the kingdom rides on this hand, then by all means play it out. And stack the deck before the game begins to get the result you want. Have them shuffle a deck and then swap it with your doctored deck while you go to the bathroom or behind the GM screen. Player's will never think of that.

Magician skills are also useful when your being a DM.

Gary

[tesral]

Two problems with "real gambling" at the table. One, I would be hard pressed to find a deck of cards. Two, that and dice games are your only choices. The other methods are not "available" due to lack of equipment.

Second, it's hard to incorporate the PCs scores into the game. I might role-play a good gambler, while I myself am not. The in game, game should reflect the skills of the PC not the player. (Although Boot Hill looked like it might have a good method openly cheating and having a roll to get away with it. You still have to know how to cheat at cards.)

So, that said we use an opposed roll. The PCs appropriate skills against the house odds. All the role playing the players wish while rolling the dice for the real game.

Hmm I need to set up some games with fixed odds.