I haven’t played much dnd, do people expect stat blocks to be fixed? Like, is meta knowledge such a part of the game that its a dick move for gm to change it?

Meta kills some kinds of fun and, for lack of a better term, can be like topping from the bottom. If you’re trying to keep it out of your game with this method, your group is dysfunctional either because there are misaligned goals or the gm and players are in a pissing contest.

Im not really asking from a power-dynamics standpoint, more as a narrative tool. As a gm I change the world to make what I see as a better story (no cheating necessary I’m literally the universe).

Like, if the players do an ambush of BBE and (according to the rules) one-shot ‘em, he’d have a shielding amulet leaving him heavily maimed but alive. Not cause how dare you kill my beautiful npc, it’s just kinda anticlimactic otherwise.

(Unless the ambush was a huge challenge in itself. Then we’re good, murder away)

One of the reasons I like Fate is it has tooling to avoid that kind of anti-climax without it feeling like an asspull.

The BBEG is sitting in his office and the players, through hard work and planning, get the jump on him. Their first attack roll is net +8 stress. That’s enough to kill almost anything! I as GM decide the BBEG is going to take a consequence (“Covered in Acid Burns” or whatever), and then concede.

Conceding is at the player level, not the character level. This is where you as a group decide on how the BBEG survives, but loses this scene. Maybe he teleports away, but leaves his computer unlocked. Maybe he drains the life force of his favorite second in command to save himself, damaging morale and loyalty. It’s up to the group.

Some people hate this style of play, and want to be told a story rather then tell one as a group. That’s fine. But it’s hard for me to take off the GM hat, so I like when players also have a lot of say in the story.

Oh I love these collective storytelling systems as a gm, hate them as a player and though – I wanna relax, pretend to be a person and explore the world, not think about what makes a better story.