Sense Motive vs Bluff

[anest1s]

Something I find strange:

If the players roll sense motive, and I tell them that "he sounds honest" then they are not sure whether they failed their check, or the NPC is telling the truth.

If I tell one of them "you think maybe he is hiding something" and I tell the others "he sounds honest to you" then out of game everyone is 100% sure the NPC is bluffing. In game only the successful PC is 100% sure, but you know how this works.

Shouldn't there be a "if you fail the check by 5 or more you think that the target is hiding something" thing? Or am I missing something? Because usually 1/4 is bound to roll good enough.

 

[Dozen]

What you're looking for is the Hunch. By RAW, a DC 20 Sense Motive tells whether or not there is something going on regardless of the Bluff check that may be involved. What you find out about this way doesn't even have to be a lie; it can be a secret he's hiding or some other, not obvious fishy stuff related to him.
Failing it, you can't deduct info, but you can form an opinion without base if you want -this is when a variation of the phrase "you can't tell if he's lying or not" should be used.
If passed and nothing is found, the 'He sounds honest" kind of answer is applicable. If he did lie/decieve/murder etc., the check doesn't let you find out anything about the nature of the deception; a purehearted knight might be nervously hiding the fact that he has the hots for the party's bard, or a benevolent rogue girl might say she's only out for herself when secretly providing for a sick relative whom she doesn't want you to know about.
No good character should cut down someone solely on the premise of pulling one over them, and you should make that clear, if needed.

Also, you should hand out notes or keep your conversation between players and you otherwise private every time there are checks where the results aren't immediately known to the others, unless the opposite is agreed upon beforehand or when they'd obviously tell each other anyway. You'll get used to it in no time.

 

[Greenfield]

This is one of the many rolls that I, as DM, prefer to make for my players. Like a trap check, they shouldn't know if they rolled well and there's nothing to find, or if they rolled poorly and missed something.

I got really tired of, "I only rolled a three, so I'm going to try again.".

That said, unlike the Detect Lie spell, Sense Motive tells you if the person is hiding something, not whether what he's saying is true.

Classic example:

Q: Do you know where John is?
A: I haven't seen him today.

While the person answering may be telling the truth, in that they haven't seen John today, they may also know that the reason they haven't seen him today is because he's out of town on a trip.

This exchange would pass a Detect Lie scan, but not a Sense Motive check.

Bluff is the ability not merely to lie, but to conceal the lie, to act normal even when there's nothing resembling "normal" involved.

 

[RUMBLETiGER]

This is the problem with metagaming issues of all kinds. it's up to your players to not translate what they learn outside of the game to the character.

I usually keep a stack of index cards on hand so I can slide a quick message to one player, and that player in turn can inform the others... or not.

 

[Sekhmet]

This is one of the many rolls that I, as DM, prefer to make for my players. Like a trap check, they shouldn't know if they rolled well and there's nothing to find, or if they rolled poorly and missed something.

I got really tired of, "I only rolled a three, so I'm going to try again.".

That said, unlike the Detect Lie spell, Sense Motive tells you if the person is hiding something, not whether what he's saying is true.

Classic example:

Q: Do you know where John is?
A: I haven't seen him today.

While the person answering may be telling the truth, in that they haven't seen John today, they may also know that the reason they haven't seen him today is because he's out of town on a trip.

This exchange would pass a Detect Lie scan, but not a Sense Motive check.

Bluff is the ability not merely to lie, but to conceal the lie, to act normal even when there's nothing resembling "normal" involved.

I'm not sure your example is correct, and it definitely isn't a part of the standard Sense Motive usages (hunch, sense enchantment, and discern secret message).
There is nothing untrustworthy of "haven't seen him today", there is nothing hidden and there are no lies. A Bluff check isn't even called for.

 

[Dozen]

I'm not sure your example is correct, and it definitely isn't a part of the standard Sense Motive usages (hunch, sense enchantment, and discern secret message).
There is nothing untrustworthy of "haven't seen him today", there is nothing hidden and there are no lies. A Bluff check isn't even called for.

You're misunderstanding. He means that person B Knows where John is, and intentionally avoids the question by saying something that implies he doesn't. This is called a mislead, and does count as a kind of deception -one of the few kinds Lawful folk may consider approvable. And since it's not a lie per se, as there is no falsehood stated, Detect Lies really doesn't work against it, but Hunch might.

As a more understandable example, let's look at Rich Burlew's Order of the Stick.

The party was trying to ascape from a prison, save for the Lawful Good dwarf cleric named Durkon who decided to wait for their trial. The rest of the party rushed out, but the party's rogue heared their captor coming, and pushed everyone back to their cells. She failed to lock the doors in time tough, and the paladin noticed. The paladin's friends with the dwarf, so she asked him what happened. The conversation went as it follows, important parts only:

Miko:...'Durkon, I know you would not lie to me. Were they trying to flee?'
Durkon:'Ha, umm, well, see... I can swear the five of us never left our cells.'(that is, he never left his cell.)
Miko:'Then what of the cell doors? How did they become unlocked?'
...
Durkon:''Twas a mechanical defect.'

The paladin(having the Wisdom score of your average mental institute patient, apparrently) believes him.
Later:
Roy:'Mechanical defect?'
Durkon:'Dunno, I count 'able to be picked by a rogue' as a pretty major defect, aye?'

While there was no actual lying involved, you can pretty much tell the dwarf was talking out of his ass. The second statement may require a bluff check, as it wouldn't be considered true without the twisted meaning behind it, but it's up to the DM to decide where he draws the line.

 

[Greenfield]

I'm not sure your example is correct, and it definitely isn't a part of the standard Sense Motive usages (hunch, sense enchantment, and discern secret message).
There is nothing untrustworthy of "haven't seen him today", there is nothing hidden and there are no lies. A Bluff check isn't even called for.

My example is a case of someone evading the question by answering something other than the question asked.

They were asked, "Do you know where John is?".
They answered, "Have you seen John?", which was never asked.

I've run into this in some games. I was running a superhero game, and began a session by telling everyone that it was a Wednesday afternoon, and asking where everyone's character was.

One said he was at the studio, rehearsing for a concert. One said he was driving to his lawyer's. One said he was working on his spaceship.

I told them there was an attempt to break a prisoner out from the courthouse. Want to guess where the "Studio" was? Where the lawyer's office was? Where the guy was testing his spaceship repairs? Yep, all right at the courthouse in seconds.

I'd asked where they were, and they all chose to answer a different question, "What are you doing?", which I never asked.

I learned from that, and try to keep my ears open for the non-answers.

Check: A successful check lets you avoid being bluffed (see the Bluff skill). You can also use this skill to determine when “something is up” (that is, something odd is going on) or to assess someone’s trustworthiness.

Spotting intentional evasion is an excellent example of Sense Motive. If the person was making casual use of language, with no intent to deceive, there's no ulterior motive to sense, nothing suspicious to observe, no basis for a hunch. But a person could use the exact same answer in response to the exact same question, as a way of intentionally misleading the listener. In other words, "Something was up", or to put it more simply, the person isn't trustworthy.

The skill isn't Listen, as in hearing and understanding the words, it's Sense Motive, which tells you when they're up to something.

This also highlights the fact that spells like Detect Lie and Zone of Truth don't in any way relieve us of the need for skills like Sense Motive.

 

[anest1s]

No guys I think you misunderstood what I meant.

There are 2 possible replies you can give to a player in a sense motive check (it doesn't matter what words you use).
1) "he is bluffing."
2) "you think he is not bluffing."

The 2) is ok, the players either failed their check (hidden check) or the guy isn't bluffing.

The 1) however is giving away that he is bluffing.


Any player, when you say to him "you think he is hiding something" knows that the opponent was using the bluff skill. Even if he has no ranks at all, and he is talking with a great bluffer. Even if everyone else in the party thinks the guy tells the truth. Just because you can't fail a sense motive check and get a wrong reading (you can only get no-readings).

 

[Sekhmet]

[MENTION=6669384]Greenfield[/MENTION], [MENTION=6698275]Dozen[/MENTION]: I think Dozen has it more or less right. The first non-answer isn't a bluff attempt at all, whereas the second "out-of-your-ass" answer is. Conversation is full of implication and non-answers, and sense motive at it's best only lets you know that something is off. It doesn't mean he's lying (I don't know where X is), it doesn't mean he's stretching the truth (mechanical defect), it doesn't mean he's veiling the truth (I'm not sure where he is), and it especially doesn't mean he's giving you a non-answer (He isn't here, I haven't seen him today).
The Sense Motive skill simply does not do that, and it is a stretch of the imagination to say that it does.
Specifically, "a hunch" is a guess - if the man says "I haven't seen him today", you might suspect that he actually has, you might suspect that he is hiding his true feelings for you, you might suspect that he wants to be a movie star if he could only get out of that place.

 

[Greenfield]

So, to you, trying to mislead someone doesn't call for a Bluff check, and Sense Motive won't spot that activity?

What about the "something's up" or "assess someone's trustworthiness" aspects of the skill? Did they somehow get lost in translation?