D&D 5E The Decrease in Desire for Magic in D&D

[Bill Zebub]

That's on the player. And frankly they'll be doing it regardless of character skill and whether they are rolling or not.

Yup. Which is a big reason I think hiding important information behind lying NPCs is problematic when planning adventures.

 

[billd91]

So, really, what using the skill as a lie detector means is that instead of your character detecting an NPC's lie, it's you, the player, detecting lies from your DM. Hmmm.

Seriously? How adversarial do you want to spin this?

 

[Mort]

I believe that, too, but Insight can be used for things other than detecting lies.

As long as you actually make sure that's true then sure.

But I've found WAY too many DMs who have some weird allergy to making skills actually be able to accomplish significant things (and sadly, most of the same DMs rarely say no to "creative" magic use because magic). It's extremely irritating.

 

[tetrasodium]

It's a skill, it's not by any means infallible.

It's only when the PC is dealing with creatures and the NPC tries to lie, not the DM directly.

I just beleive that if a player invests in something, and this DOES require investment, let them be good at it

It may not be "reliable", but its unreliable possibility holds the gm hostage against the risk of seriously damaging the campaign if they actually give any believably unreliable information in a way that makes any difference. At that point it's only unreliable in theory.

 

[Mort]

Yup. Which is a big reason I think hiding important information behind lying NPCs is problematic when planning adventures.

Sure, I beleive that too. But IF it comes up, Because you can't plan for everything?

Why not let the high insight PC shine as opposed to the near standard caster going "no worries, I got this..."

 

[Mort]

It may not be "reliable", but its unreliable possibility holds the gm hostage against the risk of seriously damaging the campaign if they actually give any believably unreliable information in a way that makes any difference. At that point it's only unreliable in theory.

Why is the DM putting themselves in a position where one conversation (one Possible die roll) could seriously damage the campaign?

no information should be gated that way!

 

[tetrasodium]

Why is the DM putting themselves in a position where one conversation (one Possible die roll) could seriously damage the campaign?

no information should be gated that way!

We are talking about possibly jnaccurate & misleading answers to a player initiated check that can accompany a pc saying or asking things. The gm isn't doing & can't do much of anything there for reasons already stated.

 

[Bill Zebub]

Seriously? How adversarial do you want to spin this?

How is that adversarial? If you know sometimes the DM lies to you about your success in detecting lies, aren’t you going to be wondering if he is lying?

The only way out I see is the play-acting version of roleplaying, in which pretending to not know anything about trolls is expected/applauded. In that case roleplaying the fall of the die takes precedence over what the player believes. But I personally don’t enjoy that.

 

[Mort]

How is that adversarial? If you know sometimes the DM lies to you about your success in detecting lies, aren’t you going to be wondering if he is lying?

The only way out I see is the play-acting version of roleplaying, in which pretending to not know anything about trolls is expected/applauded. In that case roleplaying the fall of the die takes precedence over what the player believes. But I personally don’t enjoy that.

So don't lie.

Impart information as appropriate. Say, "sorry you fail to glean anything else of significance" as necessary.

In other words, add don't subtract.

 

[Mort]

How is that adversarial? If you know sometimes the DM lies to you about your success in detecting lies, aren’t you going to be wondering if he is lying?

Kind of repetitive from last post. But don't lie.

Just say, you can't tell any more than the NPC is telling you.

The only way out I see is the play-acting version of roleplaying, in which pretending to not know anything about trolls is expected/applauded. In that case roleplaying the fall of the die takes precedence over what the player believes. But I personally don’t enjoy that.

You don't have to. If the check is successful tell them the NPC is hiding something or if really high, tell them something deeper as you see fit.

Heck you could use @iserith 's preference and allow insight to instead (it in addition) SUS out ideals bonds and flaws.

I see no reason to have the player pretend they don't know something they think they do - that just leads to absurd and worse, uncomfortable, game play