ARGH! Sense Motive is NOT frigging mind reading!

Piratecat said:
We haven't found it to be a problem. When people sense motive, I've been answering with statements like "You don't think he's lying" or "Based on how his eyes are flickering, you're pretty sure he's hiding something." If they make the check by a large amount, I might say "You're almost positive that he's lying through his teeth; his voice just has that sound to it." If they then ask what he's lying about, I tell them to figure it out for themselves.

I'm reminded of a scene in an old episode of "Stargate: SG-1":

O'Neill: "What do you think?"
Teal'c: "I believe he is concealing something."
O'Neill: "Like what?"
Teal'c: "I do not know; he is concealing it."

Generally speaking, a successful Sense Motive can give you a suspicion, but not necessarily any details.

As vulcan_idic and Plane Sailing suggest, a very good Sense Motive check (the result of a lot of ranks in Sense Motive, and probably a high Wisdom, too) might be able to give you further insight -- this'd reflect a character who's really devoted himself to being a student of reading people.
 

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Judging by the way it's written...and this is the way I play it...Sense Motive is a yes/no answer to the question "Is something fishy here?"

It doesn't tell you what is fishy. It doesn't detect lies or liars. It only tells you that the person you're dealing with has something else in mind. Whether that something else is the fact that there's a guy holding his daughter hostage in the next room and he's trying to act normal to protect her or that he's waiting for you to step on the trapdoor so he can pull the lever, or that he's trying to rip you off for a few coin...it's irrelevent. You get a hunch. Your hunch tells you that something's up, or that everything is kosher...barring enchantments, which if present might provide some more info.
 

kenobi65 said:
O'Neill: "What do you think?"
Teal'c: "I believe he is concealing something."
O'Neill: "Like what?"
Teal'c: "I do not know; he is concealing it."

One of my all-time favourite Teal'c lines... and that's saying something ;)

-Hyp.
 

I think it is important, if you are having this problem, to roll the PC's Sense Motive checks yourself, behind a screen.

There are several possiblities:

The NPC is lying and the PC fails the check: "You're pretty sure he's telling you everything."
The NPC is lying and the PC fails the check by a wide margin: "You're absolutely certain he's telling you everything."
The NPC is lying and the PC makes the check: "You're pretty sure he's hiding something."
The NPC is lying and the PC makes the check by a wide margin: "You're absolutely certain he's hiding something."

here's where it gets interesting. I've decided that Sensing Motive when the NPC is telling the truth is a DC 15 check - after all, you're looking for signs of them acting like they're lying, which might well be identical to the signs that somebody is telling the truth, except they're being done deliberately and not unconsciously. You're trying to tell the difference, and that's not easy.

The NPC is telling the truth and the PC fails the check: "You're pretty sure he's hiding something."

The NPC is telling the truth and the PC fails the check by a wide margin: "You're absolutely certain he's hiding something."

The NPC is telling the truth and the PC makes the check: "You're pretty sure he's telling you everything."

The NPC is telling the truth and the PC makes the check by a wide margin: "You're absolutely certain he's telling you everything."


Note my tweak - I'm allowing for the PC to be absolutely sure, but STILL TOTALLY WRONG, if they roll poorly on the check, whether the NPC is hiding something or not. The NPC could be the most trustworthy person in the world, but the fellow with a Sense Motive of +1 tries to see if they're lying, and makes a totally bad call that the person is lying through their teeth.
 

First things first: do you give your PCs automatic sense motive rolls when an enemy is trying to bluff them? Since bluff is an opposed roll vs. sense motive, if you don't give them that, the only way to avoid having all NPC bluffs automatically succeed against characters and players is to constantly ask the DM for sense motive checks.

This is often contrasted with "role-playing it" but that has always struck me as an incredibly dubious proposition. First, DMs often role-play people who are better or worse liars than they are. Second, players often role-play people who are better or worse judges of character and people than they are. So, there's an element of both "wow, our DM is really smoothe, we'll never be able to figure out when his NPCs are lying and when they are telling the truth" and "well, that's a pretty obvious lie, but my 7 wisdom rogue is a sucker for beautiful women and a horrible judge of character, so I'm not sure he'd notice the inconsistency; what should I do?" And, more to the point, nobody is so good an actor that they can accurately and reliably portray the differences between a scared low-life who's a lousy liar, a scared low-life who's been fooling people his entire life but right now is so scared that he's out of his depth, a low-life who isn't really scared but wants the PCs to believe that he's scared and a bit out of his depth so that they'll catch his "lie" and believe him when he tells them the "truth" and the the NPC who isn't even a low-life but wants the PCs to believe that he is an example of the first kind of NPC, and not only do that convincingly, but do it so that a person with a wisdom bonus can figure out the first case but will be fooled by the rest and the player with a really high sense motive will be able to catch all of them except the last. It's not going to happen. If you're going to have mechanics for social skills at all rather than simply pitting the DM's social skills against the players' you need to use them.

So, what I suggest is collecting the PCs' sense motive skills and rolling them behind the screen or behind your hand every time your NPCs are bluffing them. If the PCs succeed, pass them a note with something like "you don't think he's telling you the whole truth" or "he seems to be hiding something." If the PCs fail, don't tell them anything.

The other uses of sense motive are much easier to adjudicate. You might want to roll the sense enchantment uses for the players, but let them ask if they can get a hunch about NPCs. Hunches are things like "this guy seems to be on the level" or "Pholtarin is completely unhinged; there's no telling what he'd do to achieve his goals" "for all the warmth and folksiness he's trying to project here, you don't think this guy is really comfortable outside of elite, upper east side circles."
 


MerakSpielman said:
here's where it gets interesting. I've decided that Sensing Motive when the NPC is telling the truth is a DC 15 check - after all, you're looking for signs of them acting like they're lying, which might well be identical to the signs that somebody is telling the truth, except they're being done deliberately and not unconsciously. You're trying to tell the difference, and that's not easy.
It seems to me that 15 is too high for this sort of thing. I'd be more inclined to make it a 10.

Otherwise, without sense motive ranks, or any wisdom bonus (ie - the average 1st level character), he's pretty sure that 75% of the time, people are lying to him.

About half the time, he's CERTAIN that they are lying to him.

In fact, he's more likely to think someone is lying to him when they are not than he is to think the average joe is lying to him when he is.

I mean really. This just seems stupid.
 

I used to have fun with Sense Motive, when one of the PCs had a +15 modifier. He'd be talking to a guy who just wants to warn them someone's after them, and the PC would get a 32 for his Sense Motive check, so I'd say, "First, he's telling the truth. Second, he's irritated that you are giving him such a hard time when he's trying to help you. Third, he's afraid that he's getting blisters from running all day long. And fourth, he's not that worried, because he had a really good breakfast this morning, and it's kept him cheerful all day."

This was the same PC who developed a cantrip that forced the next thing a person said to be the complete, honest, and straightforward truth. He promised never to abuse it, only to use it for humor's sake. His most memorable usage was not grandma friendly.
 

Use the Extroardinary Success (3.0) or the 'Practically Impossible Tasks' (3.5) guidelines in the skill section to guide you as to what's possible with very high checks - it's not 'mind reading' but with a really good check (or opposed check' a character who is a dedicated motive-senser should be able to get a lot of information about a conversational partner's attitude, motivation, and maybe even a little of their 'surface processing'.

Hunch DC 20 He's seems uneasy, and isn't telling you the whole truth.

Hunch DC 40 He's not telling the truth, and occasionally glances sideways. He seems to feel watched, and you get the impression there's someone or something forcing him to keep the truth from you. Although scared, he's too much of a nobleman to want to show weakness in fromt of scruffy lower-class 'adventurers.' He occasionally seems uncomfortable, shifting his posture and you guess his tunic is new.

Malin Genie
 

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