maddman75 said:
Here's how I use them personally.
Bluff (along with most social skills) is a passive skill. You never say to the DM "I'm going to use my Bluff on this guy" and reach for the dice. You just say what your character is going to say. If the BS starts to get a little deep, then I'll call for a Bluff check.
Sense Motive on the other hand is an *active* skill. The PC needs to tell me that they are going to Sense Motive on this NPC. This will let them possibly pick up on body language and such to figure out that all is not as it seems. If you don't ask for the roll, the NPC can BS you all day long no matter how many ranks you have in SM.
Works pretty well.
So in your game the character does not get to make a Sense Motive to detect an NPC's BS until that character's player essentially succeeds at a Sense Motive against your description of the NPC?
That's harsh.
As Hypersmurf pointed out, the PHB has clear examples for bluff. If a character uses the Bluff skill to tell a lie then all who hear the lie make a sense motive roll. This sets the DC for the liar; the listeners are not using the skill at all.
If, on the other hand, a listener wants to get a sense of the general trustworthiness of a speaker then the listener can take a minute to ask some questions, study the speaker, and then make his roll.
That's why it's easy to lie to an unsuspecting listener (you only make one Bluff roll with a DC of the listener's Sense Motive roll) while it's difficult to lie to a suspicious listener (you make your Bluff roll, and then even if it succeeds the listener gets to make a Sense Motive roll).
Here's how it works in game (the PC is an American scoundrel trying to infiltrate a mansion in 1940's Austria).
DM: A guard halts you, and demands to know why you're here.
PC: I tell him... I tell him that "I'm just selling these fine leather jackets."
DM: Make a bluff roll.
PC: 22.
DM: (rolls a 10, adds the guard's Sense Motive of 4). Okay, he shrugs and lets you pass.
PC: Great!
DM: Just as you're about to walk away, the guard's supervisor comes out of an adjoining room. He tells the guard to be on the lookout because a spy is suspected of being in the area. He then notices you.
PC: I bluff him too. 15.
DM: (rolls a 6, adds the supervisor's Sense Motive of 5). Okay, but he then asks you "Why, if you are salesman, you do not go to purser's office? This hallway leads to restricted area." He seems suspicious.
PC: I continue my bluff, and tell him that I got lost.
DM: You succeed, but he asks you a few more questions. I'm making a seperate Sense Motive roll for him--roll another Bluff roll. He got a 16.
PC: Er, I got a 7.
DM: Okay, he suspects something's up though he doesn't know what. He says "There is something--how you say--fishy about you, American. Please be waiting here. I am contacting purser's office and am seeing if you have appointment."
PC: I deck him.
DM: Fair enough.
Just remember that those who hear a bluff get to make a Sense Motive roll in response. Since the bluffer is the one taking the action, the Sense Motive does not take a minute. If, instead, you want to take an action to use your Sense Motive skill then it takes one minute.
-z
