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If an NPC is telling the truth, what's the Insight DC to know they're telling the truth?
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<blockquote data-quote="pemerton" data-source="post: 7589157" data-attributes="member: 42582"><p>If I've understood you right, I would put this broadly into the DW way of doing things.</p><p></p><p>Two examples from my own play (neither 5e, but maybe illustrative nevertheless):</p><p></p><p style="margin-left: 20px">(1) In my Cortex+ Heroic Fantasy game, the PCs were teleported by a Crypt Thing deep into a dungeon (mechanically, I spent 2d12 from the Doom Pool to end the scene involvingthe Crypt Thing). I saddled each PC with a d12 Lost in the Dungeon complication. In due course, I framed an Action Scene which involved the PCs stumbling into a large hall, and one of the Scene Distinctions I provided was Strange Runes. One of the players declared that his PC inspected the runes to discover whether they contained information about the dungeon: mechanically, this meant making a check including the Strange Runes Distinction in his pool, which - when it succeeded - both (i) in the fiction, confirmed that the runes did indeed contain information about the dungeon, and (ii) mechanically removed his PC's Lost in the Dungeon complication.</p> <p style="margin-left: 20px"></p> <p style="margin-left: 20px">(2) In my Burning Wheel game, the PCs came to a ruined tower which, in the backstory of one of them, had been the place where he studied magic with his older brother, and had been working on enchanting a nickel-silver mace called The Falcon's Claw. As part of that same backstory, the tower had been assaulted by orcs and the PC's brother, in an attempt to cast a powerful spell to drive off and destroy the orcs, had instead been possessed by a balrog. This was the context for the PC's most important Belief, that <em>I will redeem my brother from his possession by a balrog</em>. And this moment of play was the first time the PC in question had returned to the tower since he had left it 14+ years ago as per his backstory. The PC was in the company of another character, an elven ronin who had left his homeland after his master and captain had been killed by an orcish arrow (more backstory), which the character still wore - broken - about his neck, as a token and reminder of his failure (mechanically, the player had payed a small PC creation cost to have that token on his equipment list). When the wizard PC mentioned that he had left The Falcon's Claw, unfinished, in the tower, the elven PC searched for it (using the BW Scavenging skill). I set the DC in accordance with the Scavenging skill descrition (BW has rather elaborate lists of DCs for most of its skills); the check was made and failed. So I declared that The Falcon's Claw was not found (in a subsequent session it turned out to be in the possession of a nemesis NPC who had been hanging around the tower), but that the search did reveal something else - in the ruin's of the older brother's workroom, which the mage PC had never been allowed to enter while a pupil of his brother, was a stand of cursed black arrows like the one that the elf wore around his neck! This was a shocking revelation for both PCs: for the mage, it suggested that his brother was not evil because possessed by a balrog, but rather had been possessed by the balrog because he was already evil; and for the elf, it suggested that rather than aid his companion to redeem his brother, he needed to take revenge on the brother who had made the arrow that had killed his master.</p><p></p><p>If I've understood you correctly, then I would expect that you would see my (1) and (2) as similar to what you're talking about (one a success, the other a failure).</p><p></p><p>I don't get that vibe from [MENTION=6801845]Oofta[/MENTION]'s posts myself - I get the feeling that Oofta uses a "pre-stocked"/pre-described dungeon.</p><p></p><p>But I could be wrong too!</p></blockquote><p></p>
[QUOTE="pemerton, post: 7589157, member: 42582"] If I've understood you right, I would put this broadly into the DW way of doing things. Two examples from my own play (neither 5e, but maybe illustrative nevertheless): [indent](1) In my Cortex+ Heroic Fantasy game, the PCs were teleported by a Crypt Thing deep into a dungeon (mechanically, I spent 2d12 from the Doom Pool to end the scene involvingthe Crypt Thing). I saddled each PC with a d12 Lost in the Dungeon complication. In due course, I framed an Action Scene which involved the PCs stumbling into a large hall, and one of the Scene Distinctions I provided was Strange Runes. One of the players declared that his PC inspected the runes to discover whether they contained information about the dungeon: mechanically, this meant making a check including the Strange Runes Distinction in his pool, which - when it succeeded - both (i) in the fiction, confirmed that the runes did indeed contain information about the dungeon, and (ii) mechanically removed his PC's Lost in the Dungeon complication. (2) In my Burning Wheel game, the PCs came to a ruined tower which, in the backstory of one of them, had been the place where he studied magic with his older brother, and had been working on enchanting a nickel-silver mace called The Falcon's Claw. As part of that same backstory, the tower had been assaulted by orcs and the PC's brother, in an attempt to cast a powerful spell to drive off and destroy the orcs, had instead been possessed by a balrog. This was the context for the PC's most important Belief, that [I]I will redeem my brother from his possession by a balrog[/I]. And this moment of play was the first time the PC in question had returned to the tower since he had left it 14+ years ago as per his backstory. The PC was in the company of another character, an elven ronin who had left his homeland after his master and captain had been killed by an orcish arrow (more backstory), which the character still wore - broken - about his neck, as a token and reminder of his failure (mechanically, the player had payed a small PC creation cost to have that token on his equipment list). When the wizard PC mentioned that he had left The Falcon's Claw, unfinished, in the tower, the elven PC searched for it (using the BW Scavenging skill). I set the DC in accordance with the Scavenging skill descrition (BW has rather elaborate lists of DCs for most of its skills); the check was made and failed. So I declared that The Falcon's Claw was not found (in a subsequent session it turned out to be in the possession of a nemesis NPC who had been hanging around the tower), but that the search did reveal something else - in the ruin's of the older brother's workroom, which the mage PC had never been allowed to enter while a pupil of his brother, was a stand of cursed black arrows like the one that the elf wore around his neck! This was a shocking revelation for both PCs: for the mage, it suggested that his brother was not evil because possessed by a balrog, but rather had been possessed by the balrog because he was already evil; and for the elf, it suggested that rather than aid his companion to redeem his brother, he needed to take revenge on the brother who had made the arrow that had killed his master.[/indent] If I've understood you correctly, then I would expect that you would see my (1) and (2) as similar to what you're talking about (one a success, the other a failure). I don't get that vibe from [MENTION=6801845]Oofta[/MENTION]'s posts myself - I get the feeling that Oofta uses a "pre-stocked"/pre-described dungeon. But I could be wrong too! [/QUOTE]
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If an NPC is telling the truth, what's the Insight DC to know they're telling the truth?
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