Insight/Sense Motive, Detect Lie, and "Genre-Savvy Villain Sense"

[Quickleaf]

I'm curious how the Sense Motive or Insight skill works in your games. For the record I play 4e, though my understanding is the question could apply to d20/3e as well. What both these systems have in common is they established rules for social interactions which were left up to players and DMs acting it out in older editions.

There are two good blog posts that discuss the Insight skill in 4e, and have served as inspiration for my own thoughts:
http://at-will.omnivangelist.net/2010/11/serious-skills-insight/
http://dungeonsmaster.com/2010/03/skill-challenge-lie-to-me/

When a player opposes a Bluff check using Insight/Sense Motive, how do you respond? Do you flat out say "they are lying, and here's why..."?

Let's say that part of the adventure involves the PCs interacting with an unknown villain. How do you respond to a successful Insight/Sense Motive vs. the villain's Bluff without alerting the genre-savvy players' villain detector?

To phrase it another way: it's only a matter of time before the players are alerted to an unknown villain; how do you preserve that mystery beyond first contact given the existence of the Insight/Sense Motive skill?

 

[n00bdragon]

Any time the players question the veracity of what an NPC is telling them I have the PCs roll Insight against a static Bluff +10 (for 4e) or against a Bluff check (3e) or just use a simple Wisdom check with a modifier based on the target's relative HD (1-2e). Regardless of the method, there are only three outcomes:
- You're pretty sure he's telling the truth (they succeed and the NPC is telling the truth)
- You're not sure (they fail)
- You're pretty sure he's lying (they succeed and the NPC is lying)

By using this any time the players get suspicious and only when they are suspicious you don't broadcast whether or not the NPC is actually lying until they succeed at a check. The only thing you gotta watch out for is that D&D imposes no cost on making lots of skill checks so players will sometimes get suspicious of everything.

 

[Quickleaf]

By using this any time the players get suspicious and only when they are suspicious you don't broadcast whether or not the NPC is actually lying until they succeed at a check. The only thing you gotta watch out for is that D&D imposes no cost on making lots of skill checks so players will sometimes get suspicious of everything.

What about "breach of social etiquette" as a consequence for a failed Insight check? As in, something in the PC's line of questioning offends the NPC, making them recalcitrant to further cooperate. Actually, the same could be said for a successful Insight check if the question were pointed enough...

Another failure consequence - from the omnivangelist blog, haven't tried it yet - is misinformation. This could range from a partial success with misinterpretation of motive, to completely being taken in by a convincing lie.

 

[The Human Target]

Kind of a big mixture of things.

I limit checks, for one thing. You can't make infinite Insight checks anymore than you can infinite Arcana checks on the same topic. Basically one per scene.

And I basically don't have NPCs use Bluff to conversationally lie. Lying and Bluffing are different Imo, in the context of PC/NPC interaction. A Bluff has to be a big deal.

Now if a PC does detect a specific lie, I tell them so.

And we roleplay the various results one can get.

 

[Quickleaf]

Kind of a big mixture of things.

I limit checks, for one thing. You can't make infinite Insight checks anymore than you can infinite Arcana checks on the same topic. Basically one per scene.

Makes sense, I tend to do the same. What about "pile-on" checks, when one player sees another rolled poorly on Insight (could be any skill really), and decides to make their own check? Do you require everyone to decide in advance who will roll and who will aid, then treat it as a group skill check (from DMG2)?

And I basically don't have NPCs use Bluff to conversationally lie. Lying and Bluffing are different Imo, in the context of PC/NPC interaction. A Bluff has to be a big deal.

Huh. Can you explain how you distinguish the two in more detail? How have your players responded to Bluffing and Lying being different things? Most players I've encountered expect Insight to pick up on bald-faced lies.

To take my example: The PCs are questioning a bunch of suspects, and one happens to be an unknown villain. The villain lies about his/her involvement. Player makes an Insight check. For argument's sake, they get a really frickin' high result. What happens next?

 

[The Human Target]

Makes sense, I tend to do the same. What about "pile-on" checks, when one player sees another rolled poorly on Insight (could be any skill really), and decides to make their own check? Do you require everyone to decide in advance who will roll and who will aid, then treat it as a group skill check (from DMG2)?


Huh. Can you explain how you distinguish the two in more detail? How have your players responded to Bluffing and Lying being different things? Most players I've encountered expect Insight to pick up on bald-faced lies.

To take my example: The PCs are questioning a bunch of suspects, and one happens to be an unknown villain. The villain lies about his/her involvement. Player makes an Insight check. For argument's sake, they get a really frickin' high result. What happens next?

Yeah for pretty much any check that two or more PCs want to do I make it a group check. Group checks are excellent to balance skill use of all times. Any just generally awesome.

Honestly it depends. To me Insight checks should give clues/motivations most of the time and not perfectly clear facts. But it depends on the rolls and situation. A casual check against a beet farmer is going to net different results than an intense skill challenge-ish conversation with an important NPC.

I think the 4e Insight rules are blessedly vague enough to be customized for individual groups.

As to lying vs Bluffing- a PC can lie to an NPC in conversation all they want. The NPC may or may not believe them based upon their disposition and how obvious the lie. But to ensure the NPC will believe the lie requires a Bluff check. That can be countered by an insight check, which makes it both riskier and possibly more rewarding.

Its by no means a hard and fast rule though. Just a general way of trying to fuse rolls and roleplaying.

Your example- the PC with the super high roll would realize the secret villain is for sure lying about his involvement in the crime. That's pretty clear cut to me. However knowing some one is lying and knowing the details are different. Insight isn't mind reading. Its a nudge to allow the PCs affect the story of the game.

Another important thing I think is to never let the PCs know for sure if they have succeeded or failed. Just what they think. So if the PC rolls a 14 Insight and I tell them they think the PC is lying, they don't know if its because the baddie rolled a low Bluff or rolled a very high one and their Insight based information is unreliable.

 

[The Human Target]

Let's say that part of the adventure involves the PCs interacting with an unknown villain. How do you respond to a successful Insight/Sense Motive vs. the villain's Bluff without alerting the genre-savvy players' villain detector?

To phrase it another way: it's only a matter of time before the players are alerted to an unknown villain; how do you preserve that mystery beyond first contact given the existence of the Insight/Sense Motive skill?

I guess I never addressed this in my rambling.

On the one hand- thems the breaks. As a DM you don't always have heaps of control over how things turn out. Its not always the perfect story in the end when the PCs sniff something out too early. But then neither is it when the party stomps a big bad villain in a single round due to awesome rolls.

On the other- sometimes I cheat if the end result is a lot more fun for everyone. The villain gets a +10 to a Bluff check or 60 extra HP. At the end of the day nudging things towards great fun might be the hardest and most important part of DMing.

 

[Kinak]

When a player opposes a Bluff check using Insight/Sense Motive, how do you respond? Do you flat out say "they are lying, and here's why..."?

I focus mostly on the why, actually. Knowing that someone's hiding something is... really not that useful most of the time.

The important part is knowing their emotional state, giving hints at why they're hiding something. I do my best to mention any tells the person is giving off without the check (like "he's sweating and keeps glancing towards the door") and give a professional opinion of why they're occurring with a successful check, regardless of whether lying is taking place.

Let's say that part of the adventure involves the PCs interacting with an unknown villain. How do you respond to a successful Insight/Sense Motive vs. the villain's Bluff without alerting the genre-savvy players' villain detector?

To phrase it another way: it's only a matter of time before the players are alerted to an unknown villain; how do you preserve that mystery beyond first contact given the existence of the Insight/Sense Motive skill?

I run mysteries very Film Noir, so the villain is probably lying... but so is everyone else. If anything, the one person who's not lying, who sticks scrupulously to the truth... what the hell is up with that guy? You should keep an eye on him.

If anything, good mysteries are about reconstructing who is lying about which things and why. Insight helps, certainly, so players who aren't Sherlock Holmes can play him. But it also takes asking the right people the right questions and putting the facts together correctly.

This goes double if the party aren't the rulers of the area they're investigating in. Someone probably needs better answers than "well, we have a bad feeling about the butler." And, really, knowing that the butler did it isn't very useful without knowing why and, in many cases, who he was working for.

Cheers!
Kinak

 

[MarkB]

To phrase it another way: it's only a matter of time before the players are alerted to an unknown villain; how do you preserve that mystery beyond first contact given the existence of the Insight/Sense Motive skill?

It's mostly the Law of Conservation of Detail that stymies attempts to introduce villains in an unsuspicious manner. The players know that any character you bother to have converse with them at any length is important, so if that conversation seems innocuous or unimportant, their suspicions are raised and they start calling for Insight checks.

You can, in some circumstances, muddy the waters by going against that principle - introduce four or five innocuous acquaintances to the party within a single session, most of them with ulterior motives or personal secrets that mean they're not being entirely honest, and throw the villain in at random. This can easily have the side-effect of generating extra plot hooks as the PCs latch their suspicions onto one of your decoys.

I think it's fairly reasonable, if the character's words and attitude are no different than the last ten people the PCs met and chatted to 'off-screen', to give the villain a hefty "no reason for suspicion" bonus to his Bluff check - +5, maybe even +10 if it's a deep-cover identity that's fooled people on an everyday basis for weeks.

If someone still makes the DC, they simply know that he's not being entirely honest. What he's hiding and why would require more detailed investigation.

 

[Umbran]

When a player opposes a Bluff check using Insight/Sense Motive, how do you respond? Do you flat out say "they are lying, and here's why..."?

I've been watching a TV series called "Lie to Me" that gives some great insight into such things. The main characters are experts at reading facial expressions, body posture, and vocal intonation, so that they can tell if someone is lying, or read the emotional states behind words. The thing is, it tells the characters if the target is lying, or concealing something, or scared. But they don't know about what. Knowing that the subject is lying doesn't tell you what the truth is.

I tend to run such skills in this manner - you know the subject is lying, but not what the lie is. You know they are uncomfortable, or scared, or angry, but not why.

When confronted with badass adventurers asking nosy questions, there's lots of reasons for normal people to hide the truth from them. So, using the skill on *everybody* isn't all that useful, because everybody has something on their mind - too many positive indications that really have nothing to do with the party's business. Done that way, the few people they do get a very clear reading on that seems completely innocuous makes them suspicious that they're dealing with someone with a very good Bluff

Makes sense, I tend to do the same. What about "pile-on" checks, when one player sees another rolled poorly on Insight (could be any skill really), and decides to make their own check? Do you require everyone to decide in advance who will roll and who will aid, then treat it as a group skill check (from DMG2)?

When one character asks for the check, I announce, "Anyone who can see and hear this scene may make a Sense Motive check." I don't view it as a group check, because the characters typically cannot communicate about it while it is happening. If they *set out* to cooperate on grilling the person, with a plan, that's a different matter.

To take my example: The PCs are questioning a bunch of suspects, and one happens to be an unknown villain. The villain lies about his/her involvement. Player makes an Insight check. For argument's sake, they get a really frickin' high result. What happens next?

They get the information that the character was lying. However, someone else in the bunch is also lying - or is concerned in a way that reads just like lying. Exactly what the lie is depends on precisely what questions the PCs are asking. "Where were you last night?" for example, is an easy one - the guy was at a brothel, or out double-crossing his gang's leader, or something, so he says he was at home in bed when he wasn't.

The trick is to not have things be simple, "There is one villain, and he's the only one doing anything hinkey." Make up a whole bunch of hinkey business going on that the characters stumble into, and nothing becomes clear too easily.