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Message: <blockquote data-quote="Pseudopsyche" data-source="post: 5083130" data-attributes="member: 54600">Building upon the perspective that Mike Mearls offered in his last Ruling Skill Challenges column, I would classify social skills as follows.  Bluff manipulates an NPC's perceptions and expectations, ideally preying on his character weaknesses.  Diplomacy appeals to an NPC's motivations and values.  Intimidate preys upon an NPC's fears.  What matters is not what the PC says but the effect they're trying to achieve.In the case of telling the city watch the truth, I would say that you're trying to affect the sergeant's perceptions by seeming innocent, so Bluff is appropriate.  (Note that the very first sentence of the Bluff entry in the compendium states: "You can make what’s false appear to be true, what’s outrageous seem plausible, and what’s suspicious seem ordinary."  This attempt falls under the last category, since standing over a fresh corpse with weapons drawn certainly seems suspicious.)Finally, I have no issue with players making rolls for their own characters.  The skill DCs were errata'd precisely to encourage players to use skills they haven't optimized.  But in general, I think the roll of dice in an RPG is to resolve uncertainty.  If you as the DM are certain as to what effect a PC's actions will have, no roll is needed.  Also, in general, social skills do not determine what a PC says or does, only how well they do it.  Of course, this approach requires the player to know what their character is trying to do in-game, besides "make a bluff check."</blockquote>

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