Sense Motive makes me sad

[Jon_Dahl]

Long story short: Cheating someone is too difficult in D&D.

Now a bit longer version:

Hunch This use of the skill involves making a gut assessment of the social situation. You can get the feeling from another’s behavior that something is wrong, such as when you’re talking to an impostor. Alternatively, you can get the feeling that someone is trustworthy

Why I don't like it:

So if you're pretending to be someone you're not, you're going to get caught with a fairly good chance no matter what magic or clever ploy you use.

A Bluff check is opposed by the target’s Sense Motive check.
The bluff is believable and doesn’t affect the target much. +0 modifier to Bluff

Why I don't like it:
In D&D it's hard to tell your wife that you had one beer even though you had two. Not to mention that if you tell the baron you killed all the orcs, even though you left one alive, you gonna be in a mess (Sense Motive is class skill of Aristocrats).



So I don't like the fact that social interaction (lying and noticing the truth), is a little bit too mechanic. I'd like my players to find out if someone telling the truth and not be sure about it until they have a proof. But Sense Motive works a little bit too much like a lie detector: Once you get +19 bonus to Sense Motive (you can easily get this at 7th-level, at least) you will always get the right "hunch" about everybody in 1 minute. It's pretty drastic, since it's not an opposed roll (opponent can't do anything about it). So effectively 7th-level Expert will know you're untrustworthy in 1 minute; whether you are or you're not. This beats even Undetectable Alignment.

But to defend Sense Motive, I must say that I once had a DM that utilized this skill in his games with style... He used the phrase "you sense that he's lying" as a plot-element, and it worked great. So I do admit - wholeheartedly - that Sense Motive and generally everything you find in D&D can be used to make the game fun and enjoyable. Sense Motive is like that also. I just feel that it's not my "thing" as a DM.

TBH I do cheat a lot with Sense Motive when I DM. I do it a lot. I want my players to find out if someone is lying, lie detectors are useless unless magic is used. Which also brings out the fact that Sense Motive requires very, very little innovativity from the player's part. If you cast a spell and know someone is lying, it's fine. You took the risk and effort to cast the spell. But a hidden roll "Ok, you got the right hunch" is not my cup of tea.

 

[Dandu]

One possible approach is to use circumstance bonuses. For example, give the PC a circumstance bonus if he comes up with a good story when he tries to cheat someone.

 

[Hassassin]

One possible approach is to use circumstance bonuses. For example, give the PC a circumstance bonus if he comes up with a good story when he tries to cheat someone.

This is how I do it. I call for a Bluff, but also ask for the story. That determines penalties or bonuses.

For sense motive I usually roll it secretly and if it would win I try to make the lie I'm telling more obvious. I've never used the hunch rule as such.

 

[Dandu]

Perhaps a bonus to sense motive for asking good questions?

"I WANT THE TRUTH!"

 

[Celebrim]

I never apply the 'hunch' rule to knowing the truth. I use 'hunch' essentially for epathy checks - being able to tell if an NPC is enduring some sort of emotion - without explaining why the NPC might be experiencing that emotion. So, 'hunch' gets you answers like, "He seems angry." or "You think that he is flirting with you." It's mostly used by the player to confirm that what they are experiencing in the role play is what is actually occuring within the game world, or conversely, that some aspect of the game world that isn't coming through in the role play is present in the game world. It's occassionally used as a 'spot' type check in situations where the thing that is hidden isn't visually concealed, but the motive behind it is. For example, I'd use a 'hunch' check to notice that the beggar on the street corner was acting in a suspicious manner (he's actually a lookout for the local theives guild), or that a particular couple at a dance was making discrete efforts to try to keep a conversation private.

For lying I always use bluff opposed by sense motive. I generally don't allow retries for the same information. Once a character gets away with a lie, any badgering on the same topic won't earn additional sense motive checks.

The biggest problem I have with the bluff/sense motive interaction is that a class with bluff as a class skill pretty much always succeeds at lying when opposed to classes without the sense motive skill, and a class without bluff as a class skill pretty much always fails to successfully lie when opposed by a class with the sense motive skill.

I'm not sure I see that as as big of a bug as you do.

However, I would suggest that lying to a close friend who believes you to be trust worthy is easier than anything the rules provide for. The rules assume that the easiest lie to get away with is a +0 modifier on your bluff check. I would assume that lying to a close friend (like a spouse or a leige that has reason to trust you) is easier than a +0 modifier to the DC.

For example, what about the following case:

"The bluff is not only believable but the opposite is improbable, and the character would suffer if the bluff was not true."

In D&D it's hard to tell your wife that you had one beer even though you had two.

This is like the edge case Diplomacy problem of 'its hard for a high level character to get his equally high level spouse to pass the salt'. It's a hole worth plugging, but I'm not sure that it constitutes a huge problem.

Keep in mind that Sherlock Holmes is a '7th level expert'. Naturally mid to high level characters will have skills that seem superhuman because they are superhuman. I would expect a 7th level expert to be very hard to lie to successfully.

What exactly is the bug you have that you think needs fixing? Do you want PC's to be able to dupe NPO's more often?

 

[Water Bob]

I wouldn't let the dice decide. I'd roll everything I could behind the screen, and if the dice said the player had a successful Sense Motive, then I'd use that info to color my roleplaying of the situation.

I'd work it out in roleplaying, not dicing. Use the dice to "lead" and "influence". Don't use it them to determine everything.

 

[aboyd]

Keep in mind that Sherlock Holmes is a '7th level expert'. Naturally mid to high level characters will have skills that seem superhuman because they are superhuman. I would expect a 7th level expert to be very hard to lie to successfully.

This. By the time a PC has a +19 to Sense Motive, I assume there is some serious skill there. In our world, these are the judges who have the uncanny ability to determine within minutes who the lying scumbag is when two people come before the court to resolve a dispute. These are the police officers with lots of training and years of interrogating suspects, so that knowing the patterns and discrepancies that reveal a lie is like second nature to them.

If my player got his or her character's Sense Motive up that high, I'm going to be sure that it works... a lot. Not always, but definitely enough.

Also, I'm quite fine to give information without giving everything away. I never think of anything as a "win button." So instead of saying, "Yeah, she just lied when she said that she didn't kill the guy," I might try something like this: "You sense that there is a hesitancy about her, as if she were filling in details on the fly. Why? That's for you to figure out." Maybe it turns out she is covering for someone else. The players could take the "she's making things up" hint as an indication of her guilt and summarily kill her, but that would be a huge mistake. I'd typically expect corroborating evidence would be necessary to get a solid truth.

Still, I wouldn't be sad to see Sense Motive working roughly as well as Zone of Truth. However, I wouldn't want to see it operate as well as Discern Lies.

 

[lordxaviar]

as a DM I balance game mechanics with the flow of the game, would it hurt to flub the roll and let him get away with it this time? even thought the npc has a +40 to sense motive? think that sums up my 2 cp..

 

[Celebrim]

Still, I wouldn't be sad to see Sense Motive working roughly as well as Zone of Truth. However, I wouldn't want to see it operate as well as Discern Lies.

Well, in my game both work about as well as Sense Motive. Discern lies let you use the Scry skill in place of Sense Motive for the purpose of lie detection. Zone of Truth gives everyone in it a large penalty to their bluff checks.

 

[JamesonCourage]

I like those changes, Celebrim. Let's the skills continue to be useful, even after magic is applied. On my homebrew magic system, that's what I went for, too.