Sense Motive: Walking Polygraph Machines?

[fiddlerjones]

I agree with Peter here. I will often make checks for nothing, just as I'd make spot and listen checks for nothing, just to keep players on their toes. When a character senses motive, however, it is automatic. The player should not be responsible for picking up on tells and inconsistencies that he either does not see or is not told about, but that a sufficiently practiced character should know and recognize.

 

[FireLance]

"wah wah wah, my players are effective occasionally and it reduces my ability to tell them exactly what they should be doing".

Is that basically the argument?

Actually, from the OP's statement:

"I feel it can really throw a monkey wrench into certain plans I have for the campaign because often I have NPCs try to trick the PCs by -- of course -- lying."

I think it's more:

"My players have an ability that allows them to easily get around the type of challenges that I enjoy presenting them with."

It's like find the path for a DM that enjoys mazes, Gather Information, detect evil, or divination for a DM who enjoys mysteries, or true seeing for a DM who likes using illusions.

 

[Hammerforge]

Actually, from the OP's statement:

"I feel it can really throw a monkey wrench into certain plans I have for the campaign because often I have NPCs try to trick the PCs by -- of course -- lying."

I think it's more:

"My players have an ability that allows them to easily get around the type of challenges that I enjoy presenting them with."

It's like find the path for a DM that enjoys mazes, Gather Information, detect evil, or divination for a DM who enjoys mysteries, or true seeing for a DM who likes using illusions.

Actually, you and Saeviomagy are both wrong and are jumping to conclusions. I don't care if players get around challenges; in fact, I expect them to do so. But in a game that involves a lot of intrigue, Sense Motive can spoil the fun if every single secret that a NPC is concealing is immediately exposed. But even apart from a campaign that has a lot of intrigue, I still get concerned -- and rightly so -- when I see a skill that is unrealistic and unbalanced, and I still think Sense Motive is both unrealistic and unbalanced and therefore in need of some modification. You can't get inside someone's mind and tell if they're lying or not no matter how good at "reading in between the lines" you are. There have been plenty of times in my life that I thought for sure someone was lying only to find out later that they had been telling me the truth after all. It's just too tricky of a thing to pull off to try to represent it with a die roll -- unless the ability were magical.

 

[Hammerforge]

For the record, I do not agree with this statement. Players should not (and by the rules, do not) have to ask for the vast majority of Sense Motive checks. They are frequently opposed checks, and opposed checks are (almost always) automatic.

Do the rules specify anywhere if Sense Motive can be done before the Bluff check?

 

[FireLance]

Actually, you and Saeviomagy are both wrong and are jumping to conclusions. I don't care if players get around challenges; in fact, I expect them to do so.

Oh, I expect my players to get around challenges, too. I just want them to sweat a bit first . I know that it's no fun for the DM when the players easily overcome what he thought would be a challenging encounter. My point is that certain abilities can make it easy to overcome certain challenges, and the solution is to vary the challenges. Anyway, it's good to know that you're not the vs.-player type of DM.

But in a game that involves a lot of intrigue, Sense Motive can spoil the fun if every single secret that a NPC is concealing is immediately exposed. But even apart from a campaign that has a lot of intrigue, I still get concerned -- and rightly so -- when I see a skill that is unrealistic and unbalanced, and I still think Sense Motive is both unrealistic and unbalanced and therefore in need of some modification. You can't get inside someone's mind and tell if they're lying or not no matter how good at "reading in between the lines" you are. There have been plenty of times in my life that I thought for sure someone was lying only to find out later that they had been telling me the truth after all. It's just too tricky of a thing to pull off to try to represent it with a die roll -- unless the ability were magical.

Well, it's your game, but I personally wouldn't use what I can or cannot do in real life to determine whether a game rule is unrealsitic and unbalanced. The game rules are set up so that even moderately experienced characters can reliably do things that are almost impossible in real life. By all means, make the changes if you think it's going to improve your game. However, changing the rules just to better model the real world isn't a good idea in my book.

 

[LostSoul]

But in a game that involves a lot of intrigue, Sense Motive can spoil the fun if every single secret that a NPC is concealing is immediately exposed.

What you want to do is make it so that the intrigue is increased with a successful Sense Motive check. NPC A is revealed to be lying about something - but we thought he was totally on the up-and-up! Stuff like that.

It's the same with Speak With Dead and all those other spells. In a murder mystery, things should begin with a Speak With Dead spell. That's where your first lead comes in. The PCs ask the NPC who killed him: "Don't know... he had no face." No face? Check up on that now.

Or a Find the Path spell in a maze. The Find the Path spell leads through the maze, but only the most direct and heavily-challenged route. If you want to find a safer way through, you'll have to do some exploring. (Although Find the Path should still help you.)

 

[Hammerforge]

Oh, I expect my players to get around challenges, too. I just want them to sweat a bit first .

That's exactly my perspective, too. If there is no "sweat" involved in the challenge, then it really isn't much of a challenge, in which case the game will become stale and boring eventually.

I know that it's no fun for the DM when the players easily overcome what he thought would be a challenging encounter. My point is that certain abilities can make it easy to overcome certain challenges, and the solution is to vary the challenges. Anyway, it's good to know that you're not the vs.-player type of DM.

I try to avoid the "DM vs. player" mentality because then it's as if it's no longer a game but a selfish competition. My concern about issues like Sense Motive (and others like it) is my sense of DM responsibility to keep the game interesting, varied, and challenging. My big beef is that if characters are walking polygraph machines, a campaign with intrigue will present very few challenges.

Well, it's your game, but I personally wouldn't use what I can or cannot do in real life to determine whether a game rule is unrealsitic and unbalanced. The game rules are set up so that even moderately experienced characters can reliably do things that are almost impossible in real life. By all means, make the changes if you think it's going to improve your game. However, changing the rules just to better model the real world isn't a good idea in my book.

It's the old difficult question of where to draw the line between making a game realistic and making it just a game. So your thought is well taken.

 

[LostSoul]

I try to avoid the "DM vs. player" mentality because then it's as if it's no longer a game but a selfish competition. My concern about issues like Sense Motive (and others like it) is my sense of DM responsibility to keep the game interesting, varied, and challenging. My big beef is that if characters are walking polygraph machines, a campaign with intrigue will present very few challenges.

This doesn't have much to do with Sense Motive, but I could see a game of D&D played where it's all about the DM vs. Players. The DM creates encounters using creatures from the MM and PHB. These encounters have an EL as specified in one of those tables (the one that lists the percentage of encounters of a specific EL, based on the party's level).

The DM's job is to crush the players. The player's job is to crush the DM. They both follow the RAW. Any fudging is cheating. All dice rolls are in the open. The DM is not god and there is no "Rule 0" - he has to follow all the same rules as the players, or else he's cheating.

 

[jmucchiello]

I try to avoid the "DM vs. player" mentality because then it's as if it's no longer a game but a selfish competition. My concern about issues like Sense Motive (and others like it) is my sense of DM responsibility to keep the game interesting, varied, and challenging. My big beef is that if characters are walking polygraph machines, a campaign with intrigue will present very few challenges.

But sense motive does not make them a polygraph machine. It only tells them there is falseness about what is being said or there is something being hidden. Lots of people have stuff to hide. What they have to hide may have nothing to do with the subject at hand. Likewise, parts of what are being said may be true and parts false. Just knowing something said was false does not tell you which parts are true and which parts are false.

Also, sense motive takes at least a minute. If the party doesn't spend a minute talking to the guy, they can't sense motive what he says.

 

[I'm A Banana]

"I don't like Detect Evil because it detects evil!"

"I don't like Sense Motive because it senses motives!"

Sense Motive doesn't tell PC's the truth. Just that what they are being told might not be it. The intrigue isn't in believing a lie, it's in finding out the truth behind all the lies.

And any sufficiently intrigue-based campaign is going to have creatures with Bluff skills so high that they act like a Suggestion spell. And probably shiny magic to back it up. Intrigue means, in part, finding out the truth -- liars and manipulators, Bluffers and Diplomats, are some of the most prominent foes in such a campaign. The PC's will be victims, especially of "boss-level" challenges.

Walking polygraph machines? Hardly. More like confused pawns who don't know which lie to trust. Do they trust the dark mysterious figure who said it was The King who released the demons, whom they could tell was hiding something? Or do they trust the shady, twitchy emissary who said it was Baron Von Evil that release the demons, whom they could tell was distracted and not telling them the entire story? Or do they trust the bard who tipped them off in the first place, who dresses a little too richly and talks a little too smoothly, but they haven't caught in a fib yet? And what are those orphans hiding in their ratty overcoats that is so important?! HMM?!

Drive your players crazy with suspicion. This keeps the skill powerful (they know not to entirely trust what these people say), while keeping intrigue thick (well what CAN you trust?!).