Issues with unopposed sense motive

[WarKitty]

I've had a few issues with sense motive in my games. Namely, that RAW it always works when not opposed by bluff. Here's the type of scenario I want to be able to run:

DM: "A breathless man runs up to <<character>>. You recognize him as one of the town drunks, and he's obviously had a few glasses. He's screaming about some sort of tentacled beast in the bar."
Player: I roll sense motive...-2

Now, I hate giving the character the impression that they're sure he's telling the truth, even though afaik by RAW that's what should happen. I want to be able to craft this scenario so someone with actual ranks and a decent sense motive score has an edge over someone who doesn't have anything.

[Drakevarg]

Make it a fixed DC based on believablity?

[Cerlis]

i actually have no idea what you are trying to say. I dont mean that in a "i dont see a problem" but I know there is a problem, but could you reword it, kinda way i guess.

I will say this.

i think one reason stuff like opposed checks have some confusion, is that, in this case, there is a big difference between doing something cus you know they are telling the truth, doing something cus you believe they are telling the truth, not doing something because you think they are lying, not doing something cus you know they are lying and not doing something cus you dont know if they are lying but you dont believe them enough to alter your behavior slightly.

For instance a self centered person, even if he believed the drunk, would auto fail his sense motive because hes not trying to believe or disbelieve the drunk. he tosses the drunks existance out the window cus he doesnt care about it. in fact i'd say he doesnt even make a roll cus he doesnt even consider trying to figure out what the Drunk is getting at.

[Tyndmyr]

By RAW, there's a static DC 20 check for a hunch.

This sounds exactly like what you're looking for.

[WarKitty]

i actually have no idea what you are trying to say. I dont mean that in a "i dont see a problem" but I know there is a problem, but could you reword it, kinda way i guess.

I will say this.

i think one reason stuff like opposed checks have some confusion, is that, in this case, there is a big difference between doing something cus you know they are telling the truth, doing something cus you believe they are telling the truth, not doing something because you think they are lying, not doing something cus you know they are lying and not doing something cus you dont know if they are lying but you dont believe them enough to alter your behavior slightly.

For instance a self centered person, even if he believed the drunk, would auto fail his sense motive because hes not trying to believe or disbelieve the drunk. he tosses the drunks existance out the window cus he doesnt care about it. in fact i'd say he doesnt even make a roll cus he doesnt even consider trying to figure out what the Drunk is getting at.

The situation here is a person (generally an NPC) presenting a truth that is generally unbelievable for one reason for another, and another person (usually a PC) trying to determine whether they're telling the truth.

[JonRG]

i actually have no idea what you are trying to say.

Okay, I get it now. The OP basically wants only the high Sense Motive/Wis characters to be able to puzzle out if "Dom the Drunk and Spinner of Tall Tales" is being sincere, even though he's not using the Bluff skill.

Tyndmyr's suggestion works great for that, I think. :smallsmile:

[gallagher]

wait... this is dnd, a world where magic comes from everywhere... from gods and books to rocks and mud... magical creatures and aberrations are commonplace in some of the strangest locations...

and for some reason a group of adventurers, regardless of level, wouldnt believe someone who claimed that some odd creature appeared in a bar, and he was distressed enough to run away?

why would an adventurer risk not gaining the XP? i wouldnt roll the sense motive myself, and just run there.


but thats just me :thog:

[WarKitty]

wait... this is dnd, a world where magic comes from everywhere... from gods and books to rocks and mud... magical creatures and aberrations are commonplace in some of the strangest locations...

and for some reason a group of adventurers, regardless of level, wouldnt believe someone who claimed that some odd creature appeared in a bar, and he was distressed enough to run away?

why would an adventurer risk not gaining the XP? i wouldnt roll the sense motive myself, and just run there.


but thats just me :thog:

Twas just an example...the idea is that for some reason the person telling them is unreliable, and it would have a significant impact if it were true, but would also have a significant impact if they act on it and it's false.

[erikun]

The default assumption, I think, would be "He seems to be telling the truth." If they roll high enough, they can be more sure, either certainly that he is being honest or a clear idea that he is trying to hide something.

[Zherog]

DM: "A breathless man runs up to <<character>>. You recognize him as one of the town drunks, and he's obviously had a few glasses. He's screaming about some sort of tentacled beast in the bar."
Player: I roll sense motive...-2

Is the -2 there on the end the character's modifier? If so, your reply is:

WarKitty: He's clearly had a few drinks. You can't tell if he's sincere or hallucinating.

Basically, Tyndmyr nailed it. You have to set a static DC -- 20 for a hunch is a great place to start. You then adjust it from there for different circumstances. Again, assuming the -2 is the character's modifier, the DC of 20 is nice because no matter what he can't succeed.

When you're doing this, though, try to avoid the "scaling with level" syndrome. That is, you set the DC at 20 when they're level 1, but the DC for the exact same thing is 35 when they're level 8, and DC 50 when they're level 15.

[DiBastet]

You must first understand the difference between believing a bluff and acting on the bluff, and the respective modifiers.

That said, I do this:

First, I don't make opposed rolls. The DC for lying is 10 + sense motive modifier of the target.

Second: When someone tells a truth that is usually belieavable or that no one cares too much ("The inn is down this street"), then one one cares and we keep on. In these cases, if someone wants to know if it's really truth or not, a DC 20 sense motive is enough to be completly sure.

Third: If someone tells a truth that is actually hard to believe, we make a Bluff roll just like normal (you may use your diplomacy check in this roll, if you want to), with the modifiers that apply for stupid tales. If you beat the DC, the target believes in you, as normal, and you apply the modifiers to see if the target acts on the truth, but with a +10 bonus because it's actually the truth (it's really easy to convince someone making a blank face when it's true) (This is the normal bluff "belief" of "whatever you say, dude...").

If you don't beat the dc, but would beat it with a +10, then the target sees the truth but chooses how to act ("You see in his eyes that he is telling the truth").

If you don't beat the DC, not even with a +10, then you expressed yourself so badly that the target thinks you're may be lying ("His tale is so strange / he trembles and coughs so much that you sincerely can't know if he's a bad liar or just a nervous person telling the truth")


Works for us, and it's been some years already.

Why the possibility of using diplomacy: There are many kinds of social chars that don't speak lies but should be very convicing with truths.

Why the +10 to convince: It's really different to convince someone to look down at its feet saying "giant ants on your feet, look!" when you're tying to lie to him, than when there REALLY are giant ants at his feet; or convincing the guard to let you in telling "but I AM an spy agent of the same organization as you are a guard for". If it's a lie he may believe, but won't let you in anyway (it's dangerous for him) and say "Sorry sir, I see your point, sir, but I'm not allowed. Ask the captain". You can convince him to not only believe but also to do what you ask with a VERY good bluff roll OR telling the truth.

Why "If you don't beat the DC, not even with a +10" part: So people can't say "I just fail my check!" They need to express themselves well (difference between a "Hey you! My mom turned into an alien and my house flew away! Come!" and "Sorry, I don't want to disturb, you won't believe me, I even don't believe it, but my mother, well, she's just turned into an alien or whatever, and worst, I believe my house just flew away right now. Can you take a look and tell me I'm dreaming?". Both seem dangerous to do, but the first is worse.

[Coidzor]

The situation here is a person (generally an NPC) presenting a truth that is generally unbelievable for one reason for another, and another person (usually a PC) trying to determine whether they're telling the truth.

What kind of adventurers are these that they would find tentacle beasts and barfights so unbelievable? :smallconfused:

[WarKitty]

What kind of adventurers are these that they would find tentacle beasts and barfights so unbelievable? :smallconfused:


Twas just an example...the idea is that for some reason the person telling them is unreliable, and it would have a significant impact if it were true, but would also have a significant impact if they act on it and it's false.

Also, I believe the point in the example was that the person presenting the information was less than a credible source.

[ericgrau]

I believe bluffing can be done untrained. If he's bluffing, then roll it.

[WarKitty]

I believe bluffing can be done untrained. If he's bluffing, then roll it.

He's not bluffing. The point was that he shouldn't be automatically believable just because he's telling the truth.

[Sarco_Phage]

He's not bluffing. The point was that he shouldn't be automatically believable just because he's telling the truth.

Yes. For example, while the town hetman running up to your party and hollering the factual statement that goblins have kidnapped his wife is believable, the town drunkard running up to your party and declaring that the black tentacles of Nur-Zaffar have breached the earth and are laying waste to the surrounding terrain is somewhat less believable, even if it is true.

[ericgrau]

Well then player rolls a -2. You say, sure, he's telling the truth :smallbiggrin:. Player says, aw crud. A hunch is good too if the drunk might be hallucinating, tells you whether or not it all sounds like drunken ramblings, as honest as it may be. Though if he's really plastered it might all sound like drunken ramblings regardless.

[Drachasor]

He's not bluffing. The point was that he shouldn't be automatically believable just because he's telling the truth.

If the person isn't bluffing, you MUST do a "hunch", because you can roll an opposed check to a bluff that doesn't exist. A failed hunch doesn't necessarily mean anything beyond they don't get a good read on the target.

While not RAW, it might be better to treat these things as sometimes the player thinking the person isn't lying (different than believing them -- e.g. the target believes he is telling the truth)..well, at least after that one round. Games are really weird about this sort of thing, and some GMs seem to delight in telling players they have to believe the most outlandish things on a failed roll (regardless of whether it is in character or not).

[beyond reality]

It seems like there's a pretty easy solution that's already partially covered by the rules for Bluff.

Just set a DC for Sense Motive in situations that are believable but the target may be lying. Say talking to a merchant. He tells you that there's been a real shortage of Good X recently and that's why he's charging more. It's a perfectly reasonable and believable statement but at the same time you might suspect him of lying.

Lets say this theoretical DC is 5.

Now, adjust the DC based on the believability modifiers from Bluff.

So, that drunk running down the street is probably going to be +5 to the DC, since he's a fairly unreliable source. Makes it a DC 10 sense motive check.

Now if that same drunk ran towards you and tells you he's actually a demi-god trapped in mortal form and he needs their most powerful magic items to restore his true power. He'll of course reward everyone with a wish spell. That's a +20 to the DC, making DC 25 to actually figure out that he's telling the truth (or believes that he is at least. Could still be crazy I suppose).

[Frosty]

Here's a houserule I implement for situations like this, modeled off of real life logic.

Someone's ability to convince someone else of the truth is based on 3 factors:

1) How well the convincer is able to communicate his ideas
2) How far-fetched the truth is
3) How well the convincee is able to read people and how perceptive he is. How well he can digest information and see bullcrap for what it is.

#1 is represented by Diplomacy. #2 is represented by Sense Motive. #2 is a modifier on the difficutly rating of this conversation.

The basic formula is:

If Convincer's Diplomacy roll + Convincee's Sense Motive roll > Base difficulty rating modified by how far-fetched the truth is, then the Convincer gets through to the Convincee, and the Convincee believes that truth.

So, suppose an adventurer tries to convince a town guard that there is a flood coming to town and that the town should begin evacuation. This townis nowhere near large bodies of water, and flooding is unheard of around here. The guard thinks this is pretty ridiculous, but he'll listen to the adventurer and see how sincere he sounds, and the adventurer will try to sound as sincere and sane as possibe.

The adventurer rolls a Diplomacy of 13, and the guard rolls a Sense Motive of 16, for a total of 29, but given how ridiculous the truth is, the DC was actually 40, so the guard doesn't believe the adventurer for the time being.

Of course there can be other circumstancial modifiers in this formula, like if the Convincer brings in supporting evidence, that can be a +2 bonus. If the Convincee already distrusts the Convincer, that can be a penalty. On the other hand, if the Convincee and Convincer are best buddies, then there is probably a big bonus.

[Coidzor]

He's not bluffing. The point was that he shouldn't be automatically believable just because he's telling the truth.

Indeed. That is a pet peeve of mine when I have to roll a bluff check for telling the truth in-game or making a statement...:smallannoyed:

[Drachasor]

Indeed. That is a pet peeve of mine when I have to roll a bluff check for telling the truth in-game or making a statement...:smallannoyed:

Eh, why would you ever roll a bluff check for that?

[Thrice Dead Cat]

Eh, why would you ever roll a bluff check for that?

And I think we have a sense motive fail here. Or maybe its me? Whatever, the point is that social skills always have an odd disconnect.

In this particular case, try to get the players more involved directly. You could have them still roll the sense motive, but focus more on what's happening in-game so that they don't just go "Well, I could charm monster him..." or something else. Quick little blurbs of info are good. Even a "you have no idea if person is drunk or in danger" also works well, too.

[kamikasei]

Eh, why would you ever roll a bluff check for that?
Becaue Bluff is the skill for convincing people that you're telling the truth. It's a problem with the system that it assumes you'll only need to do so if you're not telling the truth.

In reality, if I tell you something, I may or may not believe it to be true. You may or may not think it is true. I could sincerely believe something that you find too implausible to credit. You may think I must be trying to deceive you.

The OP's complaint, if I'm understanding her correctly, is that you can generate false negatives with Sense Motive - if I try to lie to you, and you fail to detect the lie, you miss a lie that's really there - but not false positives - if I don't lie, a poor Sense Motive result won't lead you to mistakenly conclude that I did.

I imagine the OP would prefer that people with low Sense Motive were just bad at telling truth from lies in general - bad at telling when they're being lied to, bad at telling when someone is sincerely telling them something unlikely.

It seems the "hunch" use of Sense Motive is the closest the system allows: "...you can get the feeling that someone is trustworthy." I guess that if you can't make DC20 then you can only assume people might be either lying or telling the truth and attempt to judge based on the evidence either way. It's unfortunate, though, that there doesn't seem to be a way to be good at being honest yourself.

So for the OP: someone makes a claim and the players want to Sense Motive. If they get a result below 20, either they detect the lie or they know only that they can't detect a lie. If they get a result of twenty or more, either they detect the lie or they get the impression - which may be false - that the speaker is telling the truth. Just be careful not to treat "she bluffed really well" (beating your >20 SM check) as different to "you can tell she's totally honest" (no bluff at all, >20 SM check).

[CTrees]

I don't roll Sense Motive, I roll Initiative.

More seriously, this has been answered pretty well. Take your drunkard example - the players think he may be lying, that's a hunch - DC20. Assign modifiers based on believability (see: Bluff) if you feel like it. Also, use your ambiguous words - "You believe he's telling the truth," "You have a hunch he's lying," "He seems to be telling what he believes to be the truth," etc. That last one especially may be useful in the sort of example your drunk represents - do the PCs believe there's a monster? Maybe it's an illusion - he wouldn't know, necessarily. Maybe he's just hallucinating - another reason he'd believe what he was saying, and thus wouldn't be lying (just wrong).

[Tvtyrant]

Continuous item of read thoughts. Problem solved.

[Zherog]

"He seems to be telling what he believes to be the truth," etc. That last one especially may be useful in the sort of example your drunk represents - do the PCs believe there's a monster? Maybe it's an illusion - he wouldn't know, necessarily. Maybe he's just hallucinating - another reason he'd believe what he was saying, and thus wouldn't be lying (just wrong).

Yeah, this is a great point. And the wording - "He seems to be telling what he believes to be the truth" - is quite good. It lets the player know his skill worked, but still leaves the ambiguity you as DM need in the situation.

[rubycona]

I approach bluff and sense motive a little bit differently than RAW.

Bluff, to me, isn't about "lying," that is to say, to speak a falsehood convincingly. If a thief goes into a store and is scoping it out, and someone asks him what he's doing, saying, "I'm just looking at the merchandise" is technically true. A greater truth is "I'm scoping out the merc to steal later," however. Saying the first line is close enough to lying that bad liars would have a hard time saying it, technical truths be damned.

So for our games, bluff instead is, "To manipulate the social situation, using verbal and/or non-verbal forms of communication, in a deceitful or misleading way." Technical truths aren't get-out-of-jail-free cards. Though, technical truths Will get around Zone of Truth and such. Someone charging in, declaring, "Thief!" will require a bluff check to not react, if you're the thief, for example.

As for Sense Motive, we use it in a more general way - it's one's ability to intuitively understand social situations. Not a lie detector. But it still works in opposition to Bluff - understanding if the social situation is being intentionally altered.

So for your drunk, a low Sense Motive, I'd give one of the two following answers, depending:

"You're pretty sure he's wasted. Quite possibly wasted enough to have hallucinated it, and possibly not. You're not sure."

"He seems earnest. So he's either earnestly lying, or earnestly telling you the truth. You could always flip a coin :)"

Likewise, a high Sense Motive, I'd give a more general insight. Assuming it's true:

"Despite the drunken stupor, there's a real undercurrent of fear. He saw something, all right, and whatever it was terrified him. Whether it actually was what he thinks he saw, you can't know, but he's dead serious."

[Coidzor]

Eh, why would you ever roll a bluff check for that?

DM fiat to cover this sort of situation.

At least, that's the only motivation I can see for it.

[Person_Man]

I use a passive Sense Motive. 10 + player's Skill ranks + Wis. No rolling. If that number is lower then the Bluff check of whoever is talking to them, then I just roleplay it out, lying as I see fit. If it's equal to or higher, I still roleplay it out in the same way, but I tell the players that they think he might be lying. If someone has a Sense Motive check that way higher then the Bluff check, I change my roleplaying and make it abundently clear through my tone of voice about which specific sentences are a lie or a truth.

[Drachasor]

Becaue Bluff is the skill for convincing people that you're telling the truth. It's a problem with the system that it assumes you'll only need to do so if you're not telling the truth.

Bluff, by RAW, is to TRICK someone. If you are not tricking them, you don't roll bluff. I don't know why anyone would possibly use it for telling the truth, that doesn't make any sense.

If you were going to use a skill for the truth, Diplomacy fits a heck of a lot better. Get people to Helpful or Friendly and you are good.


DM fiat to cover this sort of situation.

At least, that's the only motivation I can see for it.

Then the DM is an idiot. (imho).

[prufock]

I've had a few issues with sense motive in my games. Namely, that RAW it always works when not opposed by bluff.

As I'm sure others have pointed out already, this is not true. Sense Motive opposes Bluff; if the target is not bluffing, the DC is 20 to tell that "something isn't right here...."


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.
Bold part is relevant.


I hate giving the character the impression that they're sure he's telling the truth
TIP: Even when they're telling the truth, and thus have a static DC of 20, roll a d20 behind the screen.