DM'ing: Arcane Mark, Sense Motive, and other goodies

[Sacrieur]

Hi there! So I'm DM'ing a campaign or something and my players are enjoying themselves. HOWEVER, they're extremely clever little ****s. This really doesn't bother me since some of the stuff they come up with is pretty hilarious and fun. However, I'm having a hard time balancing some features within the existing rule set. So...

1) Arcane Mark

My chaotic neutral wizard has come to realize that he can use arcane mark to write things on people's faces. While hilarious, it has the potential for abuse, not that I'm worried about the player abusing it, but am rather thinking about the other PCs in the party who are going to be stuck with writing on their face without any reliable way to remove it. While I'm sure I could dig up some higher level method of preventing an arcane mark from sticking or some other magical foolery, my question, before my wizard begins to realize this, is whether or not there's a limit on the number of arcane marks you can stick on a living person or do I have to house rule something if it comes up or some such thing?

I suppose the simplest answer here is let the roleplaying figure it out. Other PCs may become hostile to the fact they have a bunch of writing all over their face that they can't remove. Still, the wizard could do it while everyone is asleep, or to some NPC or something. Hilarity ensues as this has some curious implications. Am I overlooking something or is this the way it should go down?


2) Sense Motive

Related specifically to the "hunch" rule. It seems very ambiguous and difficult to rule on what someone says would count as a hunch or not. RAW doesn't help me here. Should I just fiat it every time someone rolls this? I prefer playing with less ambiguous rules to ensure consistent fairness to my players.


3) Conceal Thoughts (http://www.d20pfsrd.com/psionics-unleashed/psionic-powers/c/conceal-thoughts)

How does this +10 circumstance bonus on bluff work exactly? When exactly is sense motive used against bluff for the purpose of determining someone's true intentions, not whether or not they're lying? Was this written poorly or does it mean something I'm missing?

[Psyren]

1) If your player is going to graffiti everything that moves you may have to houserule this one. Let him have one active at a time on a person, and as many on objects he owns as he wants, or something similar.

2) Sense Motive used for a "hunch" can take as long as you need it to to keep it from being spammed. "You could spend a whole evening trying to get a sense of the people around you."

3) It's pretty straightforward. Is your NPC lying? If no, the spell is irrelevant. If yes, the player effectively gets a -10 to their sense motive to pick up on it. Simple :smallsmile:

[Darth Ultron]

1.[/B There is no in-game limit. Note that Arcane Mark can [B]not be used to ''write anything''. The spell only allows you to inscribe your personal rune or mark. So all the wizard can do is put their personal rune or mark on a person. The 1st level spell erase can get rid of it. And it has no real effect anyway.

2. Remember Sense Motive takes at least a minute to use. So someone saying a couple words does not take a minute(normally). So you can't really spam it. You would need to wait.

A lot of DM's just use sense motive as the ''wake up call''. Just in case the players ''miss'' an obvious clue.

3. The Hunch. It's a flat bonus. Say the king wants everyone to drink the poisoned wine. The king gives a nice little speech about how good the wine is. A player rolls sense motive vs the kings bluff(+10). If the player wins they get the idea ''something is wrong'', if not '''everything is fine''.