Sense Motive v Bluff or just straight up lying

[tedcahill2]

How do you use the bluff skill in your games?

Can you use it to straight up lie to someone, or is it used to misdirect and deceive? Or do you not see a difference?

[JNAProductions]

You can use both.

I would say, the more truth you use, the bigger the bonus you get on your bluff check.

[Necroticplague]

How do you use the bluff skill in your games?

Can you use it to straight up lie to someone, or is it used to misdirect and deceive? Or do you not see a difference?

Considering that Bluff also covers things like secret messages, feinting, creating false thoughts, and creating distraction, it appears to cover, as a general rule, all attempts to misdirect and deceive. So I'd also use it for if you were telling the truth, but trying to make it appear as a lie, and you'd need Bluff vs. sense motive when giving only partial truths (sense motive winning out means they realize you're being evasive, or analyze your statement enough to notice what wasn't said).

[Anxe]

I use the rules pretty straight one that. One of my PCs put a lot of ranks into Sense Motive so rewarding that investment makes sense. I occasionally forget to prompt him to roll, but I do my best to always let him detect if someone is lying or hiding their motivations.

[Goaty14]

I would also use bluff to tell the truth if the other guy think's you're lying i.e a wizard claiming to be a rice farmer for a period of time.

[Dr_Dinosaur]

I would also use bluff to tell the truth if the other guy think's you're lying i.e a wizard claiming to be a rice farmer for a period of time.

That's diplomacy though. Bluff is for deceiving people, not telling the truth.

[Crake]

Considering that Bluff also covers things like secret messages, feinting, creating false thoughts, and creating distraction, it appears to cover, as a general rule, all attempts to misdirect and deceive. So I'd also use it for if you were telling the truth, but trying to make it appear as a lie, and you'd need Bluff vs. sense motive when giving only partial truths (sense motive winning out means they realize you're being evasive, or analyze your statement enough to notice what wasn't said).

Pretty much how I run it


You can use both.

I would say, the more truth you use, the bigger the bonus you get on your bluff check.

The bluff and sense motive entries don't say you get a bonus to bluff for being believable, but rather the opposite, the person using sense motive gets a bonus if you're being outrageously outlandish.

[TheFamilarRaven]

That's diplomacy though. Bluff is for deceiving people, not telling the truth.

So if, say, a Sorcerer (with max ranks in Bluff) took some time off to farm rice paddies, he couldn't actually convince people he did? Because then he'd be telling the truth? Whereas if he said he took sometime off to be a pig farmer, he somehow becomes more believable?

This is silly. And considering Diplomacy actually has no rules written for convincing people of the truth, (only for adjusting their attitude), you can't even use diplomacy to tell the truth. Thus the only logical conclusion is that NPCs always believe you when you tell them the truth, no matter how absurd it is.

[Crake]

So if, say, a Sorcerer (with max ranks in Bluff) took some time off to farm rice paddies, he couldn't actually convince people he did? Because then he'd be telling the truth? Whereas if he said he took sometime off to be a pig farmer, he somehow becomes more believable?

This is silly. And considering Diplomacy actually has no rules written for convincing people of the truth, (only for adjusting their attitude), you can't even use diplomacy to tell the truth. Thus the only logical conclusion is that NPCs always believe you when you tell them the truth, no matter how absurd it is.

Or you only roll bluff when people have a reason to doubt you. Whether it be that your claim is outrageous, or they consider you suspicious, or whatever. On the other hand, by increasing someone's disposition toward you, making them friendly, or perhaps even helpful, they would be more inclined to believe you, making simple truths easier to digest.

[Bohandas]

So if, say, a Sorcerer (with max ranks in Bluff) took some time off to farm rice paddies, he couldn't actually convince people he did? Because then he'd be telling the truth? Whereas if he said he took sometime off to be a pig farmer, he somehow becomes more believable?

This is silly. And considering Diplomacy actually has no rules written for convincing people of the truth, (only for adjusting their attitude), you can't even use diplomacy to tell the truth. Thus the only logical conclusion is that NPCs always believe you when you tell them the truth, no matter how absurd it is.

I just thought of a way to handle this. What if you made a single roll against a single DC using the sorcerer's bluff modifier PLUS the other guy's sense motive modifier added together

[Anymage]

Straight-up lies with no point tend not to be really impactful in fictional settings. Lies for no reason tend to only happen to highlight that the person speaking is a pathological liar (something that a character with a decent Sense Motive will quickly pick up on), or because the player feels like tweaking the system. And if a PC who grew up on a rice farm claimed to have grown up on a pig farm instead, I'd just go with it unless that minor distinction happened to be plot-relevant at the moment.

Impactful lies tend to be, by definition, ones where the liar stands to gain something concrete from being believed. And while I'd fluff depending on player taste (normally I'd go with a gut feeling about the guy, but someone who fancied themselves a Sherlock Holmes would spot a contradiction that caused the whole story to fall apart), I'd tend to only make it worth a player roll when narratively significant.

[Nifft]

Straight-up lies are more dangerous, because if they backfire you're screwed, but they are Bluff just as much as a more subtle misdirection would be.

The more subtle misdirections are often preferable because, if you get caught, you may have some degree of deniability -- and because if the other party isn't entirely ignorant of the matter under discussion, you may appear more honest, which tends to lower the Bluff DC.

Both are equally represented by the Bluff skill, but one has inherent advantages over the other.