Convincing someone you are the person you have taken control over?

[SangoProduction]

So, the disguise skill is for letting you impersonate someone. But what if you're inhabiting their body, and don't need to do anything else to look like them?

Clearly perception would not be the valid anti-skill to this "Disguise" check, right? It would be sense motive, as though you were lying with Bluff? Would it actually be Bluff, or would it still be Disguise?

[Eldariel]

Bluff seems appropriate. You're essentially trying to copy someone's mannerisms - though you could argue for the physical part of that action to use Disguise. But yeah, DM ruling: I'd say it's Bluff with the usual Sense Motive bonuses based on familiarity.

[Psyren]

Seconding Bluff; you're impersonating their attitude rather than appearance, which involves lying (even nonverbally.)

[SangoProduction]

However, the disguise skill does indicate that you can impersonate someone with it. Impersonation tends to imply more than simply a skin-level deception, but the ability to take on a role. (Just to throw some discord in to this, and play devil's advocate.)

[Captn_Flounder]

As a DM, when something could just as easily be two skills, like disguise or bluff, i make the player roll whichever is higher.

For instance, a White Pudding can be spotted through camouflage with a DC20 roll of either Perception, Survival, or Knowledge (Nature), according to the PFSRD.

[ATHATH]

On a side note/tangent here, why aren't Disguise and Bluff rolled into the same skill?

[Captn_Flounder]

If I had to guess, because Bluff is already the most versatile of the three "Social Skills" (Diplomacy, Intimidate, Bluff) and can reliably be used in place of the other two if you RP it right in a lot of cases. Like instead of "Intimidate: Move, or else!" you could "Bluff: You don't really want to be around when that undead horde right on our tails catches up!"

If you then rolled Disguise and Bluff together into one skill, it would be even better.

[Psyren]

However, the disguise skill does indicate that you can impersonate someone with it. Impersonation tends to imply more than simply a skin-level deception, but the ability to take on a role. (Just to throw some discord in to this, and play devil's advocate.)


On a side note/tangent here, why aren't Disguise and Bluff rolled into the same skill?

The difference between Disguise and Bluff is that Disguise is used ahead of time. Note the "Action:" line - 1d3x10 minutes. It's not the skill you're using in a conversation - nobody is going to stand there for half an hour while you make your check and perfect your hunch, that's something youi do while you're putting the overall look together.

Now, obviously magic reduces this time considerably, but (a) you're still not casting a disguise or shapeshift mid-conversation, and (b) the impersonation line you're citing is there whether you're using magic or not. Therefore, the skill must be for the prep work. Moment-to-moment or on-the-fly falsehoods (whether from regular language or body language) come from Bluff.

And we know Bluff applies to body language too, because of other purely somatic Bluff usages like Feint and Feign Harmlessness (the latter of which explicitly references posture.)

So while both are for deception, Disguise is for preparation, and Bluff is for thinking on your feet.

[KillianHawkeye]

I agree, it really takes both skills to pull it off well.

Impersonations that require less bluffing would be something like impersonating "a guard" or some other generic figure, while impersonating a specific individual who is either well-known or familiar to whoever's observing you would definitely require Bluff or possibly Perform (acting).

For the OP's question, actually taking over somebody's body clearly obviates the need to Disguise yourself physically, and that might be enough if all you need is to look like them, but you still need to Bluff or Perform to convince anyone who actually knows them.

I've seen enough sci-fi or fantasy shows that had scenes with body-swapping or people having to pretend they're other people to know that being a good liar or a good actor makes a big difference in these scenarios (because the people in the shows frequently aren't good and they barely succeed through luck).

[Segev]

Disguise is the first thing you'd roll. I'd give you the +10 for impersonating that specific person, for the same reason disguise self and the various shape-shifting spells that let you assume humanoid forms give it to you.

I would only make you roll Bluff if you started making untrue statements designed to back up your disguise. Managing the "I'm me, why would you even suspect otherwise?" aspect is Disguise. It's only Bluff when you start getting into specific statements or requests.