Can Commanded creatures lie?

[Eguzki]

In one of the games I'm running, there is a Character that can rubuke/command warforged through the warforged domain of Faiths of Eberron.

He currently is commanding a warforged and questioning him. The rules don't specify if a commanded creature can lie or not since usually such creatures would be mindless undead.

Let me know what you guys think.

[Ranos]

The cleric can give orders to a commanded creature. Orders such as "tell me the truth".

[Johel]

If you command him not to lie, the warforged is compelled to tell you the truth as he perceives it.

Otherwise, you can use the rules of Command Undead : if it's intelligent, it's simply charmed, not commanded.

[Eguzki]

but if the cleric hasn't given such a command it can say what it wishes right?

[Ranos]

Sure. Which is why you should always give it some sort of general, all-purpose command to prevent that stuff. Kinda like the three laws of robotics (though we all know how that turned out).

[Eguzki]

thanks for your quick responses guys. thats what I thought as well but wanted to check with others to avoid pummelled by my players.

[illyrus]

It seems kind of lame, I might put myself in the player's shoes at that point and realize that things like that might make the game less fun.

[Rad]

Sure. Which is why you should always give it some sort of general, all-purpose command to prevent that stuff. Kinda like the three laws of robotics (though we all know how that turned out).

The three laws of robotics turned out pretty good actually, at least until someone decided to butcher them in a movie [/derail]
Back on topic, I think I like the solution on charming better. It is consistent with rebuking (heck, it might even be RAW now that I think of it, since the power probably says that t works like the cleric rebuke undead) and since it applies to any warforged in Eberron, the alternative seems overpowered.

[Ranos]

thanks for your quick responses guys. thats what I thought as well but wanted to check with others to avoid pummelled by my players.

Well the character is most likely aware of how his own powers work. But I guess it's your choice whether to inform him or not in the end.

[Jack_Simth]

Sure. Which is why you should always give it some sort of general, all-purpose command to prevent that stuff. Kinda like the three laws of robotics (though we all know how that turned out).

Depends on which book, which movie, how long, how deep, how the robot(s) in question interpret them, whether or not Law 0 is in play, how well the laws are coded, and whether or not there are any loopholes. AKA, the author's mood.

You could get everything from The Matrix (a world which makes no sense as stated, but works as a processor farm or as an attempt at 3 law robots + Law 0 gone bad), to utopias of various sorts, to situations where the robots all suicide, to Freefall three-law robots that get stuck in the EPA.

[Devils_Advocate]

The rules don't specify if a commanded creature can lie or not since usually such creatures would be mindless undead.

There are plenty of intelligent undead to Command.

A Commanded creature is under the cleric's mental control. Having a Commanded creature lie unless explicitly ordered not to is like requiring a cleric to spend a standard action to get a Commanded undead to stop attacking him and his teammates, which would make Commanding an undead (unlike Rebuking) not even do anything until the cleric's next turn.

Furthermore. A GM can either assume that player characters perform actions as obvious, or else require players to provide countless details that really should go without saying in order to avoid being zapped by a cheap "gotcha" (i.e. "You dropped your sword at the bottom of the cliff. You never said that you were sheathing it before you started climbing"). The latter is unlikely to be fun for anyone but the GM, and it breaks immersion by requiring attention to actions that people are usually barely consciously aware of precisely because they're performed so automatically.

[Yukitsu]

Depends on what the player asked. If he says "Tell me who you are working for" he can't lie, because he would not be telling him who he is working for in that instance.

There are few requests for questioning that would allow him to lie.

The best he can do is tell the truth and add a bunch of extra rubbish to it.

[Thajocoth]

The three laws of robotics turned out pretty good actually, at least until someone decided to butcher them in a movie...

Actually, the book was all about how those three rules, which would be likely for humans to want in machines, are ultimately both irrelevant and dangerous. The movie took it a step further than the book. The three laws, really, are a shoddy attempt at slavery that backfires a lot. When we create truly intelligent machines though, it will be impossible to embed such rules in them anyway, so it's not incredibly important.

EDIT:

Depends on which book, which movie...

Oh, I assumed I, Robot (book) and I, Robot (movie). I'm aware of Bicentennial Man (movie), but the laws are merely mentioned there, and not an important factor. I wasn't aware of other books or movies that used the 3 laws.

-----

If I was the DM, I'd say that if they're commanded to answer a question, they must answer it truthfully in their perspective, but if they're simply under other commands and asked the question, they can choose to lie. Obviously, they'd have to make a bluff check...

[Tiktakkat]

EDIT:
Oh, I assumed I, Robot (book) and I, Robot (movie). I'm aware of Bicentennial Man (movie), but the laws are merely mentioned there, and not an important factor. I wasn't aware of other books or movies that used the 3 laws.

Which resulted in a loss of some significant elements of the novella.

However, the Three Laws feature in a significant amount of Asimov's work, and ultimately results in the 0th Law. While it was hacked into the story for that particular movie, it was definitely part of Asimov's overall concept.

[Splendor]

Don't forget not lying isn't the same thing as telling the truth?

"Did you see who robbed the old lady?"
--"No" being immortal warforged may have a different view on what's "old".

"Did you see a man just run by here covered in blood?
--"No" but he did happen to see a woman covered in blood run by.

"What did the guy who was covered in blood who robbed the old lady look like?"
--"All you humans look the same to me." It's the truth.