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New Perception Skill: Discernment
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CRMcNeill
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PostPosted: Mon Oct 01, 2018 10:13 pm    Post subject: Reply with quote

How about just stacking the two? For the purposes of the opposed roll, the con man gets the combined total of his Deception + his Tech roll, while the mark resists with the combined total of his Tech + Discernment roll.
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Naaman
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PostPosted: Tue Oct 02, 2018 8:47 pm    Post subject: Reply with quote

Not bad.

An additional option came to mind as well: add the difficulty (such as 18 ) to the con man's base difficulty or as a bonus to the discernment roll. Sometimes, the expert may not know the answer per se, but would know that something "isn't that simple" and might immediately raise questions that a BSer wouldn't know the answer to (let alone be able to anticipate).
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CRMcNeill
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PostPosted: Tue Oct 02, 2018 8:58 pm    Post subject: Reply with quote

Naaman wrote:
Not bad.

An additional option came to mind as well: add the difficulty (such as 18 ) to the con man's base difficulty or as a bonus to the discernment roll. Sometimes, the expert may not know the answer per se, but would know that something "isn't that simple" and might immediately raise questions that a BSer wouldn't know the answer to (let alone be able to anticipate).

In that case, we apply the result from the opposed roll to the Result table. A simple success means the Discerner knows something isn't quite right with the Deceiver. Maybe not what, exactly, but enough to be suspicious.
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Whill
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PostPosted: Mon Dec 16, 2019 12:15 am    Post subject: Discernment Reply with quote

Whill wrote:
Whill wrote:
I see there being many people whose ability to detect lies is LESS than their ability to lie. Having them be separate Perception skills allows for all possible combinations... But I'm thinking that a Sense Motive skill may have more uses than just detecting lies.

The above quote was from a 2014 thread. Below are select quotes from this 2016 thread.

Naaman wrote:
sense motive does indeed oppose the bluff skill and even allows characters to avoid an opponent's feint in combat.
Telsij wrote:
my group's name for this skill was "sense motive," borrowed from D20 -- a system which none of us cared for, though there were a tiny handful of elements (a skill or two here and there) that we did port over.

Our rationale too, also as has been somewhat discussed above, is that someone can obviously be a really good judge of character, and can accurately assess and "read" a given being, without necessarily being a good con man himself.

I have renamed the Con skill Deception because I wanted it to better reflect that it could include different types of deceptions in my game.

I also want to adopt Discernment as a skill that includes all of the mentioned effects from the above quotes. Successful use can discern if you are being deceived, and if you are being manipulated through persuasion, charm, and intimidation (if they are subtle). It may also be used to get a general read on people to determine if they are generally trustworthy or hiding something (obviously the more time spent interacting with the person can help to get a better read on them). And if the Discernment roll is high enough over the opposed roll or difficulty, then it could possibly discern the motive behind the deception or manipulation if not obvious. Maybe a high roll could even discern that the target character isn't acting of their own free will, such as in cases where they are under the effect of the Force, or being blackmailed or intimidated by someone else. Discernment is a better skill name than "Sense Motive" since Discernment is more general and it may or may not determine the motive behind the deception/manipulation.

A lot of you have expressed support for the logic that the ability to deceive can lend to a greater ability to detect it in others and I can see that too, but I still think it should be possible for someone to be better at lying than detecting it in others. So a proposed compromise that protects the RAW correlation but still allows for all possibilities is that the Con/Deception skill can detect deceit at -1D. So what we have in effect is that a character can attempt to detect lies with base Perception, the Discernment skill at normal value, or Con/Deception -1D, whichever is higher. So if a character wants to be good at deception and also detecting it, he could just improve his Con/Deception skill only and let the detection ability just ride along with the primary ability 1D behind. If he wants to be better at lie detection than deception, then he can raise his Discernment skill above the other. It's ok for the two skills to have some overlap. The Discernment skill is not a waste on its own because it has more uses than just detecting lies.

CRMcNeill wrote:
Discernment

Time Taken: One round or longer.

Specializations: Specific skill being resisted (Con, Persuasion, etc.)

Discernment is a measurement of a character's ability to see through attempts by others to deceive or manipulate them. A person with this skill may not be all that adept at conning or manipulating others, but is quite good at recognizing when someone tries it on him.

Difficulty: Discernment is rolled as a reaction skill to resist Con and Persuasion attempts (see description of Con / Persuasion), replacing the base Difficulty of those skills. Con and Persuasion still use their base Difficulty when rolling against NPCs; Discernment is intended for use by PCs and major NPCs. Discernment may also be used against Gambling and Intimidation, depending on the circumstances.

Results:
    Skill Roll Success # = Result

    0+ = Character has a feel for whether the opposing character is trustworthy or being duplicitous.

    5+ = Character can tell what skill is being used against him (Persuasion, Con, etc).

    10+ = Character can tell if the other does not appear to be acting of their own free will (blackmailed or intimidated, or compelled by a Force power)

    15+ = Character can discern the motive behind the attempt, such as what short-term goal the other is attempting to achieve.

    Note: A successful Discernment roll does not mean that the character using Discernment must automatically reject these attempts, merely that he recognizes what the other person is attempting to do. If the character chooses to "play along," he may re-roll Discernment at a later date in an effort to gather more information.

    Failure: On a failed roll, Discernment may not be re-rolled against the same Deception / Persuasion attempt. However, future re-rolls may be permitted at GM discretion if new information becomes available to the character being deceived / persuaded.

Modifiers: See Con and Persuasion.

In addition, a character may use Discernment on a social interaction between two other characters, but suffers a -1D penalty if he only has access to a portion of the interaction (i.e. too far away to hear what is being said, or listening only without being able to observe body language), or a -3D penalty if listening to another character who was party to the interaction describe it after the fact.

I thought I would bump this thread that had last been replied to last year. Does anyone have any updated or new insights about the Discernment skill?
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jmanski
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PostPosted: Tue Jan 14, 2020 11:46 pm    Post subject: Reply with quote

After playing a fair bit of d20 lately, I now see the use for discernment (insight) and have added it to my skill list. It was only used twice that I can remember, but the PCs really appreciated it.
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CRMcNeill
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PostPosted: Mon Jun 21, 2021 11:56 pm    Post subject: Reply with quote

Another thought for applying Discernment; use it to determine what other skills would be applicable in a given situation. As in, if the character is encountering an NPC, Discernment would be rolled to determine whether said character would be more susceptible to Con, Persuasion, Intimidation, bribery, etc.

EDIT: Going to add this to the skill description.
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Last edited by CRMcNeill on Tue Jun 22, 2021 2:24 pm; edited 1 time in total
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Whill
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PostPosted: Tue Jun 22, 2021 1:17 pm    Post subject: Reply with quote

Logical.
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CRMcNeill
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PostPosted: Mon Sep 06, 2021 1:39 am    Post subject: Reply with quote

EDIT: Went back and added this option to the write-up.
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pakman
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PostPosted: Tue Sep 07, 2021 8:29 pm    Post subject: Reply with quote

Wow....that amazing amount of stuff on this board.

Truly one of the great things about D6 is the amount of time folks have had to kick the tires and make some upgrades.

I like the stuff in here - especially the list on difficulties and results.

We added this to our game, as we too had similar skills from other games over the years. We eventually expanded it a bit, and called it Insight.
--------------------------------------------------------------
Insight - PER
DESC:
Allows a character to determine true intentions, such as when searching out a lie or predicting someone's next move. Doing so involves gleaning clues from body language, speech habits, and changes in mannerisms or incongruencies in appearance and action.

Can also be used in searching an area to determine likely uses or information about the occupants.

Specializations:
Specialization: (Crime Scene, Personal Exchanges, Written, Visual Recording )

--------------------------------------------------------------


I let jedi augment this with a sense roll....
(still working on that detail).


Note: I am in no way being critical of Discernment - I am applauding it and learning from what others have developed. I am merely sharing our independent take on the same topic - and how it is similar and yet different.

Oh, and we called it insight as most of the guys in my star wars game are also in my DND game. Smile



I love these forums....
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CRMcNeill
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PostPosted: Tue Sep 07, 2021 11:01 pm    Post subject: Reply with quote

pakman wrote:
Wow....that amazing amount of stuff on this board.

Truly one of the great things about D6 is the amount of time folks have had to kick the tires and make some upgrades.

Now if only we could find a way to get paid for it.

Quote:
I like the stuff in here - especially the list on difficulties and results.

We added this to our game, as we too had similar skills from other games over the years. We eventually expanded it a bit, and called it Insight.

Looks like we were thinking along similar lines. My only reservation is that, based on your write-up, there's an obvious degree of overlap from Insight into Search and Investigation.

I do like the idea of using Discernment to predict someone's next move (like a Social Tactics skill), though, although I'd want to ponder a while as to how that would work as a rule. Or it could simply be folded into the 15+ Success result, where the Discerning character determines what the other's short-term goal is.

Quote:
I let jedi augment this with a sense roll....
(still working on that detail).

A while back, I made a rule for Jedi v. Sith verbal combat as part of a larger Lightsaber Combat system. Taken on its face, the in-fight verbal sparring seems overly simplistic ("the Dark Side is stronger." "No u."), but I think there's a deeper, hidden undercurrent, where both are instinctively sensing truths and simply speaking them out loud. Basically, both sides would roll either Sense or Control (depending on who was attacking and defending in the verbal sparring) against 0 Difficulty to generate a bonus, which would then be added to Intimidation / Persuasion (on the attack) or Willpower on the defense, with the bonus equal to +1 per ever 4 points on the roll (or +1D for every 12).

Something similar might work here...


Quote:
Note: I am in no way being critical of Discernment - I am applauding it and learning from what others have developed. I am merely sharing our independent take on the same topic - and how it is similar and yet different.

Oh, and we called it insight as most of the guys in my star wars game are also in my DND game. Smile



I love these forums....

It's rather fun, isn't it?
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pakman
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PostPosted: Thu Sep 09, 2021 1:24 pm    Post subject: Reply with quote

CRMcNeill wrote:

Looks like we were thinking along similar lines. My only reservation is that, based on your write-up, there's an obvious degree of overlap from Insight into Search and Investigation.


After thinking about it a bit more - I feel that is indeed accurate.

I see search as the "you find holo tapes on healthy living, some expensive diet stims, locally produced trendy art and some discarding shells of some kind of avian food...".

I was thinking that investigation is more about the tangible pragmatic clues and their direct associations (more like sherlock holms on physical evidence).

"these types of eggs are very fresh - and only one market near the arts district that imports them from corellia..." kind of thing.

My idea for Insight was more like the psychological clues "the person who lived here seemed like they had rejection of mass produced culture and products, and their ego demanded they spend for it - there is an expensive corellian import market near by, we should go there next".

sooo..... or to put another way (or in dnd terms) I see investigation as more intelligence based, and insight as more wisdom based.

However - I do think I want to re-word it a bit for less overlap.

Hmmmm....

Oh yes, and it would be wonderful to be paid for it...

Smile
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CRMcNeill
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PostPosted: Thu Sep 09, 2021 2:33 pm    Post subject: Reply with quote

pakman wrote:
My idea for Insight was more like the psychological clues "the person who lived here seemed like they had rejection of mass produced culture and products, and their ego demanded they spend for it - there is an expensive corellian import market near by, we should go there next".

There's a sub-rule under Discernment where a character can make second- or third-hand Discernment rolls at higher Difficulty. I see that dovetailing here. Perhaps a high Search or Investigation roll could be used to generate a bonus to Discernment that off-sets the penalties from being unable to directly observe the character in question.

Quote:
sooo..... or to put another way (or in dnd terms) I see investigation as more intelligence based, and insight as more wisdom based.

I can see that, but unfortunately, WEG essentially chopped up Wisdom and split it between Knowledge and Perception. Oh well.
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