So apparently our group has been using the wrong skill check to determine whether or not someone is lying. It turns out that Cool is supposed to be used, and not Perception, which I find a bit strange.

Why Cool specifically? Why not Vigilance? Or Discipline? ... or why not simply Perception? Cool, to me, means that you are able to keep a level head or a steady composure. So how would keeping a level head be useful when the person who's lying to you is visibly nervous? The explanation in the CRB isn't really that helpful either.

It depends on how the liar is trying to manipulate the listener.

Are they trying to get them to think one thing when they believe otherwise? Deception/Charm vs. Discipline

Are they trying to cause the person to doubt themselves? Deception vs. Cool

Are they lying during a formal interview? Deception vs. Perception

A strength of the system is that you can do things in a variety of ways. A weakness is that its not always completely clear which is the most appropriate - trust your instincts .

I kind of wonder how I'd handle an interrogation scene. The RP is easy - I've seen a bajillion police procedurals (and yes, The Wire is the best show of all time) - but the mechanics usually fall flat or get in the way. It doesn't help here that there are a bunch of relevant skills that could help. I guess which is most relevant depends on who has the upper hand at the time.

The interrogator?

Charm vs. Cool or Deception vs. Discipline or Coercion vs. Discipline.

The subject?

Deception vs. Perception or Coercion vs. Discipline.

Who is in control? If the subject is smart (calls for legal counsel, knows the rules police have to abide by, isn't intimidated by being arrested or brought in for questioning), they do. If they're green or chemically impaired or scared, the interrogator does.

Who is in control? If the subject is smart (calls for legal counsel, knows the rules police have to abide by, isn't intimidated by being arrested or brought in for questioning), they do. If they're green or chemically impaired or scared, the interrogator does.

This isn't happening in America. There is no Bill of Rights in SPACE!

Imperial Intelligence won't be worried about protecting your constitutionally protected freedoms on whatever backwater hole of a planet you're on. You might play it Cool, but inside you know that your Discipline is about to be put to the test.

I kind of like the idea of social combat for this type of scene. However, I would also take the opportunity to create a Veritaserum and require PCs to give Resilence checks against it. It's a skill that hasn't gotten much work yet and I'm inclined to hit dump stats/skills.

Maybe have an initial check to resist it. A failure would make Deception and Discipline checks more difficult for the encounter while a Success might make Deception and Charm easier as the interrogator believes the PC is under the effects of the serum. I'm thinking at least a once upgraded Hard check (PPR). A Despair would act like a poison, have to recheck against it next turn.

Alternatively, this might be a chance to use a Fear check. Nobody is at ease when the ISB comes knocking.

This isn't happening in America. There is no Bill of Rights in SPACE!

Imperial Intelligence won't be worried about protecting your constitutionally protected freedoms on whatever backwater hole of a planet you're on. You might play it Cool, but inside you know that your Discipline is about to be put to the test.

I kind of like the idea of social combat for this type of scene. However, I would also take the opportunity to create a Veritaserum and require PCs to give Resilence checks against it. It's a skill that hasn't gotten much work yet and I'm inclined to hit dump stats/skills.

Yeah, if the ISB or Vader comes your rights go out of the window. If it's the local police I think you're on a more even footing.

Social Combat like Exalted? Like skill vs. skill, net successes = damage against Strain Threshold? When they go over threshold you've caused them to slip up (or, if using torture, broken them). That could work.

I hadn't even thought about truth drugs - and the interrogation droid from New Hope did have a syringe arm. Good catch.

I've got two ideas on how to handle an interrogation type scene, both nicked from GM Chris:

- Social Combat

- Skill Challenge

In a Social Combat type interrogation, you'd treat it as a combat and make Social Influence rolls to perform Strain damage. Whoever hits their threshold first 'loses' the interrogation.

The Interrogator makes an Opposed Coercion check vs Discipline. The successes are applied as Strain damage to the Subject.

The Subject might make an Opposed Cool vs Coercion check, to try to shrug it off and not give anything away. Again, the successes become Strain damage on the Interrogator.

And so on. Either side could try Deception, or Charm, or Negotiation, and you just continue until one side wins. You could make a "Critical Hit" chart for Social Combat, or you could have a Critical Hit have a significant effect, like one side gives away some important detail.

Skill Challenge

In a convention game run by GM Chris, the PCs have to convince a powerful NPC of some important facts. To do so he had us do a Skill Challenge-type mechanic. Using social influence skills, we had to get 3 successes before we got 4 failures (or something like that, I forget the exact numbers).

So you could play an Interrogation like that as well. Maybe the PC has to make several successive rolls based on whatever the Interrogator is doing, and if he gets X failures before Y successes, he gives away the secrets.

This isn't happening in America. There is no Bill of Rights in SPACE!

And I may make my next character a Human Politico, just to prove you wrong.

How? Prepare to meet William O'Wright, defender of the innocent (for a reasonable fee)!

When I read the title I thought this was a topic about this specific question. It seems to be a staple question in RPG's that has no real relation to reality. Don't get me wrong, I am not advocating having an RPG-vs-Reality discussion because RPG's are fun because they are not reality, but "Can I tell if he's telling the truth?" is one of the things I really hate when my players ask me. And boy, do they ask me.

For some reason they always seem to think they are some sort of PC lie detector that all have a 6th sense when it comes to truth telling. Everyone they meet it is like "I want to see if he is telling the truth."

I mean, how often do you look at people to see whether or not they are lying? What do you look for? What tell tale signs would a human being give off? Or a Wookieef? Or a droid?

How many times have you said "That's lie, obviously" just by looking at someone? I usually try to approach it from another side and ask them, "Are you questioning the plausability of the statement?" or "Do you want to use a knowledge check to see whether this is valid?"

That Detect Lie / Psychology / Body Language / Human Perception (to name a few variations) exist in RPGs I don't mind so much. Fiction is littered with scenes where the protagonist "knows" when someone is lying.

I'm not shackled to the skills, though. When I GM I have a "natural born liar" rule. I won't roll detect lie (or whatever) against the PCs when they lie unless the NPC has a reason to believe the PC is untrustworthy.

Similarly when I'm playing an NPC I'll lie as well as I think they're capable of and won't roll Deception unless the players ask me to (and then I'll do so, even if the NPC is telling the truth). I don't ever say who passed what by the most, just describe the results.

Fiction is littered with scenes where the protagonist "knows" when someone is lying.

Oh, sure. Just hardly ever do they know this by looking at them. They usually have either a working knowledge of the subject on hand and don't think the person is aware or they might have "a bad feeling" about someone.

The thing I am mostly trying to establish is that I don't like it when my players treat everyone they meet with an enormous distrust and immediately start with the age old, chewed up, spat out, chewed up again and swallowed over and over again "I check if he's telling the truth."

Just remember this: "All suspects are guilty--period! Otherwise, they wouldn't be suspects, would they?"

This isn't happening in America. There is no Bill of Rights in SPACE!

And I may make my next character a Human Politico, just to prove you wrong.

How? Prepare to meet William O'Wright, defender of the innocent (for a reasonable fee)!

'Welcome to the law offices of Bill O'Right! Have you been a victim of Imperial thuggery?! Cmon down to our lovely offices at the DoGoodus plaza on lovely Alderaan and we'll make it all O'Right!!.........Hey, what's that big round shadow in the sky??'......zap

'Welcome to the law offices of Bill O'Right! Have you been a victim of Imperial thuggery?! Cmon down to our lovely offices at the DoGoodus plaza on lovely Alderaan and we'll make it all O'Right!!.........Hey, what's that big round shadow in the sky??'......zap

"Bill O'Right is getting too close to the truth."

"There's only one weapon powerful enough to silence him."

"The Force?"

"Don't be absurd!..."

--Darth Vader and Grand Moff Tarkin

I'd have to add my agreement to the notion of there is no one correct skill to be using in questioning/interrogating. It's going to depend on many factors to decide the proper skill and I would never just pick one as correct for all interrogating. Same goes for resisting interrogation, it will depend on the form of questioning.

Interrogating could be medical skill if you are using physical torture. It might be a knowledge skill if you are using superior and already known facts to establish a baseline of how honest your interrogee is. Perception seems perfectly fine to me if you are gauging subtle nuances of body language and such during an interview. Resisting might mean you maintain your Cool. It might be Resilience to drugs or physical torture. It could be Discipline as well and just not saying anything.

This isn't happening in America. There is no Bill of Rights in SPACE!

Imperial Intelligence won't be worried about protecting your constitutionally protected freedoms on whatever backwater hole of a planet you're on. You might play it Cool, but inside you know that your Discipline is about to be put to the test.

I kind of like the idea of social combat for this type of scene. However, I would also take the opportunity to create a Veritaserum and require PCs to give Resilence checks against it. It's a skill that hasn't gotten much work yet and I'm inclined to hit dump stats/skills.

Yeah, if the ISB or Vader comes your rights go out of the window. If it's the local police I think you're on a more even footing.

Social Combat like Exalted? Like skill vs. skill, net successes = damage against Strain Threshold? When they go over threshold you've caused them to slip up (or, if using torture, broken them). That could work.

I hadn't even thought about truth drugs - and the interrogation droid from New Hope did have a syringe arm. Good catch.

Progressions gave a pretty good description of what I had in mind. I'd say that the entire social skill section is wide open in this scene. Even some Knowledge skills could get some play. What I'd aim to do is make a scene that works very much like standard combat, but without Brawl, Melee, or Ranged skills ever coming into play. If a PC wants to try Charm, it's great. If he wants to try Education or Warfare to recognize a common interrogation technique, that's great too. Basically I wouldn't limit it to Disciple/Coercion/Deception/Perception.

The idea of a truth serum exists a few places around the EU and if I recall, there is a drug in CRB that acts as a weak truth drug.

We have PCs in our campaign planning to sell relics to an underworld fence, and I plan to run the negotiation in a similar way.

Not necessarily as a Social Combat, but to allow them to engage in conversation and use the various social skills (plus whatever else they might like to use--Knowledge, Cool, etc) to influence the negotiation.

Kinda like when you collect information on the Geonosian in Long Arm of the Hutt.

I suspect Cool was chosen to reflect the target being able to keep their wits and not get swept up in the deceiver's tale, thus enabling them to clue in that something doesn't quite add up in the story they're being told. It's more of a passive defense; think of it as being akin to resisting a sales pitch from a sales person, particularly a less-than-trustworthy source like the stereotypical used car salesman, who'll gladly sell you a lemon all while making it sound like a great deal. It's also passive in that the GM is the one making the skill check, though the dice are generally weighted towards favoring the person that's actively rolling.

If the player wanted to have their character actively see if they can "spot the thread" that unravels a lie, I'd say a Perception check opposed by the other person's Deception skill would be applicable. If anything, it might work better for the players; this way if they fail they can't complain that they never got a chance to begin with.

Or, as the GM you could instead let the player choose whether they resist with Cool or Perception when an NPC tries to use Deception on them, but the same goes for NPCs too. And with Perception being a skill more likely to have ranks in it for both PCs and NPCs, that's going to make things tougher for anyone that relies on Deception.

Are they trying to get them to think one thing when they believe otherwise? Deception/Charm vs. Discipline

Are they trying to cause the person to doubt themselves? Deception vs. Cool

I really do not seen enough of a distinction between these examples to not make them both resisted with Discipline (barring creative player argument for something like Perception or whatnot).

I largely agree with what others are saying. If you want to break it down into a full-length interrogation, break it down into a social encounter and use strain as your mechanic.

It's interesting to note that, since a skill check is required in order to lie convincingly, you can sort of tell whether an NPC is lying by whether or not the GM is making that NPC roll a skill check.

It's interesting to note that, since a skill check is required in order to lie convincingly, you can sort of tell whether an NPC is lying by whether or not the GM is making that NPC roll a skill check.

Or you could let the PC's roll their Vigilance with a difficulty equal to the NPC's Deception. That way, you don't give away that the NPC is lying? I would let the NPC lie his behind off without making any checks. It's up to the players to ask if they can tell if he's lying.

There's some great comments here. I think using different skills depending the situation is much more logical than only using Cool. I wasn't really talking about a lenghty interrogation, but you guys have given me some ideas.

The situation I had in my mind, which happened during our previous session, was as followed:

My players had just rescued someone who was being interrogated for the information he had. The players wanted to know if he had told his captors anything, to which he replied he hadn't. My players wanted to roll to see if he was telling the truth, so I let them roll an easy Perception check. But the CRB mentions that Cool is used to determine whether or not someone is lying, not Perception. So it seemed weird to me that my players would have to see how 'cool' they could be when asking a simply question such as "Did you tell anyone anything?". So 'not being swept up in the deceiver's tale' isn't really applicable here, but I can understand the sentiment of using Cool for that (but unless you're emotionally involved, I can't really see anyone losing their cool when asking questions).

The descriptions of when skills could be use - especially in this game - are not hard and fast. If a certain skill is better suited for a given situation than the one suggested in the book, by the force use the one that is better suited. Reading through the book, I have found that modules and adventures will suggest some skills for a situation that may not be out the core rule book described those skills.

In previous games I have played, I could lean on codified rules to guide me through situations, but I find in this game it is really forcing me to be fluid and flexible with my arbitration, rather than leaning on RAW.

I've never been a big fan of using Perception to detect lies at least not as a tool to get correct answers with. Perception can have you notice something is off but it only provides raw data and can't analyse it for you, for that you need another skill. So in EotE I will allow a PC to make a Perception roll to see if they are lying but the best answer they could get from a Success is "you notice something off". At this point they can then choose their route to answer the question of the potential lie. They can use an Intellect based skill like a related Knowledge skill to see if they notice a fact being wrong, a Cunning based skill like Streetwise to see if they notice a familiar scam, a Presence skill like Negotiation to see if they're giving up too much for nothing...

The point is that unlike systems that are basically binary in their results (he's lying or he's not!) here you have an opportunity to play it like we actual do catch people trying to lie to us. More importantly you can have FUN playing this. A lot of games you just want to get past this part, "Is the guy lying!?" "Yes." "I kill him!", with EotE you now have a system in place that potentially gives you multiple levels of results that can form the basis of really cool interactions. I say use it.

It's interesting to note that, since a skill check is required in order to lie convincingly, you can sort of tell whether an NPC is lying by whether or not the GM is making that NPC roll a skill check.

Sadly that's an issue that's endemic of RPGs in general.

Most players get very nervous when the GM rolls dice, or asks the players what a certain trait on their character sheet is.

I don't think it's always required for the GM to make a roll for an NPC lying, nor do I think it's a good idea to. I think that unless it's absolutely necessary that rolls be on the PC side. First it's actually advantageous for Players to roll (slightly better odds) and it also doesn't force Players to try not metagame in situations like this.