(Active) CHA
  Possessed By: Some Humans, Drow, Female Drow, Bards, Rogues, Warriors, Alienists, Assassins, Shadowdancers, Underdark Warriors, Trickery priests.
  Effects:  The Bluff skill has these uses:
 * Exploitation (Talking): Characters can use the Bluff skill to exploit others, convincing them that damage inflicted wasn't a hostile act and causing creatures who have become hostile as the result of being attacked or suffering damage to become neutral again. Thus, a character with high Bluff can convince summoned creatures to set off traps, use allies as cannon fodder, etc. and still manage to retain their loyalty. This can't be used to change the attitude of creatures who begin play hostile (use Diplomacy for that) -- it is only effective on creatures who began friendly or neutral and became hostile as a result of later events. The DC for this ability varies based on many different circumstances. Exploitation is an evil act -- unless it is used on an inherently evil creature.
   * Create Distraction (Active): The Bluff skill can be used to create a distraction, misleading creatures observing the skill user. If this use is successful, creatures watching the skill user are not counted as witnesses for the purposes of Hiding -- the character can draw the attention of others away from her and slip into the shadows even when surrounded by foes. If the character beats a given observer's distraction DC by 10 or more, that observer is so distracted that they are considered off-guard against the Bluff user's attacks for a full round, in addition to the normal effect.
   Every previous distraction attempt against the same creature increases the DC of future attempts by +2 if successful, or +5 if it fails. A character can elect to try and distract everyone watching her at the same time, but this increases the DC by +5. The base DC of a distraction attempt is 10 + the target's Will save modifier or Concentration skill rating, whichever is superior -- for multiple targets, the highest DC from the group determines if a distraction is successful.
   * Conceal Alignment (Active): Some creatures are hostile to other creatures based on alignment, and in some cases alignment affects other skill checks, usually giving penalties; furthermore, characters with radically different alignments than a party leader's count as higher effective CR when they join a party. In all these cases, the creatures are assumed to be familiar with the player's alignment based on her reputation and past actions -- however, a character with Bluff as a class skill is assumed to be covert enough in her behaviour and activities that other creatures will not easily be able to perceive her alignment. Such a character suffers alignment-based penalties or hostility only if the subject creature's Appraise skill exceeds her Bluff skill. If it does not, creatures perceive her as whatever alignment favours her most -- devils will perceive her as Lawful Evil, for example, and thus be non-hostile to her and eager to deal.
   * Trick Magic (Passive): A rogue's special ability to use class or race-specific magic is based on the sum of her Bluff and Use Magic scores.
   * Issue Requests (Talking): Characters that lack a strong rating in the Diplomacy skill can choose to use their Bluff skill in place of Diplomacy to Issue Requests. This works exactly as with Diplomacy, except that if the check fails, the target creature will become hostile as a result. Because of this added factor of danger, characters whose Bluff skill exceeds their Diplomacy skill will always be asked which they want to use when issuing a request -- they can then choose to use their lower Diplomacy score and have less chance of success, but not risk causing the creature to become hostile.
   Using Bluff to issue requests (i.e., trick people into doing things for you) is an unlawful act unless it is used on monstrous creatures that aren't well recognized as people by human society, and is an evil act if used on non-evil creatures.
   * Deceptive Diplomacy: In certain circumstances use of the Diplomacy skill is considered to be deceptive, and it thus requires the Bluff skill to support it. In these cases, the Diplomacy skill check suffers a -1 penalty for every point by which the target's Appraise skill exceeds the skill user's Bluff skill.
   * Taunt (Talking): The Bluff skill can be used to taunt other characters, causing them to run up and attack you in melee as if affected by the spell dire charm. This requires a successful skill check against a DC of 10 + twice the target's Will save bonus.

 Unimplemented Uses:
   * Exclusive Guilds (Passive): Certain guilds do not allow members of other guilds to join them, as a result of competitive practices or old enimities between them -- the Thieves and Assassins, Justicars and Templars, the different mercenary orders, etc. A very high (15+) Bluff skill can allow a character to circumvent most of these restrictions by leading a kind of double-life using alternate identities. There is no check involved here; all that is required is a certain level of Bluff on a case-by-case basis.
   * Evade Justice (Passive): When a player character angers the guard in a town or city through criminal activities, a Bluff check can be used to deny evidence and get off the hook. These checks start relatively easy, but every such check made increases the DC of all future checks for the same town or city by +2. This modifier is culmulative and never goes away.
   * Reputation Buffer (Passive): When a character performs actions that would normally permanently damage his reputation and leave him with penalties to social interactions (notably killing friendly creatures outside of a dungeon), the Bluff skill gives that character a kind of buffer, allowing him to wheedle his way out of otherwise incriminating and damaging situations. Enough psychopathic behaviour will still end up with the character being unable to take allies and being shunned by all but the most chaotic and evil, but a character with Bluff as a high-rated class skill has much more leeway in this regard than most characters do.