The Listen and Spot skills

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Does Listen cover merely how good someone's hearing is, or is it related to comprehension as well, connecting the tidbits, filtering useful information and all that? I suppose if you go around questioning people and make something out of what they say, it might be Gather Information. But what about noticing important info in what you overhear someone saying? What about Spot?

 

My guess would be that Listen and Spot is just that. You can hear or see something. A natural 20 on listen (wisdom) will allow you to hear someone talking. You would still need the intelligence to comprehend what he's talking about.

For filtering useful info, I'd use Gather Information, Sense Motive or just a wisdom check.

 

For lack of a better skill to roll, I would say, yes.

If it makes more sense to you, you can replace the Wisdom modifier with the Intelligence modifier with regard to this.

Gather Information doesn't apply to this, since in my mind it represents your ability to form connections, get people to tell you stuff, get recognized as good-old-whatshisface, etc.

 

I would rule that Listenning would be approptiate for eavedropping, but comprehending what you hear involves Knowledge or other relevent skills...

 

If the players want to know what someone is saying during a Listen check, ask what languages they speak. If the listening person doesn't know the language, roll an intelligence check.

 

Thanks Kuemper, I forgot about that. I'll have to remember that trick in my campaigns...