That's what Insight checks are for.
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@H1jAcK It's a literally a meme and a joke.
But sure, the PHB does say:
Insight. Your Wisdom (Insight) check decides whether
you can determine the true intentions of a creature, 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.
To me this still isn't the same as a lie detector, especially if they never met the character before. That twitch in the eye? Maybe they just got allergies.
Insight would help you determine if its allergies or lies. Yeah it's not a lie detector but if you roll a 25 it should be doing basically the same thing.
I'll never outright say if the NPC is lying, but yeah if the player rolls a 25, "something seems off about this guy."
@ReadyUser31 I mean, kind of, but the whole body language to identify liars thing is pretty much debunked by now.
What's a tell with someone might not be for someone else.
I much prefer my party squirm under "You're sure they're not being entirely truthful." over "Yeah, they're lying."
Also I thought perception is something the DM asks for, not the players. Players can roll Insight if they want. But perception is always DM controlled, I thought.
@YoFrodo That's the case for passive checks for sure, but I can't seem to find that in the PHB directly.
At my table everyone is free to suggest what skill they might try to use to accomplish something (unless I request something anyway) and I veto or agree, depending on how good their RP-reasoning is or how hare-brained the scheme is.
" I wanna scan the field for any movement..." is a player initiated perception roll. Not an uncommon thing at my table.