Identify Ritual - Downloaded from the Wizards Community, all coding removed by Solauren

Identify Ritual

Post/Author/DateTime Post
#1
siliconwolf
Feb 24, 2009 17:00:55 My group is running 4e with varying levels of reactions to the system. In talking to them after a game one minor thing that was brought up was the way in which magic items were identified so easily and automatically in 4e. So I thought I might try my hand at creating a ritual based on the old Identify, and offer it as a possible house rule.

In creating the ritual I was thinking about the 4e philosophy that things should be meaningful at all levels. So thinking about identify in 3.5, the spell is kind of an hurdle at first, but quickly at higher levels it is a minor thing especially if you are in a game where you can buy or make a wand of it. So I very much wanted to tie the level of item to the cost, so that at any level the cost should have some meaning. I liked the idea that this could be something of a money sink, but also because residuum can be used the idea of draining old items to identify new items appealed as well. Unlike the 3.5 Identify that gave everything I used the 4e idea of levels of success so that one might get only some of the information on a particular item at a single casting.

So here is what I came up with, and I thought I would share if anyone is interested.

Identify

Focusing on a magic item, you explore the strands of enchantment and discover its purpose and function.

Level: 1
Category: Divination
Time: 1 Hour
Duration: Instantaneous
Component Cost: 10 gp + Special
Market Price: 50 gp
Key Skill: Arcana

This ritual is cast upon a single magic item. After five minutes you gain insight into the complexity of the enchantments on the item and learn the level of the item. The level of the item dictates the amount of components you will need. You can end the ritual at this point if you cannot or do not wish to pay the cost, but you do use up the base 10 gp in components. If casting from a scroll the scroll is not used up, but the components are.

The component cost for completing the ritual is 10% of the basic cost for an item of that level. If for some reason you do not have enough components at the end of the ritual then it fails, any components you did provide are lost, and if casting from a scroll it is used up.

If used on an artifact, this ritual will identify the item as an artifact in the first five minutes but cannot otherwise determine anything about an artifact. You can end the ritual at that point as normal, and any attempt to do the full ritual simply fails and uses up any components provided and the scroll if cast from one.

Your Arcana check determines the types of enchantments on an item you can identify. The level of the item impacts the DC of the check. Each level includes the lower levels of success as well.

Check Result: Effect
Less then item lvl/2 + 15: You only learn the level, but you gain +2 to future attempts.
Item lvl/2 + 15: Learn all Enhancements and Criticals.
Item lvl/2 + 20: Learn all Properties of the item.
Item lvl/2 + 25 or higher: Learn all Powers of the item.
#2
tylara67
Feb 24, 2009 19:02:21 So, basically, you want it to cost players money to use stuff they find? Why not just give them nothing but money and let them buy what they want?
#3
Neutronium_Dragon
Feb 24, 2009 19:12:27 Not only is this an unnecessary money sink (the system doesn't need one and is balanced on the assumption that there isn't one - especially of this magnitude), but you'd better hope that no adventure relies on the use of a critical plot item because there are good odds that the players won't have identified it and thus won't be able to use it when the time comes.

Apart from that, it's a headache. If they don't know what the properties are then you, the DM, need to modify (and remember to modify) every single action they take that the item might factor into - if they use it at all. There's a good chance they don't until it's identified, so a reward that they're expected to be making use of won't be, leaving the party effectively undergeared.
#4
matthewswift
Feb 24, 2009 19:25:15 Normally I'm all for the progressive nature of four oh. In this instance I tend to miss the whole "What's this item do" game. It was satisfying to ping a cursed sword before it cursed the fighter.

At the same time I gotta say a straightforward ritual doesn't do the system justice for me. At level one what caster wont want the ritual?

What about a mechanic based on the Arcana skill? Casters already deal with magic on a regular basis and the untrained "what's this button do?" comes back for that classic adventuring feel.

The level of the magic item determines the difficulty and all you have to do is look up (or flub) the difficulty.
#5
eldiran
Feb 24, 2009 19:43:28 Aye, a better mechanic would simply to be to require an Arcana check of a sufficient DC result to identify the item. (Perhaps allowing retries every day, or encounter, or every time new information is brought to light.)

If you absolutely must have a ritual, I think you would be better served by a flat cost of 10 gp and a time of 10 minutes. That way, there is a time cost to identifying an item (you won't stop and go over all your loot while in a dangerous situation) but it doesn't break the system or cause agonizing tedium for the players.
#6
johnthedm7000
Feb 24, 2009 22:26:32 I agree that the best way to handle this, if you want there to be a bit more of a hurdle to PCs finding out what their items do is to have a PC examining the item make and arcana check against an easy, medium or hard DC (based on how common that sort of enchanted item is in your campaign). This check should probably take around 5 minutes, representing experimentation with the item or in the case of spellcasters syncing up their magical fields. If they succeed, they know all of the properties of the item, if they fail then they're in the dark but can try again after an extended rest.
#7
bartleby42
Feb 24, 2009 23:57:57 Can I ask why you want to make it harder to identify items?

Because I can't come up with a reason to do that other than to gimp the players.
#8
Titanium_Dragon
Feb 25, 2009 0:01:31
Can I ask why you want to make it harder to identify items?

Because I can't come up with a reason to do that other than to gimp the players.

This. Identifying items is, usually, busywork. 9 times out of 10, if not 99 out of 100, its not a big deal. It seldom creates tension, and usually creates boredom/annoyance, not to mention people forgetting magic items (both players and DMs... nothing like asking "what does this pair of boots do?" and the DM not knowing).
#9
pizzini3000
Feb 25, 2009 5:06:21
This. Identifying items is, usually, busywork. 9 times out of 10, if not 99 out of 100, its not a big deal. It seldom creates tension, and usually creates boredom/annoyance, not to mention people forgetting magic items (both players and DMs... nothing like asking "what does this pair of boots do?" and the DM not knowing).

LOL. So many times, we'd have a party with no arcanist. After a few sessions, we'd bring our magic items into town only to discover the DM forgot what the magic items we got did.
#10
Thought
Feb 25, 2009 8:47:29 Making it difficult to ID a magic item is good... in a low magic campaign. Standard DnD settings aren't low magic, however.

If the party is only likely to come across five or six magic items each tier of play, then identifying the powers of a magic item can become an important and thrilling quest in itself.

But if the part is coming across five or six magic items ever level or two of play, its boring and needless.

And as others have pointed out, the ritual doesn't quite seem to work like you want it to. Too money intensive.

In a low magic campaign, each magic item might be legendary in its own right and thus one has to find someone in the know in order to realize its magical porperties (Bilbo never knew that the Ring he found was the One Ring, and even Gandalf who examined it had to dig deep into ancient lore to find it out).

But in a regular campaign, if you want to add "grit," simple take the DCs you already worked out and apply that to the Arcana skill. A DC of X for the item reveals its enchantment bonus, whereas a DC of X+10 reveals its powers, etc. And so on. That way a wizard might determine the immediate effects of a magic weapon or armor easily (thus reducing the secret bookkeeping a GM would need to do) but it also can still give players something to ponder over.
#11
siliconwolf
Feb 25, 2009 9:56:45 Well I don’t want to get too much into a discussion about the philosophy of 4e in the way of its simplification and abstraction. But basically for my players they happen to find that too much in a simplified direction causes the game to lose some of the verisimilitude and some of the feeling that you are experiencing the lives of the characters. I have players that really like the downtime/busy work/bookkeeping aspects of the game. Yes its true. They are also not fans of the lack of facing.

Not to be too glib, but this ritual is ritual for the same reason there was an identify spell, as the use of a spell to understand enchantments was something my players have found they prefer. Auto identification, even just using a check, just didn’t mesh well with their sense of magical enchantment. However I do appreciate the replies that have other options. As for why my players like this way, maybe its simply because they are used to the old methods. But they have been using the new for a while and find some aspects for simplicity or to facilitate “play” actually don’t do so for them.

This ritual would not be for everyone, or for every game. It is not an "improvement" for 4e or a fix for something that is inherently wrong. If you are going to have critical magic items that require the players to know what it does right now, then perhaps this is not for you. Having that kind of magical item is not something I tend to do unless I have some other in game way of them knowing what something is. If it seems like a lot of bookkeeping and you don’t want it, no problem. I have not found keeping track of such things to be much of a headache, but that is me. I happen to like to find ways of keeping track of things, so I have made cards, markers, special little reminders, putting what a magic item is in an envelope to give to the player and when they identify they can open the envelop that way they have to keep track of it, and so forth. If your party is running without an arcanist, so be it. Some depends on the choice of how easy it is to get magic items, how rare magic items are, if you like the D&D economy as it is written, etc. All this really is personal choice and so you might like things as written, or you might want to recapture some of the methods and mechanics of 3.5 that were written out.

Overall I like many aspects of 4e and its basic rules framework. This happens to be one area where I could offer something to my players that put back something they felt was lost and do it in a slightly new way in the new system, that for my game, is not disruptive. So I offer it as a house rule for those that might find it useful. I also like to read other approaches that might spark some inspiration, or that I might consider for other games or groups. I also wanted to say thanks for the feedback. One place that I agree may need more thought is the monetary cost as it was a concern and an area I was not completely sure about and will take more of a look at.
#12
Thought
Feb 25, 2009 10:56:10
But basically for my players they happen to find that too much in a simplified direction causes the game to lose some of the verisimilitude and some of the feeling that you are experiencing the lives of the characters. I have players that really like the downtime/busy work/bookkeeping aspects of the game.

The fact that you are trying to conform the game to your players wants and desires means you're a good DM; I certainly commend you for that. Unfortunately, it looks like most of us totally missed that this is something the players want.

So really, the question isn't what people think about the ritual but if that ritual will best produce the "feel" that your players want without requiring unnecessary changes to the rest of the game.

One of the things I recall about earlier editions and magic items (and is part of the "feel" I think your players might be missing, from the sound of it) is trying to figure out a magic item's powers without identifying it. If that sounds right to you, then you might want to also give some thought to how to reveal magic powers outside of the ritual. Unfortunately, there are less passive powers around so it is harder to test these things out.

Perhaps a combination of your ritual and skills might produce a happy medium that will please your players. The ritual is an assured way of figuring out what a magic item does, but basic skill checks might give the players clues to figure out on their own. An arcana check might reveal that the item has either "complex" enchantments or "simple" ones (the difference being if it is a +1 longsword or a +1 flaming longsword, for example), or possibly a glimpse of the sphere of magic it entails. A dungeoneering check might reveal that this item appears to be of Monster X make and Monster X's tend to favor a limited range of enchantments (not that this item is one of those enchantments, but that it there is a good chance it does). A history check might reveal that this appears to be an item used by a famous Fighter (while the item type might naturally indicate who should have it, one might suppose a Fighter would wear boots of a different enchantment than a Rogue, for example). I could even imagine a few instances where a religion or nature check could be of help too.

None of this is to replace the ritual, mind you, but just to give your players more ways of figuring out the magic behind the item (especially when the materials for the ritual aren't handy). Of course, you could also require that certain magic items require certain additional skill checks for the ritual.

For the ritual cost, perhaps a subsequent skill check could counteract the cost (essentially indicating that a skilled wizard can identify the item more easily). Exceeding a DC by 5 might reduce the cost by 25%, exceeding it by 10 might reduce it by 50%, and so on.
#13
bartleby42
Feb 26, 2009 0:29:08 On verisimilitude:
Odds are you have already house ruled certain items into being easily recognized. I of course speak of healing potions. Every game I have ever played in has made it so PCs somehow instinctively knew what a healing potion looked like. This is done to help ease the game along, it makes sense that the PCs, who deal with healing potions fairly frequently, would be able to identify other healing potions without too much work. This is completely reasonable.

The "short rest to identify" rule is the logical extension of the healing potion principal. If you think of/roleplay the identification as staring at an item until you know exactly what it is, sure that ruins verisimilitude, but if you think of/roleplay it as someone who is familiar with weapons/armor in an intimate way (as in I would have died 10 times this week without this stuff) testing out the balance of items that seem to be of higher quality suddenly it's a whole lot more believable.

Identify always struck me as being unrealistic. How could a fighter not know, in at least a vague sense, if a +2 sword was better or worse than a +1 sword? How could anyone not be able to tell that the weapon they are using causes fire damage? Or that you go faster while wearing these boots? In 3.X it got really wacky, by 10th level the concept of magic items was in no way new or exciting, seeing as everyone was wearing enough to cause low level mages casting detect magic sunburn, yet realizing that some gloves were Str +2 could only be done if you had a pearl.

Try just explaining/having the PCs explain how they determine the items powers, that might settle the issue without adding a money sink.
#14
trailfoot
Feb 26, 2009 13:57:22 Roleplay through the "short rest to identify" scene on occasion... let them wave their newfound magic wand around and try to use it.

Further, you could have "blind activation" of an item power not cost an item daily use from the character. Thus, if they don't know what a given item does and they say "Well... I use it anyway," there's actually a mechanical benefit to trying to do so, albeit a small one compared to the risk that the holy symbol will let the enemy solo spend a healing surge instead of blowing it up with radiant damage.

Those are, IMO, the best approaches to this problem. Further, the second feeds into the first... they can try blind-activating items during the short rest, and the only costs are the item's own expendable power (rather than the PC's item daily use) and having to deal with the effects of the item's power.

Post/Author/DateTime	Post
#1 siliconwolf Feb 24, 2009 17:00:55	My group is running 4e with varying levels of reactions to the system. In talking to them after a game one minor thing that was brought up was the way in which magic items were identified so easily and automatically in 4e. So I thought I might try my hand at creating a ritual based on the old Identify, and offer it as a possible house rule. In creating the ritual I was thinking about the 4e philosophy that things should be meaningful at all levels. So thinking about identify in 3.5, the spell is kind of an hurdle at first, but quickly at higher levels it is a minor thing especially if you are in a game where you can buy or make a wand of it. So I very much wanted to tie the level of item to the cost, so that at any level the cost should have some meaning. I liked the idea that this could be something of a money sink, but also because residuum can be used the idea of draining old items to identify new items appealed as well. Unlike the 3.5 Identify that gave everything I used the 4e idea of levels of success so that one might get only some of the information on a particular item at a single casting. So here is what I came up with, and I thought I would share if anyone is interested. Identify Focusing on a magic item, you explore the strands of enchantment and discover its purpose and function. Level: 1 Category: Divination Time: 1 Hour Duration: Instantaneous Component Cost: 10 gp + Special Market Price: 50 gp Key Skill: Arcana This ritual is cast upon a single magic item. After five minutes you gain insight into the complexity of the enchantments on the item and learn the level of the item. The level of the item dictates the amount of components you will need. You can end the ritual at this point if you cannot or do not wish to pay the cost, but you do use up the base 10 gp in components. If casting from a scroll the scroll is not used up, but the components are. The component cost for completing the ritual is 10% of the basic cost for an item of that level. If for some reason you do not have enough components at the end of the ritual then it fails, any components you did provide are lost, and if casting from a scroll it is used up. If used on an artifact, this ritual will identify the item as an artifact in the first five minutes but cannot otherwise determine anything about an artifact. You can end the ritual at that point as normal, and any attempt to do the full ritual simply fails and uses up any components provided and the scroll if cast from one. Your Arcana check determines the types of enchantments on an item you can identify. The level of the item impacts the DC of the check. Each level includes the lower levels of success as well. Check Result: Effect Less then item lvl/2 + 15: You only learn the level, but you gain +2 to future attempts. Item lvl/2 + 15: Learn all Enhancements and Criticals. Item lvl/2 + 20: Learn all Properties of the item. Item lvl/2 + 25 or higher: Learn all Powers of the item.
#2 tylara67 Feb 24, 2009 19:02:21	So, basically, you want it to cost players money to use stuff they find? Why not just give them nothing but money and let them buy what they want?
#3 Neutronium_Dragon Feb 24, 2009 19:12:27	Not only is this an unnecessary money sink (the system doesn't need one and is balanced on the assumption that there isn't one - especially of this magnitude), but you'd better hope that no adventure relies on the use of a critical plot item because there are good odds that the players won't have identified it and thus won't be able to use it when the time comes. Apart from that, it's a headache. If they don't know what the properties are then you, the DM, need to modify (and remember to modify) every single action they take that the item might factor into - if they use it at all. There's a good chance they don't until it's identified, so a reward that they're expected to be making use of won't be, leaving the party effectively undergeared.
#4 matthewswift Feb 24, 2009 19:25:15	Normally I'm all for the progressive nature of four oh. In this instance I tend to miss the whole "What's this item do" game. It was satisfying to ping a cursed sword before it cursed the fighter. At the same time I gotta say a straightforward ritual doesn't do the system justice for me. At level one what caster wont want the ritual? What about a mechanic based on the Arcana skill? Casters already deal with magic on a regular basis and the untrained "what's this button do?" comes back for that classic adventuring feel. The level of the magic item determines the difficulty and all you have to do is look up (or flub) the difficulty.
#5 eldiran Feb 24, 2009 19:43:28	Aye, a better mechanic would simply to be to require an Arcana check of a sufficient DC result to identify the item. (Perhaps allowing retries every day, or encounter, or every time new information is brought to light.) If you absolutely must have a ritual, I think you would be better served by a flat cost of 10 gp and a time of 10 minutes. That way, there is a time cost to identifying an item (you won't stop and go over all your loot while in a dangerous situation) but it doesn't break the system or cause agonizing tedium for the players.
#6 johnthedm7000 Feb 24, 2009 22:26:32	I agree that the best way to handle this, if you want there to be a bit more of a hurdle to PCs finding out what their items do is to have a PC examining the item make and arcana check against an easy, medium or hard DC (based on how common that sort of enchanted item is in your campaign). This check should probably take around 5 minutes, representing experimentation with the item or in the case of spellcasters syncing up their magical fields. If they succeed, they know all of the properties of the item, if they fail then they're in the dark but can try again after an extended rest.
#7 bartleby42 Feb 24, 2009 23:57:57	Can I ask why you want to make it harder to identify items? Because I can't come up with a reason to do that other than to gimp the players.
#8 Titanium_Dragon Feb 25, 2009 0:01:31	Can I ask why you want to make it harder to identify items? Because I can't come up with a reason to do that other than to gimp the players. This. Identifying items is, usually, busywork. 9 times out of 10, if not 99 out of 100, its not a big deal. It seldom creates tension, and usually creates boredom/annoyance, not to mention people forgetting magic items (both players and DMs... nothing like asking "what does this pair of boots do?" and the DM not knowing).
#9 pizzini3000 Feb 25, 2009 5:06:21	This. Identifying items is, usually, busywork. 9 times out of 10, if not 99 out of 100, its not a big deal. It seldom creates tension, and usually creates boredom/annoyance, not to mention people forgetting magic items (both players and DMs... nothing like asking "what does this pair of boots do?" and the DM not knowing). LOL. So many times, we'd have a party with no arcanist. After a few sessions, we'd bring our magic items into town only to discover the DM forgot what the magic items we got did.
#10 Thought Feb 25, 2009 8:47:29	Making it difficult to ID a magic item is good... in a low magic campaign. Standard DnD settings aren't low magic, however. If the party is only likely to come across five or six magic items each tier of play, then identifying the powers of a magic item can become an important and thrilling quest in itself. But if the part is coming across five or six magic items ever level or two of play, its boring and needless. And as others have pointed out, the ritual doesn't quite seem to work like you want it to. Too money intensive. In a low magic campaign, each magic item might be legendary in its own right and thus one has to find someone in the know in order to realize its magical porperties (Bilbo never knew that the Ring he found was the One Ring, and even Gandalf who examined it had to dig deep into ancient lore to find it out). But in a regular campaign, if you want to add "grit," simple take the DCs you already worked out and apply that to the Arcana skill. A DC of X for the item reveals its enchantment bonus, whereas a DC of X+10 reveals its powers, etc. And so on. That way a wizard might determine the immediate effects of a magic weapon or armor easily (thus reducing the secret bookkeeping a GM would need to do) but it also can still give players something to ponder over.
#11 siliconwolf Feb 25, 2009 9:56:45	Well I don’t want to get too much into a discussion about the philosophy of 4e in the way of its simplification and abstraction. But basically for my players they happen to find that too much in a simplified direction causes the game to lose some of the verisimilitude and some of the feeling that you are experiencing the lives of the characters. I have players that really like the downtime/busy work/bookkeeping aspects of the game. Yes its true. They are also not fans of the lack of facing. Not to be too glib, but this ritual is ritual for the same reason there was an identify spell, as the use of a spell to understand enchantments was something my players have found they prefer. Auto identification, even just using a check, just didn’t mesh well with their sense of magical enchantment. However I do appreciate the replies that have other options. As for why my players like this way, maybe its simply because they are used to the old methods. But they have been using the new for a while and find some aspects for simplicity or to facilitate “play” actually don’t do so for them. This ritual would not be for everyone, or for every game. It is not an "improvement" for 4e or a fix for something that is inherently wrong. If you are going to have critical magic items that require the players to know what it does right now, then perhaps this is not for you. Having that kind of magical item is not something I tend to do unless I have some other in game way of them knowing what something is. If it seems like a lot of bookkeeping and you don’t want it, no problem. I have not found keeping track of such things to be much of a headache, but that is me. I happen to like to find ways of keeping track of things, so I have made cards, markers, special little reminders, putting what a magic item is in an envelope to give to the player and when they identify they can open the envelop that way they have to keep track of it, and so forth. If your party is running without an arcanist, so be it. Some depends on the choice of how easy it is to get magic items, how rare magic items are, if you like the D&D economy as it is written, etc. All this really is personal choice and so you might like things as written, or you might want to recapture some of the methods and mechanics of 3.5 that were written out. Overall I like many aspects of 4e and its basic rules framework. This happens to be one area where I could offer something to my players that put back something they felt was lost and do it in a slightly new way in the new system, that for my game, is not disruptive. So I offer it as a house rule for those that might find it useful. I also like to read other approaches that might spark some inspiration, or that I might consider for other games or groups. I also wanted to say thanks for the feedback. One place that I agree may need more thought is the monetary cost as it was a concern and an area I was not completely sure about and will take more of a look at.
#12 Thought Feb 25, 2009 10:56:10	But basically for my players they happen to find that too much in a simplified direction causes the game to lose some of the verisimilitude and some of the feeling that you are experiencing the lives of the characters. I have players that really like the downtime/busy work/bookkeeping aspects of the game. The fact that you are trying to conform the game to your players wants and desires means you're a good DM; I certainly commend you for that. Unfortunately, it looks like most of us totally missed that this is something the players want. So really, the question isn't what people think about the ritual but if that ritual will best produce the "feel" that your players want without requiring unnecessary changes to the rest of the game. One of the things I recall about earlier editions and magic items (and is part of the "feel" I think your players might be missing, from the sound of it) is trying to figure out a magic item's powers without identifying it. If that sounds right to you, then you might want to also give some thought to how to reveal magic powers outside of the ritual. Unfortunately, there are less passive powers around so it is harder to test these things out. Perhaps a combination of your ritual and skills might produce a happy medium that will please your players. The ritual is an assured way of figuring out what a magic item does, but basic skill checks might give the players clues to figure out on their own. An arcana check might reveal that the item has either "complex" enchantments or "simple" ones (the difference being if it is a +1 longsword or a +1 flaming longsword, for example), or possibly a glimpse of the sphere of magic it entails. A dungeoneering check might reveal that this item appears to be of Monster X make and Monster X's tend to favor a limited range of enchantments (not that this item is one of those enchantments, but that it there is a good chance it does). A history check might reveal that this appears to be an item used by a famous Fighter (while the item type might naturally indicate who should have it, one might suppose a Fighter would wear boots of a different enchantment than a Rogue, for example). I could even imagine a few instances where a religion or nature check could be of help too. None of this is to replace the ritual, mind you, but just to give your players more ways of figuring out the magic behind the item (especially when the materials for the ritual aren't handy). Of course, you could also require that certain magic items require certain additional skill checks for the ritual. For the ritual cost, perhaps a subsequent skill check could counteract the cost (essentially indicating that a skilled wizard can identify the item more easily). Exceeding a DC by 5 might reduce the cost by 25%, exceeding it by 10 might reduce it by 50%, and so on.
#13 bartleby42 Feb 26, 2009 0:29:08	On verisimilitude: Odds are you have already house ruled certain items into being easily recognized. I of course speak of healing potions. Every game I have ever played in has made it so PCs somehow instinctively knew what a healing potion looked like. This is done to help ease the game along, it makes sense that the PCs, who deal with healing potions fairly frequently, would be able to identify other healing potions without too much work. This is completely reasonable. The "short rest to identify" rule is the logical extension of the healing potion principal. If you think of/roleplay the identification as staring at an item until you know exactly what it is, sure that ruins verisimilitude, but if you think of/roleplay it as someone who is familiar with weapons/armor in an intimate way (as in I would have died 10 times this week without this stuff) testing out the balance of items that seem to be of higher quality suddenly it's a whole lot more believable. Identify always struck me as being unrealistic. How could a fighter not know, in at least a vague sense, if a +2 sword was better or worse than a +1 sword? How could anyone not be able to tell that the weapon they are using causes fire damage? Or that you go faster while wearing these boots? In 3.X it got really wacky, by 10th level the concept of magic items was in no way new or exciting, seeing as everyone was wearing enough to cause low level mages casting detect magic sunburn, yet realizing that some gloves were Str +2 could only be done if you had a pearl. Try just explaining/having the PCs explain how they determine the items powers, that might settle the issue without adding a money sink.
#14 trailfoot Feb 26, 2009 13:57:22	Roleplay through the "short rest to identify" scene on occasion... let them wave their newfound magic wand around and try to use it. Further, you could have "blind activation" of an item power not cost an item daily use from the character. Thus, if they don't know what a given item does and they say "Well... I use it anyway," there's actually a mechanical benefit to trying to do so, albeit a small one compared to the risk that the holy symbol will let the enemy solo spend a healing surge instead of blowing it up with radiant damage. Those are, IMO, the best approaches to this problem. Further, the second feeds into the first... they can try blind-activating items during the short rest, and the only costs are the item's own expendable power (rather than the PC's item daily use) and having to deal with the effects of the item's power.