Thinking of implementing this regarding ID of magic items. Thoughts?

Thinking of implementing this regarding ID of magic items. Thoughts?

Mainly for flavor and roll-playing. Removes the boring: stop for 10min because this might be useful. Gives other non-caster something to do. Stops making wizard the default guy.

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Analytical Identification - skill-Based Alternative to Identify Spell for Common, Uncommon, and Rare magic items. 

Identification Check : When discoverinf a <Rare magic item, a character can attempt to analyze it, using a combination of skills. Player must be proficient in at least one of the skills. Player rolls two separate d20s, selects one option from each of these categories:

• Physical/Magical Analysis (Choose one): Intelligence (Arcana) or Intelligence (Investigation)
• Contextual Lore (Choose one): Intelligence (History), Intelligence (Religion), or Wisdom (Insight)

A + B + Modifiers / 2 with a DC 14 (common), 16 (uncommon), 18 (rare)

Crit/Fail - a Nat 1 or 20 on either die introduces a drama twist.

Natural 20 (Critical Insight): A Nat-20 on either dice - check auto succeeds as player has a flash of brilliant deductive reasoning. Item fully identified, and DM reveals one hidden piece of historical flavor (famous past owner,  lore hint, storyline tie-in, etc).

Natural 1 (Flawed Theory): A Nat-1f on either dice - check auto fails as player misinterprets a vital rune, material property, historical context, etc. Also, the character is utterly convinced that their incorrect theory is correct. They misidentify the item's function/activation in a harmless (but distinct way), believing the false assumption until it's officially clarified.

Natural1 and 20 Paradox: The Flawed Masterpiece

If a player rolls a Nat-1 AND a Nat-20, they experience a beautiful paradox. Character is completely right about half of item, but completlety wrong about the other half. The item s partially identified with a twist:

• What they get right: perfectly identify main function, mech stats, and bonuses and can attune to it and use normally.
• What they get wrong: fundamentally misinterpret one secondary trait, activation condition, or side effect. They are so confident that they see no reason to cast Identify.
• Resolution: This error in assumption can only be corrected if another player casts Identify, or when the player experiences the true secondary effect firsthand.

 Examples: Potion of Fly - you know it gives you a flying speed equal to your walking speed for 1 hour. - but - you don't know you turn into a bird, or you lose you movement for one round if you touch the ground. (or something like that)

Standard Failure (The Campfire Contingency): If averaged check is <16, the item's true nature remains completely hidden in the field:

• The Lockout: The analyzing character (and any allies who actively assisted them) are temporarily stumped. They cannot attempt the averaged check on this specific item again until they level up or gain new context (access to a grand library, etc).
• The Fallback: The item can only be successfully identified during a Long Rest, requiring some sort of magical identificastion (Identify spell) as a ritual to safely unwrap its properties.

Why do you want to implement this complicated ID?

Wouldn't it be better to have what you wrote on a d100 chart, have it random order so rolling closer to 100% does not lead to a better outcome.  They give you what they rolled, then you look it up and tell them.  If you want it really random, then have all of your titled answers act as a single percentage so if you have 3 items, and each PC rolls 46/47/48 they can have different results or even 46 & 48 are the same but 47 is different.  This will result in them not actually knowing if they are correct or wrong with their ID roll.

I'm not sure I understand. That seems like way more work (if I'm understanding). 

Greetings aresbear75,

It looks like you put a lot of thought and work into developing your style of Item Identification, and I hope the players at your table enjoy using it.

My first though I had reading this goes with how WotC is giving lots of classes similar abilities that make them less unique.
Giving the 'Identify' ability to everyone, makes the Wizard's abilities less unique, and thus, feeling less useful/helpful.

The 10min you mention in your post, I assume is referring to the Wizard casting Identify as a Ritual.
That 10min should not be taking up much game time, unless other players are Roleplaying during that 10min, which you would not want to interrupt as the DM anyway.
Most DMs I have seen use brevity to describe the 10min, and then give the Caster the information they gained from the Identify Spell, which should only take a minute, then you continue with your game.

Maybe have a conversation with your Wizard player, and come up with a solution that works for you both before you remove the uniqueness of his characters abilities.
You could create a Magic Item that is given to the Wizard (or another player if you want two people to have the ability) at some point to be able to cast Identify a certain number of times per day without expending a spell slot.

Cheers!

Quote from Laird_Denton >>

Greetings aresbear75,

It looks like you put a lot of thought and work into developing your style of Item Identification, and I hope the players at your table enjoy using it.

My first though I had reading this goes with how WotC is giving lots of classes similar abilities that make them less unique.
Giving the 'Identify' ability to everyone, makes the Wizard's abilities less unique, and thus, feeling less useful/helpful.

The 10min you mention in your post, I assume is referring to the Wizard casting Identify as a Ritual.
That 10min should not be taking up much game time, unless other players are Roleplaying during that 10min, which you would not want to interrupt as the DM anyway.
Most DMs I have seen use brevity to describe the 10min, and then give the Caster the information they gained from the Identify Spell, which should only take a minute, then you continue with your game.

Maybe have a conversation with your Wizard player, and come up with a solution that works for you both before you remove the uniqueness of his characters abilities.
You could create a Magic Item that is given to the Wizard (or another player if you want two people to have the ability) at some point to be able to cast Identify a certain number of times per day without expending a spell slot.

Cheers!

 I mean, it's fine so long as the wizard is allowed to 'retrain' to a different spell (because Identify is near useless now), and just remove identify from the game.  There's plenty of other things the Wizard can be doing.  This just frees up a 1st level known spell for a different ritual.