Identification: thrilling or tedious?

[Susramanian]

I vote tedious. I lump the whole identification mechanic in with the hunger mechanic and light source fuel mechanic, which were both thankfully left out of T4. They're somewhat meaningful in Angband, for example, where you have to carefully manage your inventory, but TOME 4 isn't an inventory management game. It's about tactics and strategy. Identify is pretty much just a bunch of gold and keystrokes standing between you and seeing what you've picked up.

I've been playing roguelikes for 20 years now, but I had a gap of several years when I hardly touched them. I realized why one day: I desperately did not want to deal with the tedium of identification. So I downloaded the newest version of Angband, made rods of perception early and common, and bang, instant Angband enthusiasm once again!. Now I give T4 the same treatment; I make scrolls of identify free and have them ID the whole pack. I'd prefer to not have to do even that, but I don't know a way to make that happen (besides complaining on the forums )

I wonder what the reaction would be if identification had never existed in ToME, and Darkgod suddenly included it in beta 11. I suspect there would be much irritation at the introduction of a meaningless obstacle standing between you and actually going out and killing things.

Okay, now I'll go ahead and argue with myself.

Identification does add a certain something to the game: the thrill of discovery. As things stand now in T4, this isn't a big factor except for seeing things like A Glittering Longsword or A Dragon Shield, but it would come into play if we had high-level potions and scrolls. Coming across a new potion in one of the Orc Prides would certainly cause you to sit up and pay attention. The thrill of discovery will be a bigger factor in future versions, I imagine.

So with the goals of retaining the thrill of discovery and simultaneously eliminating tedium, I have a few possible reforms. All of these apply to gear, not potions and scrolls.

1) Instantly ID everything you walk over except for artifacts. When an artifact is encountered, it has a flavored description like is currently the case. For example, "You see a beautifully-wrought dagger." Or "You see a set of steel gauntlets glowing with power."

2) Instantly ID things as described above, but only things of a certain power compared to your experience or level. Starting characters only know about completely non-magical items, level 50 characters recognize everything but artifacts. Never insta-ID artifacts, instead treating them as in suggestion 1. Tune things so that encountering unidentified items is still fairly rare, at least enough to keep the thrill of discovery.

3) Instantly ID average weapons and armor, but make ego item ID work like ID with potions and scrolls. You find one Phase weapon, you'll recognize another when you see it. Keep artifact ID as in suggestions 1 and 2. Throughout the game, encountering unIDed items remains rare and exciting.

If removing one of the biggest gold sinks is a problem, reduce gold drops or something. Hell, I'd put up with NO gold drops if it meant I didn't have to deal with the hassle of identification.

[Repton]

I do have a lot of sympathy for this view.. If I'm playing a low-magic class, I find myself just selling everything I pick up, and then buying back stuff that looks interesting. But that can be costly..

I think I'd be content if there were a guy in each town who would ID your whole pack for, say, 10 gold. Like in T2.

[Gwai]

While I enjoy identification, I will say that I really do miss pseudo-ident. It's just such a huge monetary advantage for a wizard that they have identify.

[Final Master]

Actually sense currently items show their 'real' price id'd or not, depending on exactly what the item is and how much it sells for, I will ID it. If it isn't selling for a much higher value than the things I have found prior to, I just sell it.

[yufra]

I also use the strategy Final Master mentioned. I wouldn't mind a loremaster (identify all items in inventory) being added to a certain mountain town (well, both of them actually) for low magic characters. The amount charged could be dependent on the number of unidentified items and be say one gold per item.

[Feanor.81]

I really like the id mechanics Susramanian exposed. Actually, I too use the "see what's the price of the item in the shop, if it's unusual, ergo it's an ego item, I'll id it" tactic.

Speaking of it, shouldn't shops buy an unidentified item for its base value, rather than make you an offer based on the item's real "ego" value? It's the way it worked in ToME 2.x, it's the way it works in almost any rpg, and it's the way it works in real life.

[darkgod]

I liek the proposal too, as for shops, why ?
I mean because you do not know what it is it's not like the shopkeepr does not. He is just honest (which is where you can know it's a fantasy setting, honest shopkeeper do not happen in real life ;> )

[Feanor.81]

Well, then not ALL the merchants should be honest. That's for fairy tales, not a rpg, especially one in which anything seems to be trying to smash me into pieces.
Anyways, I feel the whole item id system is just tedious and almost useless as it is, if shopkeepers are always going to pay you the fair price, and you do not even undergo the risk of using an unidentified cursed item or deadly potion (at least, never found one). It's too easy to make money, you just pick and sell whatever unidentified stuff you have in your inventory, if you're not going to use it anyway; otherwise, you check the price offered for the item, realize it's worth something, then spend 1 gold on a scroll, and finally decide if sell it or keep it for yourself.

[Gwai]

Final Master, I'm not sure if that was an answer to me or not. If it was, yes, but that does not lessen the monetary advantage that wizards have. Once I've already carried it out of the dungeon, I really don't care what most of that stuff is; I'll just sell 90+% of it anyway. No, pseudo-ID is for use in the dungeon -- is this armor good enough to be worth carrying and selling or not?

[Hedrachi]

Maybe a (possibly learned through a tome or quest or something) cunning talent that works like the Din's Curse identification system, wherein you spend a number of turns "researching" an item? Would work like 'R'esting and you'd stop researching when you see a monster. Maybe takes 120-(TL*20) turns to research an item, with a cooldown of 100 turns?

[Shoob]

how about having the cost be a random number (but constant for each item) between the ego cost and the normal cost... I could reason that is due to haggling.

[madmonk]

You might even consider refining ID further (I can't remember whether we discussed this in Alpha or not...)

Essentially what you do is this:

Fighters - ID all items that pertain to their class (weapons/armour/generic)
Archers/Slings - ID all Launchers/projectiles/generic
Thieves - same
Mages - Same

You get the picture. So each class has expertise in their own area and minimal expertise in other areas.

[UPDATE]Moved this to ideas where it more properly belongs.

[Gwai]

That would be very nice. That way if one dislikes identifying items, one never has to as much of it, but it's not removed from the game.

[darkgod]

But what would wilders, corrupters, divine and afflicted do ?

[teachu2die]

ultimately, i think ID is a very important element to rogue-likes, and without it, a lot of the mystery and intrigue is gone. ToME 2 had a colossal problem with too-much-junk, so ID was really essential - and really a chore. but that has largely been fixed in TE4, through a number of mechanisms. i really like the honest shopkeeper component, and feel like that has contributed in a very positive fashion to de-emphasize ID, while still keeping it relevant. as someone suggested, you can simply carry much of the equipment relevant to your class to the shop to get a good idea whether its worth ID'ing. and items in general are worth so little at the shop that its not like you'e not missing a huge load of cash if you failed to id that acidic dwarven-steel greatmaul of massacre and carried home a generic dwarven steel longsword to sell instead. and given that after the first 2 or so dungeons, the bulk of equipment you find is ego, and that artifacts are glaringly obvious, i think pseudo-ID would probably be irrelevant in TE4. but i am a big fan of the ID-by-use mechanism that has found its way into recent incarnations of vanilla angband - it contributes greatly to a 'realistic' feel for use of items, even if it is only particularly useful in the first 20 or so character levels (or in ironman mode).