How do we deal with unidentified magical items?

[Farnaby]

This is not a complaint, this is meant to provoke discussion.

So I submitted a bug report about an adventure where magical items had a unidentified name that gave away they were magical.
E.g. +1 chain mail would have an unidentified name of magical chain mail.
I said that this gave away that it is magical and requested that the word magical be removed.

I received this answer:


I'm not sure that I would classify this as a "bug" so much as a style difference between GMs. You obviously don't want your players to be able to tell the difference between a magical quality breastplate and a normal non-magical breastplate, for instance. Nor do you want them to recognize darkwood as being a different wood than normal wood. Some GMs will argue for their games, the differences are obvious, even if they cannot identify the specific magical nature.

I would also argue that the mere fact that a breastplate, for example, is "not identified" and missing most of its information due to being in a "not identified" state will clue in 99.9% of players that that item is not truly a mundane breastplate. They will then just cast the Detect Magic cantrip to see that it is magical.

Given that this is a style thing, if it is changed, there is a good chance that one or more people will report it as a problem to change it back. I can see some GM's and players then being upset that not distinguishing the "not identified" magic items may be harder to see in the party list because they are not tagged (or the GMs will have to go to the extra trouble of then writing "magical" in front of the item. So, as you can see, that can go both ways depending on the GM who runs the game.

I'll kick it around with the team to see which direction makes most sense: changing it as you suggested, or keeping it consistent with the previous standard that was used for all AP modules.

[snip]


This is very true but perhaps we need a different solution e.g. a flag on a normal item that only the GM can see and turn on/off? Then we wouldn't need ID/no-ID.

Or an ID/no-ID flag on every single item and the same name for both states for mundane equipment?
I don't know, I'm only throwing a couple of ideas out there, but I think we GMs need a better way we can hide a +1 sword without having the players having to metagame.

My question for all of you GMs is how do you do it with the current system and what change could you envision that would make the system easier?

[Farnaby]

sciencephile sent me an idea for a GM only text box, check it out and if you like it, vote for it.

https://fg2app.idea.informer.com/proj/?ia=81222

[bmos]

I have been changing "magical breastplate" to "masterwork breastplate" in low-level PF1e campaigns since I started running games in FG.
IMO this is what a character would see (although by the books you should also be rolling to see if the item's appearance contains a hint of its nature).
In 2e, this doesn't exist, so it might be best described as being of fine quality (although even this is a simplification as some magical items may look dingy).
That being said, detect magic basically makes this pointless. Once players are detecting magic on everything, "magical breastplate" works just as well (although making it an emanation in 2e really limits how OP this was in 1e).

[ShadeRaven]

There's no right answer here. In some of my campaigns, I literally use the same name for magic and non-magic items, unless there are aspects that mark them as different in appearance or material composition. And different names have no impact on the magic or lack thereof beyond it. A finely wrought shortsword with gold filigree could simply be a more valuable, non-magic weapon. But I have some where magic items are obvious and essentially tagged as Identify This when found.

Typically, players are pretty good with whatever style the GM presents so long as it's consistent and fair. Now obviously, this isn't always the case. I think it was indicated in the other thread, that there are definitely players who would be frustrated without any label or clue to indicate what's magic and what isn't. And that same GM obviously didn't want to deal with having non-magic items unidentified. Certainly valid opinions.

That said, I have had campaigns run where the players *asked* for restriction or even removal of detect magic and identify type spells because they enjoyed having to figure out whether or not that Orc Slave Lord's battle axe was magic or he just hit really hard with it. They want their arcane, occult, etc., skills to be more valuable.

For the most part, though, I think GMs present a style and players accept that it's done with the best of intent to make sharing the RPG experience enjoyable for all. Many, like myself, get a good feel for the types of players at the table and do their best to give them a playstyle that is most enjoyable for all involved.

By the way, there *is* a GM Notes field that can be used - I employ that little gem myself on occasion!

In the end, the obvious conclusion is that it'd be great to have Fantasy Grounds capable of handling all play styles, and I absolutely know Trenloe wants to have the most powerful and useful version of the ruleset as possible. Unfortunately, there are innumerable deviations from the norm so it's essentially impossible to cater to every play style. It is, though, why community extensions are so terrific! If there's something any of us want to see added to the game, there's always the option to get our hands a little dirty and try tackling that need ourselves. :)

What we have is pretty workable right now, imo. I can still make magic mysterious when I want or I can make it obvious when that suits the game best. I'm all for greater functionality, and would openly rejoice when it's implemented, but there are probably bigger fish to fry in the immediate future.

[Trenloe]

sciencephile sent me an idea for a GM only text box, check it out and if you like it, vote for it.

https://fg2app.idea.informer.com/proj/?ia=81222
As mentioned by ShadeRaven, this has been recently implemented. See release notes here: https://www.fantasygrounds.com/forums/showthread.php?61785-Release-Updates-for-September-15th-2020

[Farnaby]

[snip]
By the way, there *is* a GM Notes field that can be used - I employ that little gem myself on occasion!
[snip]


Great news. Perhaps the idea informer should change the status as it is still under consideration.

[Trenloe]

Perhaps the idea informer should change the status as it is still under consideration.
I added it to the PFRPG2 ruleset, not CoreRPG. So it's not available in other rulesets.