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Partial vs Full item identification

PostPosted: Thursday, 17th November 2016, 01:51
by Shtopit
Some items are partially identified when found on the floor. This happens because some rings and wands and at least one amulet have two identifying factors: the effect and a number (charges for wands or quantity of the bonus for jewels). When found on the floor, you currently see the type of the item, but the numerical value stays hidden.

My proposal is the following, and it only regards jewellery : once you have identified the item type, make the number visible when other items of the same kind are found on the floor. For example, if you have identified a +2 ring of dexterity, make all rings of dexterity you find on the floor display their number, be it +5 or -6 or anything else.

I think this change would make the game better, because:
- collecting items from the ground and putting them on is boring, because it causes unneeded inventory strain (drop other item, get, put on, drop, get item back)
- the only relevant unforeseen interaction, that of finding a cursed item which gives a penalty instead of a bonus, is nullified by the fact that, once you actually have two rings of the same kind, you almost surely have a stash of scrolls of remove curse available.

The change would touch rings of DEX, INT, STR, AC, EV, Slaying, and amulets of reflection. It wouldn't touch wands or artefacts.

Re: Partial vs Full item identification

PostPosted: Thursday, 17th November 2016, 05:21
by Quazifuji
I definitely agree. I'm of the opinion the the identification minigame and curses should be removed as a whole, but I think even the people who defend it mostly defend the resource management aspects it has in the early game. This would rarely affect that, especially because in my experience curses tend to become irrelevant even earlier than identification does (in my experience I usually build up a surplus of RC scrolls before I have a surplus of ID scrolls).