Pathfinder 2E Pathfinder 2 Detect Magic & Item ID ?

[Amatiel]

I am having troubles with the mechanics as written. Any clarification would be appreciated.

Arcana Skill - (Identify Magic): Once you discover that an item, location, or ongoing effect is magical, you can spend an hour
to attempt to identify the particulars of its magic.

How do you discover if an item is magical so you can identify it? Using the detect magic cantrip would appear as it is written that it doesn't actually tell you if an item is magical or not; only its general location down to a 5'cube - and that is as a 7th-level caster !

Detect Magic Cantrip - Area 30-foot aura.
You send out a magical pulse that registers the presence of magic. You receive no information beyond presence or absence of magic.

Heightened (3rd) You learn the school of magic for the highest level magical effect within range that the spell detects. If multiple
effects are equally strong, the GM determines which you learn.

Heightened (4th) As 3rd level, but you also pinpoint the source of the highest-level magic. You don’t learn the exact location but can narrow down the source to within a 5-foot cube. If the source is larger than that, you identify only the cube nearest to you.

 

[Lanefan]

So the 1st level version tells you there's magic somewhere within 30' and that's it? That's not far from useless.

And it's going to become completely useless once you yourself start carrying any magic items; and even if it gets worded such that it ignores what you-the-caster is carrying you'll still need to get your fellow adventurers with their magic items to stand 31' away from you when you cast it.

Bleah!

 

[Satyrn]

So the 1st level version tells you there's magic somewhere within 30' and that's it? That's not far from useless.

And it's going to become completely useless once you yourself start carrying any magic items; and even if it gets worded such that it ignores what you-the-caster is carrying you'll still need to get your fellow adventurers with their magic items to stand 31' away from you when you cast it.

Bleah!

I believe the cantrip lets you ignore all magic you're already aware of.

 

[houser2112]

I believe the cantrip lets you ignore all magic you're already aware of.

Here's the first two paragraphs, which OP only partially quoted:

You send out a magical pulse that registers the
presence of magic. You receive no information beyond presence or
absence of magic. You can choose to ignore magic you’re fully aware
of, such as you and your allies’ magic items and ongoing spells.

You detect illusion magic only if that magic’s effect has a lower
level than the level of your detect magic spell. However, items that
have an illusion aura but aren’t deceptive in appearance (such as
an invisibility potion) typically get detected normally.

 

[Henry]

I think the goal is to keep people from stopping the game at inopportune times (like in the middle of exploring a dangerous area) trying to figure out item specifics, and shifting this to downtime. I have seen players before monopolize table time insisting on ID'ing every thing magic they find at the time they find it, which slows down the game a bit.

the Read Aura cantrip works a little better, but it only tells you the school of magic. It still takes training in Arcana to properly inspect items.

 

[Lanefan]

Here's the first two paragraphs, which OP only partially quoted:

You send out a magical pulse that registers the
presence of magic. You receive no information beyond presence or
absence of magic. You can choose to ignore magic you’re fully aware
of, such as you and your allies’ magic items and ongoing spells.

You detect illusion magic only if that magic’s effect has a lower
level than the level of your detect magic spell. However, items that
have an illusion aura but aren’t deceptive in appearance (such as
an invisibility potion) typically get detected normally.

OK, that seems marginally better...but still pretty weak.

I hope there's other ways provided of detecting magic that are considerably more precise, such that a caster can find the one magic gem in a bag of 25 otherwise-identical gems without having to put the gems 31' apart from each other and casting this 25 times... Same goes for a treasure hoard - a suit of plate mail, a shield, a helmet, a longsword, a shortsword, a quiver of arrows, a bow, a vial, a rolled-up piece of parchment, a ring, an amulet, three gems, a bracelet, a golden cup, a statuette; all masterwork and there's magic in there somewhere. The higher-level versions can narrow it down a bit but are still kinda pointless, leavning no real alternative but to scoop up absolutely everything you find and sort it out once back in town.

The usefulness and value of Bags of Holding just went up big time.

 

[Lanefan]

I think the goal is to keep people from stopping the game at inopportune times (like in the middle of exploring a dangerous area) trying to figure out item specifics, and shifting this to downtime. I have seen players before monopolize table time insisting on ID'ing every thing magic they find at the time they find it, which slows down the game a bit.

Realistically, though, isn't this what adventurers would do if they had the chance? These items they're finding might be useful right now for the current mission...or might be cursed; better to trigger the curse now, if possible, in a more controlled situation than to have the curse suddenly manifest in mid-combat.

What this does is merely change what the table time is spent on: instead of being spent on field-testing items known to be magical it'll be spent in trying to determine whether things are magical at all.

 

[Henry]

Realistically, though, isn't this what adventurers would do if they had the chance? These items they're finding might be useful right now for the current mission...or might be cursed; better to trigger the curse now, if possible, in a more controlled situation than to have the curse suddenly manifest in mid-combat.

What this does is merely change what the table time is spent on: instead of being spent on field-testing items known to be magical it'll be spent in trying to determine whether things are magical at all.

While true, it also can slow down play dramatically - instead of focusing on the objective at hand, in practice I’ve seen players basically treating a dungeon like an antiques roadshow. It’s one place where realism can sometimes sacrifice fun at the table for players besides the wizard. It actually got bad enough in our home games that we instituted our own house rules nerfing detect magic into a 1st level spell, just to keep people from doing it every 15 feet. As a result, this change wound up setting very well with us.

 

[Lanefan]

While true, it also can slow down play dramatically - instead of focusing on the objective at hand, in practice I’ve seen players basically treating a dungeon like an antiques roadshow. It’s one place where realism can sometimes sacrifice fun at the table for players besides the wizard. It actually got bad enough in our home games that we instituted our own house rules nerfing detect magic into a 1st level spell, just to keep people from doing it every 15 feet. As a result, this change wound up setting very well with us.

Detect Magic just shows something is magical. What I'd do instead is do away with auto-identification of an item's properties by a simple Arcana check, and instead make it that an item's properties can only be determined through actual field-testing (e.g. to test for water-walking you step into a puddle and see if you sink in or not) or repeated in-combat use in the case of weapon, armour, and shield. The fall-back could be ye olde Identify spell, which 1e D&D did a nice job of making both expensive (100+ g.p. pearl consumed as M component) and impossible to cast frequently (caster's Con reduced by 8, recoverable 1 point per hour) - worth a look.

 

[Amatiel]

Reading the spell, nowhere does it actually reveal what is or is not magical. That is my point. How do you determine what is magical so you can ID it or even find it in the first place; because detect magic never actually reveals what is or isn't a magical item, just its general location.