How is the Appraisal skill handled in your campaign?

[Breakdaddy]

DMs, do you allow players to use the appraisal skill to appraise magic items? If so, do you just tell them the amount its worth when they succeed or do you answer the inevitable question of how they know the sword is worth 149,000 gp (thus just telling them point blank that they have found a luckblade)? I have been in campaigns where the DM told you how much the magic item was worth, but not what it was (which seems a bit silly to me, since I would need to know the weapons properties in order to get a solid estimate). What do you do in your campaign?

 

[Herremann the Wise]

They can only appraise it if they know what it is. Normally, this can only be divined by magical means - identify, analyze dweomer. However, knowing what it is, they should have a reasonable chance of appraising its worth - you may decide to apply a penalty for magical items if they are not common in your campaign.

Best Regards
Herremann the Wise

 

[fafhrd]

This is one of those things that looks innocent at first blush but can end up being a logistical nightmare. Core says you can generally sell items for half their value. Hrmm easy enough eh? Magic items seem to throw a kink in that plan for my party. How does lil ol Exp1 shopkeep know what the hell he is buying exactly? Does every shopkeep who deals in any magic need to have a level of wizard thrown in for identify? Are they likely to blow the 100 gp pearl to find out what its worth? Aha, but perhaps they have use magic device and wands of identify. Those wands don't come cheap and UMD is hardly a sure bet for said Exp1.

Then you have the party IDing the items and assuring the shopkeep it is indeed a sword of suchandsuch and you should really trust us. A couple generations of shopkeeps getting ripped off by bards with great bluff skills would suggest they are a long dead breed. That's if you can get your party to ID anything at all. "A day!?! Plus a freakin pearl?", they ask.

So I went out of the way to create "assessors". Trusted mages who provide IDing services for a mere 150 gp an item. The party balks at the outrageous charge and simply goes about leaving the poor ol' DM to factor in all the pluses, reductions, charges and the like. <mutters>

If one caves and finally just tells them what they have, no one ever bothers to get anything identified. Why spend all that time and money when I just gotta torment the DM into letting me know, they think. </rant>

If anyone has stumbled on a good solution to all this let me know. I'd be overjoyed to hear of it. Sorry for the partial hijack.

 

[Breakdaddy]

They can only appraise it if they know what it is. Normally, this can only be divined by magical means - identify, analyze dweomer. However, knowing what it is, they should have a reasonable chance of appraising its worth - you may decide to apply a penalty for magical items if they are not common in your campaign.

Best Regards
Herremann the Wise

I thought to play it this way as well, but in one of my games, they are trying to nickel and dime every little advantage out of their skills, thanks for reaffirming this, Ill refer the player's to your reply!

 

[NSTR]

Appraise

In my campaigns Exp1 Shopkeepers do not buy magical items generally. So they do not care if it is magical or not. They probably wouldnt have enough money to buy it from them. It depends on the campaign you are running, high magic or low magic. If you are in a very high magic campaign maybe everyone knows what a +1 sword looks like and what it sells for.

However, an NPC that deals in that trade on a daily basis I believe would be able to appraise the vaule of something he is an expert in. Circumstance bonus or some such.

I agree with Herrmann as well regarding having to know what it is before being able to appraise it.

 

[TwilightWhisper]

I use the rules for appraise right out of the players handbook. If we played in FR, then Aurora's Whole Realms is fairly easy to find in Waterdeep, Calimport, or any other of the large cities. My players have all spent money on Bags of Holding and HHH so they don't mind carrying some extra stuff around. In Sigil, anything can be sold. They just learned that. Sorry 'bout the hijack.

 

[Len]

Here is how Appraise is normally handled in our campaign:

DM Carl: "Inside the box are 50 gold pieces and a gem."
Daniel and Andrew: "ApAppprraiaissee!"
DM Carl: "*sigh* About 250 gp."

Funny thing is, I'm playing the rogue.

Seriously: Appraise is just a knowledge of what things are worth in the marketplace. It's not a (Su) ability that identifies magic items. If a player tries to appraise a luckblade without first having identified it somehow, the answer might be "It's a very fancy sword - it's probably worth 400 gp. Or a lot more, if it's magical."

 

[Laslo Tremaine]

We ignore it completely.

No one in our group has show any interest in haggling and such, so we just leave it out...

 

[Eltern]

We ignore it completely.

No one in our group has show any interest in haggling and such, so we just leave it out...

Chuck up 100 gold for identifying anything, and other than that, pretty much as above.

 

[jodyjohnson]

We ignore it.

If a player were to take it at all, I'd play it more like a profession or craft skill where it nets them additional funds when they work at it.