Identify nerfed in 4.1.0?

[Pondlife]

Does anyone else feel that identify has been nerfed in 4.1.0?

One of the big turning points for a mage used to be CL 11 when you could IDi everything. Now identify only reveals runes on weapons and armour. Scrolls, potions, devices etc all have to be IDed by use or by giving them to a shop (assuming non Ironman).

[Ingwe Ingweron]

Does anyone else feel that identify has been nerfed in 4.1.0?

One of the big turning points for a mage used to be CL 11 when you could IDi everything. Now identify only reveals runes on weapons and armour. Scrolls, potions, devices etc all have to be IDed by use or by giving them to a shop (assuming non Ironman).

Yep. It's a feature, not a bug. Not sure I like the balance effect on mages, but overall, I find it a small price to pay for rune-id, which has significantly streamlined play.

[petvan]

So accurate to say there is no way to ID a potion or mushroom w/o consuming it or selling it? Makes it interesting in stat gain as you basically have to eat stuff given the cost of buying it back is too prohibitive.

Identify staves gone?

P

[Pondlife]

So accurate to say there is no way to ID a potion or mushroom w/o consuming it or selling it? Makes it interesting in stat gain as you basically have to eat stuff given the cost of buying it back is too prohibitive.

That's what I've found: devices, mushrooms, potions, scrolls all need to be ID by use or sale.

It's not too bad if you're willing to return to town (although it's a bummer when you give away a valuable item), but it makes ironman mage much harder. The gain one/lose one potions are the worst: I quaffed an unidentified potion of contemplation a couple of days ago and lost a point of int.

Identify staves gone?
P

I've certainly not seen any in 4.1. But the effect would be the same as the scroll or the spell anyway even if they existed.

[Mondkalb]

That you can't identify potions and stuff by means of magic bothers me too.
That's a real drawback of the new system.

Staves, wands and scrolls, ok, but potions are really annoying.
I don't bother with mushrooms anymore unless playing a hobbit.

[Bostock]

I gobble everything with gleeful delight and DGAF. Works for me.

[Ingwe Ingweron]

That you can't identify potions and stuff by means of magic bothers me too.
That's a real drawback of the new system.

Staves, wands and scrolls, ok, but potions are really annoying.
I don't bother with mushrooms anymore unless playing a hobbit.

It used to bother me a lot, but now it is just a minor inconvenience. Like no-selling, it took me awhile to get used to it. Though with no-selling, I find it an unmitigated good, while, as I said, forced use-id for consumables is now just a minor niggle.

[Sky]

the annoying ones are .. oh dear, ill need to make a list.

stat potion of "not my stat"; i.e. contemplation, intellect, depending on what you play

potion of lose memories - actually, just buy a single RLL and thats it.

quaffing, or otherwise wasting your first: heal, *heal, rune of protection.

scrolls of teleport level, unless you have cleared the level and have nothing to lose.
scrolls of deep descent for the same reason.

destruction and *destruction when there might be useful stuff around.

salt water, for trolls. and for rogues who have 50% cast failure on Satisfy Hunger.


i still prefer this new runes model; it makes ID of new but known items much easier and faster and honestly i couldn't go back to the older model.

[Pondlife]

Sky's post pretty much nailed the various annoying factors with the new ID scheme.

I guess it means there's more use for money in the mid game, as I buy up all {unseen} consumable just to ID them.

[luneya]

Yeah, not having the ability to magically id consumables is a little annoying. But at least everything IDs on use now, even if it would otherwise have no effect. Under the old system, early-game object identification was a pain. My game start used to look something like this:

1. Buy a potion of boldness with starting cash. If none is available in ironman, that's arguably cause for a restart (at least as a warrior or divine caster, who can't just cast identify with mana). If the shops lack boldness in normal play, be sure to return to town to get one before starting to magically id potions, as boldness is a total waste of an identify charge.
2. Fully clear the first couple DLs before starting to dive, to try to collect and use-ID common consumables.
3. Test scrolls in the vicinity of an infravision-sensed clear icky thing until detect invisible is learned. (If playing human/dunedan, just buy a detect invisible scroll, as sucessfully use-IDing it requires too much luck.)
4. Test potions after meleeing some weak poison-dealer (e.g., spiders) until neutralize poison is learned.
5. Consider buying restore mana in the black market, if available. As a warrior, it saves you the trouble of identifying it with a scroll/staff. As any caster class, buying it is a net gain of two potions (the one that you bought, and the one that you didn't waste in use-ID), which is good, as this is one of the potions that you will want later. But if you haven't bought restore mana yet as a caster, make sure to cast some spell before quaffing any unknown potions, so that restore mana will be identified if that's what your unknown turns out to be.

Now there's no need to worry about any of that. You can just collect stuff, and not worry about how to identify it until your inventory fills up. The +/- stat potions are an acceptable risk, as you'll only suffer the indignity of dinging an important stat for a true dump stat at most twice (e.g., in IDing contemplation and intellect as a warrior). Also, in normal play, you have a pretty good chance of being able to ID things like healing, *healing*, mass banishment, and rune of protection by buying them in the black market before they appear in the dungeon. In ironman, you can't do that, but ironman is supposed to be a challenge, and anyway the benefits of rune ID well outweigh the cost of having to waste the first copies you encounter of each of the high-end consumables.

[umoriamaster]

*turns around white potion repeatedly, staring intently.* *Casts Identify.* "YOU HAVE NOTHING TO IDENTIFY" *throws white potion at Filthy Street Urchin* "Potion misses, potion breaks, you have no more potions of *AUGMENTATION*" FML

[luneya]

*turns around white potion repeatedly, staring intently.* *Casts Identify.* "YOU HAVE NOTHING TO IDENTIFY" *throws white potion at Filthy Street Urchin* "Potion misses, potion breaks, you have no more potions of *AUGMENTATION*" FML

You're supposed to test potions be quaffing, not throwing. Potions of explosions went out many versions ago, so there are no potions that are really worth throwing. Okay, a level 1 character can do non-trivial damage by throwing potions of sleep/poison/slow/blind, but those are weaker than thrown oil, only slightly better than thrown pebbles, and generally not worth the trouble unless you're a mage or something. If you buy CLW in your starting kit, you can just proceed by doing your quaff-tests at full health with no enemies around--you'll probably get most of those early negative potions before you end up wasting anything more valuable than CSW or CCW.

[Ingwe Ingweron]

You're supposed to test potions be quaffing, not throwing. Potions of explosions went out many versions ago, so there are no potions that are really worth throwing. Okay, a level 1 character can do non-trivial damage by throwing potions of sleep/poison/slow/blind, but those are weaker than thrown oil, only slightly better than thrown pebbles, and generally not worth the trouble unless you're a mage or something. If you buy CLW in your starting kit, you can just proceed by doing your quaff-tests at full health with no enemies around--you'll probably get most of those early negative potions before you end up wasting anything more valuable than CSW or CCW.

The only really dangerous potion would be a potion of poision, if found extremely early and you don't have the hps or healing to survive. E.g., a 1st level gnome mage. After that, as long as you are a little careful, i.e., quaff potions when at or near full health (you no longer need to have taken damage to identify CLW, CSW, CCW, etc.), and read scrolls while on stairs (to escape summoned undead or monsters if they are overwhelming for @), ID by use is much better now in the Rune-ID system and makes life a lot easier.

[Pete Mack]

The only genuinely bad potions remaining are off-stat swap potions. And even those cause at worst a temporary setback. Definitely ID potions by use.

[NimrodPE]

At first, I would have agreed with Pondlife, but now after some hours on 4.1.0 I like the new system much more, although it's sometimes aggravating if you've sold a good item because you couldn't have IDed it fully.

What I don't get in spite of the new system: Why ID scrolls don't ID everything. Concerning D&D and other similar systems an ID-mechanic should ID everything because that's the reason such mechanics exist imho.

And for those drawbacks: The dangers can (almost) be circumvented with a little preparation and while losing a good stat point (swap potions) at around DL 30-35 you can max stats in about 4 hours, so...