Item Identification function and skill use

In the history of Ultima Online, Item Identification has been a very usefull skill.
On UOR presently, Item Identification is virtually useless because one wand charge will suffice for the lifetime of any particular item.


I have a simple method, and it may come as a shock to many. I use skills in the game, for their intended purpose!!! One of my crafters has GM Arms Lore and GM Item Identification. Not only does this save wand charges, but it makes these skills valuable in the game itself. I haven't had the need on this server, but in the past, my crafter generally stayed home unless he was doing some services in town. As such, he was also my inventory specialist who knew the details of every item I owned and organized it based on such. It was easy to drop in and grab an item of basic attributes, based on my organization system (pouches, power on bottom, vanq on top, and tactics mods can be seen when you equip). When I wanted something specific.....I would just use my crafter to select it and hand it off to the intended user. If that character had any need to know the details of that item, they could spend an ID charge on it.
As for the defense mechanisms for avoiding thieves, simply having a vanq weapon in hand is enough to get one to follow you around until you cast a spell and they hotkey steal/last target. If they had to ID it first, it would be more of a game (get it, we're playing a game). One of the defenses used on other servers was carrying around a bunk magic weapon to potentially get the thieves to flag stealing a piece of shit out of your pack. If they could see it was crap, they're not going to waste their time. If they had ID skill, it would be useful (here we are again, with skills being useful in the game they were engineered for). HateCrime, you specifically mentioned thieves stealing regardless in 'hopes' that you have something good. That's part of the entire point here, wherein there would be no 'hope' involved if I'm basically walking around in a Vanquishing/Invulnerability billboard.
This goes the same in a fight. An assailant might think twice when they see that billboard, as opposed to taking the risk of attacking without knowing that the intended victim is packing a vanq kryss with 12 poison charges on it.
The function is perfectly logical because guess what, trades persons are the people with the true eye for items, in reality. In the game, it should be the same. I can't expect an F1 driver to know the difference between a connecting rod from a Mclaren engine and a Ford engine, but he certainly could if he LEARNED (ie: Skill).
You want to be able to tell what it is I'm using by looking at it, build the skill to do so. This goes for crafters, thieves, fighters, etc.
Yes, I can see this being a bit imposing in business (player vendors), but really, was it such a burden to bring an ID wand with you when you bought items from a vendor? Aren't scam vendors one of the great passtimes of Ultima Online? If you don't ID a weapon before buying it, that's the risk YOU take in trusting the vendor. Not knowing if someone is packing DP until you're casting cure or chugging a pot, is a risk factor in combat as well.

If you aren't seeing the ongoing theme of RISK here, then you will never understand how Trammel global Item Identification truly is.

+1

I fully support this idea to make item identification a viable skill here... and get rid of the the tons of id wands in my house .

Generally every skill in the game should have multiple viable functions to be usefull and fun.
There are some skills that imho deserves a deeper look in the context of a history perfected renaissance, e.g. arms lore.
Naturally this skill could as well have a positiv effect on crafting weapons, using a weapon in a fight, gathering wood for resources or carving a dead animals corps for resources.
Just some ideas.

Hear, Hear. I wish this was the case. +1

Mix em and cook em in a pot like gumbo
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=-MrQtOoQRpc

Basically you've listed 3 reasons to make everyone's life more awkward by doing away with universal item identification. Let me summarize:
1. every skill in the game needs to have some use
2. don't let opponents see what you're holding
3. RL merchants know products better

1. Historically item ID has always been a low value skill used mainly by people dealing in bulk items or those who are too cheap to use a wand. Some skills are always going to be less useful than others; Herding, Spirit Speak, Begging, Camping, Taste ID, or Forensic Evaluation for example. The Renaissance era has already brought a ton of merchant skills into wider use--things like Inscription for added defensive spells, Arms Lore to disarm, and Lumberjacking for added melee damage. There's no reason to shoehorn added functions into the Item ID skill just to puff it up.

2. Knowing what your opponent is holding is a relatively minor thing. For PVP, I suspect all the main players have a decent idea of who they are fighting regardless of what weapon they are carrying. But, it's more likely that the real reason you are bring up item ID is because you've been burned by a thief. For thieving, I know I'll just steal whatever you are holding. Knowing what you are holding simply allows me to prioritize which victim gets hit first. You might as well ask to have the last target ability removed. Moreover, it's not like there are many thieves around anyhow. Hell, there are more GM miners than there are GM thieves.

3. This is a game; it's supposed to be fun. There's no need to hobble ourselves with worthless skills or force everyone into tedious repetitive tasks just to identify an item. Also, if we're going to replicate the real world, how about making cartography a prerequisite for using UO Automap?

I see universal item ID in the same category as cutting cloth into bandages all at once or being able to recall directly into t2a dungeons. Both of these functions offer little advantage other that to avoid repetitive, cumbersome and trivial tasks.

I'm not too cheap because I don't want to take my smithy out in the wilds to hunt for ID wands. I'm using a skill as it befits the character in this ROLE PLAYING GAME. My crafter is a tradesperson with the SKILL to identify items. It sounds more like you're being too cheap to spend the wand charges to ID everything. Do all of your characters REALLY need to know what it is? I don't want additional functions to be shoehorned in, I want the function to be useful as it always has been prior to change we're seeing here.

People knowing what I'm packing is NOT a minor thing. I have been attacked and stolen from, because my assailants knew exactly what I was packing. I've been followed around town until I hit Recall, only to have my vanquishing warfork immediately hotkey stolen in the brief second it took to cast recall/target rune (which was hotkeyed to a macro that casts/targets a rune). What you're asking for is Thieving Trammel to remain in full effect. You say yourself it allows you to prioritize who gets hit first. If you had to actually use a skill or wand charges, would that be such a terrible burden? You know....having to play the game based on it's designed mechanics. You're already a thief not actually earning your items, but stealing them. You want it to remain easier for you to do so without having to case your victim like you have in the past, apparently. Yes, I have been burned by a thief and likely will again, several times. I should not be forced to advertise everything I'm wearing to suit thieves. My crafter's skills should not remain effectively useless or worthless to suit a mechanic that I don't believe ever existed on OSI.

Fun is what you make of it. Clearly your fun is stealing from other people. My fun is being a good person and fighting monsters and crafting. My crafting is work and I enjoy it. I also enjoy using ID skill, tedium included.

I'm asking for challenge and purpose to remain for a skill/function, as it has historically. You're asking for a handout of free ID for everything you're going to steal. I hardly use UOAM, so yeah, I'm totally fine with requiring cartography to use UOAM. Hell, I'd make it a Seige Perilous shard if I could and revert to one character one account each, if I really had my way.

The sheer nature of UO is repetetive cumbersome tasks. The only reason your so soft now is because you can automate nearly the entire thing.

1 - I agree but that statement was only made by one person, and not many people feel the same way about upgrading all skills.

2 - I already had my suspicions but after reading this post I'm positive you don't play a thief. It would be nice if you wouldn't make statements about what you would do in a situation that in reality you never find yourself in. In other words: if you don't steal, don't tell us about how Item ID changes would or wouldn't affect your stealing.

3 - You started the real world analogies -

But now that it was soundly refuted, real world analogies are silly? That's not how it works.

I think that's another horrible analogy and I'll tell you why. Say Item ID were changed so that, once again, it only applied to the character that IDed the item. How many more times would that REALLY make you have to ID? Lets break it down.

You would still ID all the magics that you acquired at least once initially, so no change there. A large portion of the magics would end up being junk that you'd either sell to NPCs or drop outside the bank, so no re-IDing required there. If you place high-end magics for sale on a vendor one at a time you won't need to re-ID but if you insist on hoarding up 20 power and vanq katanas before you sell them you might need to, if the character who IDed wasn't also the vendor owner. Those would be infrequent occassions and involve only small quantities of items. And if you planned on giving the vanq kat to your PvPer instead of the vendor, you might have to re-ID once. Once, unless you have five different PvP chars that you play and they're going to pass it around. So to summarize, even if Item ID were reverted to the old annoying per-character method, no one except thieves would be forced to use Item ID much more than they already do now. It doesn't create that much more work. It's just annoying when you have to do it. And while I'm sure that the thief players here have a wide variety of opinions about that, personally I think it would make thieves more enjoyable to play. In fact, I don't know if I've changed anyone else's mind but I take back what I said before - I'd prefer even the old system over the current one. That said, I'd still prefer an Item ID that applied to all characters on one account - kind of as a middle ground on this subject.

I assume everyone wishing this function to remain as is, wouldn't be opposed to having a flag visible when your character is clicked, to see whether or not you have any protective spells in effect on your character.

Let's get that change in. I'm tired of not knowing if mages have Reflect, Reactive Armor or Protection up.


Please fix.

It is pretty trammel

Some of the "useless skills mentioned" at one time in UO history did have value. Arms Lore went with blacksmithing.
Forensic Evaluation was extremely useful. Find a body, evaluale it, know who or what killed it. ( remember this was back in the early days of UO when players actually roamed around the world, mostly on foot. Some on horseback. (back than horses didn't spawn in the wild.).... So back to the corpse. If killed by an animal. no big deal, but if by a monster or another player... warning flags, pker could be in area. Of course you could tell by condition of corpse how "fresh it was"

I do believe the advantage to blacksmithing having arms lore is no longer viable.
And camping, that goes without saying, yes it has value. I can't say how many times I had a none magic user out roaming, wanted to log, so just camped. Or my fisherman camping on boat.

side note. " at one time recall wasn't part of the game, it was put in for easy access out of the depths of dungeons."

I don't know. perhaps players have changed play-style so much, few have needs for these lesser skills. But I for one
still enjoy having them, thus would not like seeing them removed.

Thanks all, good topic

Bump for Trammel awareness!!!

Two things I'd vote for ... get rid of recalling and remove universal item ID

Love both ideas ! And another one ... Make moongates work they way they used to work.
You can't choose your destination moongate but instead, it is chosen from a dial based on the current moon phase. You need a spyglass to get the current moon phase. Hell yeah.

Until recently, I did most my stuff on foot. Didn't have a ride since I can't afford an ethereal and didn't want to waste recalls because I'm not such a spoiled GM Mage GM Scribe brat.

Moongates, biiiitch :

I wholly approve of proper moongate functions, despite having become accustomed to the gump. This would play really well in Factions, that require moongate travel to carry sigils back and forth. It would also stop people from being able to escape to a destination of their choice, through moongates.

I find the response about magery and recalls funny in relation to your blessed rune suggestion.

....Did I just actually read this?

You didn't have a ride cuz you can't afford an ethy?

Mind = blown... the trammel is strong with this one.

The blessed rune was a suggestion in addition to the blessed runebook deed.

I would rather remove recalls all together from the game and not have reason to carry a rune on most of my chars anyway.

Says the guy with unlimited stamina mounts ? I just don't waste my gold on mounts but would ride one if vet rewards spit out an ethereal.
Yeah it's pretty trammie doing all your stuff on foot. Try getting from the brit gate to Britain with a 10 Dex char ...

Seriously, this trammie talk is getting on my nerves. This is basically Godwin's Law transferred to UO - and unfortunately extremely common in this forum. Why don't we keep the word trammie in the Trash Talk forum and try to argue and discuss in the grown up forums. If you can't express your thought without using the word trammie and if you can't win your argument without calling something trammie - you have lost.

Because its the nature of UO chat, for, I dunno, the last 13 years since the release of Trammel.

You don't see it as Trammel to chide someone for taking advantage of a readily available (and if you ask nicely, or have a low-level tamer, free) mount -- but say that its perfectly acceptable to utilize an Ethy for the *EXACT SAME PURPOSE*?

The only difference -- you can't lose the ethy.

That's pretty much the definition of Trammel to me: "there is no reason to do it if theres a risk I might lose something in the process"

You need to stop taking things so personally -- the implication of 'Trammy' is not meant as derision of a person; more as a descriptive of an idea that is not befitting the risk vs reward mindset. This falls PERFECTLY in line with that, so why you would turn what I thought was an amusing line into a battle is beyond me -- they were your words, not mine.

If you don't like the accusation of 'Trammy', then perhaps think out what you're going to type in terms of risk vs reward, on a shard-wide scale and not so localized to only your perspective.

Some more on the topic. Of course, we can't expect all skills in the game to be equally valuable.

But I think there is room to add more importance to Arms Lore and Item ID and finally have some skills for your "Merchant" Char.

With the three account allowance and free skill macroing, I want to meet the person that can't afford to get a GM ItemID GM Armslore Char.
Add some hiding and start with 50 Magery for spell-recalling and you have your Merchant.
Let him do your shopping, do your own evaluation on the gear on sale.

"Back in the days" I would have a dummy vendor that I would use to evaluate all my GM made weapons. That was called "Vendor Default Price" and you can still read about it on Tower of Roses http://www.towerofroses.de/pric-vdp.htm
Couldn't make my own GM ItemID because of the Anti Macro Code in place on the OSI shards then. You couldn't gain off the same item twice ...

That would add a very nice touch to the player vendor system on the shard. People learn to trust certain vendors / vendor houses and find some foul ones. Maintaining a good reputation becomes even more important and picking your vendors right as a vendor house owner is also a delicate task.

Oh yeah, is everyone aware that even Exceptional GM Smith wares differ in quality ? Take a look at the Tower of Roses VDP.

That's a messed up definition. There's many things you don't do in Felucca because there's a risk involved. That's what Felucca is all about - change the way you play because you adapt to the risks. And that's Trammel to you ?

Do you take your Silver/Vanq spear along when you hang out at brit bank ?
Do you keep the ship key on your fisherman for easy refreshing and docking ?
I could add a million things you don't do because there is a risk you might lose something in the process - if you're in felucca.

Trammel to me is complaining about the risks, getting them removed and having a courtyard.

Now when I decide the benefit of having a mount is not worth the risk of loosing it and the obligation to feed it and stable that soon-to-become-a-salami - I'm making a valid decision based on the ruleset we all play in. No complaining, just saying that I would use a different kind of mount that is much easier to maintain.

If you don't want a bonded mount, don't feed it. Otherwise, there is no upkeep. Keep it under you, and it remains.

Your very definition of 'trammel', counteracts your very explanation of the mount situation. The definition I provided, is the generally accepted definition of it -- and "I don't want to deal with the potential hassles of losing it" is VERY Trammel, accept it or not.

You are absolutely welcome to apply your own logic and function of your own volition here; but the concept of "Action A has the potential for consequence B, and therefore I will never undertake Action A because Consequence B is too much of an inconvenience to me" is at its deepest root what being 'trammy' is about.

Just to address this directly -- this is absolutely what Feluccan life is about. And, if your adaptation to that system is, "theres risk in losing it unless I have an ethy, therefore I'm just not even going to get involved in it" -- is about as trammy as you can get. That says to me, if theres a risk, I'm not interested. The Feluccan way is about finding your own ways to WORK WITH these systems -- not avoid them because they're inconvenient to you. You sir, simply have your wires crossed on this subject.

Also, Vet rewards are platinum rewards. Hence the accrual of platinum for just being here.