You are skilled at the art of casting spells, identifying magic items, crafting magic items, and identifying spells as they are being cast.

Check

Spellcraft is used whenever your knowledge and skill of the technical art of casting a spell or crafting a magic item comes into question. This skill is also used to identify the properties of magic items in your possession through the use of spells such as detect magic and identify. The DC of this check varies depending upon the task at hand.

Action

Identify Spell Being Cast

Identifying a spell as it is being cast requires no action, but you must be able to clearly see the spell as it is being cast, and this incurs the same penalties as a Perception skill check due to distance, poor conditions, and other factors.

Learn Spell from Spellbook

Learning a spell from a spellbook takes 1 hour per level of the spell (0-level spells take 30 minutes).

Prepare Spell from Borrowed Spellbook

Preparing a spell from a borrowed spellbook does not add any time to your spell preparation.

Crafting Magic Items

Making a Spellcraft check to craft a magic item is made as part of the creation process.

Determine Properties of Magic Item

Attempting to ascertain the properties of a magic item takes 3 rounds per item to be identified and you must be able to thoroughly examine the object.

Retry

Identify Spell Being Cast

You cannot retry checks made to identify a spell.

Learn Spell from Spellbook

If you fail to learn a spell from a spellbook or scroll, you must wait at least 1 week before you can try again.

Prepare Spell from Borrowed Spellbook

If you fail to prepare a spell from a borrowed spellbook, you cannot try again until the next day.

Determine Properties of Magic Item

When using detect magic or identify to learn the properties of magic items, you can only attempt to ascertain the properties of an individual item once per day. Additional attempts reveal the same results.

Special

• If you are a specialist wizard, you get a +2 bonus on Spellcraft checks made to identify, learn, and prepare spells from your chosen school. Similarly, you take a –5 penalty on similar checks made concerning spells from your opposition schools.
• An elf gets a +2 racial bonus on Spellcraft checks to identify the properties of magic items.
• If you have the Magical Aptitude feat, you get a +2 bonus on all Spellcraft checks. If you have 10 or more ranks in Spellcraft, the bonus increases to +4.