Identifying something related to a creature

[Ed Reppert]

One of the things the adventurers find under Otari is pieces (including a very large piece with big claw marks on it) of some kind of eggshell. While no one in the town of Otari seems to be able to identify it. Nonetheless, I'm wondering what DC you'd set to identify it.

just in case:

The Game Master's Guide indicates that identifying the dragon itself would be a DC 19 check, but what about the eggshell? The claw marks are a clue, of course, as is the green veining, and if no one in town can identify it (I would have expected Morlibint to at least have a shot at it) I guess the DC is higher than 19. You could set it to 30, and certainly no one in the party could beat that, but you'd have to set it to at least 33 to knock Morlibint out of the game. But is that reasonable, generally speaking?

[egindar]

When running it, the players asked if they could identify it at the end of the first floor, and I set the DC to 19 considering all the contextual clues. At least one person in the party passed it. It didn't affect much in the way they proceeded through the rest of the dungeon.

[Captain Morgan]

This is what the hard +2, very hard +5, and incredibly hard +10 adjustments are for. I usually use hard or very hard adjustments when you're working off partial information like this, so either DC 21 or 24.

[Ed Reppert]

Hm. Morlibint probably has about +12 to Arcana (fourth level, expert, 18 INT) and he apparently has no clue what this thing is (must have failed his check). I'm thinking minimum very hard. I would go for incredibly hard, but I'm not sure that's appropriate given what we're looking at.