Details learned when identifying items

[Aspiration]

Now, I have a specific question, which led me to a general question.

The specific question is that I'm trying to figure out what methods there would be to tell if a pale orange rhomboid ioun stone (http://www.d20pfsrd.com/magic-items/wondrous-items/wondrous-items/h-l/ioun-stones/pale-orange-rhomboid) contained a soul or not. Would a standard casting of Identify do it, or would that only reveal the stone's function?

Researching this, I started wondering; are there any rules or guidelines on what details about the "status" of an item are revealed by Identify, in similar situations?

[Psyren]

When you say "contains a soul," do you mean that the item is intelligent, or that there is a soul simply stored/trapped inside that doesn't affect the item itself? In other words, does the soul belong to the item or is it merely contained there?

For the former, the item becomes a creature (specifically, a construct) and thus would need Knowledge (Arcana) to identify its abilities unless it reveals itself and its powers to you. You can go a step further to hide it by giving it the Secretive (http://paizo.com/paizo/blog/v5748dyo5lbsa&page=1) property.

For the latter, you would need something that finds souls or locates creatures to determine that a creature is trapped inside the object. Depending on how powerful the soul is, this can be more or less difficult - powerful souls are more notable and thus can be more easily researched or tracked by things like Legend Lore. The person searching would have to know there is something to look for though.

[Slithery D]

When you say "contains a soul," do you mean that the item is intelligent, or that there is a soul simply stored/trapped inside that doesn't affect the item itself? In other words, does the soul belong to the item or is it merely contained there?

For the former, the item becomes a creature (specifically, a construct) and thus would need Knowledge (Arcana) to identify its abilities unless it reveals itself and its powers to you.

He might be thinking about intelligent magic items, which are sometimes fluffed as having a soul used in their creation. I think the actual item rules leave it deliberately ambiguous. Intelligent magic items aren't constructs.

[Psyren]

Intelligent magic items aren't constructs.

This is false. CRB:

"Intelligent items can actually be considered creatures because they have Intelligence, Wisdom, and Charisma scores. Treat them as constructs. Intelligent items often have the ability to illuminate their surroundings at will (as magic weapons do); many cannot see otherwise." (http://www.d20pfsrd.com/magic-items/intelligent-items)

[Elder_Basilisk]

Pretty sure the other posters are on a tangent here. The question has nothing to do with intelligent items. The particular iuon stone functions as a magic jar. So, you figure that out; the question is: "is it currently in use?"

I don't think that the rules directly address this but I generally lean towards transparency in my games, so I'd probably give that much to the players without any kind of a check: "You see the image of an wrinkled but still vibrant man with a long, oiled gray beard in the depths of the crystal." I generally want a good reason to hide things from the players and I don't see any way that their ignorance would make the game better in this situation. Likewise, if the players picked up a charges per day item and successfully identified it, i'd probably tell them "and it has 1 charge left today" or "all its charges are spent."

[Psyren]

Pretty sure the other posters are on a tangent here.

I addressed both possibilities in my initial reply. "It's storing a soul" requires some GM adjudication though.

[Florian]

Pretty sure the other posters are on a tangent here. The question has nothing to do with intelligent items. The particular iuon stone functions as a magic jar. So, you figure that out; the question is: "is it currently in use?"

I think the answer to that is pretty much clear as you also gain the "ready state" of any items, including charges/daily uses total and still left, and so on. A Magic Jar that is already occupied can´t be used right now, so that should give you some basic knowledge that it already holds a soul. What soul? Who knows, time for a Legend Lore spell or something like that.