The Beginning of a Thought

I was musing about single-use magic items, and in particular the tendency of PCs to just horde these items - because they might be needed later, or because the Cleric has the ability to cast the spell at no cost, or for whatever reason they're never the best use of resource, so they just sit there. It's something that bugs me just a bit (though not too much - it's not something I give much thought to). Certainly, I would much rather that characters use these items!

My initial solution to this had three parts:

1. Use of encumbrance rules such that the characters' ability to carry lots of potions is limited. Especially when using the "ten things" rule, carrying lots of individual potions or scrolls becomes prohibitive.
   
2. Use of some sort of 'expiry date' mechanism to foster a use-it-or-lose-it mentality. The big problem with this is that it limits the ability to place potions within a dungeon, since they'd probably have expired by the time the PCs get there.
   
3. Allowing PCs to trade in unwanted potions and scrolls. Initially, this would just allow them to sell them for cash. However, if I ever sort out my revisions to item crafting, it may be possible to break down potions into Reagents and scrolls into Lore, and thus reuse them on other items.

However, I have recently been exposed to a fourth option that I think has some considerable merit: when a PC uses a one-use magic item (potion, scroll, or similar), they are awarded a small XP award. This needs to be a small award, in order to avoid totally blowing XP budgets out of the water, but it should provide a small incentive to persuade PCs to actually use these items, rather than just hording items for a rainy day.

(My initially proposed award would be 50 XP per member of the party per item. Again, though, if and when I revise item crafting, I'm inclined to think that each item will be assigned a value - you can trade it in for gold, break it down for Lore or Reagents, or expend it to gain XP, and in each case it is worth the same numeric amount. But that's a long-term project I'll probably never get around to.)