>And if this suggestion is deemed too powerful as-is (which I could totally see it being), how about just the ability to remove one of the Enhancives in the item? (At the very least, this lets a Bard strip off things that nobody cares about, and that just serve to jack up the price to recharge it.)
I think a fusion of your idea and the original idea can work, too. Give the bard a chance to remove an unwanted enhancive property and increase another on the same item. Success rate can be based on the bard's stats/skills, as well as the enhancive properties involved. If the bard succeed, the unwanted enhancive property disappears, and the desired enhancive property can increase. If the bard fails, you get a consolation result of only removing the unwanted enhancive, and everything else stays the same. This gives demand for a higher level bard's service, but even a lower level bard can have a lot to contribute depending on what the customer wants to accomplish with their items.
To build on the example used on the opening post, for the enhancive talisman with the +5 OHE ranks, +8 first aid bonus, +5 summoning lore bonus, perhaps a bard can have a better chance of increasing the OHE rank when sacrificing the +8 first aid bonus instead of the +5 summoning lore bonus. Other factors can come in play on how success is calculated, too. Increasing a +4 OHE item would be a lot easier than increasing a +6 OHE item. Sacrificing 3 STR bonus to increase something would give a much higher rate of success than sacrificing 3 INF bonus. You get the idea.
