You make a good point, I'm not gonna pretend otherwise. Though as a side note regarding dismissing druids, I'm not really sure that most reasonable people could because this is a world where magic is demonstrably real so the idea of people being able to talk with animals isn't even as far-fetched as say, someone who can throw lightning. And druids do have other demonstrable magic so why disbelieve their experiences on this front? But that's an aside and a bit of a smaller issue, a digression really. The bigger issue as I see it is that what you describe requires players to actively make up rp reasons not to use these things if they don't want to, which just limits their roleplay. It probably wasn't even a thing the player would have factored in on a first playthrough when they didn't realize it was an option. Furthermore with something like this, who's to say that all or most players will really understand the problem or issue immediately enough that it doesn't have an impact on their experience? The game has a lot going on, and it's also entirely reasonable that the issue of replayability doesn't even dawn on a player until they replay the game after they've played through using all the items and only then realize that the experience is now lessser as a result. Expecting players to constantly be policing themselves throughout every point of the game feels like an admission that the game just hasn't been well-designed. Since I don't think I've come across a game that requires so many avenues to be policed the way this game does.
Also on a related note, it's easy to say more people should commit to RP, but that's not always easy or automtic. Me for example, I'm quite avid when it comes to roleplaying characters but my first playthrough of a game (the playthrough where having this stuff that weakens replay value) is always my weakest in terms of roleplay because I'm never comfortable committing to strict roleplay until I've seen the game through and know what kind of limitations it'sgoing to present. That way I don't create a character whose choices are disallowed by the game.
