During the night my wizard casts the alarm spell around where he sleeps (yes, even inside his tiny hut) to make sure nobody tries to touch his stuff. During the day however he has to rely on his own senses, which is just too mundane for his liking, so he has been working on a spell for that.

My current suggestion is:

Alert

xth-level Divination

Casting time: 1 minute

Range: Touch, special

Components: V, S, M (something clever I will think of later)

Duration: 8 hours

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You create a divination sensor which can warn against attempted theft. Choose a single portable object within range that is no heavier than your ability to carry it. Until the spell ends you are alerted whenever a tiny or larger creature touches the object. The alert takes the form of a vision revealing the image of the creature in a clear manner which would allow you to identify the individual creature should you be, or become, familiar with them.

When you cast this spell you can designate creatures that won't trigger the alert.

The mental alert will only trigger if the object is within 60ft of you when the object is touched.

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This spell is castable by a Wizard

I am heavily considering making this a ritual, because that fits spells like this, but that might be asking too much because then it effectively becomes free. So assuming I don't try to make it a ritual – what level should this spell sit at? I know that making it a ritual doesn't really effect the level, but it does make it a pretty moot point once you are high enough level to cast it at all, which I am.

My own personal thought is that power wise it is probably 1st level, but since Alarm already sits as a 1st level spell and doesn't cover objects I can only assume that is deliberate, so would be more likely to put this as a 2nd level spell.

Notes:

If there are any abuses with a spell like this please let me know, I put the 60ft range on it because it is only intended to protect things my character is carrying, I am happy to change that to a shorter distance if it makes sense, but 60ft felt right.

The basic idea of the spell, that I hope I conveyed with the wording, is that whenever someone touches my stuff I know who did it. The expectation is that it is one of my own party!