～ばわかる as an idiomatic expression meaning something like "if you do this you'll know right away"


I was playing Genshin Impact just now, and heard the line:

> 別に考えなくても。。見れば分かるじゃないか

This is after someone says something like "Why are you in Liyue? Is it for the
Lantern Rite festival?"

Literally, this sentence is something like "Even if you don't really think
about it, if you look you can tell right", or I think the natural translation
is something like "I mean that should be plain to see".

What I'm specifically wondering is if this ~ばわかる or maybe 見れば分かる is a
particular idiomatic expression to express something that should be obvious if
one were to look.

Edit:

Specifically, what happens if we change this to something like
見ると分かる、見たら分かる、見るなら分かる. Intuition tells me the first is fine, the second is
weird, and the third is very weird.

Also, I still struggle to understand when exactly ば is used over the other
conditionals but one of the usages seems to be in more set phrases, like
～ばよかった or ～ば～ほど, so I'm wondering if this is one of these set phrases or
common phrases.




> Literally, this sentence is something like "Even if you don't really think
> about it, if you look you can tell right",

I think you're right.  
It could also be read as two separate sentences:
「別に考えなくても（いいだろう）。。」+「見ればわかるじゃないか。」, "You don't really need to think.. If you
see you can tell, right?" When saying 「(別にetc.) Vなくてもいいだろう・いいでしょう。」, the
「いい～。」 part is often left unsaid in daily speech.

> Specifically, what happens if we change this to something like
> 見ると分かる、見たら分かる、見るなら分かる. Intuition tells me the first is fine, the second is
> weird, and the third is very weird.

「見ればわかる」 is often contracted to 「見りゃわかる」 in informal/rough speech (れば→りゃ) eg.
「見りゃわかんだろ！」. 「見ればわかる」 in your example could be rephrased 「見たらわかる」, but 見たら～
may sound more casual/informal than 見れば～, and I think we use 見たら～ more in
Kansai (or west Japan) eg. 「見たらわかるやん。」.「見るとわかる」 is grammatically correct, but
acceptable in a different context. 「見るならわかる」 sounds unnatural.

> What I'm specifically wondering is if this ~ばわかる or maybe 見れば分かる is a
> particular idiomatic expression to express something that should be obvious
> if one were to look.
>
> Also, I still struggle to understand when exactly ば is used over the other
> conditionals but one of the usages seems to be in more set phrases, like
> ～ばよかった or ～ば～ほど, so I'm wondering if this is one of these set phrases or
> common phrases.

The phrase is commonly used to say something is obvious, or to say "Can't you
see?", but I'm not sure it's an idiomatic expression (慣用句?).

これらの「～ば + (potential) verb」と同じ用法かな、と思います：

「来ればわかるよ。」「読めばわかる。」「勉強すれば受かる。」「申し込めばもらえます。」「煮れば食える。」...  
「来たらわかるよ。」「読んだらわかる。」「勉強したら受かる。」「申し込んだらもらえます。」「煮たら食える。」とだいたい同じ意味です。（但し、過去形にすると意味が変わると思います。）




> Literally, this sentence is something like "Even if you don't really think
> about it, if you look you can tell right",

I think you're right.  
It could also be read as two separate sentences:
「別に考えなくても（いいだろう）。。」+「見ればわかるじゃないか。」, "You don't really need to think.. If you
see you can tell, right?" When saying 「(別にetc.) Vなくてもいいだろう・いいでしょう。」, the
「いい～。」 part is often left unsaid in daily speech.

> Specifically, what happens if we change this to something like
> 見ると分かる、見たら分かる、見るなら分かる. Intuition tells me the first is fine, the second is
> weird, and the third is very weird.

「見ればわかる」 is often contracted to 「見りゃわかる」 in informal/rough speech (れば→りゃ) eg.
「見りゃわかんだろ！」. 「見ればわかる」 in your example could be rephrased 「見たらわかる」, but 見たら～
may sound more casual/informal than 見れば～, and I think we use 見たら～ more in
Kansai (or west Japan) eg. 「見たらわかるやん。」.「見るとわかる」 is grammatically correct, but
acceptable in a different context. 「見るならわかる」 sounds unnatural.

> What I'm specifically wondering is if this ~ばわかる or maybe 見れば分かる is a
> particular idiomatic expression to express something that should be obvious
> if one were to look.
>
> Also, I still struggle to understand when exactly ば is used over the other
> conditionals but one of the usages seems to be in more set phrases, like
> ～ばよかった or ～ば～ほど, so I'm wondering if this is one of these set phrases or
> common phrases.

The phrase is commonly used to say something is obvious, or to say "Can't you
see?", but I'm not sure it's an idiomatic expression (慣用句?).

これらの「～ば + (potential) verb」と同じ用法かな、と思います：

「来ればわかるよ。」「読めばわかる。」「勉強すれば受かる。」「申し込めばもらえます。」「煮れば食える。」...  
「来たらわかるよ。」「読んだらわかる。」「勉強したら受かる。」「申し込んだらもらえます。」「煮たら食える。」とだいたい同じ意味です。（但し、過去形にすると意味が変わると思います。）

