To generate POMs with resolved information (e.g. version numbers) to check the values that the Release Plugin will use, execute the prepare-with-pom goal. Resolved values will be saved in release-pom.xml.
mvn release:prepare-with-pom
This relies on release.properties being present from a previous release preparation. If this is not the case, you need to give the goal the name of the URL and optional tag to perform the release from. For example:
mvn release:prepare-with-pom -DconnectionUrl=scm:svn:https://svn.apache.org/repos/asf/maven/plugins/tags/maven-release-plugin-2.0
After the release is complete, the release.properties and other release files will be removed from the checkout.