Re: Staff Spears, Spear Staffs, and Associated Baggage
The text for Form Mastery (Martial Arts, p. 50) and Switching Weapon Skills (ibid. p. 104) seems to say that spears can be wielded as staves with no penalty.
As you have probably noticed, that is a very powerful option if you have form mastery, since it basically allows you to have a staff with all the usual benefits plus being able to stab. I think the problem is essentially that Staff skill and it's +2 to parry is a little overpowered and unrealistic. Dropping it to a normal (or possibly fencing) parry and using the rules from Martial Arts for Defensive Grip (p. 111) and Parrying With Two-Handed Weapons (p. 123) would keep them reasonably good while not raising awkward issues like this.
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