Damage anomaly with Wizard's Staves?

[hcobb]

If it was up to me I'd make the maul do damage as a one handed club of one ST higher with another step down for bare hands (and everything based on it) of 1d-5 at ST 6 or less.

Also have bashing and piercing attacks do half damage after armor while armor and shields (but not magical protections) are doubled against cutting attacks.

[TippetsTX]

I also think the use of the term 'maul' is inaccurate in the ITL text. A maul is the same thing as a great hammer IMO.

[hcobb]

Historically military clubs were used with sword skills for sword training.

I.e. pick the metal weapon that is the closest match to your stick and subtract two points of damage for using a lightweight wooden replica. Use it either with the matching weapon talent or use it untrained at an extra die to hit.

[RobW]

Originally Posted by Kirk

So I'm right, the rules they changed around staves don't work well?

There are problems, but this isn't one of them.

A wizard with a staff has the melee option of either a 1ST occult attack that does 1D of armor-penetrating damage (IMO this occult attack can be defended), or a physical attack that does whatever damage the staff is capable of, as club, sword,etc. That seems fine, yes?

As Tippets says, I think the problem you're raising is that club damage might be too high, at least for wizards.

[hcobb]

So the problem is that an untrained man with a stick is only slightly outmatched by a barely trained guy with a sword and is hopelessly outclassed by a sword master?

Plus the swordsman gets to use both hands?

[RobW]

Club == upgrade to nowhere

Does anyone honestly see clubs as a scary rules exploit?

[RobW]

That said, my sense of aesthetics and wonder is severely damaged by the idea of a wizard using a two-handed club staff while casting spells. Hey, batter batter....

I think I would change p 142, a two-handed staff does impede gesturing unless you have skill for it. So:
quarterstaff == OK
two-handed mega club == gesture IMPEDED

[TippetsTX]

Originally Posted by RobW

That said, my sense of aesthetics and wonder is severely damaged by the idea of a wizard using a two-handed club staff while casting spells. Hey, batter batter....

I think I would change p 142, a two-handed staff does impede gesturing unless you have skill for it. So:
quarterstaff == OK
two-handed mega club == gesture IMPEDED

I also recall seeing a suggestion elsewhere in this forum that perhaps the process of imbuing the staff with magic makes it more fragile and therefore unsuitable as a melee weapon... at least until it reaches level III or IV.

[hcobb]

But we all agree that the rules explicitly allow a talentless wizard to defend against a greatsword with a wand of negligible weight that does no damage of its own on a physical strike, right?

[TippetsTX]

Originally Posted by hcobb

But we all agree that the rules explicitly allow a talentless wizard to defend against a greatsword with a wand of negligible weight that does no damage of its own on a physical strike, right?

Ha! You are the master of loopholes, man.