Staves

[SuedodeuS]

The simple way to represent a quarterstaff's poor performance against armor would be to give it a negative armor divisor. (0.5) should cut it, although it does lead to some oddities. First off, the quarterstaff will always suffer at least a -1 damage malus. Secondly, a quarterstaff in the hands of an ST 12 individual will do nothing half the time when striking someone's bare head. How close to reality is this? If a modestly strong individual struck someone on the head with a staff, would you expect for the target to suffer nothing more than a slight sting half the time (with the other half the time ranging from reeling with pain to crumpling from a concussion)?

[Witchking]

Another potential point of abuse...in most settings staves will be cheap!!

in the campaign I am playing a wizard in the base cost for a stave is $5.

If the GM allows it, its not RAW (mine does) the cost for a VF staff (20x) is $100...less than an average broadsword.

So in addition to the +2 to parry my ST 9 mage can do 1d+3 sw or 1d+2 th...it is only crush but not too bad...

If I was GMing I wouldnt allow it but it is somewhat logical....

[trooper6]

Originally Posted by Witchking

Another potential point of abuse...in most settings staves will be cheap!!

in the campaign I am playing a wizard in the base cost for a stave is $5.

If the GM allows it, its not RAW (mine does) the cost for a VF staff (20x) is $100...less than an average broadsword.

So in addition to the +2 to parry my ST 9 mage can do 1d+3 sw or 1d+2 th...it is only crush but not too bad...

If I was GMing I wouldnt allow it but it is somewhat logical....

But that house rule isn't logical. Only bladed weapons get the damage bonus for increased materials. Even having a Fine Staff won't increase damage.

So you are a ST-9 Mage...with say, DX 10...because you've spent all your points in IQ and HT. You are not spending your points on weapon master...you've got Magery and all sorts of spells to get. Let's say you only put 1 pt in the skill, as someone mentioned upthread.

So you have Staff - 9 (DX-1) [1]
Damage thrust/cr 1d, swing/cr 1d+1
You have a Staff parry of 9. And that isn't a Fencing Parry.

This Staff-wielding mage is not Uber.

Now a Staff-wielding Weapon Master Ogre with a ST20...that is something I'm pondering considering that my little Rapier fighter may have to fight one in Wrathchild's play by post Arena fight on rpol...

Here: http://rpol.net/game.cgi?gi=35464&date=1236651857

All you GURPS fighters...join!

[roguebfl]

Originally Posted by trooper6

So you are a ST-9 Mage...with say, DX 10...because you've spent all your points in IQ and HT. You are not spending your points on weapon master...you've got Magery and all sorts of spells to get. Let's say you only put 1 pt in the skill, as someone mentioned upthread.

So you have Staff - 9 (DX-1) [1]
Damage thrust/cr 1d, swing/cr 1d+1
You have a Staff parry of 9. And that isn't a Fencing Parry.

This Staff-wielding mage is not Uber.

Lets not forget what any one wither a /real/ skill would do to them with a feint...

[Henquist]

My experience with staff fighters in the SCA is that hands tend to get smashed alot while defending with a shafted weapon. Hands arent typically an issue when using a sword or other weapons held by one end. I think there is a major oversight concerning the exposed hands and lack of stops for slides along the shaft. Swords have crossguards and basket hilts to guard against this, but what does a staff have? nothing, and two potential targets to slide towards and defend from damage.

Even wearing steel clamshell gauntlets completely concealing and covering the hands a pole fighter comes off a battlefield or tournament with battered fingers fairly often.

[Phil Masters]

Originally Posted by Peter Knutsen

Back to GURPS, part of the problem may be Wizards and similar characters in DF campaigns who get the full +2 bonus to parry rolls after just 1 CP in the Staff skill.

One point in an Average skill. Let's assume that the wizard is pretty dextrous as GURPS wizards go in my experience, and make him DX 13. So one point gets him Staff-12, which gives a base parry of 9; +2 for the staff, and +1 for retreating (because a wizard who doesn't back out of melee combat as fast as his little robe-covered legs will carry him) takes that up to 12. Pretty good, but, you know, he's taking the hit on a 13+. That's not really nice odds.

Plus, two-handed staff implies no shield; no shield implies no block and no DB, so incoming missile fire is a bitch. Sure, a "badass" staff-fighter has Parry Missile Weapons at ungodly levels - but drop those same points into shortsword and shield, and you may well be better off.

I suspect that the optimised build for a 100-150 point GURPS wizard who wants some chance of surviving melee combat is actually sword and shield; the staff is more a matter of tradition and innocuous appearances. Conversely, it is possible to build a truly badass cinematic staff fighter, but that's in keeping with tradition, from Elizabethan boasts about staff-fighters taking down three Spanish swordsmen at a time, through tales of Robin Hood in various media, to modern kung fu movies.

[mlangsdorf]

The strong advantage of Staff for mages isn't the parry, but the 2 hex reduction in Regular spell casting penalties provided by the Staff spell on a two-hex object.

I've been playing around with mages using Shield (Buckler) and Smallsword (Short Staff) to carry a 1 hex Staff object and a small shield. The extra DB and ability to block missiles is hopefully a fair trade-off for the slightly worse parry and additional -1 to cast Regular spells.

[Bruno]

Originally Posted by mlangsdorf

I've been playing around with mages using Shield (Buckler) and Smallsword (Short Staff) to carry a 1 hex Staff object and a small shield. The extra DB and ability to block missiles is hopefully a fair trade-off for the slightly worse parry and additional -1 to cast Regular spells.

The parry's base number is worse, but it IS a fencing parry (and he has a block available), so if cornered, the Buckler and Baton wizard is in at least as good a situation as Mr Staff.

Use a Regular shield for the +2 DB, and you've made up all of the Staff's bonus, plus gained an extra defense option. The fencing parry isn't as good against big or heavy weapons, but the shield will work fine. If your wizard gets pinned in a corner by three halberdeers he's not going to have enough defenses to go around, but that's a rather bad situation for a non-melee combatant anyways.

EDIT: My emergency backup Mrugnak is a buckler-and-baton type.

[Peter Knutsen]

Originally Posted by Phil Masters

I suspect that the optimised build for a 100-150 point GURPS wizard who wants some chance of surviving melee combat is actually sword and shield; the staff is more a matter of tradition and innocuous appearances. Conversely, it is possible to build a truly badass cinematic staff fighter, but that's in keeping with tradition, from Elizabethan boasts about staff-fighters taking down three Spanish swordsmen at a time, through tales of Robin Hood in various media, to modern kung fu movies.

In Sagatafl, an impotant tool for all spellcasters except the most amateurish dabblers, is a Focus. It is somewhat equivalent to a Magery bonus with Gadget Limitations, except rather more important than that.

Originally, characters would always opt for small Focus items, ideally rings or brooches (or even earrings or toe rings) because there are huge advantages to that (less likely that your Focus gets stolen) and no disadvantages.

I didn't like that. I wanted the iconic wizard-with-his-staff look to be fairly common, but that would not realistically emerge from the rules as they were.

I therefore changed the rules so that the Essence cost of a Focus item (vaguely similar to the Energy Point of a gURPS Enchantment) depended on the size class of the item: Tiny, Normal size or Large, with Large being staff, two-handed sword, longbow and similar quite large items. That gets me what I want. Now characters will - realistically - contemplate creating large Focus items, because the Essence cost discount is somewhat attractive.

In GURPS DF, there could be a similar rule for Items of Power, those energy storage items (I believe) all spellcaster templates buy with starting money. Either make a rule that makes the SM of the item affect its cost (cost being derived from maximum energy storage), or else simply make a rule that an Item of Power can be of any shape and size, but if it is a staff of between 5.5 and 7 feet in length, it gets 50% more energy storage for the same cost (in exchange for which the character must also live with the encumbrance of a quarterstaff).

It's all a question of deciding what one wants, as a GM, and then tweaking the rules so that that which one wants emerges realistically.


(If one wants more, one can do what I've done and add all sorts of staff-pimping Enchantments to the system. All weapons can get Enchantments, in Sagatafl, to become able to parry ranged attacks without penalties, but on staves the Essence cost is reduced - and even further reduced on shields. Likewise extra attacks and extra parries Enchantments are available for all weapons, but they cost less on staves. I think in GURPS terms a discount on Shatterproof on quarterstaves might be good, perhaps with the discount only applying if the quarterstaff already has the Staff Enchantment.)

[Der Wanderer]

Originally Posted by Phil Masters

One point in an Average skill. Let's assume that the wizard is pretty dextrous as GURPS wizards go in my experience, and make him DX 13. So one point gets him Staff-12, which gives a base parry of 9; +2 for the staff, and +1 for retreating (because a wizard who doesn't back out of melee combat as fast as his little robe-covered legs will carry him) takes that up to 12. Pretty good, but, you know, he's taking the hit on a 13+. That's not really nice odds.

Under the same assumptions the Warrior has at least Flail 18, Shield 16, and Extra Attack, so he can do Deceptive Attacks quickly reducing defense from 12 to 6 (-4 for morning star, -2 or more for deceptive attack) or worse, so the staff is not that nice anyway.

@All: Staffs are great (Cheap, easy available, good parry, decent damage)

Problems with staffs:
- Some attacks cannot be parried (Spray- / Area Attacks or really heavy weapons (The giants giant maul))
- Some attacks can only be parried at a penalty (Ranged Attacks / Flails etc.).
- Climbing, Swimming, Stealth with a 2 meter long pole is not an easy task (A spear has a Bulk of -6)
- While you can pack it on top of your backpack you could never Fast-Draw it, so most staff wielding heroes have it constantly in their hands while a Shortsword can be easily worn on the belt...
- Disarming / Breaking is really bad (Hard to carry a backup staff)
- While Knives will be acceptable in most places you cannot always carry a staff

Problems specific for staff wielding mages:
- A mages Staff is probably enchanted and expensive (which will make some of the problems mentioned above even graver as no mage will leave his staff behind to climb a cliff etc.)
- A staff requires two hand = no gestures = only spells that require no gesture!!!
- A staff is a farmers weapon and might be not worthy of a nobel mage.

I personally think that a mage with a short stick is better off, with the smallsword skill he gets +3 for retreat so his parry will be the same as someone with the same skill level of staff, but a short stick is much easier to carry. My favorite weapon for mages is actually the bladed hand, as it leaves the hands empty for spellcasting...