Attack of the poles

[tbone]

Adventurers' gear list has 6' and 10' poles for pitching tents and poking at stuff. What happens if you need to fight with one of these?

If this isn't already answered somewhere, my guesses:

6' pole: Treat as a Quarterstaff, at -1 damage (because it's 3 lbs. instead of 4 lbs.), +1 to break (because it's cheaper and presumably not made for fighting). Min ST still 7 (because there's no open space between Quarterstaff ST 7 and Jo ST 6).

10' pole: Treat as a Long Staff, at unchanged damage (because it's the same 5 lbs.), +1 to break (because it's cheaper). Min ST 10 (same as Long Staff).

Sound OK? Or is a 10' pole notably longer than a Long Staff, maybe calling for a -2 TH for clumsiness?

[ArchonShiva]

A long staff has a reach 3 sw and thr mode that still offers +2 Parry (i.e. Staff stance), so I guess it still has one yard more or less in your hex. I’d call it effectively the same length under DFRPG’s slightly abstracted rules.

[martinl]

For regular folks, -2 for clumsiness seems right - no sane person would be so paranoid as to make their tent pole out of a fighting staff.

For delvers, that is totally something they'd do. A cheap backup weapon that takes the same space as chunk of equipment I want anyway? Of course, why wouldn't I?

[tbone]

Thanks for the replies (to what may be the most uninteresting thread ever : ).

I'll stick with my stats for 6' poles.

For the 10-footer... That's a really long pole for fighting, so I'll keep the -2 penalty... but if the user chops off just a foot or two (creating a nice baton for someone else), I think I'll call that a proper Long Staff with no penalty.

[Tom H.]

They must have had enough, what with the invasions of the 20th Century.

[Anaraxes]

Originally Posted by Tom H.

They must have had enough, what with the invasions of the 20th Century.

A counterattack was inevitable. Plus, they have the advantage that any staves they pick up automatically become Pole arms.