Staves in Roleplay

Heya guys, just thought I'd post a my thoughts on Staves in roleplaying, and what my opinions on how they should be used in order to help the various magic wielding people here, as well as to help others. Apologies in advance if there are any spelling mistakes, but it wass half past three on a morning when i wrote this. If you notice any, let me know and i'll edit it. Cheers!

History
Well, first off, WHAT are Staves? A Staff is often a long stick or pole, commonly held in two hands. They are made out of metal or wood. Some staves have small ornaments on them, be it for decoration, or to make the staff more effective in melee or magical combat (see below on Combat for more information on this). Staves are often considered as non offensive items, and their immediate danger is not often noticed.

Melee Combat
Melee Combat with a Staff is simple, yet is often not used. As it is a heavy, blunt object, a Staff won't do much more damage than broken bones, and unless used repeatedly against someones chest or head, often won't kill someone, though alot does depend on the user. A frail mage with the stick won't do much damage with the stick, until his opponent either over powers him or gets sick of a heavy stick hitting him repeatedly in the face, whereas a strong, hard man will be able to break bones in a few good hits.

The thickness and length of the staff also give some advantages in a melee fight. To begin with, the length of the stick can let you stand further back from your opponent, allowing you to swing with ease. If any are stupid enough to try to grab the stick as it swings towards their head or sides, will often end up with a broken wrist and/or fingers. Distance is an important matter. The further you are from a target (within the Staves length) will determine how fast the stave will be going. if you are at the extreme edge of its reach, the end will be moving alot faster, and will do more damage, than if an opponent was upclose to you, where your blows are weakened as you cannot build up speed. Prodding with the weapon, especially with a metal stud at either end, is often a good enough annoyance to convince the other person to leave it, and it can be hard to deflect without a shield or similar item.

Defense against a Staff in melee combat is slightly harder without a similar object, like anther staff, a mace, or a shield. Swords, if raised against an incoming Staff, will often either become indented in the wood, will snap off, or will cut the stave in half(This largely depends of the material and thickness- larger staves of wood or metal would probably snap the sword, medium lengths of wood would probably have the sword become either inbedded with it, or take out a chunk of wood, and a thin staff would probably just snap).
Shields, Maces, and other Staves are best against a staff, to deflect or block the incoming attacks, at least until you can get up close. Remember, a Staff is best used at range where speed can help aid the blows of the weapon, the futher away, the better.

Unless the Staff has added changes to it, such as a spike at the bottom, or "branches" at the head of the staff, thats about the extent of the damage that can be dealt.


Magical Combat
This is an area which I see a surprising lack of use for the Staff. Not only is it a good weapon at a melee distance, but in the hands of a magic user, the Staff becomes a deadly weapon. Most Staves are designed for use by a Magi, and will often have some key feature to help aid a magicians spells, be it a focusing crystal, or a series of baubles, or even just the shape of a holy symbol - each of these features can help to aid a magician, helping to focus their magic across the staff, and cast from the end of it. Some magicians may also swing their staff in particular ways for each spell - repitition of such a move may make the spell more familiar, with the magic being cast alot faster and more easily.

A Magi without a staff of anykind should always be weaker than one with a staff, though exceptions will occur, such as a master magician who casts spells with ease, versus an apprentice who can barely form a spell -with- a staff, let alone without it. A staff should be the magicians focal point, with runes engraved along it to help focus the magicians mind and casts with it, as well as other object, such as a skull of a demon or a series of magical coins, each to help focus a spell and make it easier to cast. A Mage without such a staff is weak - they should find it harder to focus, and would cast weaker spells because of it. Their concentration may be broken more easily, and spells are more likely to go haywire. because the magician cannot focus as well without a staff, the spells should tax more on themselves, wearing themselves out more easily.

Conclusion
In my opinion (as this entire thing is), Magicians without a staff are much like a warrior or rogue without a weapon - while they can do some damage with their fists, they won't do as much than if they had a weapon in their hands, and it will be harder to deal large amounts of damage without reverting to a tool.

Conclusion
In my opinion (as this entire thing is), Magicians without a staff are much like a warrior or rogue without a weapon - while they can do some damage with their fists, they won't do as much than if they had a weapon in their hands, and it will be harder to deal large amounts of damage without reverting to a tool.

I would like to believe a mage can use fairly strong magic without a staff, sword, dagger, orb, book, rune.

But that the mentioned above enhances them even further to their maximum potentional.

as I said, its only my personal opinion on how they should be used and treated. And your point certainly highlights something, as well. Just as some warriors and melee fighters can still break bones with fists, so too could mages cast some powerful spells without the use of a stave. As i highlighted, I think the presence of a stave would at least help them to focus better, take less time, and cast more powerful spells, but it all depends on the roleplayer, and the characters level of skill.

I adore this post. Seeing as my character does use a staff, it's pleasing to see more people being interested in going a bit more in-depth on the matter.

I agree with fairly much every point stated above. Thanks Domovoi!

I a world where wearing a 50 pound tome on an iron chain is part of a Paladin's battle gear, and adding wings the size of cars to pauldrons strengthens your combat abilities... I'm pretty sure a staff could prove useful too.

However, I like to think any item with magical properties is a part of oneself and inherent to one's way of fighting or playing in this case. The most devoted blade dancers have their own blades with which they train endlessly. A staff, likewise, is tied to the person who made it or wielded it for a prolonged time. Grabbing the wizzard staff of someone else, for example, might open up a part of that magician's power to you, but you won't be able to wield it as fully as the magician him/herself.

An interesting post. I like it, though I disagree with some parts of it.

First of all, there are no full-metal staffs. That is way too heavy to fight with effectively. There are wooden staffs that have iron braces reinforcing them at the end. But no staffs fully made of metal (there are spits, but you don't fight with those... too slow).

Also... "won't do much more damage that a few broken bones". Staves are ferocious weapons. Functioning as long levers that can completely crush whatever they hit. They're also freakishly fast. They're no more, and no less dangerous than any other weapon. Being able to shatter most bones (including the skull and spine) relatively easy and can cause massive internal bleedings.

Other than that, I liked it. Well written

There are full metal staves, but they are entremely thin because of it, usually around the thickness of an adult male thumb (Roughly, half an inch in diameter). And as to the "won't do much more damage" bit, I mean that as in, your not likely to chop off arms or heads with it - apart from blugeoning someone to death, the worst thing you can realistically do is break a few bones about the place

Calen/Flint[Domovoi] wrote:
Melee Combat
Melee Combat with a Staff is simple, yet is often not used. As it is a heavy, blunt object, a Staff won't do much more damage than broken bones, and unless used repeatedly against someones chest or head, often won't kill someone, though alot does depend on the user. A frail mage with the stick won't do much damage with the stick, until his opponent either over powers him or gets sick of a heavy stick hitting him repeatedly in the face, whereas a strong, hard man will be able to break bones in a few good hits.

About that, I know for a fact that a good quarterstaff can kill in one good well placed hit, not even talking about just cracking bones. Doesn't need to be a strong or hard man either. It's enough for it to be someone wielding the staff in the correct way, and a good swing with a 6ft solid wooden object that get's leverage on your weight will easily crack a mans skull if it's unprotected. If it has a helmet on. Well, just imagine the bang, and the ring, and the disorientation. Breaking bones will be done in one hit if you just get it hit the right place. With proper speed (the force will come by itself) and the bone will be broken.
Also, as for close work with a longer staff, you can always punch out with it's "broad" end, or tangle it with your opponents legs for a sweep/tripping. Nor is it likely to break any well made sword, since they are made to be able to take even strong hits, and flexible enough not to be brittle, not that a sword is very likely to cut through a good staff either. If it would, a good staff user who had time to dodge the counter attack would also now realize that he had a sharp end.

But I agree, staffs are far underdone as melee weapons in PC games. I would love to see more high end melee DPS staffs in WoW.

/Edit, See others were quicker.

Polearm sparring (you use staves when you practise polearm-fighting) is notorious for many and severe injuries, much more so than sword-practise. One of the primary reason is that most armour protects very poorly against the type of attacks you use with staves. Even in a full plate harness it is very easy to get your neck or skull crushed by the force behind a hit (and since staves are longer than most swords, they hit with more force due to leverage).

So it is not a weapon to be sneered at. It's just as deadly as anything else. As for not being able to cut limbs off... no, but that is extremely unlikely to achieve with a sword/axe as well (and impossible of your opponent wears metal armour). Not to mention that amputation is seldom needed to win... breaking a bone is usually sufficient to stand victorious.

Don't agree with the part about wielding a staff while using magic should give make a big difference or give an advantage. In WoW's combat spells come from the caster's hands after all. Unless the books picture magic combat differently I'd say we need to take game mechanics into account on this one. Maces and daggers make up just as good weapons for healers and casters as staves do, too.

I agree with much that has been posted here

I just feel like I have to shove a point in this since it's an awesome topic which I don't many people realize how awesome a staff actually is!

A blunt weapon can actually do much more damage than a bladed one... A sword or dagger makes a cut, which you can actually rather easy sew back together again. You also gets a highway into the bleeding area, so you can easily gain access to it quickly.
As has been stated before, you will pretty much never cut a limb off in a single cut. Cutting through sinew and muscle is hard enough, but you have a couple of bones to get through as well.

However, when you receive a blow to the body which actually leaves the skin intact, but shatters everything underneath it. Not only will you never be able to piece it back together again, but the fragmentation of the bones will cause massive internal bleeding which will kill you in a matter of hours unless all bleeding points are stopped and the pieces of bone is cleaned up. Even if you manage to do all that, you will never use that limb again as its core is destroyed.

Prodding with the weapon, especially with a metal stud at either end, is
often a good enough annoyance to convince the other person to leave it,
and it can be hard to deflect without a shield or similar item.

"Prodding" a person with the end of a staff will most likely shatter the nose, break a couple of ribs or destroy the throat; choking the person. If you know how to aim.
The speed in which this blow can be dealt is tremendous, holding the front hand in a loose grip whilst the back hand shoots the staff forward.

As has already been stated, battle staffs are usually reinforced with metal, but with a wooden core. they are usually also weighted down at the end to give extra weight for each blow, but still keep enough balance to leave the wielder in full control.

In close quarters can easily crush the foot of an assailant (especially if the staff is weighted down), trip him, use it to punch with (you focus the force of both your arm-strength and your bodyweight through an area of 3 cm in diameter; That hurts!). But most likely cause some form of damage that will also get the wielder away from his opponent.


As for the magical uses of staffs, I do imagine that casting a lot of magic will tire the mage out. In which case the magician will more than gladly have something to lean up against as he becomes exhausted.
It is also, as the OP said, very probable that the staff has been adapted to aid the focusing of the magicians mind. However, personally, I think that they can be added to a sceptre, sword, bauble, rod or whatever might be at hand.

But something as inconspicuous as a staff, which no one actually bothers with too much because "You will not rob an old man of his walking stick, will you?".

Just my 2 cents on the subject

Have you seen jackie chan with a pool cue?..

Enough said ^^

I always saw any "magician's" weapon as merely a focus for their power. Something physical to manifest a bolt of power through. Or a channel a spell from/to.

An offhand weapon in that regard would be a fetish or book of words. A tome, or method of rememberance of the power of something.

As to the actual physical power of a staff, it is as Galhalla says, underestimated by a lot of people. I have staff fought, and it is a hard, vicious and amazing way of fighting. Simply put my favourite. Bloody, battered and bruised. But quick and great to watch (tough I fear I was never the latter... always over to quick when I handle my staff, fnar fnar).

Not really relevant here. But I do remember a great D&D campaign I played. Where I was a travelling minstrel and a follower of a Fharlanghn. I wasn't a bard, as the party originally had one (I started later). But a rogue. A rogue who used a staff as a weapon (omg contravening D&D RULES!!!). But the DM thought it fit, a staff was my tool for travelling, I used it fast, and quick like a shortsword, I also used it as an acrobat to enter the window of an inn to steal a necklace from a pretty girl. But that's a different story. Needless to say my simple staff, with leather bindings and metal studs on the top of the shaft was a killer. And a great idea.

Bimble, wimble.

But yes, staff fighting is great. Infact, staves and especially "quaterstaff" fighting was often seen as very "English". and no, I don't just mean because of "Little" John.

Quarterstaffs are bound to the collective English (As a Scot I want to say British but I can't D:) psyche as certainly as the Longbow (Now the Welsh in me is whining, dilemna!).

Incredible weapons they were used for training the essential basics of melee combat to begginers before progressing on to more 'advanced' weapons.

Gen's been carrying one in her OOC "lol, there just happened to be one of these lying around when I needed it" bag ever since I rolled her into a warrior in the vain hope Eselan would start beating her about the head with one.

If anyone has read The Wheel of Time, Mathrim Cauthron used his staff very effectively. One hard knock in the wrong place can disorient a man. One good blow in the neck can kill one. The staff is a walking stick, hence it may may blind you with confidence, as the staff is a forever underestimated weapon.

To get back ontopic for a bit, I don't really think a staff is in any way necessary for a mage to cast their spells in the IC world of WoW. As mentioned before, spellcasters always use their hands to cast while their staves are on their backs. Spellcasters as warlocks use more daggers than staves during BC levelling, if I'm not mistaken (and if I am, my bad xD. Also the big lore-casters like Kael'thas and I do believe Rhonin, too, don't use staves. Jaina, on the other hand, does. :/

And then to follow where everyone is going, staves can indeed be more lethal than many other weapons when used the right way. People will also probably think it less weird if someone uses a walking stick than to see them covered in more known weapons, like swords, bows, daggers... etc. For example, if you took a 'walking stick' with you when meeting with someone important it would probably be allowed, while, reasonably, you would need to leave a sword with the guards to ensure you're not trying to impale him/her.

As for my mage, Vayella, she does carry a staff around with her, but that is more so she's able to hit a random enemy in the face when he gets too close and her fireballs aren't working, than to make her magic stronger. (Plus she has manacrystals attached to it 'just in case', but that's a whole different story.)