I was reading staffs and material components charge you as if 50 charges, but you only get 10.
Is this a mistake or intentional nerf to cost of staffs?
Before you got charge 1 component per charge.
Now you get charged 5 components per charge.
Anyone know why this tax was kept same price?
Because a Staff can be recharged at no cost (Other than the spell used to recharge it). Thus, during the life of a staff it will probably be used more than 50 times.
Because a Staff can be recharged at no cost (Other than the spell used to recharge it). Thus, during the life of a staff it will probably be used more than 50 times.
You can only recharge 1 charge/day, so you'll be behind in charges unless you only use 1 charge/day.
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Pre-Pathfinder, staves had 50 charges, but there were no rules to recharge charged items.
Pathfinder introduced 10-charge staffs and the staff-recharging rule. So if the user has any downtime, he or she can recharge the staff 1 charge per day, at no cost. Overall, this could mean the staff is used hundreds of times.
The game in general but especially the magic system assume you will not be adventuring every day of your life as a character. It assumes you will set off on some task or quest, accomplish it (or fail to do so) and then return home, or to an inn to rest, recover, such for a period of time. Crafting assumes this, researching new spells assumes this, the XP system REALLY assumes this. If you dont have downtime and adventure every day of your characters life from the moment they gain a level, they will go 1-20 in a little over 2 months. Clearly that isn't a rational character arch.
So while you may run out of charges of a staff in an adventure, the game assumes after a few days of adventuring you will have time to fully recharge it, and then use it again next time, thus it being worth as much if not more then the old 50 charge staves.
even if you're not in-between adventures, in our campaigns it's not unusual for us to have a week of travel time between "events" or locations for the campaign and that means you will have almost completely refilled the staff of charges.
even if you're not in-between adventures, in our campaigns it's not unusual for us to have a week of travel time between "events" or locations for the campaign and that means you will have almost completely refilled the staff of charges.
How on earth did you end up with a party that has a character with a magical staff (which can't even be created until level 11), but no means of fast travel (overland flight, teleport, magic vessel, etc.)?
even if you're not in-between adventures, in our campaigns it's not unusual for us to have a week of travel time between "events" or locations for the campaign and that means you will have almost completely refilled the staff of charges.How on earth did you end up with a party that has a character with a magical staff (which can't even be created until level 11), but no means of fast travel (overland flight, teleport, magic vessel, etc.)?
Maybe he bought it/found it. You don't need Craft Staff to recharge the staff. Just the appropriate spells.
Maybe he bought it/found it. You don't need Craft Staff to recharge the staff. Just the appropriate spells.even if you're not in-between adventures, in our campaigns it's not unusual for us to have a week of travel time between "events" or locations for the campaign and that means you will have almost completely refilled the staff of charges.How on earth did you end up with a party that has a character with a magical staff (which can't even be created until level 11), but no means of fast travel (overland flight, teleport, magic vessel, etc.)?
Yeah, but I haven't heard of too many games/groups that get magical gear prior to when they should be able to afford it (per the Wealth by Level Guidelines) or craft it. Needless to say, it seems unusual to me.
even if you're not in-between adventures, in our campaigns it's not unusual for us to have a week of travel time between "events" or locations for the campaign and that means you will have almost completely refilled the staff of charges.How on earth did you end up with a party that has a character with a magical staff (which can't even be created until level 11), but no means of fast travel (overland flight, teleport, magic vessel, etc.)?
Perhaps teleport and such are out of the question for their travel? I can't see anybody teleporting an army, or a caravan of goods, especially not a mere adventuring group.
Could be a campaign world where fast travel spells aren't allowed. With the new rules for vehicles and airships I can see this happening even more now since by the time you can afford to use a lot of them, you may as well be fast traveling. Flying around in a magically powered airship may seem cooler to some people than everybody just popping around with teleports.
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even if you're not in-between adventures, in our campaigns it's not unusual for us to have a week of travel time between "events" or locations for the campaign and that means you will have almost completely refilled the staff of charges.How on earth did you end up with a party that has a character with a magical staff (which can't even be created until level 11), but no means of fast travel (overland flight, teleport, magic vessel, etc.)?
- Teleport: you can't get to a location you haven't ever seen;
- Overland flight: Range personal level 5 - Your party is made only by level 9+ wizard or sorcerers? Or theya re burning scrolls and all have high UMD?- magic vessel: seriously, it is a common contraption in your world and you get it at level 11? How fas it is?
Wind walk could work if your caster is of a level high enough to move the whole party. A 4 man party can be "moved" at level 11 (the minimum level to have a cleric capable to cast it).
You need to be level 12 to bring along the paladin mount or the druid/ranger animal companion or the wizard familiar or 1 Cohort (1 creature every 3 levels). If you have 2 of them in any combination the spell should be cast at level 15 to cover for them.
Multiple casting of the spell can resolve that problem, but you are burning high level spells at a alarming rate this way and I have problems with the animal intelligence members of the group keeping up with the others as you have just shattered their vision of the world.
A bear with a good nose and myopic sight will have a hard time adapting to a travel system that change it to a fog cloud.
Creative Director
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Yeah, but I haven't heard of too many games/groups that get magical gear prior to when they should be able to afford it (per the Wealth by Level Guidelines) or craft it. Needless to say, it seems unusual to me.
I do that all the time. Sometimes, giving out really cool magic items is a great way to introduce a story element. And furthermore, not every spellcaster automatically has "fast travel" magic anyway.
I was reading staffs and material components charge you as if 50 charges, but you only get 10.
Is this a mistake or intentional nerf to cost of staffs?
Before you got charge 1 component per charge.
Now you get charged 5 components per charge.
Anyone know why this tax was kept same price?
Pathfinder staffs suck. The 50 charges was better in terms of what you got, but it also made looting staffs pretty lame 'cause by the time you get some sort of legendary staff it's probably three shots from being a glorified walking stick.
IMHO, the best way to remedy this is to give it 5 charges per day (this is in fact equal to the 50/- charges as defined by the pricing rules). That gives you 5 charges per day that you can play around with, and you can still enjoy having certain spells discounted for using multiple charges.
You could also make lesser and greater versions of the staffs by adjusting the number of charges. For example, a 1/day charge staff would be 1/5th the cost of a normal staff, while a 10/day staff would cost twice as much; which lends itself far greater to making staffs something casters would actually desire, since it becomes a part of their character more readily.
The existing charging rules suck pretty bad, and it's definitely a nerf. If you want to actually get any additional casting power out of it, you have to pay for 50 charges but get at most 10 charges which you have to replace. You could just craft a wand of menmonic enhancer for less and rock socks so much harder (that's about 150 spell levels worth of casting if you consume the whole wand, and you don't have to pay them back each day).
As-is, the most efficient use of the staff would require you to go through 50 individual adventures before you even get what you paid for; and that's just lame.
Pathfinder staffs suck. The 50 charges was better in terms of what you got, but it also made looting staffs pretty lame 'cause by the time you get some sort of legendary staff it's probably three shots from being a glorified walking stick.
I half disagree with you here; I think the Core book staves are now way, way overpriced for what they do (I can't honestly ever imagine anyone buying or crafting one, and if you find one you're probably going to sell it because half its value is still going to buy you something way more useful than the staff) across the board, but I like a lot of the staves in the APG and think some of them are decent for the price.
But then I also tend to play in campaigns where characters won't see action every single day, so staves tend to be "full" on charges again when the action does start.
Pathfinder staffs suck. The 50 charges was better in terms of what you got, but it also made looting staffs pretty lame 'cause by the time you get some sort of legendary staff it's probably three shots from being a glorified walking stick.
I half disagree with you here; I think the Core book staves are now way, way overpriced for what they do (I can't honestly ever imagine anyone buying or crafting one, and if you find one you're probably going to sell it because half its value is still going to buy you something way more useful than the staff) across the board, but I like a lot of the staves in the APG and think some of them are decent for the price.
But then I also tend to play in campaigns where characters won't see action every single day, so staves tend to be "full" on charges again when the action does start.
That's kinda awesome, but that basically requires you to have plenty of downtime; which means that it loses that much more value to the wandering adventurer. The wandering wizard being the iconic user of staffs to begin with, of course.
Also, the staffs are terrible. While I haven't bothered looking at the staffs in the advanced players guide, unless they have some sort of special rules not based on the normal staff rules, then I imagine they still suck except they have good spells in them.
Take the Staff of the Woodlands for example. It's market value is 100,400 gp. You get 10 charges, and it would take you 10 days to recharge it to full. You have a limited selection of spells you can use from the staff, and most of those spells suck up 3 or more charges per use. For 107,000 gp; I could buy a pearl of power of every spell level used in making the staff (a pair of 1st level pearls, a 2nd level pearl, a 5th, 6th, AND 7th level pearl) which I can use every day, and am not limited to just those key spells being used.
Oh, and for bonus points, I can actually make them at half-price using the same item creation feat I make my other gear with, so with all that extra downtime that you have to recharge staffs before your next adventure, you can happily be getting more spell slots for less money; while also enjoying he fact my pearls just have to be carried, and are far harder to destroy than the AC 7, hardness 5, 10 hp staffs (see default staff descriptions). Oh, and I also get benefits for my feats such as Spell Penetration with the pearls, while I only get save DC and caster level with staffs (I can't apply metamagic without crafting the staff specifically for it, I can't use Spell Penetration, etc).
So maybe they don't suck so bad if you're assuredly going to have lots of downtime between your adventures; but for every other scenario you're trading a crapload of monetary resources for the right to waste your own spell slots for an overpriced piece of junk. If they were charges per day, I'd jump on the wagon and say they were probably worth it, but as-is, they're pretty terrible from where I'm sitting.
Our party was too big to teleport. If I remember correctly the Wiz could only teleport self+3 and we had 6 or 7 party members at the time and we were exploring the orc kingdom, somewhere we had never been before. Once we got to the port city (we were trying to see if they were building a navy to invade) we did use teleport (over 2 days) to get us back to the Orc capital, and then outside the Orc Kingdom borders.
lots of stuff
Think of it this way, the pearl of power only allows one additional spell per day, where the staff allows for as many as ten. Also the pearl requires that you actually know the spell you want to case. No problem for a Wizard, but what if you are a sorcerer or other class with limited spells known? I can buy a staff and case several spells that are not on my spells known list at my caster level with my feats applied to them. As long as one of the spells on the staff is known to you (so you can recharge it), you get all these spells known for free.
Another thing on the price, the pearl allows for one extra spell in an encounter where the staff allows for up to 10, this can significantly increase your ability to succeed.
While I haven't bothered looking at the staffs in the advanced players guide, unless they have some sort of special rules not based on the normal staff rules, then I imagine they still suck except they have good spells in them.
I accidentally unrecoverably (in this case) deleted my first attempt at a response, so I'll just say: have a look at the staves, I haven't done the math and think they're priced dramatically differently than the Core staves:
http://paizo.com/pathfinderRPG/prd/advanced/magicItems/staves.html
Another thing on the price, the pearl allows for one extra spell in an encounter where the staff allows for up to 10, this can significantly increase your ability to succeed.
I believe the poster meant for the price you could have 10 Pearls that give back 10 spells/day, and no need to recharge them the next day (they are good to go).
At least spells 1-5th, 6th lv and higher start being pricy for pearls but then so do staffs with high level spells.
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Take the Staff of the Woodlands for example. It's market value is 100,400 gp. You get 10 charges, and it would take you 10 days to recharge it to full. You have a limited selection of spells you can use from the staff, and most of those spells suck up 3 or more charges per use. For 107,000 gp; I could buy a pearl of power of every spell level used in making the staff (a pair of 1st level pearls, a 2nd level pearl, a 5th, 6th, AND 7th level pearl) which I can use every day, and am not limited to just those key spells being used.
Oracle and Sorcerer get the most use from a staff. They only need to know one of the spells in the staff to recharge it, the staff cast them at their level and use their casting stat (if they are better than the default values of the staff) and even the caster feats.
Staff of Abjuration
Price 82,000 gp;
Dispel magic (1 charge)
Resist energy (1 charge)
Shield (1 charge)
Dismissal (2 charges)
Lesser globe of invulnerability (2 charges)
Repulsion (3 charges)
Staff of Fire
Price 18,950 gp;
Burning hands (1 charge)
Fireball (2 charges)
Wall of fire (3 charges)
One high priced and one low priced staff.
Both have spells I wouldn't take if I was a sorcerer as I have a limited selection of spells, but spells that I would like to have available in several situations.
It is almost granted that as soon as possible I would upgrade dispel magic to greater dispel magic, but having access to the lower level spell through the staff would be nice in situations where I don't want to burn a 6th level slot.
Same thing for practically all of the spell on the abjuration staff.
Staff of fire. There are good chances that I will have the ubiquitous fireball. Getting access to Wall of fire e burning hands is useful,
BH to clear swarms and other low level annoyances, WoF is a good battlefield control spell.
With a good UMD a druid can use the staff of fire and recharge it (WoF is in his spell list), getting an easy access to spell he can't normally cast.
I could use a pearl of power to access the same spells? Only if my class allow spell memorization and I know the spells and I have memorized them today.
So the cost is high but the return is good if you can chose your staff.
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Pearl of Power
Price 1,000 gp (1st), 4,000 gp (2nd), 9,000 gp (3rd), 16,000 gp (4th), 25,000 gp (5th), 36,000 gp (6th), 49,000 gp (7th), 64,000 gp (8th), 81,000 gp (9th), 70,000 gp (two spells); Weight —
So with 82.000 gp I get 2 level 5 spell, 1 level 4, 1 level 3, 1 level 2 and 1 level 1.
I would say that having a specific set of spells in the staff and and the limit of the pearl that allow me to recover only a spell I have memorized and utilized approximately even out.
In both situations there is a limited set of spells available.
The capacity to access spell I don't know for me is a important point in favour of the staff.
Another good point is that I can get to use one of the staff spell between 3 to 10 times in a day if the staff is fully charged.
The point in favour of the pearls is that if I need their for several days in a row they are self recharging, while the staff, once depleted, require several days of rest.
So, for a sorcerer the staff is decidedly the better item (there is a item that increase the number of spell slot available for them, but no magic that increase the number of spell known AFAIK) .
For a wizard probably the pearls are better.
YMMV
Think of it this way, the pearl of power only allows one additional spell per day, where the staff allows for as many as ten.
The problem with this is that they usually don't. At least, not unless you plan to spend waaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaay too much money. See, most staffs consume multiple charge on good spells to reduce the cost to make them affordable.
Using the woodlands staff again as a reference, here are the spells it can cast.
Notice that each time you are casting ANYTHING from this staff that is higher than a 1st level spell, the staff consumes multiple charges. So you're not even getting the full value of the charges. Casting Barkskin once costs you 2 days worth of recharges. Eww. *barfs*
So you could use up to 10 charges per day, but it'd all be 1st level spells. Might even get 2 7th level spells out of it. In either case, you can only recharge 1 charge per day, and you may only recharge 1 staff per day; meaning that if you decided to use your staff to cast barkskin on your party member, you cannot get back those charges without 2 days worth of downtime.
Meanwhile, when I listed those pearls? Yeah, I listed one of every single level of spell that the staff actually had. 2 1st, 1 2nd, 1 5th, 1 6th, and 1 7th. If you converted them directly, that would be 14 charges according to the staff's own limits; and you get that every single day. Meanwhile you're not limited to these specific spells. You could happily use any spell you wanted.
Druid Example
With the above pearls of power, I could prepare...
An additional 7th level spell, which I can use for any spell I had prepared and cast (do I need plant growth, summon nature's ally VII, or something else I wonder...), and the same for 6th, 5th, 2nd, and 2 1st level spells. All of them are at my caster level, and use my save DCs, and MY FEATS and SPECIAL ABILITIES. See, staffs only benefit from feats that augment your save DCs. If I was an elven druid, I could benefit from Augment Summoning (for Summon Nature's Ally) and my racial that gives +2 to penetrate spell resistance. I'm getting more versatility and quite possibly for less money (since I probably want Craft Wondrous item anyway).
Also the pearl requires that you actually know the spell you want to case. No problem for a Wizard, but what if you are a sorcerer or other class with limited spells known? I can buy a staff and case several spells that are not on my spells known list at my caster level with my feats applied to them. As long as one of the spells on the staff is known to you (so you can recharge it), you get all these spells known for free.
Pearls sadly don't work for sorcerers. I think most people house-rule this because it sucks badly for sorcerers; or some people allow the sorcerer version called Knowstones from dragon magazine (basically pearls which hold a single spell that you can treat as known while you carry them, but provide no additional casting); but this is a problem with sorcerers. It doesn't make staffs worth their price just because some class can gleam some benefit from them.
Likewise, no you're really not getting all these spells known for free. You're using a limited magic item that you can recharge at a rate of 1 charge per day, maximum. Which means that if you use any spell costing more than 2 charges, you are at -1 charge on the following day.
Also, again, this part is incorrect.
at my caster level with my feats applied to them
This is only true if those feats are *drum-roll* Spell Focus and Greater Spell Focus. You gain no benefit from metamagic feats, spell penetration, greater spell penetration, augment summoning, class features (such as a fey sorcerer's +2 to the DC of some enchantments, orc blooded sorcerer's damage bonus, or a wizard's admixture ability), racial features (no +2 vs spell resistance for being an elf), and so on and so forth.
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Yeah, but I haven't heard of too many games/groups that get magical gear prior to when they should be able to afford it (per the Wealth by Level Guidelines) or craft it. Needless to say, it seems unusual to me.I do that all the time. Sometimes, giving out really cool magic items is a great way to introduce a story element. And furthermore, not every spellcaster automatically has "fast travel" magic anyway.
We're on the forums, so we're discussing forum wizards. Forum wizards automatically have every spell that the campaign world allows in their spellbooks. And they always have exactly the right spell memorized for whatever situation arises.
:P
Meanwhile you're not limited to these specific spells. You could happily use any spell you wanted.
Except for you taking about the most crappy staff you could find and then ignoring abilities on it, no, you couldn't. You'd only have access to the spells you know and have prepared. A bard could for example use the staff (with or without UMD depending on interpretation of the spell trigger rules) a whole lot, and recharge it during downtime, and couldn't ever use pearls of power to gain access to Wall of Thorns.
Meanwhile you're not limited to these specific spells. You could happily use any spell you wanted.Except for you taking about the most crappy staff you could find and then ignoring abilities on it, no, you couldn't. You'd only have access to the spells you know and have prepared. A bard could for example use the staff (with or without UMD depending on interpretation of the spell trigger rules) a whole lot, and recharge it during downtime, and couldn't ever use pearls of power to gain access to Wall of Thorns.
The only powers ignored was the crappy +2 quarterstaff (8000 gp) and continual pass without trace (3000 gp), leaving just spells of different levels remaining.
Also, I love that people mention that I picked the "crappiest staff". Staffs aren't crappy by staff. They are priced based on the spells that they have. That's like saying "you picked the crappiest wand" when all wands are identical to each other barring the individual spell and/or expensive material components.
Again, staffs still suck. Just bards, sorcerers, and oracles might be able to find some use for them. That doesn't mean they don't suck. They could still get the same usefulness out of them in 3.x, and the same usefulness under an x/day system. The only differences is that in either of those cases the staffs aren't going to suck, and require you to keep expending your own spell slots (at a very slow pace) to try and keep the staff usable at all.
Also, this up to 10 charges nonsense is being heavily overrated. Let's try a staff of transmutation. We have a few spells of 1st-3rd level (alter self, blink, and expeditious retreat) that use 1 charge per cast. The other spells polymorph and baleful polymorph use 2 charges, and disintegrate uses 3. That means that you really do not have the option of just using 10 charges per day, because the spells the useful spells cap at 5 or 3 before it cannot cast them anymore, and then you need to spend 9-10 days before you can even use the item again.
Like I said. Suuuuuuuucks.
EDIT: Let's not also forget that you can really only use one staff with any regularity, since you can only recharge 1 charge per day period. You cannot have multiple staffs and recharge 1 charge to each of them; so really they're not even worth it as found treasure; other than a cleverly disguised art object worth 1/2 the staff's market value to your character.
They are priced based on the spells that they have. That's like saying "you picked the crappiest wand" when all wands are identical to each other barring the individual spell and/or expensive material components.
They of course have differing value depending on the spell stored in them. A Wand of Knock is great from level one to twenty, as it solves a common problem and isn't reliant on saves or caster level - a wand of hold animal is quite useless (barring having a ~50% chance silencing the odd guard dog for _up to_ 18 seconds).
If I say wands suck because wand of hold animal sucks, and someone counters with "not all wands suck, wand of knock is really useful" then that's a valid argument.
Alter Self, Blink and Expeditious Retreat are ALL very useful spells, and for a spontaneous caster who's only picked one of them, gaining access to all is great fun.
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Also the pearl requires that you actually know the spell you want to case. No problem for a Wizard, but what if you are a sorcerer or other class with limited spells known? I can buy a staff and case several spells that are not on my spells known list at my caster level with my feats applied to them. As long as one of the spells on the staff is known to you (so you can recharge it), you get all these spells known for free.Pearls sadly don't work for sorcerers. I think most people house-rule this because it sucks badly for sorcerers; or some people allow the sorcerer version called Knowstones from dragon magazine (basically pearls which hold a single spell that you can treat as known while you carry them, but provide no additional casting); but this is a problem with sorcerers. It doesn't make staffs worth their price just because some class can gleam some benefit from them.
Likewise, no you're really not getting all these spells known for free. You're using a limited magic item that you can recharge at a rate of 1 charge per day, maximum. Which means that if you use any spell costing more than 2 charges, you are at -1 charge on the following day.
Now spontaneous spellcasters have the Runestone of power, from the Pathfinder field society guide. They work in a way similar but not identical to the pearl as they can be used to power the casting of a spell of the right level instead of recalling an already expended spell.
Note that they cost x2 the price of a pearl of power.
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That means that you really do not have the option of just using 10 charges per day, because the spells the useful spells cap at 5 or 3 before it cannot cast them anymore, and then you need to spend 9-10 days before you can even use the item again.
Wait... what?
The book mentions that a Staff which is out of charges can't be used until it's recharged, but that's not the same as fully charged. So using that Staff of Transmutation to cast three disintegrate spells leaves you with one charge, meaning you need two days of recharging to get it back up to the three needed to cast disintegrate again (if that spell is all you have the thing around for).
Also, why is recharging a Staff relegated to 'downtime'? You recharge it when you prepare spells for the day. So it's more like one charge per day of adventuring, and the whole shebang if you happen to get some actual downtime, isn't it?
Plus, triggering a spell from a Staff doesn't provoke, which can be a big deal in some situations.
They are priced based on the spells that they have. That's like saying "you picked the crappiest wand" when all wands are identical to each other barring the individual spell and/or expensive material components.They of course have differing value depending on the spell stored in them. A Wand of Knock is great from level one to twenty, as it solves a common problem and isn't reliant on saves or caster level - a wand of hold animal is quite useless (barring having a ~50% chance silencing the odd guard dog for _up to_ 18 seconds).
If I say wands suck because wand of hold animal sucks, and someone counters with "not all wands suck, wand of knock is really useful" then that's a valid argument.
Alter Self, Blink and Expeditious Retreat are ALL very useful spells, and for a spontaneous caster who's only picked one of them, gaining access to all is great fun.
And of course if you follow the pricing rules he could have just grabbed a wondrous item that allows him to cast alter self, blink, and expeditious retreat a few times per day (sort of like how boots of speed, or a helm of glory works). That would be legitimately worth it. For example, if for 10 rounds per day you could function as under the effects of expeditious retreat, hooray. That costs about 400 gp (1st level spell with a 1/min duration is 2000 * 2 = 4000, then is reduced by 1/2 the unlimited use cost for 50 charges, then divided by 5 for 1 charge per day = 400 gp).
Now, I guess people will probably start complaining that I'm somehow suggesting people be some sort of bad munchkins for following the guidelines that have worked since 3E came out and are still in the game today, and say that you shouldn't be able to do this; but frankly I don't care. 400 gp is probably worth 10 rounds of +30 ft speed per day. Buying a staff of suckitude +3 isn't.
EDIT: Meanwhile, an Expeditious Retreat wand is 15 gp per charge. Alter self is 90 gp per charge. Blink is 225 gp per charge. Are you seriously going to spend 82,000 gp to be able get a staff of this junk?
Also, why is recharging a Staff relegated to 'downtime'? You recharge it when you prepare spells for the day. So it's more like one charge per day of adventuring, and the whole shebang if you happen to get some actual downtime, isn't it?
Yeah, but if you don't use more than one or two charges a day, it becomes really expensive for what it does. If you're in a highly stressed campaign where you're forced to use the staff every day, it won't do you much good. If you're in a more slow-moving campaign where there may be a week between adventuring days, whoohoo that's a great item.
I prefer the new rules, but not really from a value-point of view but rather because now staffs get old. Before they were pretty much wands that ran out quicker due to higher charge costs and then they were sticks. Motivating a century-old staff still being used was hard since they were consumables. I much more prefer the new rules.
And of course if you follow the pricing rules he could have just grabbed a wondrous item that allows him to cast alter self, blink, and expeditious retreat a few times per day (sort of like how boots of speed, or a helm of glory works). That would be legitimately worth it. For example, if for 10 rounds per day you could function as under the effects of expeditious retreat, hooray. That costs about 400 gp (1st level spell with a 1/min duration is 2000 * 2 = 4000, then is reduced by 1/2 the unlimited use cost for 50 charges, then divided by 5 for 1 charge per day = 400 gp).
No, not necessarily, since that would 1. require him to be a caster and 2. require the DM to be willing to let him design new items. Those guidelines aren't there for players but for the DM, much like how I as a player can't design my guard dog as anything I like with the monster creation guidelines.
And that wouldn't be an appropriate pricing anyway, if you by your wording "for 10 rounds per day you could function as under the effects of expeditious retreat" mean that it's like boots of haste - free action to activate and doesn't need to be consequitive. The pricing you named are for 1/day activated as standard action lasts 10 rounds.
EDIT: Don't really understand your calculation. 1/day expeditious retreat is (1*1*1800)/5 = 360 gp. Or are you saying it should be priced as a continuous item?
But that's beside the point. Custom items are, like custom monsters and NPC's, the DM's territory. He might let you thread there sometimes, or not, but it's not to be assumed.
EDIT2: Also, let's use a 15th level caster as an example, because that's more where you'd have the staff. He could use it to cast expeditious retreat 10 times per day, with a duration of 15 minutes every time. If you want that in an item, the cost is 1*15*1800 (at will is cheaper than 10/day) or 27000. So yes, if you JUST want expeditious retreat out of the staff that is cheaper.
EDIT3: I'd also say that I do NOT think the staff of the wilderness +2 ability is worthless. It means you have to have at least a +2 weapon to destroy it. While that may not make a difference often, when it does you really know it. It's quite easy to sunder a staff, but with that, it's harder for giants and the like to do it.
The book mentions that a Staff which is out of charges can't be used until it's recharged, but that's not the same as fully charged. So using that Staff of Transmutation to cast three disintegrate spells leaves you with one charge, meaning you need two days of recharging to get it back up to the three needed to cast disintegrate again (if that spell is all you have the thing around for).
At which point you have overpaid a crap-ton to expend your own spell slots for a single charge per day. You are gaining little for this investment unless you have multiple days set aside that you're not going to be using this or any other staff, since it runs out of charges quickly if you bother to rely on it for any real regularity.
Plus, triggering a spell from a Staff doesn't provoke, which can be a big deal in some situations.
And yet here we are with people arguing that somehow expeditious retreat, blink, and alter self are worth the goofy price-tag to actually buy a staff; when by the time you could afford the staff you auto-succeed on casting such spells defensively (DC 18 for the highest, and you have 1d20 + level (say 15) + key casting stat (easily +8-12 at this level)).
I prefer the new rules, but not really from a value-point of view but rather because now staffs get old. Before they were pretty much wands that ran out quicker due to higher charge costs and then they were sticks. Motivating a century-old staff still being used was hard since they were consumables. I much more prefer the new rules.
I hate the new rules because they result in crappy magic items. It's hard to spin a staff as being something really awesome when it's in fact the opposite of awesome. I preferred using x/day wands, which has been supported by the pricing guidelines since 3E has existed (the cost of a 5/day charge staff would be the cost of the normal staff). 5/day recharging is more attractive than 10/- recharge-manually.
Why? Because it fixes both the issue of going nova while also fixing the issue of the staff burning itself out. Using staff of transmutation as an example once again...
We would have 5 charges per day.
Alter Self (1 charge)
Blink (1 charge)
Expeditious Retreat (1 charge)
Polymorph (2 charges)
Baleful Polymorph (2 charges)
Disintegrate (3 charges)
Each day you could use any combination thereof to a maximum of 5. Every day, any day. You can't spam disintegrate 'cause you had 3 days of downtime, but you won't feel like you've wasted it either. Works out for everybody. Those of us who like staffs to be ancient things of power that *insert favorite caster here* use to augment their power, it works. For those of us who see it as a legitimate investment, it works. It's a win/win from the GM and PC perspective.
Also (because math is cool), you can determine the cost if you wanted a staff with additional charges per day. Every additional charge adds 1/5th the base price of the staff to the cost; so a staff of transmutation with 6/day charges would cost 98,400 gp (instead of 82,000 gp) but you could get off 2 disintegrates per day, or 3 polymorph spells, etc.
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No, not necessarily, since that would 1. require him to be a caster and 2. require the DM to be willing to let him design new items. Those guidelines aren't there for players but for the DM, much like how I as a player can't design my guard dog as anything I like with the monster creation guidelines.
Much of the magic item pricing is cut and dry. Pricing for spells as items is pretty direct and strait-forward. Just like how enhancement bonuses are direct and strait forward. These are pretty basic rules. I have never seen them abused except by people who aren't actually following them (people often forget things like true-strike cannot be made continuous, or forget to multiply the cost of the item based on the duration of spells, don't add in the spell component cost, etc).
This is a lot different than building and picking out your pet dog's scruffy's ability scores, feats, and so forth. This stuff is pretty solid, and it's difficult to really break within the core rules.
Likewise, we can look at existing magic items and determine how they priced them. For example, the boots of speed are 12,000 gp, CL 10th, 3rd level spell, with a 1/day effective duration split into 10 rounds. That's the exact same price that you'd get with a CL 10 * 3 * 2000 / 5 = 12,000 gp. I actually think they under-priced it a tiny bit since they forgot to multiply it by 4 for being measured in rounds; but meh, maybe they weren't being as conservative.
And that wouldn't be an appropriate pricing anyway, if you by your wording "for 10 rounds per day you could function as under the effects of expeditious retreat" mean that it's like boots of haste - free action to activate and doesn't need to be consequitive. The pricing you named are for 1/day activated as standard action lasts 10 rounds.
EDIT: Don't really understand your calculation. 1/day expeditious retreat is (1*1*1800)/5 = 360 gp. Or are you saying it should be priced as a continuous item?
It should if you wanted it to be like boots of haste and an x rounds/day duration. If you want it to be a standard action, then go with the 1800 and not double it before dividing it because of the command word or thought. Heck, go with 750 if you want it to be a spell-trigger (more limited and requiring a UMD check for non-casters) for 150 gp.
However, I mean, by the time you could actually buy a staff of transmutation, you probably wouldn't mind spending 400 gp on what amounts to a weeny version of boots of speed because you reeeeaaaally wanted that expeditious retreat.
But that's beside the point. Custom items are, like custom monsters and NPC's, the DM's territory. He might let you thread there sometimes, or not, but it's not to be assumed.
Last I checked it's in the core rulebook. It's on the PRD. It's not in the Gamemastering. I agree 100% that the GM is the final arbiter and should make good and certain that you have followed the rules and not tried to cheat the rules by adding inappropriate cost reductions (for example, the Holy Avenger is the iconic -30% cost due to alignment/class restrictions, and an amulet of natural armor only usable by you is not appropriate for that reduction). However, there should be little to no reason why the GM would shoot you down for wanting to purchase or craft a +1/3/5 ability enhancement item, or craft some boots of striding without the springing for 2,000 gp.
EDIT2: Also, let's use a 15th level caster as an example, because that's more where you'd have the staff. He could use it to cast expeditious retreat 10 times per day, with a duration of 15 minutes every time. If you want that in an item, the cost is 1*15*1800 (at will is cheaper than 10/day) or 27000. So yes, if you JUST want expeditious retreat out of the staff that is cheaper.
And yet why would a 15th level caster need that? Why would you want waste so much money and so many spell slots for what amounts to a short term low-level buff in a staff? Exactly what is going to make you jump up and say "Man I really want a CL 15 expeditious retreat, as a standard action, 10 times per day!"?
EDIT: Except not really 10/day, since it's actually more like 1/day with extended credit, subject to closure for 10 days if you max out your staff-credit; at which point further spending shall be suspended and you will be forced to repay at the minimum rate until you have repaid your credit on your spell. Thank you for choosing StaffsSuck spellcasting loans; and have a nice day. EDIT: Gotta read the fine print on those contracts and service charges. :P
Those are good houserules, Rashiel. I ain't arguing that. The next time staves are going to come up in our campaign, I'll give that rule some serious thought.
That doesn't mean that the current staves blow though. They are great utility for spontaneous casters but not as good for prepared ones.
The boots of haste are an item that apparently aren't based directly on the guidelines. Can I haz a free action activation true strike on my gloves for 1800 k? Also, it's x1800 for use-activated items, not x2000. You're using the guidelines wrong, methinks.
And yet why would a 15th level caster need that? Why would you want waste so much money and so many spell slots for what amounts to a short term low-level buff in a staff? Exactly what is going to make you jump up and say "Man I really want a CL 15 expeditious retreat, as a standard action, 10 times per day!"?
Nothing. You were the one trying to convert the abilities into other magic items. Getting to pick and choose when I want the expeditious retreat, the blink, and the alter self is a big part of it. Or the polymorphs. But I sure as hell prefer a CL15 expeditious retreat to a CL1 one, that's for sure. Not to talk about alter self, which is often needed in extended periods. And there's a big difference between a 3 round blink and a 15 round blink. And a DC17 baleful polymorph and a DC26 one.
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Those are good houserules, Rashiel. I ain't arguing that. The next time staves are going to come up in our campaign, I'll give that rule some serious thought.
That doesn't mean that the current staves blow though. They are great utility for spontaneous casters but not as good for prepared ones.
I'm glad you like them. They've been working wonders for my group for years. We also have x/day wands available as well, but you normally have to craft them yourself (most wand vendors specifically don't want to spread a lot of x/day wands into the economy), and many people deal in partially charged wands or staffs (for example, purchasing partially used wands, or wands that were never "fully charged" to begin with). Thus the x/day wands exist alongside their more mundane cousins. The PCs often prefer x/day wands like PCs prefer +1 swords, while many NPCs enjoy x/- wands like they enjoy oil of magic weapon.
It works out nicely. ^-^
Back to our other conversation...
The only way the current staffs are really any good is if you are using them for cheap spells and expanding your spell list. The problem is that if you're not allowed to make custom items, then you're also stuck with the staffs in the book. Sucks, right?
See, I would almost buy that a staff of minor spells like knock would be really darn skippy for a sorcerer who has nothing better to do. Since the minimum CL for a staff is 8th level, that would mean you'd have knock with a +18 to open stuff, and it would scale with your level. The base price of this would be 12,000 gp. That's pretty steep for a simple knock spell, but you don't know knock and you figure it'd be better to have it than to not. Unfortunately, you also need to get some other BS spell on it so you can recharge it, so we toss magic missile on it at +960 gp (80% due to multiple similar ability pricing for staffs) and make it cost 5 charges per use.
Ok, so your knock-staff costs 12,960 gp and you can recharge it. Nice. This MIGHT, just MIGHT be worth it if you don't want to buy a wand, but now it's also a dreaded custom item that follows the rules without error or evil attempts at tomfoolery and is somehow no longer legal. So now you have to find some lame staff to spend a crapload of gold on to get the knock spell plus a bunch of other spells which you can't really rely on very often, and for what? So you didn't buy a wand? Notice that spells of 5th level and higher are also excessively expensive for what you're getting out of them as well, and you have to count 50 * costly spell components for them as well; so you can forget a staff with wish, limited wish or similar for some sort of dire emergency (even at 5 charges per cast, limited wish is +15,000 gp in spell components alone, while wish would be a whopping 250,000 gp in spell components alone).
So...yeah, I'm still not sold that PF staffs are even equally as good in gameplay as they were in 3.x. Sure, they fixed that staffs permanently burnt out, but they didn't fix it in a good way. They made staffs no longer something you would actually want. I know not a single person in my group; especially spellcasters has desired a Pathfinder-style staff, because they suck just that bad compared to any of the alternatives.
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Oh, some of the current staves absolutely blow chunks. The staff of the woodlands is one of them; you pay a ~90% premium for two abilities that are hardly useful for the item, and the spell selection, while thematic, isn't the best. Most of the charges on one will be used for wall of thorns.
The actual staff rules are fine, though. Staves work best as utility items. You don't want a staff that contains a bunch of spells that you already cast frequently; it's not doing anything for you. What you want is a staff that has several spells that you'd like to have handy, but don't want to waste spell slots on because they don't come up every day.
The staff of healing is a perfect example. Remove disease, remove blindness/deafness, and lesser restoration are all spells that are life-savers in the right circumstances, but those circumstances don't happen every day (unless you're doing an undead-themed campaign), so you'd rather not "waste" spell slots on them. The staff is cheap to make (14,800) and allows you to have those spells covered and still have your full allotment of spell slots. And, as a bonus, you can pump out 10 cure serious wounds if the party's in dire straits and you're out of healing (or a bard, inquisitor, or other partial caster can do it if you get taken out).
A wand of Remove Blindness/Deafness is 225 gp per charge. You get 50/- charges buying a new one, or less for less if you buy a used one. If you blow through this many charges during your game, you really DO need them regularly.
A wand of cure serious wounds is 225 gp per charge. You get 50/- charges buying a new one, or less for less if you buy a used one. If you blow through this many charges during your game, you really DO need them regularly.
A wand of lesser restoration is 90 gp per charge. You get 50/- charges buying a new one, or less for less if you buy a used one. If you blow through this many charges during your game, you really DO need them regularly.
A wand of remove disease is 225 gp per charge. You get 50/- charges buying a new one, or less for less if you buy a used one. If you blow through this many charges during your game, you really DO need them regularly.
Since neither the 1st nor the 2nd spell benefit from a higher caster level or save DC, neither are good in staffs. Cure serious wounds is a poor combat option, and out of combat cure light wounds wands are generally more effective (750 gp for an average of 250 healing divided as desired).
So if we were to rebuild the staff of healing as just having some wands, the prices would be...
750 gp for a wand of cure light wounds (50 charges)
4,500 gp for the lesser restoration (50 charges)
5,625 gp for the remove blindness/deafness (25 charges)
4,500 gp for remove disease (20 charges)
Total = 15,375 market price.
You can use as needed and buy more as desired. Doesn't mess with your WBL because consumables are meant to be used. Also, it has the side benefit of being purchasable in far more places from a much lower level. See a staff of healing is above the core metropolis limit on magic items, which means that it either is only available randomly or by GM-fiat. All of the others are more than likely freely purchasable in any Large City.
Also, they can be used as needed. If you don't intend to use them often, then a staff's ability to recharge is useless to you. If you do need to use them often, then a staff's recharge mechanic is useless to you.
EDIT: Just to put it into further perspective, if you used every one of those spells once per adventure, they would last you no less than 50 adventures before you had to restock, and would never have to stop and recharge them. 50 adventures. Plus they have the side effect of being more useful if you suddenly DO need to cast a lot ("Oh crap, surrounded by shadows! I didn't see this coming. Well I've still got 20 charges left on my lesser restorations, and it looks like I might use them all!").
Spell trigger items can be used by anyone whose class can cast the corresponding spell.
If it's not on your spell list then you don't get to use that spell. A staff with multiple charges is effectively multiple spell-triggers drawing off the same charges. If you are trying to cast a spell off the staff, then that is the spell corresponding with the spell-trigger item.
Thus even if you're a bard, you still need to make a UMD check to cast from a staff of healing to cast remove disease because your class cannot cast the spell corresponding to the spell-trigger in question.
Ergo, I don't really see much use for them as far as gaining access to spells outside your spell list.