I really fancy the staff concept, though I find their mechanics a bit ponderous.
As the GM of my group i've been wondering if it would be okay to implement the following changes/additions to the way staves work at lower levels and in a broader purpose:
1) The character in possession of the Staff can, as a standard action, charge the staff (unless casting the spell would normally take longer, then the charging duration is the same as the casting time).
To do so the character must know the highest levelled spell in the staff and have it prepared (or have unused spell slots of its level) and be able to cast said spell.
This triggers the spell energy as if it had been cast, the staff gains as many charges as the spell costs the staff to cast. There is no limit to how many times this can be done in a day. If the spell has a costly material component or a focus the caster must produce and use the materials as if he had cast the spell.
2) there is no longer a minimum limit on the caster level of a staff.
instead a staff is required to have at least 2 spells.
The requirements for the craft staff feat are unchanged.
Point 1 means that a staff can be charged back up to full power a LOT faster, however because you need to know the highest levelled spell in the staff to charge it this does not allow a low level mage almost unlimited access to a higher levelled spell beyond his scope, this also favors wizards slightly over sorcerers as wizards will have an easier time knowing the spells of a looted staff.
The main feature of charging a staff in this manner is that a character can use his "toy" and still be able to use it again a day or two later, as opposed to having to wait a week before the staff gets back to a reasonable amount of charges.
I dont think that this charging mechanism is overpowered because it requires the staff user to know and have ready the highest level spell in the staff.
A character using the staff to gain access to an extra bit of spell options (like a sorcerer who fancies himself some defensive magic, but isnt willing to waste his precious spells known on highly situational spells) cannot charge the staff in this manner if he does not know the highest level spell.
A character who sought out a staff to gain access to a spell beyond his level (like a level 7 cleric blowing his wad of cash on a staff with flame strike) wont be able to charge the staff and spam said spell until he actually reaches the required level.
Point 2 means that, while the benefits of crafting a high level staff remain, the players can exploit cheap staves to cast low level spells in abundance
Of course this means that mid-high level mages will hardly ever run out of spells to cast by buying dirt heap staves that contain their most basic spells, but that is hardly a huge issue when said low level spells rarely have a meaningful effect on an important battle.
It also enables low level casters to purchase staves that have a meaningful effect without utterly shattering their purse.
The requirement to have 2 spells imposes a slight increase in price.
A level 1 magic missile staff would craft for a measly 400 gold, sold on the market for 800 and be vastly more useful than a wand in the long run, adding a second spell pushes the price up and ensures that players dont just buy staves to function as oversized wands.
Access to staves at low levels would also help casters deal with their limited allotment of spells at early levels.
Issues behind this idea:
With these changes a low level staff completely outshines wands that create magical effects at a higher level than their lowest possible.
A CL 9 magic missile wand is utterly useless to a level 9 caster who possesses a CL 1 staff with the magic missile spell in it, the effect of each item is the same but the staff does it at a vastly lower price.
A caster can effectively double, triple or even quadruple his allotment of spells at a certain level by having a fully charged staff at a given time, though the staff needs to be charged, too quick access to charges might make a key disadvantage for caster characters simply vanish.
What do you think of my ideas? OP, UP, Pointless? Are staves perhaps fine as they are and arent meant to find their way into the clutches of low level adventurers in the first place?
Well, this means someone could easily charge several staffs over the course of a few days and then go into a dungeon with access to maybe double or triple the normal number of spells per day, completely throwing the normal spell system balance out the window.
I always thought it was annoying having limits on spells per day anyway though, so hey it could be fun.
I don't like the way staffs are handled right now, so maybe this would make them more worthwhile.
:)