| Joey Cote |
So, here is an area where there is some murkiness. If a character has access to a spell as a power, and that spells is one of those that is on the spell list for a staff, can the character invest the staff at the start of the day and then use the charges from the staff to cast the spell?
An example of this would be a paladin with the channel energy feat. This gives him the ability to cast the heal spell, but as a power, not a spell. So could he make use of a staff of healing to cast heal using charges from the staff?
On page 379 under Investing a Staff it says "When invested during preparation the staff gains a number of charges equal to your highest-level spell slot." A paladin of course doesn't have spell slots, which would seem to indicate that he wouldn't be able to invest. Under Casting Spells from a Staff it says "To be cast a spell from a staff, you must have the spell on your spell list...." Again calling for a spell list, which paladins don't technically have.
Then we go to page 194 on the Non-Spellcasters with Powers section. Which says that if your class cannot normally cast spells the highest level of power you can cast is half your level, rounded up and your powers are automatically heightened to this level. Then it goes on to say that "Though the ability to cast powers does not mean you become a spellcaster, you gain the ability to use the Cast a Spell activity."
Not really sure how staves work in regard to Trick Magic Item feat either. Can the person trick it and invest it? If so how many charges does it get? If you are of a different magical tradition tricking it to invest, does it gain charges equal to your highest spell level or something else. If you cannot cast spells at all, can it gain charges from you? If not, does that mean you can only use the stored charges? Since the way staves seem to work is that you are drawing on the stored magic in the staff but casting the spell yourself, if you don't know the spell, can you somehow still cast a spell from the staff's list?