Sage Advice's ruling on staves

[Mistwell]

If it, on occasion, contains several 10-foot cube boxes, I agree with you.

If it never has and never will, but has the capacity to do so, then I don't agree; your car could store several 10-foot cube boxes, but your car does not store several 10-foot cube boxes.

-Hyp.

When I bought the car, the seller said it stores several 10-foot cube boxes. I checked, and the space is indeed there. I just have not used it that way. But, it's still a car that stores several 10-foot cube boxes. It's not doing so now, and it may well never do so, but the sentence "stores several 10-foot cube boxes" is no more or less accurate based on how I decide to use it. It was and will always be one accurate description of my car.

There is a way to use the phrase "stores several" without it being literally "must store several". In fact, I think that is the most common usage of the phrase.

I really don't understand what utility there is in reading that sentence literally, given others have proven pretty well that the rest of the paragraph isn't intended to be read in a literal manner (the whole wood thing).

 

[GeorgeFields]

A Staff of Life has two powers. Is that "SEVERAL"? I don't think it is.

Some of you are taking the RAW WAY TO LITERALLY AND SERIOUSLY.

I think if you were at a pool hall, and somebody ran the table and shouted "I'm on fire!", you 'd throw a bucket of water on them.

Is it that really a big deal if someone created a staff with only one power? Is it going to unbalance your game? Unlikely. I understand rules interpretations all too well. I've been involved in more rules arguments in the past 27 years than I care to count.

All they do is take away the most important factor of the game: having fun. If your player thinks having a staff with one spell (a waste in my opinion), let him make one.

I'm going to hvae to agree with Andy on this one (hey, first time for everything).

On another note, WotC could have done a lot better picking somebody to replace Skip as the sage.

 

[Hypersmurf]

When I bought the car, the seller said it stores several 10-foot cube boxes.

Then I don't think he was using the word correctly.

-Hyp.

 

[GeorgeFields]

Then I don't think he was using the word correctly.

-Hyp.

Main Entry: 1store
Pronunciation: 'stor
Function: transitive verb
Inflected Form(s): stored; stor·ing
Etymology: Middle English, from Anglo-French estorer to establish, restore, supply, from Latin instaurare to resume, restore
1 : LAY AWAY, ACCUMULATE <store vegetables for winter use> <an organism that absorbs and stores DDT>
2 : FURNISH, SUPPLY; especially : to stock against a future time <store a ship with provisions>
3 : to place or leave in a location (as a warehouse, library, or computer memory) for preservation or later use or disposal
4 : to provide storage room for

Actually, he was. The fact something isn't doing something it isn't capable of doesn't make the statement false.

 

[Whizbang Dustyboots]

nm!

 

[Hypersmurf]

Actually, he was. The fact something isn't doing something it isn't capable of doesn't make the statement false.

Yet regardless, a Staff of Fireball doesn't provide storage room for several spells; it provides storage room for Fireball and nothing else.

-Hyp.

 

[Mistwell]

Then I don't think he was using the word correctly.

-Hyp.

Do you emphatically think he wasn't using it correctly?

I think the salesperson was using the phrase in a fairly common way. Here, check these out:

http://www.adorama.com/LLVIP61.html

It's a rigid plastic box with foam inserts that "stores several" lamps. If you fill it with your large metal figures instead of lamps, the ad would still be accurate. And if you put just one lamp in it instead of several, it's still an apt description of the item.

http://www.shopping.com/xPC-Andrew_...Passport_Case~r-1~CLT-INTR~RFR-www.google.com

It's a passport case that "stores several credit cards". The picture is even devoid of a single credit card, as they are merely describing it's potential storage capacity. I doubt if you filled the case with debit cards it would suddenly not be a passport case, nor would the ad description be inaccurate. You could put just one credit card in it as well. In fact, you could put several of the exact same credit card in there.

http://www.allworldsoft.com/software/12-111-breaktru-remind.htm

This is a calendar/scheduler type message notifier. It "stores several" one line messages for a latter date notification. If you schedule only one message, the ad was not inaccurate. If you store the same message over and over, the ad was still accurate.

I could go on, as there are literally hundreds of such descriptions. It's a very common way to use that phrase when referring to storage capacity of a container.

And given how common that usage of the phrase is, I think it's time you admitted it's at least one reasonable interpretation of the sentence that the author meant potential capacity and not minimum usage.

 

[GeorgeFields]

CREATING STAFFS
To create a magic staff, a character needs a supply of materials, the most obvious being a staff or the pieces of the staff to be assembled.
The cost for the materials is subsumed in the cost for creating the staff—375 gp x the level of the highest-level spell x the level of the caster, plus 75% of the value of the next most costly ability (281.25 gp x the level of the spell x the level of the caster), plus one-half of the value of any other abilities (187.5 gp x the level of the spell x the level of the caster). Staffs are always fully charged (50 charges) when created.
If desired, a spell can be placed into the staff at only half the normal cost, but then activating that particular spell costs 2 charges from the staff. The caster level of all spells in a staff must be the same, and no staff can have a caster level of less than 8th, even if all the spells in the staff are low-level spells.
The creator must have prepared the spells to be stored (or must know the spell, in the case of a sorcerer or bard) and must provide any focus the spells require as well as material and XP component costs sufficient to activate the spell a maximum number of times (50 divided by the number of charges one use of the spell expends). This is in addition to the XP cost for making the staff itself. Material components are consumed when he begins working, but focuses are not. (A focus used in creating a staff can be reused.) The act of working on the staff triggers the prepared spells, making them unavailable for casting during each day of the staff ’s creation. (That is, those spell slots are expended from his currently prepared spells, just as if they had been cast.)
Creating a few staffs may entail other prerequisites beyond spellcasting. See the individual descriptions for details.
Crafting a staff requires one day for each 1,000 gp of the base price.
Item Creation Feat Required: Craft Staff.

Let's break it down.

CREATING STAFFS
To create a magic staff, a character needs a supply of materials, the most obvious being a staff or the pieces of the staff to be assembled.

Pretty obvious.

The cost for the materials is subsumed in the cost for creating the staff—375 gp x the level of the highest-level spell x the level of the caster, plus 75% of the value of the next most costly ability (281.25 gp x the level of the spell x the level of the caster), plus one-half of the value of any other abilities (187.5 gp x the level of the spell x the level of the caster).

The highest level spell costs 375 gp x spell level.
The next highest costs 281.25 gp x spell level.
If you add any more, they cost 187.5 gp x spell level.

If you really wanted, you could say this mandates a second spell.

Staffs are always fully charged (50 charges) when created.

It doesn't get any more obvious than that.

If desired, a spell can be placed into the staff at only half the normal cost, but then activating that particular spell costs 2 charges from the staff.

Does this mean multiple spells on a staff can't have this but only a spell of your choice? Hmm, Staff of Power breaks RAW here.

The caster level of all spells in a staff must be the same, and no staff can have a caster level of less than 8th, even if all the spells in the staff are low-level spells.

Nothing to dispute here.

The creator must have prepared the spells to be stored (or must know the spell, in the case of a sorcerer or bard) and must provide any focus the spells require as well as material and XP component costs sufficient to activate the spell a maximum number of times (50 divided by the number of charges one use of the spell expends). This is in addition to the XP cost for making the staff itself. Material components are consumed when he begins working, but focuses are not. (A focus used in creating a staff can be reused.) The act of working on the staff triggers the prepared spells, making them unavailable for casting during each day of the staff ’s creation. (That is, those spell slots are expended from his currently prepared spells, just as if they had been cast.)
Creating a few staffs may entail other prerequisites beyond spellcasting. See the individual descriptions for details.
Crafting a staff requires one day for each 1,000 gp of the base price.
Item Creation Feat Required: Craft Staff.

Or in the rest of it sa far as that goes.

It looks like poor wording has got the rules lawyers' panties in an uproar.

In my opinion, mandating more than one spell in a staff is like mandating shoppers fill their carts to the top. After all, if you don't fill it to the top, it's nat a cart... Is it?

 

[Hypersmurf]

Let's break it down.

You haven't included the description of staffs, only the description for creating a staff.

Would you allow, then, someone to create a potion of a spell with a casting time of more than one minute, since it is only the description of potions, not the description of creating potions, that prohibits it?

And given how common that usage of the phrase is, I think it's time you admitted it's at least one reasonable interpretation of the sentence that the author meant potential capacity and not minimum usage.

Sure. But a Staff of Fireball doesn't have the potential capacity for several spells. It has the potential capacity - which it is utilising fully - for a single spell: Fireball.

Compare a Ring of Spell Storing, which has the potential to store multiple spells even if it isn't doing so right now, with a Ring of Counterspells, which can only contain one. If we postulate that someone might come along and use Forge Ring on the Ring of Counterspells to add the powers of a Ring of Spell Storing, that still doesn't mean that the Ring of Counterspells stores several spells; it stores one.

The Staff of Fireball stores a single spell. If someone came along and Craft Staffed it to make it into a Staff of Fireball and Scorching Ray, it would store more than one... but it's no longer a Staff of Fireball, so that possibility doesn't change that a Staff of Fireball stores and can store but a single spell.

-Hyp.

 

[pallandrome]

Yanno, I gotta wonder about a campaign where this would actually be a frikkin issue.