Magical Staves Ought to Default to {!a}

[MainiacJoe]

The base weapon class is horrible, half the staves don't do anything special in melee, and of those that do it takes a lot of investment before it's worthwhile. Currently these are a newbie trap, but I recognize that my suggestion is interface-spoilery if a player doesn't know how to turn off the inscription when they actually want to swing with it.

[Cimanyd]

Staves of energy, wizardry, power, conjurations, and summoning should be changed to confirm on attacking, like attacking barehanded or with a ranged weapon. No need for an inscription.

[Rast]

Magic staves are a mess.

They should refactored as offhand items rather than melee weapons. Worn in the shield slot, but not using the shield skill or providing any SH.

[kroki]

Staves of energy, wizardry, power, conjurations, and summoning should be changed to confirm on attacking, like attacking barehanded or with a ranged weapon. No need for an inscription.

really elegant love it

[Lasty]

I'm not sure why magic boosts should compete with shields.

[duvessa]

I'm not sure why magic boosts should compete with shields.

they already do if you're a spriggan, or (somehow) think majin-bo is a good item

[Rast]

I'm not sure why magic boosts should compete with shields.

Better than them competing with weapons. And getting a janky attack that is based on your skill in a spell school and evocations. And having to swap them with a real weapon when you need to kill something tough in melee.

Also:



vs

[Spectrina]

Moving staves to shield slot solves hassle involving playing optimally, especially using staff of power (swapping once you expend your bonus MP). I doubt it's much of a concern, but removing magical staves as a melee weapon might prevent a "noob trap" , since the consensus among good players back when I was playing seemed to be that they're trash and it takes a ton of XP to even be somewhat comparable to a good melee option. I doubt this has changed. The current interface is kinda bad for telling players how much of a bonus they're getting from evocations/spellschool training anyway.

I'm not sure why magic boosts should compete with shields.

As duvessa mentioned, this is already a problem for Spriggans. It's not the only instance where you're asked to sacrifice defenses for spell power, either, since Archmagi is a robe ego (at least I'm assuming it still exists, I can't remember when I've last worn a robe).

This change would also add a bit of choice to what is currently a no-brainer: whether or not you should use a shield on a Formicid. Currently all Formicids want to use a shield no matter what type of character you are, the only exception being followers of Ru.