The Wizard's Staff

The Wizard's Staff is an enchanted item created in the original Fantasy Trip RPG supplement "Wizards" produced in 1978.
Pg 13 describes how it is created by the IQ 8 spell "Staff" (costing ST 5) and how knowing that spell at character creation means a character automatically starts off with one (yet their ST does not start off depleted)
Pg 18 describes the rules. In addition to literal staff variations like a quarterfstaff it can also be a rod or wand. Per pg 13 "any piece of wood" will do.
==2000s update
pg 148 "Advanced Magic" of the 178-pg "Into the Labyrinth" (by Steve Jackson Games .. not the original 1980 version with 83 pages) prints advanced rules.
pg 46 also talks about it
==plurality==
Pg 18 emphasizes staffs aren't made in-game with a parenthesized exception of "to replace a broken one". This might imply a mage can only have one working staff at a time, as otherwise there might be good reason to create dozens of exploding wands simultaneously as a way of spending excess ST on long-term investments.
==Benefits==
===Accuracy===
pg 22 mentions wizards are at -4 to DX with all weapons that aren't a staff. The DX Adjustment Table says "Wizard using any weapon except his staff or a dagger . . . . . . . . . - 4" implying that daggers are also an exception.
*Pg 18 actually says "The only way a wizard can make a physical attack is by striking with his staff" which seems inconsistent with the rest of the book. It can't be taken to mean a -4 penalty for parrying because TFT does not use active defenses like in GURPS - the only weapons useful for defense are daggers/shields and they work the same as armor by subtracting "hits" from the damage rolls of successful incoming attacks.
A lesser-known penalty only mentioned on the DX Adjustment table preceding page 13:
:"Wizard whose weapon or armor is iron or steel, instead of silver . -4"
This would mean that the only unpenalized metal weapon a wizard could use would be a silver dagger - a or steel dagger would created a -4 penalty to hit (same as using a silver sword) while a steel sword would stack both -4 penalties creating a -8 penalty.
===Armedness===
Pg 10 under "Engaged and Disengaged" mentions:
:"The only "unarmed" enemy in this game is a wizard who has no staff."
Being classified as an 'armed enemy' relative to one's opponent is important for trapping them in an 'Engaged' state, which makes them less mobile.
===Casting===
pg 22 mentions spellcasting cannot be done while holding a Ready weapon unless it is a staff - non-staff weapons need to be drop/slung to cast spells
===Damage===
all staffs inflicting a fixed 1 die of damage. When compared to the Weapon Table on pg 13 of Fantasy Trip Melee this is the same as the 1d done by the Club and Rapier both which require ST 9 to use. It's unclear what the ST requirement of the staff is.
Daggers and Main-Gauce by contrast do less damage (1d-1) when "engaging" when enemies in Adjacent hexes - they only do more damage (1d+2) when closing into HTH range.
Unlike GURPS, the ST has no impact on the damage done by fighters (there is no "thrust" derived from it) aside from dictating the weight of weapon which the character can use.
Spell Shield's phrasing "damage done by weapons (ordinary, magical, or staffs)" implies the damage as a separate category, perhaps somewhere in between 'normal' and 'magical'.
===Replaceable===
pg 18 "A wizard whose staff is broken may either do without or create a new one from the piece in his hand. A broken staff does not work."
==drawbacks==
===Breakability===
the Break Weapon spell found in the Wizard Reference Pages mentions that while broken weapons normally do half damage, "broken staffs are useless". It is initially unclear if that means normal quarterstaffs or if it also includes The Wizard's Staff because "Does not work on enchanted swords, shields, etc ..." might apply the ETC to TWT. As mentioned under "damage" it is unclear if this counts as an "enchanted" or "magical" weapon.
Pg 18 eventually clarifies this question later in the book:
:"A staff CAN be affected by a Drop Weapon or Break Weapon spell."
The drawback compared to other weapons (no damage, not half damage) is however offset by the aforementioned benefit of easy repair for 5 ST, which would upgrade it back to a full-damage staff.
===Melee dropping===
pg 22's "A wizard involved in HTH must drop his staff" may be interpreted as over-riding some of the usual policy on pg 16 of Fantasy Trip Melee which rolls 1d and results 5+6 are "defender does not drop his weapon".
If however this is just referencing to initiating melee, then it may just be referencing how only hands/knives can be used in HTH range (same-hex similar to reach C in GURPS)
==Explosion==
If someone other than the owner picks it up without their approval ("against his will"), it explodes inflicting 3d damage. That could be a benefit (free surprise damage on foes, foes cannot use weapon against you) but also a drawback (easier for foes to destroy your weapon)
The 'will' caveat implies it should be possible for someone to carry a wizard's staff for him (so long as they got his consent) although pg 22's "Fighters cannot carry magical staffs" seems to imply it has to be a non-fighter character who does this.
An 'exploded' staff is presumably "broken" but could be repaired via the 'Staff' spell (similar to one destroyed via Break Weapon though this is not explicitly clarified.
==changes in New Fantasy Trip==
These are largely upgrades which are absent in the original game
*designated as "occult weapon"
*the 1d attack on adjacent hexes is no longer a physical one - it is a "flare of magic energy" which doesn't require contact
**a key difference may be how this interacts with the critical failure results on pg 12 of Wizards - initially this specified drops on 17s and breaks on 18s when staffs were classified alongside melee weapons, but if it works like a spell it might just count as an 'automatic miss' without breaking the staff, similar to a 16
*if IQ is higher than DX it can be used to target the attack
NFTP also created advanced staff spells (presumably with earlier ones as prerequisites, although this isn't specified)
*IQ 8 Staff I (as one might retroactively rename it for distinction) creates the usual Wizard's Staff (with the NFT changes listed above)
*IQ11 Staff II creates a Manastaff
*IQ13 Staff III] creates a Staff of Striking
*IQ15 Staff IV creates a Staff of Power
*IQ17 Staff V creates a Staff of Mastery
category:rules