Why is Staff a 2h Weapon?

MasterSpatula

Vevvev wrote: »

Sealish wrote: »

Although whenever I think of people using a staff in one hand and something else in the other I think of Gandalf. The sword didn't do him much good though...

I mean, he slew Durin's Bane with it, at least in the movie. ¯\_(ツ)_/¯

merpins

Staff used to be considered a 1-handed weapon in eso. At least in terms of set bonuses you get (you could have 11 slots towards set bonuses, not 12).

Enkil

this is mostly DAOC and partly elder scrolls..

JPS

My staff needs to be handled with 2 hands. It's just too big...

zaria

heaven13 wrote: »

They actually weren't always considered 2 handed weapons. Not until Summerset. Previously, they only counted as 1, although you still couldn't equip something else with them. Same for bows and actual 2-handed weapons. That patch (update 18) they changed bows, staves, and actual 2-handed weapons to count as 2-pieces so people using them would benefit from a full 5 piece set bonus, instead of 4.

Allowing staves to be equipped with something else would require a new weapon line with how the game works. Right now we have 2-handed, Dual Wield and Sword & Shield. If you only equip a single handed sword/dagger/etc, you won't benefit from either skill line (need to equip two 1-handed weapons to use something like Flurry or sword and shield to use Puncture, for example). So for technical design, staves needed to count as 2-handed.

Staffs counting as two set pieces was changed for bows and two handed swords and other melee weapons too.

Changing it to one hand would mess up things a lot as you could either equip another staff, an melee weapon or an shield.
Yes they could restrict this like you can only have shield in left hand I think.

Cambionn

As @heaven13 mentioned, they used to be single handed, which changed for gameplay reasons only. Basically, they are "can be hold in one hand but you can't really use it properly while also using another weapon at the same time" type of weapons, much like bows. That would be a horrible long category name for something that effectively, works the same as 2 handed weapon gameplay wise. So for gameplay it's considered a two handed weapon.

Just imagine someone holding two full sized staffs, one in each hand and try to wield them properly including movements (so not Skyrims just hold them up a bit, unless you want all animations to become that...). It'll be so clumsy. Especially considering most mages aren't physically trained much, and seem to focus on training intellectuality and magic abilities only. Let's be well, most people who talk here about what you can do with, talk about a physically trained person. And maybe som mages train, but certainly not the norm

Imagine:
・How often the staves will hit each other due to size
・How hard it'll be to balance two huge sticks, sometimes with heavy stones and metal parts, let alone focus magika properly.
・How people must carry this around and grab it. The pulling a long swords of your back is already fantasy ***, but two things of this length? Each with only one hand? TES has always been on the border of semi-realistic with armour and weapons (not saying it's realistic, but there are no 3 meter swords with a blad as wide as a dagger or anything like that). Starting Skyrim they already added a few more "odd" pieces than usual.
・How are we gonna block with two weapons? Hold them together? Otherwise, unless the other is very small, the staff will be hold in one hand and that makes is used as a a leaver easily, unless very precisely placed, and even that'll be difficult.

Admitted, I've only done longsword fighting and had limited experience with other weapons, although I did use other weapons (pike, dussack, single stick, dagger) a few limited times. So my experience on staff fighting might not be perfectly accurate, but I think it won't stop being very clumsy without some serious physical practice, which again, most TES mages don't seem to do.

Most games agree staves are 2 handed for a reason. Fantasy has some ridiculous ***, and that's fine, it's fantasy, but there are still certain things that tend to be common, and for a reason. Surely there can be changes to those too, it's fantasy after all, but if it makes too little sense, it either needs to be a lot of fun or have a damn good explanation to satisfy people. There is also a reason most battle mages/warrior-mage type classes tend to use a sword as focus in many other games. So it could maybe be different for some fantasy games and single handed staves could maybe be done, but I'm not sure a franchise of 23+ years old is the place to look for to change these things to be honest, beside maybe in completely new lore. And magic is far from completely new lore.

But then, we also changed from chainmail bikinis to some of the more logic fantasy armour I've seen with even most pauldrons being okay sized (although the common too low waist "issue" stayed, among other things), to armour that doesn't cover half your body because you gotta be able to flex those muscles in full plate steel, especially in a cold, snowy country. We also got to use longwords continuously (there are techniques that call for it, but always using it like that is kinda...) with one hand in the past which is as unpractical as it's horribly heavy. So you never know. Maybe one day we can use staves as one handed things, and even dual wield them. But personally, I prefer it we don't do that in ESO.

However, if they're gonna add single handed magic, It's more likely magic shooting from our hands like in Oblivion and Skyrim. I can't remember small staves/wands in previous games, but I might have missed/forgotten something (didn't play Arena till Morrowind in a long while either).

As for people comparing LOTR wizards. Let's not forget those are basically angels. That's not a fair comparison to "each random mage playing person in the world", even if we're all the vestige.

kichwas

Dracofyre wrote: »

there is a "Bo Stick combat", if you watched Xena, the warrior princess, her sidekick, Gabrelle use as Bo Stick., when she walk, she lean on staff when tired or resting, when she fights, she use 2 hands.

Yes.

Fighting with a large stick is a very common "martial art" across the planet. It's basically a universal human weapon.

It's not too common in fantasy - but my mental reference 'genre fiction wise' when I made my post about it a few pages ago was actually a scene from a Robin Hood movie.

But anyone here who is a human in 'real life' has probably seen someone in their life wield a stick before...

@Sealish While you could hold a 6-foot stick and a shield at the same time - you could not use either one effectively without dropping the stick... So even if the stick is just an overgrown wand - you're going to drop it the moment someone bashes you because of your leverage being all wrong.

- Personally I think it was a mistake for the animators to make animations with folks waving it around in one hand... because that's a good way to get it knocked loose.
-

Rittings

It would be interesting to see some alternative ways to build... like decrease the damage when equipping an offhand piece... but on that same note, maybe we could do the same for 2 handed weapons... like Diablo does - being able to wield a 2 handed sword in one hand (because you are just THAT brutish lol). Maybe at a reduced amount of damage, but increased speed and the ability to have another offhand...

Not sure how it could be made possible, but it's definitely a good spitballing suggestion

DracoSaggitaExSole

I think staff should be a 2H weapon, but a wand a spell sword, and spell warding shields in a new skill line would be cool. Lineage II has stuff like that, it could work, higher mitigation and less damage than the staff option but keeping it magica based.

Jerdeh

Sealish wrote: »

I am kinda curious why the staff is a 2h weapon.
You hold it in one hand, it has single hand animations, you can preview a staff and shield equipped, and it has base weapon damage that follows 1h progression and not 2h progression.
Also, i know that this isn't skyrim, but staves were 1h weapons in Skyrim too so there is reasonable precedent within the series (and yes I know that 2h staves also appear in the series).

I feel like this is a missed opportunity. Instead of making Frost Staves the Magicka tank weapon Zenimax could have done this:
1) Made 1h weapons with empty offhand have their own skill line (preferably a melee magicka/stamina "spellblade" style hybrid that scaled on the higher of your two resources... you know... the MOST advertised single weapon style in ESO marketing that for some reason isn't in the game)
2) Left Destro staff with empty offhand the same but reworked Frost into a DPS option
3) Made the tanking skill line dependent upon equipping a shield with either a staff or 1h melee weapon. Skills and passives could split slightly (similar to how Destro splits on staff types) but have the same utility (for example Puncture would do the same thing but would use either Stamina or Magicka based on equipped weapon and would do either Physical or Fire/Lightning/Frost damage)

This would give Magicka Tanks a fully fleshed out tanking tree to use while also allowing DPS frost mages to be a thing.

When the game first released, characters did wield it with both hands when doing heavy attack. But they changed it.

ForfiniteStories

If your magical prowess is potent enough, you can wield a staff with just your mind, therefore they can also be considered zero-handed. :^)

Mazra

I'd settle for some melee animations with the staff when attacking targets in melee range. Melee weapons get multiple animations for their attacks. Only two or three animations, but it's better than the staff pewpew fireball animation that repeats ad nauseam.

Yeah, I'm a wizard, but I'm also a Nightblade. A staff is a pretty good melee weapon, you know. No reason to puke fireballs in melee range when you've got a metal/wood stick. Just smack 'em!

Ramber

You cant point it with one hand unless its cheap and hollow lol.

Bradyfjord

kichwas wrote: »

While you could hold a 6-foot stick and a shield at the same time - you could not use either one effectively without dropping the stick... So even if the stick is just an overgrown wand - you're going to drop it the moment someone bashes you because of your leverage being all wrong.

Most likely, a person using a staff/shield combination would end up using the staff like a blunted spear. They would probably hold up the shield and stab out from behind with their staff. It would be a weapon of desperation rather than practicality, imo.

xxthir13enxx

I’m sorry but... my staff is a two hander