do you guys use staves?

[Sky]

clickbait-ey thread title but really, i hardly ever use devices. Allow me to explain.

1. if i get a OOD wand way too early, i'll hoard it and use it against something annoying like smeagol or wormtongue (if i have no speed) or one of the uruk uniques. Sure, Drain Life is great against those guys, but it's not a game changer against anything else.
i normally carry TO until far late into the game, but other than that it's just drain life and Annihilation.
Dragon breath is useless; by the time it shows up, it's just a waste of an action.

2. i use a few rods. Slow, Healing (if i am grinding really hard and i wind up having a half dozen), Detection/Treasure if i dont have the spell, TO, restoration if im really desperate for sustains, although it doesnt really work for the morgoth fight. Magic Map is great if you dont have the spell (priest / paladin), but then again most artifact lights will do this anyway. Playing randarts, Arkenstones and Stars are plentiful.

3. staves are absolutely useless.
My top 3 staves are:
summoning (good for calling uniques at low depth)
banishment
power

all the other attack staves (such as Slow) tend to wake huge swathes of mobs which is not a good idea. They affect very few uniquest or even bigger mobs, and even then they have limited effect. The best thing about Teleportation is that you can sell it, when otherwise a scroll is far better - never fails, cannot be drained, weights less.


i want to hear from the devices aficionados as to what they do with their wands/rods/staves. Do YOU carry a dozen rods of frost bolts to kill hydras?

I understand that this is because i maximize the hurt of my characters, while someone who prefers stealth may need a different approach.
Discuss.

[mrfy]

Originally Posted by Sky

i normally carry TO until far late into the game, but other than that it's just drain life and Annihilation.
Dragon breath is useless; by the time it shows up, it's just a waste of an action.

Depends on the character class, but I usually carry wands of TO and Slow Monster (works well with the 4.2.x version against uniques and high-level monsters.

Originally Posted by Sky

2. i use a few rods. Slow, Healing (if i am grinding really hard and i wind up having a half dozen), Detection/Treasure if i dont have the spell, TO, restoration if im really desperate for sustains, although it doesnt really work for the morgoth fight. Magic Map is great if you dont have the spell (priest / paladin), but then again most artifact lights will do this anyway. Playing randarts, Arkenstones and Stars are plentiful.

I prefer wands of Slow Monster to rods. Can recharge as needed and no time waiting for the rod to recharge. Same with TO. Sometimes you need to TO multiple enemies.

I carry Rods of Detection, Light (early on until the mid-game for use against light-sensitive undead and to light up long hallways), Recall.

Originally Posted by Sky

3. staves are absolutely useless.
My top 3 staves are:
summoning (good for calling uniques at low depth)
banishment
power

all the other attack staves (such as Slow) tend to wake huge swathes of mobs which is not a good idea. They affect very few uniquest or even bigger mobs, and even then they have limited effect. The best thing about Teleportation is that you can sell it, when otherwise a scroll is far better - never fails, cannot be drained, weights less.

Your assertion that all attack staves such as Slow Monster wake mobs is false, to my knowledge.

I disagree that staves are absolutely useless. I usually carry teleportation, unless I can get a 0% fail spell that does similar. Scrolls can't be read when confused or blinded btw.

Banishment, Power, Holiness can be useful. I don't like Destruction or *Destruction* due to the damage it causes to items in the dungeon. I'd rather kill the monsters and get their drops.

At the moment my Blackguard is also carrying Rods of Cold Balls, due to the damage they can do to 'M's and others who are susceptible to cold attacks. I'll carry similar devices if they help cover a hole in my arsenal.

[Darin]

I tend to be pretty much a no-selling packrat, so I use devices, scrolls, etc. as I find them, even if I *could* use a spell to do the same just because I can save spell points (waste not, want not). But for certain classes, the devices are the only form of detection/mapping until one finds badass egos/artifacts to do the same.

Specifically, I find that Slow works pretty reliably (wand or rod). The damage attack devices I use at range, but my expectations for all of them tend to be low.

As for staves, they are indispensable in the early game for most classes. Early on I never find enough scrolls to light/map/detect stuff, and not every class can do that at all. I even use that minor healing staff if I find it early enough. And the best thing about the Staff of Teleportation is that it is in the store; I can never find enough scrolls in the dungeon/Black Market.

[Monkey Face]

I tend to use staves of mapping until I get a better source of dungeon mapping (Star, Clairvoyance, etc.). Having a mapped dungeon can help you find the nearest exit and/or the best way to get away from/avoid something.

[Ingwe Ingweron]

Depends on class, situation, equipment found, depth, etc., etc., etc. So, yes, my @s use staves as I find appropriate.

[Sphara]

Depending on a character ofc, I use them a lot.

Wands: I carry any attack wand at some point, gradually dropping them if in need of inventory space. TOP TIER: Annihilations, TO, Stone-to-Mud, Drain Life, ball-wands.

Rods: If I do not have a spell counterpart, I carry some of these to the very end. Like TO, Detection, TreasureDetection, Mapping rods. I try to minimize turn count, so Healing, Speed and Restoration have too long time to charge for me to use them. If my inventory starts to get full, attack rods are usually first to go. Curing rod usually gets ditched around DL50, depending on resistances.

Staves: I DO carry these. To to point I get encumbered. Tele, Map, CLW early. Banishment, Holiness, Destruction staves are items, I basically ALWAYS make room in inventory for. Especially if I have plenty of means to recharge. Staff of Power depends on char ofc.

EDIT
@Sky: Maybe I misunderstood, but sudden early Drain Life wand does break the game in means of dealing damage, as long as it stays intact There aren't bad undead/demon uniques within the early game. Remind me if I forgot something.

[Pete Mack]

Staffs: Teleport self I use until dl 50 or so. Banishment is fantastic. Speed is critical for most clssses--and hoard speed pots for the final fights. Beyond that... not much.
Wands: just about any low level attack wand; replacing with better when they become available. Wand of TO is hugely powerful, especially when backed by escape scrolls. Stunning.

[Adam]

Staff of the magi and healing are also very good, but that's probably obvious. Especially with the never failing recharge scrolls.
Staves do not make you gorged so CLW staff can be more useful than potions.

[Nick]

Also in 4.2 rangers use them to make arrows.

[archolewa]

I just pulled off my first Rogue win almost exclusively using devices (I did use the occasional arrow of slay undead in the end game). I used pretty much every attack wand I got my hands on, especially Wand of Light against orcs and Lightning bolt against corridors of others in the early game. Fire bolt and frost bolt were my bread and butter through the midgame, until I found a wand of Drain Life.

Mapping was one of the first staves I got my hands on and I kept some with me the whole game, because I didn't have to wait for them to recharge (and when playing a rogue, I find that I want to spend as little time as possible on the level).

Similarly, I ignored rods of TO and used wands until my TO spell got reliable and had enough SP. I did ignore the Wand of Dragon Breath, because the fact that the element is random makes them unreliable. I did have a wand of Dragon Flame and a wand of Dragon Frost to take down creatures that were weak to those elements, or couldn't be hurt by Drain Life and Annihilation.

I really liked spamming Wands of Dragon Flame because I could hit an entire room of enemies fairly quickly.

I used wands of Fire balls to hit enemies with splash damage before they came into LOS.

I also used a staff of healing that I found, because hey, renewable healing! I even used it when fighting Morgoth (phase door away, invoke the staff unless Morgoth smashed me with Mana Storm, so I had to chug a *healing* potion or risk being killed next turn).

I abused the staves of *Destruction* I found, because I like just sending the Tarrasque and Black Reavers, and other nasties from the level. I also *heavily* used wands of stone to mud to set up kill corridors, bypass nasty monsters, and keep a bead on Morgoth as he approached.

Staves of Light were also really nice in the early and midgame, though they became less necessary once I got telepathy.

It was a ton of fun, because with a reliable recharge, my rogue had:

1. A wide variety of elemental damage.

2. Could hit most nasty enemies really hard from range.

3. Mostly renewable healing.

4. A mostly renewable means of knocking enemies off a level.

5. Renewable mapping.

One of my most interesting and versatile characters to date. I don't think I used any staves of dispel evil though. Though come to think of it, it might have been a good choice against the Ringwraiths. Alas, maybe next time.

But yeah, when I'm playing warriors, paladins or priests I generally ignore most wands and staves. They don't have as reliable recharge, so wands and staves are much less renewable, and so much less useful, except for utility wands and staves.