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View Full Version : comparing costs of healing, staff vs wand of lesser vigor



taltamir
2010-01-03, 03:35 AM
A staff or a wand costs 750 x CL x SL
with CL = minimum (or actual) caster level and SL = spell level.
the staff has the interesting advantage that it uses the attributes of the person casting from it. So CL is raised appropriately if your caster level is higher then the base. It does require a masterwork quarterstaff to be enchanted though (a cost of 300gp; since a non masterwork quaterstaff has no listed value).

So lets do the math:
lesser vigor is known to be a great bang for the buck healing spell. It heals 10 + CL (to a max of 15 rounds total at CL5)

The staff costs 1x1x750 + 300gp = 1050gp
the wand costs 1x1x750 = 750gp
The cost per cast is the cost of the item divided by 50.
so for the staff it is 1050/50 = 21 per cast, for the wand it is 750/50 = 15.

Used by a level 5 or above cleric or druid, the staff heals 15HP, @ 21gp per cast that is 21gp/15HP = 1.4 gp/HP.
A wand heals 11HP at any level, @15gp a pop, thats 15gp/11HP = 1.363636 (repeating) gp/HP.

The wand is actually the greater value, had the bonus capped out higher allowing a 6th level cleric to heal 16hp, it would have resulted in the staff being cheaper.

there is one caveat though. When you are done using it, the wand leaves a useless twig, the staff leaves a non magical staff worth 300gp that can be enchanted again for another 750gp. As a bonus, there are optional rules for recharging staffs at half price, which make them more lucrative if your DM allows it.