I want to love the quarterstaff, but the Iron-Clad outclasses it in every way. Unlike most other .1 weapons, the Quarterstaff does not get the offhand slot to help compensate for the lesser damage of like skills among its tree. I will list the comparison of the two weapons. All of these will be of the T4 type.
Q Ability: Concussive Blow
The Quarterstaff (QS) does 178 damage whereas the Iron-Clad (IC) does 198 damage. The Iron-Clad is a straight up upgrade here.
W Ability: Stun Run
- The Quarterstaff and iron-clad both boost movement speed for the same amount and duration, but the iron-clad has over a half second longer stun(QS 4.85sec vs IC 5.37sec). As a weapon whose primary reason in PvP is CC, the IC wins here.
W Ability: Empowered Slam
- The QS does 322 damage whereas the IC does 357 damage. This is a small difference, however as stated before, the primary reason for the QS line is stunning. Most people will take Stun Run over Empowered Slam when it comes to PvP.
W Ability: Heavy Cleave (Iron-Clad only and double-bladed staff only)
- This attack does 761 damage, same 15 sec cool down as Empowered Slam, but has a 1 second casting time. Both this and Empowering slam are nice if you already have a pure stunner, but again is mostly ignored due to Stun Run.
E Ability: Forceful Swing (Quarterstaff only)
- This is an instant cast push back attack that pushes back enemies in 360 degrees around the caster. It also does a fair 134 damage. It has a great 10 second cool down timer, but also costs 37 mana to use.
E Ability: Hurricane (Iron-Clad)
- This is just like Forceful Swing as a push back ability. The difference that makes this ability so much more powerful is it spins, pushes back, and damages all targets for 4 solid seconds (and the duration scales). The ability not only does 62 damages every time it hits a target (which will tick every second for 4 seconds), but you can also move while this ability is being used for its duration. To top it off, it only cost 1 mana more than Forceful Swing. The one and only downfall is it’s a 20 second cool down but is lessened by the fact that the cool down starts upon activation.
Other than the fact that the Q and W abilities does straight up more damage on the iron-clad, the E ability is where it steps far ahead. It does more damage over time (especially if you can keep pushing them into a wall), has more chances to interrupt the enemy (which is the main reason to use any weapon in the quarterstaff line), and won’t drain your mana nearly as much as the quarterstaff. I suggest improving the quarterstaff by:
- Double Forceful Swing’s damage. This gives the QS a more damage role than the IC. It doesn’t make it as strong of CC as the IC, but it will give the QS the ability to do damage
as well. - Reduce Forceful Swing’s mana. The QS runs out of mana really quickly if you’re trying to interrupt. The IC doesn’t as quickly because of Hurricane’s cool down, but Hurricane
also will interrupt 4 or more times as much as Forceful Swing. - Make Forceful Swing stun or slow as well. This may make QS OP by interrupting and stun/slow, but there’s also a reason it’s never used over the iron-clad.