Polypore staff

The polypore staff is a magical staff requiring 80 Magic to wield. It is constructed by growing 3,000 polypore spores on a polypore stick, with 15,000 fire runes to imbue it with power. Doing so requires a minimum of 80 Farming, which can be assisted or boosted by items such as Garden pies.

The staff has 3,000 charges once created, and can be recharged using polypore spores and fire runes, at the same rate required to create it. The staff can hit up to 702 damage on a Slayer task in Kuradal's dungeon, making it the highest-hitting magic-based weapon in the game (outside of special attacks). It also has the third highest prayer bonus of any staff at +5 behind the animal staves which have +6, and the third-age druidic staff, which has a prayer bonus of +7.

Players can also use this staff to cast other spells (such as Ancient Magicks), however the staff will become "Polypore staff (degraded)" - it will still have all of its charges left.

The Polypore spell can be used on any spellbook, and due to the low price of each cast, may make it a viable option for Mages in the future, when prices settle down.

Due to the creatures in the Polypore Dungeon having a weakness to magic, and that they drop the spores needed for recharging the staff, it can be very profitable, even cost saving to slay the creatures there using the staff's innate magic attack.

One charge at current Grand Exchange prices costs .

After an update on 6 December 2011, the melee attack bonuses and an attack level requirement of 80 were removed.



Spellcasting
While the polypore staff can be used to cast spells in the standard spellbook as well as Ancient Magicks spells, it also has a built-in spell that can be selected via the combat styles interface. Rather than consuming runes, this spell consumes one charge per cast; each polypore staff can cast up to 3,000 casts of its spell before recharging. The spell has two available attack styles: Accurate and Longrange. These give Magic and Magic/Defence experience respectively.

The staff's spell is extremely powerful. With no other damage boosts aside from the staff's 13%, it is possible to hit as high as 355 damage at 99 Magic. Additionally, due to the fact that it does not require a specific spellbook to use, it can be combined with spells from any of the three spellbooks, such as Entangle from the standard spellbook or the Lunar spell Vengeance.

It is worth noticing that the Celestial Surgebox will not grant the wearer an additional splat every 5th successful hit.

Not including the 13% boost, the max hit of the spell is equal to (5 * magic level) - 180. At level 106 (using an extreme magic potion or equivalent) the max hit is 350. With 99 Magic, an extreme magic potion or equivalent, an arcane stream necklace, a hexcrest, and a ferocious ring, it is possible to hit 672, which is the highest possible Magic spell hit, not including fire spells on ice strykewyrms and Glacors. In Castle Wars with proper damage boosting equipment (including Profound equipment) a max hit of 812 has been achieved.

A notification appears in the chat box when the staff's charges are half way used up.

Trivia

 * When attempting to craft the staff without the required fire runes, the game will display a message saying, "You require 5 fire runes for each polypore spore. The staff will not accept substitutes."
 * Because the staff does not cast an actual spell, no base experience is gained per cast; experience is only gained for damage dealt. For this reason, it may be slower to train Magic using the polypore staff than conventional spells.
 * There was a large amount of controversy over the staff's 80 Attack requirement. Many felt that since it was impossible to attack with Melee with the staff, the staff shouldn't have had a Melee requirement. However, it was confirmed that the Attack requirement was to be removed, and the melee bonuses reduced. This update occurred on December 6, 2011.
 * The Polypore Staff changes colors at different stages of degrading.
 * The Polypore Staff's attack has an attack range of 6 squares when on accurate stance and 7 when on long-range, while most magic spells have a range of 10.