What happens to a magister (especially a low-level magister) who loses his staff, but has the psionic template?
Caster level doesn’t influence what spells you know or what spells you can cast. If a magically poor area has an effect of -1 caster level, spellcasters don’t forget spells or start knowing fewer of them: Spells just come out as less effective. This solves at least one part of this: You can’t be made unable to cast spells simply because your caster level went down (although going down to caster level 0 will cause a number of spells to be quite worthless). This doesn’t solve the second part, but because the psionic template explicitly says to ignore focus requirements, a 1st-level magister sans staff casts psionic spells at caster level 1. The lack of focus applies to spells and checks as they are made, not retroactively. If I lose my staff, ongoing spells don’t shrink in duration to match my new caster level.
