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Description
This is what happens when I don't want to sculpt a spiral staircase on my own. (This used to be straight. Yes, I rigged a bone to every step on the lower staircase. XD)

This and the theater box will be the final pieces I add to Cyrkensia. Woohoo!

Short text-only version of the how-to:

1. Get a (preferably straight) staircase.
2. Make a bone for every stair-step, plus one for the IK and IK target (I set these bones smack in the middle of the steps for even bending, but that's technically optional).
3. Rig each step to each bone (I rig step #1's to the whole staircase 100%, #2's to the whole staircase minus step #1, etc. with between-bone vertices getting 50% weight).
4. Set up IK (I used 1 loop and small (1?) angle so that every step would bend, and restricted motion to the Y axis).
5. Use Transform View to bend the stairs to taste.

I turned on Perspective Mode (rightmost icon in the bottom of PMD View) to make rigging easier, but it might help in bone-making too.

Note to self if I make an IK "info-pic" later, on the actual IK bone (not the linked ones), Target is self-explanatory, Loop = # of spirals the chain can make (for these stairs, I only wanted 1), and Angle = maximum angle bones can bend before earlier bones in the chain have to move too (so if Angle = 15, the last bone can rotate 15 degrees before the next-to-last bone must rotate--for these stairs, I used Angle=1.5). Unless you Limit Angles, linked bones WILL rotate in other axes.

Description
This is what happens when I don't want to sculpt a spiral staircase on my own. (This used to be straight. Yes, I rigged a bone to every step on the lower staircase. XD)

This and the theater box will be the final pieces I add to Cyrkensia. Woohoo!

Short text-only version of the how-to:

1. Get a (preferably straight) staircase.
2. Make a bone for every stair-step, plus one for the IK and IK target (I set these bones smack in the middle of the steps for even bending, but that's technically optional).
3. Rig each step to each bone (I rig step #1's to the whole staircase 100%, #2's to the whole staircase minus step #1, etc. with between-bone vertices getting 50% weight).
4. Set up IK (I used 1 loop and small (1?) angle so that every step would bend, and restricted motion to the Y axis).
5. Use Transform View to bend the stairs to taste.

I turned on Perspective Mode (rightmost icon in the bottom of PMD View) to make rigging easier, but it might help in bone-making too.

Note to self if I make an IK "info-pic" later, on the actual IK bone (not the linked ones), Target is self-explanatory, Loop = # of spirals the chain can make (for these stairs, I only wanted 1), and Angle = maximum angle bones can bend before earlier bones in the chain have to move too (so if Angle = 15, the last bone can rotate 15 degrees before the next-to-last bone must rotate--for these stairs, I used Angle=1.5). Unless you Limit Angles, linked bones WILL rotate in other axes.