On Bearing Arms in Cormyr and Arabel

[The Red Mage]

I'm unsure if there were any offered resolutions in this thread, but I see it was shut down in long-used fashion.

Some say roleplay it instead of using it as a visual prop.

Some say write the rule down somewhere publicly.

I'll pop in to say that I have never went topside to enforce this rule, but I have enforced it as a player by kindly suggesting there would be consequences if it happened. As long as I've been on the server, there has never been an "exception" of which Trylo explained in his scuffle. The majority of people use description to sharpen blades publicly and the such, and there is no issue. But if someone were to use a dagger as a visual prop, stand, and emote sharpening it, it may be different.

I can't explain why it is different, but I'll throw the "Uh, it's CD, I guess" stick at you and hope you catch it neatly(and safely!). Use description instead, and if someone wants to check out your macho weapon, show it in a trade window or whisper them more detailed description. NWN visuals are often poor representation of anything, really, so think of it as a favor instead of a strange disciplinary thing with ambivalent ruling.  

[trylobyte]

Dec 12, 2014 21:44:02 GMT -5 ladybug said:

A legally-registered firearm would more likely than not still be holstered either on the hip or on an over-the-shoulder strap. Carrying a firearm in your hand is some real Plan 9 violation of common sense and asking for an accidental discharge. Said holstering seems to be in line with Vincent's ruling about not walking about with weapons in hand, so the matter should be dropped.

You missed the point of the comparison.  Violation of common sense or not, there is actually, in-game, no written law against having a drawn and ready weapon in a public place.  It doesn't exist.  You could classify it as a few other things, depending on situation, but it is not in and of itself illegal by the written rules - In fact, if you know the official lore well, it mentions that the opposite is true in Arabel specifically - Openly-drawn weapons are everywhere and peacebinding is rarely enforced.  This puts this law in the awkward position of being an official, enforced rule that isn't recorded anywhere and runs counter to official canon.  I'm not saying it's wrong or that it needs to be changed, I'm just pointing out that it's one of those CD changes that runs counter to canon but isn't recorded anywhere.

[ladybug]

Dec 12, 2014 23:22:58 GMT -5 trylobyte said:

Dec 12, 2014 21:44:02 GMT -5 ladybug said:

A legally-registered firearm would more likely than not still be holstered either on the hip or on an over-the-shoulder strap. Carrying a firearm in your hand is some real Plan 9 violation of common sense and asking for an accidental discharge. Said holstering seems to be in line with Vincent's ruling about not walking about with weapons in hand, so the matter should be dropped.

You missed the point of the comparison.  Violation of common sense or not, there is actually, in-game, no written law against having a drawn and ready weapon in a public place.  It doesn't exist.  You could classify it as a few other things, depending on situation, but it is not in and of itself illegal by the written rules - In fact, if you know the official lore well, it mentions that the opposite is true in Arabel specifically - Openly-drawn weapons are everywhere and peacebinding is rarely enforced.  This puts this law in the awkward position of being an official, enforced rule that isn't recorded anywhere and runs counter to official canon.  I'm not saying it's wrong or that it needs to be changed, I'm just pointing out that it's one of those CD changes that runs counter to canon but isn't recorded anywhere.

How? You brought up ownership of firearms as a poor grounds for legal action as a real world comparison. In the real world, we cannot walk around with firearms in hand. They have to be holstered. Arguing that a holstered gun is as dangerous as a freely held polearm is a false equivalency. Which is what prompted this entire issue. No one said the character would be arrested for having the weapon. She was simply asked to keep it in a position that it could not be accidentally hazardous. You keep mentioning lore, but admin rulings trump it. (See: Spellplague)

Oh, and:

1. Use Common Sense.

More than anything else, this will prevent problems. If something seems wrong, it almost certainly is. We are all adults here, or at the very least, we should all expect to be treated like adults, and to treat each other like adults - so there's not many excuses for not knowing better. Ask questions if need be. Trying to rules-lawyer your way around the intention and spirit of any of the rules is a bad idea.

[hommedeterr2]

I mean, you can walk around with firearms in hand...  When my cousins go hunting, they do that all the time.  Just food for thought right?

[ladybug]

In a populated town where it could accidentally discharge? Or out in the woods where they are planning on firing them? Not saying it doesn't happen, but it just doesn't seem like the best of all possible ideas.

I should just bow out of this thread. I've said my piece (and hopefully didn't seem too hostile, wasn't intended), and the admins have already made a ruling on it. Nothing I add can really help an already basically closed conversation, and I readily admit that I'm not the expert on gun laws.

[hommedeterr2]

Guns don't accidentally discharge though...  That's the people using them.  And sure, if you carry them unloaded, you can totally carry them in a lot of towns openly, so long as you don't point them at anyone.

I'm a little confused as to how a sword could "accidentally discharge."  But it'd be pretty funny to have mages be treated like their staffs might accidentally discharge!

[ladybug]

Trip and impale.

[trylobyte]

Ooookay, since this is derailing, time to clarify.  Open carry is not 'gun in hand.'  Open carry is 'gun in holster, but visible.'  You're missing the comparison entirely because you're not comparing the right concepts.  My analogy was someone being arrested for open carry despite there not being a law against it because 'well, we've always done it, duh.'  Which is, in fact, equivalent here.

And I also remind you, the Common Sense law doesn't apply tcleanly because its meaning and implications change depending if you're IC or OOC.  If you look in official canon - The stuff Wizards actually wrote and published - Arabel has almost no weapons laws and people walking around with drawn weapons in hand is a pretty common thing due to the high traffic of merchants, caravans, and adventurers.  So apparently it's not considered a big deal and they're well used to it.  This has changed on CD over time due to the actions of irresponsible or murderous adventurers, but never made it into the lawbook; we consider it 'common sense' because of our modern perspective, with our concern for safety and well-being and disinclination towards violence, even though it contradicts 'common sense' in the setting, where Arabel is a very high traffic frontier town that is practically besieged and has an entire district that is so criminal the guards refuse to patrol it.  I'm not arguing one way or the other (My most active characters are mages anyway so I'm allowed to walk around with my laser death stick) but I'm pointing out there is a distinct difference here and it's one that needs to be accounted for.

[Voice of Kerensky]

Dec 12, 2014 19:46:42 GMT -5 sinisteromnibus said:

It sounds as if this is something that should be or has been handed off to an admin to resolve, and if so it's a bit rude to be having a public discussion about these things until the admins have had time to make a ruling. I'm all for academically discussing lore/setting, but the reality of it is, psappho that this thread appears to be your way of circumventing the oocly established protocol which is clearly defined here:

To be explicitly clear on this, I initially went to one (actually, both) admins and the suggestion and recommendation of one was specifically to post this topic for discussion in the forums as he felt I did have some valid concerns that should be discussed openly. In fact, several of the points I brought up were things that he recommended I should point out.

There's more than simply the issue at hand itself at this; regardless of the way the law is ultimately set in stone or interpreted or what have you, there is a significant problem with documentation of the laws and various setting changes. We can certainly have a productive discussion on that.

I'll leave it up to the admin in question to verify this (or not).

Dec 12, 2014 23:22:58 GMT -5 trylobyte said:

You missed the point of the comparison.  Violation of common sense or not, there is actually, in-game, no written law against having a drawn and ready weapon in a public place.  It doesn't exist.  You could classify it as a few other things, depending on situation, but it is not in and of itself illegal by the written rules - In fact, if you know the official lore well, it mentions that the opposite is true in Arabel specifically - Openly-drawn weapons are everywhere and peacebinding is rarely enforced.  This puts this law in the awkward position of being an official, enforced rule that isn't recorded anywhere and runs counter to official canon.  I'm not saying it's wrong or that it needs to be changed, I'm just pointing out that it's one of those CD changes that runs counter to canon but isn't recorded anywhere.

This. All of this.

Dec 13, 2014 1:03:47 GMT -5 trylobyte said:

And I also remind you, the Common Sense law doesn't apply tcleanly because its meaning and implications change depending if you're IC or OOC.  If you look in official canon - The stuff Wizards actually wrote and published - Arabel has almost no weapons laws and people walking around with drawn weapons in hand is a pretty common thing due to the high traffic of merchants, caravans, and adventurers.  So apparently it's not considered a big deal and they're well used to it.  This has changed on CD over time due to the actions of irresponsible or murderous adventurers, but never made it into the lawbook; we consider it 'common sense' because of our modern perspective, with our concern for safety and well-being and disinclination towards violence, even though it contradicts 'common sense' in the setting, where Arabel is a very high traffic frontier town that is practically besieged and has an entire district that is so criminal the guards refuse to patrol it.  I'm not arguing one way or the other (My most active characters are mages anyway so I'm allowed to walk around with my laser death stick) but I'm pointing out there is a distinct difference here and it's one that needs to be accounted for.

And that.

[ladybug]

No, I'm not. I understand the concept of open carry - and I believe I outright said the definition you just gave, which is why I'm disagreeing with your comparison. I bring up "gun in hand" because of the specific situation in the square that prompted this thread, where a character was walking around with a weapon not holstered but in hand.

You've brought up open carry, but in the situation that prompted this thread, the character was asked to holster her weapon - basically, to comply with the concept of open carry - and refused. Not to turn it over to the guards. To put it in an appropriate holster. That is why I said false equivalence. Your argument came across as "Asking someone to comply with open carry is like arresting someone for open carry." If that is not what you meant, I apologize for the misunderstanding.

That said, an admin has already made a ruling on this.

Dec 12, 2014 19:53:24 GMT -5 Vincent07 said:

Don't walk around towns with weapons equipped.  

RP it all you want.

There's your law, and I don't think there's any room to misinterpret it to favor any one person over another, which is how it should be.

As for canon?

Dec 12, 2014 8:40:12 GMT -5 Edge said:

Frankly, all the arguments and justifications are irrelevant to me. Especially quotations from source material; CD is its own beast and has been such for years, thanks to multiple player and DM actions that have deviated away from "core FR", 100% for the better in my opinion.

[Fire Wraith]

Okay, let me try and clarify/summarize.

First off, the question of weapons is a fairly minor IC matter, that will get handled in all circumstances ICly.
Again, This is not a "Rule", it's an IC/RP convention.


That said, the following are all true:

1) Characters are expected to, and allowed to, carry weapons in Arabel.
2) The guards in Arabel expect people to keep their weapons sheathed or otherwise carried in a non-threatening manner as appropriate.
3) You can best do this by keeping them unequipped in most cases.
4) In all cases when someone, for whatever reason has theirs equipped - be sensible. See the rule about "Common Sense". There's a big difference between, say, someone standing and walking around with their longsword drawn, and someone who's seated and emoting sharpening/polishing it.

[Voice of Kerensky]

Big nevermind due to the post above.

[trylobyte]

Dec 13, 2014 1:30:20 GMT -5 ladybug said:

No, I'm not. I understand the concept of open carry - and I believe I outright said the definition you just gave, which is why I'm disagreeing with your comparison. I bring up "gun in hand" because of the specific situation in the square that prompted this thread, where a character was walking around with a weapon not holstered but in hand.

You've brought up open carry, but in the situation that prompted this thread, the character was asked to holster her weapon - basically, to comply with the concept of open carry - and refused. Not to turn it over to the guards. To put it in an appropriate holster. That is why I said false equivalence. Your argument came across as "Asking someone to comply with open carry is like arresting someone for open carry." If that is not what you meant, I apologize for the misunderstanding.

You're still not quite getting what I'm saying because you're fixated on making the specific ingame situation match the generalized metaphor I'm trying to make when I'm not actually doing that  - You're actually making the false equivalency.  Maybe I didn't phrase it well.  Here, let me try another way:

You research laws in a town and see they have a law permitting concealed carry and a law prohibiting drawn, unholstered weapons.  There is no law regarding open carry specifying whether it's illegal or not.

The equivalency ingame here would not be the same.  Arabel has a law permitting the carrying of sheathed weapons (concealed carry equivalent), forbidding attacking or threatening people with weapons (drawn weapon equivalency), but no law specifying whether having an unsheathed weapon is illegal (open carry equivalent).  Essentially, shift everything up one degree and there are the equivalencies I was making.


Having explained it like that, maybe I shouldn't have picked something so close in proximity.  That -is- pretty easy to misinterpret.  My bad!

Moot argument now anyway, since both admins have chimed in.  Just wanted you to understand what I was trying to do.

[ladybug]

I give up. You're missing the point entirely. In-game incidents need to be taken in full context with all details, not compared to hypotheticals with variables changed to muddy the waters. If an admin or DM says "don't do a thing," that's the end of it and should be taken to PMs if continued.

[Deleted]

That is how ICly I treat the OOC mechanic of unequipped:

• For a sword, dagger, rapier or similar traditionally sheathed.
  
• For a bow unstrung.
• For a crossbow uncocked/unloaded.
• For an axe, spear or similar the sharp edges are kept 'sheathed' in a leather thong made for the weapon.
• For a warhammer, mace or equivalent, hung from a girdle/belt loop, slung over the back, etc.

Because of the uber high magic level of CD and what would be the relative prevalence of items such as Quivers of Ehlonna, and devices such as bracelets and gloves that allow one to store a weapon in an extra-dimensional space and summon it at will to their hand, a lot of leeway is available. If this is an issue that is wrecking folks immersion, perhaps we need to introduce a few RP item trinkets that are described with that capability. 

If you have a weapon equipped, you aren't emoting that you are cleaning, polishing, etc. or otherwise using it to whittle, I will send the player a tell for clarification if the response isn't something to do with maintenance or craft, I would respond ICly whether playerside or DM side.

Whether or not its law, it would not be common for folks to walk around with openly bared weapons in hand in a city in Faerun. That just falls under common sense.

Like I said...don't be a menace to Arabel Central.