From: mperry@waikato.ac.nz
Newsgroups: rec.games.frp.misc
Subject: Re: Carrying weapons around (was Re: META:  Swords, etc)
Date: 13 Nov 92 10:52:16 +1300
Organization: University of Waikato, Hamilton, New Zealand

In article <40833@sdcc12.ucsd.edu>, bkoike@sdcc13.ucsd.edu (Bryce Koike) writes:
> In article <9349@blue.cis.pitt.edu.UUCP> seawasp@vm2.cis.pitt.edu (Sea Wasp) writes:
>>>	But, in my opinion, if you're carrying a gun, either you're
>>>doing it for bluster (and then you're a fool), or you're doing it
>>>because you're prepared to use it.  I'm assuming your friends are
>>>the latter and that means that they most definitely are preapred to
>>>kill someone with their weapon.  If not, then I'd question why
>>>they're carrying the weapon around to begin with.
>>
>>	Huh? Didn't you read my above paragraph? "Because they feel there
>>are enough bad people out there to make it worthwhile to carry around a
>>good piece of self  defense...", that's why.
> 
> 	Precisely.  Which means they are expecting to NEED TO USE
> THE GUN SOME DAY.  
Carrying a weopon doesn't mean that you expect to use it. Hell - do you wear a
seatbelt while in a car - according to you you are expecting to be in a crash,
not wearing it in case of a crash (if you are not wearing one, then you are
breaking the law). In the US you are allowed to carry licensed guns, they are
legal. If someone shoots at you, what would you do - yell "please don't shoot
me" as they shoot you in the back. Or would it be better to have a gun and be
able to shoot back. You don't even need to be accurate, just pointing and
firing a gun in the general direction will frighten off many people. Take a
gang member who is out on a shooting spree (say LA where there has been
something like 400 gang related murders and many more injuries lately), is he
going to shoot unarmed people? Yes. Will he shoot armed people? Yes, but he is
less likely to because now his/her own neck is in the firing line, like most
cowards who like to shoot unarmed people, they tend to run at the first chance
of themselves being shot. If such a case happened that someone shot at the
friend, and the friend had a gun and shot back - is it murder or a service to
society? Take another example of a jewelery store which I read about in the
paper, it has had 5 attempted robberies and 7 dead robbers - this sort of
advertising reduces the chance of a robbery occuring, and it saved the justice
system the cost of finding these 7 robbers, the court costs of the trials, and
the cost of insurance for all the jewelery stolen and the damage to the shop,
and the medical insurance for the victims. The friend is prepared to point it,
and possibly fire it - this is totally different to intending to use it and
commit murder which you are suggesting. They probably don't expect to use it,
and probably hope not to, but they are prepared to use it.

> if they
> think they'll need to use their gun, they're willing to kill someone
> with it.  Not randomly, not for spite, but killing is killing
Refer to the seatbelt example, to don't think you will need it, but you still
wear it in case you do need it. 

>	That's all I'm saying.  And the biggest problem with people
> owning guns today is that there's no system of determining whether
> or not the people buying the weapons are capable of using them
> responsibly.  I have met far too many people in my few years on this
> planet who shouldn't be allowed to purchase firearms much less carry
> the weapons with them on the street.  
What is your suggestion? that noone carry guns? Then the cops are out gunned
(which they are already) and only the criminals have guns. Problemo, the cops
cant tell a non criminal from a criminal as the criminal conceals their weopon.
We don't live in a perfect society, and removing a way of defending ones self
won't make the world a safer place. Now an armed hold up were they point a gun
at someone in a form other than self defense is obviously a crime. Look at the
statistics for crime, most crimes are people reoffending. Another problem, look
at the number of children per criminal family - it is high, they breed like
flies. Solution, get rid of the criminals, and remove children from criminals
family so they don't grow up thinking that crime is their occupation. Without
doing something, crime will continue to grow at the current alarming rates. The
need to defend yourself will grow. Take Austrailia, they have had quite a
number of people go on shooting sprees, and just yesterday someone walked into
a hospital and gunned down someone. 

[stuff deleted]

> 	I've always been assuming your friends are the latter as I
> hope I managed to say above.  (READY really means WILLING, mind you.
So if you wear a seatbelt in a car you are willing to have a crash - almost
wanting to crash the car - Get real!

> I honestly don't know of anyone who carries a gun who isn't willing
> to use it to defend himself/herself.  And the only good defense a
> gun is for is if you intend on killing someone with it.  Otherwise
> you're better off without it.)
"Hes got a gun" Bang. "Oh, your dead" A lot of good that did you.
or.
"Hes got a gun" "Oh, you have one too" 
Generally, someone who murders unarmed people will tend to run if their is a
chance of themselves being shot. You don't need to kill them (but it may be
better if you do), but scare them by 1) showing you have a gun 2)being prepared
to fire it 3) being prepared to shoot them (doesn't have to be fatal)
4) willing to kill (almost wanting) the barstard of a criminal who has had the
gall to point a gun in your direction. If the friend is prepared for 1), 2), 3)
then they don't have to be willing to use the gun at all. And if, someone did
point a gun at them and they developed 4) I wouldn't complain. Anyone who
points a gun at someone else for no good reason deserves to get shot.

> 	But even so, if a city is peaceful and open weaponry is
> looked down on, then people WILL get hassled.  In some it might be
> customary to walk around in full battle dress/whatever, but the
> rarer the adventurers are, the lower the chance of anyone coming
> across cities like that...
Take Croatia, if you can find battle dress, it would not be out of place in a
formally peaceful place. Out of the front line near the begining of the war
battle dress would not be uncommon in one of the peaceful cities. As well as
the city, you have to consider the surroundings, if the surroundings are
dangerous then battle dress would often be accepted by traverlers and even the
occupants if the city is not capable of defending itself.

>>	Maybe. The alternative explanation I heard from friends was that
>>"Cops hate the wierd ones. You can't predict them. So why hassle him when
>>he might go psycho and try to skewer one of you?"
> 
> 	That's pretty scary, actually.  If he's that crazy, he
> DEFINITELY shouldn't be walking the streets with weapons!
Who said he was weird, a possible oppinion of the cops is being put forward,
not the personality of the person.

> 	What about innocent bystanders getting hurt?  I can think of
> many a time in the past (this is AD&D, but I doubt the game system
> matters) that our party had to make a hasty retreat from a city
> after a combat injured several innocents (not by our spells, but
> still).
What about the damage by the others, without something to combat them they will
do more damage, and become more prolific. So if you meet five bandits who are
going on a raid and you do damage to the surrounding buildings, they would
probably done that much damage without you, or over the next few raids. So 5
bystanders were killed and 32 were wounded, but on a normal raid they would
have killed 3 and wounded 20 - so you have actually saved the town by killing
five bandits who would have done more damage in two raids than you and them did
combined.

>>>	Again, your world is a high-risk world (especially for them
>>>adventurers!) and being armed can be accepted.  If the world was at
>>>relative peace, no wars were going on in the nearby vincinity,
>>>running around armed may very well be cause for alarm.  (And I can
>>>think of a lot of examples in your world where being adventurers
>>>would get parties kicked out of cities.  "We don't want our peaceful
>>>city turned into a warfield!  Out!  Out!"  
Such a peaceful city is easy pickings!
>>>Heck, if it's as
>>>dangerous as you say, what inn would open their doors to an
>>>adventuring party?  "Yeah, there were some adventurers here last
>>>week.  A group of kobold assassins caught up with them in the night
>>>and nearly burnt down half the inn.  At least they were nice enough
>>>to pay for the damage...")
For assassins to be about it is not so peaceful is it. If the adventurers had
not been armed the inn keeper would have to pay for his rooms to be cleaned of
some adventurers bodies, and the kobolds may have started a fire anyway. The
kobolds wouldn't have left treasure ot pay for the damage.