Permitting (Quarter)staves in Cities

[Tsidkenu]

BG & Wyrms Crossing the guards will chase after you and demand you put any and every kind of weapon away. Eastern, Northern Farmlands, FAI & Beregost have a disarm-on-entry script but the guards won't chase after you if you take out said weapon later.

[Blackman D]

right, however i think the script he is referring to is that the ones that chase you will actually arrest you if you dont put your weapon away after a few secs when they catch up to you

it use to port people straight to the FF jail cells, but its been turned on and off, broken etc etc, idk what it does now

but if they chase you and just stare at you after that means its broken, not like it matters too much since they dont run they are easy to get away from...

[YourMoveHolyMan]

Let me pose this question:

Are the players who want quarterstaves allowed inside the city wanting to do so, for reasons of in-character want?

Or is this just about the mechanical inconvenience?

Because if the latter, the same argument could be made for hooded characters with buffs attached to said hoods. I've been back and forth to BG over the years, I wouldn't want to return to the days of hooded goons roaming the city and using the guards as cover.

[Theodore01]

YourMoveHolyMan made an excellent point here.

right, however i think the script he is referring to is that the ones that chase you will actually arrest you if you dont put your weapon away after a few secs when they catch up to you it use to port people straight to the FF jail cells, but its been turned on and off, broken etc etc, idk what it does now but if they chase you and just stare at you after that means its broken, not like it matters too much since they dont run they are easy to get away from...

Not really, i witnessed today as a weaponwielding toon was arrested right after the transition from farmlands to the bridge. That happend so fast i could not read the messages before he was gone.

[Wolfshear]

Honestly half the time I just rp that I have my staff anyway, or whip it out when it is convenient to do so.

If they had an actual seperate staff type item that had a walking stick animation I'd be all over that like a child of reasonable weight on cake.

[Duster47]

This is not going to happen without first the DMs asking for it and next the Build Team implement it without breaking the current NPC law enforcement activities.

Anyone thinking a walking stick is not a weapon just watch Morgan on The Walking Dead. Oh, its just a cane, then watch Setrakian on The Strain. But hands can be fists and those can be dangerous! Everyone has hands so a line is drawn somewhere.

As for active patrols in Beregost and Nashkel, there is a to-do list builder side. Some day...

[Tsidkenu]

Let me pose this question:

Are the players who want quarterstaves allowed inside the city wanting to do so, for reasons of in-character want?

Or is this just about the mechanical inconvenience?

Because if the latter, the same argument could be made for hooded characters with buffs attached to said hoods. I've been back and forth to BG over the years, I wouldn't want to return to the days of hooded goons roaming the city and using the guards as cover.

My OP probably implies the latter, but in fact the greater reason is the RP. Aeili is both a wizard and a cleric, so I like to RP that her magic staff is emblazoned with the Symbol of Mystra (as per her IG description) and as such can be used by a cleric to turn undead and perform other divine tasks requiring a holy symbol. Yet at the same time it (mechanically) enhances her arcane abilities (in this case bonus spell slots). It would be nice to be able to walk around BG with this tell-tale sign of her vocation at hand without being arrested by guards at every turn, with the added goodie of having a handful of low level spells added to her already unused arsenal!

And answering about hooded characters: said characters can -change- the item appearance to something which is not a mask/hood at whim with the appearance changer. Then they can receive their buff as long as they want and change it back when they are in a suitable area. A staff, regardless of its appearance, irks the guards every time without question when I really don't think it should.

Anyone thinking a walking stick is not a weapon just watch Morgan on The Walking Dead. Oh, its just a cane, then watch Setrakian on The Strain. But hands can be fists and those can be dangerous! Everyone has hands so a line is drawn somewhere.

I don't think anyone set forth this proposition, though. My point is that, while a staff is an able and powerful weapon in the hands of a master, how many people in Baldur's 70,000+ population are at this level? And of those, how many have caused trouble in the city with said weapon, causing it to be banned at large from peasant to priestess? Swords, bows, daggers, clubs, crossbows: sure! The blind beggar's walking stick? Hmm. . .

I only wished for this to be put up for discussion. I would like to hear more arguments from the negative side, though, as I can see there have been 6 votes that way.

Of course, if it is too hard to be scripted I do not want to burden the DEVs with the work. This was just a suggestion looking for feedback!

[DM Cradh]

And answering about hooded characters: said characters can -change- the item appearance to something which is not a mask/hood at whim with the appearance changer. Then they can receive their buff as long as they want and change it back when they are in a suitable area.

Actually if you use the appearance changer to change the looks of an item it unequips the old appearance and reequips the new appearance. This removes all buffs and additional spell slots and then readds them. This is the same as having to remove a staff and reequip.

[AlwaysSummer Day]

Use a lantern or banner. Quarterstaves are weapons so sayeth the wiki https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Quarterstaff

I agree it sucks to have to reset your spells every time (that is why I never use polymorph) however a weapon is a weapon and the laws are quite clear. If you can carry a quarterstaff then why not an axe? I play a lumberjack. A scythe? I play a farmer. A bow? I play a hunter. This really is a can of worms we have no need to open.

[Nomster]

I voted yes because staves are a status symbols in some cases, walking sticks in other.

It is not a sharp weapon. Running around with a drawn sword looks ridiculous. There would realistically be a danger of harming someone with it (or yourself) if it is not sheathed.

This is not the case with staves.


Anyone saying a mage staff could kill someone, well... if the mage ever needs to kill someone, choosing the staff would be ridiculous due to mages not being melee fighters. The mage would go pew-pew-pew instead.

Besides, most things could kill someone. Hit someone hard enough or the right way... lanterns could kill someone! A rake is like a staff except for sharp things attached!

[Tekill]

No offense but the 'don't open a can of worms because its the law' argument, is not a good argument.

I do not think many of us are getting upset because we have to sheath our staves when in a city. We understand that the rule is in place to aid game mechanics, specifically pvp.
But it is just a fun debate. Specifically to me, it's fun pointing out the flaws in the reasoning regarding why the gimpy finger waggles have to put away their walking sticks in a city. Forget the staff, they should sheath their fingers or prevent them from holding any books or scrolls.

There are many many other ways to provoke pvp or engage in hostilities.

In the real world, whenever I see some guy with a cane I often wonder if its one of those sword canes, or I wonder how much it would hurt if he smacked someone with it.
I remember once buying a baseball bat at the mall. I was walking around the mall with my louisville slugger, window shopping, eating at the food court. I got some odd looks, including from the security guards, but I was not tackled. I was not arrested, or told to sheath my club, because people could clearly see that even though I was walking around with a big stick in my hands, that I was clearly no threat.
If some guy where to walk up to me with a big stick in his hand like a club or a bat or even a walking stick it might cross my mind that this guy could smack me with said stick. If a guy were to walk up to me with a sword carefully sheathed at his waist it is still going to cross my mind that they may take the sword out of the sheath and smack me with it. The sheath does not make that big of a difference.

So where are we sheathing the staves anyways....where are we sheathing scythes for that matter!?

[Rhifox]

Forget the staff, they should sheath their fingers or prevent them from holding any books or scrolls.

This is why FAI does it best. Tie your thumbs into your belts, mages! Very smart inn, that. (unless the caster has Still Spell, of course).

[AlwaysSummer Day]

Its not a walking stick, it is a weapon. Simple as that really the law isn't about pvp it is about immersion. Those thousands of non adventurers see a being who far surpases them physically walking around with something specifically designed to harm people in their hands.

Quarterstaves are not walking sticks.

Quarterstaves are thicker pieces of hardwood cut to a specific length to make them suited for combat. This is why your characters hold them sideways unless RPed otherwise in which case they are now leaning on a weapon.

My argument is not the can of worms my argument is IC immersion > ooc opinions/annoyances. I'm all for raesal coming up with a way to save spells while it is unequipped but until then lets keep some perspective.

[Flasmix]

I remember when they were first put in. They were implemented to allow Flaming Fist PCs to not have to enforce that law. The majority of the players doing it were.... Well... Idiot newbs who just wanted to grind. Every time a Fist member would say "Can you please remove your weapon in town?" They would either ignore us completely and just keep running around or become confrontational.

An NPC that auto teleports to jail? A bit harder to avoid that and it reduced the whiny butt hurt on the forums about other PCs trying to interfere with their special snowflake. With there being hardly any new players around anymore, I think those NPCs are redundant. I vote to just remove them and have a DM punish the odd abuser that pops up.

The NPCs were ruthless too. They went after Fist PCs as well. I used to use it as a free teleport to town because I could just unlock the cell with my key. Ahhhh the good old days.

[Hoihe]

I remember when they were first put in. They were implemented to allow Flaming Fist PCs to not have to enforce that law. The majority of the players doing it were.... Well... Idiot newbs who just wanted to grind. Every time a Fist member would say "Can you please remove your weapon in town?" They would either ignore us completely and just keep running around or become confrontational.

An NPC that auto teleports to jail? A bit harder to avoid that and it reduced the whiny butt hurt on the forums about other PCs trying to interfere with their special snowflake. With there being hardly any new players around anymore, I think those NPCs are redundant. I vote to just remove them and have a DM punish the odd abuser that pops up.

The NPCs were ruthless too. They went after Fist PCs as well. I used to use it as a free teleport to town because I could just unlock the cell with my key. Ahhhh the good old days.

They love arresting people at times of war.

Once, during the black orc attacks, a Fist arrested a number of people. Later on there was a DM quip he was hanged for high treason.