Gun control in the Pact Worlds


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Shinigami02 wrote:
Deadmanwalking wrote:
thejeff wrote:

Detect them in the field? Sure. That's hard.

Detect them on the confiscated weapons after the punks with their Glamered Guns shoot up the bar, so that you slap the extra decade onto their sentence? Not so hard.

I remain skeptical of the practicality of such a law.

And even if I didn't, the setting pretty clearly has no such laws, or there'd either be a mention or Glamered would be higher level infusion (remember, higher level weapons require more permits and the like).

The setting has whatever laws the GM puts into effect. Now does the default setting assume such a law? Of course not. That doesn't mean that GMs can't put them in if it facilitates the story.

"So the GM's are going to make the laws for the system now too! Tyranny! Legislative mandate should come from the elected will of the people not some farce man in the sky who is just running some, some game for his own enjoyment! That's daft!

IF I was to go around saying I was an emporer just because I was the first one to get hands on a rulebook they would lock me up..."

Slam! Bonk!

"Help Help I am being repressed! Come see the violence inherent in the system!"


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Pathfinder Roleplaying Game Superscriber; Pathfinder Starfinder Roleplaying Game Subscriber
Shain Edge wrote:

Also, Absalom station fluff text states that the outer walls of the station are almost indestructible, including the basic impossibility of expanding the station beyond it's original construction size.

Why would indestructibility preclude expansion? You could still easily clamp things to or build on top of or around the outer layer.

Exo-Guardians

Just play as a mechanic and craft your own level 1 laser gun... All you need is like 240 in materials and the mechanic skill. It may be illegal in your system to carry a gun, but when has that stopped players from doing things.

GM: You arrive in spaceport, the customs officer asks for all your weapons.
Player: I give him my space pistol. "Sir, where can a honest mechanic like me buy some materials for fixing my robot?"
GM: "over at AbadarCorp of course."
Player: "Thank you sir." Walks to the store, buys materials, crafts guns for everyone in the party.


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Pathfinder Starfinder Society Subscriber

The main purpose I can see for gun control in Starfinder is to guarantee that all party members are outlaws -- and just add some more laws if they find ways around the gun control laws. For example:

"I don't need a gun -- I am a Technomancer!" So -- do you have a license to practice technomancy? You do? Well -- technomancy has just been outlawed. You have one week to report to a local surgical center for a lobotomy or you will be declared a dangerous fugitive to be shot on sight.

Something like this probably works best in a tyrannical, dystopian homebrew setting.


David knott 242 wrote:

The main purpose I can see for gun control in Starfinder is to guarantee that all party members are outlaws -- and just add some more laws if they find ways around the gun control laws. For example:

"I don't need a gun -- I am a Technomancer!" So -- do you have a license to practice technomancy? You do? Well -- technomancy has just been outlawed. You have one week to report to a local surgical center for a lobotomy or you will be declared a dangerous fugitive to be shot on sight.

Something like this probably works best in a tyrannical, dystopian homebrew setting.

Because obviously the only alternatives are lobotomies or people walking around in power armor with rocket launchers not even drawing strange looks.


Ravingdork wrote:
Why would indestructibility preclude expansion? You could still easily clamp things to or build on top of or around the outer layer.

Oh, you could clamp stuff on the outer hull, but it wouldn't be like there was an access-way from the clamped stuff to the internal workings of the station, unless you used the docks, or something similar. Not that the stuff hanging on would be protected very well on an attack when the station starts shooting massive weapons.

Liberty's Edge

thejeff wrote:
Because obviously the only alternatives are lobotomies or people walking around in power armor with rocket launchers not even drawing strange looks.

Given that any given 7th level Technomancer can be a walking rocket launcher (9d6 in an area effect)...kinda yeah.

Or at least, neither being illegal. Getting strange looks is not something this thread has actually talked about.


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Deadmanwalking wrote:
thejeff wrote:
Because obviously the only alternatives are lobotomies or people walking around in power armor with rocket launchers not even drawing strange looks.

Given that any given 7th level Technomancer is a walking rocket launcher...kinda yeah.

Or at least, neither being illegal. Getting strange looks is not something this thread has actually talked about.

Then there are the soldiers who can make a grenade from garbage in ten minutes flat.


Deadmanwalking wrote:

Given that any given 7th level Technomancer can be a walking rocket launcher (9d6 in an area effect)...kinda yeah.

Or at least, neither being illegal. Getting strange looks is not something this thread has actually talked about.

Mind you, Shadowrun has combat magic that can match up to a rocket launcher and also has gun laws. It just requires a licence for combat magic like it does for guns/requires mages to be registered.


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Ravingdork wrote:
Shain Edge wrote:

Also, Absalom station fluff text states that the outer walls of the station are almost indestructible, including the basic impossibility of expanding the station beyond it's original construction size.

Why would indestructibility preclude expansion? You could still easily clamp things to or build on top of or around the outer layer.

I am sure they have done that.

But now you have houses inside the safe bubble and outside the safe bubble. And let's guess where you put the poor people to.


thejeff wrote:
David knott 242 wrote:

The main purpose I can see for gun control in Starfinder is to guarantee that all party members are outlaws -- and just add some more laws if they find ways around the gun control laws. For example:

"I don't need a gun -- I am a Technomancer!" So -- do you have a license to practice technomancy? You do? Well -- technomancy has just been outlawed. You have one week to report to a local surgical center for a lobotomy or you will be declared a dangerous fugitive to be shot on sight.

Something like this probably works best in a tyrannical, dystopian homebrew setting.

Because obviously the only alternatives are lobotomies or people walking around in power armor with rocket launchers not even drawing strange looks.

Now that you mention it, in an evolution to dystopia, you'd likely get both: A bunch of people with surgically-altered brains (by techniques probably having more finesse than just lobotomy) who get used as robots, and have been rendered incapable of giving strange looks unless their masters want them to; and a bunch of masters walking around in powered armor with rocket launchers as well as weapons to deal with any peoplebots who somehow manage to work around the effects of their surgery . . . .

Liberty's Edge

Ikiry0 wrote:
Deadmanwalking wrote:

Given that any given 7th level Technomancer can be a walking rocket launcher (9d6 in an area effect)...kinda yeah.

Or at least, neither being illegal. Getting strange looks is not something this thread has actually talked about.

Mind you, Shadowrun has combat magic that can match up to a rocket launcher and also has gun laws. It just requires a licence for combat magic like it does for guns/requires mages to be registered.

Well, yes, but Shadowrun also has a notable underclass of people with unregistered weapons/magic and is more than a bit of a dystopia.

My point was rather that when you can have the ability to kill people with your brain, gun laws tend not to work, not that a repressive regime (and the governments in Shadowrun definitely count) wouldn't try it.

The Pact Worlds on the whole don't seem to be quite that repressive, though.


I'm not sure it would really be called repressive. I mean, that's for the people to decide if they want it with elected governments.

Maybe if it's a dictatorship imposing it but that was repressive beforehand.

Liberty's Edge

Ikiry0 wrote:

I'm not sure it would really be called repressive. I mean, that's for the people to decide if they want it with elected governments.

Maybe if it's a dictatorship imposing it but that was repressive beforehand.

The government in the UCAS in Shadowrun is only technically democratic since there's a huge underclass comprising most of the poor people who cannot legally vote.

That's pretty repressive already and I've just gotten started. But this is really a debate for another thread.


Voss wrote:
Ouachitonian wrote:
Think of it this way: was anyone in ANH or RotJ ever worried about blowing a hole in the Death Star with a blaster rifle? Nope. Well, Absalom Station is that big. Maybe bigger.

No it is not. The death star gets compared to moons. To pick a random moon (ok, ours), the diameter is 2,159 miles.

The diameter of Absalom is... 5 miles (though obviously from the picture this isn't uniform).
Manhattan is 2.3 x 13.4 miles. or 22.7 square miles.
[Or possibly 1.21 giga-O'briens]

Think of Absalom station as 5 or 6 Manhattans stacked on top of each other.

But you still aren't blowing out walls in Absalom with hand weapons. Not even vesk-portable heavy weapons.

The death star is not really a moon more like an astroid. The first one was 180 miles in diameter. So like a lot of other Sci-Fi backgrounds Star Wars got a big problem with scale^^


Deadmanwalking wrote:

The government in the UCAS in Shadowrun is only technically democratic since there's a huge underclass comprising most of the poor people who cannot legally vote.

That's pretty repressive already and I've just gotten started. But this is really a debate for another thread.

Actually, I was referring to any Starfinder planet imposing it.


David knott 242 wrote:
The main purpose I can see for gun control in Starfinder is to guarantee that all party members are outlaws -- and just add some more laws if they find ways around the gun control laws.

Personally, I think some kind of arms control laws (not just guns) adds to verisimilitude - in other words, immersion.

And as I outlined earlier, a total ban on weapons should be an extremely rare occurrence. But at the same time, it breaks suspension of disbelief if characters run around with military heavy weaponry or large-scale explosives all the time, even in fairly "civilian" environments where attacks by random monsters are unlikely. And even then, there may be exceptions - if the PCs have constantly acted heroically and are known to help ordinary people, they will be given a lot more slack than if they are known outlaws.


I think known outlaws with heavy weapons will actually be challenged less in some communities...


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I think that:

1) Starfinder is written to REALLY, REALLY encourage and allow GM control. There's not a lot of stuff written about, say, "gun control" in the Pact worlds, because there's quite a few Pact Worlds, all of which may have different strictures, and each of those worlds is a WORLD. We don't have one set of gun control laws on Earth, so why would Verces, for example, have one single regulation about them for the entire planet.

You may go to a place where weapons are strictly prohibited and characters are examined for them, or you may go to another where people carry rocket launchers into the bar. If it matters for the adventure, or the Adventure Path, I bet it will show up, but there's probably no good reason to devote limited pages to it in the Core Rulebook when it's not going to be uniform across the Pact Worlds.

And that's on top of the fact that the Pact Worlds are ONE SOLAR SYSTEM in an entire Galaxy. I'm SURE the Veskarium has different laws (probably different on each planet, and probably varied by planet), and that's just ONE more solar system.

2)I think people are hugely underestimating how much 'But X could do Y damage to Z people' is limited simply by people being people, and not crazed murder-bots. I could go buy 5 gallons of gasoline right this minute, pour it out around some residence or building, and set it on fire. ANYONE could. But virtually all of the people don't do this, virtually all of the time. Everyone in America who owns a gun could run out right now and empty all their clips into random people, but almost no one does this, ever (statistically speaking).

As much as real world tragedy strikes all too often, the huge, vast majority of people DON'T go around killing other people, regardless of the laws against it. I suspect that's simply true on the Pact Worlds too.

3) Complete Aside, but is anyone else really, really surprised by how small Absolom Station is? 5 miles in diameter? I thought it was going to be, like, moon-sized or something. It can't be, as one poster put it, the 'last refuge for humanity', because it would be like all humanity living in New York CIty! In one way, that's cool, because Paizo could really actually detail it significantly, and in another way, I'm having trouble seeing how it's important at all, other than the Starstone, because almost everywhere else you might live is bigger than Absolom Station!


Gun control is an idea that probably sells better when the populace can be convinced that things are normal and that present times bias toward peace.

A setting with any reasonably interesting amount of conflict and chaos is going to see people wanting to be ready for whatever comes, as best they can.


Jürgen Hubert wrote:
David knott 242 wrote:
The main purpose I can see for gun control in Starfinder is to guarantee that all party members are outlaws -- and just add some more laws if they find ways around the gun control laws.

Personally, I think some kind of arms control laws (not just guns) adds to verisimilitude - in other words, immersion.

And as I outlined earlier, a total ban on weapons should be an extremely rare occurrence. But at the same time, it breaks suspension of disbelief if characters run around with military heavy weaponry or large-scale explosives all the time, even in fairly "civilian" environments where attacks by random monsters are unlikely. And even then, there may be exceptions - if the PCs have constantly acted heroically and are known to help ordinary people, they will be given a lot more slack than if they are known outlaws.

What sort of lawful society lets people break laws (especially laws like "no carrying anti-armor weapons in public") just because they're known to be nice guys? That sounds like an awfully chaotic place if "look, everyone knows I'm a good guy" is an affirmative defense to prosecution.


Xenocrat wrote:
I think known outlaws with heavy weapons will actually be challenged less in some communities...

In some, yes. In others, they will be seen as a direct challenge to the local authorities. Whether that is official law enforcement or the local mob boss.

It all depends on the context. If there are creatures around that legitimately warrant such weaponry, then that is one thing. But if there isn't, then this will likely be seen as an attempt to intimidate the locals. Sometimes such intimidation works, but sometimes it will... backfire.


Butch A. wrote:

I think that:

1) Starfinder is written to REALLY, REALLY encourage and allow GM control. There's not a lot of stuff written about, say, "gun control" in the Pact worlds, because there's quite a few Pact Worlds, all of which may have different strictures, and each of those worlds is a WORLD. We don't have one set of gun control laws on Earth, so why would Verces, for example, have one single regulation about them for the entire planet.

You may go to a place where weapons are strictly prohibited and characters are examined for them, or you may go to another where people carry rocket launchers into the bar. If it matters for the adventure, or the Adventure Path, I bet it will show up, but there's probably no good reason to devote limited pages to it in the Core Rulebook when it's not going to be uniform across the Pact Worlds.

And that's on top of the fact that the Pact Worlds are ONE SOLAR SYSTEM in an entire Galaxy. I'm SURE the Veskarium has different laws (probably different on each planet, and probably varied by planet), and that's just ONE more solar system.

2)I think people are hugely underestimating how much 'But X could do Y damage to Z people' is limited simply by people being people, and not crazed murder-bots. I could go buy 5 gallons of gasoline right this minute, pour it out around some residence or building, and set it on fire. ANYONE could. But virtually all of the people don't do this, virtually all of the time. Everyone in America who owns a gun could run out right now and empty all their clips into random people, but almost no one does this, ever (statistically speaking).

As much as real world tragedy strikes all too often, the huge, vast majority of people DON'T go around killing other people, regardless of the laws against it. I suspect that's simply true on the Pact Worlds too.

3) Complete Aside, but is anyone else really, really surprised by how small Absolom Station is? 5 miles in diameter? I thought it was going to be, like, moon-sized or something. It can't be, as one poster put it, the 'last refuge for humanity', because it would be like all humanity living in New York CIty! In one way, that's cool, because Paizo could really actually detail it significantly, and in another way, I'm having trouble seeing how it's important at all, other than the Starstone, because almost everywhere else you might live is bigger than Absolom Station!

1) Eh, not sure that I agree. Generally speaking, I'd expect worlds to have more-or-less unified governments. Local laws might vary a bit, but not much. In the same way, as loose as the "Pact" seems to be, I'd expect at least a little standardization of laws across the Pact Worlds, and that might include some sort of provision on who can carry what weapons where. Maybe not, but it would be simpler than a GM needing to worry about every different podunk town having different rules. There would be exceptions, I'm sure. (Eox's Bone Sages seem to be pretty particular about controlling their holdings, so maybe they have a lot of variance while Aballon has fully-standardized laws worldwide. Or whatever.)

3) It is a lot more three-dimensional than an earth city. From the top of Freedom Tower in NYC to the lowest subway tunnel is less than half a mile (I think). So you should be able to effectively stack several cities on top of one another. Assuming living quarters aren't spacious, you could probably fit tens of millions in without trouble. Still smaller than I'd have thought, but not as bad as if it was just one 5 mile by 5 mile square.


Add in the fact that there ARE people everywhere with weapons and being a mass shooter or terrorist is a low yield proposition. At least in the US, the presence of an armed public reduces casualties by 1/9th.

And yes, PCs do obtain the permits and contacts to get better weapons as they level up. And nothing says those contacts are 100% legal either.

The Sesquipedalian Thaumaturge wrote:
Having recently gotten ahold of the rulebook PDF, I was reading over the weapons section when a thought struck me: shouldn't the Pact Worlds, a technologically advanced and socially modern society, have some restrictions on the purchase of military-grade weaponry? As it is, it seems that any citizen can buy assault rifles, grenades, etc. fairly easily. This problem is exacerbated by the existence of fanatically hostile organizations such as the Cult of the Devourer. Am I missing something, or should Absalom Station be constantly plagued by mass shootings and suicide bombings by Devourer cultists and other crackpots?


Pathfinder Starfinder Society Subscriber

The information we have so far makes the Pact Worlds seem rather decentralized. I doubt that the Pact Worlds as a whole have any arms control laws (as that seems to be something that they would leave as a local matter) and several of its planets also seem to lack centralized governments.

But planets that do have centralized governments and extensive urban areas could well pass and enforce weapons laws (with the general guidance being to leave any weapons that they ban on your ship at the spaceport) if they so chose. For example, I would imagine that the drow colony on Apostae severely restricts weapons by social status, while many asteroids might limit weapons to the locals (as they have such small populations that the asteroids in question are effectively their homes).


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Been playing for 30 years. I don't think I ever heard an argument for restricting the use of swords and bows in D&D.


Pathfinder Starfinder Society Subscriber

Planets in Traveller have "law levels" that primarily limit to varying degrees what weapons the PCs can legally carry. They also have starports, which are controlled points of entry that actually make such laws enforceable to varying degrees, as well as (in most cases) unified planetary governments.

Change any of those conditions, and restrictions on PC weapons become completely ineffective.


Butch A. wrote:
Complete Aside, but is anyone else really, really surprised by how small Absalom Station is? 5 miles in diameter?

Looking at the picture, it has humongous mile-high skyscrapers and many "underground" levels. So it can hold more people than NYC. But yes, the real planets probably have more people.


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5 miles makes it larger than quite a few moons in our solar system.


EC Gamer Guy wrote:
Been playing for 30 years. I don't think I ever heard an argument for restricting the use of swords and bows in D&D.

It was a thing in the Forgotten Realms, from its original incarnation onwards through the editions. Cormyr in particular required adventuring parties to be licensed and for weapons to be 'peace-bonded.' (Swords tied to their sheaths so they're difficult to draw). I suspect most groups ignored it.


The Glove of Storing magic item (slotted) and Null-Space Chamber hybrid item (unslotted) also make it pretty easy to smuggle weapons around in areas where weapons might not be popular to flash around.

Liberty's Edge

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Sarah the Soldier: Ugh, I hate the security checks at Absalom. This is such BS.

Samara the Solarian: (antenna wriggling) It's to keep Absalom Station secure, Sarah.

Eddard Edvard, Envoy Extraordinaire: (hands his survival knife over to station security) They give you a receipt, Sarah. Chill.

Sarah: Ugh, fine. (hands her laser pistol over)

Security Guy: If you're packing, we want all of it.

Sarah: Oh, for God's... (hands over her slugthrower pistol) (and her cryo pistol) (and her hunting rifle) (and her scatter gun) (and her arc rifle) (and her machine gun) (and her shirren-eye rifle) (and her dueling sword) (and her survival knife) (along with about three dozen various frag, shock, incendiary, flash, and sticky grenades)

Security Guy: ALL of it.

Sarah: (sighs, and hands over the pathetically small needle gun she had in her ankle holster that she forgot about)


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Pathfinder Lost Omens Subscriber

The player characters get one block away from the weapons check... and then the ambush happens, in true trope and jerk-GM mode.


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Or you read Incident at Absalom Station and realize they have no problem with you wandering off an arriving shuttle with heavy weapons and grenades, and their only response to firefights at the shuttle port is to show up a few minutes later and check the video footage to exonerate the survivors for self defense.


There are scifi books where space stations have wall strengths so high that they can withstand meteors. It takes large battle ships to damage the hull of a space station.

So they're not worried about piddly little things like a tank.

Perhaps that's why Absolom Station doesn't worry about gun control in any meaningful sense.


Mechanically, I expect Abasalom Station to have a hull at least as durable as the generic "starship bulkhead" the book itself provides on p. 408. That is, at least 5 feet thick, with a hardness of 35 and 2400 HP. That's durable enough that even adamantine has no special properties here. You certainly can punch through that eventually, if you're at a reasonable level and equipped for it. But for most people, personal weapons are completely irrelevant to the hull integrity of the station itself.

That's not an excuse for the security teams not doing their job, though. Maybe Dead Suns takes place on an off day. For everyone attached to that area. At the same time.

Scheduling errors and such.


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Pathfinder Roleplaying Game Superscriber; Pathfinder Starfinder Roleplaying Game Subscriber
Hithesius wrote:
That is, at least 5 feet thick, with a hardness of 35 and 2400 HP.

That's enough to survive the biggest nuclear bomb the Core book has to offer.


The way I plan to play it is that (for Dead Suns) anything larger than a small arm or one-handed melee weapon must be registered and locked securely in an enclosure where it cannot be easily accessed if at any time in a public area, theory being that the local laws state that small arms for personal defense are allowed, but anything larger cannot be "carried" and must be "stowed", and heavy weapons are banned, but in reality the offender faces a fine if it is found and confiscated, so there's a loose understanding that as long as you don't go walking around with visible weaponry, or with anything larger than a pistol concealed, the authorities don't hassle you...

...basically a Sci-Fantasy version of Texas. :)

Also, the laws are technically in force in the lower districts of Absolom Station, but they are only very loosely enforce, largely because the police won't go there.

That way, if a firefight breaks out, the PCs are not unarmed by a jerk move by me, and it doesn't break versimilitude by allowing them wandering around with longarms at the local shopping mall.


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ENHenry wrote:

The way I plan to play it is that (for Dead Suns) anything larger than a small arm or one-handed melee weapon must be registered and locked securely in an enclosure where it cannot be easily accessed if at any time in a public area, theory being that the local laws state that small arms for personal defense are allowed, but anything larger cannot be "carried" and must be "stowed", and heavy weapons are banned, but in reality the offender faces a fine if it is found and confiscated, so there's a loose understanding that as long as you don't go walking around with visible weaponry, or with anything larger than a pistol concealed, the authorities don't hassle you...

...basically a Sci-Fantasy version of Texas. :)

Also, the laws are technically in force in the lower districts of Absolom Station, but they are only very loosely enforce, largely because the police won't go there.

That way, if a firefight breaks out, the PCs are not unarmed by a jerk move by me, and it doesn't break versimilitude by allowing them wandering around with longarms at the local shopping mall.

Except for the heavy weapons specialist soldier, who's kind of screwed.


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A brand-new PC can't really afford to start with more than one gun.


ENHenry wrote:

The way I plan to play it is that (for Dead Suns) anything larger than a small arm or one-handed melee weapon must be registered and locked securely in an enclosure where it cannot be easily accessed if at any time in a public area, theory being that the local laws state that small arms for personal defense are allowed, but anything larger cannot be "carried" and must be "stowed", and heavy weapons are banned, but in reality the offender faces a fine if it is found and confiscated, so there's a loose understanding that as long as you don't go walking around with visible weaponry, or with anything larger than a pistol concealed, the authorities don't hassle you...

...basically a Sci-Fantasy version of Texas. :)

Also, the laws are technically in force in the lower districts of Absolom Station, but they are only very loosely enforce, largely because the police won't go there.

That way, if a firefight breaks out, the PCs are not unarmed by a jerk move by me, and it doesn't break versimilitude by allowing them wandering around with longarms at the local shopping mall.

You can do that in Texas.


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Heck, in Texas you're now allowed to wander around the whole state with your sword and your rifle.


Ouachitonian wrote:
ENHenry wrote:

The way I plan to play it is that (for Dead Suns) anything larger than a small arm or one-handed melee weapon must be registered and locked securely in an enclosure where it cannot be easily accessed if at any time in a public area, theory being that the local laws state that small arms for personal defense are allowed, but anything larger cannot be "carried" and must be "stowed", and heavy weapons are banned, but in reality the offender faces a fine if it is found and confiscated, so there's a loose understanding that as long as you don't go walking around with visible weaponry, or with anything larger than a pistol concealed, the authorities don't hassle you...

...basically a Sci-Fantasy version of Texas. :)

Also, the laws are technically in force in the lower districts of Absolom Station, but they are only very loosely enforce, largely because the police won't go there.

That way, if a firefight breaks out, the PCs are not unarmed by a jerk move by me, and it doesn't break versimilitude by allowing them wandering around with longarms at the local shopping mall.

You can do that in Texas.

I stand corrected -- didn't realize you could carry a rifle into a shopping mall in Texas! :)


thejeff wrote:
ENHenry wrote:

The way I plan to play it is that (for Dead Suns) anything larger than a small arm or one-handed melee weapon must be registered and locked securely in an enclosure where it cannot be easily accessed if at any time in a public area, theory being that the local laws state that small arms for personal defense are allowed, but anything larger cannot be "carried" and must be "stowed", and heavy weapons are banned, but in reality the offender faces a fine if it is found and confiscated, so there's a loose understanding that as long as you don't go walking around with visible weaponry, or with anything larger than a pistol concealed, the authorities don't hassle you...

...basically a Sci-Fantasy version of Texas. :)

Also, the laws are technically in force in the lower districts of Absolom Station, but they are only very loosely enforce, largely because the police won't go there.

That way, if a firefight breaks out, the PCs are not unarmed by a jerk move by me, and it doesn't break versimilitude by allowing them wandering around with longarms at the local shopping mall.

Except for the heavy weapons specialist soldier, who's kind of screwed.

Not really -- as long as they keep it stowed in populated areas, there's no problem, and if they whip it out, they pay a fine. There's no reason to be toting heavy weapons openly in commercial populated areas, anyway, in normal circumstances, and if it happens to be in a "trunk" they're carrying, then no one is going to stop and search them just because they're carrying a case...

Liberty's Edge

ENHenry wrote:
I stand corrected -- didn't realize you could carry a rifle into a shopping mall in Texas! :)

You can legally do this in Montana, too. You'll get funny looks (at least around here) and may be asked to leave in many places, and depending on how you're carrying...but it's certainly legal.


While it may be "legal," it doesn't mean it is socially acceptable.

Around here, you can open carry. If you swing into a gas station on the way out to the range or hunting, it'll be shrugged off.

A grocery store might ask you to leave.

A restaurant almost certainly will.

People on the street are probably uncomfortable and won't really want to answer your questions with anything more then a quick response so they can move away.

--------

So, if the players are wandering around town looking for information, they might be shooting themselves in the foot (figuratively) by open carrying. I certainly wouldn't let them walk into most corporations touting heavy weapons.

The social response may cut down a lot on the amount of open carry happening.

Then again, the part of town they walk into may not care, or actively look at them as prey for NOT open carrying.


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Interestingly, in the United States it's legal in 44 out of 50 states to openly carry a long gun. Although, in 3 of those states the gun must be unloaded (hardly enforceable).

31 states allow you to openly carry handguns.

Most states require a license to carry concealed firearms of any sort.


In the Aliens universe it is strongly implied that the legal-political system of nation-state sovereignty has been overrun and destroyed by the rule of megacorporations, which have few limits on their activities within their territories. It is a world dominated by corporatocracies instead of traditional national governments; even superstates like the EU no longer wield effective power within their borders. So for example Weyland-Yutani could do whatever it wanted on LV-426. There was no political entity with any teeth that could have held Weyland-Yutani liable for the actions of its managerial staff in their exploration and handling of the xenoforms and artifacts recovered from the derelict Space Jockey starship. Even though the entire colony and its population were lost in the disaster, any disciplinary actions taken or justice rendered would have been entirely in-house. Whoever was the lowest-ranking manager that could be saddled with the blame might have gotten reprimanded, demoted, fired, etc by upper management at the pleasure of the shareholders, but that would be all. That's corporatocracy in action.

If the civilization of Starfinder operates under a similar paradigm, it will be a civilization divided into corporate republics, perhaps punctuated by revolutionary syndicalist "buffer states", self-governing socialist communes, and anarchy zones in continuous (but irrelevant) conflict with the megacorporations in areas that no megacorporation thinks is profitable to expand into (neutral zones).

In reality it's the megacorporations who hold the real power. It'll be whichever megacorp has prevailing or majority jurisdiction over a certain space station, surface colony, planetside city-state, or geographical region that decides the gun laws, or who hands down the orders to the commissioner of police to enforce (or not enforce), that decides what happens if some gang of well-armed folks is spotted packing heat in public.


In mine I follow common sense.

In places with a local law enforcement contingent I generally say two handed advanced melee weapons are illegal for open carry, long guns, explosives, and heavy Weapons.

Pistols, one handed melee weapons, those are generally fine.


Pathfinder Rulebook Subscriber

in my games my players gotten used to weapon restricts. in harn you cann't walk around with weapons and armor in towns. i input those rules in my d&d games too. i am currently running a traveller game waiting till the alein book comes out before starting a starfinder game. i will bring traveller law levels into the game in some form.

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