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Shpadoinkle
2008-12-13, 02:27 AM
Semirandom thought.

Okay, the game's universe has things like laser rifles, supersonic jets, the internet (or it's equivalant), grenades, rocket launchers, nuclear missiles, MP3 players, camera phones, and niftiest of all, digital watches. Why in the name of the Nine Hells would anyone ever use something like an ordinary steel sword? Well, there's a reason.

All living things carry a life energy- some call it ki, some call it The Force, some call it spiritual potential, some call it Spanky. But whatever it's called, it's there, and with training, it can be harnessed and encouraged to grow by those who know the proper techniques. While it can be used with pretty much anything, it works on a curve- extremely simple weapons (if you can really call them weapons), like random sticks and rocks, have a very low potential for this energy to be channeled into them because they're too simple. Something VERY advanced, like a laser rifle, also has a very low potential: it's been processed too much, there's nothig personal involved in the making of a laser rifle... but it's a bell curve. In between those two extremes lies something a thousand times simpler than the laser rifle, but thousands of years more advanced than sticks and rocks. Typically, this is a sword.

Swords, battleaxes, warhammers, advanced spears and polearms, and other things of that approximate technological level are right around that peak in the bell curve. Something about the simplicity of the concept and function of the weapon itself, but the complexity of the acts of making it and using it just clicks with the human spirit, and it's easier to channel one's personal life force through these weapons than any other. Thusly, a person who has learned the ways of the sword can match or even outdo someone with a laser rifle. The rifle's easier to learn- hell, you just point and click, but the sword has a higher potential, though it might take several months or even years to reach it.

Baron Corm
2008-12-15, 12:23 PM
I think this belongs more in Gaming or something but *shrug*.

I think the reason you give is a decent way of expressing the reason why most RPGs of today still take place in sword-wielding eras, though I'm not sure what The Force has to do with it. A sword is symbolically an extension of the human punch. It gives us claws. While guns still need to be guided well by the human eye and muscles, they are not humanlike enough for us to identify with them. In an FPS, it can be fun to tear things up with a gun or explosive, but in an RPG, it's kind of lame. And sticks are simply ineffective.

That said, in a setting with rocket launchers and sniper rifles, the sword guy is generally assumed to have more personal training, because technology is for big dumb Western brutes, and thus can dodge bullets and hide in the shadows, etc. But that's only if the setting creator wants it to be that way.