Are Law Enforcers Stupid?

[Gulnyr]

I ask the question that is the subject of this thread because of thoughts that flowed from reading [post=724662]this post[/post].  I don't mean any offense to Falonthas in asking this stuff.

In a world where magic is real, and it is not especially uncommon that people will change size and shape, would anyone who had that potential really be held in a room with a window or behind a simple set of bars?  Would there really be no cells designed for holding mages or suppressing magic in general?

I understand that smaller towns and villages might have a simple jail, or even just a nice corner of a barn where they can chain people, but a big city like Port Hempstead should have a prison that fits the reality of a magical world.  Even if they don't have fancy cells, I really don't think the city guard as a whole is so incompetent as to give prisoners easy and obvious ways out.

[Dorganath]

There are jails designed to hold magic users of all kinds, and the authorities would surely take such precautions against someone like that.

Despite what he posted there, he'd have quite a difficult time just "deciding" to shapeshift and squeeze out through the bars on his own.  However, if he wants to try, he should contact a GM...and bring his lucky dice. *evil grin*

And likely, there'd be a few poachers who would pick off the easy prey gathering outside the jail.

[Weeblie]

Sometimes, the jail is the safest place before a sentence has been placed.

If escaping, the authority would unlikely having anything against someone bringing the culsprit back... with force... And if the said person would accidentally use a little bit too much force? Well... at least, the guilty one was truly guilty... right...? Or why else would he run?

[Gulnyr]

I've just never seen prison design mentioned before, and it's easy to default to a real world concept of what a medieval sort of prison would be like.

Thanks.

[Pseudonym]

Quite so.

I dare say a place like Hempstead would have magical wards, specially designed cells, etc to house the most cunning mage (or druid). The jail in Vehl perhaps would be less subtle and (when the Rofis were looking the other direction) do nasty things to the fingers of the spellcasters - no spells with a somatic component for a while!

[Drizzlin]

Well if I were warden...

First you tie the mages fingers together behind his back, secure a log behind his back and ties his arms behind that. Then hog ties his ankles to  his wrists. Stuff his mouth and gag him. Then string him up by the log in his back.

If they were a really bad bad mage, you put them in a bubble of sorts infested with insects that bite. That will help mess with any consentration to even cast a spell, if they could possibley do it (with the feats above).

Now of course with still spell, silent spell and all the enscrew feats, they could possible cast, but even if they could the wards would trigger off left and right.

Hmm, maybe I will open a jail in mistone!

[Polak76]

Well if I were warden...

First you tie the mages fingers together behind his back, secure a log behind his back and ties his arms behind that. Then hog ties his ankles to  his wrists. Stuff his mouth and gag him. Then string him up by the log in his back.

If they were a really bad bad mage, you put them in a bubble of sorts infested with insects that bite. That will help mess with any consentration to even cast a spell, if they could possibley do it (with the feats above).

Now of course with still spell, silent spell and all the enscrew feats, they could possible cast, but even if they could the wards would trigger off left and right.

Hmm, maybe I will open a jail in mistone!

This sounds like a Corath Massage Palour

[Falonthas]

actually khuren went without protest with the guard when he was put under arrest for johans death

yes he could shift and vanish into the wilds but he made a simple request of having a cell with a window so he wouldnt be denied the open sky to a point and he can sun himself on the window sill in his animal forms and talk to his friends until the shutters are closed at nightfall

he hasnt done anything wrong in his mind and no word from the druid council has told him otherwise

the ones actually at fault are those who are detaining a druid from free travel

but that will all come up in the trial soon to come

but yes if he really wanted to escape whose to know which little black cat or bird or snake is really him

he also knows the city folk live by their laws and even though he doesnt live by them they will get their trial

what happens then who knows
but only the council and the heirophant can actually impose a sentence that would mean anything to khuren
city folk are just that
they need others to tell them how they live
where druids all follow one but have a voice in what is brought before the whole

[Dorganath]

yes he could shift and vanish into the wilds but he made a simple request of having a cell with a window so he wouldnt be denied the open sky to a point and he can sun himself on the window sill in his animal forms and talk to his friends until the shutters are closed at nightfall

Actually, that's where you're wrong.  He could not just shift and vanish.  That's what is being said above.  The jail where he's kept would have provisions against it.  That and even if there weren't, you'd need to work with a GM to determine the success or failure of the attempt.  

There are no "Get out of jail free" cards.  Even the wizard/druid teleport can be mechanically prevented if we desire.

[lonnarin]

Beholders would make the perfect jailbreaking team.  Charm the Guards, disintegrate the walls, point the antimagic ray at the wards, fly away fly away home free.

Tunneling Xorns would be my second pick.  If that fails, just earthquake the whole town to rubble.  Wards or no wards, I seriously doubt any town or jail is earthquake proof.  Or flood proof.  Runes on a door or wall are wholley impotent to the earth's plates shifting and the clouds in the sky.

Then as a druid, one could always talk to the dungeon rats to roll around in filth and bite all the guards to spread the plague.   Nothing like a swarm of bubbling, oozing open sores to temper their pledge to justice.

[Eight-Bit]

It's also is up to the guard (i.e. the GM) to place the proper restraints upon the player. For example, in the few times I had to capture someone or place them in jail, all of their possession are "confiscated", including any spellbooks (or teleportation tomes) in the case of Wizards. Spell Casters were usually bound by the hands and feet, and if they got smart with me, a dirty 'tater sack was tied over their head and one of Garent's moldy socks were crammed in their yapper.

But, as a player, it's always been my practice to ask the GM before I attempt anything drastic, such as melting the bars.

[Drizzlin]

Beholders would make the perfect jailbreaking team.  Charm the Guards, disintegrate the walls, point the antimagic ray at the wards, fly away fly away home free.

Tunneling Xorns would be my second pick.  If that fails, just earthquake the whole town to rubble.  Wards or no wards, I seriously doubt any town or jail is earthquake proof.  Or flood proof.  Runes on a door or wall are wholley impotent to the earth's plates shifting and the clouds in the sky.

Then as a druid, one could always talk to the dungeon rats to roll around in filth and bite all the guards to spread the plague.   Nothing like a swarm of bubbling, oozing open sores to temper their pledge to justice.

Have you ever heard of a dead magic zone or simply put powerful level spells that supress magic period and within them you can not cast, period. These are all common things used in D&D setting to detain casters. Not to mention the techniques I mentioned above about how to tie a mage down. If you can't go through the extremely complex movements, speech, and spell components to cast a spell, you can not do it.

Even in D&D settings where psionics are allowed, they make helmets to strap to the head of the psionisist that prevent the use of psionics. You seem to have a vivid imagination on what your PC can do with all the spells, jail breaks, and earth quakes. Try giving the DMs and NPCs the same benefit of the doubt.

[lonnarin]

Have you ever heard of a dead magic zone or simply put powerful level spells that supress magic period and within them you can not cast, period. These are all common things used in D&D setting to detain casters. Not to mention the techniques I mentioned above about how to tie a mage down.

Sounds to me like another shoddy excuse for an NPC "I Win" card.  Where are these no-magic zones sold and how much would it cost a player to install one in their own home, hmmm? ha ha! (j/k!)

Seriously though, law enforcers aren't stupid... agreed.  But they're not infallible either.  I wholeheartedly support a GM being present to regulate the escape... it beats the lock becoming unpickable, the walls unquakable, the npc mage casting invincible spells that no player mage could ever learn and the guard becoming 40th lvl with DR 60/+12, then we would never have had a problem with Bloodstone to begin with.  Without a GM present, you're pretty much stuck in there behind the bioware hardcoded walls of invincibility after all.  

[Weeblie]

There's a different between putting a person into the jail and keeping him in there.

The first might be very difficult/impossible for normal city guards. The later is trivial... even a commoner can defeat the most powerful mage in the world, if he's letting the commoner do that (either freely... or like... if passed out and he has no auto-hit-back-amulet-of-instant-death).