I was writing a new run today. I started thinking about the meet and what I could do a little different with it. Got me thinking about bouncers and scanners at the doors to the different bars, night clubs, and lounges around town. This, coupled with all of the shadowart imagery we get in our lovely sourcebooks.

I realize that there are penalties for all of the different stages of possessing or using a weapon in the game (and I enforce these when my runners get caught with weapons by LS or KE). The imagery however, seems to counter the rigid laws against toting weapons around. Most street-level 'snapshots' seem to show numerous criminal types partying it up on the streets, guns hanging off their hips or strapped to their backs. I understand that some of this is for the glorification of the lifestyle and all that.

That aside, when said gun/weapon-wielding criminals visit their favorite watering hole to meet up with some fat cat Johnson and are checked at the door, is there a standard policy about someone carrying weapons around with them? It seems like there's always a coat closet area for guns. Should bars and night clubs maintain a sense of "well, the world's a shitty place. I can understand why you're packing" type of attitude? Or, should they be more "Holy Crap! That's a frickin' gun!!! Someone call Lonestar!!!"?

I've always played that short of the most upstanding of places, most establishments have some sort of understanding of this type of situation. Just wondering how some of you others have either GM'ed or experienced through the PC's eyes, this situation. Your thoughts?

the 2 examples you give are the extreme ends of the spectrum. some places may allow you to carry based on concealment, their familiararity with the characters, or the size of the bribe payed. you also have the option to have the security staff check the weapons at the door (my GM's favorite) or even have different sections of the resteraunt with security matching the firepower of the patrons (shooting or nonshooting, please). you should tailor your response to both the establishments clientele and the specific firepower being toted along by the party. remember that some places will turn you away for not wearing a tie, and some have a 3 drink minimum (or 2 fight min.). some places want shadow business more than others and all will aactin the best interest of maintaining their ppreferredclientele.

I think it depends where you are. corp strong holds and AAA rated neighborhoods, bad, lower down the area, well as long as you don't flash it around, they don't care,going to Z rated ares, "need a gun buddy?"

The art work seems a little dramatic but if you go back to the original food fight I think the police, corp employees not civic employees, know there are weapons for "self defense" and as long as you don't draw attention to yourself, they don't care. In most places you'll need it to defend yourself before they can arrive.

Seattle isnt exactly a crime-free city. There are most likely areas that Lone Star avoids unless escourted by a swat team. I wouldn't be suprised if there were areas where people carried illegal firearms around all the time without fear of LS or KE.

HA I can see this scean in my head.
Orc walks into a bar and is asked if he is packing. Orc pulls out a Ceska Scorpian. Bouncer looks at it and says "That all?" Orc nods. Bouncer says "your gonna need more then just that little thing." Bouncer pulls out an Ares Alpha and tosses it to he Orc.

LOL!

"Sorry Pal, this here bar has a two shot minumum."

isn't it orK?

in my game, its all relative. you can get away with a light or hold out pistol in a bar or club in a fairly decent hood, but not anything much bigger, and only if they're concealed. in other areas, like the barrens, you can pack an externally holstered heavy pistol and nobody will mind so long as you're not pointing it at them. now, a freaking assault rifle is another thing entirely. you have that out, you're there to rock and roll, not protect yourself.

"I'm here to chew gum and kick some hoop. But I just broke my foot, anybody got a piece of Juicy Fruit?"
or
Sign at the local bar with small hole for measuring round reads: "Your ammunition must be at least this caliber to drink here."

The machine to the left of the bar sells Marlborough, Royals, Benson and Hedges...

The machine to the right of the bar sells 9mm, .45 and 7.62...

Now your cooking with gas

In my games, we play with the gun-check version rather than the Holy shit version. Bouncers ask for weapons at the door and you can pick them up when you leave. No questions asked.

But like it's been said, depends on the place. Some rough bars would only raise an eyebrow if you handed them a SMG, while an upscale restaurants assume you don't have any guns and would send you home if you didn't pass the discreet metal detector at the entrance.

But in general, clubs and bars simply remove weapons from their patrons without asking for permits and stuff. That's how we play it, anyway.

And given that the streets basically belong to the gangs at night in most of the areas, I doubt any officer of the law would bat a second lash if you've got a shotgun in the car after 5pm.

I had this one player that was clueless. At Dante's, the team was told to check their weapons. Unspoken understanding ment anything larger then an HP. So I have this player that's a ganger. He decides to check ALL his weapons including the AR he had on his back. Bouncer doesn't mind the AR, but then the player trys to be smart and show off his spurs.
Retractable, cyber spurs. Bouncer grabs his wrists and proceeds to get a nearby fire axe...

Just a thought on this, if for some reason you want a game mechanic....

Already in the game, in the BBB, there is a legality rating on all gear, and that's the TN for a cop to make something out of the gear (after they've already noticed it witha perception test). The cop rolls their Police Procedures (or Security Procedures) skill as appropriate, and if they get any successes against the legality rating, they make an issue of it. I don't remember if number of successes matter (ie. warning vs. citation vs. arrest).

The TN for the Legality test is also modified by the part of town -- it's like -2 TN for AAA rated spots, +4 for Z-zones, etc.

Anyway, you could co-opt this for bars and even citizens. Bar security might roll their Security Procedures skill too, if they have it, and even average folks might default to their Intelligence attribute for that Knowledge skill.

Given that an AR is like Legality 2 and an HP Legality 5 or so, you could say that trained security in a AAA zone (-2 to TN) makes an issue about nearly everything, and even pedestrians (+4 to TN) will usually call the cops about an AR (mod. TN 4). Some might even do it about an HP (modified TN 7).

In a Z-zone, trained security might care about the AR (mod. TN 6), while Joe Average Ganger rarely gives a flying frag (mod. TN 10) about even the AR, let alone the HP (mod. TN 15).

--K