Tonfa
Nunchaku
Also called a bokutō, btw...
Is there that much wood, or material available, to craft Nerf Weapons under the Dome?
Nerf foam, yes?
The only real difficulty as far as I can tell is that there doesn't seem to be a way to alter the way you approach Martial Arts after you make your choice, making it one of the very few major character choices you lock into before you necessarily know what's up. This might contribute to a perception that Martial Arts is limited, I guess?
The heck Vera...You think you know someone...
Now, if you mean martial arts being limited, as in the fact that non of us are going to be leaping across buildings, or warding off hoards of corpie clones with metal pipes, then I say to you, good sir, that you've partaken many Wachowski movies, yah...
Realistically, now a days you're not going to see anyone get into Martial Arts for any reason other then 'losing weight', or 'exercise', or just 'something for my kid to do over the summer break'...
Um. I dunno. Instead, why not just add a non-lethal combat command called Spar?
Shtap. You're a terrible lab-rat, and you are misleading my fragile newbie mind...
And I'm aware of the @lethal and @holdback commands (at least NOW I remember them, after reading helpfiles for days and forgetting everything I read already). Though, I'm really just suggesting to add a command that ties it all together in a package. People can be quite forgetful...
BTW, if you're sparring with sharp weapons...you must be all kinds of cray-cray.
"Killing people to see if you can" is like the immy who comes through the gates and tries to fight a ganger, thinking this is a hack and slash game. Not every character is going to be a murderer or a sociopath.
How do people train with knives in real life? Do they ever know for certain what their skill level is? I think there's a lot of RL uncertainty about things like that as well; people train and practice but until you put the pedal to the metal, you don't really know what's going to happen.
Anyway I personally think there shouldn't be rubber knives because the uncertainty involved in lethal weapon use creates a motivation to get out there and get your hands dirty.
IMO, there are themely ways to deal with other characters that don't involve killing them. Violence most definitely has a place, but I feel it's to often used as a lazy option. Anyone can play a thug, but it takes an artist to move past just beating people over the head with something.
And, what would you prefer?
"I need to test my skills, I'll find someone and we'll spar in a gym with previously agreed terms then we'll be sparring BFFs and nobody gets hurt!"
-- OR --
"I need to test my skills, I'll find someone to get upset with and beat them up in a dark alley, creating conflict in a creative way that will create more roleplay for more people by driving people into problems.
I mean, cricket bats are meant to be used to swing them at cricket balls during cricket games, but you see how that's working out...
No one is suggesting the removal of conflict, or otherwise, lacking creativity, or an inability to provoke excitement...
While this may be a Cyberpunk genre, everyone has their methods and are allowed to RP as they see fit, so long as RP is involved. RP is always involved. Some people want to plan their next attack, or collaborate with someone to see how well they'll pull off that bank heist. SOME people aren't going to stalk the streets of Newyork City playing vigilante.
You might. But some people aren't.
That's totally understandable and it's actually fine to play the way you feel the most comfortable playing. This is why admin don't hand out punishments to "passive" players that aren't actively involved in backstabbing chemes and other malicious plots, because everyone has a different playstyle, and I respect that, and actively try to bring roleplay to those playstyles too. It's totally fine if you like playing that way! But one thing is true, you should stay cyberpunk at all times (read: http://www.sindome.org/help/cyberpunk/) if you want to get the most out of Sindome.
Don't get me wrong: I love new content, and new features, and new mechanics to explore and things to do. However, I don't think adding shittier, less efficient versions of weapons that already have shittier, less efficient versions of them (there are a lot of shitty melee weapons already) is a good investment of available manpower, not under the pretext of "we need more non lethal weapons" because that is a very good way to drive conflict out of the streets and right into a gym under friendlier terms. In my opinion, conflict is the main way to progress in Sindome and any actions that may remove conflict from the game and its effects on the playerbase one way or another, may not be a good thing for the game!