Restraint & Capture    Adventurers working in bounty hunting often need to take certain enemies alive. Other parties might face less-planned battles, but still wish to avoid killing for moral or philosophical reasons. Still others might seek to capture enemies for information or ransom. Whatever the purpose, this chapter covers the challenges involved in keeping captives who presumably don't wish to remain captive.

Injury    In Legends, there is no cartoonish "hit them on the head" to reliably and safely knock a character out. Knockout Specialist (Stealth) assists in incapacitating or pinning a character, but there is no fully "safe" way to inflict damage. Moreover, keeping them injured to that point risks complications from their injuries, and can constitute illegal abuse; all the Declaration realms prohibit undue cruelty to captives, even by adventurers pursuing lawful bounties. Finally, incapacitated characters who are not doomed by their injuries eventually gain the stabilized status, potentially giving them options to sabotage their captors in whatever way they can. While injury from a fight can be all the restraint needed for a captive if the guards are already on their way, most capture jobs will require a more reliable means of restraint.

Persuasion    Since even a successful persuasion social action is "optional" for the strong-willed, it is typically only effective on 1-2 bWILL characters, such as common soldiers or bandits. Even then, captives with any sort of conviction will likely not be able to persuaded to come willingly, if there is any possibility of escape. Social actions are best used to take captives in morally neutral contexts, when they expect to be treated fairly and not receive severe punishment from whoever they're being taken to.

Sedation & Paralysis    Major Sedating elixirs (see Elixirs) are a costly but safe and foolproof way of rendering an organic character unconscious for 15 minutes. Even if awoken after the 15 minutes, the captive will still have helpful DEX and INT penalties.

    Forcing an elixir on an unwilling character requires them to be pinned or otherwise rendered incapable of making melee defense rolls. The administering character must have one free hand and the elixir in the other, and must succeed on a d12 roll on DEX. If successful, the victim is stunned until the end of their next turn, and receives the effect of the elixir as if they had drank it normally on that turn. If the roll fails by 5 or more, the elixir is spat out and wasted, and if attempted on a creature with a Bite attack, the administering character takes damage as if hit by that Bite attack on their elixir arm.

    Paralysis, most often via poisons, can also be an effective way to speed the capture of a character without excessive injury. If a poison needs to be administered without damage, it may follow the same rules as forcing an elixir. However, even if effective on a given character, paralyzing poison's short duration means some form of restraint will often be necessary.

Degrees of Restraint    For all the following types of restraint, the effects are described in three degrees.

    1st-degree: The character is restrained in either the hands or feet. If hands, they lose the use of any rule or Ability requiring free hands. If feet, they are largely immobilized; they may hop or crawl to nearby locations, but cannot meaningfully move in combat nor for travel rules, and they always have the knocked-down status.
    2nd-degree: The character is restrained in both hands and feet, as above for 1st-degree.
    3rd-degree: The character is fully immobilized, unable to even crawl. They function as if paralyzed, except that they may still perform verbal actions if not gagged. They require assistance in eating and drinking. They do not receive safe rest days, and recover only half the normal exhaustion from rest.

    Any degree of restraint may also include the character being tied to an object or another restrained character, preventing them from escaping unless they can drag the other along with them. Any degree that does not leave free hands may also include gagging, preventing a character from performing verbal actions, and/or blindfolding, which prevents normal sight.

    Characters restrained only in the hands can be led around by their captors, either directly or by a rope; they can attempt to resist this by rolling d6 on SPD, with 1 Hindrance for every multiple of their own STR that is exceeded by the sum of their captor's WGT and STR. If more than 4 Hindrance would be added, the attempt automatically fails. On a success, the captive may resist being moved for 1 round (5 seconds), and if they succeed by 10, they may force the captor to either move with them or let go of them. However, regardless of success of failure, the captive takes 8 fatigue per attempt, making this a poor option for long-term escape attempts. It is typically only used during combat, to sabotage the captors or cooperate with rescuers.

    Quadruped, winged, and serpentine creatures ignore 1st-degree restraint. They lose all Claw attacks and the use of their wings when restrained at a higher degree, and lose Bite attacks if gagged.

    As with free hand rules, rules for "hands" need not apply literally to hands, so long as the species has appendages that function as free hands for rule purposes.

Rope    As rope is an affordable and multipurpose tool (see General Equipment), it is often what adventurers have on hand for an unplanned capture, though better restraint options are available for sentient species. Tying up a character requires them to be willingly compliant, or rendered incapable of making melee defense rolls (such as via pinning, paralysis, or incapacitation). The tying character must use both hands. If time is pressing, tying up a character is a process action rolled on DEX, with a point goal of 20 and a roll interval of 1 round (5 seconds), requiring major actions each round. Achieving the point goal accomplishes 1 degree of restraint; it can be repeated to increase the degree. By default, tying up a character requires 5 feet of rope per degree of restraint. The amount of rope required per degree is increased by 1/10 the character's WGT.

    Degrees of restraint from rope can potentially be escaped. This requires 1 minute of effort, during which the captive must be unattended (that is, no captor characters within arm's reach). At the end of the minute, they may make a roll on DEX to escape: d20 if currently at 1 degree of restraint, 2d20 if 2 degrees, and 3d20 if 3 degrees. Their newfound freedom is immediately visible unless the roll succeeds by 10, in which case the character may conceal it until an opportune moment, though a captor coming within arm's reach will still notice. If the roll fails, the captive may not re-attempt the process for 12 hours, unless their degree of restraint is reduced in the meantime.

Shackles    Shackles are more effective than rope for restraining captives, both in terms of speed and difficulty of escape. They are typically produced in an adaptable style suitable for the hands and legs of all WGTs of all playable species. The one exception is Therbolgites, who require their own variety of shackles which are ineffective on other species. Shackles weigh 2 pounds and occupy 0.5 carry slots, and can be bought in cities. The cost is 10 coins for steel shackles, 30 coins for coral, 60 for quartz, and 120 for adamant; the only functional difference is the armor range if targeted via Damaging Objects rules.

    Applying shackles to a character requires them to be willingly compliant, or rendered incapable of making melee defense rolls (such as via pinning, paralysis, or incapacitation). The applying character must use both hands and a single major action. One set of shackles creates 1 degree of restraint; if a character already has 2nd-degree restraint entirely from shackles, they may be raised to 3rd-degree as a major action, without requiring a third pair of shackles.

    Shackles cannot be escaped as rope can, but they are subject to Lockpicking (Stealth). Characters concealing a lockpick may use it on their own shackles without the requirement for a free hand, provided they are not in 3rd-degree restraint. Shackles break and lock permanently when a roll is failed. They are sold with keys (0 pounds, 0 slots) matching the individual shackles.

    Alacrian keyless shackles are available for 1,200 coins. Instead of keys, these shackles become biocoded to the character who applies them, and the button to unlock them will respond only to that character. If that character is not willing and able to release them, they can only be defeated by damage. Keyless shackles are always made of adamant, and are rarely found in the Therbolgite configuration.

Arcane Manacles    Normal restraints are sufficient for shutting down all Arcana Abilities which require a free hand. However, truly neutralizing an arcanist requires more specialized measures, as they are capable of using handless Abilities even while restrained. Arcane manacles (sometimes known colloquially as "caster cuffs") follow the rules for keyless shackles, except that they apply only to the hands, and must be made specifically for either antecessoroids or a single disparate species. Once placed on an arcanist, adamant interference patterns prevent the wearer from using any Arcana Abilities, even if they do not require free hands. The character still counts as an arcanist for all other rules - this includes retaining their arcane sense, their signature on others' arcane sense, their regaining of arcane insight, and their involuntary arcane visions. Arcane manacles cost 2,000 coins, and have the same weight, carry slots, and armor range as normal keyless shackles. They are powered by the energy in the arcanist's own adamant, and thus do not need to be recharged.

    Aterr are immune to the effects of arcane manacles (except for the degree of restraint), thus bounties on them will virtually never ask for live capture.