Attorney vs Lawyer

EvilBeeker · Sep 23, 2003

While I think they did a great job on the Menace Manual, there is one thing I just noticed:

On page 101 under GM Characters they have the ATTORNEY, and on page 113 they have the LAWYER.

:::Setup for future jokes and pun ... ready:::

What the hell is the difference?

Even the stats are near identical. Seems like this one slipped past the leads.

---Let the humor begin---

------------------------------------
EvilBeeker

MThibault · Sep 23, 2003

I believe that in the USA an Attourney is a lawyer who is qualified and authorized to present cases in a court of law. A lawyer is a more general term which includes this group and those who act as consultants, advisors and the like.

I'm not sure I would waste space splitting the two, but I haven't seen what they did with them, so it might be genius for all I know.

Cheers

Greatwyrm · Sep 23, 2003

I stumbled on this in the Menace Manual last night, too. I didn't see any difference between the two. Maybe I didn't look hard enough.

MThibault said:
I believe that in the USA an Attourney is a lawyer who is qualified and authorized to present cases in a court of law. A lawyer is a more general term which includes this group and those who act as consultants, advisors and the like.

I think it might be the other way around, but my law class was a while ago. In any event, that's a pretty fine hair to split in a book like this. If it was the "Lawyers and Lawsuits" supplement, I'd expect it, but not here.

JPL · Sep 23, 2003

Greatwyrm said:
I stumbled on this in the Menace Manual last night, too. I didn't see any difference between the two. Maybe I didn't look hard enough.

I think it might be the other way around, but my law class was a while ago. In any event, that's a pretty fine hair to split in a book like this. If it was the "Lawyers and Lawsuits" supplement, I'd expect it, but not here.

Lawyer
Pronunciation: 'lo-y&r, 'loi-&r
Function: noun
Date: 14th century
: one whose profession is to conduct lawsuits for clients or to advise as to legal rights and obligations in other matters

Attorney
Pronunciation: &-'t&r-nE
Function: noun
Inflected Form(s): plural -neys
Etymology: Middle English attourney, from Middle French atorné, past participle of atorner
Date: 14th century
: one who is legally appointed to transact business on another's behalf; specifically : a legal agent qualified to act for suitors and defendants in legal proceedings

My card says "attorney," but I tell people "lawyer."

Mistwell, are you gonna straighten this out for us?

Doc_Souark · Sep 23, 2003

JPL said:
My card says "attorney," but I tell people "lawyer."

What gets me is that you admit it ! Sorry I know there are some good lawyers out there but mine was a scum sucking jerk.

JPL · Sep 23, 2003

Doc_Souark said:
What gets me is that you admit it ! Sorry I know there are some good lawyers out there but mine was a scum sucking jerk.

As in any profession, there are good guys and bad guys and a lot of people in between.

But let's leave it at that, before my delicate feelings are hurt and I have to sue for reckless infliction of emotional distress.

<Wink>

buzz · Sep 23, 2003

Hehe. I just picked up the book about an hour ago and I spotted this as well.

Greatwyrm said:
I stumbled on this in the Menace Manual last night, too. I didn't see any difference between the two. Maybe I didn't look hard enough.

There are some differences in skill ranks here and there, and the high-level attorney has a typo.

(Read/Write English is repeated.) On the whole, they're identical. I don't really get it.

I also don't get why only the last couple of organizations in the Factions chapter have gudelines for the three default campaign models. Weird.

Still, there's tons of Alternity and D*M material in here, and minimal D&D repetition, so I'm happy. I still can't shake the nagging feeling that d20M is the red-headed stepchild of the WotC stable fo RPGs, though.

Plane Sailing · Sep 23, 2003

buzz said:
I still can't shake the nagging feeling that d20M is the red-headed stepchild of the WotC stable fo RPGs, though.

Looked at Wheel of Time d20 recently?

buzz · Sep 23, 2003

Plane Sailing said:
Looked at Wheel of Time d20 recently?

Heh. Ditto Call of Cthulhu d20, in a sense. Of course, WotC was pretty clear that both of those were one-off projects. d20M is supposedly part of the holy trinity.

afeldspar · Sep 24, 2003

EvilBeeker said:
While I think they did a great job on the Menace Manual, there is one thing I just noticed:

On page 101 under GM Characters they have the ATTORNEY, and on page 113 they have the LAWYER.

:::Setup for future jokes and pun ... ready:::

What the hell is the difference?

Here is the "difference", as explained by Eric Cagle, who wrote the lawyer character:

Part of the reason is that we had three authors working on this book. I wrote up the Lawyer NPCs and when I saw the first galleys of the book, noticed that there was an Attorney in there as well (I believe penned by Matt Sernett). When I asked our editor, he said "that's fine, there's a difference between the two." <shrugs> Never question your editor.

Found at http://boards1.wizards.com/showthread.php?s=&threadid=100776

afeldspar

Attorney vs Lawyer

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