D&D General Are lockpicking tools legal in your fantasy world?

[tetrasodium]

I wish my players played like you think!

The best part is that they don't need to for you to use it &they will start once you begin rewarding them for it
Bob"I'm going to pick the lock"> and result above 2-5ish GM "
Ok mike there you are at the door you just confirmed was locked & up walks bob unrolling his toolkit no doubt to do some super precise ultra involved lock picking like they always show the bad guys & spies doing in the Phiarlin scryhouse plays...your sure this is going to be good so really lean in to get a good look & maybe learn something">gm"bob left or right?">bob:"?????? .... " gm: gestures left & right "which one? 50/50 no skills just pick one">bob:"... leeeffffffffttttt?....">GM:"you guys all watch bob grab a little hammer & a nail from his toolkit & before you realize it BAM the door is laying on the ground because he pued the hinge pins & there was nothing left to hold the door up".... also good substitutes are under/over door tools or the teensiest bit of not quite mage hand pulling the hinge pins out of the other side if the door if not just opening the door. You can also help the social engineering stuff along by picking someone with a character likely to know rather than the one who just said "I want to roll perception to look for the best entrance"& say "Alice give me a [whatever] check">>alice:"four....">gm: " You grew up working parties like this & know how lax security is if you even look to be dressed a little close to the staff uniform & have some legitimately good ideas for getting in the staff entrance."

Once your players start seeing that kind of stuff even when they will start getting creative & keep being creative in cool ways as long as you keep rewarding them with cool results

Edit: bob:"why km ETF or right? Gm:"oh yea bob the hinges were on the left side of the door bit everyone was too startled by the bsng"

 

[Umbran]

Lol. I wish my players considered methods other than smashing doors down and cracking skulls.

Yeah, but considering these methods is predicated on knowing they exist. If you don't know that modern lock-makers produce master keys that work on large batches of locks, you aren't going to consider finding such a master key.

 

[TheSword]

Yeah, but considering these methods is predicated on knowing they exist. If you don't know that modern lock-makers tend to use master keys, you aren't going to consider finding such a master key.

To be honest I more meant dressing up as delivery guys and bluffing their way through

 

[Snarf Zagyg]

To be honest I more meant dressing up as delivery guys and bluffing their way through

That would be a different thread.

"Does your fantasy world have FedEx?"

 

[TheSword]

That would be a different thread.

"Does your fantasy world have FedEx?"

Or Uber Eats

 

[Snarf Zagyg]

Or Uber Eats

Ugh. Don't start that.

Because then people would have to talk about what people in a fantasy campaign ate.

And then the conversation would go to eating different types of monsters. And, of course, is it wrong to eat monsters with intelligence? And then someone would mention cows, or an octopus.

But then someone would ask if a human eating a hobgoblin steak was cannibalism, and it would just right off the rails.

 

[embee]

The better question is "Why would a law banning thieves' tools exist? What is its purpose?"

The answer is probably not "to outlaw thieves' tools."

Real-life parallel: In several jurisdictions, even possession of drug paraphernalia is illegal. Why? To reduce drug use or possession? No. It's to give the police and/or prosecutor more leverage over an arrestee. It is ultimately a vagrancy law.

Historically, vagrancy laws are good for two things: incentivizing people to leave town (such as in sundown towns) or drumming up menial labor. Vagrancy historically was punished with forced labor.

As to your question, you could actually make a really good adventure out of it. Specifically, you could make a fantasy version of "First Blood." The local constable finds thieves' tools on a PC (or some other trumped up charge) and tells them to leave town, maybe even "offering a ride" out of town. If the party refuses, they're arrested and sentenced to forced labor. Have the constable be running the town like his own little fiefdom, squeezing the locals for money, etc.

 

[Michael Linke]

In any world where there are locks, there are people who lose their keys, so there are legitimate locksmiths who will need to open those locks.

I would set laws so that any criminal's punishment could be enhanced if he was carrying lockpicks, but carrying them while breaking no law shouldn't be a crime in itself.

 

[MGibster]

This young woman, who I can only assume is a graduate student, produced a condensed history of lock picking you can find on Youtube. I'm not an expert on locks produced from the middle ages through early modern Europe but since when has my lack of expertise prevented me from participating in a thread? Judging from locks I've seen produced in the 17th and 18th centuries, I suspect lock picks used in D&D are going to look a bit different from modern picks. Locks in early modern Europe are going to be rather large by our standards and so would the key. (Yeah, they made smaller locks such as those you might use in a keepsake box.)

 

[MGibster]

And to answer the OP, no, lock picking tools aren't illegal in most of my fantasy games. And it's largely because I think picking tools would be indistinguishable from other tools given the state of the locks from the medieval period through 1750.