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Message: <blockquote data-quote="Man in the Funny Hat" data-source="post: 5616485" data-attributes="member: 32740">It does, and that's why I didn't say, "ALL modern governments..."  One has to be careful about phrasing things in absolutes in internet discussions like this because people jump on such things and the topic gets derailed. But that just isn't true.  A totalitarian state may WANT to own all the bullets, it does it's best to prevent use of bullets if people do own them, but it does not have a monopoly.  It only takes the right circumstances to prove that any supposed monopoly on force is temporary, conditional, or delusional.  Even if it means that weapons or spellcasters come in from the outside, that monopoly is clearly leaking.  Just because you have things in check now doesn't mean you always will or always did.  Just because there's no current ongoing proof that someone else in your land can exert force without the government being able to control it doesn't mean it doesn't exist.  It DOES exist.  The idea that governement - any government - has a MONOPOLY on force is incorrect in the OP. And then someone who wants to make swords to arm his friends gets an anvil from a neighboring country, or hides one of his anvils when they come to take them all away, or smuggles one back out of the castle, or a foundry is set up somewhere remote where the government won't find out about it, or the soldiers were bribed when they came to search and sieze the village of Um. Which only means that the revolution occurs - or is at least CAPABLE of occurring by other means, thus disproving the idea that the government DOES retain a monopoly on use of force.  But they don't have to be actively exerting the force they are capable of to disprove the idea that the government doesn't have the monopoly on force that it WANTS to have. Yes, and once upon a time people wrote such things into campaign settings but in time it was probably just seen as too much of a bother for anyone but the hardcases so they were dropped.  Much the same with language.  Races have languages, different human kingdoms often don't.  Or even if they do there is still the COMMON tongue. D&D economics is a discussion all its own.  Look around the boards and you'll see.  <img src="https://cdn.jsdelivr.net/joypixels/assets/8.0/png/unicode/64/1f642.png" class="smilie smilie--emoji" loading="lazy" width="64" height="64" alt=":)" title="Smile    :)"  data-smilie="1"data-shortname=":)" /> Welcome to ENworld!</blockquote>

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