"Small" New Project, and some thoughts

[Daerir]

The only option I see that would work in said situation is either boots, assuming they allow you to keep your boots, or stockings. Or maybe toward the bottom of a pantleg. When you sit, just put your arms around your legs and slip the knife out. BAM free to assassinate orcs as needed

[deadextra]

Somewhere to find ideas might be the use of the real life sgian dubh or sgian achlais, usually concealed Scottish knives. The modern wear of the knife is just tucked into a stocking, but I seem to remember reading an article about real use of the knife a few years ago.

[robinhoodsghost]

Great job....and we would never judge a man by the size of his blade.

[Pwyll]

Nice work. I thought I recognized that shape blade and handle. Yes, one of the two companion blades for a kukri. That one is called the cardo (if my age fuddled brain remembers correctly).

The other one is the chukmuk.

[ineffableone]

Something you might consider when looking for conceal points, is how you might actually be bound, and how will you reach the knife when bound. Look at various ways someone might get bound if captured, and consider what parts of your body can be reached. You will likely find that no one place will be perfect. Someone hiding a blade in case capture, probably has multiple blades, in case one is found and taken, and to maximize the chance it one can be reached in the emergency of being captured.

A suggestion from the comic superheroine Empowered who happens to be comically bondage prone, "don't fight with all you got till the end, when you know your done for accept it and first good punch play like you got knocked out, harder you fight the tighter they will tie your bonds, if they believe your possum play they you can 'wake up' and start working on your bond sooner than if you were really knocked out." Or she said something like that. Can't find the exact quote if you want to find it it was volume 6 My Advice for Struggling Superheroines.

Anyhoo, the gist is don't make things extra hard for your captors and they likely wont make it extra hard for you. So resit the urge to fight and bite and scratch till the end. I know it doesn't sound very heroic, but there is some truth to it.

[Elleth]

respectfully ineffable, I think that's the kind of strategy that only works in scripted drama... or perhaps if your captors already have a strict code of ethics re: treatment of prisoners. After reading home invasion stories, frontier capture narratives, and seeing jihadi videos ... I don't think anything less than "never be taken alive" is a good attitude to take into some conflicts.

ISIS or orcs, i think the better attitude is summed up by another drama..

"knowing humans as thou dost captain.... wouldst thou be captured helpless by them?"

All that said... maybe a little knife would help if you got lucky. And certainly "better to have and not need..."
But I'd not build a "go down early" plan around it.

[ineffableone]

respectfully ineffable, I think that's the kind of strategy that only works in scripted drama... or perhaps if your captors already have a strict code of ethics re: treatment of prisoners. After reading home invasion stories, frontier capture narratives, and seeing jihadi videos ... I don't think anything less than "never be taken alive" is a good attitude to take into some conflicts.

ISIS or orcs, i think the better attitude is summed up by another drama..

"knowing humans as thou dost captain.... wouldst thou be captured helpless by them?"

All that said... maybe a little knife would help if you got lucky. And certainly "better to have and not need..."
But I'd not build a "go down early" plan around it.

Sorry, I was only half serious with the suggestion of not resisting, it was from a comic book heroine who is constantly getting caught and bound LOL I thought it was evident to be a bit tongue in cheek (damn text mediums making tone difficult to convey). There is some truth to the concept in general, that at some point it can be better to stop resistance if your plan is to try and escape later, but in plenty of situations you would be better to take as many with you as you go down. And as you mentioned some situations better to not survive at all and make sure you aren't captured alive. The concept of not resisting to the end would only be for "semidecent" captors. And the idea is don't piss them off, if you do they will tend to make sure the ropes are cutting off your circulation, that there is a lot less movement of any limbs, etc. Modern cops are the same way. Piss them off and those cuffs are a lot tighter, assault a cop and you not only get cuffed on your wrists but your ankles too. Literally piss on them as well as fight them and you will likely get a few extra zaps from the tazer and some pepper spray too. Captors tend to up their enforcement of captivity in relation to how much you resist.

Again I was only half serious, in that one might plan to go down. But playing it smart and knowing when to resist and when not to can be the difference between escape and months of torture.

The first part of my other comment though of considering placement of said small knife was completely serious. If your arms are tied behind a tree, can you access a small knife in your boot? If your hog tied is a knife in your armpit going to help? Different placements will be unreachable for different ways of being restrained.

[RikJohnson]

Whenever I went overseas with the Air Force, I always have a small flat and very sharp bocketknife at the small of my back clipped between my pants and back for exactly the reason mentioned. To cut myself free if taken prisoner.

Fortunatly, I never needed it.

But the idea of folding knives are old, even the Romans had them so I can well imagine that they existed in Middle Earth.

[Elleth]

ineff-- oopsie. My mistake.

Rik - glad you never had occasion to use yours!

[Stormraven]

Really great idea Greg. Any thoughts to where you'd carry it?

[Manveruon]

I'm going to be doing some minor thread-necromancy for a little while as I attempt to get completely caught up with what I missed back in May and parts of June, so bear with me.

As mentioned before, I love the idea of a hidden knife like this.

Also, I think the comments about knowing when to fight like a hellcat vs. put your hands up and surrender peacefully I feel are quite apt. Different situations call for different approaches, obviously, but I think it's a good bet to say that most captors will treat you better (and will consider you less of a threat) if you do not resist capture (at least, not in an obvious way). Historical pirates were a great example of this. Many of them were documented to be relatively civil to their victims if the members of a given captured ship decided to surrender immediately rather than put up a fight. If they fought back and were captured anyway, the pirates would often take their vengeance without mercy.

However, there are other instances when being captured at all is just not an option. Reavers, for instance (Firefly reference, for those not in-the-know). When it comes to Reavers, you either escape, you kill every last one of them, or you take whatever steps are necessary to ensure there is no way you could possibly be captured alive - because if you are, you'll wish you'd never been born. I would assume, thinking about it realistically, and not from a romanticized point of view, that being captured by orcs or goblins would likely be much the same (at the very least you'll likely end up being tortured, killed, and eaten - and if you are very, very lucky, they'll do it in that order), unless they were under specific orders to spare your life so as to deliver you to whomever they were working for at the time (like the situation with Merry and Pippin)

In any case, knowing your captors is definitely important.

With that in mind, it's also likely a good idea to know just exactly how thorough a search your captors may perform - and in that vein, carrying more than one concealed means of escape might really be a good idea. My trouble is, how does one know what a given captor might loot directly off your body? If you've got a nice pair of boots, I would think the first thing a captor would do would be to take them from you. Same goes for any particularly nice clothing, leather goods, etc. So ultimately, I'm not sure hiding it anywhere in your clothing would be 100% effective. But I guess at that point you would just have to expect it to be taken, and devise another means of escape. If you were captured by a slightly less avaricious foe (I'm thinking maybe a situation like Sam and Frodo being captured by Faramir's men in the Two Towers film, or something similar), this would certainly not be an issue as they would likely just do a cursory search, but leave you your boots, your belt, your hood, etc.

However, even if the knife might be taken from you in the end anyway, I suppose it's not a bad idea to at least have it - just in case.

[Tomcat1066]

I would assume, thinking about it realistically, and not from a romanticized point of view, that being captured by orcs or goblins would likely be much the same (at the very least you'll likely end up being tortured, killed, and eaten - and if you are very, very lucky, they'll do it in that order), unless they were under specific orders to spare your life so as to deliver you to whomever they were working for at the time (like the situation with Merry and Pippin).

Another Firefly reference. Nice.

Tom (Confirmed Browncoat in more ways than one!)

[ineffableone]

While yes we tend to think of orcs, goblins, and trolls as pretty bad and evil. The books each of these captures rather than out right kills the party encountering them. I would have to say I would put them much lower on freaky bad compared to Reavers. Heck the goblins in the Hobbit almost seem justified and rational. They discover the band camped on their door step take them captive rather than killing them, discover weapons that are known anti goblin weapons.

Not taking the goblin side or anything, but I would hesitate to use a blanket statement the orcs, goblins, and trolls are just mindless evil incarnate like Reavers. Sure they are evil and bad, but they are still bound by some social order and even some sense of morals and ethics though far removed from our own. You can't talk to a Reaver and get them to spare your life for a short time. But the evil creatures of Middle Earth all seem to at least have the possibility of negotiation or tricking.

To dip into another fantasy series, the Sword of Truth series, they do a good job explaining that even the evil people have good reason for what they do. The main bad guy's father was killed by the the 1st Wizard. The bad army is told many lies to make them think they are actually the good guys. Etc Etc.

While I don't think orc, goblins, and trolls are misunderstood good guys they still have their own justifications and reasons for doing what they do. Understanding their motivations can be the difference between a quick death or possible chance for escape.

For example Bilbo keeping the trolls talking till the sun came up on what the best way to cook dwarf might be.

Suggesting you might know where to get a hold of treasure could get an orc to keep you alive rather than eat you. Giving you more opportunity to escape.

Even Smaug seemed to like to talk rather than just outright wreck and kill things.

[Manveruon]

Goblin Sympathizer!!!

[Manveruon]

But seriously though, you're right about that. Tolkien loved his talky villains. So in Middle Earth at least, you've probably got SOME chance of reasoning with your captors, or otherwise tricking them. The Uruk's seemed a bit less merciful on the whole, but then, they were also pretty much always acting under orders of some kind, so they were more soldiers than mindless killers. Really, Tolkien didn't write any mindless killers into his stories except the various spiders - but they were treated as little more than straight-up animals anyway. So yeah, getting captured by a spider seems like it might be the worst possible fate in Middle Earth, next to being captured by the Nine or Sauron himself.