Rescued Prisoners Can't Even Fight
"When you free prisoners, you expect them to rise up, its very inspiring and the whole reason to free them. It’s not very inspiring to watch them take several days to recover."
Local prisoners, known to adventurers as The Under Guard, have been released from their detention in the Grand Rift, only to reveal they can’t fight back against their jailers. “Why did we even bother freeing them?” asks adventurer Swel Nightswift. “When you free prisoners, you expect them to rise up, its very inspiring and the whole reason to free them. It’s not very inspiring to watch them take several days to recover.” Fellow adventurer, Gran Offtook was also disappointed in the outcome. “First they say they’re too weak from being a prisoner, then they say they don’t have any weapons, and then they say their muscles have atrophied,” explains Offtook. “Just tell us you’re not going to fight and find another way to help.”
It should be noted that not all of the adventurers expected the prisoners to fight. “The reality is they don’t help much and they make combat take longer,” says Griff Tiephal. “I mean, they’re prisoners, if they were good at fighting they would have already been trying to escape.”
The prisoners themselves seemed surprised at the hostility. “They free you from being in chains for 2 weeks, and immediately expect you to fight,” says member of The Under Guard, Phen Tientury. “I’m not sure they realize that there are other things you would rather do after being under lock and key. It’s an unrealistic expectation that we would want to fight.”
Others suspect that the lack of fighting on the part of the prisoners isn’t due to inability, but due to politics. “I know the Prisoner’s Guild is behind this,” says head of the League of Adventurers and Mercenaries, Kit Petoryim. “For years they have been trying to limit the workload of freed prisoners. At first they fought against prisoners having to provide any type of aid: crafting services, spells, maps, and especially knowledge of the enemy’s weaknesses. Then they told us we couldn’t make them carry our loot. This is just them circumventing negotiating.”
An official press release from the Prisoner’s Guild expresses that while their official stance is that prisoners should not be forced to provide any assistance to rescuer’s, they do not condone The Under Guard’s unilateral action in the matter. “It hurts our bargaining position,” says Prisoner’s Guild leader and spokesperson Veil Ottervat. “If prisoners start taking action for themselves, where does that put leadership? I’ll be out of the job.”
Some adventurers have taken it upon themselves to hire prisoner scabs to replace prisoners who won’t join in battle. “It’s just easier to hire people from town, take them prisoner in a dungeon, and them free them,” says rival adventurer Neams Lenweiler. But the prisoner’s guild has taken a hard stance against adventurers who take such tactics. “This makes it feel like they want the prisoners to do they jobs for them, which not only hurts our members, but also the Vengeance Guild as well,” states Ottervat. “It used to be you could support a whole family on a prisoner’s wages, but scabs are selfishly ruining that for all of us.”
Ultimately the prisoners have made a final statement with regards to the rescue: “Honestly, just leave us here. The bad guys treat us better. And stop trying to roleplay with us.”