Arx Loricatus Heavy Blunderbuss Boarding Axe

There's just something about the word "Blunderbuss".  I like to think the name was coined by some unknown sailor trying desperately to explain to his tyrannical captain just what happened when the boarding crew went over the railing of the pirate sloop they had cornered, how as they descended into the hold there was a sound louder than a musket, a rush of air and stinging lead... The narrow confines of a ship is the perfect place for a blunderbuss, its a close quarters weapon and very versatile; in a pinch you can jam all sorts of small sharp bits of metal down it, the blunderbuss is not picky and doesn't mind if you have to be a little sloppy.  Just don't expect to take down that pesky seagull circling overhead with it.

The original Arx Loricatus blunderbuss was also my first real success as a virtual gunsmith and embodied the principle of balancing the logistic realities of SL Combat Role Play with the reality of how these weapons were used and functioned historically.  The Blunderbuss fired a relatively large, wide and slow bullet, limiting its effective range to about 40 meters.  Its reload time was faster than a musket or pistol.  It proved particularly useful for persons with less robust connection speeds or poor computer performance.  Once fired however, if the enemy was still coming, you had two options; drop the gun and draw your sword or run like hell until you could reload it.  Not anymore.

 

The Arx Loricatus Blunderbuss Axe is designed to allow both ranged and melee combat within one weapon while not overlapping controls.  The weapon fires a wide, shorter range shot that is most effective within 40 meters but has a maximum range of about 100 meters.  Melee animations are triggered by pressing the left mouse button and any direction key other than the crouch ("c" or PageDown) key.  Pressing the Crouch command with the weapon loaded and drawn will cause the weapon to fire.

The two holsters are already sized for either male or female avatars, and are also modifiable to allow the owner to customize the fit.

Price: 800L Available in world or on the SecondLife Marketplace

New Release: Lorenzoni Mechanism Repeating Cane Musket

 

The Arx Loricatus Lorenzoni Cane Gun is a unique combat/role play accessory based on late seventeenth century repeating fire mechanism developed by the Italian inventor Michele Lorenzoni.  The principle of the weapon was that two tube like chambers located in the butt or grip of the gun contained gunpowder and lead balls, and that the rotation of a crank on the side of the weapon would carry both one ball and the correct charge of powder to the firing chamber mechanically, also priming and cocking the gun in the same motion.  There are very few complete examples of Lorenzoni mechanism weapons still existing today, as they were expensive and naturally prone to breakage.  The mechanism itself however is well documented and has been reliably recreated

In creating the Lorenzoni Cane Gun, I wanted to offer more options to the increasing numbers of role-players who are involved in text or dice-based RPs.  Combat will always play a significant role in the vast majority Second Life role plays, but as proprietary meters and other systems become more available and diversified the emphasis on the weapon's compatibility with the system decreases and the weapon become more of an enhancement,  an item that conveys the personality of a character and helps maintain immersion. Often in role play sims hitting the target is not determined by the gun at all, and so switching between the usual third person viewpoint favored by role play to the first person view required by most ranged weapons (since not aiming with the cross-hairs in mouselook means you simply won't hit anything) is simply an extra hassle that disturbs the flow of the action.

To address this, the Lorenzoni Cane Gun allows the user to disable the need for mouselook, instead activating the aiming animation by holding down the crouch control ("C" or PGDown). With this depressed, clicking the left mouse button will fire the weapon, so all the action and animations can be viewed from the third person.  The Cane gun retains its normal weapon options however, so for those who rely on careful aim and quick reflexes, the weapon retains the same excellent performance of any Arx Loricatus firearm.

The Canegun also includes a walking animation and sound effect, which can be disabled from the menu.  Because of the nature of the weapon the attachment must rotate and move to positions stored inside the weapon depending on the pose and animation.  This would cause problems for different sized avatars so a separate menu is included to specifically tailor each pose to your avatar and save those positions in the script.

Available Now at the main store, affiliate vendors and on the Second Life Marketplace:
Purchase on the Second Life Marketplace