# Silent Arms
*The Ranged Armory, Forty Launchers and a Quiver System for Exodus NDS. Source: https://exodusnds.com/sourcebooks/ranged-armory/silent-arms*
This is the one family in the book where damage is not the point.
Three of the six entries here do 2 damage, which is less than a thrown knife. They are bought anyway, because **Silent** is on every entry and nothing else in this book carries it. A shot from any other launcher tells a courtyard full of people where the shooter is standing. These do not.
**The damage is a delivery mechanism.** A blowgun dart that does 2 damage and 4 more every round from the toxin on it is not a 2 damage weapon. Chapter 9 sells the payload, and the entries here sell the quiet.
**Concealable** appears on four of six, because a weapon carried past a guard and a weapon that does not announce itself are usually wanted by the same person.
**Nothing here carries Point Blank.** These are close weapons by design, and that is worth noticing: they are the only family in the book that is not worse when the target is standing next to you.
**Skill:** Light Ranged throughout.
##### Blowgun
Sarbacane, Pea Shooter, Dart Tube, Cerbatana
2
5
Short
0
Light Ranged
110
Common
Thrusting
Silent, Concealable 2
A hollow tube. A dart. A breath.
**Crit 5 is the worst in the book** and the damage is the lowest, and neither number is the reason anybody owns one. A blowgun costs 110, hides in a walking stick or a bundle of reeds, makes no noise at all, and puts a poisoned needle into somebody across a room.
*Read the entry with the Blowgun Dart in Chapter 9. Separately they are both nearly useless.*
##### Long Blowgun
Fukiya, Sumpit, Great Tube, Hunting Blowpipe
2
5
Medium
1
Light Ranged
130
Common
Thrusting
Silent, Accurate 1
Twice the length, bored straight and true, held in two hands.
The longer barrel steadies the dart and adds a range band, and the weapon loses every scrap of concealment doing it. A two-metre tube is not hidden under anything.
**This is the hunter's version and the other is the assassin's.** Same tube, same dart, opposite purposes, and the stat line says which is which more clearly than any amount of description would.
##### Sumpitan
Spear Blowgun, Bladed Sumpit, Lance Tube, Zarabatana
2
5
Medium
2
Light Ranged
190
Rare
Thrusting
Silent
A long blowgun with a spearhead lashed to the muzzle and a hardwood sheath over the bore.
**It is the only launcher in this book that answers Point Blank instead of suffering it.** Every other entry here and in Chapters 4 through 6 gets worse when something closes to arm's reach. This one becomes a spear.
> **Used at Engaged range as a spear**, the sumpitan deals **4 Thrusting damage, Crit 3**, using the wielder's melee skill. It has no ranged qualities in that mode and no melee qualities in the other.
*One weapon, two jobs, and no maneuver required to switch between them. What it gives up is the accuracy of the long blowgun and every point of concealment.*
##### Spring Dart Sleeve
Wrist Launcher, Sleeve Needle, Bracer Dart, Coil Sheath
4
4
Short
0
Light Ranged
300
Restricted
Thrusting
Silent, Concealable 3, Limited Ammo 1, Prepare 1
A coiled spring and a catch strapped along the forearm under a sleeve, throwing a single needle when the wrist is flexed against the trigger bar.
**Not air.** The only entry in the chapter driven by a spring, which is why it does twice the damage of a blowgun at the same range.
**Concealable 3** ties the sling glove for the best in the book, and it is better hidden than that in practice: a sling glove is at least a glove, and this is nothing at all until it fires.
**One shot.** Resetting the coil is the **Prepare 1**, and it cannot be done with the arm the sleeve is on.
##### Air Reservoir Gun
Windbüchse, Pump Gun, Air Rifle, Bellows Piece
7
3
Long
3
Light Ranged
700
Rare
Thrusting
Silent, Accurate 1, Pierce 1, Limited Ammo 6, Prepare 2, Fragile 1
A brass flask charged by hand pump to a pressure the maker would rather not discuss, feeding a valve behind a rifled barrel.
**This is the chapter's outlier and the reason the family is not simply "low damage weapons."** It matches a light crossbow's damage, carries **Pierce**, reaches Long range, is **Accurate**, and does all of it in complete silence.
**Prepare 2 is the pump**, and it is not two maneuvers before the first shot. It is two maneuvers to recharge the flask after the sixth, which takes the weapon out of the fight for a full round every time.
**Fragile 1** is the pressure vessel and the valve. A gun that holds several hundred atmospheres behind a brass seal does not respond well to being dropped.
*Rare, expensive, and worth every piece to somebody who needs a sentry to fall over without anybody hearing why.*
##### Air Cane
Walking Stick Gun, Cane Piece, Gentleman's Stick, Reservoir Cane
5
3
Medium
2
Light Ranged
300
Rare
Thrusting
Silent, Concealable 3, Limited Ammo 2, Prepare 2, Fragile 1
The same mechanism built into a walking stick, with the reservoir in the shaft and the trigger in the handle.
**Concealable 3 on a weapon doing 5 damage at Medium range** is the best concealment-to-threat ratio in the book. It is not hidden in anything. It is a stick, carried openly, in a hand, in daylight.
Two shots before the pump, against the reservoir gun's six, and a range band less. That is the cost of the disguise.
*Legal in most places precisely because most places have not thought about it, which is a matter for the GM rather than the price list.*