THE LEGAL DISTINCTION

BASE ITEM
WEAPON
RANGED
LEVEL 14

REQUIRES LEVEL 14

THE LEGAL DISTINCTION is a ranged weapon, wielded from level 14. DEXTERITY is the stat that scales it.

The requirement cuts both ways: nothing below level 14 ever drops one, and a hero below it banks the find rather than wearing it.

Dropped by THE FOUNDER as he bolted for the rift. Legally — and he stresses this — it is not a flamethrower. Legally, what it does to a corridor is not arson.

What it does

BOTH HANDSIt takes the off hand as well, so you carry no shield and no bag while it is drawn. That is what the extra damage is paying for — a two-hander is forged above the budget line every one-hander sits on, because the alternative to carrying one is carrying a fifth piece of armour.
PRICED FORAbout 1 target a swing. That is what the damage budget assumes it reaches, which is why a wide weapon carries a smaller blow than a narrow one of the same level.
CRIT WEIGHTA critical hit lands for 2.05× — a flat trait of the ranged class, the same on every weapon in it. Your build earns the crit CHANCE; the class fixes what a crit is worth.
WILDIts blows swing ±40% around the average — far wider than the usual band. The mean is unchanged; the excitement is not.

It feeds on bullets, one round per trigger pull however many projectiles that pull throws. In exchange it never wears out and never needs a repair kit — it runs dry instead, and the hero puts it away for whatever he can still fire.

A fresh find in the hands of a hero who has spent no stat points — the piece itself, with nothing of the wielder in it. Your own STRENGTH, DEXTERITY or INTELLECT lifts these from there, as does an item level found deeper than the requirement.

Make quality

Every plain drop of this base rolls a make quality on top of the numbers above — the craftsmanship of that particular copy, stamped at the moment it drops and frozen for life. It scales the damage and the wear budget together, and it leads the name: a BROKEN THE LEGAL DISTINCTION and a PERFECT THE LEGAL DISTINCTION are the same base item and not the same find.

The bands overlap on purpose, so a good CRUDE can out-swing a poor NORMAL while a PERFECT always clears a NORMAL. Which one you get depends on the level of whatever dropped it: the two odds columns below are a level-1 killer and a level-60 one, and everything between is interpolated. Craftsmanship and magic are exclusive — a magic-or-better find is always normal make.

MAKE	DAMAGE	SCALE	ODDS AT MLVL 1	ODDS AT MLVL 60
BROKEN	39–55	0.58–0.82×	20%	0%
CRUDE	49–65	0.73–0.97×	25%	6%
NORMAL	60–74	0.90–1.10×	52%	54%
SUPERIOR	69–85	1.03–1.27×	3%	28%
PERFECT	78–96	1.16–1.44×	0%	12%

THE LEGAL DISTINCTION, a base item weapon in Ada's Trail, shown on the map of GOODCO HQ where it drops — THE LEGAL DISTINCTION — where it drops, in GOODCO HQ.

Where it comes from

THE FOUNDER (MARS) always hands it over.