(05-12-2015, 04:12 PM)Chris Ganale Wrote: Sorry, Kyrrae, didn't mean to cut the legs out from under you, just that was my immediate reaction.
That aside, the logic there is valid, but I would also posit that they at least train their conscripts in the use of guns/gunblades. Even Chao, for all her prodigious magical and physical talent, is well aware that sometimes it pays to be able to quick-draw and put a .50 SAP-HE in somebody (not that I'm implying Garlemald has calibers and special ammunition like that).
Me, I would love to see that prevalence of guns when we go to kick over Garlemald. I'd rather be on the other side of the guns imbalance, but you get what you've got. Hell, Ghost would feel right at home.
I would still go back to the whole notion of only seeing officers and high-ranking individuals with gunblades. As not every soldier has one it stands to reason that the common soldiery either wasn't allowed to train with them, wasn't able to due to limited quantity, or simply that they didn't need to.
I.e. it doesn't really make any sense to take a modern day Marine and rather then train him or her in marksmanship with a rifle and squad tactics to then say "oh by the way we're also going to train you to use a sword because... reasons!" It's generally better to play to a soldier's strengths, anyway. With the conscripts being primarily Eorzean it's likely that the idea of using a gun or a gunblade wasn't even something they considered or were ever considered for due to the lack of evidence of any prevalence whatsoever of the weapon in Eorzea.
If you want to say that your own character(s) is familiar with that kind of weaponry then that's of course just fine.