Now I don't want this to come off as a whine, I really just want to know what the balance is supposed to be.

Here's the situation. I am bound and trussed. I am backstabbed. I beat down the thief and he flees after 5 rounds. During the fight I was able to do spec skills, dodge, parry, yada yada. I wasn't able to, after the fight, quaff a potion, move, or untie myself. He grabs another thief and they gang me. I don't see how this is very balanced at all. Being totally without the ability to move outside of combat for 6 hours?

Being that blackjack is the setup for this situation, I also have to ask why it is that skills which are much less effective fail so much more. Take a skill like stab for instance. Mastered it fails easily 30% of the time, and you take damage for it. Blackjack has never failed on my current char, and he always wears helms with good ac.

WarAngel

I played a binder thief about 9 monthes ago and it was the most frustrating thing of all time. First off, even if you should be lucky enough to get truss off every little scrub and their mother thinks it's fun to untie them, whether it's good rp or not. Secondly, even when I got trusses down they seemed to come off in the first or second round of combat which let the victim flee along his merry way. Lets not also think about failed blackjacks against an axe wield giant or a flurrying warrior.