This is not entirely related to the discussion, just my opinion on where this argument went wrong:

The thread started out looking for a rules clarification, or at least it appeared that way.

I clarified the rule.

You clarified that you were in fact, not looking for Rules As Written, but seeing if anyone interpreted them as you did.

I misunderstood, since my explanation relied on the contrast between 'In' and 'Into', and you were still using the word 'Into.' Therefore, I explained the same thing as before.

Here's where things went downhill.

At this point, you explicitly stated that you didn't care about the rules as written, which confused me because this forum subsection is for clarifying rules. I had no knowledge that you were also discussing the issue with your players.

From this point on it devolved into a series of ignored explanations, different interpretations of real-life combat, misunderstandings,and a disagreement over how important the written rules were in a primarily character-based game.

Since, personally, I'm a huge believer in following all rules as closely as possible (Since, if you disregard some of them, why bother with them at all? You need guidelines to know how you can act, and if the guidelines constantly move then you can never plan anything,) and you apparently subscribe to the philosophy of 'Realism over Abstraction' or else possibly 'Game Flow over Rules' or some other opinion, we clashed in this regard.

Seeing as this was a conflict of opinion over general playstyle, (And you had made up your mind to change the written rules with your team, though we didn't know that) the subject of argument ceased to matter.

So, yeah... In the future, I'd reccomend moving over to the House Rule subsection once you've decided to depart from the Rulebook itself, and I'll try to get the hint that you don't care about my opinion more quickly.

My point about the proximity may have been unclear. I meant that when engaged in melee it is assumed you time and control your attacks such that you do not accidentally hit your team-mates, even if wielding Unwieldy or Flexible weapons like Eviscerators or whips. This also applies to pistols used in Closed Combat.

Later rulesets declare this in more precise wording, so the intention of the rules is quite clear. You are of course free to House Rule as you please, but as a general warning I would tell you to not worry too much about common sense in a fantasy/sci-fi game where space-wizards shoot lightning and flying cathedrals shoot bullets the size of city blocks at the space-elves ship

If two players are in melee together with an enemy they are as likely to hit each other as they are to hit the enemy. I mean if the thug dodges your axe, your friend may be next in line in the arc of the swing. So by that reasoning you really shouldn't interfere in a melee at all, no matter what weapon you intend to use.

On the other hand, you may assume that the acolytes have trained together and know a bit about each other, so they can work together in the melee situation. But then again, it wouldn't matter what weapons they bring to the fight, because they of course trained that scenario.

In my campaign I allow players to use their pistols if they are locked in melee as a normal ranged attack without the range modifiers. I.e. they can aim and use semi/full auto etc.

To me it comes down to,

Do you want to play by the rules that make sense in the setting, or do you want to bend them so that they fit with the physics and circumstances that are involved in a real-world brawl - with a gun.

?

To me it comes down to,

Do you want to play by the rules that make sense in the setting, or do you want to bend them so that they fit with the physics and circumstances that are involved in a real-world brawl - with a gun.

?

Right. That is what we ended up agreeing on.