Yeah, IRL you can have much more things mounted to your weapon...It's just a game mechanic thing...

It is to prevent people from mounting 40mm grenade launchers on their Colt Manhunters without resorting to capactity rules for mounts.

besides, what are you going to be putting on a pistol anyways?

probably a smartgun (make it integral by paying extra), a silencer... and i suppose maybe a scope. which only makes sense in terms of a wireless, electronic, miniaturized scope as far as holdouts go.

i mean, really, most of the rest of the stuff is for recoil compensation... and if you're reduced to using a holdout pistol, then recoil compensation isn't going to do that much to save you, i'm thinking.

The most common things currently mounted under barrel on a pistol are a flashlight, which has been replaced with much more advanced optics in SR, and a laser sight, which has been miniturized or replaced with a smartgun link in SR. Basically, the idea has been replaced, technologically.

Also, the grenade launcher thing...

There are still laser sights in SR4, which are useful for peeps with simsense vertigo, can't afford Smart Link, or full auto weapons using tracers....just for info...

I think the easiest answer is just to not make laser sights take a mount at all. Even with today's technology, they can be made extraordinarily small. By 2070, a laser sight is probably a piece of tape with printed circuitry and battery built in, and printed computer controlled microscopic mirrors for adjusting the aim of the beam. No sense in that taking a slot.

I would think you could have little underbarrel weapons, like a one or two shot dart setup, a mini smoke grenade launcher (rather than a full sized grenade launcher), or any various gadgetry you could think up and build for the underbarrel area on a pistol. Even many light pistols aren't really that small and heavy pistols easily get large enough to mount something like this.

Holdouts are obiviously not large enough to have any accessories, so thats fine...

And whats this about pistols not having underbarrel mounts for game balance? Yeah... an extra mount really unbalances a pistol compared to a rifle... suuure...

I seem to have be resorting to sarcasm a lot lately...

I think it would have been nice if the designers had looked at RL firearms for, let's say, five minutes.

i don't believe anyone has brought balance into this.

the only reason given why pistols have no underbarrel mount:

there are two kinds of things that can go underbarrel.

1) small things, like lasersights and smartgun links. most of these can also go up top
2) not small things, like 40mm grenade launchers, bipods, tripods, and so on.

no one has a problem with putting a laser sight on the underbarrel of a pistol. the problem is with being able to mount a tripod or a grenade launcher onto the underside of a pistol. now, since fanpro is trying to keep things simple, they aren't going to differentiate between underbarrel mounts. which means, they can either allow grenade launchers on pistols, or they can disallow laser sights on pistols. considering that you don't really have that strong of a need for the underbarrel mount unless you either want another weapon mounted, or heavy recoil compensation, they decided to disallow laser sights. not because it's unbalanced... but because it's simpler. the other things you listed are because of flaws... notice that they wouldn't be much of a flaw if you didn't take a penalty from it. furthermore, notice that you don't need simsense to use a smartgun anymore, so far as i can tell. and i can't say i really anticipate a need for a scope if you are doing a full-auto burst with tracers.

now then, the company has 0 problems with you houseruling whatever changes to the mount system. but that's how they organized it. if you don't like it, then change it. i promise you, i won't care in the slightest.

They're doing better than the general weapon power stat in 3rd edition with the Armor Peircing stat. I wish they would change the bow on the other hand. It should be something like str/2 + 3 with an armor piercing of -1. Keeps them about on par with say a Heavy Pistol while not always being as powerful as a rifle.

An orc with above average strength, decent agility, and a matching bow will be slaughtering gun bearing characters left and right... Hell, they could even scratch a dragon.

And a troll with a bow.... OMSJ....

Edit: What you do is... say in the description, that "this accessory may not be used with pistols." Boom. Simple. Have a nice day. ^_^

Jaid: Smart guns are a form of simsense, read the simsense vertigo negative quality description...

you sure they're simsense? it may say that... but i'm kinda thinking that might be a leftover. you don't need a simsense module, simrig, or anything, you can just do it with goggles that have an image link. i can't see that being simsense really.

regardless, the point still stands; that's part of the drawback of simsense vertigo.

Yeah, now that I read it again, I'm not sure if its simsense...but it's either that or AR according to that flaw...prolly AR I'd think...

hmm... not sure how you can have AR vertigo. one of the options is for you to be basically looking at a screen. you get vertigo from looking at a screen, that's not a flaw, that's a death sentence. heck, you look at someone's clothes (of the variety where the lettering can change) that's a screen, you're out. you start a run on a corp, you better hope they don't have any screens anywhere if that's gonna give you vertigo...

just seems a little silly to me, is all.

AR is a little more than looking at a screen. It turns your whole field of view into one big screen, with windows and information flowing over it. It's unnatural, but most people can get used to it. Some people cannot, and they get bonus BP.

A monitor or display is actually rather different than AR. An AR is basically like having your own personal HUD, with lots of options. Some people actually DO get kinda sick with things like VR goggles and clear LCD displays on eyewear (yes they have some of it here and there... bulky but they exist). They don't have any problem with TV or computer screens unless they have to stare at them for long periods of time. I know a friend of mine thats like that. He wasn't all that happy when he played his first Virtual Boy began feeling a bit queasy.

thats more in the same area as motions sickness. try watching while someone plays a flight sim or fps. basicly your brain is getting conflicting signals from your senses, one sense says your moving, the other says your not moving. bingo you become sick...

Sorta. He's actually a big space flight sim fan (see also Wing Commander) and plays those rather often. I think its something similar but slightly different. Could be a combo of motion sickness, far sightedness, and perhaps even a neuralogical disorder.

thing is that i said watch, not play. i have this person in my family that can play a first person shooter just fine, but watching someone else play and he just have to give up. its something about being in control of the data, that way your brain can tell itself that your doing it or something.

hell, watching someone play aliens in any of those aliens vs predator games for pc and i have to give up to. i just get dizzy and slighty sick.

never tryed the virtual boy, but it could be something with the blockage of vision so that you have nowhere to rest your eyes or something.

does anyone know if there have been any scientific studies into vr motion sickness? or maybe its used to investigate motion sickness in general?

hmmm... i suppose that's true. still seems a little suspicious to me, since there is no sim gear required iirc... but i suppose it *is* intended to be a flaw. if they could still use a smartgun, that's part of the flaw remover right there, i suppose...

but in any event, most of the time you won't need the underbarrel mount. and if you do, it's probably for something that's no use on a pistol, or because of a flaw, which wouldn't be much of a flaw if it didn't have drawbacks...