What kind of loadout do your PCs bring to bear?

Mission-specific? Mil-spec all the way? Real men use Heavy weapons? If it ain't belt-fed, it don't count?

What kind of heavy weapons? LMGs? Assault rifles? GLs or underslung GLs? SMGs? Laying down the LAW?

How many different types of guns did your party sam ever insist on carrying at one time? I think my party's record was 12 different handguns.

-Siege

All mil-spec, all the time. I always carry at least two MMGs, a sporting rifle, a grenade launcher, and a blowtorch. I can go as high as four MMGs and an extra SMG when I need to.

~J

Load out was mission specific. Although ammo wasn't we used gels, Flechette, EX-EX, or APDS exclusively. Lightest mission was heavy pistols and implanted weapons. Heaviest saw us using 2 Ares III MP lasers, a Vindicator, a Barret Sniper Rifle, One Missile launcher, two Panther Assault cannons, 2 Ares Alphas loaded with IPE Offensive, AUG in the LMG mode, and 2 LAWS per person. In our defense we were up against one of the lesser Great Dragons, smoked that fragger, too.

Had one Samurai carry eighteen pistols and each one got through airport secuirity despite two of them being massive custome revolvers.

One Ingram Valiant LMG, belt ammunition, regular rounds, 2 clips of AV ammunition

Two SMG's, one AK-97 Carbine, one Ingram Smartgun assorted ammunition

Assorted pistols: Ares predator, Ruger Super Warhawk, Remmington Roomsweeper.

1 Yamaha Pulsar Taser

1 Dikoted Katana

Assorted grenades of various lethality.

Saving up for a Vindicator with all the recoil compensation I can purchase. Or a Panther Assault Cannon. I haven't fully decided yet.

Waiting for it's moment to shine is an IWS Launcher with one highly illegal black market SAM Missile.

My PCs rarely carry anything heavier than a submachinegun unless the mission parameters demand it, in which case they may pack an assault rifle or bolt-action sniper rifle.

All the PCs carry assorted grenades at all times. They're small, easily concealed and can dramatically turn the tide in a battle.

Mission specific for me...

Right now I am playing a Wolf shaman, so he really doesn't have much in the way of firepower, but he's hella good with his ranger compound bow, a sword, and his fists, and his magic.. Of course, with this character, the sneaking skill and Silence spell are his favorite tools to use at first, not seen, better.

I also have a merc, however, who carries a range of weaponry...in his collection he has three pistols(Predator, Colt American, Ruger Warhawk), a shotgun(remington 990), assault rifle(ares alpha), LMG(ingram), and HMG, with an extra grenade launcher. In additon to a survival knife and combat axe. However, again, mission specific. If it calls for a pistol and a knife, a pistol and a knife come along. If he can get in and out without shooting, great. If it calls for the HMG, a 100 round belt of APDS ammo and a grenade launcher with HE grenades, then he's ready as well.

Once upon a time, my party's gunslinger adept had an everyday carry arsenal that included the following: one hold out pistol up each sleeve, a submachine gun strapped in a sling underneath his trenchcoat, an Ares Predator and a Defiance Super Shock taser hanging from his belt, three machine pistols clipped to the insides of his coat, one boot revolver, three cyber pistols locked in various bodily compartments, a squirt gun loaded with Narcoject in an ankle holster, an eye gun in his left cybereye, and the disassembled components of the SA Puzzler distributed across various pockets of his clothing.

With 20 dice to throw at any given firearms test, the only thing that he didn't know how to do with a gun was reload it.

My main PC has essentially 3 loadouts he uses, as he only just recently (3-4 games before we converted to SR4 and I got the 'firearms' skill group) picked up the ability to use anything other than pistols.

His firepower can mainly be described as primarily 'quiet ways to deal with the opposition' followed by - if silence isn't possible - 'put as many bullets as you can in that area'.

"Daily Affairs"
2 Manhunters with silencers, conceal quickdraw holsters. Occasionally a pair Ares Crusader MP IIs in conceal quickdraw holsters if we're expecting stuff to go very bad but still have to be in public for a decent amount of time.
Manhunters: Regular rounds 90% of the time, APDS 10% of the time (when available, basically).
Crusader MP IIs: Ex-Ex rounds. Because if a mage can't stunbolt it or shoot it silently and kill it, it's probably making a lot more noise than I will.
2 extra clips for the Manhunters.

"Butchery"
2 Manhunters, Silenced. Ex-Ex rounds. Same holsters.
2 Crusader 2s, Ex-Ex. Same holsters.
2 Steyr TMPs in custom holsters (rather than on slings) with Gas Vent 4s. Ex-Ex rounds.
This is for those days when you've gotta break into someplace and you know there's gonna be some bloodshed no matter what you do. Again, if a mage can't spell it into submission, it's time to let fly with all the lead you can muster. And no, under no circumstances could this load be concealed.

"Oh God We're All Going To Die"
Same as "Butchery" as above, with the addition of:
Ares Alpha, GV 4, Shock Pad, loaded with APDS and IPE Offenive grenades.
Ruger 100 Sport Rifle with grade 3 scope, shock pad, Ex-Ex or APDS as the situation calls for it. Silencer.
This is what I used when we had to go into the Arcology. Into the Amazon. The Middle East. And, god help us, when we MIGHT have had to go to the Yucatan. As much firepower as I could reasonably carry. Thank god I never really had to use much of it.

This is in addition to the Force 8 Stunbolt, Force 6 Manaball, Force 5 Lightning Bolt and various other utility spells.
And the metamagics of: Masking, Quickening, Centering and Shielding.

standard for me is the predator, a smaller back-up gun(light or holdout), a shock glove, and a couple extra clips of ammo. maybe a smoke gernade or two.

more/bigger guns only if the mission requires high-firepower, and no stealth, which should not be often.

Infitration expert, cybered to the gills (including gills), but not the way a Sam is. Had a VCR and cyber control deck for stealth drones.

Primary Weapons: Narcoject dart pistol, Generic Heavy Pistol, ultra-concealable holdout.

Secondary Weapons: Dual-Charge: IR Smoke/Flashbang, Flashbang/Neurostun, IR Smoke/Neurostun, a Superflash, and a few regular grenades.

Specialty Weapons: Barret sniper, Narcoject dart rifle, laser target designator (and a vertical launch missile system built into his car, to be either fired from the vehicle, or subscribed).

For walking around Seattle/casual stuff: Cavalier Scout in the ankle holster, along with an Ares Crusader, Yamaha Pulsar (or whatever it's called), or a Savalette Guardian -- all legally owned, with permit, etc. Depends on the neighborhood.

For most in-city urban ops: Silenced Savalette Guardian, Ingram SuperMach or Suppressed HK 227 (depends on what level of noise is appropriate), Cavalier Scout for a BUG. A couple flashpacks, a couple frag, a couple stun grenades (2 of each, or thereabouts).

Jobs out in the field: HK G36 in some configuration (generally carbine) replacing the SMG, the rest of the kit same as an in-city (as far as weapons go).

Our characters have pretty much always gone with heavy pistols, shotguns, and assault rifles, with two exceptions. Of course, those vary by character (HPs for the mages & the face, rigger and the werewolf had shotguns, sammies & mercs - and the rigger - had assault rifles & shotguns). The exceptions were the decker and the sniper. The former had a Remington 950 and some kind of SMG. The latter liked her Barret more than her teammates.

We even tend to stick to the same models.

Pistols - Everyone's got a Pred 3, excluding the face who uses a Browning for normal jobs and a Morrissey for stealth/noncombat.
Shotguns - I've seen a few Enfields, but the rigger stuck to his Franchi.
Assault Rifles - AK-97/98 or Colt M23. But again the rigger was the odd man out, using an Ares Alpha.

It depends on the character. My mages/shamans are usually only skilled in Pistols, while my street samurai will generally have Pistols and one or two of the following: Assault Rifles, Shotguns, Rifles, and Launch Weapons.

For low-key work like meets at secure locations and undercover infiltration I usually like to carry a Light Pistol. Hold-outs don't have a sufficient bonus to concealment to make up for the fact that they're complete garbage, in my opinion. Depending on the situation I'll either try to have APDS (to make up for the low stopping power of Light Pistols) and Gel Rounds, or just Hi-C Rounds if metal detectors are going to be an issue. I might carry a Flash-pak or two as well.

For day-to-day stuff, I like at least on Heavy Pistol - sometimes two - and a Machine Pistol. I'll usually try to carry a fair amount of ammo for the Heavy; APDS, Gel, and EX-Explosive are a common selection. I usually only carry normal rounds for the Machine Pistol. I'll sometimes drop the Gel Ammo and carry either a Taser or a Dart Pistol instead.

On any mission where I don't need to pass an inspection, I like to have an Assault Rifle or burst-capable Shotgun, another Heavy Pistol (identical to the first, purely for redundancy), and either some mini-grenades or the regular kind in a wide variety of purposes (smoke, gas, and high-explosive are the big ones). I love to have AV ammo for the AR, but usually have to settle for APDS and EX-Explosive. For the Shotgun, I like to carry a little bit of everything, including normal buckshot (good for Devil Rat swarms and animal-form shapeshifters), Big D's (about the only way to damage a tougher spirit), and lockbusters, along with a few AV and normal slugs.

If the character uses Rifles, he'll instead have a high-power Sport Rifle and a Sniper Rifle for special occassions only. A Launch Weapons character will most often use a Grenade Launcher, with Missile/Rocket Launchers (oh, hell with it, we all know all anyone ever uses is the Great Dragon ATGM...) only for very, very special circumstances.

I haven't used a Hold-out, SMG, or Heavy Weapon (not counting vehicle-mounted ones) in years, and never really intend to again. As I said in the other thread, some weapons don't really have a niche as far as I'm concerned.

Depends on character and circumstances, so everything from just a blade to SMG to a LMG has been used so far.

Most chars prefer the good old AK-97 (i love the pics in the CC) or some sort of SMG like MP5x or SCK 100.

I think the most a character of mine ever carried was: an assault rifle with an underbarrel launcher, two heavy pistols (one silenced), one light pistol, knife, shock gloves, extendable staff, 2 incendiary and 2 concussion grenades.

Though he also - while it's not strictly speaking a weapon - sometimes "packs" a drone designed as a mobile shield/piece of cover that he controls via datajack, and uses to carry additional weapons and extra ammo. Nothing like breaching a building with your own portable piece of partial cover in front.

Well my latest character carries a monofilament whip in the top of her boot (wire retracted duh!). That and her magic. Then again she seeks to invoke one of the other F reactings from those she meets...

The NPC I have as a group member in my new campaign packs a big honking revolver (troll modded Super warhawk) under his coat. If the situation looks serious he packs a CMDT shotgun and plenty of spare ammo.

I've never had a character with anything larger than a submachine gun.

I only had one character toting anything bigger than a pistol. And she got blasted by an invisible frickin mage's lazer. Hell, with Will 7 and impact armor 5 she was much better suited against a manabolt.

Anyway, weapons of choice... predators, shock gloves, and the rare sniper rifle. Mostly, my weapons are disposable, concealable and help leave little evidence at the scene.

Players in my game tend to get nasty with their guns - it´s almost pathological for some, I guess. The Troll Mercenary uses medium and light machine guns, mostly, with the Ares M107 being hid darling, loaded with ADPS, tracing - and sometimes - explosive ammo. In pistol tastes, he goes for the Remington Roomsweeper, one magazine on flechette, another on hollow-point (a house-rule). And C-4. LOTS of C-4

The other are more on SMGs, light pistols and sometimes a carbine. My wife´s sammy likes frag grenades, FN-HARs and Colt Manhunters (always buys ´em back when they are lost on a mission), with a strange attraction to explosive ammo. And blades. Lots of knives and swords and cutting and stabbing stuff (sometimes she really freaks me out with this, and I have a hard time sleeping).

The team´s most recent acquisition was a Panther Assault Cannon for the troll, with a hip bracer, 100-ammo belt and all.

Depends on the character and situation. Assuming you're talking about "on mission" and not at meets and other social occasions:

Orc Sammy: Ares Alpha with ExEx and IPE Offensives, M2100 Sniper Rifle with APDS, and a silenced Salavette Guardian w/ ExEx (he also owns a Barrett Sniper Rifle, but rarely ever brings it except for special circumstances).

Troll Sammy: HMG with ExEx, Great Dragon Launcher with 3 ATGM missiles, Claymore, Extendable Baton (he's trying to get a Panther Cannon too, but no luck yet).

Human Shaman: None; she is a weapon

I think the best load out a PC I wrote up would carry would be roughly:

Rifle: the bigger the better. Supressed, if not silenced.
Stoner HMG on a tripod, w/ Gv4 and Vox trigger. Add a radio.
2 very modified Machine Pistols. (10 rd clip, w/ 3 rd internal mag. The idea was to be able to have the action lock back so it looked like it was out of ammo, but still be able to fire the last burst.) Think "Your out of bullets." *3rd burst* "No Im not."
Chainsaw
A usefull amount of commercial grade explosives. (C4, C12, Det cord, what ever was at hand.)
Break action assault cannon. Besides, the idea of wearing a bandoleer of 30mm cannon rounds is entertaining.


Yep, lindt was a total nutter.

I've always wanted a character with a "Dorothy System" -- basically, one boot has the monofilament wire, the other has the reciever. Click your heels, and you have a length of the wire running between your feet. Useful if you know Coipora (or however it's spelled while not horribly mangling it -- I can't even pronounce it, much less spell it without looking it up).

"If you're wondering how something with no blades can make that particular sound effect, you're catching on"?

Good comic.

Handgun/ Machine pistol everywhere.

SMG/Light AR to ganger parties.

ARs with Underbarrel Grenade launchers, and a few willie petes to drone parties.

Absolutely nothing to dikoted ally spirit parties.

Excepting riggers, I don't think any of my characters have wielded anything bigger than an assault rifle since I was 16. Unless you're a para hunter, you'll almost never get to use it otherwise. The most common weapon is pistols, although shotguns and grenade launchers can both be reasonably concealable and very deadly. SMGs make for a nice compromise.

Of course, how unreasonable the weapon loadout is depends largely on what the nature of the run is...

Generally, if my street sam breaks out the assault rifle with the underbarrel grenade launcher, he just goes all out - face covered by the FFBA hood, urban camo suit, vest with pouches for ammo and grenades, helmet, etc. - because bringing anything bigger than a heavy pistol usually means that subtlety has already gone out the window.

On the other hand, I've done a run on which two characters broke into a beachfront resort by coming in out of the water in swimwear, carrying a very small waterproof bag containing the minimal gear needed, some shorts and t-shirts, and shock gloves.

Most of my characters are the sneaky type who usually prefer very concealable but still effective weapons (Except Leela who took a liking to the Gyro Jet)

For Gracie the ex MET2000 merc it's a whole different story.

Dwarf with Starting Strength 8 + Augmentations (See Below)

2 Svalette Guardians ("Stadtler" & "Waldorf")
1 Ares Alpha ("Thelma") with Underbarrel GL ("Louise") & maxxed out Recoil comp.
(Louise is always loaded with IPE HE grenades)

2 Dikote Cougar Fineblades - Long ("Jake" & "Elwood")
Unarmed damage 14M (Plastic Bone Lacing Muscle Augmentation 4)

With the recoil comp on her Ares Alpha and Strength mod she can hold her ground going full 10 rounds auto with +1 to TN. (Has a frequent buyer card at Weapons World - buy 10 clips get the next one free)

She Also has Full Ambidexterity and Commando training as her Martial Arts style.
(Close Combat, Multi Strike both with unarmed & the fineblades).

Now for weird attacks, there is Night Angel the "fallen angel" with her "Kiss of Death" (Chemical gland - Arsenic - Spit Vector). And yes she is a knockout (CHA 8 elf with Human Looking edge & appropriate social skills)

Sorry, I realized after posting that my post did not add a single thing to the thread... So I killed it.

Well, you might want to learn to use and purchase a gun for use in areas with a high background count. You're certainly right in saying that a Mage is usually best served by fighting with magic, though.

But if you don't put at least some karma against learning the skill, you might as well not haul a weapon.

Unlike real life, a bullet requires a certain amount of skill behind it to be dangerous.

-Siege

'Strue. SR does ignore the original purpose of a gun as a weapon that you could hand to some mook you pulled off the street who'd never worked a toaster before and have a reasonable expectation that they'd kill a few people before blowing their own head off.

~J

Well, it's not impossible to occasionally hit your target without any/much skill, it's just unlikely. If you take Joe Mook (Qui 3) and give him an Ares Predator, he'll be looking at a base TN of 8 (4, +4 for defaulting) and tossing 3 dice for very basic Pistol checks. He'll hit almost half the time, that being the case, and since he's jerking the trigger just as fast as his little Joe Mook finger can manage it, it'll be about a hit an action.

In theory, anyways, you could take 6-8 random street bums along on every single Shadowrun, and use them to suppress hostile security your characters might happen to stumble across. Tell the winos everyone who hits something gets a case of Jim Beam Black Label, toss 'em all a bunch of hundred-nuyen crappy Predator knock-offs, and sit somewhere where you can pop off a shot at the occasional combat-pool-depleted security guard (tired, after dodging all those 1-success heavy pistol shots).

Usually fully character dependant. If something comes up as a requirement for a mission that he doesn't know how to use, he either makes sure that one of the other team-members can, or contracts out for someone that can.

My last character was a combat medic that knew how to use SMGs and Pistols, so that's what he carried.

My next/current character (writing out the medic this weekend) is a ninja-adept duder. Dikoted katana and one SMG. Rolling 16 dice with a sword, and if it weren't for wanting him to be able to assense and jump 30 feet in the air, it'd be higher. Hehe. Who knew being a PC could be so much fun? (My players in games past, I would think .)

In SR3 the most "armed to the teeth" character of mine carried:
2x Muchado SR-50's (a custom heavy pistol that fired only in burst, 50 rnd mag, conceal of 7, rc 6, sound supressor, and internal smartlink, usually loaded with gel or APDS)
1 Muchado Outrider (a decked out custom sniper rifle, given to her my a Johnson to "assassinate" him during a political speach)

In SR4, with the wonderful addition of skill groups (and cheap ambidexterity):
1 streetline special
2 Fichetti Security 600's (on hidden arm slides, saw "Taxi Driver" too many times)
2 Ares Predator IV's (in concealable hostlers)
2 Ruger Super warhawks (in quickdraw holsters)
2 Ingram Smartgun X's
1 Ruger 100
1 Walther MA-2100
1 Remington 990

all with smartlink, 5 clips of ammo for each(3 reg, 1 gel, 1 stick n' shock), and 5 full reloads for each weapon that had internal mags (3 reg, 1 gel, 1 Stick n' shock). Not to mention a knife the character didn't have a skill for, and 10kg of foam plastic explosives.

And everything but the internal magazine weapons come with her everywhere she goes, she gets in a lot of gun fights. Sad part is the character was a hacker, and boy you should have seen her commlink, which by itself(totally loaded with every program in the book at level 6) costs 124,200

Can anybody tell me why all these custom weapons seem so...cheesy to me?

They can be used to create reasonable guns, but that hardly excuses them.

~J

Our team's loadout varies per mission but are usually categorized as street gear or work gear. With street gear all members carry heavy pistols at the most. Also, all our weapons are custom built by our armorer.

The following are our usual work gear:

Mage always just carries her pistol since she usually relies on her mojo.

The Rigger and decker each carry a HP and SMG

Adept has a pair of HP's, a pair of SMG's, Sniper rifle, and assorted melee weapons

Orc sam has a HP, a SMG, and an assault rifle

Troll sam has a HP, a HMG, an Assault cannon, a Missile launcher, and his battleaxe.

It really depends on the character.

Troll Hunter - no firearms, just thrown weapons(boomerang, throwing knives and grenades), Ranger X bows and polearms + Great Dragon
Orc Sam - shotgun, assault rifle, heavy pistol, cyber-spurs(both arms)
Elf Adept - rifle, carbine (multi-weapon system) and heavy pistol(all silenced/suppressed), Killing Hands
Human Shaman - heavy pistol and magic
Otaku - Grenade launcher and the Great Dragon that the troll is carrying
Human Combat Decker - shotgun, heavy pistol, cyber spurs(1 arm)
Rigger - Naval guns, ANDREWS, naval missles, etc.