I was wondering, while the rules don't really cover combination type accessories, I was wondering how difficult it would be considering the SR level of technology.

Could you have an underbarrel mount that serves multiple purpose? Like a laser sight, regular light (lowlight/normal) and rangefinder? Would the weight of all the stuff crammed into that space also be useful in being a recoil modifying 'barrel weight'?

I don't imagine that regular lighting attachments need to be as big to be as effective as current/real life underbarrel light attachments. The rangefinder probably would be about the size of a real life light of a pistol attachment. Then slap an internal smartlink, should be good to go right?

Cost is not really a concern.

I would personally rule that while you could concievably build them as such, since underbarrel weights are essentailly built for competitions and are little more than a liability in combat, you would have to personally assemble them yourself, personally check the zero, etc.

I wouldn't give any "Underbarrel Weight" like RC bonuses. But then I wouldn't give RC bonuses for an Underbarrel Weight to begin with.

Yes, the technology is certainly there to pack 2 different laser sights and 2 different lights (IR and visible light) on many RL weapons today, without touching anything on top of or in front of the weapon (ie without using Top or Barrel mounts). Actually, you could probably mount dozens of the damned things on a gun, they're just of no use. Underbarrel Grenade Launcher + Laser Sight + Tactical Light + Fore-Grip + Scope-3 + Rangefinder should be no trouble to fit on any Assault Rifle in the 2060s.

Well, realism is killed by balance in this game. The developers wanted two things in their simplistic rules of firearm design:

1) Make them simple enough that even people who don't know jack about guns can follow them.

2) Make customized guns balance out with other aspects of the game, such as magic, rigging, decking, & adepts.

Cramming a whole lot of stuff onto a gun not only gives a huge advantage to the wielder, provided the can both carry the gun and make use of all of the attachments, but said huge advantage unbalances other archetypes. Multiclassing just makes the problem worse, so the GM has to work extra hard to come up with comparable NPC threats, thereby making the GM position a royal pain in the arse.

The developers wanted to keep the game fun by limiting firearm creation.

I'm not going to follow this topic. Coming to this thread was an accident.

I suppose I shouldn't bother to tell you why this doesn't ruin game balance in the least, or why the actual game balance problem are the huge bonuses from some firearm modifications that don't really provide such bonuses IRL, then. It would be a total waste of my time to point out that a Forearm Grip should probably just be a cool-factor-thing anyway, and that a Tactical Light does not provide a numerical advantage 99/100, or at least shouldn't, or that Shock Pads and Gas Vents (beyond rating 1 and 2) and a whole crapload of other modifications are really fricken stupid.

I most certainly shouldn't keep rambling on about how my position as the GM in my games has only gotten more fun as I introduce more and more realism into the system while managing to keep the game perfectly balanced.

So I won't.