I personally consider every state except California to be like that.

Californians have no room to talk. Anyone who elects Schwarzenegger as their leader can't say anything about anyone else. Ever.

Well, here's one reason why a hold out might be nice.

Running around with a long coat buttoned up indoors looks a bit suspiscious. Nice thing about a Hold-Out is it is small enough to toss in a pocket, or put in a glass of coffee (ala the Heist), unlike Heavy Pistols that need a holster

The main purpose of hold-outs is that you'll have them when the enemy doesn't. Therefor, you'll get to shoot up your enemy, when at best, they might have a knife. Toss in the potential of things like SM and Ex Ex Rounds, and it hold outs become a bit more acceptable>

We must hang around very different kinds of chicks then.

I feel perhaps, that many people don't understand that hold-outs are not really all that common. Light pistols are fairly common, especially in the real world, because of their cheapness and the ease with which to acquire one. And that almost every criminal who uses one ends up discarding them at some point. Hold-outs are just, well, shitty.

As a runner, why carry a hold-out? There really is no point, unless you really need a wallet sized pistol. Something hyper concealable, because you are in jail, transport from said facility, on a plain, or whatever.

Hold-outs are not combat guns. This is known. Neither are light pistols. Don't expect them to be combat guns. If you take a dodge stratus to a race, expect to lose. If you carry a hold-out to a gun-fight, expect the same.

And by the way: What's up with freaks and longcoats?

Everyone wants to be Neo.

IMG, streetline specials and Walther palm pistols are the most common guns out there. Everybody and their dog has one.

Why? Because they're easily obtained and dirt cheap. With an availiability of two and a street price of 75 , any street punk can get his hands on a streetline special. Only the Walther and the Streetline have availiabilites that low. At that availiability, you can also barter the price down even further, and lay your hands on a case of them for cheap.

For Shadowrunners, that makes those two hold-outs the ultimate disposeable pistol. Use it, toss it with a clean conscience; it probably cost less than the ammo. If you really want to have fun, try planting it on someone after you've used it. (I defy you to slip a Warhawk into someone's pocket without them noticing, but a palm pistol?)

Now, combine ultra-cheapness with super availiability and a super-high conceal, and you've got a decent backup piece. It's still not a good combat gun, but it'll do the trick.

As for the rest of the hold-outs, they vary in usefulness. The Tiffani series are good for pretending to be a corp worker, since they come in all the top fashion colors. A security guard is more apt to let it slide for that reason. The Raecor, IIRC, is the only off-the-rack hold-out to come with full Ceramic Components, which makes it useful in other ways. The others? That all depends on personal style, although I'm hard-pressed to find much use for some of them.

As someone has already indicated, I think their usefulness comes down to whether characters in game behave as though they're being shot at, or behave as if they're being shot at with something that's going to do no more than 4L damage -

IRL just having a gun, even a pissy one, radically changes a situation, and just letting loose a few rounds is going to get people out of your way unless they're wearing heavy armour.

But if NPCs and (in particular) PCs start acting as though they know that shots are going to bounce off them or, at worst give them a flesh wound, the whole "duck, he's got a gun!" and "don't move I've got a gun" thing goes straight out the window- and I think that's a real shame. But by the same token it's odd if you've got NPCs acting as though holdouts are potentially deadly, and then having PCs ignore the fact, or having them actually pull the trigger on their "intimidating" piece of hardware and leaving their victim with a light wound...

Yes, tiny bit more. I included the Walther mainly in comparison to the holdouts I mentioned. When you need concealability, the Walther is far better, and you're already dealing with about the same price range and generally worse availability.

The Elite was really mentioned more as something a ganger would get if he got lucky with connections, as they are cheap and quite potent; for criminals higher up on the food chain, they don't have to worry about getting ahold of them, and the price and concealability make it no contest.

101T was included because it's availability and price are similar and potency is far greater.

This is even more true of the Predator, which is the premiere pistol for the down and out. 250¥, easy to get ahold of, and will put down anything you point it at. That is the dramatic increase in potency that doesn't cost much more. Is there a place for Streetline Specials? Sure. There's a place for Saturday Night Specials that let you kill someone for $25 in real life, too, though they should include rules that let them blow up in your hand half the time. But is there much use? No. I'd much more expect a real thug to pack something that's not a complete joke, and it's not like the Predator costs a whole lot more.

my old char was a street sam who specialized in pistols

He typically carried a pair of insanely customized browning ultra powers for an actual run, a Walther as a backup in an ankle holster and a Tifanni Needler as a "oh shit" weapon. He kept the holdout in a compartment in his cyberarm where it saved his life after being captured by a group of not so friendly Triads. He was left alone waiting for some guy to come in and put a round or two into his skull but managed to break the rope he was tied up with. He then popped open the compartment and gave his executioner a rather unpleasent suprise. He then picked up the preadator off the corpse and made his escape with that. Since then I've never been without one.

Wound TNs do not effect resisting damage or drain...

I see... They are probably just my group's house rules, since I learned from playing rather than reading the whole book. I like the idea of drain tests modified by wounds though, gives mages an incentive not to get shot...

Given the lower Body most mages have, their (on average) lower armor ratings, the fact that TN penalties apply to all other magical rolls, and the +2 to most medical TNs when dealing with the awakened I think mages already have plenty incentives to not get shot at.

I've played with both systems, drain unaffected/affected by wounds, and in my experience the later system can do little to encourage mages to better avoid damage - they're already doing that about as good as they can. We use it, because it seems more "realistic" that a bullet in one's stomach makes concentrating on correctly channeling mana more difficult, but I don't think it increases the mages players' effort to not get shot at.

Is there a point to hold-out pistols?
Yes.

Is there a point in a runner using one?
No, not unless you have a use for it.

Hold-outs are not really a runner's weapon. That does not make them pointless, however. Saying that they are pointless would be a bit like saying BTLs are pointless as no professional runner would use them. On the streets: hold-outs are still probably going to wound an unaware street-level target (body 3 ganger), making them useful for drive-bys and such. The Tiffani guns are fashionable, and still capible of wounding unarmored targets, thus useful. The Elan could be a runner's weapon, its high concealability and undetectability by MAD scanners make it a good way to smuggle a weapon past security.

Hold-outs can also become much more powerful in the hands of a skilled character (runner). Runners could use smartlink-2s and called shots to avoid armor, step 1 on keeping the power at a reasonable level, plus many runners will be able to afford a choice of several ammunition types (Hollow Point, Glaser, ETC). The walther is nice, but it

As for re-making the Walther in ceramics/resin/whatever: Could it really be a 1-1 swap? I wouldn't be surprised if whatever the metal was replaced with had different properties from the normal metallic components, thus a direct swap (maintaining the weapon's attributes) might not be possible.

I do agree, however, that the Walther, or a custom full-ceramic light pistol with concealability 8, is probably a better choice of weapon if you can afford it.

I also agree that the numbers are somewhat off. IMHO, Normal people (body 3) should have very little chance of staging damage from a pistol wound to nothing. I think that in my next game I'll try making light, hold-out, and machine pistols do +1 damage level (M rather than L) or maybe add a bit of power.

I just think it's sad that a hold-out pistol can be more effective as a bludgeoning tool than a firearm.

I suppose in the end, hold-outs are like long-coats; they entirely depend on the style of the players and GM. In some tres chic, Mortimer greatcoat and a hold-out will get you into a club or bar armed and unchecked. In other games, all pistols are pretty much equal so you may as well trade in the Saturday Night Special for an Ares Pred...

Well: By canon you don't get to stage damage level if you are calling the shot to avoid armor so that's only 8M damage.

IIRC the Dermal Armor of trolls counts as armor which I'm not sure if it should be possible to bypass. Thus there would be no +1 damage level against them, taking the damage code back down to 8L.

No, it counts as an extra point of Body for damage resistance only.

~J

Isn't the dermal armor still a variety of armor, however? I know it dosen't reduce the power of the attack but isn't it still a protective measure, labeled armor no-less, which stops them from being technically unarmored.

I didn´t read all it says in this thread so it may have been pointed out earlier, but: Isn´t it ok for hold-outs to be worthless? People who plan on killing someone don´t buy the smallest gun in the store. Hold-outs are the kind ladies have in their purse. At least that´s the way it is in the movies . Maybe some american who has actually SEEN a gun can help me out.

I always thought of the hold outs as those teeny little Derriger thingies, like Aesir. The piddling little almost-too-small-for-the-hand slingshots with delusions of grandeur.

Something like a Beretta Tomcat or Glock 36 holds more of a punch than a Derringer. They can kill. It is not ok that they are worthless. For god's sake, with the way it is now, they might as well be paintball guns.

That's still being generous.

Anyone got a muzzle velocity quote on a .45ACP or .44Spl Derringer or a .357Mag Downsizer? I'm pretty sure those things are also quite capable of killing.

They certainly are. It was the .22 Derringers that gave the entire line a reputation for impotence.

[edit]

gknoy, that is exactly the order you should knock them out in.

Mage, sword, sam. Every time.

I'd say mage, sam, sword. In order of decreasing maximum range.

~J

hehe ...

@Arethusa: Those .45 cal derringers sound pretty good. Wonder if those would be considered 'hold out' or 'light' by SR standards, tho .. probably light

They'd hit a bit harder than SR light pistols, but, really, there's nowhere they fit in in canon SR. 6M, maybe? Hard to say.

I actually built similar guns, using a base Heavy Pistol frame. My goal was to recreate a four-barreled, break-action hold-out; the real ones, IIRC, are chambered for .357 magnum.

Yeah, probably the COP357 is what you have in mind. Seems to fit the bill, and it's not like .357 Magnum, four barreled, break action holdouts are common.