Guns, oils, and trying to find some balance.

[Adonijah]

(I did some forum searching (revolver, stephen king) prior to making this post so as not to post something that's already been discussed)

While I haven't played the gunslinger yet, some of the reviews and discussions have a few similar complaints. Not enough damage, revolvers would be necessary/overpowered, other classes abusing firearms, and the like. Having re-read Stephen King's magnum opus of late, one of the things that Roland (the protagonist) does is maintenance on his guns, including the use of gun oils. Now, without wishing to rewrite Golarion to some degree, perhaps that might make things easier.

Flintlock pistols are not terribly mechanically difficult to make, nor hard to use. When I was young, I asked why people used guns if bows, by comparison, fired faster and more accurately. One of several reasons, was that firearms were easy to use. To use a bow, one required some measure of practice to build muscle, learn to aim, and so on and so forth. Firearms require minimal training by comparison. He went on to say that even a man injured in the field of battle could use a firearm without too much difficulty. Why do I mention this? I don't believe it would be too much to make flintlock pistols common technology, however expensive by comparison. Making flintlock pistols simple weapons would be my next step, but not exotic by any means since it often refers to some amount of special training required to use with proficiency.

If we assume that flintlock pistols are expensive but more commonplace, Revolvers can become the weapon of choice for the gunslinger. Revolvers (or if you prefer, six-shooters) are mechanically more complex. This makes them more expensive but more prone to wear and tear, one of the reason Roland often cleaned his guns. In his world, many had never even seen such a thing. In truth, the technology to make them was lost. Along the same lines of thinking, I think of how the Colt M16 was falsely advertised as self-cleaning and not issued with cleaning kits. A gun enthusiast friend of mine has had opportunities to use M16s from the Vietnam Era, which to this day need to be cleaned quite regularly because they were not cleaned during the course of duty.

With that in mind, Paizo can add rules concerning revolvers needing regular maintenance so that they don't jam. Without the PDF in front of me, I can't be certain, but one of the 1st level abilities is called "Firearms". One or two added paragraphs about gun maintenance would likely be enough to describe that a gunslinger is trained to know how to extract oils from certain types of flora that allows a revolver to be cleaned of residue that would eventually lead to a revolver to become unusable. This should allow classes other than the gunslinger to use firearms with a limited rate-of-fire at lower levels. At higher levels, the cost of a revolver would be negligible compared to income, meaning that other classes could use them until they were jammed and have multiple to compensate for the problem, much like the use of a Wand of Scorching Ray.

Well, that's my thinking anyways.

[Jaçinto]

Well if you read the information on Alkenstar, you would know that they are the only country that makes guns, rarely makes any at all, and jealously guards their technology. Exotic weapons are not always about how hard it is to use, but rather how rare they are and therefore exotic. Due to all the secrecy, some people may know guns exist but almost no one knows how they work. Someone that has never used one before would have no clue how much black powder to put in the gun so it has enough power to propel the bullet but not enough to explode the gun. The main gun factory in Alkenstar also makes no more than one gun a month. Not because they can't, but because they want to keep the tech secret and not flood the market. They also will never make a masterwork gun, because then your gun wont break and therefore you wont need to go get a new one. There simply are not that many guns in Golarian. Like i said, once you know how they work they are not hard to use, but they are very rare and most people don't know how to use one. Also trying self-teach yourself how to use one can result in your death because you wouldn't know how much powder to use, how to clean the barrel to prevent backfire, whether or not the bullet goes in first or the powder, and so forth. THIS is why they are exotic weapons in Golarian.

[Wolfthulhu]

Besides which, all weapons require periodic maintenance. Bow/crossbow strings must be replaced, edged weapons sharpened, staves and clubs checked for splinters and cracking. It's a fact of life, but it's 'capital b' Boring. The only nod in the general direction of such activity is the presence of a whetstone on the equipment list. There are no positive or negative effects for proper care of your weapons and to be honest, even as one who leans toward the simulationist side of the fence, I think it's a good thing. Guns already have a break %, something no other weapon has and something I fully intend to house-rule out. Because it's not balanced. It's annoying.

[Jaçinto]

Except that sharpening with a whetstone, like you are supposed to, gives you +1 to your next attack. Adventurers armory, I believe.

[Arcane Knowledge]

Jaçinto wrote:

Except that sharpening with a whetstone, like you are supposed to, gives you +1 to your next attack. Adventurers armory, I believe.

That could very well be true, please excuse me for not looking it up this late at night, but that is basically a variant rule in a splat book and not a core rule. This is important to note seeing as how a whetstone is mentioned in the core book under equipment, but makes no mention of such a bonus in the core rules.

Also this would be a rather unfair to other weapons that did not have blades. I mean what would the equivalent for a bludgeoning weapons? If it's good for the goose it's good for the gander, as the saying goes. I could see this working for piercing weapons quite easily though. I could see it working for arrows and bolts. A whetstone could work like the spell greater magic weapon, and work on a certain number of projectiles, like twenty or so. But even then a whetstone would be more useful for projectiles than other weapons.

So I guess my question is where is the balance?

Arcane Knowledge,