The Modern Armory ยท Chapter 5
Service Pistols and Revolvers
These are the handguns carried openly, in a holster, by people whose job includes carrying one. They reach Medium range and most hold enough ammunition that nobody counts it.
Damage follows the cartridge. The table is the chapter in one view.
| Cartridge | Damage | Might needed |
|---|---|---|
| .22 | 4 | any |
| 9mm, .38, .357, .45 | 6 | any (.45: 2) |
| .44 Magnum | 7 | 3 |
| .50 | 8 | 4 |
Revolvers trade capacity for something: Accurate on the service revolver, raw damage on the magnums. Every revolver carries Limited Ammo.
Skill: Light Ranged throughout.
Target Pistol, .22
Ruger Mark series, High Standard Supermatic, Colt Woodsman
4 5 Medium 1
Light Ranged 200 Common Ballistic Accurate 1, Concealable 1
A full-size rimfire pistol with a long barrel and good sights, built for paper targets and small game.
Accurate 1 and Medium range on a damage 4 weapon. It is the cheapest Accurate firearm in the book, and it is the pistol most often fitted with a suppressor, because the cartridge is already nearly subsonic.
Service Pistol, 9mm
Glock 17, Beretta 92, SIG P226, Browning Hi-Power, Luger P08, Walther P38
6 3 Medium 1
Light Ranged 300 Common Ballistic Concealable 1
The standard sidearm from 1939 to the present. A Luger and a Glock 17 are thirty years of engineering apart and the same stat line.
Damage 6, Crit 3, Medium range, and no drawback: this is the reference handgun. Every other handgun in the book is this entry with something traded.
Service Pistol, .45
Colt M1911, HK45, SIG P220, Glock 21
6 3 Medium 2
Light Ranged 350 Common Ballistic Vicious 1, Cumbersome 2, Concealable 1
A heavy, slow bullet from a heavy pistol. It was the United States service sidearm for seventy years and it is still carried by people who do not trust a smaller hole.
Vicious 1 is what the cartridge buys. Cumbersome 2 and Encumbrance 2 are what the pistol costs.
Service Revolver, .38 or .357
S&W Model 10 and Model 19, Colt Python, Webley, Nagant M1895
6 4 Medium 2
Light Ranged 350 Common Ballistic Accurate 1, Limited Ammo 6
A four-inch, six-shot double-action revolver. Police carried one until the 1980s, and a good one outshoots most automatics of its day.
Accurate 1 comes from the fixed barrel and the trigger. Limited Ammo 6 is the price, and at Crit 4 it wounds less cleanly than the automatic beside it.
Magnum Revolver, .44
S&W Model 29, Colt Anaconda, Ruger Redhawk
7 3 Medium 2
Light Ranged 600 Common Ballistic Vicious 1, Cumbersome 3, Limited Ammo 6
A large-frame revolver built around a hunting cartridge. It cannot be hidden under anything shorter than a coat, and nobody who hears it mistakes it for anything else.
Damage 7 is one above any other handgun short of the .50, and Vicious 1 sits on top of it. Cumbersome 3 is the Might requirement: a shooter with Might 2 adds a Bane Die to every shot. It has no Concealable rating and reloads after six.
Hand Cannon, .50
Desert Eagle .50 AE, S&W Model 500, Magnum Research BFR
8 3 Medium 3
Light Ranged 1200 Rare Ballistic Knockdown, Cumbersome 4, Inaccurate 1, Limited Ammo 5
The largest handguns made: gas-operated automatics and five-shot revolvers chambered for cartridges that belong in rifles.
Damage 8 with Knockdown is the top of the handgun scale. Cumbersome 4 means only a character with Might 4 fires it without penalty, and Inaccurate 1 applies to everyone. With Might 2 it adds three Bane Dice to every shot, which is the usual result of buying one for its looks.
Machine Pistol
Glock 18, Skorpion vz. 61, Stechkin APS, MAC-11, Mauser Schnellfeuer
5 4 Short 1
Light Ranged 500 Military Ballistic Auto-Fire, Inaccurate 1, Concealable 1
A pistol that fires automatically. It empties its magazine in under two seconds and climbs off the target while it does.
Auto-Fire in a weapon that still rates Concealable 1 is the reason to carry one. Inaccurate 1 stacks with the Trial Die that Auto-Fire already adds, and the range is Short.