Guns are terrible and terribly rare. Why?

In the beginning, all I wanted was to get out of the ridiculous iron age getup as soon as possible. Why does my character have a 3D printer, but no schematics loaded into it? Why is it so hard to just get a gun? Why am I flying around in a spaceship and then attacking things with a bow and javelins?

There's a thematic disconnect here that, while amusing at first, gets old very fast. I finally found a trader that sold shotguns and sniper rifles, only to find that not only were these weapons completely inferior to steel medieval weaponry(???), they also required energy to be used. So they're extra rare, you can't build them yourself anytime soon, they require energy to use, and they have crappy armor penetration and damage compared to primitive weapons.

This makes no sense, and I would like firearms to be appropriately devastating. They sure seem to be whenever I run into a hostile NPC wielding one. Why can't I pick up theirs?

 

They arent inferior, but all trader guns quality depend on the planets they spawn in. The higher the threat, the better the gun sold.

Also beta

 

The first time I realized I'd picked up a gun drop from an NPC, I got really excited

And then I realized it was only armor penetration 3 and all my other stuff was level 15

 

Thankfully the removal of armor penetration and the overall damage rebalance should fix this problem.

 

I agree with you. But what about players who want to use swords instead of guns? Should they automatically be at a disadvantage and forced to use guns? I've noticed a trend with my own suggestions and the suggestions of others: theme/realism/narrative must give the right of way to balanced gameplay.

It's a game. It doesn't operate within the same confines of the actual universe. It's gotta be fun and fair.

 

I Agree with the above.
Right now youd have to be lucky to find traders for new guns on every 2nd planet if youd go for higher level ones.
Once the big balance patch comes the overall dps of guns will apply and having a 'safe' ranged option will be viable and my stuff doesnt turn into peashooters whenever a monster 1-2 levels higher appears.

 

Sci-Fi ≠ High-Tech.