So with the latest patch they added That Gun to the Cowboy perk. Why not add bolt-action rifles (excluding the .50cal) to it as well? The Hunting Rifle fires slower than the Sniper Rifle, even with the Custom Action. It would still be very balanced too.

1. You'd have to invest to in the Cowboy Perk
2. The Hunting Rifle has a Critical Multiplier of x1
3. It fires much slower than the Sniper Rifle or Gobi Rifle
4. Some might argue that you could combine this with the Hand Loader's JSP and have some "be all end all" weapon. Again, you'd have to invest into getting that perk too. So if you CHOSE to make your character that way, you could have a very nasty weapon.

It's not "over powered" when you have to do all that work. This would also make the Ratslayer more effective at higher levels. Instead of it just being an early level weapon. The .50cal shouldn't be effected simply because it's already a monster.

This next idea isn't really an addition for the Cowboy perk, just an idea. You should be able to recover Throwing Knives, Hatchets, and Spears from enemies after you use them. I like the idea of covering a Throwing Knife with some poison and hitting an enemy with it from a distance. However I don't like the fact that they're not a heavily supplied item and that you're basically just throwing money away. Especially if you miss.

Because it's unneeded. A scoped Trail Carbine loaded with SWC rounds and cowboy perk is exact same damage per shot as the current hunting rifle loaded with JSP ammo. Trail Carbine has a higher ROF and -6DT as advantages. Hunting Rifle has a higher zoom scope and shorter reload cycles as it's advantages.

If you need more hitting power than that you're pulling out a .45-70 howitzer or the AMR depending on if you have the cowboy perk.

... because bolt-action rifles are not thematically cowboyish, and other bolt-actions (like This Machine!) do NOT need a damage boost?

This Machine is not a bolt-action rifle. And yes, they ARE cowboyish. As it stands, there's no reason to even use the Hunting Rifle. Every other .308 rifle is better than it.

As far as it being the exact same DAM as the Trail Carbine, that's wrong. If it had the +25% DAM from the Cowboy Perk, it would do a 78 DAM. Actually making it a rifle that would be worth taking.

When I think "cowboy rifles", I think "lever action". I think Mauser/Springfield/Enfield/Mosin-Nagant when I think bolt-action.

???

Trail Carbine + SWC ammo + Cowboy perk = 67.5
Hunting Rifle + JSP ammo = 67.5

The Lord Death perk will cause both weapons DAM rating to hit 70 and bloody mess will push it to about 72-73, in any event both guns DAM ratings will match perfectly as they scale.

Oh, and a Hunting rifle with JSP ammo and cowboy perk would have a DAM rateing of 84.375. 45(1.25)(1.5) = 84.375

You're right about the 84 DAM. My math was wrong. Your little "67.5" thing just proves my point though. The Hunting Rifle is useless as it is now. Given the added effects of the Cowboy perk, it's no longer an inferior weapon. It won't do the same amount of DAM as the Brush Gun. However it has the option to have a scope and can hold more ammo. It doesn't do the amount of DAM as the .50cal. It doesn't take a STR of 8 or weigh 20 lbs. So it would become a much more useful weapon, for those who take those perks. It would be very balanced. The only way it would be that powerful is if you chose those perks for your character.

As far as everyone who claims bolt-action aren't "cowboyish". There have been bolt-action rifles for a long time. Even before the wars that Call of Duty games are based on. So to the guy who got his list of rifles off of Wiki, if you'd kept reading you would've seen that they've been around since the 1700's. I dunno about anyone else. But I think a cowboy or two probably used one.

again.

???

I'll put it in a different way. A hunting rifle loaded with JSP ammo, 80 skill in guns, better criticals and a sneak attack to the head will kill a Quarry Junction Deathclaw (more health than normal deathclaws) with a single round on normal difficulty. Now precisely why does this weapon need to do more damage than that in the first place?

Also, I don't recall seeing too many bolt-action weapons in my spaghetti westerns or seeing John Wayne shooting a Mauser on horseback all that often. Bolt-Action weapons and the classic stereotypical American Cowboy just don't go together.

???

What's not to get? It's not as good as the Sniper, Gobi, or This Machine. It's inferior to ALL three of them. The Trail Carbine with the right perks and ammo is better than it. The Hunting Rifle is worthless. Why take it when so many other rifles are better? There isn't. Except for the old trusty standby answer "for role playing". That's it. Adding it and other bolt-action rifles to that perk would make them far more useful. How is that hard to comprehend?

The Hunting Rifle and Ratslayer both have the potential to be very useful weapons. The Ratslayer is only good at low levels. As already stated, the Hunting Rifle is trumped by so many other weapons it shouldn't even be in the game. Whether or not they were THE most used rifle in B Movies, doesn't mean that they weren't used in that era. They're older than Repeater Rifles are. Since they're still used today, you don't think cowboys used them? What, did those weapons just skip that era? No, they didn't.

Generally, the first rifle to be considered a bolt-action was the Dryse Needle Gun. A single shot affair firing a paper cartridge and first fielded in 1841. The first metal cartridge bolt actions saw service in the 1860s, and repeaters (ones with some type of magazine allowing the shooter to fire more than one round before reloading) in the 1870s. The first successful bolt-action rifle, in the configuration as we know them today, ie: bolt-action, magazine fed (internal box magazine), repeating rifles, was the Model 1885 Remington-Lee, which mated a Remington action/barrel with Scottish/American gun designer James Paris Lee's (of later Lee-Enfield fame) internal box magazine. Interestingly enough, this rifle was actually first produced by Sharps, not in 1885, but in 1879.

Most all bolt-action rifle evolution was spurred by the military sector. Lever-actions were generally spurned by militaries, with the notable exception of the Russian purchase of Winchester 1895s (ok, Teddy Roosevelt bought them for his volunteers too), because a prone soldier had problems cycling the action. Conversely, cowpokes, ranchers, outlaws, lawman and all sundry of weapon purchasers out in the American West in the second half of the 19th century favored lever-action rifles. Ease of use and maintenance, reliability, durability, low cost, ready availability, light weight and commonality of ammuntion all seemed to favor lever action rifles for range work. Serious big game hunters used more substantial rolling block or falling block rifles (which, although they have levers, should not be properly termed lever-actions. They are correctly called single shots. Lever-actions are repeaters.) until John Moses Browning (one of the other great American gun designers) made a lever action strong enought to contain the bigger cartridges.

The result of all this is that bolt action rifles were predominantly the pervue of militaries throughout the late 19th century, the time most associated with cowboys and the wild west. Bolt actions saw a series of significant design improvements, first with the adoption by most major nations of bolt-aciton repeaters in the last decade of the century and first of the next (Mauser G98, Mosin-Nagant 1891, Krag-Jorgensen M1892, Lee's-Metford and Enfield, M1903 Springfield, among others) and then with the advent of the first high powered smokeless powder spitzer pointed rounds. While there may have been some commercial sales and/or surplus of military bolt actions that made their way west, the vast majority of weapons fielded by "Capital C" Cowboys were levers. Even the US Army did not standardize to a bolt action rifle until 1892. They don't call the Winchester model 1873 the "Gun that won the West" for no reason.

Sorry for the long winded history lessson, but I doubt most folks know all this stuff, so I thought I'd pass it on.

-Gunny out.

First off the Hunting Rifle is already a very useful in it's role. Post patch it now does more damage than both the Sniper Rifle and Gobi with a single round, easier to acquire, lower skill requirements and much higher durability. Sniper Rifle has the big advantage of the suppressor (Carbon Fiber Parts mod has been broken since release), Gobi is 1.5Wg lighter and both have a higher ROF. The durability of the Hunting Rifle is the biggest advantage since it can fire 300 shots before needing repairs, with the Sniper Rifle coming in at 80 shots and the Gobi doing 160 shots.

Second, the Hunting Rifle complements "This Machine" perfectly as that weapon completely fails at long range sniping with only iron sights and 0.5 weapon spread, yet covers the Hunting Rifle's short range weakness (60AP VATS cost). These two weapons are not even remotely in competition with each other. No, firing .308 rounds from "This Machine" fast as you can feed in fresh clips until the pixel in the distance stops moving is not sniping, but it is effective in it's own way.

Granted the Trail Carbine setup right (Scope mod, SWC ammo, Cowboy Perk and 75+ guns skill) is superior to the Hunting Rifle in almost every meaningful way. You do have to burn up an extra perk slot and jump through some skill check hoops with a particular NPC to get there. While putting all those parts together one can be using a JSP loaded Hunting Rifle, with all three mods of course, to great effect. Even then the Hunting Rifle will still do better at getting more rounds on target, at long range, thanks to it's better scope and lower spread.

Gunny's history lesson is great. While the bolt-action weapons where around they where never icons of the american west of the mid 1860s to the early 1890s. The game's Cowboy perk is drawing it's inspiration from that historical period where Henry/Winchester repeating rifles, along with all kinds of revolvers, where the mainstays of civilian and law enforcement firearms in the american west. The Hunting Rifle would be a very strange fit indeed.

Says someone who probably thinks that since there were bolt actions in RDR they must be "cowboy guns". Never mind that game was set in 1910, well after the "cowboy era" was dead and buried. Bolt action repeaters didn't become popular with civilians in the US until after WW1....due to returning vets who had been exposed to bolt actions with the Army in France. Before then the rage in rifles was single shots and lever action repeaters. Even our Army didn't adopt a bolt action until well after nearly every Army in Europe had.

Only the officers in the Rough Riders were armed with the '95s.......the enlisted men were issued Krag carbines from Army stores thanks to TR's political clout.




There was also tons of Civil-War era surplus floating around.....people who couldn't afford a Winchester or a Sharps made do with a Springfield or Enfield rifle-musket, or if they were a little better heeled, a Spencer or other breechloader from the war.

Why not use the Hunter perk for this purpose. Remove a bit of the critical bonus against animals and add a damage bonus to bolt-action rifles (and throw in the Hunting Revolver, but make it either/or so you can't use both perks). Then add a third perk for Military style weapons.

The Hunting rifle should not get the cow boy perk because it should never out class the sniper rifle, which is the higher tiered weapon. AM > Sniper > Hunting Rifle > Varmint rifle.

I give up. This is like clapping with one hand you people. The fact is: the Cowboy effects guns that are manually operated.

Revolvers = Manually Operated
Lever-Action = Manually Operated
Bolt-Action = Manually Operated

No, cowboy perks affects coyboy weapons. It just so happens all cowboy weapons are manually operated, but not all manually operated weapons are cowboy weapons.

Cowboy+increase .45-70 Gov't = Win

IIRC Cowboy doesn't improve Ratslayer.....

Don't insult others unless you do some reading first.

Cowboy Perk description: "You do 25% more damage when using any revolver, lever-action firearm, dynamite, knife, or hatchet."

You see the words "Manually" or "operated" in there anywhere?

Is the Hunting Rifle a revolver? A Lever-action firearm? Dynamite? Knife? Hatchet?

You'd be better off complaining that switchblade knives aren't included.

I know right. Revolvers and Lever-Action weapons aren't manually operated. :facepalm:

Nah, instead they should add a Cowboy II perk that significally reduces recoil and increases accuracy like 50-70% with all "cowboy" style guns. To me, bolt action rifles are more of a "hunters" (think: people who hunt animals for sport) weapon than a "cowboys" (think: "The Good, the Bad and the Ugly") weapon so I agree with Showler about them changing the perk's usage.

Follow this carefully:
Lever-action weapons are all manually operated.
Bolt-action weapons are all manually operated.
All manually operated weapons are not Lever-action.
Bolt-action weapons are not Lever-action.
The perk effects Lever-action weapons, not Bolt-action weapons.
The perk does not effect Bolt-action weapons.

There is a reason for this. Your refusal to accept the reason does not negate it.

Or there's a great black hole of logic out there swallowing people up. I like your idea of modifying the hunter perk. The only problem you'll have is that for a long damn time lever-action rifles were the epitome of a hunting rifle in the US. As stated above bolt-actions (or slide actions for that matter) didn't become popular for hunting in the US until long after Europeans were using them. So many would argue that a hunter perk should also include lever-action rifles. Perhaps the sniper perk could be modified with a damage spiff and then limit it to "sniper" rifles. Since a bolt action "hunting rifle" is essentially just a military sniper rifle dressed in sunday clothes, this could work. It would allow you to boost the performance of the hunting rifle relative to other types of rifles (levers and assault rifles) while allowing the Sniper Rifle and AMR to keep pace since they could qualify for the perk also.

-Gunny out.

The important thing to keep in mind is this is an inexplicable Perk in a video game which is based on stereotypical roles.

The lever-action weapons are the stereotypical Cowboy long weapon. When I see John Wayne shoot someone from a distance, odds are high it's with a lever-action rifle.

Bolt-action rifles are stereotypical hunting rifles. Both of the guns Sarah Palin shot at the Elk with were bolt-action.

There also seems to be a fairly distinct separation in the game between military styled weapons, hunting styled weapons and cowboy styled weapons (with some crossover in shotguns, but they get their own perk).

If they needed to do some long distance work then they'd break out a Buffalo rifle....some form of .45-70 single shot rifle. Clint Eastwood used a scoped Sharps Express rifle at one point in "The Good, the Bad, and the Ugly". It would be nice if they included one in the game to fill out the suite of Cowboy Weapons. The low DPS due to the time in-between shots should balance how hard it would hit.