So I'm finally at a point where I have gathered all the weapons I really like to use, but since I'm playing on hard/hardcoe now I can't carry them all with me. I've decided that I need a melee weapon for those "oh s**t!!" moments, even though I'm not a melee character, a handgun, a close quarters demolition weapon, and a long range weapon. I only use guns, no energy weapons and I'm iffy on grenade weapons. All my weapons are modded, including the uniques thanks to WMX etc.

Here's my shortlist:

Melee: Chance's knife (not yet fully modded), Katana (fully modded), possible something cool like a baseball bat or pool cue.

I like Chance's just because I rarely use melee and it only weighs 1.

Handgun: Ranger Sequoia (fully modded thanks to WMX etc), Mysterious Magnum (fully modded), Lucky (fully modded), (A Light Shining In Darkness, but I haven't obtained it yet).

I really like revolvers and the Ranger most of all. But the others are so awesome too due to their uniqueness, so I can't decide. The Ranger is slow, but it takes out everything with one shot. Lucky and Mysterious are a bit faster, but that just means a lot of reloading with a revolver. I need to get my hands on Light as I've never actually tried it.

Close quarters: Riot Shotgun, (some other shotgun), All American (fully modded), some SMG.

I like the shotgun cause of the way it deals with "oh [censored]!" moments. The Riot is fast too and modded it holds 20 rounds, which is pretty good. American is obviously cool, but I find the scope annoying at short range cause it's no help in a panic situation, quite the opposite in fact. I've never really been a fan of shotguns or SMGs, so I'm open to suggestions here.

Long range (and this is where the real pickle lies): I can't decide which of these lovely ladies should accompany me on the wasteland journeys: AMR, Pacienca (fully modded), This Machine (fully modded), Medicine Stick (fully modded).

So the way I like to play I do a lot of sniping and long range shooting in general. Basically whenever I can I'll take out enemies at long range, and I always use a revolver at short range unless it's real close and melee/shotgun/smg is called for. I love the AMR, but it's a beast to haul around on hardcoe and the ammo also weighs a ton, plus it's hard to come by. Since all the other rifles are modded with a scope I don't really feel that spread is an issue, so I'm mostly looking a capacity, speed and of course damage. AMR takes out most enemies save Gigantic Lakelurk and really angry Deathclaws with one shot, which is nice. The others I find usually require two shots unless you score a crit or headshot. For those obviously recoil becomes a question too, but neither of them really have too much of that.

Pacienca might be too weak, but it has its strength in the crit damage, which you always get on a long range snipe.

They all look great so I can't decide based on that =)

I'd love to hear pros/cons from more experienced users so I can choose my bride-to-be based on overall awesomeness.

You seem to be over thinking things, and it's dependent on your perk setup. If you have shotgun perks you don't need to have a back up melee or pistol. IT also depends on what you want for a long range weapon. for instance the bolt action arms are good at range but suffer from slow RoF at closer ranges. The battle rifle(This machine) can do both mid and long range if you just swap out the scope for closer engagements if you need power.

If you don't have shotgun perks, I'd suggest having a SMG as your close in weapon.

I don't have any shotgun perks and don't plan on taking any. I'm at lvl 24 and there are plenty other perks I like better, so the shotgun is just because of its stopping power. Honestly the Ranger might do the job, it's just kinda slow in a panic situation. I hadn't thought of just removing the scope in a pinch but of course that's an option (if you don't care about realism). I'm leaning towards This Machine or Medicine Stick for their speed and versatility over the AMR and the low power of Pacienca.

And of course I'm over thinking it, it's what we do when we have so many sweet options! =)