In Dead Money the holo rifle is great since the only other energy weapon is a laser pistol, but after I get back I can't seem to find a use for it.

In near every post talking about energy weapons someone always talks up the greatness of the holo rifle so I was expecting something awesome.

It can't replace a pistol for CQB or room clearing due to its scope, slow firing and limited ammo.

The scope is not as good as the laser rifle for sniping and the slower speed of the projectile makes this more difficult as well. The small ammo capacity also limits follow up shots.

It does not hit as hard as the gauss when sniping big game, plus the same issues with the scope and projectile speed.

Elijiah's LAER out classes it with big damage and fast firing.

It does not benefit from laser commander or plasma spaz.

I just don't see where it is supposed to shine given the other weapons available. If I am sniping I go with the laser unless the target is heavily armored and then I use the gauss. At closer ranges or active combat I'd go with the plasma defender if I want meltdown explosions, the plasma caster if I want big meltdown explosions, or the advanced LAER for hard hitting fast shots.

What role do all of the holorifle fans see it outperforming the other choices?

Extreme critical damage (Holorifle means Holorifle with all three modifications I suppose)

I'll let others speak for the ingame awesomeness and say something about metaphysical value. The holorifle tells a story. It's a testimony of Father Elijah's genius and grandeur in adapting any kind of marvellous technology. Being able to convert the Hologram research from Big MT's masterminds (it's something that must seem like magic for an unwitting person) into pure weapon power is an unparalleled accomplishment. The Holorifle not fitting into the laser and plasma categories speaks for itself. Elijah was able to create a whole new kind of weaponry. His advanced LAER and his Jury-rigged Tesla Cannon further prove his mastery, but the Holorifle is given to you personally by Elijah, it accompanies you through the horrors of Dead Money and throughout it's uprading process becomes a much more personal weapon than many others.

That's why I love it so much.

Spot on. It's something you trust your life to in Dead Money, I couldn't get rid of it after that. More practical reasons, OP, are the night vision scope, high damage/DPS (especially with Optimised/Max Charge ammo). It can snipe, take out single enemies easily and does additional holo damage. I'll grant that the clip size is poor but for me that's easily outweighed by everything else.

Holorifle Pros:

+ It weighs only 8 pounds

+ it takes Microfusion Cells, not .50 BMG rounds, thus lighter.

+ Shot per shot, it does more damage over time than a Gauss Rifle or even YCS/186

+When modded, it can kill most targets rather easily

+ with Max Charge ammo and modded fully, the Holorifle easily does 157.5 damage+15 damage of Holorifle damage, which can handle most situations, save for swarms of Deathclaws.

+It has a crit damage of 80, and with the right perks, becomes 180 damage, turning your already impressive hit into 337.5 damage.

Holorifle Cons:

- it's shoots pretty slow, 1.11 shots per second.

- slow projectile

- single loading cells

Overall, the reason people like the Holorifle is simple: it's an all-around beast weapon for energy users. It kind of fits that niche of "The one weapon that becomes your best friend", basically like the AER14 Prototype but more for late game. With the right perks, at least one of those issues becomes less of a problem.

Other weapons may outclass the Holorifle in one stat or another, but when looking at the whole package, no other energy weapon is as versatile and can fill an all-around, "if I only had one weapon to carry" role as well as it can.

It may not have as large a critical multiplier as the Gauss or the Laser Rifle, but when it does land a crit it's absolutely devastating. With a sneak attack critical to the head and a high skill, it can ash Rawr from Lonesome Road with a single max-charge microfusion cell.

Its scope may not have the same magnification as the Gauss or the Laser Rifle, but it's good enough for most situations and it gives you night vision, which the other two scopes don't.

With the Reinforced Parts mod, it's just about indestructible, even when firing max-charge cells. While Elijah's LAER comes close to it in damage per shot and has a big edge in damage per second and magazine capacity, this comes at the cost of a very, very fast weapon degradation rate, plus the LAER doesn't have a scope.

In terms of damage per microfusion cell used, it's the most powerful energy weapon in the game. By comparison, the Gauss Rifle does more damage per shot, but it uses five cells per shot, and only has the magazine capacity for a single shot. Also, since it uses more than one cell per shot, its DPS as displayed in the Pip Boy does not take into account the reloading time (this is a game engine limitation). If you use VATS a lot with the Gauss, it's affected by the same bug it had in Fallout 3.

I really like all of the other energy weapons I've compared it to (except for the Gauss Rifle; I've tried very hard to like that weapon but just can't), but for an all-around go-to weapon, I reach for the Holorifle every time.