Just got this and it looks like a cool weapon. It seems pretty different from the one in F3.

I have googled and searched and cannot find the answeres I am looking for about the Railway rifle. If anyone can please enlighten me, it would be very much appreciated.

Which perk(s) affect damage?

Is it considered a Rifle and/or Big Gun?

I think it can be modified to be auto or regular?

Ammo seems difficult to find - where should I look?

Thanks bunches.

classed as a rifle for perks (so rifleman)

pretty sure the spikes are pretty rare, buy them probably? the bedford railway has a couple of 4packs if i remember at that place respawns very quickly

Look for ammo from merchants

not a big gun but i believe it's affected by either rifleman or commando depending on your mods because yes it can be modded as auto or at least an increased rate of fire. I suppose it depends on whether you need to click or hold to fire. Not sure

Auto as per the auto shotgun.

Ammo is never easy to find for it, you can get it in small amounts from merchants and from construction robots. So If your like me you will spend more time gathering ammo than you ever spend actually using it.

Thanks for the replies everyone. It's a little disappointing that I haven't been able to use this much and I think Desdemona only gave me a handful of ammo. I don't think Tinker Tom had very much for sale either.

Although there are some great weapons in Fallout, the ammo is lacking. Perhaps if I take Scrounger? I took it with a different character and it didn't seem to do much for finding .44 ammo?

Shiskebab used to be one of my favorite weapons in the other Fallouts but they changed that a lot, too. War ... war never changes ... but apparently weapons and ammo do.