What to do with guns?

[Hazrond]

So i'm playing in a game of the Skull and Shackles AP and my GM has given my gun-wielding besmaran cleric the schematics needed to construct both cannons and advanced firearms. What are some ways i can get the most out of this beyond the obvious first step of "build a Rifle"?

[Palanan]

You mean, after inventing yardarm-to-yardarm broadsides?

:smalltongue:

[el minster]

revolvers should do the trick

[Dmitriy]

It largely depends on what kind of fantasy you are into. Do you like Pirates of the Caribbean? Use flintlock pistols! The Dark Tower? Masterwork Revolvers are what you need.

But, Sarenrae bless you, don't you ever try to use the standard Pathfinder rules for gun combat. For example, employ the damage values from d20 Modern, where a Colt .357 deals 2d12 points of damage, and 2d6 is a minimum for a gun, make a lot more sense than a pistol hitting you more weakly than a longsword.

Keep levels low enough so that this damage can actually matter.

[vasilidor]

the problem i have with guns in pathfinder (and dnd in general) is they are all failures. they fail to represent any gun with anything remotely close to resembling accuracy. a part of this is they want the longbow to be the be all end all, and nothing can be better than their precious longbow when it comes to ranged combat. to this i say wah. the first thing you should do with guns is change their ranges. muskets had, on average, ranges that out performed longbows. and that was before rifling. mind, they were not consistent, but there you go. pistols, on the other hand, generally had shorter ranges. the primary advantage of muzzle loading rifles and pistols is it was so easy to teach your troops how to shoot them, and you could carry more ammunition with less overall weight. then gunpowder became cheaper than arrows after a while. when that happened the bow was put aside as a weapon of war. all of that before the creation of more modern multi shot rifles that they had in the 19th century (lever action rifles in example). then you go into pathfinders misfire chance thing. I hate it. the only guns that were as bad as the one in the pathfinder books were the matchlocks or earlier, and the most common thing is the match would go out before you could fire your gun. yes, some would blow up in some peoples faces, but by the time you got around to flintlocks (which is what the guns in pathfinder are displayed as) the chances of a gun misfiring was about 1 in 1000 in dry conditions, 1 in 20 if it was raining, and then the gun simply did not fire. this problem was mostly resolved by the invention of the metal cartridge, while misfires can and do occur in modern rifles it is around 1 in 10000 on average across all guns and ammunition types, with some performing better than others.

but seriously, fix the range issue.

[TheFamilarRaven]

So i'm playing in a game of the Skull and Shackles AP and my GM has given my gun-wielding besmaran cleric the schematics needed to construct both cannons and advanced firearms. What are some ways i can get the most out of this beyond the obvious first step of "build a Rifle"?

Theorize that because you're knowledgeable about advanced firearms such as the pepperbox rifle which features a rotatable cylinder that house ammunition, that it is possible for your cleric to envision a multi-barreled gun, in which each barrel can fire a single shot. It is operated by rotating a handle of some kind, and as the operator turns that handle it cycles through several separate barrels. While one barrel is moving from just being fired the next barrel takes its place and shoots, while at the same time a metal cartridge is feeding ammunition into the barrel that was just fired. Not only does this reload each barrel but it also gives them time to cool down so the barrel doesn't over heat too quickly.

Next, manufacture several of these devices. And while on the high sea, place several of these "Crank Guns" above decks, while you're main broadsides are below. And when you're enemy has to spend a full round or more reloading grapeshot rounds into their large, clunky cannons, your devastating new technology is ravaging their crew with a continuous volley of bullets, coupled with your big guns tearing up their hull.

Bonus points if your character's last name is Gattling

[Berenger]

It largely depends on what kind of fantasy you are into. Do you like Pirates of the Caribbean? Use flintlock pistols! The Dark Tower? Masterwork Revolvers are what you need.

But, Sarenrae bless you, don't you ever try to use the standard Pathfinder rules for gun combat. For example, employ the damage values from d20 Modern, where a Colt .357 deals 2d12 points of damage, and 2d6 is a minimum for a gun, make a lot more sense than a pistol hitting you more weakly than a longsword.

Keep levels low enough so that this damage can actually matter.

d20 Past (a supplement for d20 Modern) also has the stats for old-timey guns of the wheel lock and matchlock variety, with damage values ranging from 2d4 / 2d6 for pistols to 2d8 for longarms. Cannons range from 1d12 (1-pounder) to 12d12 (60-pounder siege cannon). Unfortunately, they went a bit overboard with the gritty realism and gave them several drawbacks (misfire chance, even higher misfire chance in rain, no Dex modifier to hit because of low accuracy, long reload times...). So, either you should remove few of these or apply the appropriate ones to bows and crossbows as well to maintain balance.

[Tels]

But, Sarenrae bless you, don't you ever try to use the standard Pathfinder rules for gun combat. For example, employ the damage values from d20 Modern, where a Colt .357 deals 2d12 points of damage, and 2d6 is a minimum for a gun, make a lot more sense than a pistol hitting you more weakly than a longsword.

Keep levels low enough so that this damage can actually matter.

You do realize that swords can, and do, deal more damage than a gun does in real life? You can get a clean shot on someone with a regular bullet and they can survive, even be mostly fine, but you get a clean shot on someone with a longsword... its not looking good for them.

Guns didn't become the predominant weapon of the battlefield because they dealt more damage, but because you could slap a rifle in anyone's hands and make them a soldier after a very short period of training, and they dealt their damage at long range.

[el minster]

You do realize that swords can, and do, deal more damage than a gun does in real life? You can get a clean shot on someone with a regular bullet and they can survive, even be mostly fine, but you get a clean shot on someone with a longsword... its not looking good for them.

Guns didn't become the predominant weapon of the battlefield because they dealt more damage, but because you could slap a rifle in anyone's hands and make them a soldier after a very short period of training, and they dealt their damage at long range.

Do you mind supporting your first claim/paragragh with evidence?

[MoiMagnus]

Do you mind supporting your first claim/paragragh with evidence?

Going through internet, it's difficult to find a consensus, because real life humans tend to die quite easily. And the question in practice is not "how much damage" but more "is a vital organ hit".

On https://www.quora.com/I-have-heard-read-that-a-wound-caused-by-a-knife-spear-sword-etc-can-sometimes-be-more-deadly-than-several-gunshots-Is-there-any-truth-to-this I've found

As an ER doc, yes. Statically 90% of stabbing victims are DRT, dead right there. A 4 inch knife is deadly a 6 inch knife more so. A sword can cut you in half. Knife wounds are deep narrow, or deep and wide. The heart is in easy reach as are the kidneys liver and spleen. Cut those and you bleed out quickly. Bullets are blunt force trauma. Damage caused by temporary cavity formation and actual wound channel. Devasting in solid organs injurious in compressible ones. Your chance of surving being shot are excellant if you arive alive to the ER.

Ive also found here https://www.quora.com/Which-does-more-damage-a-sword-or-a-gun


Swords can do more damage than guns. They almost never do.

Swords can cut people in half - bisected at the waist, cut from shoulder to hip, that which is one has become two. That's about as much damage as any sword can do. No small arms can match that feat (though, again, “guns” is a really broad category, and there are all manner of guns that can do much, much worse than merely bisecting a person).

But.

But but but but but

BUT

Swords almost never do that kind of damage, for three main reasons.

Reason the first, not all swords can reasonably be expected to cut a person in half even under ideal or close-to-ideal circumstances.

Reason the second, it is stupidly easy to manufacture armor that is immune to sword cuts.

Reason the third, cutting that well is really hard, and requires more training than most fighting swordsmen actually need.

This last post highlight something quite important: the strength of guns is that you don't need a lot of training to use them, and that armour is ill-adapted against them. Both would probably translate as bonus to Hit, not damages.
(In fact, a modern gun could reasonably be considered to target touch AC if the enemy doesn't have bullet-proof armour)

[el minster]

However armor protects from swords and knives much better than it does against bullets

[Tvtyrant]

@gun conversation: Guns are useful because they punch through armor and have a relatively flat trajectory, so massed fire will shatter charges and massacre the very expensive professional melee units. They were bad because they were short ranged, inaccurate and slow to reload to start out and required a slowly dwindling band of babysitting pikemen to keep safe. Then they were displaced by cannons firing cannister, forcing them to resort to bayonet charges, and then again by machine guns forcing them to create thin skirmish lines and rely on mechanized weapons to move the battlefield.

@OP I would look at cannons with cannister or grapeshot as a mechanical fireball effect, letting you essentially cast a midlevel spell for free once a combat on ship.

[Railak]

However armor protects from swords and knives much better than it does against bullets

Hence why Pathfinder guns are ranged touch attacks within 1st increment on early and 5 increments on advanced.

[vasilidor]

However armor protects from swords and knives much better than it does against bullets

this is dependant on the armor, actually.

[vasilidor]

on gun damage vs. sword damage, it really is a matter of energy transferred to the target. a .45 or 9 millimeter have an approximate equal energy to a 200 pound man swinging a baseball bat focused into the surface area of a finger. this will have the injury be focused along a line passing through the body. if the round is a hollow point that round becomes a cone, and more energy is transferred to the target as the percentage of energy transferred to target increases by a significant margin, fletchet rounds increase this transfer of energy yet again. however with each increase in transfer of energy to target armor becomes more effective. a better rule for guns in pathfinder would be they ignore up to a certain amount of ordinary or natural armor as after a certain point the thickness of something like the hide of a dragon would in fact be an issue.

yes, i know, i am putting real world physics constraints on a fantasy game.

[el minster]

That actually sounds likea great idea

[Tels]

Guns ingnoring only a certain amount of armor was, in fact, James Jacob's original rules when he created the gun rules for his homebrew, and then gave them to Paizo. Paizo Devs thought it would be too complicated, and just simplified it to "target touch AC."

Anyway, the thing about bullets vs swords is that alot of bullets will do very little damage when passing through a human, assuming they are using just a plain old bullet. This is because there is so much force behind the bullet, it punctures and goes right through cleanly. Modern bullets had to be slowed down, because they were going so fast you could shoot a man 5 or 6 times and he wouldn't even be slowed down unless you hit something vital. By slowing the bullet down, more energy was transferred, dealing more damage.

Meanwhile, a guy with a sword can just cut your stomach open and you probably aren't surviving without a miracle. While you can wear armor to prevent damage from the sword almost entirely, it doesn't change the fact the sword can deal way more grevious damage to the body.

In order for guns vs melee weapons to really make sense at all, you would need to make an entire system, basically from scratch, to handle the different base damafe types, and give those damafe types different properties, and then give weapons even more properties to interact with armor and other things. As in, cutting or slashing attacks deal incredible amounts of damage, but are almost entirely negated by even basic armor. Thrusting attacks penetrate armor and can deal critical damage, but also have a strong chance of being deflected. Bludgeoning attacks can be greatly reduced by the right kinds of armor, but cannot really be negated, and maybe it damage your hp and deals non-lethal damage at the same time. Then you have guns that have armor penetration based on the caliber of the shot fired, but the shot can be modified to deal more damage at the expense of reducing the penetration if you also want to future proof it for modern weapon (and not just cowboy-esque guns).

[Dmitriy]

the problem i have with guns in pathfinder (and dnd in general) is they are all failures. they fail to represent any gun with anything remotely close to resembling accuracy. a part of this is they want the longbow to be the be all end all, and nothing can be better than their precious longbow when it comes to ranged combat. to this i say wah.
I don't know if they wanted such a situation, but yes, they have created it.


the first thing you should do with guns is change their ranges. muskets had, on average, ranges that out performed longbows. and that was before rifling. mind, they were not consistent, but there you go.
You seem to not understand the real reason why rifling makes a gun better. When a bullet flies, it flies fast, and there is huge air resistance trying to stop it. There is also drag which is constantly trying to bring the bullet closer to the ground.

A usual item propelled into the air is unstable. Take, for example, a scrunched up piece of paper and throw it -- you will notice that it: 1) rolls in its flight 2) doesn't travel in a straight line. This is because it is not stabilized. However, if you grab a bow arrow by its center of mass and throw it, or, to make things easier, make an origami plane and launch it, those objects will travel more or less straight and be more or less stable.

You can also notice that a ball of paper doesn't travel nearly as far as a properly constructed paper plane of the same mass (made of the same sheet of paper). Why?

Because rolling over consumes a lot of bullet's energy. Not only does it change the direction that it follows, it also slows the bullet down. And yes, a bullet starts to roll over very quickly.

What rifling does is stabilizing the bullet, making its flight a lot more straight. The same can be achieved by giving feathering to your projectile (arrows, paper planes).

Because of feathers, an arrow shot from a longbow can actually travel a lot further than a bullet shot from an early musket. Quoting Wikipedia (you can find all the needed references there): "The range of the medieval weapon is not accurately known, with much depending on both the power of the bow and the type of arrow. It has been suggested that a flight arrow of a professional archer of Edward III's time would reach 400 yd (370 m)[25] but the longest mark shot at on the London practice ground of Finsbury Fields in the 16th century was 345 yd (315 m).[26] In 1542, Henry VIII set a minimum practice range for adults using flight arrows of 220 yd (200 m); ranges below this had to be shot with heavy arrows.[27] Modern experiments broadly concur with these historical ranges. A 667 N (150 lbf) Mary Rose replica longbow was able to shoot a 53.6 g (1.89 oz) arrow 328 m (359 yd) and a 95.9 g (3.38 oz) a distance of 249.9 m (273.3 yd)"

We are talking about the ranges a few times higher than what muskets of the 18th century could achieve. The rate of fire is, obviously, significantly higher with a bow.

The longbow has suffered with armour penetration, though: even the cheapest padded armour could significantly lessen the damage, and full-plate armour could almost fully stop the arrow. Even the heaviest armour-piercing arrows fired at very short ranges didn't inflict much damage on penetration. Not that full-plate was common, nor were longbowmen incapable of hitting people. But armour and shields were also used for a reason.

The real thing that killed the longbow was actually the amount of training needed to wield it proficiently. People trained since early childhood to become professional archers.

With a musket, you can simply give it to a commoner, teach the reloading procedure, and you have a ready soldier. The first firearms had abysmal ranges, didn't always penetrate metal armour (as they often used stones as projectiles), and took very long times to reload, but they were cheap. The Hussite wars have shown how firearms could be wielded efficiently, but they were still far from what line infantry was equipped with.

Anyway, again, I agree that Pathfinder fails to represent anything meaningful, making its firearms neither poor man's ranged weapons (they are expensive as hell) nor something unwieldy that proves to be useful once you master it (their damage is pathetic compared to bows).

____________
On gun vs. sword damage, I can only say that guns and swords damage in very, very different ways. HP is a very rough approximation anyway, so it's probably not worth thinking too much about it.

[Berenger]

You do realize that swords can, and do, deal more damage than a gun does in real life?

In real life, every personal weapon used on a battlefield has a damage of "can kill anyone with a single unmitigated hit".

[Tvtyrant]

In real life, every personal weapon used on a battlefield has a damage of "can kill anyone with a single unmitigated hit".

Including a lucky/unlucky punch or tripping on a sidewalk crack.

[Brenden1k]

Going through internet, it's difficult to find a consensus, because real life humans tend to die quite easily. And the question in practice is not "how much damage" but more "is a vital organ hit".


This last post highlight something quite important: the strength of guns is that you don't need a lot of training to use them, and that armour is ill-adapted against them. Both would probably translate as bonus to Hit, not damages.
(In fact, a modern gun could reasonably be considered to target touch AC if the enemy doesn't have bullet-proof armour)
I disagree with any portrayal of a mordern gun as a touch attack, medieval armor can stop pistol round and muskets from what I looked up (not very reliable and the inertia might drop you anyway) the whole bullet proof term comes from proof mark on knights armor
And I think plus five Enchanted dragon scale armor is a whole new ball game.

Giving musket style, shotguns loaded with buck shot or modern pistols a plus five to aim to represent ease of use, armor penetration and speed vs bows makes sense, rifles can have the ability to trade the plus five to hit for minus 10 armor from foe for attack, thus giving them a bonus vs well armored foes,

This would have guns hitting far more often than real life, but d&d combat system is not entirely realistic. Not sure how useful these guns would be for players, I suspose if they got some sort of ranged power attack feat, it could be handy, plus ten to damage right there but it would actually make mobs of commoners possibly threatening, a five percent chance to hit becoming a 30% is quite the jump.

Stop complaining about the links forum, I am only quoting people who posted link already.

[vasilidor]

I don't know if they wanted such a situation, but yes, they have created it.


You seem to not understand the real reason why rifling makes a gun better. When a bullet flies, it flies fast, and there is huge air resistance trying to stop it. There is also drag which is constantly trying to bring the bullet closer to the ground.

A usual item propelled into the air is unstable. Take, for example, a scrunched up piece of paper and throw it -- you will notice that it: 1) rolls in its flight 2) doesn't travel in a straight line. This is because it is not stabilized. However, if you grab a bow arrow by its center of mass and throw it, or, to make things easier, make an origami plane and launch it, those objects will travel more or less straight and be more or less stable.

You can also notice that a ball of paper doesn't travel nearly as far as a properly constructed paper plane of the same mass (made of the same sheet of paper). Why?

Because rolling over consumes a lot of bullet's energy. Not only does it change the direction that it follows, it also slows the bullet down. And yes, a bullet starts to roll over very quickly.

What rifling does is stabilizing the bullet, making its flight a lot more straight. The same can be achieved by giving feathering to your projectile (arrows, paper planes).

Because of feathers, an arrow shot from a longbow can actually travel a lot further than a bullet shot from an early musket. Quoting Wikipedia (you can find all the needed references there): "The range of the medieval weapon is not accurately known, with much depending on both the power of the bow and the type of arrow. It has been suggested that a flight arrow of a professional archer of Edward III's time would reach 400 yd (370 m)[25] but the longest mark shot at on the London practice ground of Finsbury Fields in the 16th century was 345 yd (315 m).[26] In 1542, Henry VIII set a minimum practice range for adults using flight arrows of 220 yd (200 m); ranges below this had to be shot with heavy arrows.[27] Modern experiments broadly concur with these historical ranges. A 667 N (150 lbf) Mary Rose replica longbow was able to shoot a 53.6 g (1.89 oz) arrow 328 m (359 yd) and a 95.9 g (3.38 oz) a distance of 249.9 m (273.3 yd)"

We are talking about the ranges a few times higher than what muskets of the 18th century could achieve. The rate of fire is, obviously, significantly higher with a bow.

The longbow has suffered with armour penetration, though: even the cheapest padded armour could significantly lessen the damage, and full-plate armour could almost fully stop the arrow. Even the heaviest armour-piercing arrows fired at very short ranges didn't inflict much damage on penetration. Not that full-plate was common, nor were longbowmen incapable of hitting people. But armour and shields were also used for a reason.

The real thing that killed the longbow was actually the amount of training needed to wield it proficiently. People trained since early childhood to become professional archers.

With a musket, you can simply give it to a commoner, teach the reloading procedure, and you have a ready soldier. The first firearms had abysmal ranges, didn't always penetrate metal armour (as they often used stones as projectiles), and took very long times to reload, but they were cheap. The Hussite wars have shown how firearms could be wielded efficiently, but they were still far from what line infantry was equipped with.

Anyway, again, I agree that Pathfinder fails to represent anything meaningful, making its firearms neither poor man's ranged weapons (they are expensive as hell) nor something unwieldy that proves to be useful once you master it (their damage is pathetic compared to bows).

____________
On gun vs. sword damage, I can only say that guns and swords damage in very, very different ways. HP is a very rough approximation anyway, so it's probably not worth thinking too much about it.
i did mention that it was easier to train someone with a rifle over a bow. and in the ranges of muskets, i mentioned the average. yes i am well aware that the early firearms were crap. but again the muskets displayed in pathfinder were flintlocks. by the time that flintlocks were around firearms were completely outranging bows. if the bows could get close enough they could fire faster, yes. but the bows with the arrows weighed more as well for the same number of shots. there were several times when archers lost to muskets on the open field, they fared better in hills or forest where one could take away the advantage of range. please note at this point i am referring to stuff that would have been around in the 17th and 18th centuries. in the 14th and 15th centuries an archer wins about 90% of the time against a musket man. it is worth noting that the heavier armors that started to come about in the 15th and 16th century were a direct result of firearms on the field of battle. by the 18th century armor was almost entirely done away with as impractical, rifled flintlocks were too effective by that point in time. while wheel locks were often better than flint locks they did not catch on due to a lack of people who knew how to make them, too complex for most smiths to make. then the percussion cap replaced the flintlock in most fields as it yet again was an easy to make design that increased reliability yet again. it is worth noting that pathfinder list rifles with metal cartridges and it still gives them a misfire that shows up 1 in 20. grrr.

[King of Nowhere]

i will introduce guns in an industrial age d&d setting, and i'm going to heavily houserule them, because i've never seen any satisfying rendition.

there are a few premises to be made; basically, d&d world is not our world, and guns are not going to have the same effect.
d&d characters are superhuman already at mid levels. they can shrug off a dozen solid hits with a longsword, so of course they can also shrug off bullets. no surprise, no "it's irrealistic". so, when bullets bounce over your skin leaving only a superficial wound, and you can swing your sword hard enough to tear down a concrete wall in seconds, then you may still prefer the sword to the gun; again, adventurers using swords in a gunfight is not irrealistic, just a consequence of making them superhumans. still, guns level the field a bit; a high level character has nothing to fear from an army of 1hd mooks; but if those mooks have rifles (and some low level casters for support with things like dispel invisibility), then perhaps they can be a threat.
also, we know guns penetrate armor, but that's an oversimplification; in fact, historically, the finest armor managed to repel bullets until at least the 17th century, so it's not as clear cut as "ignores armor"; but it certainly has higher penetration capacity than an arrow. and when your armor is heavily enchanted, i would expect it to be reasonably effective even against modern weaponry. then again, if you cna enchant a sword or an armor, there is no reason you wouldn't enchant a gun either. in fact, given how expensive cannons are, and how much maintenance they require to not get rusty, and how they are woefully inaccurate, i expect most cannons will be at least +1, it would be only a moderate increase in cost and it will save a lot of problems.

i want guns to reflect all this.

my solution is to give guns an armor penetration (AP) factor. they ignore a part of armor (not touch attack armor, of course). most small arms have AP 5, mounted heavy machine guns have AP around 10.
it means a pistol will straight out ignore a light or medium armor, but a heavy armor may be able to deflect a glancing hit. a heavily enchanted heavy armor is still reasonably effective. and the best grade armor with the top tier enchantment may still manage to make you impervious to small arms fire. a heavy machine gun will ignore anything nonmagical, though heavily enchanted armor can provide a modicum of protection against it too.
this AP factor also allows mooks to hit adventurers more easily. it also allows them to hit monsters more easily; i can totally see a bunch of troops with guns taking on massive monsters. high caliber weapons are dangerous even to dragons.
as for flat damage, there was quite some debate on whether it is worse to be hit by a bullet or a sword; the fact that there is such a debate means it's not clear-cut. it depends on lots of factors. so, guns deal more or less the same damage of other weapons. but, some may object, this way a sword still deals more damage once you slap a good STR modifier and some power attack behind it. Yes, and again, that's just a consequence of d&d characters being superhumans. a guy with STR 30 can lift a car with one hand. a high level raging barbarian can pick up an elephant and toss it a fair distance. of course being hit with a sword by those guys is worse than being hit by a bullet. possibly their swords move faster than bullets, too. with +40 to hit and damage 20 or 30 times greater than what a regular guy would deal swinging the same sword, i fluff it by narrating high level combat punctuated by supersonic booms of the swords being swung just that fast.

finally, average cannons deal 30d6 on a touch attack (specifics depend on how the cannon is mounted; a fixed cannon can't really be aimed at anything smaller than a massed army, but a golem with a cannon mounted on its arm is another matter). canister shot deals 20d6 (reflexes halves) in a line. seemed reasonable values. if one is durable enough to survive 30 arrows, then i assume a cannonball will bounce on his chest too.

as a result of those rules, high level adventurers keep using fantasy weapons. the main exception is rogues being able to make good use of revolvers: they can get a lot of sneak attacks with them, and the armor penetration complements well their poor BAB.
armies are also somewhat more relevant than they were before. and with cannons, the regular mooks are able to take care of most wandering monsters.

[Tvtyrant]

I think it would be easier to remove the touch attacks and just give guns a really good crit range. Guns before rifling are extremely inaccurate, much more so then swinging a sword or shooting an arrow and unless you make some weird new mechanics this is hard to get across. Making them crit better and easier then other weapons is the closest to how they would really work IMO; say crits on 15+ and does 4x damage on a crit to show it hitting a vital hard.

[el minster]

If you're gonna do that drop the damage to something like a d6 on the low end to a d12 on the high end

[Yahzi Coyote]

So i'm playing in a game of the Skull and Shackles AP and my GM has given my gun-wielding besmaran cleric the schematics needed to construct both cannons and advanced firearms. What are some ways i can get the most out of this beyond the obvious first step of "build a Rifle"?
Er, I wrote a whole series about it. Sword of the Bright Lady, published by Pyr.

TLDR: guns are awesome when you're 1st level. By 17th level you really need to up your game to remain competitive with magic, though.

Edit: the other strength of guns is that you can make them bigger. There is a limit to the size of a crossbow, based on material constraints. Ballistae aren't really crossbows, and they top out pretty early too.

But guns? Just make 'em bigger and put in more powder. This doesn't top out until you're shooting bullets 12" wide over a couple of miles. The scalability of guns is important to D&D, with its huge piles of hit-points. We make guns the size we do because of the size of the targets we are shooting at. If we had to deal with 9th level fighters, the standard assault rifle round would be a .50 cal.

[vasilidor]

once you combine magic with guns, there is no reason for them to be as effective, or more than, their bow counter parts.

[King of Nowhere]

once you combine magic with guns, there is no reason for them to be as effective, or more than, their bow counter parts.

actually, there is. if a gun is better than a bow, then a magic gun should be better than a magic bow. unless magic, for some reason, works better on bows.