One of the things I don't like in the game isn't so much a rule as it is an application of the rules. Players will obviously want to upgrade their equipment to better equipment considering the sheer quality difference available. However, this comes up against a fundamental problem in the psychology of people. They like what is familiar. A gunslinger will most often stick with his trusty gun over any new fandangled contraption because they have an intimate knowledge of that weapon and know how to get the most out of it.

Unfortunately, roleplaying an attachement to a weapon doesn't often aid you in any way and can actually hamstring you (only using your lascarbine in the face of plasma guns and heavy bolters).

So I'm trying to create a balance between gear porn and collecting the next best thing and the comfort of using your trusty sidearm.

What I'm thinking is that someone that has carried a weapon since character creation gets a familiarity bonus to its use. This sort of thing wouldn't be available until ~4th rank or so to ensure it's earned and also to keep pace with those who prefer to upgrade all the time. It would be a talent bought with XP to represent the extensive training with this specific weapon. And it would only be ONE weapon, not a group or type of weapon. It should also have a name or at least a personality - 'she kicks to the left but **** does she put the heretics down!' sort of thing.

Now, this could actually be a sequence of talents that stack one atop the other rather than a one off thing, but I don't want it to be too complicated.

At the moment I'm thinking that the simplest solution is to grant the Accurate quality to a favourite weapon.

Other ideas include maximised damage (still roll to produce RF though) although this could have an uneven effect due to the weapon damage levels

Increase point blank to short range instead.

It's a tricky balancing act because I don't want people to never want new gear without also penalising those people who want to stick with their faithful sidearm.

Thoughts?

Hellebore

One thing I did for my players is after they go through creation and pick their free acquisition, I let them chose one of their ranged weapons. That weapon gains the customised quality.

That's an option, but it's not particularly powerful. My intent is to allow a player with a lasgun to compete with a player with a boltgun or plasmagun. To try and take the focus off gear porn and continually upgrading equipment.

Hellebore

Hellebore said:

The higher their profit factor, the quicker they acquire the best possible gear for themselves unless you limit the number of tests they can roll. I let my players make as many acquisition rolls as they like between endeavours (only once for each item) and, even with a starting profit factor of 20, I expect them to upgrade their personal gear to the best they can get after only a few endeavours, excluding stuff they can't use yet (If they don't have the skills/talents to use it, I don't let them try to acquire it). The focus has already shifted to equipping their minions.

So if your players are anything like mine, the upgrading will quickly stop except for a few areas:

- Items that weren't available before becoming available. For example, gear introduced in new supplemental books.

- Items that didn't look useful before, but something has changed their mind. For example, only one of my players is even thinking about grenades right now*, but I expect that to change once NPCs show them how useful they can be.

- Items they can't use, and therefore can't acquire. Yet.

But in all of those cases it will only be a short period before they upgrade their new gear to full. Especially if they have a high profit factor or use fate points for their acquisition tests.

*So far he has acquired a grenade launcher but has failed every single test to acquire grenades for it