History Main / GunsAreWorthless

* L.E. Modesitt, Jr.'s ''Literature/TheSagaOfRecluce'' novels have fairly good reasons why any weapon using gunpowder is useless. Chaos mages can set off gunpowder from a distance (typically somewhere outside the maximum effective range of the average firearm), or else make themselves invisible so as to get close enough otherwise. It isn't until late in the series chronology that we see firearms deployed to any great effect by any considerable force, and then it's essentially because shell casings have been invented (the shells prevent a chaos mage from tampering with the powder). Until this happens, arrows (particularly iron arrows, because chaos mages have a rough time with iron) are nearly the only reliable projectile weapons in the series.

* Averted to Davy Jones' locker and back. In ''VideoGame/NewHorizons'', pistols and rifles are extremely powerful weapons, and can one-shot anyone and everyone. Some fights are solely decided by whoever draws - and hits - first. A cautious captain will equip some decent armour and pick some damage-reducing skills.

* ''VideoGame/MissionImpossibleKonami'': Out of your three agents, Max is the only one using a gun. While it naturally has much greater range compared to Grant's fists and Nicholas' boomerangs, all three weapons deal the exact same amount of damage to enemies. Both Grant and Nicholas can also hit multiple enemies at once in the right scenario, while Max's rifle is only ever capable of hitting one target at a time.

** Averted by the only two firearms that [[SurprisinglyRealisticOutcome actually take advantage of the fact that the Hunters are super-strong]] -- [[{{BFG}} the Gatling Gun and the Cannon]]. The former does about as much damage as other firearms like the Rifle Spear and Hunter Pistol per shot, but with a much higher [[MoreDakka rate of fire and capacity]].[[note]]It also shoots four bullets for every Quicksilver Bullet consumed to make it actually usable. So e.g. it and the Rifle Spear both do 85 damage at base per bullet, but one Quicksilver Bullet will give you 340 damage for the Gatling Gun and only 85 for the Rifle Spear.[[/note]] The latter is basically a light field gun that fires explosive shells; it doesn't gain much from a high bloodtinge stat, but its base damage is so high that it can kill most enemies in a single hit (and take out small clustered groups) and, with the help of a CriticalAttack multiplier or Bone Marrow Ash, take out even bosses in just two or three shots. Both weapons are prevented from being [[GameBreaker Game Breakers]] because they're both TooAwesomeToUse; even with min-maxed stats, you can only carry enough ammo to fire the Cannon three times or the Gatling Gun for a few seconds, without resupplying.

* Gun based characters from ''Franchise/MortalKombat'', particularly Ultimate Mortal Kombat 3's Stryker and later, more such characters, subvert this somewhat. Due to the game's balance, while guns can be beaten, they are surprisingly effective at chip and regular hit damage in MOST matches, and PROBABLY because they're superior to pretty much any other projectile attack in the game and have low or no startup and cooldown. Stryker was infamous for this, as his "shoot gun" attack (in both UMK3 and MK9) was so good that it's possible to win entire matches using only shoot gun, and take no damage.

** The difference lay between smoothbore muskets and rifled muskets (early rifles). Rifles are so-named for having rifled barrels - that is to say, there is a texture inside the barrel which introduces a spin onto the bullet as it is fired. The net result is a stabilized bullet which flies a lot straighter. High-quality rifles of the time were quite accurate weapons in the hands of skilled marksmen, while smoothbore muskets were not. Rifles had only seen limited use before the 19th century because it was a pain to shove a sphere down a grooved barrel, limiting their firing rates to 1 shot per minute; this was changed by the introduction of the [[https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Minié_ball Minie ball]], which allowed rifles to reload as fast as smoothbores with no loss in lethality. Experiments at the time found that the smoothbore muskets used by soldiers would only strike a target at typical combat ranges roughly 40% of the time. It is commonly claimed that the Civil War was fought using outdated tactics with more advanced weaponry, but the reality is that due to the nature of command and communications at the time, fighting in large line formations was often the only practical way to conduct an organized battle. In situations where other tactics were available for use, fighting changed considerably; some of the later battles in the Civil War featured early TrenchWarfare. Additionally, over the course of the Civil War, increasingly sophisticated weapons became more and more affordable. The reason that muskets were used was not because they couldn't build anything better - repeating rifles were invented prior to the American Civil War, [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Kalthoff_repeater more than 200 years prior]] - but because such weapons were too expensive (and broke too easily) to supply all their soldiers with one.

* The first ''Film/{{Tremors}}'' movie goes back and forth on this: survivalists Bert and Heather do gun down one Graboid with their arsenal when it smashes through the wall into their basement "rec room", but the rest of the time, the creatures are burrowing through the ground, and even powerful guns can't get enough penetration to do any damage.

* ''VideoGame/Tekken8'': Nina Williams now carries a pair of pistols that she incorporates into her fighting style. She can fire multiple shots from point-bank range into her opponent and still do less damage than one of her more powerful kicks does.

* In the latest ''VideoGame/{{Tekken}}'' game you can equip a character with various firearms that are actually useable during a fight. The input to use them is a little tricky to get the timing down, and while they provide a nice ranged attack they don't do much damage at all.

** Ultimately, it is inverted by the fact that Hellboy also uses a pistol, but a rather large one firing special bullets made specifically to fight demons.

** In ''Film/JurassicPark'', Alan Grant's SPAS-12 loaded with slugs proved unable to even hit ''Velociraptors'' behind glass, and the weapon suffered a stovepipe jam in the end.
** In ''Film/TheLostWorldJurassicPark'', the hunters pretty much killed nothing with their automatic rifles, and Ronald Tembo's double rifle was unable to take down a ''T. rex'', because [[SarcasmMode good guy]] [[DesignatedHero Nick]] stole the bullets.

** Gray Fox in ''VideoGame/MetalGearSolid'', Olga Gurlukovich in ''VideoGame/MetalGearSolid2SonsOfLiberty'' and Raiden in ''VideoGame/MetalGearSolid4GunsOfThePatriots'' are not only ImmuneToBullets thanks to their armored exoskeletons, they also have the options of either [[DodgeTheBullet dodging]] or [[SuperReflexes deflecting]] the bullets with their blades depending on whichever they feel would be cooler at the moment. The Black Ninja from ''VideoGame/MetalGear2'' gets a special shoutout for also being fairly capable despite lacking these advantages.

*** The Renaissance-era weapons are only slightly stronger than crossbows, and share all the attributes that make them lag behind standard bows (you can't attack and reload in the same turn, and users with higher stats don't deal any more damage) but ''without'' access to Rapid Reload, Crossbow Sniper or any of the other support options that can be used to make crossbows more effective. They also don't have any kind of AntiArmor properties, which in 3.5 are exclusive to {{Projectile Spell}}s and certain buffs or fighting techniques.

** 3.5 falls squarely into this. While most settings don't really use them, the Dungeon Master's guide has rules for some modern weapons. Notably, they're treated as being harder to master than standard medieval weapons (exotic rather than simple, suggesting the difficulty is due to lack of familiarity), they don't do much if any more base damage than standard projectiles (and can't be modded to factor in ability score modifiers, but also don't suffer penalties for low strength), and there aren't any special rules for how they interact with armor or shields suggesting that they don't penetrate (which goes down to how abstract Armor Class works in the first place). They can still be enchanted, though.
*** This is due to the fact that characters gain hit points as they progress while weapon damage remains constant. This means that an experienced SWAT member is way more bulletproof ([[{{Handwave}} or can dodge more]]) than a rookie beat cop (who can die after one lucky shot from a 9mm pistol).

*** There's also a more pragmatic reason: the very first Law of Magic is that ThouShaltNotKill a mortal with magic, and doing so earns you the wrath of the Wardens, relentless wizard "cops" who enforce the Laws with AntiMagic {{Cool Sword}}s. Of course, as long as you're not killing ''with magic,'' the Wardens don't give a crap; hence guns.

*** Modern and futuristic firearms are much more effective. They do much more damage, can be used with extra attacks without the need of the Gunner feat (making all other ranged weapons obsolete) and some get an AreaOfEffect attack (spraying an area with bullets that requires a Dexterity save instead of high armor class). There are no listed prices for these firearms or their ammunition as it is expected that the players will not have easy access to such powerful weapons.
*** The Artificer class can cast spells via the weapon (which can be a gun), enchant weapons (including giving them BottomlessMagazines) and the Artillerist subclass can summon magical cannons.

[[folder:Anime and Manga]]

* In ''Manga/{{Shiki}}'', firearms are ineffective in vampires because they are undead and can regenerate quickly. Unfortunately, the villagers quickly find out how to effectively fight the vampires. [[spoiler:A shotgun to the head though tend to do the trick]].