This is what I was getting at with my earlier statement about wanting different rules for the lethality of guns (Post #31). You don't need them.
While some people have asked for guns to be super-lethal, that is not what I've suggested. I have pointed out that early guns were considered comparable to the crossbows of the time. The conquistadors, for instance, had equal amounts of each.
My point is, perhaps, subtle. Guns do not
reliably kill their targets with one shot, in real life, but they
often do, and early firearms either killed their targets with one shot, or they did not kill their target at all, because they only had one shot.
So, what many consider a minor flaw in D&D's combat system -- with certain advantages attached to it -- leads to jarring consequences in the game when we move from swordfights between armored men to gun-fights: you can't hunt with a gun, you can't duel with pistols, the opening volley never kills any veterans, etc.
Certainly, we see guns take down "experienced" combatants in film, but rarely with one shot.
I don't know why you'd claim that gun-shots rarely take out anyone competent in film. Certainly many protagonists have plot-protection, but ordinary grizzled veterans in a war movie don't take multiple shots to put down.
You bring up Indy- but that's 1) pulp, which is grittier than fantasy in almost all ways, and 2) it's unclear as to how "experienced" those who get killed that way really are.
Now that's just silly. Indiana Jones belongs to perhaps the least gritty genre ever, the Hollywood Saturday Matinee
Serial. There is nothing
noir or
hardboiled about it. And the fellow he shoots is obviously meant to be a paragon of martial skill. (If anything, it was humorously
against genre for Indy to shoot him.)
Furthermore, look at the great archers of action films and you'll encounter the same problem you're having with guns- they get a lot of one-shot kills.
I agreed with that point earlier. It's just more pronounced with a weapon that should bypass shields and armor, like many guns.
The inability of weapons to end an encounter with a single blow is just part of D&D's HP/damage system. No weapon needs to be singled out for beefing up.
Yes, it's an artifact of D&D's hit point system, but the problem is more pronounced with certain weapons than with others. And it's not an issue of "beefing up" certain weapons; they don't have to be
more lethal so much as
differently lethal.