EDF Sidearm

[Carolyn Saarinen]

In the spirit of ideas regarding an EDF uniform I've been giving some thought to the notion of a suitable EDF sidearm to complete the look. You might not believe it, but 'ray guns' are actually hard to find in 2L. I bought one or two but they just weren't right, but I thought I was on the track of something when I found this:

Now clearly, this is a Steampunk ray gun, but it seemed in the spirit of what I wanted. It has both visual and sound effects, and can be drawn, though not fired. I contacted the maker TracyLynne Carpenter and she made me a gift of a design which wasn't for sale:

This, I think you'll agree, is more the Extropian style. It too has visual and sound effects, but cannot be drawn. It still wasn't exactly what I wanted. TLC was willing to work with me though and I did some digging, finding a company that makes prop weapons like these:

The middle one especially took my fancy. I showed it to Tracy and she came up with these proposals:

TLC especially favours the type with the 'tank' accessory as seen in the bottom row. Here's one modelled by TLC herself:

At present however, things have stalled a bit. TracyLynne's favoured scripter is very busy and she does not feel that there would be enough demand to justify the cost - to her - of finding another scripter. To help things along, I have the following thoughts:
*Does anyone else, like the looks of this weapon as much as I do? If I can report the existence of more potential buyers to TLC, it would be a help I think.
*Is it vital - at least for now - that the weapon is firable or would a drawable version do for now, with the possibility of an upgrade later?
*Does anyone in the EDF have the scripting skills to help TLC finish the project? Hopefully avoiding either the cost of an expensive third party scripter or the delay of waiting for TLC's usual person?

[Cdr. Vidal "Trip" Tripsa]

I suppose I could ask Galatea about the script for this gun, which I modelled to a similar Weta Workshop design a few months ago... ^^;

It shoots non-combative ray beams (bullet-style ammunition doesn't feel the same anyway), but doesn't 'draw' as such. The designs your friend came up with are pretty nifty, and a holster is always a fun addition to a pistol.

Since you brought it up, I do highly recommend Dr. Grordbort's Contrapulatronic Dingus Directory, from which that scan is taken as a catalogue guide to Weta's rayguns website.