Rifles

A gunman knows how to keep his cool and has the reflexes to take the best possible shot.

The ability to use long guns like assault rifles and carbines, shotguns and SMGs among others. Capable of having very high damage output compared to most other weapons.

Advantages

Rifles are very, very strong, same as pistols. Dodge also seems to have little effect on tohit, making dodgy mobs and players alike cry, and they're mostly PC-, which means they're unparryable. Rifles also have access to specialized ammunition such as Iceblox and Thumper rounds, which do nigh unsoakable explosive and cold damage, and if paired with a crafter or using a crafting build, rifle users can have nearly unlimited access to hand-loaded rounds, which do much more damage than standard rounds. Rifles also tend to cause consistent, good damage, and bullet damage itself is only soakable by specialized armor or exosuits generally. Rifles, as with pistols, also have the advantage of being able to attack from cover, forcing melee users to spend time charging at them, and greatly helping you dodge enemy gun users.

Disadvantages

Just like it's a good thing, most rifles, like other guns, are PC-, which means you need to rely on your dodge or a friend to not to get hit. Cover is hard to utilize most of the time for PVE, seeing how most mid-late game enemy automatically attacks you. And just like real life, guns need ammo. Carrying a lot of ammo is a necessity, to be able to go on long stints away from automats and gun stores. The specialized ammo is also very hard to find, either from the Oil Refinery or from Camp Benjamin, and generally only small amounts of it can be gotten compared to standard/handload rounds. Likewise, hand-load rounds require a decent crafter who has familiarity with guns to make them. The top-tier assault rifles themselves are difficult to acquire, as well. Guns also take time to reload, which can cost valuable time when in the middle of fights. And gun mods also require quite a lot of money compared to their melee counterparts. Finally, guns lose a bit of durability every time you need to reload, so you either need to be best friends with a repairer or have good skill with it yourself, or have to keep managing your ammo between fights, making combining your best friend.

Weapons

10/22 Rifle - Uses .22 speedloads. Only for grinding.

M100 Rifle - Can be bought from Blastarms, your go-to gun for early game grinding.

American 180 - Uses .22 Pancakes. Highest magazine capacity and fastest speed of any rifle, best for grinding.

EMP Shotgun - The proton pack of rifles. Can be loaded with MK I and II cells for ghosts, and ectoblasts for everything else - they're fairly slow though.

Pump Shotgun - Very slow, low damage, and craft-only means you will probably never see this thing used, and rightfully so since every other shotgun in the game is better than this.

Riot Gun - Another shotgun, a step above the Pump Shotgun, but still very slow and low-damaging compared to actual rifles. Can be loaded with the same shells as all other shotguns. They're also PC1, which means you can actually parry with them.

Kel-Tec KSG Shotgun - The best shotgun, high capacity, higher damage, and faster than the Riot Gun. Can be loaded with the standard array of shells.

Vector Carbine - Only useful for grinding, and the American-180 is still better at it. Slow, and craft-only.

Needle Rifle - Uses needle clips. It's bleed damage gives it a niche roll among the rifles, since very few things (several high-end mobs) can soak bleed.

Harpoon rifle - The rifle version of the harpoon pistol. Only good for underwater fights.

Tommy Gun - Complete garbage, only good for decoration. Uses drum-magazines that are bought at Blast Arms.

TEC-9 Machine Pistol - Drops from Karnivore Seniors, very very rarely. A collectors weapon, not worth using as its damage and speed is not comparable to weapons of its level.

Rusty Gremlin SMG - Dropped by rig workers. Same stats as the TEC-9, but with a chance to explode in your face.

AK-7 - Comes in both rusty and normal versions, decent weapon early-mid game with easily available ammo.

AR-17 - Craft only, made from an AK-7 and other parts. Higher tohit and better damage, while just a bit slower. Makes better use of the 7.62mm special ammunition.

Bullpup Rifle - Former king of the rifles, stands in the midground between the SCAR-L's speed and the AR-17's damage. Uses 5.8mm rounds.

Sighted Stermgewher - A fully modded Bullpup, gotten from a few named Sky Raiders. Still uses 5.8mm rounds.

Sniper Rifle - Incredibly slow, but incredibly high damage. Using tantalum sabot rounds and aiming should allow you to instantly kill almost any player.

SCAR-L - The best easily available rifle. Lightning fast, uses somewhat common 5.56mm round, and does quite good damage. Can be switched to single, full auto, or burst.

Plasma Rifle - Very good damage, but suffers from a number of problems. For one, its a complete bitch to craft. Two, its ammo is a complete bitch to craft. Three, most high-end mobs soak burn damage to such a degree that you'd be better off using the regular (and faster) bullet-shooting rifles. Also not good for PVP since most people wear Leech anyways. It is however good for killing raider bosses if you plan on farming exoscraps. Overall its not really worth using except in very specific circumstances.

Snow white AKS-74u - Current king of rifles. The damage of the AR-17, while slightly slower than the SCAR-L. This rifle is incredibly rare, and incredibly tedious to acquire.

Strategy

Use Handloads whenever available, they far far outclass standard ammunition. If you have the rep, special ammo can be very useful (better than handloads) as long as you know which one to use where. Take cover before every engagement to make every enemy take time to hit you, or lower their tohit dramatically. Make sure to never run out of ammunition, and manage your ammo between fights unless you want to repair your gun all the time.