Pistol

Sawn off

Whippit / Short Barrels

Break open

Single barrel break open shotguns are usually sporting models or Farmers guns

Double Barrel shotguns can come with the barrels either 'over and under' or 'side by side'.

Over and under is usually a sporting model, side by side farming.

3 and 4 barrel break open shotguns can be made, but are unusual. Most are street sweepers illegally made by spot welding double barrel shotguns together

Lever action

Like a lever action rifle, the lever action shotgun uses a hand cranked lever to load and unload the shells from the chamber.

GM NOTE . The ROF of a lever action shotgun is 1 if the users REF or Rifle skill is 5 or less.

If either is 6 +, they can fire at ROF 2, but with -2 to hit.

If either is 10+, they can fire at ROF 3, but with -4 to hit

This represents them hammering out shots as fast as they can work the lever, so accuracy is lost Lever action shotguns are an old design, and are not commercially made by the big gun manufacturers. Most in circulation are old, custom made or collectors items

Pump action

The pump action shotgun uses a sliding fore-grip to load the shells The weapon can be accidentally 'short shucked' by not fully drawing the pump back before you let it return forward. This only half loads the round and jams the shotgun

Working the pump again may clear it, or it may need to be removed by hand (takes time)

NOTE: Old style shotguns use the pump being slid back to eject the shell loaded and pull a new one from the magazine, and the return motion of the pump going forward to load the new shell. Some newer shotguns use a different system to keep the shotgun compact. The pump is slid forward, out from under the barrel to open the chamber and eject the old shell, and is slid back under the gun to load the new round.

Gas automatic

The force of the shell being fired is used to eject the casing and to chamber the next round. The first round has to be chambered manually by cocking the weapon, and the gun fires at one rate of fire only.

A Dud round will stop the weapon firing and will have to be cleared manually by working the breach open and closed . Most gas Auto shotgun are also pump action, so that Duds can be cleared by working the pump.

Motorised

The motor action uses an electrical motor to work the guns action, loading, firing and ejecting the rounds at a set rate that can be varied simply by altering the motor speed.

Dud rounds are ejected by the action without an interruption in firing

Revolver

Only a few current shotguns use a revolver system. The weapon is wider than a normal shotgun, but can be shorter and more compact

The simpler model is spring loaded, rotating the cylinder one step after each trigger pull

The more complex are gas operated, using the gas from the firing of the shell to rotate the cylinder

A note on cases

Military loads are normally brass cased, longer than sporting rounds so they cannot be loaded into a normal pump action shotgun. The brass case absorbs a lot of the heat generated on firing, and so allows the automatic shotguns to run quite cool. If a CAWS was to use normal shotgun shells it could overheat and jam, possibly even warp and melt. Any shotgun capable of full auto fire that's using normal rounds counts as one class less reliable.

Brass cased ammo costs slightly more (cost x1.5) and is usually harder to get hold of, as its only real use is in Full auto weapons

Military auto-shotguns (CAWS) use 10 round box magazines like rifles, but the size of the shotgun shell keep the amount of ammo a box can hold down. At the most 20 round drums are possible

Belt feed is possible (the Rolling Thunder automatic shotguns)