[FOCI]
Planar Character Options
If you're interested in playing someone who Brandishes a Firearm, work with the GM to make sure ahead of time that a firearm is appropriate for their game's tone, setting, or other considerations.
Brandishes a Firearm has some similarities to Carries a Gun; however, Brandishes is useful for someone in a society where firearms are vanishingly rare. It's also more about trickshots and showing off, whereas Is Licensed to Carry is more about being the best shooter ever.
Someone who Brandishes a Firearm begins with additional equipment that includes a medium handgun and handloading tools.
Someone who Brandishes a Firearm is sometimes called a gun jack.
Your situation is potentially unlike most others in that either you hail from a world of the Material Plane where mechanically exotic "firearms" are known and sometimes used, or you found—or were given—a working mechanical weapon that fires tiny projectiles with extreme ferocity at your foes. In other words, you have a pistol, and you know how to use and maintain it, as well as fashion the special ammunition you need to use it as a weapon. If you ever have to replace your gun, you must spend about three days in an appropriately plane-touched community tracking one down and must pay for an expensive item (about 250 gp) to complete the transaction to obtain another one.
For you, the pistol becomes more than just a weapon. In your hands, it is almost an extension of your skill and ferocity in a fight. Among the gun jacks and others who learn to handle a firearm, few will ever achieve the skill and finesse you hope to attain with it. Perhaps legends will one day talk of your gun savvy and skill. But only if you practice.
HANDLOADING TOOLS Handloading tools include a variety of instruments such as lubricant, a powder funnel, a small press, and other items (including special supplies) to create ammunition for your firearm. To fashion ammunition, you must spend an uninterrupted hour using the handloading tools, at the end of which time you will have created about 25 bullets. Your handloading tools contain enough consumable supplies to create a total of 50 bullets. Purchasing the raw supplies needed to restock the capacity to full costs 20 gp.
You are practiced with guns and suffer no penalty when using one.
You affix a shortsword-like blade to the end of your firearm, allowing you to use it as a medium melee weapon that you are practiced with, or as a ranged weapon as normal, interchangeably.
You can perform small tricks with your gun, including gunspinning (twirling your firearm around one finger), shooting the eye out of a playing card at long range, shooting a pipe from someone's hand at long range, shooting a coin tossed skyward at long range, and so on, after which you can reholster your weapon in the blinkof an eye. These tricks can't hurt or affect a creature that is not your ally (or their equipment); however, if you perform a gun trick to impress or intimidate a foe, that task is eased.
If you act first and your firearm is holstered, you can draw and fire your weapon so blindingly fast that you gain a surprise action against your foe, even if your foe was already aware of your presence (but not if combat has already begun). This doesn't allow your allies to act with surprise, only you. You have an asset on the attack. On a successful hit, you inflict 2 additional points of damage.
Ability Choice: Choose either Close-Quarters Gunner or Trained Gunner as your tier 3 ability.
While targeting a foe within immediate range, you can attack twice with your firearm, once with the bayonet and once by shooting, making two separate attacks on your turn as a single action. You remain limited by the amount of Effort you can apply to one action, but because you make separate attacks, your opponent's Armor applies to both. Anything that modifies your attack or damage applies to both attacks, unless it's specifically tied to a particular bullet or some enhanced quality of the bayonet.
You can choose from one of two benefits. Either you are trained in using guns, or you have the Spray ability (which costs 2 Speed points): If a weapon has the ability to fire rapid shots without reloading (usually called a rapid-fire weapon, such as an automatic pistol), you can spray multiple shots around your target to increase the chance of hitting. This move uses 1d6+1 rounds of ammo (or all the ammo in the weapon, if it has less than the number rolled). The attack roll is eased. If the attack is successful, it deals 1 less point of damage than normal.
Enabler (being trained in using guns) or action (Spray).
Once on your turn you can attacka target with a shot from your firearm in such a way that the attack comes from an unexpected direction after ricocheting off one surface. The attack is eased but inflicts 1 less point of damage (minimum 1).
You use your handloading tools to prepare your next firearm shot so that the attack is almost inaudible (instead of the normally deafening bang that accompanies your regular attacks using the weapon). This silent shot eases any tasks you attempt to remain hidden if taking a shot stealthily or while hiding this round.
Ability Choice: Choose either Never Miss a Shot or Lethal Damage as your tier 6 ability.
If you shoot at a target and miss, reroll. If you hit, it's because your shot ricochets off a nearby surface and actually hits, inflicting 2 points less damage. Each time you reroll the same shot, 2 more points are deducted from the total damage, until the wildly ricocheting shot finally hits or the damage amount goes to 0.
Choose one of your existing attacks that inflicts points of damage (depending on your type and focus, this might be a particular pistol, a special ability such as a blast of fire, or your unarmed attacks). When you hit with that attack, you inflict an additional 5 points of damage.
"Another thing that makes my ambushes so deadly is the deafening report of my firearm. That sound startles and confuses my target as much as the surprise attack itself." —Isla the Gun Jack
GM Intrusions: Even if a shot hits a foe (and especially if it misses), the velocity of the bullet may mean an additional target, object, or structure is hit unintentionally. The sound of shooting can draw unwelcome attention.