Honostaly untill you hit the Ascended ranks where the big "I" is picking up all your Ammo Costs who can afford the Ammo Prices (except mid ranked or higher Nobles, who still have to fire spairingly) I've found a simple way to side step the ongoing prohibitive cost of  feading a Bolt Gun or Bolt Pistol

Bolt Pistol alternitive, Best Quality Hand Canon (650 Thrones) preferabaly a Carnodon (2000 Thrones) shure the intital outlay is higher but compare Ammo Costs 18 Thrones each for a Bolt Shell to 5 thrones for a pack of 6 Manstopers, Same Damage and better Pen and slightily better range at much lower cost all your giving up is the over kill type "E" damage for type "I"

Bolt Gun Alternitive, try a Best Quality Armogedon (1000 Thrones) loaded with Manstopers, suere you give up some Pen comparativaly and Damage is "I" not ""E" but you get a Full Auto option and slightiy better range and you can always fork over extra cash for the extended clip option.

Start-up Chost is higher but a normal hand canon will have paied for it's self  in the first adventuere and an Armogedon within 2-3 and 3-5 for a Carnodon if your buying your own ammo (and if you don't need the Pen you can always use normal ammo) and it's an easer (Fel) roll to get your boss to cover the cost for a box of Manstopers than for a clip of Bolt shells.

now don't tell my GM or my Players, let's just keep it betwen you and me.

Bolt Pistol Dam. 1D10+5 vs. Carnodon Dam. 1D10+4 = Bolt Pistol better

Bolt Pistol Pen 4 vs. Carnodon 2 (Man-stopper 3) - see errata = Bolt Pistol better

Bolt Pistol Tearing vs. Carnodon Accurate = Bolt Pistol better

Bolt Pistol damage type "X" vs. Carnodon damage type "I" = Bolt Pistol better

Hand cannons (including Carnodon) are -10 to hit if used one-handed (below SB 4) = Bolt Pistol better

Bolt Gun Dam. 1D10+5 vs. Armageddon Dam. 1D10+4 = Bolt Gun better

Bolt Gun Pen 4 vs. Armageddon 0 (Man-stopper 3) - see errata = Bolt Gun better

Bolt Gun Tearing vs. Armageddon Full-Auto choice = about equal

Bolt Gun damage type "X" vs. Armageddon damage type "I" = Bolt Gun better

About all my players (Rank 6-7) wield Bolt Pistols with Red-dot to kill most mundane adversaries with a single aimed shot. Except the Guardsmen, who wields a Plasma Pistol by now…

Bolt gun loaded with inferno shells = absolute OP

Angelus + hyper density penetrators = one shot most of enemies

Storm bolter - this thing is killing machine

Psycannon rounds = insta death to psykers

And now absolute most devastating killing thing

two forearm mounted storm bolters fired as dual shot loaded with psycannons or inferno shells or HD penetrators = zilion damage in one shot 

Of and for bolt pistols choose mauler (reliable + S/3/-) or sacristian bolter 1d10+6 X - every point of dmg counts. 

In addition to Luthor Harkon's numbers, there is the fact that the Errata added Tearing to bolt weapons, making them pretty much the Grand Poobah of 'basic' weapons.

-But Drop Bear still has a valid point: if you can't afford a steady supply of bolt ammo, there are some alternatives that are nearly as good.

and sometime there is the other point, when undercover Bolt Weapons stands out and a slug thrower won't

Also if you go for "Best" quality you get the WS Bonous and the +1 Damage, also if you start to use Bolt weapons the GM will start using enimes that can stand up to them, that means you need either Stormtrooper Carapace or Power Armor to survive their attacks.

this is a good way to sneek a power up past the GM, without costing yourself the stars.

Amaimon said:

Although I get the sarcasm, you can only forearm mount pistols as far as I remember… Bolters are great but expensive and ammo is hard to come by, except when compared to Plasma or Melta… And I find pistols to be always underpowered at endgame, nothing really goes past 1d10 except for again Melta or maybe Plasma…

Back to the topic, depends on what you want… For melee combat if you have no weapon skill, a melta pistol is probably the best choice… For sniper single shots, you are probably better off with a Long Las and Hot shot charges, or something like that… Now if you are going full auto and, then a heavy weapon like a Heavy Stubber or Assault Cannon if your GM is crazy enough to allow it. If he is not which is what I would expect, and you have a lot of money to waste on ammo, then that Storm Bolter is probably a good choice.

rafaelmb said:

Neither can you use Dual Shot with auto-fire, and Storm weapons only work with Full Auto. But I do appreciate the odd Munchkin excersise in Gross OverPoweredness :)

Drop Bear said:

 "Best" quality only offers the WS Bonus and the +1 Damage to Meele Weapons,  "Best" quality Ranged Weapons instead won't jam anymore.

And if you fight with sticks and stones the GM might use only Rabbits and Squirrels as enemies, but where is the fun?

Ohh snap! I didn't really looked much into it. As for strom i probably used version of this quality used in later systems such as BC or OW. About mounting more than pistols, I guess I had the image of grey knights with strom bolters on their forearms :) Yeah I agree its munchinnes, but how coool would your character look? With bands of ammo from his arms to his backpack :D Probably it would weight a ton, but with power armour, you could manage it :)

Hey, you still can fire two strom bolters with recoil gloves :) or pistol grips. 

If we're talking about cost/effectiveness, the best weapons in this game are in my opinion:

- hack shotgun - at point blank it kill almost everyone with its one shot, get some inferno shells for extra OP flame effect

- two hand flamers + cleanse & purify - I know why this talent was removed from later versions of the game

- vanaheim - full auto + scatter = dense atmosphere

- armageddon - as said above

- simple long las or hunting rifle - the accurate quality damage bonus is too good to be forgotten

Heavy stubber is piece of shit. I dont understand this weapon. Lets compare it to armageddon. 

Arma vs heavy stubber

Range 100m vs 120m - minimun insignificant difference

RoF   S/2/6  vs -/-/10  - armageddon has more versability, 10 round full burst is not needed, you rarely hit more than 6

Dam  1d10+4 Pen 0 vs 1d10+4 Pen 3 - same damage, more pen for heavy stubber, difference can be easily negated by man stopper bullets which are cheap (it annoys me so much, that those stupid people that made campaigns to DH namely apostasy gambit, didn't read the errata; enemies have heavy stubbers with ManStR, that have 6 Pen, morons  (or form haarlock legacy inquisitors herrod lathe mono blades))

Clip 15 vs 20 = 2 FA + SA burst vs 20 FA burst - clear heavy stubber win, as expected for HMG which it supposedly is; solution - fire selector

Rld Full vs 2 Full - armageddon win

Qualities - reliable vs -  

Weght 8,5 kg vs 35 kg - armageddon is heavy gun, but heavy stubber is 4 times heavier. Total weight of arma with FS is 9

Cost 100 vs 750 - this is the biggest bullshit. 750 for what? I dont get it. Total cost of armageddon with FS and 3 clips of MS is 179

One shot weapons are one shot and can easily be dodged easily. Shotguns on point blank offer large number of hits, and high chance of hitting, plus ammo versability. 

In hth they still can inflict multiple hits. If you have acrobatics, you can disengage as half action and then shot someone in the face. Or just walk away, risk taking the hit (40something%) and then shot someone in the face. Im talking about hack shotguns or pistol shotguns of course. Hack shotguns are better because of the bigger chance for righteous fury. Trust me, I killed bloodletters with these. 

Dude were talking about weapon you use, when you can't afford using boltguns, or don't have weapon training to use them, or as a backup weapons. Of course blotguns are better at every aspect.