M6G Pistol

* M6G
* M6C SOCOM

## M6G Personal Defense Weapon System

Medium-Range

* UNSC
	+ BR54HB Battle Rifle
	+ MA5E Assault Rifle
	+ M247 Machine Gun
	+ M41 Rocket Launcher
	+ M310 Grenade Launcher
* Covenant
	+ Plasma Rifle
	+ Brute Plasma Rifle
	+ Spiker
	+ Needler
	+ Void's Tear
	+ Brute Shot
	+ Hunter Beam Cannon
	+ Hunter Fuel Rod Cannon
* Forerunner
	+ Sentinel Beam

Long-Range

* UNSC
	+ M393 Designated Marksman Rifle
	+ SRS99C-S2 AM Sniper Rifle
* Covenant
	+ Particle Carbine
	+ Focus Rifle
* Forerunner
	+ Sentinel Sniper Beam
	+ Sentinel Light Rifle

The **M6G Personal Defense Weapon System** (M6G PDWS), more commonly referred to as the **M6G Magnum** or simply the **Pistol,** is a United Nations Space Command infantry firearm, and is one of the variants of Misriah Armory's M6 sidearm series.

## Overview & Background

The M6G is an all-purpose pistol, which saw heavy use during the Battle of Reach. In the hands of a Spartan-II like the Master Chief, the weapon can be fired with pinpoint accuracy up to a certain range when fired slowly. The Master Chief is an expert with this weapon, and when using its smart-linked zoom, he will never fire the weapon at a rate at which it will lose accuracy. This means that it will fire at a slow rate of fire when zoomed. However, when unzoomed, the gun can be fired at an alarmingly quick rate, outputting massive damage while burning through its relatively shallow magazine. Like all pistols, it is headshot capable.

## M6C SOCOM

The **M6C SOCOM** or the **M6C** is the standard-issue secondary weapon for the ODSTs and the starting secondary weapon for SPARTAN II May-017 in Lumoria. Unlike the common M6G Pistol, the M6C SOCOM comes with an internalized suppressor and an extended magazine. This makes the pistol a powerful stealth weapon for beginners, as its internalized suppressor do not take up much of the player's view in contrast to other suppressed weapons. Moreover, its extended magazine of four more extra rounds, allows the M6C SOCOM to deliver an increase fire rate and a last minute headshot. The M6C SOCOM comes with a targeting laser sight, making hip firing easier; combined with the Pistol's scope and the SOCOM could actually be a viable weapon even in late game.

## Gameplay Information

### Advantages

#### General

* The Pistol deals relatively high damage per shot, allowing it to rapidly punch through Brute armor and low-ranking Elite energy shielding.
* The Pistol has an "uncapped" rate of fire, meaning that the weapon can fire as fast as the player can pull the trigger. This makes for an extremely dangerous emergency weapon at close range, as an adept player can counteract ambushes by performing a magazine dump (emptying the magazine as fast as possible) into the aggressor.
* The Pistol possesses near-perfect accuracy while scoped in which, combined with its ability to instantly kill via headshots, makes it into a proficient precision weapon capable of sniping enemies from close-to-medium range.
* The Pistol is easily among the more powerful and versatile Close-Quarters Combat weapon on offer, combining the above benefits with fast reload times/melee strikes (compared to other weapons capable of performing headshots) which allows the weapon to rapidly eliminate entire squads of adversaries.

#### M6C SOCOM

* It comes with an internalized suppressor, making it good for stealth kills *and* not taking too much of the player's view when compared to other suppressed weapons.
* High magazine size allows for extra shots and higher fire rate.
* Laser sight grants a more accurate hip-firing.

### Disadvantages

#### General

* Bloom will cause the Pistol's accuracy to quickly degrade while fired unscoped, restricting magazine dumps to close-range encounters.
* While scoped in, the Pistol's rate of fire is restricted to 2 rounds per second, drastically reducing the weapon's burst-damage capabilities and forcing the user to rely more on sniping for headshots when engaging enemies at range.
* Compared to other weapons capable of performing headshots, the pistol has a drastically shorter effective range, making it a strictly close-quarters weapon with limited medium-range applications.
* Due to its small 8-round magazine and 80-round reserve ammo capacity, the Pistol cannot be retained for extended periods of time should its ammo be expended in a wasteful manner.
* This more or less forces the player to primarily shoot for headshots when using the Pistol, as it is the most ammunition-economic option available.

#### M6C SOCOM

* Large magazine size and higher fire rate means that the M6C SOCOM could easily burn through ammo.
	+ As such, the SOCOM has less magazine per rounds than the M6G.
* Compared to other marksman weapons in Lumoria, the M6C SOCOM has the lowest damage-per-shot in its category.

## Developer Information

The Pistol is central to *Halo 1* and we wanted to honor it, yet it had to change due to the addition of the Battle Rifle, DMR, and Carbine. With the Battle Rifle taking the role of the pistol with its 12 bursts per clip and roughly identical damage, the Pistol needed to redefine itself. The idea of a pistol with bloom in *Halo: Reach* was a mixed bag, with it becoming annoying to use in some situations, but fun in others, noticeably at close range.

The zoom behavior from *H1* was retained, making it an effective mini rifle, albeit with a reduction in range to give the BR and DMR an edge at longer range combat. We added a feature designed for the BR's single shot behavior, allowing us to modify the rate of fire when a zoom state was detected that was added by OpenSauce. We then combined that with the Sniper Rifle's functionality of having total accuracy when zoomed in to get consistent and reliable behavior.

Meanwhile, the rapid-fire functionality from Reach was brought in, which gives the gun a unique purpose in tight spaces, like the Pillar of Autumn. This was questioned by some, as the first half of the game gives you few spaces where this is useful. However, we knew this would be important once the Flood were introduced, where players would want to take advantage of its close range capabilities and fast melee attacks, especially since the Flood now have a headshot capable region on their chests.

The Pistol was then made the most commonly distributed headshot weapon among levels, so that players could always get a headshot capable weapon, but not one that would be the best necessarily for headshots. Due to its inferior nature, we hoped people would have to make better decisions and weigh the trade-offs of dropping their rifle.

Likewise, it is paired with the more powerful load-out weapons in order to make sure the player does not have to much of an advantage over the other choices.

## Trivia

* The pistol has a range of 30 world units, compared to the 40 on the BR and 50 on the DMR. For perspective, a Frag Grenade has a max radius of 3.5 world units.
* The M6C SOCOM functions almost exactly the same as its counterpart in *Halo 3: ODST*.
* Along with the AMPED DMR, the SOCOM M6C Pistol is part of the Rebel Assassin load-out in The Truth And Reconciliation, making them the only two Lumoria exclusive weapons usable in the Installation 04 Campaign.

## Gallery

The Pistol's evolutionM6G's first person view.M6G's scope.The M6C SOCOM's first person view. Note the laser sight.The M6C SOCOM's scope.