Sniper? What Snip-

Snipers. Really spooky FPS gawds. But are they any use in a ShadowRun situation? this might be the wrong forum, as it's less of a question and more my own curiosity, but I'd hate to be stomped on for putting this over in General.

Consider. The Sniper poses laying down across the street and covering the door.
the team moves into the building
The sniper remains still
The team has exciting adventure. By exciting, we mean 'they probably get torn to bits by various things going horribly wrong'.
The sniper remains still.
The team exits the building at full run and/or car chase ensues.
The sniper ... gets left behind? Drat.

I mean, how useful are they, really? Wouldn't it be better to have a Sammie with a few skills in long arms rather than someone who specializes in long arms and is utterly useless if they can't get time to stop and aim? Or setup? Thoughts on this, as it was an interesting topic of choice I had with a few fellows in real life.

And, in that regards, what about 'action snipers'? Is it really that handy to have a long barrel slung over your shoulder when your trying to sneak about with your team in close quarters?

You got the problem with pure snipers down pretty well. Sniper rifles are deadly when you get the chance to use them, but somebody who only sits in one spot and takes pot shots is pretty useless a majority of time. That said shotguns are also longarms, so a sniper could be useful if he is willing to put that scope down and get in there with the rest of the group.

Something that generally gets ignored by sniper players: A gun-adept sniper with AP rounds is often perfectly able to target using a remote link (either a drone or an image link from a fellow runner) and make a successful hit straight through a wall, sometimes more then one wall (depending on what they are made of). So even from a stationary position, they aren't quite as limited as they look at first glance. Plus the inherient cool factor of having a target hiding behind a concrete wall fall to a head-shot. And depending on the rifle you are packing, some of them can be used in close up fights just fine without loosing accuracy, so no need to swap out for that shotgun.

Now -there's- a thought. Sniper with AP round. Barrier rating? Pfft. **** your barrier rating! Of course, initial problem still remains. What about someone with a simple Remington 950, with a site instead? Still allows for close quarters rifle butting and firing, then - when the need arises - pull a Clint Eastwood and settle down with your rifle for some long range barrel explosions.

But, yes. I've been looking across character sheets, and I see a -lot- of characters with specilization in sniper arms as well, so the curiosity is double factored. But a sniper teamed up with a rigger as a spotter might be a nice duo, even though we run across the situational modifier again; How often are -you- gonna have the drop on -them-?

Plus, if you're a mage, you can attach a sustaining focus to your rifle and bind magic fingers to it, meaning your gun can now shoot from anywhere you want, including a kilometer directly above your target. As long as the gun is within your line of sight, you can fire from there.