This is a great story so far and I can’t wait to see more of it

I havent read a single word of this story but when i saw that its derpy focused its instant favorite

Is...is he going to hunt diamond dogs? I'm not sure I understand the motivation. How does he plan to get money from the dogs with his gun?

11811780
He's hunting gems and he's packing primarily out of defense. I don't think he's looking for a fight but, considering his told background so far, he knows a fight might come looking for him. Gems are worth bits as Spike said before after all and with no better choices, he's going for what he can.

I hope he doesn't end up shooting any dogs. Even if they are a nuisance, I doubt ponies would take kindly to killing.

this is swaggin

Im in love with this story!

No, no, no, no! I can't catch up now! I need to read more!

11811780
I can see 3 options:

1 - The weapon is for self defense and taking all evidence will be so that the technology doesn't leak. The comments about using this as a springboard is to get starting capital so that he can move onto something else.

2 - He's intending to let them do the finding and digging and then killing them for the end product once the work is done. Again, using this as starting capital, and covering his tracks with evidence.

3 - He's going full murder-hobo on the idea of them being Earth-quality "Raiders and Slavers" and will bring back loot and freed slaves, presumably. His motivation on cleaning up his methods is unclear here unless he is merely trying to suppress the tech.

My money is on 1. 2 is a bit cold blooded and I doubt his ability to handle 3.

With firearms, even flintlocks, being unheard of in Equestria I'd imagine that just shooting a round into the air would be more than enough to spook any would-be Diamond Dogs looking for a fight. Guns are loud and if you have good hearing, well, it's even worse. Foraging for gems could work out for the guy since it's a necessary commodity. I do hope he takes into consideration how precious every bullet is because there's no way to get them back.

As far as humans making a weapon out of anything, a blunderbuss wouldn't be too difficult (don't the griffons have them?). Obviously, substitute some magic or alchemical process for the black powder, but the rest is fairly forgiving with no precision machining available. Getting things made is a different story, especially since a lot of ponies in town are distrustful of the man and shun him.

11812365
Well, that and he's pretty much broke.

Assuming the chemistry is the same, he could create black powder. I agree a blunderbuss type weapon would be the easiest, or some other shotgun-type weapon that shoots shot. They have steam trains, so they could in theory machine out weapons from the mid 1800's, since they have the ability to create the metals and machine the parts for the trains. The fulminate of mercury might be a bit of a problem to create though :) At least without losing yet another body part in the process.

Wonderful, please 🙏 don't let this one die

something's definitely going to down soon, but it doesn't seem like it'll go too far with the lack of a dark tag

11812832
There will be violence though, we can count on that!

11812379
You could use silver fulminate as well, since silver is seemingly more common in equestria. Just not quite as powerful, but still sensitive enough to work and ignite a charge.

🐉❤

What’s he going to do? Take over the burrow and make them work for him?