Gauss Rifle (Fallout: New Vegas)

The Gauss rifle is a weapon in Fallout: New Vegas.

Characteristics
It is almost identical in appearance to the Gauss Rifle in Fallout 3 apart from the shoulder Protector

It uses 5 rounds of Microfusion Cells per shot instead of 1

Locations
Simply follow the Brotherhood of Steel quest line, and after a time, in addition to becoming a brotherhood Paladin, you are also taught to wear power armor, and can purchase a Gauss Rifle from the quartermaster in the bunker.

They can also be found in abundance on the Brotherhood Paladins inside the bunker in Hidden Valley.

The Silver Rush in Freeside sometimes sells them when you reach higher levels (around 14 or so).

One may, with luck, also be found in Brewer's Beer Bootlegging, west of the Sunset Sarsasparilla Headquarters. It is behind a locked door, inside a locked gun cabinet, though there is a key in the same area. Keep in mind though that the loot in the gun cabinet is randomly generated, so there are no guarantees.

Two Gauss Rifles can also be found in the Brotherhood of Steel firing range in Hidden Valley, right across from the quartermaster. They are on the ground in the left-most partition.

Tips
Always buy and collect all energy weapon ammo (including drained), recycling & converting ammo is free buying SEC's and ECP's and converting them to MFC's can save you time and effort later.
 * Ammo Issues

Variants

 * YCS/186 Gauss rifle: over 33% more damage and use 20% less ammunition per shot

Appearances
The Gauss rifle appears in Fallout: New Vegas.

Bugs

 * The Gauss Rifle in Fallout: New Vegas is identical to the one found in Fallout 3, and thus suffers from similar bugs, including the one that affects its damage output when used fired via V.A.T.S.. When used in V.A.T.S., any hit will do exactly 95.244% of the maximum damage, regardless of enemy DR, critical hits, or sneak attacks. This means, that with Energy weapons skill of 100, the Gauss rifle shot will do 95.244 points of damage with every V.A.T.S. shot. This is still lower than free aiming, and no bonuses are applied to headshots.
 * The above damage bug is related to the Gauss rifle's "explosion" visual effect, which affects its V.A.T.S. damage calculations. Removing the effect via user-created mods is currently the only known solution to the issue. Notably, the Displacer glove, which applies a similar visual effect on impact, is not affected by this bug.