HvZ Gun Theory: What is "Best"?

A lot of you have probably been thinking about HvZ for this coming year as much as I have, and basically two things have been occupying my mind: 1) My Clan and 2) Whatisthebestgun. Now there are a few things I want to set out before I say "Best gun", because it's obviously not that simple.

1) Each gun reflects a different type of style. An ideal squad will have a balanced combination of weapons that are both long range and short range, spread fire and semi auto, single shot accuracy and full-auto crowd control. So, when I say 'best' gun, I really mean for the all-arounder, the person that wants a good balance of range and accuracy, but focuses primarily on survival--and survival means killing zombies from a short range.

2) Short range is better than long range. Let's face it guys, if you have a dozen zombies running towards you at HvZ, and your super awesome gun pelts one in the leg from 100 yards away--they aren't going to stop. A big problem I see with HvZ is that it's extremely hard to prove kills, mostly because there isn't time for you to stand there and argue while a tide of blood-covered murderers are coming at you in full sprint. Because of that, zombie players "usually" aren't going to fess up to dying without being called out (which we just established is impossible). So, with that assumption, zombies are only really going to stop when you've killed them at a close enough range that makes it obvious that they have been shot--when you're looking at them in the face.

Please feel free to debate either of these points with me, as they help me get a better understanding of this. In my history of playing SNUG games since we started freshman year, I've found that my survival in zombie-related games goes up huuuge when I was using my recon as compared to an alpha trooper. As a bit of background: My recon only had an AR mod, that's it. Nothing else. The alpha trooper I was using had an AR mod and the OMW Stage 1 kit installed. The AT was godly, doubled the ranges of my recon, never ever jammed, and was extremely accurate. And yet, I died more often to zombies with the AT as compared to the Recon.

Why? Because of the length of the gun. The AT isn't that long--probably shorter than a raider and certainly shorter than a longshot or a longstrike. But it's long enough that it's a difficult weapon to fully turn when zombies are getting a surround on you. Yeah, I can hit one from a long range with accuracy, but zombies are never "actually" a danger until they're close to you. So, it just seems logical that you combat a short-range threat with a short-range solution. It's like carrying around a sniper in Halo in a map with corridors...and everyone has a plasma sword. You feel me?

Right, so yeah, this is the way it would go. Zombies get a surround, I shoot one, boom. Dead. Accurate, perfect. Turn not even 45 degrees and I get gun-tagged before I can even bring the rifle up to bear. I'm gone.

A Recon is 13 inches long WITH its buttstock (Barrel removed, obviously). That's almost half the size of the AR, and I find that even with its inferiority compared to the OMW Alpha, it was just "better" in zombie games. I would shoot a zombie at close range--easy, accurate enough to hit someone that close to me. I turn 45 degrees, zombie coming at me, reaches for "me" instead of my gun because the thing is literally at my side. It's dead. Rinse and repeat. I could get out of a full surround "easy". It's not because I'm particularly dexterous, it's not because I'm super fast or awesome, it's because I used a short gun and, because of it, was able to better combat a short-range enemy.

Don't get me wrong, for SNUG games like Assault, ZDM to an extent, and other human-based fights, long range wins out, but I'm speaking strictly for HvZ--basically the event of the year that we all build up so much hype for. I've talked to Jeff and Taylor about this at length, but I'm wondering what everyone else thinks about this sort of thing. Because the way I currently reason it, I'm going to be rolling into HvZ this year with a Recon bearing Stage 1 and 2 OMW kits.

tl;dr recon is the best weapon in hvz: yes or no

personally i favor the alpha trooper only because it is lightweight, works with the clip system, and out of the box its still a beauty unmodded, it is probaly one of the few guns that actually get the 30-35 ft ranges that nerf claims right out of the box, the recon is good once its been modded, although it lacks slamfire and it primed from the top of the blaster, it throws me off just a bit sometime when looking firing in quick succession, however if i wanted a slam fire capable version of the recon i would just spend the money on a quick16

I'm going to second the AT. A good alternative to the AT is a Raider pistol. Smaller than a Recon and still has slamfire.
However, I much prefer the firepower of a highly modified Stampede with Swarmfire integration
I never liked the Quick16, a hassle to mod and can't quickly change out clips. Maybe I just suck at reloading on the fly with it. It's cool design idea though, just not for me.