[tshiggins]

High-tech weapons in a post-apocalyptic setting is definitely "cinematic." It works in Reign of Steel, because the apocalypse was for humans. The robots have an industrial infrastructure that works very well, thanks.

In a post-apocalyptic setting, there usually is no longer any industrial infrastructure -- that's a big part of why it's "post-apocalyptic." In such a setting, things as useful as energy-dense power cells are incredibly useful and, therefore, in increasingly short supply.

The characters will have to compete with, literally, everyone for access to items that useful, and I'd think the local powers-that-be would want a lock on the dwindling supply of such incredibly valuable commodities that nobody can make, any longer.

That doesn't mean power cells won't be available, but those that are will be ungawdly expensive, of dubious quality, and completely black-market, with everything that implies.

Me? I'd go for a flintlock muzzle-loader. Much less hassle, and dead is dead.