Sorry it was kind of hit and miss with the chat yesterday. As for the answer to your question about bowguns...Well, I've never been a big fan of them. Before I start let me say that I have not tried them in Tri yet. K, now onto the rant. You have to spend a ton of money and time buying and combining good ammo for them, their base damage is usually very low (even for the heavy ones), and you have no defensive block when they are out.
As a multiplayer "support" type weapon they are great, and some quests in previous versions it was almost required to use them ...cough, fatalis, cough. I've never found them to be as effective as say a lance or greatsword in single player mode though. End rant.
Bye the way, I finished my lagiacrus armor last night and made a couple new weapons. Tonight my goal is to knock down a couple of ratholos to make the ratholos GS and Longswords.