"Its worked for thousands of years and still works now, why would we use anything else?"
And indeed with good reason! As Natasha Brigs reported to her guild,
and I concur with her statements on the subject, many ballistic based
weapons through the utilization of advanced technologies are fully capable
of unleashing a rate of fire above most Energy based rivals. Furthermore
Ballistic based firearms are much more ideally suited to ambush situations
as it is considerably more difficult for the opposition to trace the
origin's of fire. A final and important note was later added by the Mentat
Joshive in regard to alien life forms. It Essentially stated that some
life forms encountered had appeared to be resistant, if not highly, to
energy weapons, while similar enemies existed that were resilient to
ballistics a suitable application of advanced armor piercing bullets
allowed conventional ballistics to overcome this problem vastly easier
than their Energy based counterparts. It is because of these reasons that
The Nine felt the use of both Ballistic and Energy weapons is essential to
the success of the Federation armies. Both varieties possess unique
advantages and disadvantages and it was decided the best way to fill the
gap of one was through the use of the other.
Firearms are exceedingly well spread within Techoren society. Many
individuals feel it is both their right and responsibility to own a
firearm and the various world governments encourage this, if for no other
reason than to increase the defensive potential of their world. As a
result firearms are easily acquired, though not cheaply, across the whole
of Federation space. I feel it also worth noting that the Techoren do have
gun licenses, as a way of controlling the level of firearms a person can
buy. Further more military issue firearms are just about never sold on the
open market.