who actually uses a sidearm??

I only take one on Krogans because of their large carry weight. It's handy to have a carnifex (or an ushior whenever I unlock it) to damage sync kill enemies from range if I'm rocking a Hesh or Ruzad, but that's about the only time I ever use it.

In ME3MP only the Acolyte needed a sidearm depending on the kit it was being used on.

In Andromeda, I've yet to find a reason for doing so.

I don't have time to switch weapons. Same in ME3. I also don't want some ugly weapon on the back or hip messing up my toon's aesthetics.

<insert Mom joke>

I still use the hurricane + scorpion combo because it hits right under the weight threshold for almost all of my characters. scorpion was great for longer range fights back when hurricane had shitty bloom, but since 1.08's accuracy buffs, the scorpion hasn't seen much gametime.

A sidearm would make sense in the context of SLOW ASS RELOADS if switching guns was quick (and possibly uninterruptible). Like, CS 1.6 quick.

As it stands? Generally pretty pointless.

Weapons aren't heavy enough to matter.

There is no reason to carry any gun for its light weight in this game. The best guns are practically weightless anyways.

This means you are always carrying an effective primary that does it's job better than any secondary would, and there is enough ammo on the maps that it doesn't really matter either.

Only when serving drinks...

Sidearms are mainly a Human Splodier thing for me. PAW for priming, Sidewinder + Turbocharge for heavier targets (feels like the Mattock should).

Melee classes also get a sidearm, to do some whittlin' whilst uploading/hacking.

It depends on the character and main weapon.

On something like the Asari Adept with main weapon = Hurricane or Equalizer, I will take a sidearm like the Sidewinder or the Scorpion so I can shoot something from long range when stuck in a Hack or Upload.

On any character using the Dhan I will take a scoped pistol or SR sidearm for similar reasons.

Basically if I have the weight to spare I'll always take a sidearm because why not?

It's fun to bring two pistols to a pistol+50 Apex match, or whichever weapon type applies.

I brought a ruzad and PAW to the 11 wave match last night on my Kroguard. Lucky I did because the CQ gameplay was a lag shitshow and made off host headshots seem like a good deal.

But Bioware failed to make weapon classes different enough to matter. Aside from mods, the only class specific tweak I can think of is the snipers' hipfire penalty which I put in the overworked bag of things that were unimaginatively carried over from ME3 which consists mostly of player penalties and much less so of perks.

Some tweaks that would make two weapon loadouts more appealling
- Variable Pistol / shotgun damage drop at range. Improves ARs and gives a reason to have an SR/SMG loadout.
- Do something other than the hipfire penalty to make SR use difficult in CQ.
- Give all the snipers at least the 2x headshot bonus.
- Make significant changes to the weapon mods available to each class
-- Delete the Pistol scope and replace it with a range extender to reduce range penalty.
-- Broaden the difference between Pistol and shotty melee mods or put an accuracy penalty on the Pistol melee mod.
-- Broaden the difference between weapon class Receivers and maybe just delete the Pistol receiver entirely

I do. My human soldier goes through Cyclone ammo very fast, and many times I had to switch to backup Charger to keep shooting till I can get to ammo box.