Well, this would be an excuse to bring in bean bag rounds... I suppose the tazer vs armor would be an issue, but at least on a realism standpoint, I doubt they could penetrate a leather armor. Wish I could honestly find data on the penetration of the prongs, but I doubt its much more than an air rifle to be honest.
Then again, heavier duty prongs are like flechettes with wide backs, essentially shanking the target with very short razor sharp rounds designed to penetrate, but with less power....so maybe the effect would work? after all, it only requires it to poke through and hit the flesh to take effect, so I figure that might work, even if it stopped most of the force, kevlar wouldn't do shit if both prongs poked into your belly. I suppose you could assume they are heavier "flechette" style prongs, which would penetrate armor like spike boar darts.
How about a compromise, of an armor penalty with further range? Or is this possible? Like the farther you fire it, the harder time it will have going through, while point blank all the velocity will push it through?
still, I do wonder about tazers having melee, just with far less effectiveness than the prongs (less armor penetration) and less reliability behind it. Though this might screw with balance a bit, as it would make many other melee weapons redundant.
....also, why are tazers crappy? Besides the short range, they seem pretty effective to me.... ...though, I did use like 4 shots to take down a dagon morph.
...maybe you are right.