In the 5th Edition Dungeon Master's Guide, there's a chapter called "Dungeon Master's Workshop," which is all about different rules you can add or alter in your own game. For example, they suggest Honor and Sanity as additional ability scores for players to roll up when they start (the latter being one I have mixed feelings about, which is probably the subject for a different post.)
Now, a lot of people prefer their fantasy remain strictly Medieval in terms of technology level, and to them that often means no guns. I'd point out that early muskets and cannons definitely started showing up in the late middle ages, but my greater point is that I've always found this requirement to be very limiting. A lot of the biggest fantasy influences on me - like Stephen King's Dark Tower series or the Final Fantasy (and other Squaresoft) video games - certainly did not limit themselves like this, but you'd still very much identify them as fantasy.
There is a problem, though, when it comes to handling firearms. Mechanically, weapons in D&D do a certain die or set of dice of damage. A shortsword does 1d6 piercing damage before you add in the character's modifiers. A maul does 2d6. And a glaive does 1d10.
Firearms were revolutionary in the real world, changing the way that battles are fought. While the slow speed of firearms made melee combat still quite viable for centuries, at this point modern soldiers only fight hand-to-hand in extremely desperate situations.
One of the major ways that firearms changed warfare was that bulky plate armor was no longer useful. The rich noble knights who were covered in solid metal used to be able to weather most attacks - in fact, the development of long weapons like a claymore was enabled by the fact that, in full plate, there wasn't much of a point using a shield anymore.
Now, longbows were certainly an early counter to this kind of heavy armor, given the profound power behind their arrows. But longbows required extreme strength and training to use properly. A firearm got more of a punch and certainly by modern days is far easier to use.
It makes sense, then, for firearms in D&D to deal more damage than their medieval counterparts.
But where does that leave us in terms of game balance?
As an example: in D&D, the longbow does 1d8 piercing damage, plus your dexterity bonus. That's an average of 4.5 damage + dex. Meanwhile, a hunting rifle - one of the modern weapons - does 2d10 damage plus your dex, which is an average of 11 plus dex. Even if you were to try to balance firearms by removing the dexterity bonus to their damage, you'd still be better off with a hunting rifle than a longbow even with your dexterity maxed-out.
Firearms do have the loading property, which can slow down their use similar to crossbows (unless you take the feat Crossbow Expert.) But many firearms only need to be reloaded after several shots, meaning that you'll often not have to reload until the current combat encounter has ended, with little price to the action economy.
And this is of course before you get into the futuristic weapons. Laser pistols do 3d6, Laser rifles do 3d8, and antimatter rifles do a whopping 6d8. These weapons also do non-physical damage, and in the case of lasers, they do a type of damage that can often have additional beneficial effects when fighting things like vampires or other undead.
Now, I bring this all up as a DM who has happily introduced guns to his homebrew setting. And yes, even futuristic ones. Currently, the Rogue has temporarily surrendered his laser pistol so that an NPC ally can construct a laser rifle.
Admittedly, the damage of a weapon has different impacts depending on the class.
As a rogue, that player only has one attack per turn. And more of their damage is coming from sneak attack (which, as a wood elf with a cloak of elven kind, he nearly always gets.) His sneak attack is currently 5d6, and so with a laser pistol, it has been a total of 8d6 damage plus his dex (so an average of I believe 33 when he hits.) Now that he's using a longbow temporarily (he's a wood elf, so he's proficient,) it's 1d8+5d6+5, or 27 average damage. So admittedly, he's doing only 80% of the damage he'd be doing with his laser pistol. However, at level 9, I figured it was fair to give him a +1 longbow, so it's actually 1d8+5d6+6, and with a bonus to hit. So that means it's closer to 85%, plus he hits more frequently.
One way in which I could imagine limiting firearms is by declaring that the magic to enchant them hasn't been figured out yet. This could be a very significant nerf when dealing with creatures resistant to non-magic damage (though this doesn't work with futuristic weapons) but I think also creates an interesting tension for players.
Let's return to the Hunting Rifle vs. the Longbow. And to take it to the extremes, we're looking at an unmodified rifle versus a +3 longbow (we could even go crazy and give them +3 arrows - I need to see if the existence of magic "+" ammo means you can't have "+" bows, or if that's just meant to be a special bonus for a class that has to use consumable ammunition.) Assuming you've maxed out your damage stat (Dex,) you'll be doing 1d8+8 damage with the longbow, and if you're level 20, you've got a +14 to hit. Meanwhile, if you're using the rifle, you're doing 2d10+5 and have a +11 to hit.
Comparing the damage alone, you get 12.5 with the bow and 16 with the rifle - but you hit less frequently.
In fact, even if we give ourselves that +3 ammo, the average damage is still just shy of the rifle, at 15.5. Now, at this point you've got a +17 to hit, which even at level 20 means you'll be hitting everything other than the Tarrasque more often than not.
Again, given the prevalence, especially at those levels, of creatures that have resistance to non-magical weapons, that damage advantage the rifle has will dry up very quickly.
But lore-wise, if firearms exist, why shouldn't people be able to enchant them the same way?
Essentially, I think that there are some balancing issues that arise when you choose to make firearms a part of your setting. For the most part, melee classes are rewarded for risking themselves in closer quarters by giving them access to harder-hitting weapons. The Paladin swinging a greatsword gets 2d6 (average damage of 7) to the Ranger's longbow's 1d8 (4.5) but doesn't get to duck behind cover after attacking. If a Fighter can go with a Dexterity build and slam targets for 2d10 damage four times in a round, why play a Strength fighter swinging a mere 2d6?
Right now, my plan is to simply reduce the other magical bells and whistles that firearms get in my setting. You can also consider making ammunition for them significantly more expensive. I toyed with the idea of preventing them from getting proficiency with them, but that felt a little too much like "please don't use these awesome things I've presented you with." At the moment, the only ranged physical damage dealer in the party is the rogue, and given that he only gets one attack per turn, I don't think it's been too disruptive. However, there's a player who created a character for a one-shot - a Ranger who is using a +1 revolver. I might need to do some selective nerfing (maybe making its damage 1d8 but keeping it light, so it's a little better than a hand crossbow and allowing crossbow expert to apply to it.) Also that character is a Beast Mastery Ranger, so maybe there are no further nerfs necessary?
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