Better guns with higher damage is not the problem solver here. If anything it will ruin Ol'West and move the gameplay (pk-wise) closer to Era's no skill form of player killing. Ol'West has a unique style when it comes to player killing because it doesn't involve ridiculously overpowered weapons that can kill in 5 shots, if you want faster paced gameplay I suggest you move over to era.
I agree the melees were/are very dominant, but I would much rather these be nerfed than new guns with higher damage be released, that is what contributed to era being ruined after its release. Everything was fine on early era before the higher damage, overpowerd guns were released and im afraid that this would happen again - I can't walk around era without being killed in a second or two
Edit: if higher damage guns are implemented, please have them as an extremely slow fire rate and freeze unlike the BAR..