Lower fire rates on many of the weapons in Destiny would more than likely be enough to stop players from abusing certain weapons. The extra time a player would have to take in order to aim for consistent precision shots would add that much extra time to kill for weapons that currently kill way to fast.
I personally don't feel that the damage drop needs to really be changed on most weapons (well, not decreased anyways); if a player wants to hit a target at a range, they should be able to, but with careful aiming. The one thing that I find detracts from Thorn and TLW's balance is the fact that you can essentially spam them across the map currently, you don't really need to aim very carefully to make sure those shots hit (let alone precision hits).
This also applies to other specific weapons (AR's were originally similar to how Thorn/TLW and pulse rifles are now; relatively high fire rates + extreme precision), but I won't get into those weapons in this thread.
Honestly, most of the other hand cannons seem fine overall and the changes to Hawkmoon seem fine (as long as the general hand cannon changes don't go into effect).
Some other changes could be made too; things like removing perfect balance from TLW/Thorn (maybe even Thorn's range perk) etc.
Overall I don't find it's the range that makes these weapons broken, so much as their fire rates combined with their long range accuracy (again, players should be able to aim, hit and do damage at a good distance, especially considering how small most of Destiny's pvp maps are, but they should have to aim somewhat carefully too)
Post any other ideas you have for balance too! I just don't think that messing with the damage directly is the correct way of balancing currently.
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It is not the damage of thorn or the speed of last word. It is the bloodily range! I don't care if I get two in the head and the burn kills me. Dial the range back. Make it harder to snipe someone out. As for last word. Same. He'll watch Olympic and world champions use six shooters *shudders*. Bungie if Bungie returned them to what they were and dialled back the range, I for one wouldn't care. But either way. All weapons needed a balance of some sort.