Within a same weapon category, does "more expensive" automatically mean "better"?

There is a somewhat large panel of weapons choices in Payday 2, with a wide range of prices (from $10k to $500k) and unlocking requirements.

After a some tests, I'm pretty convinced that, regarding handguns (secondary weapons), the Deagle is one of the most interesting: few ammo and some recoil, but great damage and gadgets possibilities. It's also one of the most expensive handguns (and secondary weapons).
The Kobus 90 stands at the exact same price ($501,300), unlocks at the same level (36) and looks like the sub-machine gun counterpart. Way less interesting to me, but perhaps it's the "best" sub-machine gun ?

Does it mean that all the pistols cheaper than the Deagle are not worth it and can simply be sold back once I've bought the Deagle ?

Same question goes for the rifles and shotguns (primary weapons).

I'm wondering it because:

• It doesn't sound like a good game-design choice (once you can afford the most expensive weapon, you can sell back all the others)
• It didn't work this way in the first Payday

I feel some "better isn't revelant" remarks coming up: of course I mean "overall better", which requires a bit of abstraction over the gameplay, I have to admit it ;) But since some weapons are almost never part of any matchup (stealth, rush, endurance, ...), it doesn't sound completely absurd to imagine some overall ranks for each category of weapon. I rarely see players playing with other handguns than the Deagle, for instance (it happens, but rarely), nor with the basic AMCAR or AK.

Using the term "better weapon" is really ambiguous.

The more expensive weapons seem like a good choice when going against large army of police, but they have some trade-offs. The double barreled shotgun has a huge visibility, very low ammo capacity and only 2 shots before reload. The Deagle has a big recoil and relatively large visibility. The automatic pistol is hard to handle effectively. While it is safe to say that generally more expensive weapons pack more punch, they aren't as flexible as the cheaper ones.

These are just a few examples. It really comes down to your style and the mission you're playing. You cannot simply say one gun is better than everything else in all situations. Weapons are very situational.

Speaking overall, the more expensive weapons are not better, but they can be a better choice depending on your situation and goal. Low visibility and silencer are important for stealth; this makes CAR-4 and Compact-5 the superior weapons allowing you to reach minimal visibility. For sheer power, the AK-series and shotguns make for excellent choices, depending on range. For very large open maps, the UAR and M308 win the game with their supreme accuracy at long ranges.

Despite my earlier claim that more expensive weapons are not better, the more expensive weapon of the same type is usually better than the last one. (AMCAR is inferior to the CAR-4, and AK is inferior to the AK.762.)

"Better" is subjective, and you're the person who decides which weapons are better for you and your playstyle. More expensive does not always mean best.

Quite a bit of it is down to playstyle and personal preference, and how you've chosen to approach the mission at hand. Breaching a building and taking out all of the guards (for example how you would do on Framing Frame) means that weapons that contribute the lowest to your visibility and can be fired without alerting nearby guards or civilians will be the weapons of choice. Likewise, going in hot and shooting everything around you (think Watchdogs), high damage and mobility come into play.

The Deagle - using your example - has significantly less ammo capacity and far more recoil than the much cheaper Crosskill pistol but does more damage and has a similar number of gadgets. However, it's worth considering that both weapons slots (both primary and secondary) cater for multiple classes of weapons - so alongside the Deagle and the Crosskill pistols you have the K90 submachine gun and a MP5 replica - each boasting higher rates of fire (and thus technically more damage per second).

For a primaries example, you have the Mosconi 12G - far more expensive than the CAR-4 but without the possibility of a suppressor is useless for stealth, and with small ammo reserves and the requirement to reload every two shots might not be the gun that everybody gets on with, even though it's the most powerful (statistically by 'damage') weapon in the game. As a third example, there is the M304 rifle, which is the only semi automatic rifle in the game, and fitted with a scope doubled up as a reasonable sniping weapon, with headshots being guaranteed to take down pretty much any enemy in a single shot.