I think blockland could use a better weapon system. I couldn't compare it to anything better than source because I've worked with source for a long time.
There would be two types of the same weapon: A third person model (world model), and a first person model (view model).
The first person model could be high poly because it would be the only model of that gun to be rendered in first person view. It wouldn't have to be the entire model either, as long as it covers the main details (example: the scout's scattergun first person model only covers the detailed parts to the left of the model, the rest is blank)
The third person model could be very low poly. Really just a separate model from the first person model with reduced shape quality. It would also have different animations so the original first person model could have separate firing animations while the third person model wouldn't. The exception would obviously be that you could only see it in third person (on other people's hands in the map, too)
So when you equipped this weapon, you would see the very detailed first person model. When you tabbed to third person or looked at another person with this gun, it would show the low-poly third person model. That way we wouldn't have to balance out detail and reduced poly.