One thing that actually disappointed me in this game is that not many enemies shoot at you.
The only shootout I remember is when you have to save a woman during the Master Firearm quest.
Now that I think about it,you don't fight many mages too.Most enemies charge at you with a melee weapon,or are animals.
It's a pity, 'cos with this unique setting a player expects battle between mages and technologists,which are quite rare in this game IMO.

That's a pretty fair criticism I think. I played a melee based fighter for my playthrough, which I do with most games. Usually I can get a taste of what the other disciplines are like through observing the enemies but I didn't really see much in Arcanum. Bashing everything to death worked a little too well.

Indeed, this does seem a fair problem, especially with all the gun shops around.
Maybe we should mod the game such that a few of the duellists in the towns, the sort with whom you can pick a fight, draw guns on you.
I mean, sure, drawing a sword is historically an honour and a pleasure, but drawing a pistol and having it out is likewise an oldskool joy with its own rich tradition (though the best of such took place with perfectly matching duelling pistols taken from a box and overseen by seconds and crap like that, with such possibilities as one party forfeiting by firing into the ground or air or something and thus both 'fighting' for his honour and letting the enemy get in a clear, easy shot and all that stuff.)

Sorry, that went on a while, didn't it.
Point is, enemies spontaneously drawing pistols in a bar seems like it'd be an easy fix.

Gun-wielding enemies are also extremely nonthreatening in Arcanum - almost all of them carry generic or low-tier guns which aren't effective even in a master gunman's hands, presumably as a means of forcing players to invest in tech in order to acquire guns that are useful.

The only gunfight in the entire game in which I actually felt slightly threatened was the shootout with the Tarant police in the Donn Throgg quest.

Ah yes, that is a problem. There is no equivalent to the Balanced Sword in the guns, nor any painful and effective rifle to be purchased from any competent gun shop.
That would be harder to solve, I'd think.

the only challanging gunfight i remember was the dwarf with a shotgun who is in the group of bandits in the sewers. he would run behind you and bam bam get your health to.. what? eight tenth of what it is? well the doctor quest in shrouded hills promised a much more gunslinging bullet hurdling game troughout but it doesnt deliver. ive always thought that the game was hurried up (like actually all of the troikas games) and during the mass-remaking for the final release they forgot to add in everything that they have planned during the first composition of the game. which includes gunslinging enemies. but im glad they at least finished the game and balance many things (like balancing tech-magic chars that use bows and thrown items) and didnt leave any quests undoable. which i cannot say for kotor 2 and temple of elemental evil.

The bedokaan poachers are ok, one has an elephant gun. Usually once you're that far, it isn't too hard to beat them though.

The tarant police orc strike quest is probably the toughest, because of the extremely good machine guns they use.

Master firearms quest would come in second I guess.

Overall, you're completely right to state that there isn't enough enemy combat diversity in Arcanum. Almost no magic using enemies, almost no gun using enemies, and absolutley zero grenade using enemies. Just because of that, magic resistance is almost entirely worthless, sadly.

Now you mention it, I did notice that, then it must be hard to play as one since most enemies drop melee weapons and armour.

There's a few decent ones in the stores, one or two pretty good ones if you're patient or know from whom to steal. There are reasons to become a gunsmith, though, rather than leaving it at what's found or stolen.