Problem rigging weapon to character

[Hollow]

So im working on this game project where our main character needs to be able to switch between both a gun and a hammer at anytime in game, now im sort of new to character rigging and animation but i know enough to rig and animate the base character, now my problem is that im not sure how to go about adding the weapon in his hands. Should I make some sort of bone dedicated only to the weapon, and have it link the follow the hand bone or something? And how would I go about doing a gun and a hammer switch from rig to rig? Would i have to re-skin the whole model, one for the hammer and one for the gun?
If anyone's got an idea how i can tackle this I would greatly appreciate your help :doh: this is giving me a hard time :s

[omnicypher]

do you want the hammer or gun to dissapear when not in use, like grand theft auto, or do you want it to just move to a storage position like in gears of war?

[Hollow]

I want it to move with the character like Gears of War, but without having the 2nd weapon that isn't in use show on my characters back.

[omnicypher]

in 3ds max, theres an option to have prop bones on a biped. now if your going to hide each when not in use, you could just put all your weapons on 1 bone and hide all but one. thats how i would do it, but i dont rig or animate so often.

[Hollow]

Could, didn't notice that prop bone option before, i'll check it out, thanks :)