ArenaNet talk:Skill feedback/Ranger/Bows

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Basically, you're suggesting to make rangers more 12345678 button mashing fun. Lightblade 03:34, 5 May 2008 (UTC)

Bow damage is piss-weak. The only way to get any use out of them in PvP is to use pretty much your entire bar and all of your attributes on Glass Arrows and a Conjure to get some hefty spike damage; even then, the DPS drops drastically over time, since you can't spam attack skills without running out of energy.

I wouldn't mind seeing base bow damage increased. Or maybe just add a stupidimba PvE-only preparation that increases bow damage by like 30 per arrow. -Auron 03:39, 5 May 2008 (UTC)

13 expertise and zealous weapon makes your 5 energy attack skills cost 1. Kindle Arrows + Quickshot/Needling Shot = sustainable DPS of 40+, this is already close to assassin's burst dps. Lightblade 06:11, 5 May 2008 (UTC)

It takes all your attributes and all of your time (spamming quick shot on recharge) to match the dps of a warrior not using any skills. Since it's single-target-only, Barrage will always be a better choice in PvE. And since it can't cripple, it isn't useful in PvP, either. 40 dps really isn't amazing; not something worth tossing your elite slot away for. -Auron 06:39, 5 May 2008 (UTC)

Master of damage test:

• Shock Axe (IAS with frenzy) without attack skills = 35 sustainable dps
• Shock Axe (IAS with frenzy) with attack skills = 41 sustainable dps
• Conjure cripslash (IAS with frenzy) without attack skills = 44
• Conjure cripslash (IAS with frenzy) with attack skills = 56
• Bow (increase damage with Kindle Arrows) without attack skills = 22
• Bow (increase damage with Kindle Arrows) with (the above) attack skills = 49
• Bow (increase damage with Glass Arrow and Conjure) without attack skills = 26
• Bow (increase damage with Glass Arrow and Conjure) with attack skills = 45

And since the above warrior builds are made for damage, it is compared with builds that's made for damage. And as you can see, bow's damage almost doubled when used with attack skills. Warrior, however, their attack skills doesn't make much difference. Lightblade 09:28, 5 May 2008 (UTC)

Bows don't match the DPS of a warrior, plain and simple. If you devote your entire bar and all of your attributes, as I've said, you can get quite a nice spike, but not maintainable killing power. On top of out-DPSing rangers, warriors employ a number of other things that make them king of killing things; knockdowns (shock, entire hammer line), snares (bull's strike, cripslash), deep wound (easily the most crucial thing in any attempt to kill a target) and sometimes interrupts on top of the whole thing (dstrike, pleak, ddagger). Rangers can get the last one pretty well (dshot is a nice skill), but in terms of actually killing things, they fall far short of the goal.

For a while, rangers had DPS that didn't suck; the "turret ranger" build combined rapid fire with bonus damage attack skills and the energy management of prepared shot; it was good enough that people ran it in GvG. However, it had to devote all of its skills to damage, and thus could not pack interrupts or any other kind of utility. Once the damage was nerfed, rangers went back to apply (which is a hundred times better than kindle).

Lastly; yes, warrior attack skills make all the difference, for a few reasons. For one, they're free; warriors don't have to spend any energy out-DPSing a bow ranger. Any energy they do spend is for pure utility. For two, as I've mentioned, attack skills cause the Deep Wound, which is pretty much required to kill anything that isn't an armor on the isle of the nameless. Lastly, ranger attack skills simply suck (outside of maybe Sloth Hunter's Shot, which for some reason you don't use); the cheap ones have no bonus damage, and the skills that do have bonus damage are expensive and have a high recharge time. Quick Shot can shoot quickly, but that's about it; exec and evis both do roughly 40 bonus damage (armor ignoring) on top of the axe's already high DPS. The best quick shot can do is spread poison, but since you aren't using apply, it really isn't achieving anything. -Auron 01:51, 6 May 2008 (UTC)

I wouldn't mind a little bit of armor penetration, since I always liked seeing the plate armor at the museum with holes from the longbow arrow that made it obsolete, and it could probably take a small damage boost without being overpowering. But mainly I would like it for flavor, I don't think bow damage is that low personally, but I just PvE/RA/Aspeenwood/alliance and have no experience with GvG/HA. Certainly if it needed a damage buff, I think armor penetration would make sense since bow does have a hard time killing armored warriors, but then don't all weapons? - Elder Angelus 17:31, 9 June 2008 (UTC)

Merge Discussion Page

The other discussion page was comparing bows to spears and is completely opposite to what I'm suggesting. This page is comparing bow attacks to everything in terms of attack time per damage.William Wallace 02:00, 7 May 2008 (UTC)

Why should that matter? Many of the skill feedback pages have multiple suggestions. -- Gordon Ecker 03:45, 7 May 2008 (UTC)

It does matter. The other page just compares it all to spear attacks and I am comparing it against every other type of damage (scythe attacks, hammer attacks, swordsmanship, axe mastery, dagger attacks etc.).William Wallace 21:17, 19 May 2008 (UTC)

That's why it would get a separate entry. The Ursan Blessing feedback page has 17 separate entries addressing different issues and making different comparisons, and its' talk page has 17 separate topics. -- Gordon Ecker 22:58, 19 May 2008 (UTC)

Response

Rangers actually have some of the greateset spike potential out of all the classes in Guild Wars, bows themselves already do enough damage to be dangerous, I use the same builds in PvE and PvP and it has never bothered me. If you want lots of damage use a conjure glass arrows build or something. By the way, Anet staff already stated that piercing damage will not = armor penetration. --The preceding unsigned comment was added by User:Backsword (talk).

Instead of QQing about range spike, learn to adapt. Use "Shields Up!" and Shield of Deflection, for example. --The preceding unsigned comment was added by User:72.71.239.110 (talk).

Bows are the third most damaging weapon in the game and the most damaging ranged weapon, they either need no change or a nerf. 69.247.22.37 00:23, 20 July 2008 (UTC)

Spears deal more damage due to their faster attack rate. -- Gordon Ecker 02:08, 20 July 2008 (UTC)

The damage isn't the problem, it's the ridiculously slow refire rate. --The preceding unsigned comment was added by User:72.71.223.24 (talk).

Make bows more realistic

A spear doing more damage overall than a bow is just ridiculous, especially with attack skills(spears can inflict deep wound while bows can't).

Realistically a bow does a lot more damage as you can store potential energy in the bow. Throwing a javelin doesn't allow for potential energy storage like that. --The preceding unsigned comment was added by User:72.71.239.110 (talk).

Realistically, bows and spears would both have much higher damage, bows would have heavy armour penetration and any weapon would be able to kill a target with a critical hit. Realism != good game design. -- Gordon Ecker 23:54, 30 July 2008 (UTC)

Solution to all of the problems

Issue 1

Range Spike.

Suggestion

Cut down on the number of fast activating bow attacks or give them damage penalties "this arrow does 25% less damage.". This particularly applies to interrupt skills like savage shot and punishing shot(both of which used to be popular with range spike). Cause certain bow attacks to cause Weakness on the user for 2 seconds.

Increase damage or reduce energy cost of normal activation bow attacks to match damage of scythe or spear attacks.

Here are a few examples of "fixed" skills.

• Power Shot 5e 4r "If Power Shot hits you strike for +10...26...31 damage." Energy and recharge have been decreased while the fast activation has been removed. Damage has been given a generous increase.

• Savage Shot 10e 1/2s 5r "Savage Shot does 33% less damage than normal and interrupts, doing +10...34...40 damage if a spell was interrupted." The conditional damage has been greatly buffed while the base damage has been nerfed, rewarding use of this for interrupting as opposed to spiking.

• Punishing Shot 10e 1/2s 5r "Punishing Shot does 20% less damage than normal and does +10...18...20 damage, causing interrupt. If a skill was interrupted, it does an additional +10...30...35 damage. If you didn't interrupt a skill this cannot critical." This makes Punishing Shot very effective for interrupting(+55 damage) while making it ineffective for range spike (20% less damage, cannot critical hit).

• Glass Arrows 5e 2s 12r "For 10...30...35 seconds your bow attacks with inflict +8...20...23 damage and cause Bleeding for 8...18...21 seconds if they are blocked. Bow attacks with fast activation time inflict +5...13...15 damage instead." Nerfs Glass Arrows spike while buffing Glass Arrows for other purposes.

• Dual Shot 10e 6r "Fire two arrows at your foe. Each arrow does 25...10...7% less damage. You suffer from Weakness for 2 seconds." Since the bow refire rate is already around 2 seconds, the weakness won't affect you unless you fire an arrow immediately afterward...like in Range Spike.

Issue 2

Damage from bows hasn't been buffed because bows already inflict conditions.

Suggestion

Make conditions and Wilderness Survival preparations "interfere" with certain damaging skills. A Ranger would have to specialize in damage or conditions but not both.

Here are some "fixed" skills.

• Marauder's Shot 10e 4r "Marauder's Shot inflicts +10...34...40 damage, if target is suffering from a condition this skill takes an additional 3 seconds to recharge."

• Sundering Attack 5e 3r "Sundering Attack strikes for +10...20...22 damage if it hits. If you don't have a Wilderness Survival preparation it also has 25% AP." Energy has been decreased but the fast activation is gone. The damage output has been increased generously and the conditional is even better.

• Barrage 5e 1r "Fires arrows at up to 6 adjacent foes doing +5...17...20 damage. Lose a Wilderness Survival preparation." Now you get to keep your Read the Wind and Rapid Fire without getting nerfed due to Apply Poison + barrage.

• Poison Arrow 5e 1r "If Poison Arrow hits, it strikes for +5...17...20 damage and inflicts Poison for 5...17...20 seconds." This can be buffed as it is elite.

Bows can now be changed. Reduce refire delay by about 25% and increase damage to 22-28. If bows don't do a lot of damage, now they can sure inflict damage consistently. --The preceding unsigned comment was added by User:72.71.239.110 (talk).

I'm not sure if your Glass Arrows suggestion could be implemented. Currently, no skills have conditional effects dependant on activation time. -- Gordon Ecker 23:41, 31 July 2008 (UTC)

I posted an improved version of this in a place where more people would see it, so feel free to remove it from this page. --The preceding unsigned comment was added by User:72.64.4.14 (talk).

Damage from bows

→ moved from ArenaNet talk:Skill feedback/Miscellaneous/Damage from bows

Bows aren't underpowered. Spears are just overpowered. If bows did 18-40 (or whatever you suggested), already powerful ranger spikes would be unbeatable. ~Shard (talk) 03:03, 1 May 2008 (UTC)

Gotta agree with shard. Also, spears don't get, lets see, this, this or even this. -- NUKLEAR IIV 09:32, 1 May 2008 (UTC)

Vs. Scythe: Scythe is melee range, vulnerable to snare. Vs. Spear: Adrenaline skills need charging before they can be used. This means that you can't use certain skills in time when they're needed the most. If you haven't noticed already, most of the Spear Attack skills used in PvP uses energy. Because energy based attack skills are just more reliable. Lightblade 06:04, 5 May 2008 (UTC)

Adrenaline skills free up energy for pet builds. --The preceding unsigned comment was added by User:72.71.232.18 (talk).

nah, spear is superior to bow when you compare dps. DPS on a ranger is meant to be bad. What else is there to say? -- NUKLEAR IIV 16:00, 5 May 2008 (UTC)

Some Bow attack skills are the best in the game. Bows just aren't meant to be that damaging, they're meant to have superior attack skills. 145.94.74.23 06:40, 21 May 2008 (UTC)

An alternative solution is to make bows more consistent instead of more damaging. For example, how about increasing their damage to 26-30? They wouldn't do too much damage on criticals(only slightly more than axes) but would be able to reliably do mediocre damage over time. --The preceding unsigned comment was added by User:72.71.223.24 (talk).

Another solution is to just make the bows attack faster. Short bows should be 1.5, Recurve 1.7, Longbows 1.75, Flatbows 1.5, and Hornbows 1.8. Short bows are in the range of spears, Recurves because its not really far, Longbows because of the distance, Flatbows because of the Arc, and Hornbows just need a buff. prokiller88 01:37, 24 July 2008 (UTC)

Also remove the ridiculously high arc of the flatbow. --The preceding unsigned comment was added by User:72.71.239.110 (talk).

Err...no don't remove the flatbow arc, then you'd have a longbow clone (not inclusive of your idea.) The flatbow is awesome for tricky spots your other bows can't quite get. --Ezekial Riddle 03:25, 3 August 2008 (UTC)

Bows aren't really for doing high damage, more the utility of their skills (conditions, interrupts, etc), and 18-40 would be *way* too high. Sure, 15-30 maybe, it'd give them another point on average and make their crits better, maybe even, say, 14-31 or something, but *not* 18-40. Bear in mind that they're ranged, so while the odd arrow may stray or be dodged, you have the great advantage that you can attack constantly without having to move and kiting is useless against you, along with anti-melee counters (there are more anti-melee than anti-range) and Return.

I would agree, though, that it's silly for Scythe rangers to be more effective than bow ones. --The preceding unsigned comment was added by User:86.10.17.180 (talk).

Rangers have utility skills, but they don't need bows for them. Bows don't have utility skills. To daze one with a bow, you have to spend 25 energy, be in melee reach, or hit a stationary target. Interupt skills can be blocked by anything that blocks ranged attacks, and most casters have access to an interupt prevention skill. Bleeding isn't so great on bows, apply poison + spear works better, and burning only comes through 2 elites, and isn't as good as a fire elementalist, leaving crippled, which all melee characters should have access to. So a bow has worse interupts than spells, worse conditions than melee weapons, worse damage than anything but staffs, not to mention they make worse stat sticks than the spear+shield combo, and you don't think they need a buff? I think some serious buffs are in order. Either base damage of bows goes up enough to make them as good as all other weapons for rangers, or serious bow skill changes need to be made, to make bows as good as other weapons for rangers at least.72.161.123.22 01:42, 10 June 2009 (UTC)

Merge proposal

→ moved from ArenaNet talk:Skill feedback/Miscellaneous/Damage from bows

Is anyone opposed to this? -- Gordon Ecker 00:45, 15 September 2008 (UTC)

no. It would just make it easier to delete it. -- NUKLEAR IIV 15:07, 15 September 2008 (UTC)

Go ahead and merge it I guess. --The preceding unsigned comment was added by User:96.233.0.7 (talk).

Attribution notice

ArenaNet:Skill feedback/Ranger/Bows contains text from ArenaNet:Skill feedback/Miscellaneous/Damage from bows. The contributors to the source article prior to the merge were 71.174.28.140, Shard, 71.174.22.154, 96.233.0.251 and 72.64.10.83. -- Gordon Ecker 22:18, 18 September 2008 (UTC)

Bows

Everyone's argument for making bows more powerful have become null and void.--70.118.205.153 03:29, 17 May 2009 (UTC)

Distracting Shot does not make up for the fact that bows deal less damage than any other non-caster weapon. The mesmer spell Diversion makes a skill take up to 59 extra seconds to recharge, can't be dodged or blocked, and works on skills that can't be interupted, like stances, and mesmers don't have to use a weapon from a secondary profession to cast viable spells.

Bows need a buff.

The average damage per second on longbows, recurve bows, and hornbows is lower than a staff or wand at 12 marksmanship. Spending 16 points in marksmanship, all bows beat staffs/wands, but are below every other weapon in the game. Seeing as how attack skills are covered by expertise, a ranger can use any other phsycial weapon and deal more damage through his secondary profession. Rangers can use Moebius/Death Blossom, a beastmaster/scythe, beastmaster/spear or beastmaster/hammer build, hundred blades sword build, or an energy heavy axe build to do more damage than a bow can. Every other physical class can use its own weapons to deal more damage than it could with a bow. Caster classes have no use for bows or the /r secondary. There are very few pve only skills that work as good with bows as they do with spears, stat bonuses on bows pale in comparison to main/offhand sets, and even Junundu and Siege Devourer attacks do less damage with bows than most other weapons. The only positive about bows is the long range, which you get from even the lowest level bows, and is only really useful in PvE pulling situations. Buffs are needed to make these weapons at least compete with other weapons for damage and viability in PvE.72.161.123.22 01:08, 10 June 2009 (UTC)

To everybody who thinks bows need a buff

Didn't anyone learn anything from when bows had Read the Wind, Flail and 3 consecutive big damage attack skills? Bows are perfectly fine, they deal "reasonable" damage, but what you have to remember is that bows are not just designed around pure damage, they can provide brilliant disruption, while also pumping out poison with every attack, spreading poison can easily add up damage on a good ranger. And lets not forget that bows have amazing split/snare options with Melandru's Shot and Crippling Shot (even pin down), while ofcourse being used by a ranger they basically can't die (lol natural stride).
Besides, we have Rspike which shows bows deal a lot of damage, and pretty much every spike build (omega/balanced) will use a form of bow ranger (mostly Glass Arrows).
And lastly, standard builds in pvp have always ALWAYS had a ranger in, not a spear ranger, not an RaO Axe or Hammer Ranger, not a Scythe Ranger, but a Ranger using a bow (like they're meant to). If they have been used for 4 years without fail, surely they have something going for them? Or maybe people who think bows are bad are well, bad... Frosty 01:55, 10 June 2009 (UTC)

First of all, that poison on every attack works on any physical weapon, and isn't great for most PvE. Secondly, Natural Stride isn't that great in some PvP and all PvE, where enchantments from henchies are common. Thirdly, never seen anyone waste an elite slot on Magebane Shot when Savage and Distracting are perfect(but I'd like to be allowed to play without them). Finally, Snares are also absolutely useless in most PvE. Bows need a buff in at least PvE play. PvP is random at best, and adaptability is a good way to go there. But PvE play makes adaptability stupid. There's no point in adaptability when nothing unexpected happens. There's a reason PvE only has one bow ranger build, called a Barrager, and that's because it's the only bow build that even remotely compares to grabbing some other weapon from a secondary, and running into melee. Bows need a buff so that more than 1 of the 16 elite bow skills Rangers have are viable in PvE play. That's all I want anyway, just the ability to press more than one button in combat.72.161.123.22 05:06, 10 June 2009 (UTC)

I think rangers take more of a backseat role in PVE anyway, which makes them a very versatile player, along with the way they are constructed. There are few missions in normal mode ( although a few more in hard mode ) where I would say a ranger is NEEDED. To talk about making PVE more viable to rangers is to talk about changing the entire profession of ranger, in my opinion. --Tha Reckoning 05:25, 10 June 2009 (UTC)