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Should Most Bows be 2-3 Ranged?


Should Bows be 2-3 Ranged?  

56 members have voted

  1. 1. Should Bows have 2-3 Range?

    • Yes
      45
    • No
      11


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One of the problems I have (and I'm sure others have these too) with Archers is that since they're locked to 2-Range, 1-to-2-Range units like Mages and Ninja/Thieves render them practically obsolete.  They're too specialized for killing fliers, who might even be perfectly dispatchable with other weapons anyway.

So after playing Shadows of Valentia, I got this idea:  How about we make Bows 2-to-3 Range weapons (Longbows can be 3-to-5-Range), but give them only double Might against fliers instead of triple Might to compensate?

Edited by Von Ithipathachai
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I think it's a good idea because as you have said, 2-range archers are obsolete against magic and throwing weapons. Bows were the weapons I used the least during my playthrough's of Awakening and to a lesser extent, Fates. The archers need something to make themselves stand out.

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I prefer the 1-3 and 1-5 in Gaiden/Echoes, but with two minor additions. You should take a damage penalty for firing at 1 range (arrow hasn't picked up full velocity yet), and accuracy penalties for each range past 2 (because leading your target is harder and harder the further away they are. If they see they're being fired upon, they have that much more time to react). 

This way Bows are still most effective at 2 range, but you can use them in other scenarios with less effectiveness which won't overshadow other 1-2 range weapon types.

Edited by Gustavos
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23 minutes ago, Gustavos said:

I prefer the 1-3 and 1-5 in Gaiden/Echoes, but with two minor additions. You should take a damage penalty for firing at 1 range (arrow hasn't picked up full velocity yet), and accuracy penalties for each range past 2 (because leading your target is harder and harder the further away they are. If they see they're being fired upon, they have that much more time to react). 

This way Bows are still most effective at 2 range, but you can use them in other scenarios with less effectiveness which won't overshadow other 1-2 range weapon types.

I also thought about a general accuracy penalty of, say, 3 Hit for every space after 1-Range for all weapons.  This would be most observable with long-distance weapons.  For example, if you were to attack from 10 spaces away, you would lose 27 Hit, while if you were to attack from only 6 spaces away, you would only lose 15 Hit.  Of course, such long-ranged weapons could receive an accuracy buff to counteract the significant penalties at longer distances.

Edited by Von Ithipathachai
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20 minutes ago, Gustavos said:

I prefer the 1-3 and 1-5 in Gaiden/Echoes, but with two minor additions. You should take a damage penalty for firing at 1 range (arrow hasn't picked up full velocity yet), and accuracy penalties for each range past 2 (because leading your target is harder and harder the further away they are. If they see they're being fired upon, they have that much more time to react). 

This way Bows are still most effective at 2 range, but you can use them in other scenarios with less effectiveness which won't overshadow other 1-2 range weapon types.

I think a sweetspot range is a good idea if they bring back 1-5 Bows. I think 2-3 is a good range, then 4-5 have accuracy penalties, while 1 range has an Avoid penalty?

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The appropriate range for bows is going to depend on how strong archers are. In SoV, archers are more like support units and have really long range. If archers are going to capable combat units by themselves, I think they should have 2-3 range as a base class and 2-4 when promoted (+1 if using a Long Bow). I'm fine with them having no melee range, as that makes them distinct from magic/knives.

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Flavour-wise, it's ridiculous that daggers, javelins, and hand axes can be thrown as far as an arrow can be shot. Gameplaywise, the fact that those weapons are 1-2 while bows are 2 only makes bows nearly obsolete.

Both observations lead to the same conclusion. Give bows a range boost. 2-3 sounds good as a base.

 

2 hours ago, Gustavos said:

You should take a damage penalty for firing at 1 range (arrow hasn't picked up full velocity yet)

Arrows don't gain velocity as they travel. The (flavour) reason that bows can't fire at 1 range is because doing so is dangerous; it takes time to draw a bow back and during that time an archer is defenseless, so a nearby melee fighter could kill them. If this isn't a concern (e.g. an archer is taking out a target not aware of them), then the closer the better as far as accuracy/damage is concerned.

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2 hours ago, SatsumaFSoysoy said:

I think a sweetspot range is a good idea if they bring back 1-5 Bows. I think 2-3 is a good range, then 4-5 have accuracy penalties, while 1 range has an Avoid penalty?

As long as the 1 range attacking penalty is considerable enough that they're incompetent on the front lines even when sufficiently leveled. Otherwise you have a unit that's great everywhere and doesn't need babying to use. Also, since I assume the next FE won't do class base stats and characters will have excellent growths, making bows have generally low stats can keep archers from one round deleting enemies that are important for maintaining the map's difficulty (like other archers, the boss, or a summoner). To use Fates as an example, they buffed bows. An iron yumi was 9MT while iron shuriken was 4MT and Fire was 3MT. That would have to be reconsidered. Besides generally low hit rates, SoV made it so every bow gives a speed penalty and not a ton of MT either. 

4 minutes ago, Dark Holy Elf said:

Arrows don't gain velocity as they travel. 

You're right, I confused them with bullets.

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I feel like 2-3 range would be a good sweet spot if archers are going to have longer range. I feel the one range attack could be possible depending on the bow they wield such as the short bow.

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Without a doubt. As others have pointed out, archers are either too niche or too easily overshadowed by other weapons. 

However, giving them a range of five seems to be taking things too far, as it makes it way too hard for squishier units to even approach the battle.

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1 hour ago, Thane said:

Without a doubt. As others have pointed out, archers are either too niche or too easily overshadowed by other weapons. 

However, giving them a range of five seems to be taking things too far, as it makes it way too hard for squishier units to even approach the battle.

As I mentioned before, I figured that only Longbows could be 3-5 range.

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When it comes to archers I want bows to have their 1-3 or 1-5 range depending on what bow is being used and whether or not said archer is promoted. Now I would want their accuracy improved but that's true of all units in Gaiden/Echoes. I do think that perhaps the farther away a target is the less accurate the hit rates should be but that might be tough to program.

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Giving bows more range is great in theory but it massively influences the entire balance of the game. It's not just that bows and archers in Gaiden and Shadows of Valentia are  weak, the map design also accommodates them (it's not a coincidence Mages also get 3-5 range spells too). Furthermore, while this will buff your archers a great deal, it will make any archers much more irritating as even getting to them could be difficult if the maps are wide open like in Gaiden.

I'd like to see if done every now and then but as a standard, I like the 2 range bows that we've had for so long. The way I see it, bows aren't the problem. Archers and handaxes/javelins are. And the way to fix archers is pretty easily, just do what they did in Fates. Give them 1-2 range options, buff their stats and nerf handle/javelins. On top of everything that Fates did I would like to see archers have above average resistance so they can be an effective counter to mages too.

Edited by Jotari
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  • 3 weeks later...

Could introduce crossbows. I think they were in Radiant Dawn.

Maybe something like:

Bows: 1-3 range, damage penalty at 1-range, accuracy penalty at 3 range.

Crossbows: 1-3 range, no penalties but unit cannot ever double.

Edited by Wanda
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On 6/8/2017 at 1:49 AM, Jotari said:

Giving bows more range is great in theory but it massively influences the entire balance of the game. It's not just that bows and archers in Gaiden and Shadows of Valentia are  weak, the map design also accommodates them (it's not a coincidence Mages also get 3-5 range spells too). Furthermore, while this will buff your archers a great deal, it will make any archers much more irritating as even getting to them could be difficult if the maps are wide open like in Gaiden.

The way to fix archers is pretty easily, just do what they did in Fates. Give them 1-2 range options and buff their stats. On top of everything that Fates did I would like to see archers have above average resistance so they can be an effective counter to mages too.

I dunno - 1-2 range hardly had anything to do with bows in Fates being good. Last I checked, the 1-2 bows you got were either magic based, and thus limited in who could put them to use, or pathetically weak.

1 hour ago, Wanda said:

Could introduce crossbows. I think they were in Radiant Dawn.

Maybe something like:

Bows: 1-3 range, damage penalty at 1-range, accuracy penalty at 3 range.

Crossbows: 1-3 range, no penalties but unit cannot ever double.

 

1 hour ago, NinjaMonkey said:

Make the bows like Radiant Dawn: 2 range bows and 1-2 range crossbows.

If they bring crossbows back, I sure hope they aren't fixed Mt - that made them all but useless in RD.

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1 hour ago, Levant Mir Celestia said:

I dunno - 1-2 range hardly had anything to do with bows in Fates being good. Last I checked, the 1-2 bows you got were either magic based, and thus limited in who could put them to use, or pathetically weak.

 

If they bring crossbows back, I sure hope they aren't fixed Mt - that made them all but useless in RD.

Nerfing Hand Axes and Javelins also made a big difference.

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As Jotari said I'm skeptical of giving all bows 2-3 range by default for balancing purposes: with such a large attack range it runs the risk of being too good unless bow stats are bad. Instead, smaller range additions could be done individually, with Longbow (+1 range for infantry at the cost of worse Hit), bringing back the Curved Shot art (+1 range for any user but forfeits doubling), and as a class bonus for the bow specialist (bow-lock deserves to be the exception here).

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2 hours ago, Levant Mir Celestia said:

If they bring crossbows back, I sure hope they aren't fixed Mt - that made them all but useless in RD.

I don't see how they could have the damage dealt dependant on the users Strength, because, unlike a regular bow, that's not how a crossbow works.

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Best thing to do with Crossbows is to keep the high mt negated strength system of Radiant Dawn, but give them significant boost to damage for each weapon rank so that they can scale with enemy's defense. Either that or make their damage skill dependent.

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I think 2 is fine before promotion, but they should get additional range upon promotion, so they'll be 2-3. So even though an archer may be hard to train, the outcome of a sniper and/or bowknight/nomad trooper could be deadly.

And if some sort of technology mechanic is added, if we can upgrade to crossbow, we should be able to attack at melee range as well, like Radiant Dawn. 

I wonder if another weapon triangle should be made though with bows, knives, and whatever else they can think of.

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On June 24, 2017 at 11:17 AM, Jotari said:

Nerfing Hand Axes and Javelins also made a big difference.

Well, that's true.

23 hours ago, NinjaMonkey said:

I don't see how they could have the damage dealt dependant on the users Strength, because, unlike a regular bow, that's not how a crossbow works.

While that is true that crossbows don't work like that, the fact of the matter is that crossbows were all but useless unless they were targeting something that they were effective against. It didn't help that the strongest crossbow that wasn't one-of-a-kind was only 28 mt.

13 hours ago, Jotari said:

Best thing to do with Crossbows is to keep the high mt negated strength system of Radiant Dawn, but give them significant boost to damage for each weapon rank so that they can scale with enemy's defense. Either that or make their damage skill dependent.

See above.

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