They should add some kind of exhaustion. You will have a hard time targeting anything properly if you just ran around for a minute or draw the bow every second. Same for inf who holds a heavy hammer overhead for minutes.
I said it a bunch of times now.
Ranged can out pace shielders because of weight penatlies of shield and the heavier armour most shieders wear.
The solution is to revert the damage back to where it was before, and then add an athletics delay when aiming / firing / drawing a ranged weapon. Something like 3 second delay on/after any of these activities would be a huge balance between melee and range without the need to overnerf the damage till its not even really viable.
Range needs to choose, shoot, or run, but not both back to back which gives us the current kiting situation. 2 archers can easily kite 1 shielder to the point where they can't possible block both firing arcs while easily out pacing them and being safe from harm.
For those who say its a lame fix or unrealistic are not looking at the big picture, and are incorrect.
First off it would promote team play more, by range depending on melee for protection to be able to fire at targets without being harassed in melee.
Second it wouldn't nerf their speed, only when they can utilize it, so yes range specialists will fall back and retreat when they notice a significant threat. However, if you were to successfully ambush them while they are firing they will have a harder time escaping unscathed.
Lastly, shooting a bow, firing an xbow, and throwing a weapon are all rather exhausting activities IRL so if your gripe is that its unrealistic, then your wrong. I wouldn't say you would be exhausted immediately, but each has their own reason why you can't just start sprinting immediately after firing it a few times. Without endurance I think this is the only fair way to keep the classes core utility in tact (range power) while balancing it against a real counter (mobility).
I don't want to see the melee capabilities reduced further either because that will just promote being a pure build instead of allowing room for hybrids either.
EDIT: The athletics delay could only effect certain classes of range weapons as well. Fast but low damage bows may not be effected by the athletics delay, same with the light throwing weapons and maybe the lightest cross bow. This would add an alternative utility to them as mobile infantry range assault type classes instead of being able to do this with
ANY range weapon.
