Archery Nerfed

[DrKronic]

So what you're saying, is that when I use a Rus bow, or even my horn bow and hit a naked or non armored opponent in the chest or neck, they shouldn't make a momentary stumble and keep charging at me the way they do now.

dude I totally agree they should drop dead as hell, crazy thing is I have hit naked guys with extremely deadly weapons (things like MW german GS/Might elegant poleaxe) and they lived from a neckhit as well(or hell a blow right through a guys spine lol)

[Shinobi]

    I've been primarily an archer since I started playing cRPG and survived countless nerfs and adapted.  But with strategus up I've had to face a difficult situation: do I continue to play a class I've loved and enjoyed for so long but has become exceedingly dull and unskillful and provides little benefit to my clan on a strategus battle no matter how much I've practiced and tried to be good at archery OR do I respec into the 2her or polearmer chadz and company seems to want the battles to focus upon with a level 4 shield to get up close against xbows and throwers, which will prove far far more useful a build for my clan with maybe 100 wpf in xbows to boot for ranged accuracy. 

     I actually had planned to respec to a dedicated archer from my hybrid for strategus, but for now I am waiting a bit longer before I go the complete opposite direction toward what chadz and company ahs been driving towards all along (mass melee spamming).  Already half the archers of my clan have retired or are working toward retiring into a non-archer build as sitting around twiddling your thumbs trying to look effective when your entire class is ineffective is mind-numbing work and not an exciting game.  The only archers I can see now are longbowmen (85% or more) as all other bows do about the same damage as a level 10 archer did before the last patch, which just marks them as easily killed dogs with bark but no bite.  I can only imagine 2-4% of the people in this game will have archers as their main within the 2 months because its significantly more useless than throwing was before the latest patch.

I must say I have more respect for a good archer then xbowmen. If I get head-shot I dont mind dieing from what ever but xbow can hit me in the toe with med armor and its annoying when everything else takes at least two shoots/strikes to kill.

The xbow Shotgun is a beast with no real noticeable requirements when used close ranged and thats one additional reason why we see so many xbows instead of archers today. Its a cheap way to get kills without having to do a trade-off.

In throwing there is a need to have wp and i support that idea. The pt only builds feelt just wrong and was rightly nurfed. Now contemplate going to the battlefield today, you have no throwing wp, powerthrow or xbow wp points, you see two corpses one with an xbow and bolts and one with a throwinglance. Some strange law dosent permit you from picking up the throwinglance and throw it but you are free to take the xbow and bolts and do just as much damage as someone who specialize in the xbow alone. Just wait or go close to you target pull the trigger and have an instant kill.

My next instant level 30 will be an xbowman with agility coming out of its ears and a cheap xbow doing 40+ dmg and il still going to rock in melee range, going to be fun until the nurf    

At least bowmen have to have some finesse and do some hard trade-off´s.         

I have noticed a big increase in xbows being used for awhile now and ofcourse there is a reason for that.   

[AzureSkys]

I've been stubbornly holding on to my archery build. Finally I'm grasping the new mechanics and, if not getting hit in the back from cav or shot in the face by xbows I didn't see, I can do ok if my aim and focus are working proper. The biggest difficulty has been the decreased range and slow missile speed. Of anything, if these things could be closer to what they were prior to the nerf I think it'd be pretty good balance. Upkeep cost and weight for arrows would be nice to have reduced as well.

I'd like to have longer hold time after draw, I'd like more damage, and I'd like it to pierce damage, but that's too much to hope for and would turn more threads into 'nerf archery' again. The biggest scores come from heavy armor/2h/polearm and the few wizard's of speed and time who can block like crazy so that seems to be the focus of the mod (as has been said).

[KING_UGBERT]

The biggest difficulty has been the decreased range and slow missile speed. Of anything, if these things could be closer to what they were prior to the nerf I think it'd be pretty good balance. Upkeep cost and weight for arrows would be nice to have reduced as well.

Agreed.

[Wookimonsta]

i like archery the way it is now, fun to play, not dominating.

[Spartacus]

oh archers just take tho long bow and make a good build then you 1 or 2 hit medium armor guys!

[Cheap_Shot]

Archery isn't bad (unless you're using something other then a longbow).

That bloody projectile speed though, good lord. By the time you reeeeach for an arrow, and draaaaaaawww back the bowstring, and loooooose the arrow, and it flie.....eee.....flieeeees....hang on....putters to its target, they've gotten bored of waiting to be hit by an arrow and left. Or they've been 1 hit by a pole/1hander.

At least with archery though you get some range and your targets aren't likely to realize you're aiming at them if you do it right. Throwing got it's projectile speed lowered too for some crazy reason, and when you're throwing at someone it's kind of hard not to be noticed. I go archery when I need a break from throwing.  Maybe I should go to crossbow for a break from both and then wonder why anyone bothers with the bows or throwing in the first place.

Eventually we're all just going to take a break from everything and play plate wearing pole and xbow hybrids. The "chadz Special".

[Warcat]

Archery isn't bad (unless you're using something other then a longbow).

For my purposes, the longbow isn't very good, it's just way to slow, and I can't use it mounted on good cav maps. So instead I shoot toothpicks at people with my horn bow, it doesn't do much damage (I can't even kill naked people), but it at least gives me some maneuverability on foot or horse. After all, my job as an archer is to wound people low enough for the melee to finish them off easily, right?

I go archery when I need a break from throwing.  Maybe I should go to crossbow for a break from both and then wonder why anyone bothers with the bows or throwing in the first place.

Did the opposite for quite a while, still do some, but not having my 2 throwing lances do as much damage anymore is rather annoying. I get more kills with my MW Stones.
 Just as often use my super high speed katana spammer or my 12 shield skill alt now.

[Cumulonimbus]

Archery does seem pretty crap now. Horsies can run rings around the team unopposed, people can dodge with ease, and the arrows hit like noodles.

Most of my kills are from my weak melee weapon. Though i'm only level 22 with this archery build, but still... being a low level melee guy is a hell of a lot easier than being a low level archer, where the bows are just minor annoyances to the enemy before they smash your skull in.

Might just roll a staff spam character instead.

[Xant]

i like archery the way it is now, fun to play, not dominating.

Agreed

[Leshma]

Hopefully archery will never be buffed again. Hopefully...

[MrShine]

Ehh I'm a bit unimpressed with archery this gen.  I'm still doing alright, but I feel noticeably less accurate, which I attribute to the slower missile speed. 

What it really comes down to is whether the enemy notices you or not.  I score the most hits on unaware archers or melee that are about to engage another target and are moving in a straight line.  If they are coming towards you or know they are under fire it literally becomes a crap-shoot as an archer because you can't effectively predict any sort of movement by the time the arrow reaches the target.  Once people get close to you there's a better chance to hit them but you'll get 1 maybe 2 legitimate shots at that before you're engaged in melee.

I think that the missile speed AND the cut damage changes AND the increased arrow upkeep costs were too much at one time.  If I had to pick one of those to revert I think missile speed would be ideal.  I'm ok with weaker shots but still retaining general accuracy, but being weaker and less accurate and more expensive just kinda... blows.

Good thing I'm almost done with the gen!

[ShinySpoons]

I rather like how the arrows arc now. It feels much less point and shoot like as one has to judge more stuff to hit a target.

 I wouldn't mind the draw speed being faster though.

In terms of effectiveness I'm playing my HA mostly and my main targets are enemy horsies, naked ones I do fine in taking them down. Armoured ones I plink on, which is somewhat annoying, but justifiable.

On my foot archer I can sometimes top scoreboards if I'm playing well (I play mainly as close infantry support).

So in terms of how much archery was nerfed, I feel the addition of a faster firing, lower pierce bow would even things out. As it stands, against heavy armour the longbow is the only viable weapon. Personally, I'd like to see more variety. 

[Cheap_Shot]

It's the same thing with throwing. The cut change made most of the ranged cut weapons useless. No variety anymore, it's just "you have to use these ones or you are restricted to only killing naked peasants." I really liked throwing axes so it's a shame.

[B4dg3r]

I fully agree with those who say bow missile speed needs to be increased, among other changes necessary to balance the archer class.  To be completely honest, I was debating on whether to make my gen 3 archer or gen 3 xbower my main before the patch and decided (after much deliberation) it would be my archer, which I loved and had played since day one.  Luckily, I didn't make it official pre-patch and found my archer nearly unplayable compared to my xbower (Ghillie), which is now my main.  IMO an increase in missile speed IS A MUST for bows... it's been said over and over on this thread but bow missile speed is just horrendous.  I haven't played enough on my archer since the patch to comment on more than that, but missile speed alone was enough to get me to switch classes.  I mean no offence to any of the developers - I certainly appreciate the mod and the community that has spawned from it.  I'm just stating my opinion and agreeing with many who have posted here.