The Useless Longbow

[Loki]

I ground my way up to 18/18 to be able to use one and I discovered once I had that the longbow is a complete waste of time. The new animation which slows archery combined with the bow's own slow speed means you have a delay of about 4 seconds between choosing a target and releasing the arrow. This is too much for the bow to have any real value: at long range your target could have gone anywhere in this time while at close range you have already been killed. Unsurprisingly hardly any archers use the longbow now. It should either be totally reworked or simply removed from the mod.

I tried the longbow thinking it would be good in the new patch, but it shoots slower than a light crossbow.  Literally.  I got in a ranged duel with a guy with a light crossbow and he was outshooting me.

[3ABP]

Longbow is designed (only in this game, not in RL of course) as long range weapon.
To shoot at the distance where short bow are useless.
But ATM even strong bow (masterwork) at long distance shooting faster (it must be) and even more precision (!!!) than Longbow.
I don't know why is it - I tried many builds - but anyway Strongbow and Warbow are better than Longbow.
Strongbow much faster, Warbow - just faster.... dmg on long distance (because of lowering dmg from distance) is very near.
And here is no point to use Longbow at all.

BTW I think all other bow are just fine.
I playing with all bows.
Khergit is awesome on close combat and medium ranges.
Strong - a little slower but a little more dmg.
Warbow is ideal for medium and long distance.

Longbow - can't be used at any distance. Because always here is better weapon at this distance.
But when we trying to use Longbow at extra long distances - there he is too totaly useless.
Because not only of overall shooting speed (weapon speed) - let it be, let it will be slow... slowest, it must be. No discussion.
But projectile speed and accuracy (and I don't know why... but accuracy is terrible) doesn't allow to shoot at long distance.
Because of:

1. big lag (delay) between releasing a shoot and moment when arrow REALLY fly out from the bow.

2. terrible accuracy. I can't understand why. All other bow are fine for me (their accuracy). But for Longbow I tried many builds (all possible ways) and didn't
found any build what allow to shoot at long distance. At short and medium - OTHER bows are MORE accurate than Longbow. Even in short-medium Longbow loosing. So you can imagine what with increasing length of shooting distance accuracy makes lower.

3. terrible... just terrible projectile speed. While arrow fly from archer to far far target - it takes seconds...not one... many...
And plus "1" and "2".... At results you must be Nostradamus and very lucky to hit anything.

4. We spent a lot of tests and found what bow+arrow dmg is very highly depends of arrow traveling distance.
Longer distance = lower dmg. Since Longow have a very similar damage to Warbow (and even Strong) but using to shoot at much more greater distance - so...
there is not a point to shoot ATM at all. It's logical to wait while target will be closer. But when target is closer - Longbow with their speed isn't needed anymore.
And on closer distance are fine to use War, Strong or even (really - I using and happy) Khergit bow.
So - at long distance Longbow hit (in case if arrow even hit target and not miss) very frequently as mosquito bite.
And just for info - I used in test (and in games) Masterwork Longbow + bodkins arrows (+high PD and WPF... dedicated archer).

5. As I (we) received an info from one of developers - right now weapons (bows) damage depends ONLY from bow dmg type.
And arrow have not affecting resulting damage by arrow type dmg. It's very bad for Longbow (exceptionally for Longbow, because all other bows for me are just fine. I love to use all of them - depends of situation).


So I very want to see smth like +projectile speed for Longbow and plus dmg (no matter how it will be increased... or by dmg type, or by pure dmg...no matter).
+projectile speed = not +1 or +2. It must have real effect.
The same for dmg. +1 or +2  - do not even feel.
Here is need deep balance decision for Longbow. Or big boost for arrow speed and overall dmg (even with lovering weapon speed).
Or.... I don't know another way.

P.s. and pls don't buff other bows ^). Really - because they are fine. And if other bows will be buffed too - then situation repeats, but only on new level.

[3ABP]

added later
Sry for so long post ^), but some more my feeling about Longbow:

Let it will be very specific weapon. Not for "just take for fun" and shoot to anything.
Let it will be very hard to use weapon. With big disadvantages, what required very high personal skill (player skill).
BUT anyway - player must receive something back for it (in return).
I spending very many time to find a position, I shooting very rare because of speed and because of "shooting windows" for long range shooting are opened
much more rare than for medium and short distance. Let it will be useless in close combat. Let I will have disadvantages in melee battles because of spending all skills to archery. But in this case there must be something in return.
Right now - there is none.

[Magikarp]

Longbow used to be the most overpowered bow ever in the history of cRPG. All chadz did was nerf the speed, because he thinks it should fulfill the role of being the more powerful bow, but slower.

And it does, stop whining.

[Elmetiacos]

Longbow used to be the most overpowered bow ever in the history of cRPG. All chadz did was nerf the speed, because he thinks it should fulfill the role of being the more powerful bow, but slower.

And it does, stop whining.

At the expense of being any use.

[bruce]

The damage of the longbow just doesn't compensate for the horrible arrow release speed and firing speed, the warbow is close in damage since the arrow damage buff (34 vs 37, that's a 8% difference in damage, less then one level of powerdraw).

The problem: if you're making, eg. a longbowman with 6 PD, a warbow with 7 PD will be faster and more accurate and do more damage and have a comparable arrow speed (since PD increases arrow speed, too). So in my view it's best to increase the speed of the longbow so the difference in firing speed isn't so massive compared to warbow, since they're close in damage.

[[ptx]]

Having a dedicated longbowman alt, i wouldn't mind the fire rate staying as it is, as long as the longbow got some other noticeable advantage over other bows, be it damage, accuracy or arrow speed.

[Mullerian]

Having a dedicated longbowman alt, i wouldn't mind the fire rate staying as it is, as long as the longbow got some other noticeable advantage over other bows, be it damage, accuracy or arrow speed.

Exactly, i mostly use the longbow and if you were to buff id much rather see it as a buff towards diversity. Adding extra speed just turns it into a slightly different warbow and thats hardly and interesting change.

[Dravic]

Add another 4 cut dmg to Longbow and +3 to shot speed (NOT speed rtng!), if you dont want to change all bows, just buff Longbow.

[[ptx]]

Nah, a better idea would be to simply rebalance archery, move the damage from the arrows (+7 bodkins? srsly?) back to the bows, perhaps making the gap between the bows wider. That would be the optimal solution, imho.

[Dravic]

Yeah, but only if pierce dmg would be returned to bow. Simply, now pierce is very very important for bows, even those small amounts with arrows. Really! That is the reason why arrows got pierce dmg.

[[ptx]]

Dravic, arrows don't affect bow damage type. Which is why arrows don't have pierce damage, they simply add extra damage to the bow.

[Rumblood]

Having a dedicated longbowman alt, i wouldn't mind the fire rate staying as it is, as long as the longbow got some other noticeable advantage over other bows, be it damage, accuracy or arrow speed.

This is the crux of the matter. We are content to have a really slow drawing bow, but it must have some advantage that makes it desirable over the other bows.

[Cecil]

Yes, we definetly need more powerful ranged weapons, the current ranged spam is not enough, we need a longbow to terrify us so we're afraid of it's mightyness from the moment we spawn. It would be only fair that an archer who stays away from battle and never puts himself in danger gets a more powerful weapon.

I agree with punisher   +1 to him  xD

[Joxer]

Yes, we definetly need more powerful ranged weapons, the current ranged spam is not enough, we need a longbow to terrify us so we're afraid of it's mightyness from the moment we spawn. It would be only fair that an archer who stays away from battle and never puts himself in danger gets a more powerful weapon.

Like a tincan never puts himself in danger cause he has tons of armor. Like cav never puts itself in danger cause it just runs away from it. Like shielders never put themselves in danger cause they keep their shields up...