I recently went back to settle on longbow archer too. After 2 respecs (at a low level, thankfully), I've settled on still giving myself athletics and a balanced build, hoping the dust from the min/max focus will settle and appropriate fixes will be made. We have heard that the athletics nerf will be reverted next patch. A lot of people are left sitting around with less motivation to play, and people are demanding respecs, which is understandable.
I'm with you though man. Mostly infantry and cav. After 9+ gens of english bill, I praised the spin nerf because it made perfect sense. Whether they affected us negatively or not they made sense. I'm right there with you on this one though. Athletics is already an investment. You're trading power for speed.
Like that chinese player so eloquently put it, "Strongbow archers to attack the premise and running archers guarantee of life. The archers to abandon the heavy armor, to give up the melee weapons. Now have to give up running, that Archer what is left? Balance of the game, not by weakening a career that can be achieved."
Brings a tear to my eye, m8
Its refreshing to see strength archer builds be considered viable. 24-39 strength archers should have a place, as the only problem before was the power draw penalty was too high to warrant it. Increased draw time and missile speed is an excellent motivation to play strength and be less mobile, on top of the added damage. Just removing the wpf penalty on PD entirely would fix it, leaving athletics out of the picture.
