I made some quick tests yesterday with Perverz.
I went my lvl 30 2h hero with Heraldic Transitional Armor, Heavy Gauntlets and Sallet with Visor and Coif. Perverz went HX with Light Crossbow +3, Steel Bolts +3 and Desert Horse +3.
1) Firstly we did standing tests, we were standing about 5 meters from each other:
He needed 5 chest hits to kill me, so standing damage is completely fine imo.
Head hit took me about 60% of my HP, so 2 head hits would kill me, which is also fine imo.
Hand hit took me just 10-15% of HP, which is ridiculously low.
2) Next we tried damage with average HX speed:
It took him 4 hits in chest to kill me, so it's also fine imo.
Headshot this way takes most of my HP (like 80%), but don't kill me.
Hand hits are still pathetic.
3) Then we tried full speed HX:
One chest hit took about 50% from my HP, another one about 40%. So after 2 hits I had just about 10% HP left.
One head hit kills.
My summary, after this test:
- High speed damage bonus is too big, it should be reduced. Right now full speed bonus gives you about twice the damage of standing HX, which is surely too much.
- Standing and average speed riding HX does fine damage, it don't need to be reduced, it's not even close that much as some people here claims.
- Hand hits damage is pathetic and should be buffed. When enemy "dances" infront of you, you will most of the time look at his side, so it's huge chance hit will be hand hit. I think this could be overal ranged problem, hand hits damage reduction is too high.
I presume you only did this once each? The random factor in damage is like 10% and the random factor for armour soak and reduce is even more random. Combined you can get as much as 40% deviation due to random factors with all else equal, as far as I know. Which means that doing these tests once, especially when it comes to 2 or 3 shotting, will not allow you to draw any useful conclusions.
Still I appreciate the test, if you are correct then the added damage from speed bonus is ridiculous and completely unrealistic, I think that could use a reduction. A horse moving does not influence the speed of a bolt all that much. Although maybe base damage should just be reduced so that doing full speed shots is the only way to get some real damage. Although completely unrealistic and dumb, it would add a layer of skill to the class and higher risk as well, as you need to move towards your target at high speed.
Either of these two changes seem fitting to me, with the first being more realistic, but the second one being more interesting.
