How to nerf archery, without destroying it.

[Ronin]

Yeah people are forgetting the fact that archers can drop their bow&arrows for a second to fight in melee. It's not like it vanishes within a few seconds, it stays there safe for at least like 15 minutes (I know this from PWmod).

All I can say is, there should be a some kind of limit to archery. Making archery to not go higher than, lets say 180 for instance. So any archer who has extra points to spend, will spend those into a melee proficiency. That way, archers who like to melee will not be sacrificing their archery power and I think 180 wpf is already good enough for an archer.

[Templar_Steevee]

All I can say is, there should be a some kind of limit to archery. Making archery to not go higher than, lets say 180 for instance. So any archer who has extra points to spend, will spend those into a melee proficiency. That way, archers who like to melee will not be sacrificing their archery power and I think 180 wpf is already good enough for an archer.

That's also not good. There should be a limit for every bow for accuracy, if you go above it you gain only reload speed

[Kafein]

Yeah people are forgetting the fact that archers can drop their bow&arrows for a second to fight in melee. It's not like it vanishes within a few seconds, it stays there safe for at least like 15 minutes (I know this from PWmod).

All I can say is, there should be a some kind of limit to archery. Making archery to not go higher than, lets say 180 for instance. So any archer who has extra points to spend, will spend those into a melee proficiency. That way, archers who like to melee will not be sacrificing their archery power and I think 180 wpf is already good enough for an archer.

The "wpf-to-utility" curve of ranged weapons needs to be flattened on the high wpf side, just like melee wpf is. I don't think a cap is a great idea.

[kinngrimm]

but we have it already, all you need to di is drop a bow

the logic behind is different.

With the current system you can drop bow and arrows and still run away.

With the logic i suggest, you are slow by default, but speed up for the fighting when you take up a melee weapon. So running away is only still possible then, while you swing a melee weapon, which may look funny and but is still slower then walking of other non ranged players. By "default" ranged would be slower and only for melee fights would have the movement speed increased to compete in those melee fights.

[Leshma]

the logic behind is different.

With the current system you can drop bow and arrows and still run away.

With the logic i suggest, you are slow by default, but speed up for the fighting when you take up a melee weapon.

Good idea, but how do you plan to achieve that?

[Rumblood]

Rumblood, that's not a good idea.

If you will give archer ability faster, he will use it to kite.


As I understand your suggestion if you will have bow in your hand you will be slow, but if you will put in or you back you will run faster.

For players with hi ath bulid and low tier bow time to draw a bow is a split a second. they will just pull out melee weapon to run away, and then take a bow and shoot. That will be totally gay move, but archers will do that

Not if you implement a "string your bow" mechanic that takes as long as reloading an arbalest whenever you switch back to bow.

[Templar_Steevee]

Bows are meant to be faster than x-bows.
It's still possible to spam a long bow archer with nomad or tatar bow.

"string your bow" also is divided in two parts:
1)putting arrow on string and prepare it to draw
2)draw a bow

third part is aiming and releasing an arrow.

As an archer i can say that part 2 takes way less time than 1. It also depends on what bow you are using.

Rumblood, have you played an archer for more like 2 gens? I'm asking, because you are writing really wierd suggestions sometimes (almost as wierd as Kingrimm's  )

[kinngrimm]

Good idea, but how do you plan to achieve that?

similar to

if (rangedskills):
___movementspeed=movementspeed*.7
___if(meleecombat):
_______movementspeed=movementspeed*1

While by far not the statements of the actual code, but you still may get from that the concept of "how", but it wouldnt be "me". So your question is a bit strange, see i am not the dev, so i dont "plan" anything. I just share idears, which in many cases get ignored or end up on page xy in a forum topic without devs ever reading it or due to sometimes biased voices would be burried under a lot of crap.

[Rumblood]

Bows are meant to be faster than x-bows.
It's still possible to spam a long bow archer with nomad or tatar bow.

"string your bow" also is divided in two parts:
1)putting arrow on string and prepare it to draw
2)draw a bow

third part is aiming and releasing an arrow.

As an archer i can say that part 2 takes way less time than 1. It also depends on what bow you are using.

Rumblood, have you played an archer for more like 2 gens? I'm asking, because you are writing really wierd suggestions sometimes (almost as wierd as Kingrimm's  )

Well let me put that back at you like this, have you been reading for more than 2 gens? I'm asking because you don't seem to understand the words coming out of my keyboard sometimes )

"String your bow" means exactly that. It has nothing to do with the mechanism of shooting the arrow, which is an animation of nocking the arrow to the string, then the draw of the string and release. What "string your bow" means is that if you put your bow away, you take the string off. To use it again, you must restring it. Currently we do not have that mechanism in this mod. However, if we did, when an archer put away their bow and took out a melee weapon in order to get their athletics back, when they pull the bow out again, they can't use it again until they do restring it. This should take about 10 seconds. This prevents an archer from being able to kite. In compensation for this, arrow weight should be reverted to normal, while running with the bow equipped should give you 0 athletics.
Currently, no matter how many wpf points and archer has, they will 95-99% of the time dump them all into archery. If you want to encourage archers to take some melee, then cap the PD and archery wpf. To compensate for the loss of accuracy, the cap for optimal accuracy will need to be lowered. To compensate melee for the extra melee abilities that archers will then have, archery damage needs to be reduced.
As a result, HA's will also receive a bit of a nerf, doing less damage, and losing accuracy without being invested in Horse archery. That will also reduce the number of mounted ranged that we have. And finally, it would be nice to add an arrow that is only able to be used from horseback that does a slight bonus to horses. That gives HA's a niche of cavalry hunters, while avoiding melee because of the lower damage there.

And yes, 20 gens, thanks 

[Templar_Steevee]

Well let me put that back at you like this, have you been reading for more than 2 gens? I'm asking because you don't seem to understand the words coming out of my keyboard sometimes )

Sorry Rumblood I were drunk last night and i didn't catch what you mean Typing drunk on forum is not good

Anyway, your idea with "string your bow" is a  missunderstand.

Why an archer should make his weapon unusable for about 15 seconds? (it can be even shorter time, but still)

Why also fact that your bow is ready to use make you slowest player on battlefield? Archers ale light geared and should be fast moving unit, not a standing still cannow without protection. You idea is making archer unplayable, because you just can't follow your team and with 0 ath it's impossible to do anytning against cav (except shooting them). In you idea you can follow your team only with piece of wood and string in your arms with wich you cannot do anything to your enemies. If you want to be usefull you have to stop for about 10 sec. In this time for example your team can move for about 20 meters, x-bow with arbelast can reload, aim, and kill you, and an archer can shoot 2-3 arrows.


IMO this mechanic is just DUMB...

[Rumblood]

I have 0 athletics and have no problem getting into position when on foot. I can also avoid cavalry with 0 athletics on foot. It is far from unplayable. Why make your bow unusable for 10 seconds? It is a choice between hoping you get the kill by shooting that last arrow from 5 feet away, or pulling out your melee weapon and fighting with a decent chance to win. But you can't kite away. It is dumb if you only look at it from an archers standpoint. If archers didn't kite and min/max, resulting in even DUMBER nerfs to the class, there would be no need for this compromise. It is about game balance, not being an archer lobbyist.

[Templar_Steevee]

But you can't kite away. It is dumb if you only look at it from an archers standpoint. If archers didn't kite and min/max,

You can't kite away atm. Only really hi lvl archers like me or shokoshugi have enought ATH to stay away from melee fight a litttle bit longer and shoot.

Maybe on NA life for archer is easier, but on NA there are tons of agi players that can catch every single archer.

IMO we don't need anything that will slow down archers, and putting string on and off is just silly.

String bow off during battle for an archer is like dropping a GS and fighting with sicle instead of sword for a 2H.

Modify:

almost every one is min/maxing, no matter what class he is playing...

[Branches]

4. Lower missile speed for low tier bows (Long bow should have highest missile speed, but it stay just like it is atm, rest should have lower missile speed with rule: lower dmg ->  lower missile speed)

I really agree with this. The separation between a bows missile speed and its damage contribution has always bothered me. What results in a bow's contribution to final damage if not the missile speed?

It seems to me that a bow's missile speed and damage should be directly linked.

[StuLLe]

I have not read the whole thread, didnt have time yet, but I will.
I just wanted to add something noone took into consideration, until page 8 at least.^^

I think one big reason we have so many archers on the servers atm is the beginning of Strat. Archery is clearly op in these early stages of strategus, because of which a lot of people, and I mean really alot are leveling and training archer alts atm to gain an advantage in strat, which probably wont be used anymore once strat goes into midgame.
So before making any fast changes I suggest waiting a bit and see.

[Templar_Steevee]

I have not read the whole thread, didnt have time yet, but I will.
I just wanted to add something noone took into consideration, until page 8 at least.^^

I think one big reason we have so many archers on the servers atm is the beginning of Strat. Archery is clearly op in these early stages of strategus, because of which a lot of people, and I mean really alot are leveling and training archer alts atm to gain an advantage in strat, which probably wont be used anymore once strat goes into midgame.
So before making any fast changes I suggest waiting a bit and see.

It's a standard: Strat starts -> number of ranged increase

And also this thread were started long time before we were close to new round of strat