Are bows gimped?

[Blovski]

On the other hand, many casters and bowmen in the game are skeletons, and piercing damage doesn't even tickle them. A scepter might even be better. Rods are slashing/piercing, both damage types equally bad against skeletons.

 

Trueish but skeleton casters tend to be in isolated parts of the game so you can switch over if you want to, and additionally have pretty terrible accuracy relative to squishy ones and I don't remember the DR being enormously inspiring. Animats (and maybe Wood Beetles) are the trickier enemies for Hunting Bows but with a ranger I tended to find I was just critting all the time against them so it wasn't actually that important.

[Exoduss]

 

 

They kinda are, unless you know what you're doing

This . First Post answered everything there is in this discussion .

If you put a Hunting Bow on ranger cuz it feels right , well they are gimped then and your character does negative damages. 

Put a bow on ranged rogue with right Talents , Skills and Items and you got yourself Highest and most reliable DPS build in this game . 

 

Shocking News : gotta know what you doin 

[Blovski]

Hunting Bow Ranger with Penetrating Shot, Vicious Aim and one of the game's two good hunting bows (Persistence, graduating to Lenas Er), you will have a good damage dealer. Won't match up to the rogue on DPS because getting Sneak Attacks could hardly be easier but the accuracy's better and your utility stuff is way more fun.

[Blovski]

Double post because internet messing me around. Apologies.

Edited April 25, 2015 by Blovski

[Exoduss]

Hunting Bow Ranger with Penetrating Shot, Vicious Aim and one of the game's two good hunting bows (Persistence, graduating to Lenas Er), you will have a good damage dealer. Won't match up to the rogue on DPS because getting Sneak Attacks could hardly be easier but the accuracy's better and your utility stuff is way more fun.

This is definitely accurate : good damage dealer , yes , BUT :

 

You can go for fast reload build with ranger and use arbalest for way more overall damage than this hunting bow crap ,

You can do a quick switch build with 3 blunderbusses and forgiveness for a burst damage that would take you 30 secs to achieve with god damn hunting bow . 

 

Dont do rangers with bows  

[Blovski]

 

Hunting Bow Ranger with Penetrating Shot, Vicious Aim and one of the game's two good hunting bows (Persistence, graduating to Lenas Er), you will have a good damage dealer. Won't match up to the rogue on DPS because getting Sneak Attacks could hardly be easier but the accuracy's better and your utility stuff is way more fun.

This is definitely accurate : good damage dealer , yes , BUT :

 

You can go for fast reload build with ranger and use arbalest for way more overall damage than this hunting bow crap ,

You can do a quick switch build with 3 blunderbusses and forgiveness for a burst damage that would take you 30 secs to achieve with god damn hunting bow . 

 

Dont do rangers with bows

 

Eh, gun quickswitching is a lot of micromanagement, doesn't apply stunning shot or interrupts as efficiently and requires an otherwise inferior race pick and two extra talents (and moreover, if you're taking Blunderbusses, you're not saving on penetrating shot) and means you can't do interesting things like using Spellbindy weapons as your backup. I'm sure it's effective if you've got the patience but it's got a ton of disadvantages.

 

How much can you speed up the reload time on Arbalests and what are you sacrificing to get it? I mean, those things take about as long as an Arquebus to reload.

 

In any scenario where DR is under control, bows perform well.