D&D 5E (2024) Why doesn't D&D have fire arrows?

[James Gasik]

Fire Arrows!

 

[Misanthrope Prime]

Because we are rarely fighting thatched roof cottages, dry timber framed houses and bales of hay?

I suppose they would come in handy if you were forced to kill a gazebo but at that point just have some +1 arrows of gazebo slaying

 

[aco175]

It should be under actions that you can do all day. Fighters can fire a second arrow at 5th level.

Arrows that are actually on fire with some sort of movie magic cloth or strapped with explosives are cool and we should have this. Maybe ranged combat is too powerful but they could reduce the range and damage to make up for it. But then the explosives make up for the reduction of arrow damage.

 

[CreamCloud0]

like is the answer to far too many other things martials should have, i think the answer is 'there's a spell for that'

FLAME ARROWS:

 

[Levistus's_Leviathan]

I was thinking about this recently. A lot of people don’t include guns in their games because they don’t feel medieval, while also ignoring fire arrows, thundercrash bombs, hwachas, nest of bees, fire lances, hand cannons, and other early gunpowder weapons that were around in the Middle Ages. I think it’s a missed opportunity.


Historically fire arrows would have been mostly used for sieges or against flammable structures (boats). But it would definitely be useful in D&D adventures. At the very least, they’d be good against trolls, scarecrows, mummies, and treants.

Anyways, early gunpowder weapons have a fairly prominent role in my setting. The Dwarven Empire in my setting produces fire arrows and keeps them as a secret military technology. The emperor owns royal caves used to harvest guano for the gunpowder and the empire allows vampires to live in these caves so long as they keep the bats there.

 

[Maxperson]

Fire Arrows!

Because it takes a wizard!

Level 3 Spell for 3.5e

Flame Arrow: Arrows deal +1d6 fire damage.

 

[loverdrive]

Jokes aside, specialized arrows, be it combat-oriented (like fire arrows) or utility like Thief-style rope arrows would make playing archer characters much more exciting.

Although I guess there's already Arcane Archer...

 

[AlViking]

As others have said, flame arrows are not particularly useful against individual opponents, they're used for setting objects on fire. On the other hand I made a flametongue bow that adds 1d6 fire damage to any arrow it shoots because I'm not overly concerned about real world logic.

If you don't want a magic bow the real issue is to me that we already have alchemist fire that sells for 50 GP per flask. I could see adding alchemist fire arrows but considering how much more useful they'd be I'd also make them more expensive. So 75 GP, add 1d4 fire and dex save or start burning (continue taking 1d4 damage until you take an action to put it out)?

 

[CreamCloud0]

like is the answer to far too many other things martials should have, i think the answer is 'there's a spell for that'

FLAME ARROWS:
View attachment 419565

even so, this spell is kind of underwhelming IMO, i might actually consider using it if the fire damage from each shot was persistent and had to be extinguished like alchemist's fire.

 

[James Gasik]

As others have said, flame arrows are not particularly useful against individual opponents, they're used for setting objects on fire. On the other hand I made a flametongue bow that adds 1d6 fire damage to any arrow it shoots because I'm not overly concerned about real world logic.

If you don't want a magic bow the real issue is to me that we already have alchemist fire that sells for 50 GP per flask. I could see adding alchemist fire arrows but considering how much more useful they'd be I'd also make them more expensive. So 75 GP, add 1d4 fire and dex save or start burning (continue taking 1d4 damage until you take an action to put it out)?

It's something I notice any time I play an archer and run into creatures that are resistant to piercing damage or who have vulnerabilities/special effects with fire. Getting access to firebolt is super easy, but if you don't want to fumble around with oil or alchemist's fire (which are improvised weapons in 5e, making them even less viable), you have no solution outside of magic. And it's almost always been like this (save for 3e, which had fairly robust alchemical items). I asked my DM about fire arrows, and even offered him that YouTube short to explain what I was talking about, and he might let us make a few during downtime, but the idea that something like this isn't standard equipment strikes me as insane.

There are creatures that ignore arrows. There are creatures you want to use fire against. But apparently there's no market for adventuring gear to help solve these issues. I thought we were past the "niche protection" era, lol.

As for how effective a fire arrow like the one in the video would be, I honestly would be happy with 1 frigging fire damage lol. It would be nice to ignite the target for some ongoing damage, but for some reason, ongoing damage is actually somewhat rare in 5e (as opposed to 4e and Pathfinder 1e, where it was all over the place), being relegated to a few monster abilities and a couple of acid spells (despite the fact that fireball, for example, even talks about igniting things).