D&D 3.x [3.5] Archer changes

[RigaMortus]

One of Rapid Shot's prereuisites is Point Blank Shot -- which gives +1 to hit and damage, within 30'.

TWF has no equivalent.

Weapon Focus... al beit, it is not a requirement, but that is a good thing. Here you have a choice to take it or not. For Rapid Shot, you HAVE to take PBS first (which most people would do anyway, even if it wasn't a prereq)...

 

[Majoru Oakheart]

Well, in the 3 or 4 campaigns I've played in so far, the most powerful damage outputter was always the archer.

Consider this, two fighters one melee and one archer.

Their 2 prime stats are 14 and 20 at first level. The melee having 20 str and 16 dex (lets assume dex for this arguement), and the other way around for the archer.

By 20th level, they can have a +6 enhancement bonus to each of their stats (I'm going for the most extreme version, it is only slightly lesser for lower levels). Plus, they'll put all 4 stat increases into their prime stat

This means that the melee fighter is using a two handed weapon (as most melee fighters do in my experience), great sword with a +5 enhancement bonus and +10 strength bonus. Because it's two handed, plus WS for a total of +22 damage. Assuming WF, he gets 5 attacks at +36/+31/+26/+21/+16

The archer is using a +4 mighty bow with +5 enhancement bonus and +5 arrows. He has point blank shot, rapid shot, WF, WS, bracers of archery. That means his total damage bonus with one arrow when within 30ft is +18. (if your DM allows +5 mighty bows like mine did, then this would be +19) However, his pluses to hit and attacks are: +44/+39/+34/+29/+24. That means the archer can take his option to fire another arrow each round for -2 to hit and STILL get better bonuses to hit than the meleer. Even if his enemies are getting +4 ac due to cover bonuses, the archer STILL gets more pluses to hit, with more attacks.

Defensively the archer is ALSO better as with the proper armor or magic items, you can easily rival full plate +5 due to the much higher dex.

If you're wondering about being within 30ft, almost every battle in every campaign I've played in started at about 50 ft away. Often less. It wasn't too dangerous getting close, no one could hit our archer. When it was hit turn he took a 5ft step back and fired(until he became an order of the bow initiate, then he was getting sneak attack damage fairly often and being able to fire while in melee as well). Keep in mind that the archer can spread his attacks out amongst almost every monster on the battlefield as well, if he kills a monster with each arrow, he doesn't have to worry about which ones are within melee range.

As for grappling, keep in mind that you have to make a melee touch attack to start grappling. A normal fighter is easy to hit, not normally more than ac 16 for touch(ring of prot +5, only +1 from dex due to full plate). While the archer has a touch ac of 25 assuming a +5 ring of protection.

Using the old feats a two weapon fighter wouldn't fare too much better, they need two feats to match the archers extra attack, and they have to spend extra money to buy a second weapon just as magical as the first. They only get half their strength bonus on their extra attack, however, instead of the full +4 for the archer.

Purely just changing it so arrows don't stack any more would solve most of the problem. Plus, the change to TWF/weapon finesse will balance out two weapon fighters.

Majoru Oakheart
Yes I do too much math, I can't help it

 

[Shard O'Glase]

Weapon Focus... al beit, it is not a requirement, but that is a good thing. Here you have a choice to take it or not. For Rapid Shot, you HAVE to take PBS first (which most people would do anyway, even if it wasn't a prereq)...

except weapon focus is a general wepaon feat not a mellee feat and one that the archer will likely take as well.

 

[dcollins]

Having played every edition of D&D I feel a little silly asking this, but did the damage of magic arrows and magic bows stack in 1E and 2E?

Yes -- but (working from 1st Ed. sources here):

- Bows only went up to +1 (that's right), arrows up to +3 (or +4 with UA, and you could only find 2-8 of those at a time).
- Even then, magic items generally had to be discovered by chance, and not created by PCs or bought in a store.
- There was no GMW.

 

[LokiDR]

I have seen archers abuse GMW far too much. With the +1/4 lvls change, this will be slightly less of a problem. I also think that ammo needs to be reduced to something like 20 per casting or that bow/arrow stacking be elimated. +3 keen arrow from a +2 flaming burst bow is a +3 keen flaming burst attack. Bows count for DR, because the other DR means you will need to by other materials/enchantments for your arrows.

Archers will be losing a bit in the DR and GMW changes. I don't think it is quite enough. They need to loose a bit more to be even up with the death melee combatants meet all the time.

 

[Zad]

Here we go again.

I did a breakdown over several levels of how melee damage stacks up against archery damage. Unfortunately two weapon fighting is not used in the analysis. If you really want to go through this topic again, then head to this thread - I won't post it again here - no value added.

Archer vs Swordsman damage comparison

 

[LokiDR]

Zad, your analysis lacks any abuses. If neither side tries to break the rules, the rules hold. That says very little.

 

[Endur]

Archers are much more powerful

Zad,

I posted a rebuttal to your analysis, showing that the archer is much more powerful than the swordsman at both 5th and 10th level.

I kept the characters the same, just modified slightly the magic items and buff spells for what we normally see in our games (actually less than what we normally see, but probably pretty standardized for everyone). i.e. everyone uses Bulls Strength.

Tom

Here we go again.

I did a breakdown over several levels of how melee damage stacks up against archery damage. Unfortunately two weapon fighting is not used in the analysis. If you really want to go through this topic again, then head to this thread - I won't post it again here - no value added.

Archer vs Swordsman damage comparison

 

[coyote6]

Point Blank Shot works only within 30ft, which brings you dangerously close to the enemy (one move action, and they can start to grapple. Just hope you can grap your dagger in time, or else you can't even make an AoO....)

Forget the dagger. It's a free action to shout to the rogue, "Hey, look here, grappling guy! No Dex bonus! Sneak Attack bait!"

Grappling someone with friends in the area -- especially friends with sneak attack -- is kind of a bad idea, in many (most, I suspect) cases. It may work well for the extremely large size creatures that can take the -20 to grapple checks and still win, or for creatures immune to criticals (beware grapple-loving iron golems); but for anything else, it's either not going to work (that -20) or it's going to make them a sitting duck (no Dex bonus).

 

[RigaMortus]

So it seems like the general concensus is that ranged combat is "better" than melee. Do you think melee should be better? Or do you think they should be equal?

I think it makes sense that Ranged combat is a better form of fighting. Perhaps it does need to be toned down a bit (I can see where the pluses for stacking launcher and projectiles can get a bit out of wack), but I think Ranged Combat should be superior. The whole point is to do damage while staying away from your opponent so they can not do damage to you. Perhaps it should be harder to become a good archer than a good meleer, but you should do more damage as an archer than a meleer. There would be a trade off then.

I do think Archery needs to be toned down a bit, but definately not made weaker than a meleer.