Bow against Sword!

[LokiDR]

A 20th level archer should have learned by now to stand further away when he shoots

-Hyp.

Well, of course. Since all 20th level archers can just shoot throught the walls at their enemies, this will never come up. The high level archer is forced near combat nearly as often as a low level archer. Archers at least need a line of sight. I think making the archer as weak as a single hit in combat is a real cop out. Enemy double moves, snips bow string, archer is out of combat for a round or two. Why play an archer?

 

[Hypersmurf]

I think making the archer as weak as a single hit in combat is a real cop out. Enemy double moves, snips bow string, archer is out of combat for a round or two. Why play an archer?

[confused blink]

Well, that's why traditionally, archers stood behind long lines of people carrying sharp pointy things. Or rode horses, shooting and running away, shooting and running away. Or had some other weapon so that when an enemy got too close, they had something sensible to hit back with.

Bows aren't designed for arms-length encounters.

-Hyp.

 

[LokiDR]

[confused blink]

Well, that's why traditionally, archers stood behind long lines of people carrying sharp pointy things. Or rode horses, shooting and running away, shooting and running away. Or had some other weapon so that when an enemy got too close, they had something sensible to hit back with.

Bows aren't designed for arms-length encounters.

-Hyp.

And people aren't meant to throw or be hit by fireballs. Archers are not suited to a lot of things they do, like fire down corridors. Declaring a bow is such a fragile thing (true enough in reality) just prevents players from playing an interesting architype or the NPCs from being inteligent in combat. How can I focus on archery if I loose use of my bow every other round? If I split my efforts on the sword, I will just be less effective overall. No smart player would ever focus on archery.

 

[Hypersmurf]

And people aren't meant to throw or be hit by fireballs. Archers are not suited to a lot of things they do, like fire down corridors. Declaring a bow is such a fragile thing (true enough in reality) just prevents players from playing an interesting architype or the NPCs from being inteligent in combat. How can I focus on archery if I loose use of my bow every other round?

Fireballs are magic.

If it bothers you, perhaps introduce an effect that increases hardenss and hit points of a bow beyond what they get from enhancement bonus. Or that gives a weapon a "personal" deflection bonus that stacks with the wielder's deflection bonuses. Use magic to do magical things.

Basically, if you don't like a rule, it's what Rule 0 is for. I'm just pointing you at the FAQ quote.

-Hyp.

 

[Fisk]

Nothing like the concept of the slippery slope

After you do the following... where does it end?

If it bothers you, perhaps introduce an effect that increases hardenss and hit points of a bow beyond what they get from enhancement bonus. Or that gives a weapon a "personal" deflection bonus that stacks with the wielder's deflection bonuses. Use magic to do magical things.

If the answer to all the questions is to Make up a House Rule then whats the point of having the rules to begin with? Don't say "to have a starting point inwhich to base the game" , at this point 25+ years in RPG's we have a enough rules to base a game.

The challenge now is how to make it work within the rules... any idiot can make up new rule

With that said.... if anyones writing 4e.

I think a few things are bunk.....

1. The easy sundering of anchers bow.... be he 1st or 20th. (no balance)

2. The five foot step back that allows an archer not to provoke an Aoo. (weak balance) And the archer gets a full attack. (rapid shot ect...)

 

[Hypersmurf]

If the answer to all the questions is to Make up a House Rule then whats the point of having the rules to begin with?

No, the answer to all the questions is "Sundering a bow uses the Strike an Object rules from p135."

If you say "That sucks, it should be different!", then you make up a house rule.

It's the same with any other rule. It's like asking "Can a druid use a bow without breaking his spiritual oaths?" The answer is no, by the Core Rules. "That sucks, it should be different!" Make up a house rule.

After the second time the archer loses his bow, he has to start thinking about what he can do to avoid it a third time. There are alternatives to standing thirty feet away from the incoming orcish horde and calmly firing shot after shot. Even Legolas switched to melee weapons when the press got too tight.

-Hyp.

 

[Shard O'Glase]

There was a thread a ways back(no search function for me) called I beleive to sunder or not(to sunder) And there was a group of us who thought sunder was wrong on multiple levels one of which was that we felt it was way too easy.(Too easy to hit, to easy to break) I like sunder in the game, but the problem is IMO sundering a weapon even a bow should be incredibly difficult and as is it frequently ends up being stuipidly easy. IMO the sundering rules as is suck, a big screw up etc.

I'd like to have them in my game, but the crap they served up for a rule on sundering is wose to have in a game than not having any sundering at all. (again IMO)

 

[Fisk]

No, the answer to all the questions is "Sundering a bow uses the Strike an Object rules from p135."

If you say "That sucks, it should be different!", then you make up a house rule.

It's the same with any other rule. It's like asking "Can a druid use a bow without breaking his spiritual oaths?" The answer is no, by the Core Rules. "That sucks, it should be different!" Make up a house rule.

After the second time the archer loses his bow, he has to start thinking about what he can do to avoid it a third time. There are alternatives to standing thirty feet away from the incoming orcish horde and calmly firing shot after shot. Even Legolas switched to melee weapons when the press got too tight.

-Hyp.

Perhaps we are just of differing oppinions of the acceptablility of and use of "house rules" .

Some guys play the rules and work within them, banging their heads trying to find ways to make concepts work and make them playable. And others just simply make up their own new rule to solve the problem.


As far as the refference you gave... That was a bit redundant considering that we were all just talking about that rule. I had read the previous posts and as could be seen commented on the the very rule that you cited.


As far as dismissing Aoo against an oponent trying to strike a bow. Thats a bit short sighted. Any one with a spiked guantlet, improved unarmed strike, armor spikes, or even striking with the arrow itself as a melee weapon can be used in that Aoo with out provoking further Aoo's. Now if there is a FAQ on this I am not aware of it.

 

[LokiDR]

If the FAQ states that hitting a bow counts under the "strike a held item" rule, why make it even easier by allowing people to strike a bow string, instead of the bow as a whole. This leads to statements like "I want to break the grip of his sword." Sundering shouldn't be the first thought you have in combat, this leads to players becoming paranoid, wasting money on spare items, and generally slowing the game down.

If I accepted a bowstring as a valid target, I would take out every archer in a party with a simple ambush. AC 19 is easy to hit. The string will snap with no problems. No archer. There is not enough time in the combat round to prevent sundering by drawing a melee weapon, else the archer would always have his sword out in any sort of urban or dungeon setting. That is not fun to play, if you want to be an archer.

 

[Darklone]

Forgive me to laugh, but this is silly.

Your argument, summed up, is: I want to play an archer that is as strong in close quarter fights as any melee fighter. And since the rules don't support this (IMHO silly) claim, you say the rules are wrong.

The archers in my campaigns never had problems with being too weak. And I never pulled punches. They just tended to climb on trees or roofs before unleashing clouds of arrows at their enemies.

With a little bit common sense you could avoid MANY problems. Forgive me to be insulting, but this just ASKS for it.