Bows vs. Crossbow (for discussion)

[JGP]

So this seemed like the area to discuss if Archer and Crossbow might need tweaking.

First my sources.....

Video showing Longbow vs. Crossbow fire rate

A general comparision of Longbow and Croosbow users stats

So I started out thinking that bow users were not getting fair stats versus crossbow stats.  Longbow especially due to recent changes.  I seems though that I was not as spot on as I thought.

When I compare the histrorical info, and the video, it seems that for the most part our ranged weapons are rather spot on for the most part.  There might be need to tweak a few things, but depending on game mechanics I do not fully understand this might not be needed.  So here what I can call out.

- Shoot speed needs to be balanced some.  As I currently see the bows all have slower shoot speed then equal cross bows.  Shoot speed I assume is how far the fired round (arrow/bolt) travels.  Longbows had about twice the range of a crossbow for simular accuracy.  So I would suggest that bows see a increase in shoot speed, or crossbows see a decrease.

- Currently bows do half the damage of an equal crossbow.  Using the data I found both weapons could penetrate (i.e. kill) a plate wearing soldier.  The crossbow could do this at close distances, but the longbow needed more distance to target to gain kinetic energy.  Also the crossbow could penetrate plate armor at distances beyond the 30 yard limit longbow had for plate armor penetration.  So I would suggest that bows (or atleast longbow types) have 1/3 to 3/4 the damage of equal crossbows.  This would allow crossbows to still out damage within effective ranges, but give longbows greater damage for their extended range.

- Please remove crossbows from using the support slot for their ranged weapon.  Or allow bows to be slotted in the support slot.  Archers are forced to either load double ammo, or have a melee weapon.  Crossbows can load double ammo and have a melee weapon.  Crossbow can also triple load ammo, but doubt they would go weaponless.  Please just asking for a fair option here.

- Make crossbows heavy to carry.  Archers are lightly armored, and lack melee combat skills.  Crossbow users were usually medium armored, and had more time to train in melee combat skills.  Archers trained for years versus the few months for a crossbow.  So by increasing their weight they would run more slowly.  This seems a fair trade off for the advantages crossbows have over archers.  I am not sure lowering their athletics would be fair, but if they ran some what slower while having simular training it would equal out.

So there are some ideas for balancing, but I can not say that they are absolutely needed.  The mod is rather well balanced as far as the classes are concerned.  No one class should out shine the others since working together they are most effective.  Bows were the ranged option until advances allowed the crossbow to offer a new option.  Just like firearms made both bows and crossbows less effective.  So Archers shoot fast, crossbows can one shot, and the melee classes can handle close quarters better then both.

[Chris]

Wow this is actually really interesting to read, the only critical comment I can make is to remember that I can shoot an arrow once every 2-3 seconds while a crossbow man takes 10 seconds per shot.
This basically means that I can put on average 3-4 arrows in a target while crossbow men can only put one bolt in someone. So I can actually do more damage per second then crossbow man.

But other then that it was a really good read.

[JOPO]

Hmm , you can headshot 5 bots in the time we headshot one , thats prolly a disadvantage. Okay

[Huscarlton Banks]

Just a few observations from gameplay with both both a sniper and a sharpshooter:

With top equipment, most enemies will go down in the same amount of hits, i.e. one bodyshot for fodder npcs on normal, one headshot for fodder npcs on hard, making the damage difference mostly irrelevant due to overkill.

Bows fire much, much faster than crossbows, meaning that it's fairly easy for a sniper to get at least twice as many kills as a sharpshooter. A sharpshooter simply cannot outdps or outkill a sniper of equal skill.

Sharpshooters cannot hit and run anywhere near as well as Snipers, because Snipers have 2 more athletics, much lighter armor, and Crossbowmen need to stay still to reload anyway.

Despite being able to carry up to 3 sets of bolts, it is actually unwise to carry more than one, because of low fire rate.

[Swadius]

The crossbow could do this at close distances, but the longbow needed more distance to target to gain kinetic energy.

Can you elaborate on this? Are you saying that arrows increase velocity once it leaves the bow?

[JGP]

[quote author=JGP link=topic=2810.msg23088#msg23088 date=1334503022]
The crossbow could do this at close distances, but the longbow needed more distance to target to gain kinetic energy.

Can you elaborate on this? Are you saying that arrows increase velocity once it leaves the bow?
[/quote]

I can answer this. 
Crossbows function more like a gun then a bow does.  The bolt is not nocked like an arrow when fired.  The bolt is lighter, shorter, and not acted on as long as an arrow by the force of the string.  Crossbows do tend to have more draw weight then a bow.  So the crossbow has the most potential the closer it is to the target.  Some claim crossbow bolts have a more flat flight path due to design, but I can not speak to this.  A bow fired arrow weighs more due to being longer, and is acted on more by gravity after the apex of it flight.  If you ever watched movies with medival battles you might have seen the archer scenes.  They always show the high long shots they used with multiple shots.  It was not accurate, but the long trip down gained the arrow "terminal velocity".  It is not that the arrow gains more, but it regains the potential kinetic energy it expended on the trip up as it travel back down.  If you fire from a point higher then your target the arrow does gain more potential kinetic energy as it passes the archer height to the targets lower position.  A crossbow bolt would have this happen, but usually less effective due to the lighter weight/less curved flight path.

The game does not have game mechanics to adjust for gravity, air drag, angle of deflection, and the many other variables.  So as I said I would like it if something might be tweaked, but the game is rather fair for the most part.  It is not perfect, and to "fix" it might just ruin things more then help.  I quite honestly thought an archer could fire much faster.  Seems I have watched to many "elf archer" scenes.  They were fast, but only about twice as fast when aiming.  Also moving targets slow this down, so honestly might be better leave things as they stand.

[Swadius]

If you ever watched movies with medival battles you might have seen the archer scenes.  They always show the high long shots they used with multiple shots.  It was not accurate, but the long trip down gained the arrow "terminal velocity".  It is not that the arrow gains more, but it regains the potential kinetic energy it expended on the trip up as it travel back down.  If you fire from a point higher then your target the arrow does gain more potential kinetic energy as it passes the archer height to the targets lower position.  A crossbow bolt would have this happen, but usually less effective due to the lighter weight/less curved flight path.

While an arrow coming back down the the earth will gain some momentum on the up shot, I do not think it that it would retain as much of their velocity when it parted from the bow. The first few instances that the arrow leaves the bow will be it's fastest, in effect, this is faster than it's terminal velocity due to it not just being pulled by gravity, but shot out of a bow. If it has reached terminal velocity on the down arc of the shot, this is tremendously slower than when it was shot out of the bow.

In context to the other things that he wrote, he seems to be saying that arrows do indeed speed up the longer they are in flight as he was talking about piercing plate (which I don't think it's possible to do given actual plate made for armor purposes). That he was talking about plate I think determines this quite well. All that time the arrow spends in the air is time that the arrow is meeting air resistance, having been shot faster than terminal velocity, this means that the arrow will continually slow down to that point, and never go above this again. Hitting plate at the instance the arrow flies off the bow is the best chance the arrow has of penetrating it.

[Blondin]

Oh I love those kinetic/physics discussion about arrows and bolts speed.
Most fabulous was on cRPG forum, about arrows speed, some ppl were arguing that an arrow couldn't do max damage at point blank because arrow gain speed after release(!). Well it's impossible, an arrow is at max speed just after release and can't gain speed after, except if target is lower than shooter (gravity) otherwise an arrow always lose speed due to frictional forces.

About arrow and bolt, a bolt is heavier but arbalest have more power, so they goes almost to the same distance (the bolt lose more speed but has more at the start).

Anyway I don't think that you can balance a game with RL dynamics, in fact we don't care of too much realism otherwise we couldn't do half of what we do in game

[Hypernoma]

This discussion is pretty pointless. Bows are fast and can headshot. Xbows are high in damage and can penetrate shields where archers cannot.

[JGP]

Please lock the thread then.  No point if it will not be changed.