Curse

Ras the Swift Death · Sep 29, 2010, 01:03 AM // 01:03

One of my guild mates told me that a hornbow is the best as that armor penetration makes up for the refire speed (and a IAS like Never Rampage Alone helps), but I looked at some old topics about barraging and a people recommended flatbows and recurve bows.

What's the best in your opinion? I originally though a shortbow would be the best but apparently many disagree.

Sankt Hallvard · Sep 29, 2010, 02:12 AM // 02:12

http://www.guildwarsguru.com/forum/b...tml?t=10164713

Looks like hornbow is not favored.

Chthon · Sep 29, 2010, 02:51 AM // 02:51

Well, your guildmate is an idiot. The hornbow is out and out terrible and the AP comes nowhere close to making up for the awful speed.

As for barrage, it's an odd special case that changes the usual analysis. The 1sec cooldown begins halfway through your attack animation. So, you don't really need anything faster than a 2sec attack interval, as you'd just end up starting and then canceling an auto attack. That breaks the normal rules in that you can:

use a flatbow with no IAS (still need FW to fix the arc though)
use a shortbow with no IAS
use a longbow or flatbow with minimal IAS (Drunken Master (w/out booze) or Green Rock Candy or Essence
use a hornbow with at least 25% IAS (this is the only situation where a hornbow is acceptable)

It's a question of some debate whether having IAS that puts your attack interval faster than 2sec actually hurts you. Some people believe that the cancel-then-attack animation sequence takes slightly longer than the regular attack sequence. I honestly can't tell for sure.

Ras the Swift Death · Sep 29, 2010, 05:05 AM // 05:05

So it would be completely OK to barrage with a hornbow if I'm using Never Rampage Alone? It's a maintainable 25% IAS and doesn't cost very much due too Expertise. Then I get both the benefits of a better refire rate and the armor penetration.

Either way I'm using an NRA no matter what bow.

Desert Rose · Sep 29, 2010, 04:01 PM // 16:01

If run detailed tests about this topic in the past, sadly I haven't summarized my findings in english so I can simply copy them here.

You want to use a flatbow (or shortbow if you're lacking Favorable Winds and don't want the bad arc of a flatbow) if you have about 25% IAS or less.
You want to use a long- or recurve bow if have 33% IAS or more (if you use a flatbow, have 33% IAS and spamming Barrage you'll do a normal attack during two uses of Barrage, decreasing the frequency you can use Barrage greatly).

Never ever use hornbows if you're planning to spam Barrage; with Marksmanship 12 and no IAS the target needs to have more than ~180 armor to make a hornbow better than a long- or recurve bow, and more than ~400 armor to make it better than a flat- or shortbow.
With higher Marksmanship, higher IAS and/or damage increasing skills like Great Dwarf Weapon hornbows perform even worse.

reaper with no name · Sep 29, 2010, 04:17 PM // 16:17

Quote:

Originally Posted by Chthon

Well, your guildmate is an idiot. The hornbow is out and out terrible and the AP comes nowhere close to making up for the awful speed.

As for barrage, it's an odd special case that changes the usual analysis. The 1sec cooldown begins halfway through your attack animation. So, you don't really need anything faster than a 2sec attack interval, as you'd just end up starting and then canceling an auto attack. That breaks the normal rules in that you can:

use a flatbow with no IAS (still need FW to fix the arc though)
use a shortbow with no IAS
use a longbow or flatbow with minimal IAS (Drunken Master (w/out booze) or Green Rock Candy or Essence
use a hornbow with at least 25% IAS (this is the only situation where a hornbow is acceptable)

It's a question of some debate whether having IAS that puts your attack interval faster than 2sec actually hurts you. Some people believe that the cancel-then-attack animation sequence takes slightly longer than the regular attack sequence. I honestly can't tell for sure.

Do all attack skill cooldowns work like that, or is barrage a special case? I was under the impression that attack skills didn't start recharging until they ended.

Well, considering I often use Frenzy a lot in my Ranger's build (and the monsters STILL ignore her!), this might make me switch to a hornbow.

Quote:

Originally Posted by Desert Rose

If run detailed tests about this topic in the past, sadly I haven't summarized my findings in english so I can simply copy them here.

You want to use a flatbow (or shortbow if you're lacking Favorable Winds and don't want the bad arc of a flatbow) if you have about 25% IAS or less.
You want to use a long- or recurve bow if have 33% IAS or more (if you use a flatbow, have 33% IAS and spamming Barrage you'll do a normal attack during two uses of Barrage, decreasing the frequency you can use Barrage greatly).

Never ever use hornbows if you're planning to spam Barrage; with Marksmanship 12 and no IAS the target needs to have more than ~180 armor to make a hornbow better than a long- or recurve bow, and more than ~400 armor to make it better than a flat- or shortbow.
With higher Marksmanship, higher IAS and/or damage increasing skills like Great Dwarf Weapon hornbows perform even worse.

I don't understand. The only difference between a hornbow and a longbow or recurve bow in this case is the refire rate. If with an IAS either one is fast enough to get your one barrage per 2 seconds or whatever it is, then why wouldn't you go for the hornbow (assuming range and arc aren't issues, of course)?

chuckles79 · Sep 29, 2010, 04:48 PM // 16:48

May I suggest that you take your ranger to the isle of the nameless and check out the dps at the master of damage. It's not scientifically accurate but it gives you a good idea of what you should be seeing.
Personally I think if you are already bringing an IAS, that a hornbow would be sufficient (you don't have to bring FW spirit along and keep it nearby like a flatbow) and range would be better than shortbow.
Personally I never liked hornbows, but if you are in an area with a lot of warriors, it might be worth it.

Desert Rose · Sep 29, 2010, 05:38 PM // 17:38

I did my tests back at december 2007, so ANet might have changed the mechanics since then.

Afaik nobody has so far detailed analyzed the animations of attacks/attack skills without fixed attack time, therefor I'll use knowledge about attack skills with a fixed attack time.
Most attack skills with fixed attack time trigger the damage before the full animation of the attack is over. It is assumed that the damage triggers when the animation is halfway through, but after rereading my old results I'm not sure if that may be slightly incorrect. My tests and the tests from Epinephrine indicate that the time when you trigger the damage (or the arrow starts to fly) the animation is about 60-70% complete.
Because of this your character is already ready to attack again before Barrage has recharged, thus results in a small reduction in attack speed if you're spamming Barrage.
The (rounded) attack speeds of the bows are:
Short-/flatbow: ~2.3 seconds
Long-/recurve bow: ~2.5 seconds
Hornbow: ~2.7 seconds
I've gathered these values by attacking for a set period of time, counted the number of Barrage I was able to use, and divided that number through the time I've attacked for; sadly I don't have the exact values anymore.

The hornbow suffers less from spamming Barrage because when the attack animation of Barrage is finished the recharge of Barrage has nearly completly recharged; one the first view a hornbow seems to be the best bow for Barrage because there's less time "wasted", but overall you use Barrage during a set amount of time less often and therefor deal less damage.

A hornbow profits more from an IAS than a recurve or flatbow because obviously 33% less from ~2.7 is more than 33% less from ~2.3 or ~2.0. Therefor my previous statement that hornbows become worse the more IAS you have is false. But nevertheless it's still true that hornbows are bad damage-wise because you cannot use Barrage as often as with the other bows.
E.g. with Markmanship 12 and 25% IAS against a target with 60 armor the damage output of a hornbow is slightly higher than a long-/recurve bow due to its AP, but still less than a short-/flatbow.
With more points in Markmanship or targets with more armor the hornbow performs worse and worse because the armor-ignoring damage of Barrage itself becomes more and more important compared to the base damage of the bow and therefor the AP of the hornbow. If you e.g. switch the target in the above example with a target with 70 armor the hornbow already perfoms worse than a long-/recurve bow.
If you use a skill that give +damage per attack (e.g. Order of Pain, Order of the Vampire, Ebon Battle Standard of Honor) hornbows will virtually never match the damage output of the other bows.

sonofthort · Sep 29, 2010, 09:06 PM // 21:06

tl;dr

I noticed you said "elemental barrage".

If you are using a conjure, ur doing it wrong. Even if you are not using a conjure and using an elemental bow mod, you are still doing it wrong.

The damage you gain from using a conjure skill is equal to the damage you lose from decreasing marksmanship and losing the vampiric mod. That being said, it is terrible to make your damage rely on an enchantment. Also, your attacks won't trigger stuff like barbs and mark of pain.

Chthon · Sep 30, 2010, 04:40 AM // 04:40

Quote:

Originally Posted by reaper with no name

Do all attack skill cooldowns work like that, or is barrage a special case? I was under the impression that attack skills didn't start recharging until they ended.

Bow attack skills are a special case. The arrow is released 1/2 through the animation, and the recharge starts when the arrow is released. That's why you only need to accomplish a refire rate of 2sec to get the maximum speed with Barrage.

Now, some of the fixed-activation-time bow attacks get even funkier. Part of their listed "activation time" is actually an aftercast that appears to be fixed regardless of IAS. As best I can tell, most of the skills that became 3/4 in the most recent update on bow skills now behave lie a 1/4 skill, releasing the arrow at 1/8, and then end with a 1/2 aftercast pause.

Quote:

Originally Posted by Ras the Swift Death

So it would be completely OK to barrage with a hornbow if I'm using Never Rampage Alone?

Well.... I'd say that the most major issue is overcome. There's still a number of other reasons to not choose a hornbow: bad range, bad flight time for interrupts, no flexibility to use other attack skills (except fixed-activation-time ones), cost of a skillslot for IAS in a build that might not otherwise need one. Is 10%AP worth all that? Maybe sometimes.

WhiteAsIce · Oct 01, 2010, 02:17 AM // 02:17

With no IAS, a recurve or longbow is better because you can spam Barrage non stop with no interruption. If you did it with a short or flat, you will notice that your character will pull the bowstring back before pulling it again to initiate the next Barrage. It's negligible in the short run, but over time, this can lower your DPS. Q-stepping after each Barrage can negate this though.

If you're running an IAS, you will always need to Q-step after each Barrage to prevent auto-attacking, which causes the bowstring-pull delay. In this case though, a flat or short is best.

Also, Conjures are so last decade. The main variants nowadays are /Rt for Splinter, or /W for "Save Yourselves!"

afya · Oct 01, 2010, 04:14 AM // 04:14

i like flatbow +wind

Chthon · Oct 01, 2010, 04:29 AM // 04:29

Quote:

Originally Posted by WhiteAsIce

With no IAS, a recurve or longbow is better because you can spam Barrage non stop with no interruption. If you did it with a short or flat, you will notice that your character will pull the bowstring back before pulling it again to initiate the next Barrage. It's negligible in the short run, but over time, this can lower your DPS. Q-stepping after each Barrage can negate this though.

1. If you work on your timing you'll find it's possible to go straight from Barrage to Barrage with no frames of canceled animation in between on a 2sec bow like a flatbow or shortbow. You just have to hit Barrage exactly as it recharges. Of course, it's a lot easier against practice dummies where it's the only thing you're paying attention to...

2. I don't think anyone has conclusively shown that you end up with extra frames for canceling an attack. The double quiver reach thing is so skippy I can totally believe that no frames have been added to smooth it out.

Desert Rose · Oct 02, 2010, 10:33 AM // 10:33

Quote:

Originally Posted by Chthon

Bow attack skills are a special case. The arrow is released 1/2 through the animation, and the recharge starts when the arrow is released. That's why you only need to accomplish a refire rate of 2sec to get the maximum speed with Barrage.

I've made some quick tests yesterday, and so far this seems to be correct; I wonder when this mechanic was changed to work this way.

Ras the Swift Death · Oct 10, 2010, 09:20 PM // 21:20

Would Barrage be a broken PvE skill if anet removed the side-effect of taking away preparations?

Fay Vert · Oct 11, 2010, 01:13 AM // 01:13

No

---12 chars---

-Makai- · Oct 11, 2010, 01:16 AM // 01:16

Quote:

Originally Posted by Ras the Swift Death

Would Barrage be a broken PvE skill if anet removed the side-effect of taking away preparations?

More than likely. Not only that, but Incendiary Arrows would probably need a small buff in response.

WhiteAsIce · Oct 11, 2010, 03:35 AM // 03:35

Quote:

Originally Posted by Ras the Swift Death

Would Barrage be a broken PvE skill if anet removed the side-effect of taking away preparations?

No. None of the current preparations are good enough in PvE to make Barrage broken. The only preparation worth using would be Read the Wind for a little extra damage. Expert Focus isn't worth it because if you need energy, use a Zealous bow.
Assassins might combine Barrage with Disrupting Accuracy for widespread interruption, but that's not entirely useful in PvE, and it'll only be a poor man's Panic.
Choking Gas needs Practiced Stance to be useful, which limits you to Volley.

PvP is a different story. Barrage would become meta in that case. Spread poison = broken.

Xenomortis · Oct 11, 2010, 10:40 AM // 10:40

Read the Wind would become the staple one.
Disrupting Accuracy might see use by sins and Choking Gas would be hilarious. Maybe Expert's focus if somehow your energy really sucked.

Barrage would be broken, yes. It wouldn't be overpowered though.
And even with that, Rangers would still be bad.

Sirius Bsns · Oct 11, 2010, 11:07 AM // 11:07

Horn Bows are only good in Ranger Spikes, nothing else. If not spiking, use a Recurve Bow, Long Bow, or even a Flat Bow [on non-moving, fixed-in-place, snared, etc.. targets].