Curse

Eldin · Mar 14, 2007, 07:57 PM // 19:57

First off, my usual weaponslots:

-Poisonous Longbow of Marksmanship (For trap farming)
-Elswyth's Recurve Bow (B/P or any other sort of barrage)

I want to try something new and am taking an interest in flatbows. I'm pretty experienced with rangers, though throughout my ranger's whole life I've primarily used longbows and recurves. Flatbows have the speed of the shortbow and range of the longbow, IIRC. However, I hear they have a high arc and are easy to dodge. Many people reccomend using Read the Wind/FW.

Personally I hate preparations, and I even only use Apply Poison when, say, I'm preparing other things like traps, and don't like to use it alone.

I don't know if I can stand using FW/RTW and a preparation like kindle arrows. I've heard in ways RTW/FW is more effective than something like kindle arrows (I use it in Maguuma and Hell's with winter for ultimate domination), because instead of elemental damage which an enemy may be resistant towards, it gives a general damage boost.

So I want advice from others who use flatbows - what kinds of preparations do you use, if any?

All replies are appreciated.

Franco Power · Mar 14, 2007, 08:02 PM // 20:02

It's not preparations, it's just RTW or FW because it makes your arrows fly faster, making them harder to dodge, the accuracy of the flatbow is low so you'll need that if you want a good performance, personally I think flatbows are only good for Barrage, and since I think PvE is boring and too easy, I won't comment much on their use, if you want to use flatbows just know, you need RTW or FW for a good performance, the range is good like the longbow, the refiring rate is awsome but the accuracy is low, but since you'll have RTW or FW that shouldn't be a problem.

IMO I'd stick with your Elswyth recurve bow, it's awsome and good for almost everything, the only flatbow I have used is the drago but only because I love the skin on a female ranger.

XvArchonvX · Mar 14, 2007, 08:42 PM // 20:42

Personally, if I'm not going to be under the effect of RtW or FW, then I won't use a Flatbow. That being said, I believe that a Vampiric Flatbow is the best bow type for a Barrage/Pet build since you should always be under the effect of FW. If FW drops, you can always switch to a trusty ol' long or recurve bow.

Flightmare · Mar 14, 2007, 10:35 PM // 22:35

Longbow>Flatbow with a barrage build imo, longbows have a longer recharge time, but barrage has a fixed one, overriding the longbow recharge time. Ok the difference isn't that big, but it IS a difference.

I prefer flatbows for luring becouse it's better at luring enemies that are on higher grounds.

XvArchonvX · Mar 15, 2007, 12:23 AM // 00:23

Quote:

Originally Posted by Flightmare

Longbow>Flatbow with a barrage build imo, longbows have a longer recharge time, but barrage has a fixed one, overriding the longbow recharge time. Ok the difference isn't that big, but it IS a difference.

Care to explain? The only time this would make sense is if you are not under the effects of Fav Winds. As long as you are under FW, you will get the exact same flight time with both a long and flatbow, but you will get a faster refire rate with the flatbow.

eggs0wn · Mar 15, 2007, 12:37 AM // 00:37

This is what he means:

Barrage has a one second recharge. The firerate of a longbow fits the one second for constant Barrage. I agree because I use a Longbow for Barraging and once my arrows hit and im ready to refire Barrage.

lennymon · Mar 15, 2007, 12:58 AM // 00:58

O I C
Well if I might make the suggestion, get a timer and make 100 barrages with a longbow, and then repeat the exercise with a flatbow on armor dummies just outside great temple. Just because barrage says 1 s recharge doesn't mean all bows will still fire at the same rate...
By the same token if fire rate makes no difference, how could [skill]Flail[/skill] speed up barrage? yet it does.

Jetdoc · Mar 15, 2007, 01:47 PM // 13:47

Quote:

Originally Posted by Franco Power

It's not preparations, it's just RTW because it makes your arrows fly faster.

Read the Wind IS a preparation.

Personally, other than taking up a skill slot, I don't see why taking Favorable Winds would be that much of an inconvenience, unless you are running a build with no points in Wilderness Survival.

In addition to FW's additional damage, you are gaining the benefit of the faster attack speed of a Flatbow. Add that to whatever IAS stance you're taking, and it's a natural fit.

SnipiousMax · Mar 15, 2007, 02:22 PM // 14:22

Quote:

Originally Posted by eggs0wn

This is what he means:

Barrage has a one second recharge. The firerate of a longbow fits the one second for constant Barrage. I agree because I use a Longbow for Barraging and once my arrows hit and im ready to refire Barrage.

But that's not the case. I've tested the different bows using barrage, and refire rate does make a difference in the time it takes to cycle barrages. Intrestingly enough, it even makes a difference on interrupts and other attack skills with set cast times (needling, quickshot, etc).

Using an IAS will ALSO increase the number of barrages you can get out... but in a suprising twist, it turns out that using a Hornbow under an IAS is the way to pump out the absolute most amount of damage with barrage (search for the tests done by Jenosavel).

XvArchonvX · Mar 15, 2007, 02:56 PM // 14:56

As Snipious and others have said, the attack refire rate does have an effect on spamming of barrage. Barrage will have a 1 second cast as it states no matter what bow is used, but the period of time between casts (i.e. the time when you draw your next arrow) is variable and dependant on bow type and/or attack speed effects.

Franco Power · Mar 15, 2007, 05:40 PM // 17:40

Quote:

Originally Posted by Jetdoc

Read the Wind IS a preparation.

Oh really? Thanks for that, I never knew

, /sarcasm off

He was talking about apply poison, kindle arrows etc, I meant that it's not all preparation(S), just RTW

bobrath · Mar 15, 2007, 06:54 PM // 18:54

(Just asking cause now I'm interested) Snipious, I assume you did all your tests from the same range or does that not really have an affect?

The interesting thing to me from reading this is that my B/P ranger should carry both a Flatbow and a Hornbow depending mainly on if I carry TigFur or not. Fair statement?

SnipiousMax · Mar 15, 2007, 07:22 PM // 19:22

Quote:

Originally Posted by bobrath

(Just asking cause now I'm interested) Snipious, I assume you did all your tests from the same range or does that not really have an affect?

Yea I did them all from shortbow range, in the intrest of establishing good habits... but it wouldn't have made a difference as I was counting the number of times barrage activated, not counting the number of times the target was hit by barrage, so the actual range would have been negligible. Interesting to note, that no matter how fast I was tapping the buttons, an extra normal shot would sneak out every so often on the flat/short bows. Even with the extra shots (which I didn't count), Flat/short's came out on top.

Quote:

Originally Posted by bobrath

The interesting thing to me from reading this is that my B/P ranger should carry both a Flatbow and a Hornbow depending mainly on if I carry TigFur or not. Fair statement?

You'd have to use Flail now to get the same results as the test that Jeno ran, cause Tiger's Fury is only a 25% increase now. But yes that is the jest of it. Considering that B/P groups have a copy or two of FW, there isn't any reason at all not to bring a flatbow, except that you have an IAS and run a Hornbow.

bobrath · Mar 15, 2007, 08:00 PM // 20:00

Thanks for the response. Time to change up weapon slots again...

At least my trapping "weapon" was an easy decision.

anshin · Mar 18, 2007, 12:18 AM // 00:18

Flatbow all the way...

did you know the damage from RtW and FW stack?

with my marks at 16 and having a hero bring FW and me bringing RtW my needling shot is causing 37 damage... cool huh?

i like using preperations because i now even use the insignias that give more armor when using a preperation