Bow Users Are Widely Considered A Liability To The Team Due To Their Ineffectiveness In Direct Combat. Why Not Buff Their Handling?

[TheGambler_BR]

I don't think the bows need a buff.

The ONLY thing I'd ask for is that enemies do not "flich" when they suffer elemental damage (such as electrical, mainly), as their corpses:

 

1) do not fly violently, which kills enemies, and;

2) BLOCK new arrows with their bodies.

 

Just because an enemy was electrocuted, does not remove the momentum arrows normally give when without elements.

[Fsac]

+1 The problem isn't it's killing power, both bows go to a 50% crit chance with mods, which is insane for its overall damage output. The problem is that you can only kill one target at a time (bar thunderbolt, but it's really really weak anyway). Other "sniping" weapons allow you to switch between targets rather quickly, while the bows are really sluggish in that regard, a slight increase in either charge or reload speed would allow you to aqcuire targets faster and keep up with the more user friendly weapons.

You can quite easily kill multiple mobs in a single shot, with the right mod setup.  The problem is, most people load down their bow with every form of elemental damage they can get their hands on, even though they'd be one-shotting mobs without them.  A couple of these mods hinder your ability to preform "pinning" attacks.  When a corpse gets pinned, it gets thrust violently away from the shooter, and if that corpse hits any other mobs, it will deal damage equal to the killing blow to that mob as well.  Of those who don't use these mods for one reason or another, very few play with the pinning effect in mind, positioning themselves in ideal spots to abuse this mechanic.

+1 The problem isn't it's killing power, both bows go to a 50% crit chance with mods, which is insane for its overall damage output. The problem is that you can only kill one target at a time (bar thunderbolt, but it's really really weak anyway). Other "sniping" weapons allow you to switch between targets rather quickly, while the bows are really sluggish in that regard, a slight increase in either charge or reload speed would allow you to aqcuire targets faster and keep up with the more user friendly weapons.

 

Also, while the Snipertron and Vulkar might be able to put a few rounds downrange quicker than a bow would, they suffer greatly from obnoxious reload times.  I would much rather be shooting a consistant stream of arrows than a short burst of bullets.

 

As far as giving bows "a slight increase in either charge or reload speed" ... you already can.  And it's more than slight.  http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=LFRSrp9OfW8'>Here is a quick video I threw together to show the difference between unmodded and fully modded bow speeds.

 

 

I don't think the bows need a buff.

The ONLY thing I'd ask for is that enemies do not "flich" when they suffer elemental damage (such as electrical, mainly), as their corpses:

 

1) do not fly violently, which kills enemies, and;

2) BLOCK new arrows with their bodies.

 

Just because an enemy was electrocuted, does not remove the momentum arrows normally give when without elements.

Agreed.  I would love to see this "bug?" fixed.

Having said that, as I noted above, I feel too many people mindlessly throw these mods in their bows because, hey, it's damage, right?  Foregoing the likes of Speed Trigger and Fast Hands to pick up mods that literally give you no meaningful benefit for 98% of the mobs you will encounter is the exact reason that some people see need to complain about the bows.

[TheGambler_BR]

Agreed.  I would love to see this "bug?" fixed.

Having said that, as I noted above, I feel too many people mindlessly throw these mods in their bows because, hey, it's damage, right?  Foregoing the likes of Speed Trigger and Fast Hands to pick up mods that literally give you no meaningful benefit for 98% of the mobs you will encounter is the exact reason that some people see need to complain about the bows.

 

 

I have little to no option, to be fair. My bow currently has 12 empty mod slots that I literally cannot fill because I haven't found the "ideal" mods such as multishot or cryo rounds, and I'm still upgrading my other mods (serration, vital senses and etc - just finished maxing point strike). Sometimes, players just can't help doing that. :/

[taiiat]

And what is so wrong with Speed Trigger actually being useful to the thing?  I'm sorry, but I don't think the defacto loadout for every gun should be Split Chamber + Serration + Piercing Hit + Hellfire + Cryo Rounds + Stormbringer + Beer + Popcorn.  This is especially true for the bows, as using some of those mods greatly hinders your ability to preform multi-kills.  I use Speed Trigger and Fast Hands on my bows without a second thought or regret in the world.

 

I don't hear people complaining in defense missions when bow users are sniping enemies out of high cover, or key enemies out from the back lines well before they can reach the group, or stuck mobs from half the map away.  Please don't let the stubborn few who refuse to switch weapons make the whole of us look bad.

absolutely! having every item have the same mod loadout be the 'only thing to use' could turn Warframe from the customization spree it is, into a generic level grinding game. 

 

i don't see how bows are particularly bad at defense, frankly. earlier today myself, a couple randoms, and a clanmate did lv40+ wave1 corpus defense, we ended on 20 when we got something kind've decent to take(as a novelty item, but better than something useless). i had Vipers and a Boltor, everyone else had Bows, presumably Dreads. i actually had a hard time getting many kills, the 3 of them were killing everything pretty quick :/ but i didn't mind after i got my kill challenge completed :p

 

the Bows are different, and interesting as they are. i don't think they NEED any sort of buff, but i guess i won't say no to it. 

 

 

hell, i even carry all or almost all of the Elemental damages on my guns. honestly, i don't give  flying F*** about this damage type not being as effective against this type of enemy. i'm not going to switch the mods on my guns every 5 seconds. it's a pain in the &#!. and, so what if i'm like, 10% less effective than i could be? i won't worry about it. i'll use a couple extra bullets or just not suck at shooting or dodging. 

and despite that, including bows, i don't think i've used a gun that's just been blatantly bleh at killing things (other than the Braton, lawl). sure, i spent some time with each gun finding some really effective mods to use on that specific gun, but i usually just have fun playing the game and throwing useful mods on weapons, upgrading most mods at random. so Bows aren't underpowered or anything, even despite the last time i used one i'm sure i just stacked lots of damage types and ammo. 

Edited June 10, 2013 by taiiat

[aTaVaX]

if they increased the fire rate, they need to increase the amount of ammo you get, even with the slow fire rate, its super easy to run out of ammo

[X3Evanescence]

Dread FTW! +1

[Whackhat]

i only opt for more ammo. i understand that arrows are larger than bullets, but the bows/snipers do substantially less base damage than shotguns, yet shotguns get more ammo.

 

sniper rifle base ammo should be 120-150 imo, because thats 120-150 kills. sniper ammo drops less than 10% of the time, ammo conservation is supposed to be important on weapons like the gorgon, grakata, and boltor. Not slow firing weapons.

[Tetsmeha]

They don't need a buff because game balance. Well modded bows can 1 shot enemies whereas most primaries and secondaries require more than 1 shot. Asking for bows to be faster is like asking for snipers to shoot faster and reload faster because their DPS doesn't match up with other guns.

[TheGambler_BR]

They don't need a buff because game balance. Well modded bows can 1 shot enemies whereas most primaries and secondaries require more than 1 shot. Asking for bows to be faster is like asking for snipers to shoot faster and reload faster because their DPS doesn't match up with other guns.

 

Exactly.

 

There are DPS guns and Burst-damage guns.

 

DPS guns usually have some downside like limited range (for shotguns), high ammo consumption and/or constant aim required.

Burst guns will deal MASSIVE damage in an instant, however their overall DPS will prove to be far lower than the other weapons.

 

A problem - that does NOT happen in this game - is when your Burst guns do not deal enough damage to reliably dispatch of even the cannon fodder enemies, and as such DPS guns become obnoxiously superior.

[DarcnyssWolfe]

My first crafted weapon was paris. My most used weapon is paris. I have nearly 200hrs of play time, majority of which was using paris. During that time the only draw back that made me wish I had a different weapon on me was not its damage, rate of fire or any targeting issue. No, the only buff the bow need are one to its ammo supply. By default "Snipers" should have at least 100 round reserve. Further more I play endless defence ALOT, and I rarely miss with either paris or dread. And during those endless defences it rarely takes longer than waves 15-20 before I begin running low on ammo and ammo drops. Now with that in mind I can use my latron, fire a few more rounds per target and using the same ammo hunt i do with paris and dread, I end up with an endless ammo supply well into the 40s, at which time i only run low becuase it begins to get too dangerous for my crippled Trin to rush through hordes or dodge the gunfire of the small armies being sent. So I also believe that either the amount of ammo gained from a pick up or the drop rate of said pick up should be increased (say maybe double either, but not both)

[AndiNaga]

I agree as well, though maybe not as much as 0.6 but 0.8 or 0.7, its a good weapon and in the right hands one of the best,
I support all thinks Bolt, heres to hoping they add a cross bow, which i also support,

[SnokyoDrift]

And what is so wrong with Speed Trigger actually being useful to the thing?  I'm sorry, but I don't think the defacto loadout for every gun should be Split Chamber + Serration + Piercing Hit + Hellfire + Cryo Rounds + Stormbringer + Beer + Popcorn.  This is especially true for the bows, as using some of those mods greatly hinders your ability to preform multi-kills.  I use Speed Trigger and Fast Hands on my bows without a second thought or regret in the world.

 

Speed Trigger turns the bow from something that is extremely clunky to use into something that is okay to use. Mods should be optional additions, not mandatory for smooth performance.

 

I don't hear people complaining in defense missions when bow users are sniping enemies out of high cover, or key enemies out from the back lines well before they can reach the group, or stuck mobs from half the map away.  Please don't let the stubborn few who refuse to switch weapons make the whole of us look bad.

 

Contrary to popular belief, people can be polite and most won't point out to the bow user that they're not actually contributing by doing the mentioned activities. In any sufficiently challenging defense, doing 71 AI base DPS or 107 base DPS is a pathetic contribution to the team effort to say the least. The player MUST be achieving a hit rate of 90% and a headshot rate of 90% to compete with a humble braton, which has comparable DPM at range. I'd wager that the majority of bow users fall below this benchmark for efficiency.

 

 

A problem - that does NOT happen in this game - is when your Burst guns do not deal enough damage to reliably dispatch of even the cannon fodder enemies, and as such DPS guns become obnoxiously superior.

 

 

The problem is that EVEN IF you are outleveling your oppponents enough to oneshot them, EVEN IF you have all the attack speed mods possible, EVEN IF you have 100% accuracy with 100% headshot, EVEN IF you have perfect target acquisition, EVEN IF you kill 2 enemies with each shot, you are killing 1.8 enemies per second, which slightly exceeds a random guy with a boltor (if paris) or braton (if dread) just holding LMB and hitting a target in the body. This is a problem with bow users rather than the bow itself; that a large number of them are affected by the Dunning-Krueger effect (hint: if you think you're good with the bow compared to non bow users, you're not).

 

All this talk about "burst" damage simply ignores the biggest point of the OP. It takes 0.625-1.000 seconds to prepare this "burst" shot, which is only possible to do without hindrance a small percentage of the time. When the stars align, you are killing at a rate comparable to the most vanilla rifle which boasts accuracy and effective range comparable to the bows. Anything with higher endgame potential will simply demolish the bow's damage potential and leave it in the dust.

 

Instead of thinking about bows in a vacuum and believing whatever you do about yourself, take some time to honestly self-assess and ask yourself if you're good enough to be killing 1.8 enemies per second. In reality it will be something like 0.4-0.6 enemies per second, far below the team average and therefore a liability.

 

edit: This is not a thread for you to provide anecdotal evidence on whether bows are liabilities, because in my experience, statistically, AND empirically, they are the worst weapons in the game. I do not care for people stroking their own e-peen telling tales of their imagined battlefield prowess in this thread. Instead, I welcome discussion of weapon balance levels supported by statistical analysis and logic. In any case, a BUFF to the bows certainly would not hurt them and should not offend your collective senses of self-worth gained from using a bow.

Edited June 10, 2013 by Tryysaeder

[AndiNaga]

I am a bow user but my main primary is the boltor, i am proud to say i like and use both weapons, however,
Though stated very bluntly, and some may say harshly, the above statment by Tryysaeder is near 100 accurate,

Bows arnt for speed running or killing alot of enemies at a time, they are for taking your time,

[KF5AQX]

Bows are amazingly good for soloing. Paris is still my go-to weapon whenever I see an Alert come up, just because of the stealth, and the fact that you can make sure things are dead.

 

Plus, they're stealth weapons. If you're trying to use them in open combat, you will need heavy mods, or you will need to be a master of their use. Use them for what they're intended, and they work amazingly well.

[LazerusKI]

i think you have never played with a good paris-player.

most of the time i have the msot damage of our team, most kills etc...and my paris is not maxed with serraiton now.

my paris can deal a very massive amount of damage, at the moment 1200 per shot (max. multishot, crit chance and crit damage)

with speed trigger and fast hand you can shoot realy realy fast with it...

paris is fine.

if you know how to aim to hit the target, paris can be a beast. bows are the weapons with a high learning curve.

 

dread is a little bit...meh

Edited June 10, 2013 by LazerusKI

[mmSNAKE]

i think you have never played with a good paris-player.

most of the time i have the msot damage of our team, most kills etc...and my paris is not maxed with serraiton now.

my paris can deal a very massive amount of damage, at the moment 1200 per shot (max. multishot, crit chance and crit damage)

with speed trigger and fast hand you can shoot realy realy fast with it...

paris is fine.

if you know how to aim to hit the target, paris can be a beast. bows are the weapons with a high learning curve.

 

dread is a little bit...meh

 

Dread gets over 4k crit tick on lv 100+ enemies. :) You can get over 10k damage if most things crit.

[LazerusKI]

Dread gets over 4k crit tick on lv 100+ enemies. :) You can get over 10k damage if most things crit.

against what kind of enemy?

mod setup?

 

so far i made a bad experience with my dread, because of the missing AP.

Edited June 10, 2013 by LazerusKI

[mmSNAKE]

against what kind of enemy?

mod setup?

 

so far i made a bad experience with my dread, because of the missing AP.

 

Any enemy you hit in their weakspot.

 

On ancients I got around ~4k total on average using cold element, I didn't have hellfire on, expect to have much more when you have Hellfire and hit their weak spot. Sometimes more sometimes less. When it crits it's enough to kill lv 100+ ancient in one shot.

 

Mod setup:

Serration

Piercing Hit

Split Chamber

Speed Trigger

Element

Point Strike

Vital Sense

[Torguish]

But it isn't a bow, it doesn't use a string.

It's technically some sort of railgun, that uses magnetic fields to propel solid spear-like slugs.

So, I dunno, science?

 

Maybe the magnetic field doesn't reach full stability until it's 100% charged?

Maybe it takes that long to charge a capacitor to then then instantly dump the energy into the accelerators?

That would explain not having any effect until fully charged, you charge the capacitor from reserves, not the field itself, possibly to avoid tearing off your hands.

 

I dunno, but they clearly stated that it is not a traditional bow, and does not use a string or cable to fire projectiles.

Dunno how you see it but i see a string attached to it. Not a normal string but a string nonetheless.. :|

[SnokyoDrift]

i think you have never played with a good paris-player.

most of the time i have the msot damage of our team, most kills etc...and my paris is not maxed with serraiton now.

[snip]

More anecdotes in face of statistical and empirical analysis.

 

 

against what kind of enemy?

mod setup?

 

so far i made a bad experience with my dread, because of the missing AP.

 

Paris is AI, not AP.

 

As long as you're getting headshots, the Dread isn't very far behind the Paris.

Only AP element equipped:

Paris: 4897 against a grineer with theoretical 100% resistance

Dread: 4772 against a grineer with theoretical 100% resistance

[Phoenix86]

So basically if u aim for weak spots the dread is more effective than the paris, am i right?

[SnokyoDrift]

So basically if u aim for weak spots the dread is more effective than the paris, am i right?

 

Yes. Shielded enemies too.

[Countess_Hapmuhr]

I'm not even sure where to begin on this one, so I'll just start from the top... the subject.

The bows a liability in direct combat?  Okay, yeah, kinda.  They fill a different niche than a lot of the other weapons.  You wouldn't try to snipe with a Strun, or take your Gorgon into an Exterminate mission... so why assume that all bow users use their bows for everything?  The bows should be paired with warframes and weapons that can highlight their strong points, as well as downplay their weaknesses.  In my case, I use Dual Broncos for "direct combat" and thrown weapons for adding a ton of versatility to my mid-range.

 

Are bows bad because they can't take out a dozen enemies inside 5 seconds?  Hardly.  That's what warframe abilities are for, or at the very least, alternate weapons.

 

And what is so wrong with Speed Trigger actually being useful to the thing?  I'm sorry, but I don't think the defacto loadout for every gun should be Split Chamber + Serration + Piercing Hit + Hellfire + Cryo Rounds + Stormbringer + Beer + Popcorn.  This is especially true for the bows, as using some of those mods greatly hinders your ability to preform multi-kills.  I use Speed Trigger and Fast Hands on my bows without a second thought or regret in the world.

 

I don't hear people complaining in defense missions when bow users are sniping enemies out of high cover, or key enemies out from the back lines well before they can reach the group, or stuck mobs from half the map away.  Please don't let the stubborn few who refuse to switch weapons make the whole of us look bad.

 

Yeah, only thing that needs a buff is the OPs common sense. You simply don't bring a knife to a gunfight. The bows are hard to use for certain, if you miss your kill chance just went out the window, but that still doesn't mean that a skilled user can't dominate with them. I can only imagine the insanity that a high level Serration would bring to the table with a Dread though.

[LazerusKI]

So far i build my Paris with:
Ammo Drum (Because more ammo)
Split Chamber (90%)
Serration (90%)
Vital sense (150%)
Point Strike (125%)
Fast Hands (Faster Reload)

Speed Trigger (Lower Charge time)

Thunderbolt (i dont know if i like this one...explosion damage seems to be crap, also it feels bugged sometimes, maybe i replace it with Ice or AP)

only serration is not maxed on it.

im running good with it, high RoF with high Damage per crit.

 

maybe i will build my dread on pure elemental then

AP, Ice, Fire, Storm, Ammo drum, Serration, Split Chamber, Point Strike

Edited June 10, 2013 by LazerusKI

[Fsac]

i only opt for more ammo. i understand that arrows are larger than bullets, but the bows/snipers do substantially less base damage than shotguns, yet shotguns get more ammo.

 

sniper rifle base ammo should be 120-150 imo, because thats 120-150 kills. sniper ammo drops less than 10% of the time, ammo conservation is supposed to be important on weapons like the gorgon, grakata, and boltor. Not slow firing weapons.

Ammo is tricky.  95% of the time, the 72 base is completely fine, as mob drops are often more than enough to either keep you topped off, or at the very least reduce the attrition rate to a very slow rate.  If I go through the whole of my ammo reserves, it's usually because I am using a weapon too much... and that is an area where I think many players fall victim, be they bow users or otherwise.

 

Contrary to popular belief, people can be polite and most won't point out to the bow user that they're not actually contributing by doing the mentioned activities. In any sufficiently challenging defense, doing 71 AI base DPS or 107 base DPS is a pathetic contribution to the team effort to say the least. The player MUST be achieving a hit rate of 90% and a headshot rate of 90% to compete with a humble braton, which has comparable DPM at range. I'd wager that the majority of bow users fall below this benchmark for efficiency.

 

 

 

 

The problem is that EVEN IF you are outleveling your oppponents enough to oneshot them, EVEN IF you have all the attack speed mods possible, EVEN IF you have 100% accuracy with 100% headshot, EVEN IF you have perfect target acquisition, EVEN IF you kill 2 enemies with each shot, you are killing 1.8 enemies per second, which slightly exceeds a random guy with a boltor (if paris) or braton (if dread) just holding LMB and hitting a target in the body. This is a problem with bow users rather than the bow itself; that a large number of them are affected by the Dunning-Krueger effect (hint: if you think you're good with the bow compared to non bow users, you're not).

 

All this talk about "burst" damage simply ignores the biggest point of the OP. It takes 0.625-1.000 seconds to prepare this "burst" shot, which is only possible to do without hindrance a small percentage of the time. When the stars align, you are killing at a rate comparable to the most vanilla rifle which boasts accuracy and effective range comparable to the bows. Anything with higher endgame potential will simply demolish the bow's damage potential and leave it in the dust.

 

Instead of thinking about bows in a vacuum and believing whatever you do about yourself, take some time to honestly self-assess and ask yourself if you're good enough to be killing 1.8 enemies per second. In reality it will be something like 0.4-0.6 enemies per second, far below the team average and therefore a liability.

 

edit: This is not a thread for you to provide anecdotal evidence on whether bows are liabilities, because in my experience, statistically, AND empirically, they are the worst weapons in the game. I do not care for people stroking their own e-peen telling tales of their imagined battlefield prowess in this thread. Instead, I welcome discussion of weapon balance levels supported by statistical analysis and logic. In any case, a BUFF to the bows certainly would not hurt them and should not offend your collective senses of self-worth gained from using a bow.

If this was DPSframe, or DrawSmileyFacesOnTheWallWithYourGunframe, I would agree with you.  To assume that, in a group of four, everyone must only bring high DPS weapons in order for the mission to be successful is just flat wrong.  There are multiple roles that the individual player can take up to aid the group's overall performance.  Would you think less of someone for bringing Enemy Radar instead of Rifle Amp or Energy Siphon?  What about bringing a Trinity or Nyx instead of a Banshee or Ash?  DPS, nor even damage in general, is not everything.  Bows are capable of (note the wording there, because obviously there are those who would just shoot whatever is closest to them) adding a certain level of utility to the group by taking out targets that your Bratons, Heks and Gorgons can't initially reach in any efficient manner.  

 

(Warning: e-peen stroking paragraph) Shield Osprey, Shockwave and Railgun MOA, Scorpions, Ballista, Toxic and Disruptor Ancients... these are the types of mobs that I try to deal with well before they ever reach you.  Don't worry, I know you're a big boy and plenty capable of dealing with them yourself.  If I'm doing right what I perceive to be my role as a sniper, then honestly, you should never really know.  And you, as my teammate, should be willing to pull a little extra weight in the fodder-killing department to make up for this.  The way I see it, if a lot of mobs need to die really quickly, someone needs to be pressing '4' and not holding down 'LMB.'

 

Lighthearted commentary aside... I simply don't think the bows need to compete 1:1 with the other weapons, because the bows fill out an entirely different role.  You are clearly looking at them from a pure "how many enemies can it kill in 10 seconds" standpoint, and that's just not the way to go about it.  You are also making the mistake of assuming that all bow users use nothing but their bows.  It's all about using the right tool for the job, and I can safely say that easily 40%, if not a full 50% of my kills in any given defense mission actually come from my pistols.

 

...and don't get me wrong, the bows are far from perfect.  The fact that death animations and certain elemental effects outright remove your ability to do pinning shots is a major issue that needs to be addressed by DE.  Would that alone "fix" the bows to your liking?  Not even a little bit... but for those who see them for what they are, it would be a huge step in the right direction.

 

I agree, the problem lies with the player and not the weapon.  Similar complaints could be levied on just about every other weapon out there, though.  For me, nothing warrants a heavy sigh more than seeing someone with Dual Vipers or Grakata in a defense map.  DPS?  Yea, they've got that in spades!  The ammo pool, though, is absolutely atrocious.  I know that every time I see someone using them, there is a really good chance that they didn't bring the 8x ammo kits necessary to keep the thing viable on a long run.

Edited June 10, 2013 by fsac