Snipe and it's implication on PvP, from a long time Bow user

DeanTheCat

Hello all,

I am Dean the Cat, and I would like to discuss snipe, the favourite flavour of the month skill in Cyrodiil since patch 1.5.

This will be a long read, and there is no TL;DR version, so be warned.

Do note that I am discussing Snipe from the point of view of a long term bow user. I have been using my bow since beta, back when bows were subpar and the game was dominated by the infamous "Stick and Dress" (There were no jerkins back in patch 1.0, so yes, dresses) combination.

Snipe has undergone many changes since it's first incarnation in patch 1.0. To put it simply, snipe, at that time, was hands down the worst weapon feat in the game. It had a deadzone of 20m, a stamina cost of more then double (Back then, medium armour didn't have cost reduction on stamina usage) then it's current incarnation along with a crippling 3 second channel, which meant that you were completely exposed during the cast and it was completely useless in open combat. At the time, I didn't even bother slotting Snipe, and instead went for a heavy attack as my stealth opener.

In comes Patch 1.2. Snipe undergoes buffs, turning it from unusable to slightly below average. Stamina cost was reduced, along with a reduction in the deadzone from 20m to 10m. The channel time is also cut short, from 3 seconds to 2 seconds.

In Patch 1.3, Snipe receives a further reduction to it's channel time, from 2 seconds to 1.8 seconds. Snipe becomes decent, and well suited for many different uses. It took some skill in positioning to pull snipe off, due to it's innate deadzone of 10m and it's 1.8 second channel time. An archer with decent positioning staying at a reasonable (15-36m) distance could support allies fighting on the front lines with Snipe, as the healing debuff from the morph Lethal Arrow or the extra DPS provided by the morph Focused Aim (The bonus damage used to apply to all ranged attacks, not just bows) could turn the tide of a battle if the right target was focused down with snipe. "Immortal" DKs stopped being so immortal after they have been hit with a healing debuff. Scales was not as prevalent as it is today, due to reflect costing the caster resources and most 1vX DKs not slotting it at the time.

Now, in comes Patch 1.5, which reduced the damage of snipe by 5%, but also reduced the cast time to 1.1 seconds as well as completely removing the deadzone of the ability. This change completely broke the ability, turning it from a balanced ability which demanded some degree of positioning skill from the user to a broken overpowered ability that is even more spammable and cheaper then it's magical counterparts, namely Crystal Shard and Solar Flare while maintaining it's incredible sneak attack potential and it's incredibly useful DPS buff OR healing debuff.

As a result of this change that was mainly targeted at PvE sustained DPS, it's now what you face in every fight in Cyrodiil. Archers are now casting Snipe at point blank range, easily doing 900-1k NON-CRIT damage due to how easy it is to push weapon damage way above softcap along with sets like Morag Tong, Kyne's Flight, Hawk's Eye and Kyne's Kiss providing unique bonuses to bows that are not available to other weapons. (I know Morag Tong isn't bow specific, but bows benefit the most from Morag Tong.)

It's now easy to solo capture resources with a bow, and it's possible to capture a KEEP with 2 archers + 1 healer, as tested by my guild, SatGNU. A few weeks ago, when Thornblade EU was painted Red and the only smurf raid present was busy at Fort Rayles, I headed up to Scroll Temple Ni-Mohk. There, with Lethal Arrow, Mass Hysteria, Healing Ward and Poison Injection, I managed to clear the scroll-less scroll temple of Ni-Mohk of ALL of it's temple guards. Think about it. A single lone Nightblade archer, managing to clear a SCROLL TEMPLE solo. Imagine what a raid of archers, working in tandem will do.

I really hate how at long last, bow is actually top tier, it becomes absolutely gamebreaking and everyone who holds a bow is automatically labeled as a "noob snipe monkey" and looked at with disgust. In my perspective, this change to snipe is a huge middle finger to all the skilled bow users out there, people like Itse and Decimus, who I hold lots of respect for. As far as I know, Itse quit ESO over the changes to bow and stealth in general, which is a huge shame, as I always held him in huge respect as a rival. It's kind of sad, that the bow will need to be nerfed, just after they had been made good, and I don't think the stigma associated with the bow will ever go away. These changes to snipe removes all vestiges of skill that used to be required of a good bow user, which means all the skill of all good bow users before Patch 1.5 means absolutely nothing.

Snipe needs to be nerfed. For the good of PvP, it has to be toned down. It's current incarnation is over the top, and I have removed Snipe from my bar as I refuse to use something this broken. Snipe needs it's 10m deadzone restored, along with it's cast time increased to at least 1.5 seconds. Right now, how to be a good bow user is pretty much this:

1) Smash head into keyboard
2) Did the target die? If the target hasn't died, repeat step 1. Else go to step 3.
3) Move on to the next target, repeat step 1.

Please Zenimax, make the right choice, nerf snipe. This is coming from a long time bow user. Snipe has to be nerfed, for the good of PvP in ESO.

To all of you who have stayed and read this long, I thank you for your patience.

May your road lead you to warm sands.

Columba

as long as I get a way for a bow to bypass reflect and block every once in a whilie, i'd be fine with both. bring back the dead zone no matter what though.

kijima

Yeah, bring back it's 1.5 or greater draw time like you say, so I can 'skillfully' use my bow with Snipe, Mark target (morphs) and a heavy attack or maybe venom arrow all to land at the same time. You know, the attack from stealth to land all three at once, undetected and therefore undefendable. Throw in camo hunter for the walking dead and you have up to 4K damage in one hit.

Broken much?

You aren't the only Bow user that has been loyal since Beta.

We've all be thrown into the FOTM build class because of Bow's recent buffs, and I don't give a tinkers cuss what some people want to label me, good for them if it makes them feel special calling me a snipe monkey. I know I've been Bow loyal since beta, and I'm proud of that.

Sure, re-introduce the deadzone. Sniping someone at close range is a stupid idea, you wouldn't shoot someone at close range with a sniper rifle, why do it with a Bow? And for the love of all that is Holy, get rid of the heals debuff on snipe. Watching healers wave their hands around in a mad flurry to fix themselves while amusing... It's a little tragic at the same time.

Arowe_eso

I can definitely agree on bringing the deadzone back, it adds counterplay in pvp without affecting precious pve balance.

The sneak opener is one of the few advantages of going with a stam/wd build, so personally i see no problem with one time spike damage like that. With the way stealth bugs out sometimes its really situational anyway.

MiyaTheUnbroken

I've been an archer since I started as well, but I think you're taking it too far in other direction. These changes weren't made blindly. They had good intentions, but failed to execute. Yes, lengthen the cast time to discourage spamming, but make sure it stays short enough that you can't weave two other attacks with it. Definitely bring back the dead zone, but keep PvE in mind. Ten meters might be a bit much for people who do dungeons. Some of them can be very tight spaces, with loads of crap screwing up line of sight; a dead zone that is too large could cause problems.

As a whole, I feel that the developers idea to make snipe the bread and butter of archers was a poor choice. It should be a situational skill, and venom arrow should be the skill most often spammed.

Domander

Block and/or interrupt and bow is much much less effective.

I run a bow build as a secondary to my main in pvp, it's great for certain situations, but not for others. I enjoy it, but I don't feel it's too powerful at all. Trying to kill someone that goes defensive is very difficult.

I'd like to get some of these hits 800-1k point blank..you must be fighting someone who doesn't know how to interrupt or block or dodge. If someone doesn't bash a snipe point blank they deserve a snipe to the face.

It is possible to push weapon damage very high, but you give up a lot to do that. It's glass cannon in it's truest form here in eso. My hits are not nearly that high, but I also do not go full glass cannon.

If someone hits me for 1k with a snipe, then my guard was down. I don't get mad or think it's overpowered or anything. Being instagibbed before patch 1.5 was OP, and bull.

The removal of the dead zone is fantastic for the bow in pve, it saves a lot of frustration. In pvp it's really not an issue, at least for anyone that knows what they're doing.

A lot more bow users? of course, it's been brought up to the power of the other weapons and can fight now without relying on stealth attacks. Players also want more survival in these large battles, running in to melee range in these types of battles is a lot more difficult, made even more so by the removal of camps.

DeanTheCat

kijima wrote: »

Yeah, bring back it's 1.5 or greater draw time like you say, so I can 'skillfully' use my bow with Snipe, Mark target (morphs) and a heavy attack or maybe venom arrow all to land at the same time. You know, the attack from stealth to land all three at once, undetected and therefore undefendable. Throw in camo hunter for the walking dead and you have up to 4K damage in one hit.

Broken much?

You aren't the only Bow user that has been loyal since Beta.

We've all be thrown into the FOTM build class because of Bow's recent buffs, and I don't give a tinkers cuss what some people want to label me, good for them if it makes them feel special calling me a snipe monkey. I know I've been Bow loyal since beta, and I'm proud of that.

Sure, re-introduce the deadzone. Sniping someone at close range is a stupid idea, you wouldn't shoot someone at close range with a sniper rifle, why do it with a Bow? And for the love of all that is Holy, get rid of the heals debuff on snipe. Watching healers wave their hands around in a mad flurry to fix themselves while amusing... It's a little tragic at the same time.

I didn't use the heavy attack + snipe + poison arrow combo before 1.5, and I'm not going to do it even if it was possible. A heavy attack needs some time to be drawn, and I didn't say to bring it back to it's 1.4 status where you could use all 3. I was suggesting to increase it to some sort of middle ground between old 1.4 snipe and 1.5 snipe, hence my suggestion of 1.5 seconds. Please do not think that I want snipe changed just so I can do the triple hit combo.

MiyaTheUnbroken wrote: »

I've been an archer since I started as well, but I think you're taking it too far in other direction. These changes weren't made blindly. They had good intentions, but failed to execute. Yes, lengthen the cast time to discourage spamming, but make sure it stays short enough that you can't weave two other attacks with it. Definitely bring back the dead zone, but keep PvE in mind. Ten meters might be a bit much for people who do dungeons. Some of them can be very tight spaces, with loads of crap screwing up line of sight; a dead zone that is too large could cause problems.

As a whole, I feel that the developers idea to make snipe the bread and butter of archers was a poor choice. It should be a situational skill, and venom arrow should be the skill most often spammed.

I don't blame them for trying to improve the bow. I only mentioned snipe in my call for a nerf, whereas I am not saying anything about the new Poison Arrow, which I find to be perfectly reasonable as a spammable. It's just that every time I log on, I see my guild chat filled with rants about snipe, and I myself feel that it's over the top. That's the whole reason why I made this thread. I just want to have fun fighting in Cyrodiil, and not the cheesefest that snipe has become. I used to take pride in being able to use a bow well, both from stealth and in open combat. It's just depressing to see how everyone jumps on the latest FotM broken OP thing and ruin it for everyone who was using it before it went OP. I hope you can understand where I'm coming from.

DeanTheCat

Domander wrote: »

Block and/or interrupt and bow is much much less effective.

I run a bow build as a secondary to my main in pvp, it's great for certain situations, but not for others. I enjoy it, but I don't feel it's too powerful at all. Trying to kill someone that goes defensive is very difficult.

I'd like to get some of these hits 800-1k point blank..you must be fighting someone who doesn't know how to interrupt or block or dodge. If someone doesn't bash a snipe point blank they deserve a snipe to the face.

It is possible to push weapon damage very high, but you give up a lot to do that. It's glass cannon in it's truest form here in eso. My hits are not nearly that high, but I also do not go full glass cannon.

If someone hits me for 1k with a snipe, then my guard was down. I don't get mad or think it's overpowered or anything. Being instagibbed before patch 1.5 was OP, and bull.

The removal of the dead zone is fantastic for the bow in pve, it saves a lot of frustration. In pvp it's really not an issue, at least for anyone that knows what they're doing.

A lot more bow users? of course, it's been brought up to the power of the other weapons and can fight now without relying on stealth attacks. Players also want more survival in these large battles, running in to melee range in these types of battles is a lot more difficult, made even more so by the removal of camps.

It's not always possible to bash things like uppercuts and snipe, what with the constant lag and the new shorterned channel times. And I'm not really a glass cannon per-se, I have 3.3k HP along with 2.5k stam and 1.9k Magicka with purple food when I'm in Cyrodiil. I also have over softcap weapon damage. Going high weapon damage doesn't always need to equate to low health and Magicka. If I find myself facing a defensive spec and it's safe enough to engage without getting run over by his friends, I toss shades, caltrops and go WW form. The bleed will kill them through block.

I understand why the dead zone was removed for PvE reasons, but it's encouraging really cheesy tactics in Cyrodiil, made even worse by the constant lag.

EDIT: Typos

Draxys

+agree with all of it. I'm fine with buffing bows, but specifically the magnitude of the snipe buff was clearly the wrong move. I don't think every person needs to wear light armor and use staffs, but they certainly don't all need to wear medium and spam snipe either.

Domander

DeanTheCat wrote: »

Domander wrote: »

Block and/or interrupt and bow is much much less effective.

I run a bow build as a secondary to my main in pvp, it's great for certain situations, but not for others. I enjoy it, but I don't feel it's too powerful at all. Trying to kill someone that goes defensive is very difficult.

I'd like to get some of these hits 800-1k point blank..you must be fighting someone who doesn't know how to interrupt or block or dodge. If someone doesn't bash a snipe point blank they deserve a snipe to the face.

It is possible to push weapon damage very high, but you give up a lot to do that. It's glass cannon in it's truest form here in eso. My hits are not nearly that high, but I also do not go full glass cannon.

If someone hits me for 1k with a snipe, then my guard was down. I don't get mad or think it's overpowered or anything. Being instagibbed before patch 1.5 was OP, and bull.

The removal of the dead zone is fantastic for the bow in pve, it saves a lot of frustration. In pvp it's really not an issue, at least for anyone that knows what they're doing.

A lot more bow users? of course, it's been brought up to the power of the other weapons and can fight now without relying on stealth attacks. Players also want more survival in these large battles, running in to melee range in these types of battles is a lot more difficult, made even more so by the removal of camps.

It's not always possible to bash things like uppercuts and snipe, what with the constant lag and the new shorterned channel times. And I'm not really a glass cannon per-se, I have 3.3k HP along with 2.5k stam and 1.9k Magicka with purple food when I'm in Cyrodiil. I also have over softcap weapon damage. Going high weapon damage doesn't always need to equate to low health and Magicka. If I find myself facing a defensive spec and it's safe enough to engage without getting run over by his friends, I toss shades, caltrops and go WW form. The bleed will kill them through block.

I understand why the dead zone was removed for PvE reasons, but it's encouraging really cheesy tactics in Cyrodiil, made even worse by the constant lag.

EDIT: Typos

Bow is just the worst possible weapon you can have at <5 meters, even without a dead zone on snipe.

glass cannon to me = less sustain

Tintinabula

i was using bow before 1.5 and frankly its hard to ignore that much damage and also breaking down someones stacked shield with one (or two shots). As a DK its a much better opener than crit charge or invasion ..and besides for a gap closer I still have those after just in case lethal arrow was blocked

Francescolg

DeanTheCat wrote: »

This change completely broke the ability, turning it from a balanced ability which demanded some degree of positioning skill from the user to a broken overpowered ability that is even more spammable and cheaper then it's magical counterparts, namely Crystal Shard and Solar Flare while maintaining it's incredible sneak attack potential and it's incredibly useful DPS buff OR healing debuff.

It is funny to see how you mention these two very similar skills, especially as a main Templar player. As good as no (PvP-) Templar is using Solar Flare due to this very simple but totally clear and reliable comparison you have done.
The damage-numbers are not balanced.

The buffing of weapon-skills and especially stamina-stats (and all other things which have to do with it in one way or the other) has not been done accurately. This all goes back to early August.. It is not an actual design flaw that came with 1.5x..! 1.3 is the culprit!

Thanks for mentioning the gap in item-set bonuses and the resulting possibilities for bow users!
Even the ratio of items which spec on weapon crit - compared to items which give magic crit - is underwhelming and the developers don't care about it.

For an 8% magic crit set I've to farm PvE (...) whereas there are 3 (!) craftable sets which offer 8% weapon crit as set bonus.. tbc

(relating to Itse: he is one of the reasons stealth-opener damage has been nurfed. I can tell you that he did too much damage, numbers far above 2000 dmg. I see no reason to argue for him, given we met him often enough and all he could do was just skill-cast time stacking + stat max'ing. That he quit the game is just a further prove that he is not a bow-passionate player who sticks to this role no matter what happens.. now that players get a chance to push block or pop a shield after the second attack.. the heal debuff alone seems not to be enough for him to have a 100% kill guarantee..^^)

DeanTheCat

Francescolg wrote: »

DeanTheCat wrote: »

This change completely broke the ability, turning it from a balanced ability which demanded some degree of positioning skill from the user to a broken overpowered ability that is even more spammable and cheaper then it's magical counterparts, namely Crystal Shard and Solar Flare while maintaining it's incredible sneak attack potential and it's incredibly useful DPS buff OR healing debuff.

[Snip]

(relating to Itse: he is one of the reasons stealth-opener damage has been nurfed. I can tell you that he did too much damage, numbers far above 2000 dmg. I see no reason to argue for him, given we met him often enough and all he could do was just skill-cast time stacking + stat max'ing. That he quit the game is just a further prove that he is not a bow-passionate player who sticks to this role no matter what happens.. now that players get a chance to push block or pop a shield after the second attack.. the heal debuff alone seems not to be enough for him to have a 100% kill guarantee..^^)

I actually worked with Itse on his build. We were both doing 2k+ damage per stealthed shot damage on snipe in 1.4, but he hit significantly higher numbers then me due to him having the "Stealthy" passive while I didn't have the passive, but I had higher base attributes due to the 22% bonus to attributes from the Imperial racials. Itse was actually quite a nice guy, if you got to know him better. I don't mind stealth opener damage being nerfed actually, even though I use stealth quite a fair bit.

Jitterbug

I agree (also bow user since early access), it does not need to be THIS strong. I used it before, and I'll use it after.
I do, however, like how more people have picked it up. Sometimes you even have ranked combat with the foot soldiers forming a line, the archers behind them, and the medics last. That's cool I think.

Grimbim

DeanTheCat wrote: »

...

Agreed!

Lava_Croft

Signing in to agree with OP.

SoulScream

It is getting worse. Last night I had some death recaps that were all lethal arrow. Nothing else! Lame

eliisra

At the very least, fix the stackable healing debuff. It's beyond ridiculous and most likely not intended.

There's not enough time realistically to break free, purge twice (one is never enough to clear all the dirt), than heal up, when being hit by more than one Lethal Arrow. Especially not if you need to squeeze a weapon swap in there.

Also, there's always a majority of happy amateurs not using Purge(been like that since the dawn of Cyrodiil), meaning all smart heals in the area goes to them and heals for 0.

Really wish the surroundings of Cyrodiil offered more LoS objects vs. the 40 meters ranged snipe monkey army that's currently dominating PvP. Would be nice with portable defence walls/barricades for AP or something

Pathfinder

eliisra wrote: »

Also, there's always a majority of happy amateurs not using Purge(been like that since the dawn of Cyrodiil), meaning all smart heals in the area goes to them and heals for 0.

This x1000.

Erock25

It's hilarious seeing all the bow spammers out there now. I'm one of them. I get ran over if the zerg gets to me but just sitting back and plinking with the bow is 10x more effective than sitting back and plinking away with Sorc abilities.

Huntler

A well thought out, reasonable, unbiased post on the forums? He's a witch! Burn Him!

DeanTheCat

Jitterbug wrote: »

I agree (also bow user since early access), it does not need to be THIS strong. I used it before, and I'll use it after.
I do, however, like how more people have picked it up. Sometimes you even have ranked combat with the foot soldiers forming a line, the archers behind them, and the medics last. That's cool I think.

I personally would love to see more of such battle formations organically form, instead of the old "Handicap Rainbow Trains" spewing out of Forward Camp after Foward Camp. Although, come to think of it, is the current situation (Snipe spam) any better the the old Impulse trains? Food for thought.

Huntler wrote: »

A well thought out, reasonable, unbiased post on the forums? He's a witch! Burn Him!

I prefer to keep my gender intact, as "Witch" usually refers to a female. Also, I get burnt alive by DKs on a regular basis, so I have kinda gotten used to being burnt alive already.

*Puts on a 1550 Fire Resist amulet as well as a 1550 Shock Resist ring in case @Huntler decides to use electric burn instead*

AllPlayAndNoWork

I use a bow. Bring back the dead zone and up cast time to 1.3 seconds.
Although I have to say - in close range I still don't snipe.

Palidon

When is Please ZOS NERF this or NERF that going to end. Learn how to deal with it. I like the way the Bow is now. But as usual there are always the cry babies out there. Give me a break.

Sharee

Palidon wrote: »

When is Please ZOS NERF this or NERF that going to end. Learn how to deal with it. I like the way the Bow is now. But as usual there are always the cry babies out there. Give me a break.

If the OP was a victim of snipe and complaining he died to it you would have a point. He is not. He is the one doing the killing. As such, he has little reason to 'cry'.

Pathfinder

As soon as the patch notes were released my guildmates immediately saw that the bow was OP. I have always run S&B/Bow solo, and S&B/Resto group so I am seeing both sides of the bowpocalypse.

No one was saying that bows needed a buff before 1.5 and the surge of players using bows now in cyro are not doing so because bows are finally on par with other weapons.

elausche_ESO

Changes to attempt to balance Snipe and it's morphs.

-Fix Lethal Arrow, so that it does not stack with itself for the healing debuff.
-Increase cast time to 1.3 seconds to match other cast times in the game.
-Add a 6+ meter minimum range. If the enemy can melee you, they can't be sniped.

Thechemicals

Sharee wrote: »

Palidon wrote: »

When is Please ZOS NERF this or NERF that going to end. Learn how to deal with it. I like the way the Bow is now. But as usual there are always the cry babies out there. Give me a break.

If the OP was a victim of snipe and complaining he died to it you would have a point. He is not. He is the one doing the killing. As such, he has little reason to 'cry'.

Or so he says. How often do people come on the forums and say that the main weapon they are using since beta, want it nerfed. Besides, hes capturing keeps on a dead server so whats that tell you? He could never do that on Thornblade at any hour of the day so that point is null and void.....and btw did you also siege the outer and inner with 3 people? How long that take you? Point is just bad.

Snipe is the perfect weapon against blobs and zergs, hasnt anyone even realized how *less ineffective impulse spam groups are now? They are being sniped and sieged to death which is how it should be. This is why so many of them are running Dk's now, hoping they can regain that spam kill with reflective scales.

Snipe has very little imbalance issues(perhaps the doublestacking heal debuff), and it is not the flavor of the month, many many people have been sniping since the very start of its cast reduction months ago. Or have we forgotten all the moaning threads and complaints about taking too much dmg from it?

Rylana

Thechemicals wrote: »

Sharee wrote: »

Palidon wrote: »

When is Please ZOS NERF this or NERF that going to end. Learn how to deal with it. I like the way the Bow is now. But as usual there are always the cry babies out there. Give me a break.

If the OP was a victim of snipe and complaining he died to it you would have a point. He is not. He is the one doing the killing. As such, he has little reason to 'cry'.

Or so he says. How often do people come on the forums and say that the main weapon they are using since beta, want it nerfed. Besides, hes capturing keeps on a dead server so whats that tell you? He could never do that on Thornblade at any hour of the day so that point is null and void.....and btw did you also siege the outer and inner with 3 people? How long that take you? Point is just bad.

Snipe is the perfect weapon against blobs and zergs, hasnt anyone even realized how *less ineffective impulse spam groups are now? They are being sniped and sieged to death which is how it should be. This is why so many of them are running Dk's now, hoping they can regain that spam kill with reflective scales.

Snipe has very little imbalance issues(perhaps the doublestacking heal debuff), and it is not the flavor of the month, many many people have been sniping since the very start of its cast reduction months ago. Or have we forgotten all the moaning threads and complaints about taking too much dmg from it?

I am going to stop you right here.

Playing on thornblade does not mean youre a good player.

Not playing on thornblade does not mean youre a bad player.

Hate to break that to you, but you have a skewed sense of whats good and whats bad.

Lava_Croft

Thechemicals wrote: »

Sharee wrote: »

Palidon wrote: »

When is Please ZOS NERF this or NERF that going to end. Learn how to deal with it. I like the way the Bow is now. But as usual there are always the cry babies out there. Give me a break.

If the OP was a victim of snipe and complaining he died to it you would have a point. He is not. He is the one doing the killing. As such, he has little reason to 'cry'.

Or so he says. How often do people come on the forums and say that the main weapon they are using since beta, want it nerfed. Besides, hes capturing keeps on a dead server so whats that tell you? He could never do that on Thornblade at any hour of the day so that point is null and void.....and btw did you also siege the outer and inner with 3 people? How long that take you? Point is just bad.

Snipe is the perfect weapon against blobs and zergs, hasnt anyone even realized how *less ineffective impulse spam groups are now? They are being sniped and sieged to death which is how it should be. This is why so many of them are running Dk's now, hoping they can regain that spam kill with reflective scales.

Snipe has very little imbalance issues(perhaps the doublestacking heal debuff), and it is not the flavor of the month, many many people have been sniping since the very start of its cast reduction months ago. Or have we forgotten all the moaning threads and complaints about taking too much dmg from it?

I asked OP to write this post around the same time OP decided for himself that the forums were in need of a constructive post about the 1.5 changes to Snipe. A post written from the perspective of a long-time Bow user and with a focus on perceived problems and possible solutions.

OP is one of the best archers on the EU server.

DeanTheCat

Thechemicals wrote: »

Sharee wrote: »

Palidon wrote: »

When is Please ZOS NERF this or NERF that going to end. Learn how to deal with it. I like the way the Bow is now. But as usual there are always the cry babies out there. Give me a break.

If the OP was a victim of snipe and complaining he died to it you would have a point. He is not. He is the one doing the killing. As such, he has little reason to 'cry'.

Or so he says. How often do people come on the forums and say that the main weapon they are using since beta, want it nerfed. Besides, hes capturing keeps on a dead server so whats that tell you? He could never do that on Thornblade at any hour of the day so that point is null and void.....and btw did you also siege the outer and inner with 3 people? How long that take you? Point is just bad.

Snipe is the perfect weapon against blobs and zergs, hasnt anyone even realized how *less ineffective impulse spam groups are now? They are being sniped and sieged to death which is how it should be. This is why so many of them are running Dk's now, hoping they can regain that spam kill with reflective scales.

Snipe has very little imbalance issues(perhaps the doublestacking heal debuff), and it is not the flavor of the month, many many people have been sniping since the very start of its cast reduction months ago. Or have we forgotten all the moaning threads and complaints about taking too much dmg from it?

The keep that I mentioned was captured on the PTS, also known as the testing environment. It presents a theoretical possibility, one that can happen, assuming no defenders interfere with the process. Rams are not just for decoration you know.

Likewise, the solo scroll temple clear took place when pretty much every DC was desperately trying to reclaim Rayles from one of EP's nightcaps. I had informed a friend who I got to know through dueling of my presence in Ni-Mohk. As there were no player defenders, this likewise is a theoricial possibility that has been proven to be able to be done, assuming ideal conditions of being completely undisturbed during the process.

I know you don't know me, and therefore are suspicious of my claims. I therefore invite you to go onto the EU Megaserver and contact Koma Grey, Kris, themdogesbite, Fluffy Fr0zer, Turack, Derra, Jurra, Valgar0r, Red Recursion, Zuna Stormcloak or Magicka De Hex (Forgive me if I forgot anyone important) and ask any of them how long have I been using a bow and my views and experience using said bow.

Snipe may be effective vs zergs, but it has always been effective vs Zergs at long range even before 1.5. What 1.5 did was render Snipe's weakness essentially null and void, creating a skill with literally no downside with a power level that far exceeds the catagory of "Skills with no downside". What if one day Crushing Shock started doing 1k damage and inflicting a heal debuff? Would you call that balanced?

PvP relies on players fighting other players to keep everyone happy. As much as you may hate zergs, remember that without them, you would have nobody to fight, and therefore no content, and you would perish of boredom. The game would then die off, and I don't want to see that happen. Remember, you are not whacking on some mindless AI that does things because they are programmed to do so. You are fighting real people with feelings and emotions just like yourself.