Bows builds need some buff, especially on BG

Etherea1

In PVE bow can do some good damage, but its sweaty compared to ranged mga builds.
PvP is dominated by mele tank meta, bow have no chance and no damage here.
BG matches against random people with 18k hp in pve gear does not count here.

Mr_Stach

Part of the issue is Bow's Passives, they are just inferior to DW and 2H. There's nothing for Armor Pen at all, the Long Shots passive is useless as people are in your face constantly.

Hawkeye should affect all abilities, not just Bow Abilities.

Add Armor Pen based on how close someone is to you, as a secondary effect for Long Shots.

Just some thoughts there.

Dalsinthus

Totally agree that the skill line needs some love. I’d suggest Hawkeye applying to all ranged attacks as a starting point.

Dracane

I don't think you really want to buff bow stamsorcs even more. They will be truly nasty next patch.

Necrotech_Master

i run a 2h/bow NB in pvp, and i get far far more kills with the bow than i do with the 2h lol

poison injection is the one ive gotten the most kills with lol

Veinblood1965

Necrotech_Master wrote: »

i run a 2h/bow NB in pvp, and i get far far more kills with the bow than i do with the 2h lol

poison injection is the one ive gotten the most kills with lol

What setup are you using if you don't mind sharing armor wise? I recently rolled a Bow NB and getting kills but still could use some improvement.

Necrotech_Master

Veinblood1965 wrote: »

Necrotech_Master wrote: »

i run a 2h/bow NB in pvp, and i get far far more kills with the bow than i do with the 2h lol

poison injection is the one ive gotten the most kills with lol

What setup are you using if you don't mind sharing armor wise? I recently rolled a Bow NB and getting kills but still could use some improvement.

its not perfect but it works for me:

• 2 pc sellistrix (for the stuns, and sometimes kills people)
• 5pc plaguebreak (no cooldown, adds DoT, explode on death/purge)
• wild hunt ring (speed)
• 2pc agility set as filler (for 1600 extra max stam)
• front bar weapon 2h perfected maelstrom maul (maul for the penetration)
• back bar blackrose bow (more dot with the magnum shot pairing with the knockback)

with food im probably sitting at around 28k max hp, not super squishy but not super tanky either, the balance between dmg/survival/sustain works for me

if i had to guess, i would say 60-70% of my kills with poison injection are from the direct dmg, not the dot, because while it doesnt hit super hard, its very very fast firing (one of the few skills that actually feels "instant") and i usually pair it with a light attack weave

i started using kill tracker a few months ago and i have almost 200 killing blows with poison injection (it doesnt differentiate between the direct dmg or dot), my next closest skill is still less than 100 (probably executioner)

merpins

Some better passives would be nice, as well as a buff or a rework on a couple skills like scatter shot, and to a lesser extent arrow spray and the focused aim morph of snipe.

Etherea1

Maybe it is time to review bow passives in 2025 again, to make it on pair with other weapons?

Sluggy

Necrotech_Master wrote: »

...
if i had to guess, i would say 60-70% of my kills with poison injection are from the direct dmg, not the dot, because while it doesnt hit super hard, its very very fast firing (one of the few skills that actually feels "instant") and i usually pair it with a light attack weave

i started using kill tracker a few months ago and i have almost 200 killing blows with poison injection (it doesnt differentiate between the direct dmg or dot), my next closest skill is still less than 100 (probably executioner)

Careful with that!

That's how rending ended up getting re-nerfed. People were complaining about how carve and executioner were too strong and I showed them how rending slashes was my number one killing skill by a huge margin on a warden... didn't take long for it to catch on and then, BAM. Nerfed.