Rage. New Str Belt. Str poison or disease.
Rage is a factor, I agree. A new strength belt would generally be either bought (and then you can get a matching bow) or found as end-of-the-adventure loot (due to the value at that level) and then you may often get a matching bow soon after.
Poisons and diseases don't lower your actual bonus so they would work the same regardless of adaptive or non-adaptive bow. If your strength is 16 and you take 10 strength damage, a (+3 comp) bow will deal 1d8+3-5 and an adaptive bow will deal 1d8+3-5.So yeah for a non-urban barbarian I can kinda see it, but even then the atlatl is straight up better and the javelin will almost always be better.
My character, who spent 600gp on a +5 Composite Bow at level 3, has run into all these issues between levels 5 and 7. It's not constantly changing, but you might miss out on a point or three of damage per hit or suffer a -2 attack penalty depending.
Well, then either you have some house rules at your table or you should get a few points back from that poison and disease :P
The other question is, do most melee characters use their ranged backup often enough that it's worth 600gp to avoid reload times?
And to get better damage. And crit multiplier and, if they care, range.
Remember that for a strength 14 character a longbow deals the same damage as a sling but has higher range and crit multiplier. For a str 18 character a +2 bow does the same.But still the atlatl is straight up better, and the range you lose by taking a javelin instead of a sling is one third the range you lose by taking a sling instead of a comp bow; granted the less range you have the more it matters, but I don't know any game where it's been more common to engage enemies at exactly 35-50 ft than somewhere 55-105 ft.
Even getting a full attack isn't worth much if you don't have the Dex to hit with an iterative. If you're built as a switch hitter you'll want a better ranged option but if the ranged weapon is just used when you absolutely cannot melee something (once per level?) you might be better off with a sling and some well-chosen consumables.
I just theorycrafted a Halfling rogue (scout, sniper)9/fighter 1 build:
Str 16 (14 -2 Halfling +4 Belt of Physical Perfection)
Dex 23 (15 +2 Halfling +2 level advancement +4 Belt of Physical Perfection)
Con 17 (13 +4 Belt of Physical Perfection)
Int 10
Wis 8
Cha 14 (12 +2 Halfling)
Feats:
level 1 Point Blank Shot
Rogue Talent level 2 Weapon Training sling
Level 3 Dodge
Rogue Talent level 4 Close Quarters Thrower
Level 5 Bludgeoner
Rogue Talent Level 6 Finesse Rogue
Level 7 Sap Adept
Level 9 Sap Master
Fighter level 1 Bonus Halfling Slinger
Using this I figured (unless my math is off) the following ranged attack from 30' or closer when a Sneak Attack is achieved:
Ranged +2 Merciful sling +18 (1d3+6 plus 10d6+20 Precision plus 2d6 Merciful; all of this damage is non-lethal)
So this averages to about 70 non-lethal/Sneak Attack. That is pretty cool, but he has to keep moving all over the field, moving 10' every round or charging. Also he only gets this on a single attack; the only time he'd ever Full attack from ranged would be from concealment or surprise or when his opponent was otherwise denied their Dex bonus.
70 damage doesn't really do a lot to CR 10 monsters. a Bebilith for example has a 22 AC so its easy to hit but it also has 150 HP. Correct me if I'm wrong, but couldn't a dedicated Manyshot archer bring that thing down or close to it in a single round? It would take my Halfling slinger 3 rounds to finally knock it unconscious.
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Rage is a factor, I agree. A new strength belt would generally be either bought (and then you can get a matching bow) or found as end-of-the-adventure loot (due to the value at that level) and then you may often get a matching bow soon after.
Rage. New Str Belt. Str poison or disease.
If you buy a new matching bow immediately on getting a Str belt then you're losing 300gp on the upgrade. And use it maybe twice before you upgrade to adaptive?
Poisons and diseases don't lower your actual bonus so they would work the same regardless of adaptive or non-adaptive bow. If your strength is 16 and you take 10 strength damage, a (+3 comp) bow will deal 1d8+3-5 and an adaptive bow will deal 1d8+3-5.
So yeah for a non-urban barbarian I can kinda see it, but even then the atlatl is straight up better and the javelin will almost always be better.
My character, who spent 600gp on a +5 Composite Bow at level 3, has run into all these issues between levels 5 and 7. It's not constantly changing, but you might miss out on a point or three of damage per hit or suffer a -2 attack penalty depending.Well, then either you have some house rules at your table or you should get a few points back from that poison and disease :P
Looks like we were working with a misunderstanding of the ability damage rules which I will bring up at our next session. I don't think it changed the outcome at all that I had a -2 penalty to attack and damage when I should have had only -1 from 3 points of Str damage.
A javelin would probably have been a good idea. I guess I'm not trying to say that the sling is a good choice, just that for some characters it might not be worth investing in a composite bow for quite some time. Since both are cheap & light it might make sense to have both a sling & a few javelins on hand - use the sling in those odd 35-50ft scenarios or against DR/bludgeoning and otherwise use the javelin.
If you buy a new matching bow immediately on getting a Str belt then you're losing 300gp on the upgrade. And use it maybe twice before you upgrade to adaptive?
Note that if you have a strength of say 18 and is using a +4 mighty bow and get a +2 belt, your +4 bow will still deal more damage than using a sling even if you don't upgrade.
We're looking at 1d4+5(x2) vs 1d8+4(x3) after all.For rage (unless combined with getting a new belt), it's damage neutral between them but still provides higher crit; 1d4+6(x2) vs 1d8+4(x3). And of course better range.
So even in those circumstances a bow will be higher damage (notably with the belt, slightly with the rage) and longer range than a sling. Depending on interpretation of buckler, you might lose 1 AC with a bow though.
And yeah, there's reason to keep a sling around - but it's extremely circumstantial and there's very few circumstances where there aren't as easily accessible weapons that are straight up better. DR/bludgeoning isn't that common, it's mainly skeletons (which granted are pretty common for a single kind of creature but still makes up a tiny fraction of all opponents). But again, for any case except DR/bludge, an atlatl is like an improved sling. It's like the benefits of the sling and the benefits of the javelin combined.
BTW you shouldn't have had any attack penalty to ranged attacks from strength damage. It does not lower your strength so you still fulfil the requirement of the composite bow, just like you can still use power attack. So instead of -2 atk/dmg you should have had -1 dmg only.
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The -2 applied to the melee attacks I was making. I started raging as soon as the poison came up and that put my reduced Str above the bow's rating. That is, if I'd used the bow in that particular fight, which I didn't, because I built a melee character rather than a switch hitter and closing for +14 attack, 2d6+23 damage (including Str penalty) seemed like a better idea than hanging back and shooting at +8 attack, d8+5 damage. Which was my primary point; the bow has been used in about three fights against flying or otherwise inaccessible opponents so was it really worth 600gp to get +2 damage compared to the sling on about 6 attacks, half of which missed anyway?
I mentioned Str damage only because I thought it could cause Str to fluctuate and therefore an attack penalty with a composite bow, not because it was terribly relevant to my archery in that particular fight.
The atlatl is superior to the sling and that makes me sad because there's no reason for it to be.
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One of the things I hear in these threads often is that historically the sling was used by everyone (Simple Weapon Proficency) but that to be really amazing at it took more training than the bow (more feats overall). Unfortunately the game doesn't support this concept as there are several feats that add damage options only available to bow/crossbow users.
Deadly Aim and Focused Shot come to mind. The implication to me is that mechanically you should be getting your extra damage from strength since that's one of the values of using a sling but it still requires Dex for accuracy.
It also suggests though that the sling was a less precise weapon. You can use your Int and "Focus" (I assume this represents a brief physics exercise calculating angles and wind speed and such) or you can take "Deadly Aim" with a bow or crossbow, lining up sites and such. Not so with a sling. Is that to imply that there's no aiming with this weapon and of course using it can never be an intellectual exercise.
The sling itself will always do less damage than a bow or crossbow, that's fine. But why exclude this weapon from feats that seem to focus on aiming, focusing on a single target and all that? Oh right... water baloons.
I'm just being sarcastic. I don't mean to insult or offend. If I have, sorry. Hope everyone's having a terrific morning so far.
Umm....I'm pretty sure you can use Deadly Aim with a sling. You could use focused shot, but the full attack paradigm of the game makes it a bad idea.
The main thing slings and crossbow lose compared to bows is Manyshot. That, and the other feats it requires to be able to reload them as a free action to get them to the same basic starting point as the bow.
Otherwise, all the other main archery feats should be applicable to bow/sling.
It's just that the archery feat tree is long. It takes a lot of feats to be competent at it. With slings or crossbows it takes even more feats. In the case of slings it requires specific race selections to even be capable of reloading as a free action (if I understand it correctly).
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Deadly Aim works on all ranged attacks, including slings, but Focused Shot only works with a bow or crossbow:
As a standard action, you may make an attack with a bow or crossbow and add your Intelligence modifier on the damage roll. ...
As Mark Hoover pointed out, that's a little silly given the precise timing required for really accurate slinging.
Depends on your level really. Sap master and general range builds both work better with bows.
At fairly high levels I think Double Sling could potentially work well, but combining TWF feats + ranged feats + two feat tax to reload + possible proficiency feat tax means it will probably come online extremely late. A Slayer, Fighter, or Warpriest would probably be your best bet.
I took a quick stab at a slinger and archer build. Used human for both builds to keep the comparison as fair as possible, but a halfling slinger is not a terrible option - losing the bonus feat balances out with gaining proficiency with the double sling. To cut down on the time spent building I did not include gear - this is actually an advantage for the slinger, since enchanting a double sling would put him far behind the archer and he misses out on archer-specific gear like bracers of Falcon's Aim.
Male human fighter 10
N Medium humanoid (human)
Init +4; Senses Perception +15
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Defense
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AC 14, touch 14, flat-footed 10 (+4 Dex)
hp 94 (10d10+30)
Fort +9, Ref +7, Will +4 (+3 vs. fear)
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Offense
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Speed 30 ft.
Ranged composite longbow +14/+14/+9 (1d8+14/19-20/×3)
Special Attacks weapon trainings (bows +2, close +1)
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Statistics
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Str 16, Dex 19, Con 14, Int 10, Wis 12, Cha 7
Base Atk +10; CMB +13; CMD 27
Feats Clustered Shots[UC], Deadly Aim, Disrupting Shot[APG], Greater Weapon Focus (longbow), Improved Critical (longbow), Manyshot, Point Blank Master[APG], Point-blank Shot, Precise Shot, Rapid Shot, Weapon Focus (longbow), Weapon Specialization (longbow)
Traits seeker
Skills Acrobatics +14, Perception +15, Swim +16
Languages Common
SQ armor training 2
Other Gear composite longbow (+3 Str), 150 gp
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Special Abilities
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Clustered Shots Total damage from full-round ranged attacks before applying DR
Deadly Aim -3/+6 Trade a penalty to ranged attacks for a bonus to ranged damage.
Disrupting Shot Readied ranged attack vs. caster within 30' increases the concentration check by +4.
Manyshot You can shoot two arrows as the first attack of a full attack action.
Point-Blank Shot +1 to attack and damage rolls with ranged weapons at up to 30 feet.
Precise Shot You don't get -4 to hit when shooting or throwing into melee.
Rapid Shot You get an extra attack with ranged weapons. Each attack is at -2.
Weapon Training (Bows) +2 (Ex) +2 Attack, Damage, CMB, CMD with Bows
Weapon Training (Close) +1 (Ex) +1 Attack, Damage, CMB, CMD with Close-in weapons
Hero Lab and the Hero Lab logo are Registered Trademarks of LWD Technology, Inc. Free download at http://www.wolflair.com
Pathfinder® and associated marks and logos are trademarks of Paizo Publishing, LLC®, and are used under license.
I basically ran out of good archery feats to take, best thing I came up with was Disrupting Shot.
Male human fighter 10
N Medium humanoid (human)
Init +4; Senses Perception +15
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Defense
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AC 14, touch 14, flat-footed 10 (+4 Dex)
hp 84 (10d10+20)
Fort +9, Ref +7, Will +4 (+3 vs. fear)
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Offense
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Speed 30 ft.
Ranged halfling double sling +11/+11/+11/+6 (1d4+14/19-20)
Special Attacks weapon training (thrown +2, close +1)
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Statistics
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Str 16, Dex 19, Con 14, Int 10, Wis 12, Cha 7
Base Atk +10; CMB +13; CMD 27
Feats Ammo Drop, Clustered Shots[UC], Deadly Aim, Exotic Weapon Proficiency (double sling, halfling), Improved Critical (double sling, halfling), Juggle Load, Point-blank Shot, Precise Shot, Rapid Shot, Two-weapon Fighting, Weapon Focus (double sling, halfling), Weapon Specialization (double sling, halfling)
Traits seeker
Skills Acrobatics +13, Intimidate +11, Perception +15, Sleight of Hand +5, Swim +16
Languages Common
SQ armor training 2
Other Gear halfling double sling, 140 gp
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Special Abilities
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Ammo Drop Swift or move action to reload a sling with no attack of opportunity.
Clustered Shots Total damage from full-round ranged attacks before applying DR
Deadly Aim -3/+6 Trade a penalty to ranged attacks for a bonus to ranged damage.
Juggle Load Free action to load a sling with no attack of opportunity.
Point-Blank Shot +1 to attack and damage rolls with ranged weapons at up to 30 feet.
Precise Shot You don't get -4 to hit when shooting or throwing into melee.
Rapid Shot You get an extra attack with ranged weapons. Each attack is at -2.
Weapon Training (Close) +1 (Ex) +1 Attack, Damage, CMB, CMD with Close-in weapons
Weapon Training (Thrown) +2 (Ex) +2 Attack, Damage, CMB, CMD with Thrown weapons
Hero Lab and the Hero Lab logo are Registered Trademarks of LWD Technology, Inc. Free download at http://www.wolflair.com
Pathfinder® and associated marks and logos are trademarks of Paizo Publishing, LLC®, and are used under license.
I ran into some issues with Hero Lab while statting up the slinger. It wanted to give him a 1.5 strength modifier to damage with the sling, which I believe is a mistake. It also didn't catch that Sonny could make full attacks with the double sling, so I had to do the math for a full volley manually.
Archibald Archer: Ranged composite longbow +14/+14/+9 (1d8+14/19-20/×3) + Manyshot
Sonny Slinger: Ranged halfling double sling +11/+11/+11/+6 (1d4+14/19-20)
Any suggestions or feedback is welcome. If there's interest I could do something similar with a warpriest. :)
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As the ranged weapon of a strength-oriented melee, it's not a bad choice. Eventually they'll get a +1 adaptive bow, but seriously, that's 3,400 gp. That's 21% of your cash at level 6.At level 6 they won't have a constantly changing strength score so why would they need adaptive? With a 20 strength, it's 600 gp for a composite bow for their strength. For a primary ranged character, that's level 2. As a backup weapon, it's level 4.Rage. New Str Belt. Str poison or disease. My character, who spent 600gp on a +5 Composite Bow at level 3, has run into all these issues between levels 5 and 7. It's not constantly changing, but you might miss out on a point or three of damage per hit or suffer a -2 attack penalty depending.
The other question is, do most melee characters use their ranged backup often enough that it's worth 600gp to avoid reload times? Even getting a full attack isn't worth much if you don't have the Dex to hit with an iterative. If you're built as a switch hitter you'll want a better ranged option but if the ranged weapon is just used when you absolutely cannot melee something (once per level?) you might be better off with a sling and some well-chosen consumables.
Adaptive property, +1000gp and it adapts to whatever strength you have.
Indeed, but we are talking a rogue (scout) here, so he can move 10' and be attacking flat-footed AC with full sneak attackWhy you target flat-footed AC? Because the Scout Skirmisher ability make your attack deals sneak attack damage as if the target was flat-footed, not hit flat-footed AC.
Darn! Missed that...the little fink's in for a surprise the next time he uses it...
One of the devs, when asked why crossbows were just objectively bad, compared them to a water balloon fighting style. Saying, basically, that crossbows were goofy and you were goofy for wanting them to be goodIt is worth pointing out that actually IRL crossbows were not as good as longbows - they had less range, much slower rate of fire, and only equal power at best. It is also worth pointing out that decent longbowmen had to be trained for years to use them, and that in Pathfinder that would be the equivalent of all longbows needing Exotic Weapon Proficiency, while crossbowmen could be trained up in a week or two, and musketeers in just a day or so.There are several over-broad assertions in this post on the mechanics. I will say that the idea that crossbows outcompeted longbows due solely to ease of training troops is also somewhat suspect. Trained mercenary crossbowmen on the Continent actually generally commanded higher pay and higher social status perks than competing mercenary longbowmen.
And when you are hiring mercenaries, they come already trained to use the weapon, that's not an issue for the buyer.
Crossbows almost completely displaced bows among elite career soldiers on the Continent, and that isn't because they were easy to put in a peasant's hands, it's because they offered major advantages to the skilled user.
Yes, but the elite crossbowman had to pay three other people to be his loaders. He was the marksman, he had four crossbows and three loaders, and a tower shield to shelter behind. He shot, then passed back his crossbow to a loader and took a second crossbow that had been pre-loaded, and repeated. He still didn't get the rate of fire or range of the longbow, although at close range he did get better armour penetration.
Time to train does count, as it hinges on the availability of the troops. The reason the English deployed longbowmen and most of the continent didn't was because in England it was law that all able-bodied men had to practice archery on the village green every Sunday, and no-one else had such a law to provide a large pool of longbow-trained soldiers. Almost no-one else had any trained longbowmen, so they didn't employ them, they pretty much had to rely on crossbows.
Kudaku has the right idea. Instead of focusing on the bad in slings we should focus on the good. Yes, not all of the gear will work for a slinging build and they won't do much damage. I think though if you go halfling (doing even less damage) you can make them extremely accurate and therefore viable.
By 10th level the average AC is a 24. We want a build that, by the law of averages, has a better than 50% chance of hitting. That means an attack bonus of greater than +14.
A halfling fighter, level 10, would have 10 feats. They'd also have Weapon Training 2, meaning they've got +2 to hit and damage right there. Add in that they don't have to burn 2 feats on Ammo Drop and Juggle Load and you could hit the accuracy he needs.
Point Blank, Precise Shot, Dodge and Close Quarters Thrower means that he can sling in melee with no penalty. Add in Weapon Focus, Greater Weapon Focus, Weapon Specialization and Halfling Slinger and now you've got another +3 to hit and +2 to damage. The last two feats, I don't know. I suppose you could go Deadly Aim and Rapid Shot, but that defeats the purpose of an accuracy build.
If you don't lose any accuracy on the last two feats then you have a slinger full attacking with a 19 Dex and 14 Str (from Sonny above, -2 Halfling penalty to Str):
Ranged sling +19/+14 (1d3+6)
Ranged (from 30') sling +20/+15 (1d3+7)
That's before any magic gear and situational bonuses. If you gave him Snap Shot and Mounted Combat for example you could spend all his money on some tricked out magical mount that will survive melee combat and then have him riding around full attacking from it's back and then getting into melee and threatening within 5' even though he's ranged. This means he joins his fellows on the front line, suffers no AoO's firing into melee and gets AoOs himself if his foe causes one to happen.
You might instead go the Vital Strike/Devastating Strike route and keep the Halfling on his own 2 feet. If they're not full attacking at least they're still dealing 2d3+8.
Finally if you went Rapid Shot and Deadly Aim you'd have the following full attacks
Range sling +14/+14/+9 (1d3+12)
Range (within 30') sling +15/+15/+10 (1d3+13)
I suppose it all comes down to what you want out of your build.
Kudaku has the right idea. Instead of focusing on the bad in slings we should focus on the good. Yes, not all of the gear will work for a slinging build and they won't do much damage. I think though if you go halfling (doing even less damage) you can make them extremely accurate and therefore viable.
I don't think you have the right idea here. The thing is we're not talking about builds in general where "it can't do lots of damage" isn't necessarily a bad thing as there is the implication it brings more to the table than that. We are discussing a damage option. That is all a sling is. It will not help you talk your way past an encounter, buff your allies, debilitate enemies, or greatly extend your utility. It literally only does damage. That is all it will ever do, but do less at more expense in the long run than comparable options.
That said, yes, you can make a build and do okay with a sling, but by doing so you are intentionally making yourself less powerful ranged combatant than you could be. That's not necessarily a bad thing, but it is fact.
Kudaku has the right idea. Instead of focusing on the bad in slings we should focus on the good. Yes, not all of the gear will work for a slinging build and they won't do much damage. I think though if you go halfling (doing even less damage) you can make them extremely accurate and therefore viable.
I considered going halfling for Sonny, but the main advantage for halflings (warslinger) was ruled to not apply to the double sling, and the reduced damage die and strength penalty is obviously less than ideal. That said, the +1 bonus for being small would be handy since the double slinger straggles behind the archer in the accuracy department even before equipment, and he still has to enchant a double weapon while the archer is just using one bow.
Building Sonny was a fun challenge since I'm not terribly experienced with the various sling-specific options, but also quite frustrating. With three feats tied up in proficiency, Ammo Drop and Juggle Load I found I didn't have the feats available to cover the obligatory ranged feats (which I'd consider as PBS, precise shot, rapid shot, clustered shot and down the line Improved Precise Shot), the fighter-specific feats (w. focus, w. spec, imp. crit etc) AND the (imo interesting) sling-specific feats like Sling Flail. Being short on feats when making a level 10 human fighter(!) was not really a problem I'd anticipated and really illustrates how painful this build would be at low levels. At any given level you'd be two to three feats behind an archer, meaning you'd be dealing with Precise Shot penalties and no rapid shot for a long, long time.
In short, if I had to choose between the two builds I posted earlier there is zero doubt which one I'd pick to play.
I could build a halfling using a normal sling instead (avoiding the reload feat tax), but then I'm stuck wondering why I'm not using a bow with blunt arrows instead. The only real upside there is that I could potentially use the sling as a light flail and make a switch hitter of sorts - there might be a niche for a halfling sling warpriest relying on Sacred Weapon to make up for the crummy baseline stats of the sling. I looked for a deity that had the double sling as a favored weapon for a possible warpriest build, but near as I can tell no such deity exists. There are however 15 (!) deities that favor long and/or shortbows.
After playing around with this for a while, I think there are a lot of interesting things you can do with switch hitter halfling slingers using either the double sling for volley fire or sling staff for harder-hitting attacks, but the ruling on Warslinger and the subsequent penalty of Ammo drop/Juggle Load really shuts them down hard. If that ruling was revised to include all sling variant weapons it would enable a lot of fun but not overpowered halfling sling-builds - the sling staff for example is a perfectly viable alternative to the longbow so long as you could reload as a free action without investing feats in it. If you want to make sling builds more viable in your home game then houseruling warslinger to work with all slings would be a great step in the right direction.
Finally, I'm not sure if Close Quarters Thrower would work with a sling? The sling is listed both as a ranged weapon and a thrown weapon in different rules sections. I did a quick google for it but didn't find anything definitive.
I speculate that sometime between 3rd edition and the Pathfinder CRB, someone tried using a sling.
mikkelibob, I agree it's too bad there isn't an intuitive [halfling with rocks] build,b e it sling or skipping stone or whatever. Even if that did exist, I'd not like having to roll a d3 so frequently, though.
Adaptive property, +1000gp and it adapts to whatever strength you have.
That is what we are discussing - I think you missed the context. We are talking about using it as a backup ranged weapon for a high-strength low-level melee character. I think at around level four a mighty bow will be more worth the cash, they think it's at a higher level than that. At 4th level you clearly won't spend the 3300 gp needed for a secondary ranged weapon; we're talking about 600 gp to do 1d8+5/x2 in most cases vs free to do 1d4+5/x3 at shorter range.
I think it's worth those 600, but wouldn't at all be worth the 3300 at that point. Now, at level 6-7 things are different.
Don't forget Large Target on your Halfling slinger. +1 dmg/size category your target is larger than you is significant.
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Adaptive property, +1000gp and it adapts to whatever strength you have.That is what we are discussing - I think you missed the context. We are talking about using it as a backup ranged weapon for a high-strength low-level melee character. I think at around level four a mighty bow will be more worth the cash, they think it's at a higher level than that. At 4th level you clearly won't spend the 3300 gp needed for a secondary ranged weapon; we're talking about 600 gp to do 1d8+5/x3 in most cases vs free to do 1d4+5/x2 at shorter range.
I think it's worth those 600, but wouldn't at all be worth the 3300 at that point. Now, at level 6-7 things are different.
Yes, that's the issue under discussion.
I think it varies a lot depending on the character - how often you use your ranged backup and what else you would use the money for.
The total cost of an adaptive bow is 3,400gp (minimum) for a +1 adaptive composite bow (+0 base rating). This gives you +1 attack, +3 damage, twice the range, and an extra crit multiplier compared to the free sling (or +2 damage compared to the atlatl >_>). That looks like a pretty good deal. But look at what else you're buying at 7th level, with 24K. I think most melee characters will want to invest in a +2 equivalent weapon at that level (8K), and will spend a similar amount on basic defenses (armour, shield, ring of protection, cloak of resistance). That leaves you about 8K. If you use your melee weapon more than twice as often as your ranged backup, your next buy is a +2 Str belt since +1 attack and damage 70% of the time beats +1 attack and +3 damage 30% of the time. With your last 4K you could get your adaptive bow - or you could get a cloak of elvenkind, ring of feather fall, handy haversack, or for part casters a lesser metamagic rod of extend. I don't think that's a no-brainer.
Of course, for proper switch hitters the +1 adaptive bow will be more important than upgrading the melee weapon to +2, some people might prefer to skimp on defenses or utility items for that purpose, and others might have or be a weapons enchanter who can make a +2 weapon and a +1 adaptive bow for 5.5K total. Conversely, if you find most of your gear you might not get an adaptive bow as soon as it fits in your theoretical budget - and upgrading the draw before then can chew up cash.
Personally, I bought into the idea that a mighty bow was the ranged weapon for martials and invested early (level 2-3) in a pricey MW composite bow, +5 draw for 900gp. I assumed I'd give it +1 and adaptive around level 7 but now I'm there and I'm not sure it's worth 3,000gp for +3 damage on the approximately one attack per level that I hit with. Maybe around level 9. Right now I'd prefer a Cloak of Resistance, which I probably should have bought instead of the bow in the first place and used a sling (or atlatl >_>) as my ranged backup.
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I've decided to go ahead and "focus on the positive" here as suggested. Two of the unusual benefits of slings which can be gained by investing 3 feats are that you can reload a sling with one hand as a free action and use a sling in melee as a mostly inferior flail. That might open up a few unusual options.
One interesting thing is that the rules for Sling Flail say, "Using a sling in this way does not expend mundane ammunition, but magical or masterwork ammunition loses its special properties after a single hit." To me that implies that the magical properties of the ammunition might apply when the sling is used as a flail. If so that would give you a novel way to stack melee enchantments. Crafting bane bullets of various sorts might provide a minor advantage though some DMs might question whether or not you should be able to drop the "used" bullet and load a new one in between melee attacks. I guess that having a single weapon to enchant for ranged and melee attacks would also save a bit of gold ("Slings: The Miser's Weapon" by Ebenezer Baggins)
As has been pointed out before, you could also use a sling with a shield. This could be interesting when combined with Shield Slam since the sling would give you a way to make follow up attacks on enemies you'd pushed away. Another oddball combo which might be tougher to pull off would be tripping the enemy with Sling Flail and then pushing them away with Shield Slam. I think you'd basically get a +4 on the bull rush attempt, and while you wouldn't be able to get an AoO when the opponent stood up they also might be too far away to stand up and attack you. You'd need a pretty intense selection of feats and MAD attributes to make such a build work, but it might give you some options not every archer has.
Not needing an equipment change to go from ranged to melee mode can be pretty nice, and shields are an easy way to boost AC. Maybe I'll take the time to write up a sling build or two later though honestly it seems like a pretty tough road to follow.
I've decided to go ahead and "focus on the positive" here as suggested. Two of the unusual benefits of slings which can be gained by investing 3 feats are that you can reload a sling with one hand as a free action.
Per my previous statements in the thread, I'm not sure that's how the rules work.
Also, one potential issue I noted with Ammo Drop/Juggle Load, they might not give free action reloading with one hand. Ammo Drop lets you reload one-handed as a swift action, but Juggle Load only changes your standard reload time, with no mention of handedness. It's ambiguous enough that a GM might rule that you can reload with two hands as a free action, or one hand as a swift.
Dabbler - as long as we recognize that the crossbow was a favored weapon of elite, career soldiers, and not indicative of a lack of training, then the point is made. Detailed pro/con lists are a bit beyond the scope of my post (and of my reading), and off topic for a thread on slings.
I will say - because I can't resist sabotaging my own desire to stay on topic :) - that laws mandating civilian archery practice were in no way either unique to, or invented by the medieval English. Like many other things legal, military, and medieval, the blueprint came from late Rome, where attempts to militarize the civilian populace were a part of the Western Empire's struggle to defend itself.
During the Spanish Civil War and The Finns during the War with the Soviet Union used Slings to throw Grenades farther then one could by hand.
Now if there was only a feat to allow Alchemist to use a sling to toss their bombs
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There are multiple options for threatening in melee with a sling; not so with a bow. The other thing I've noticed is that since slings don't initially deal a lot of damage nor do you get some of the higher level feats for ranged damage you tend to be more accurate with them.
Then there's the double sling. With the investment of not one but 2 feats (exotic weapon prof and 2 weapon fighting) you've got multiple shots. Nice thing is with high accuracy you've got less shots but more of your iteratives actually have a shot at hitting. Add in the Speed quality and suddenly you've got 6 shots/round but 5 have a 50% or better chance to hit.
Finally... ammo. The Ranged Tactics Toolbox has introduced some (expensive) magic ammo for slings. You can hurl bullets that deal their normal damage plus alchemical splash weapons as well; there are bullets that are actually shrunken siege boulders that deal at least 4d6 damage. The sling is free; for 800 GP or so you can have a simple leather pouch deliver a vital strike that deals 8d6 and whatever your static bonus is.
And a last note: Captain Chaos is right. The sling is a means to dealing damage and it takes more feat investment to do less damage with them. However with that feat investment eventually comes the ability to use a ranged weapon in one hand, possibly in melee and possibly even threatening foes with that ranged attack from up to 10' away. You're reloading with one hand which means the other could be holding anything: a decent shield, and alchemical splash weapon, a second melee weapon, or nothing at all being an improved unarmed strike that you're flurrying with.
My point is the sling gives you options, albeit minor ones. Building a certain way around this weapon versus others opens up possibilities you wouldn't otherwise have with a bow. With a crossbow there's Exotic Weapon Prof: repeating crossbow but now you're back to extra feat taxes and cash.
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During the Spanish Civil War and The Finns during the War with the Soviet Union used Slings to throw Grenades farther then one could by hand.
Now if there was only a feat to allow Alchemist to use a sling to toss their bombs
Now there's a scary thought!
Haven't read the whole thread, but if you think a sling is bad, try slinging arrows. Not very practical, but arrow slinging with a sling designed so that it doesn't take forever to load the arrow (as seen in this video) might be good for an environment that has serious humidity change problems (bad for bows) and a scarcity of good rocks (and bakeable clay for making sling bullets) for normal slings.
EDIT: Found Kestros (Greek, with reusable sling but apparently not used very long) and Plumbata (Roman, used single use slings).
Haven't read the whole thread, but if you think a sling is bad, try slinging arrows. Not very practical, but arrow slinging with a sling designed so that it doesn't take forever to load the arrow (as seen in this video) might be good for an environment that has serious humidity change problems (bad for bows) and a scarcity of good rocks (and bakeable clay for making sling bullets) for normal slings.
EDIT: Found Kestros (Greek, with reusable sling but apparently not used very long) and Plumbata (Roman, used single use slings).
I know you already admitted it was slow, but good lord, that took almost 4 rounds to load and fire.
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As far as I can tell, the reload times in Pathfinder aren't meant to be realistic. Realistic reload times would probably make weapons like heavy crossbows and early firearms very unappealing for use in the game.
Who are the 2 iconics for bows and slings? I postulate it's an elf for the bow and a halfling for the sling. Now what is the major boon for the sling, right at first level? Str to damage. Who takes a hit to Str? Halflings.
Then a couple levels and feats later, what's a nice add-on for damage with a bow? Focused shot that grants damage from Int. Who has a bonus to Int? Elves. To me it appears that in the long run Halflings gain accuracy (Halfling Slinger) with their racial weapon but that's about it.
As far as sling use in general there's only one thing I can find that slingers can do that bow and crossbow wielders can't: Arc Slinger. You eliminate the first range penalty and you can Point Blank from 50'. Your enemies can still charge you, but if that charge is hindered for some reason you've got 2 rounds worth of full attacks from that range before they reach you.
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You're throwing rocks with a jockstrap. What are you expecting?
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You're throwing rocks with a jockstrap. What are you expecting?
I realize that you're asking in jest, but: That a weapon which is extremely hard to master and reputedly extremely effective in the hands of a skilled user be a viable weapon when used by someone who dedicates all his resources into making it as good a weapon option as possible.
Sometimes I wonder if whoever did the write-up on slings thought he was designing slingshots. :(
You're throwing rocks with a jockstrap. What are you expecting?I realize that you're asking in jest, but: That a weapon which is extremely hard to master and reputedly extremely effective in the hands of a skilled user be a viable weapon when used by someone who dedicates all his resources into making it as good a weapon option as possible.
Sometimes I wonder if whoever did the write-up on slings thought he was designing slingshots. :(
Actually, one of the designers in 3.0 admitted that was what he thought they were imitating. He said he had one as a kid.
Watch out or you'll spawn a new thread about what the Pathfinder stats for slingshots should be and possibly links to articles about how the slingshot could be an effective weapon on par with bows, guns, ICBMs, or maybe even katanas.
Watch out or you'll spawn a new thread about what the Pathfinder stats for slingshots should be and possibly links to articles about how the slingshot could be an effective weapon on par with bows, guns, ICBMs, or maybe even katanas.
Baka gaijin shooty-sticks could never oppose the might of glorious nippon steel folded over 1000 times.
Don't forget Large Target on your Halfling slinger. +1 dmg/size category your target is larger than you is significant.
Uh. You're still eating a -2 penalty to damage from being a Halfling(Small/Strength penalty) so it's really only making up for being Halfling if you only fight larger or larger creatures.
Which makes it only about as good as Weapon Specialization which is still a gods awful feat.
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Watch out or you'll spawn a new thread about what the Pathfinder stats for slingshots should be and possibly links to articles about how the slingshot could be an effective weapon on par with bows, guns, ICBMs, or maybe even katanas.Baka gaijin shooty-sticks could never oppose the might of glorious nippon steel folded over 1000 times.
Everyone knows the Japanese katanas were so good that in World War II they could chop through the armor of American tanks in a single blow.
Just like how the English longbow was so amazing that it was a medieval machine gun capable of firing a hundred arrows a minute that could easily put a single arrow through three armored knights.
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Because no one is allowed to challenge the longbow master race!
(also, something about water balloons...)
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Because no one is allowed to challenge the longbow master race!
Honestly, given the situation when the longbow mythology was mostly written, this does likely play a non-ironic role.
Agincourt and Crecy et. al were certainly reinvented in later eras - with wars of religion, colonial adventures - in an attempt to show the superiority of English people and society.
It's super convenient that the supposed splendid isolation of the English longbow towering above all other medieval weapons was right there to reflect how those later English wanted to see themselves now.
Don't forget Large Target on your Halfling slinger. +1 dmg/size category your target is larger than you is significant.Uh. You're still eating a -2 penalty to damage from being a Halfling(Small/Strength penalty) so it's really only making up for being Halfling if you only fight larger or larger creatures.
Which makes it only about as good as Weapon Specialization which is still a gods awful feat.
Medium and larger creatures comprise the vast majority of a Halfling's opponents. +1 or more damage when your base damage is 1d3 is significant. Using a sling is not optimal, nor is being a Halfling in most cases, but if you're going to go that route, finding ways to add static damage bonuses can't hurt.
A light shield's weight lets you carry other items in that hand, although you cannot use weapons with it.
To load a sling all you have to do with the second hand is hold/carry the ammo. Remember you do not have to pull a string or anything, you just put the bullet or Stone into the sling-cup and you are done loading. Nothing more complex than handing over a weapon to have a Hand free to cast or the like.
So you can reload a sling while wielding a shield RL (been proven) and this loophole makes it possible in the game, too.If all the caster light shield shenanigans are possible, this is easily possible, too.
And the last part of above quote refers to attacking not loading.
BTW: the same is true for firearms. You can hold them with the shield hand while reloading them. You use two hands without violating the shield rules.
Because no one is allowed to challenge the longbow master race!Honestly, given the situation when the longbow mythology was mostly written, this does likely play a non-ironic role.
Oh... There is nothing "likely" about it. We know for a fact that crossbows (and presumably, slingshots as well) are specifically designed to be inferior to longbows.
The sling is more than a Halfling weapon, it was a common weapon for all and should really be better respected than it is.
There are several things wrong with the sling in pretty much any fantasy game system. While I understand this *is* a fantasy game the range listed is deplorable, in real life the sling had similar ranges as the bow, in fact the English longbow record is roughly 306 Meters, with the composite being 566 meters. Both of these records where with lightweight flight arrows. The sling with proper ammunition can get to 505 meters with a combat projectile (bipointed lead weight). Another is the types of ammunition, the sling used round, ovoid (tear shaped) and bipointed munitions. These ranged the gamut from fire hardened clay, stones, lead and weighted metal) Additionally their is historical accounts of slings being used to deliver grenade like weapons. Finally damage, again historically their are accounts of slings breaking weapons, killing through kinetic impact. The average arrow hits about 60 m/sec a slinger can hit 90+ with projectiles being equal in weight for the sake of argument the sling will have a greater kinetic impact.
One of the first things I did as a GM was adjust the sling, to try and balance it out a little better without reworking the entire ranged section I moved to shortbow equivalency, and adjusted the munitions. Of course this is all *house ruled* but its worked out and I've actually had folks play slingers rather than archers. I have a slinger archetype originally I mod'd off the archer for gnolls but others wanted to try it.
Lastly here is a good source of info for slings and what they can do
Slinging.org its eye opening.
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Sniper Shot - not the greatest feat in the world but a good one to have if you're a rogue. Who's good at being a rogue? Halflings. Who's good with slings? Oh yeah... HALFLINGS! Man this is gonna be great except...
Benefit: As a full-round action, you may make an attack that allows you to deal precision-based extra damage to a distance equal to your weapon’s range increment. You may only make this attack with bows and crossbows.
Bow-only feats make you a good sniper, once/day you can heal at range, you can fire 2 arrows on your first shot, add your Int to damage and even give yourself a 2 Str range Adaptable enchantment (Exceptional Pull feat). With sling-only feats you can full attack and PBS from 50'.
I've said it before and I'll say it again: I don't mind that slings deal less damage. Most bludgeoning weapons in this game do and that's fine with me. But if there were at least some interesting options with this weapon versus the bow or crossbow, that might make it worth keeping in the game. As it stands right now I don't see a reason to use a sling as anything more than a backup weapon after level 1, and even then I'd probably give my PC a javelin.
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Watch out or you'll spawn a new thread about what the Pathfinder stats for slingshots should be and possibly links to articles about how the slingshot could be an effective weapon on par with bows, guns, ICBMs, or maybe even katanas.
I think I just thought of the ultimate weapon: A bow that fires katana.