Before I even start, I want to acknowledge that my druid is not an optimal build, and was not intended to be. But in spite of her obvious shortcomings, I would still appreciate advice on how to beef up her bow damage output.
She is 8th level (+6/+1 BAB) with the following feats: point blank shot, precise shot, rapid shot and many shot. She has a +1 longbow and racial longbow proficiency. Her base dexterity is 16, but she has +2 dex from a pair of 3.5 grandfathered magic gloves.
Our GM is fairly reasonable about partial cover so she usually only takes a -2 on cover in combat, and probably avoids cover penalties at least half the time.
She typically buffs up with "Aspect of the Falcon" on her first round if she is going to use her bow. Her typical attack bonuses on a full attack are +11/+11/+6 using all her feats. Usually our cleric will either cast "bless" or when he is feeling particularly generous, he will cast "greater magic weapon" on her bow.
Ideally I would like to avoid the need for buffs entirely.
Assume she has 12,000g to spend and can retrain at least one, and possibly two feats.
The point of the question is to ask how to improve her archery, so "retrain as a wildshaped melee fighter" isn't what I am looking for.
So far the best I've come up with is a +1 shocking bow. I have considered a +1 shocking composite bow with a +2 str adjustment, but my party members feel that is too risky since she would take penalties without "bull's strength" buffing.
Any help is appreciated.
Well, you need deadly aim. No question.
You can have two bows, you know. In fact, a backup weapon is something you SHOULD have.
If you avoid buffs entirely, you just won't be competitive at higher levels. Sorry, but that's not how the game is designed.
I'd retrain many shot into leadership, and get yourself a bard cohort who can inspire courage and cast haste.
Aside from that, your archery doesn't look that bad. What problems are you having?
Leadership would be worth looking at, but she's a rather unique build and I would have to work hard to come up with a role play reason for my dryad-raised city-hating druid to have a bard henchman... lol
I would only be able to trade manyshot for deadly aim, precise shot is too important and rapid shot is a pre-req for manyshot.
I don't think she's bad with a bow, but I have this opportunity to improve her in this area so I wanted to see what could be done.
I thought about the two bow option too. Problem is that part of that 12,000g is from selling the +1 bow. She actually makes MW bows herself with her craft skills, so extra bows aree always handy.
I thought about a belt of giant strength and a +1 str adj MW bow so her str would be boosted constantly. But running the numbers kept coming back to the +1 shocking (or other energy type) bow.
You can't add another enhancement to an already enchanted bow can you? I know you couldn't in 3.5.
Your bow should take advantage of your strength bonus (normal). You don't say what your STR is, so that's all the help I have.
Personally, I'd rather have deadly aim over manyshot.
I don't agree about 3.5, I think a +1 flaming, shocking bow would count as a +3 weapon and cost 18,000 gold coins.
If you have craft arms and armor, you can make magic arrows and further enchant your magic bow. That might be a great feat to take.
With 12,000, you could buy an efficient quiver, a selection of special material arrows, and have 6000 left over to take your bow from +1 to +2. That should be done right away.
Your call, what's best for the campaign? An elemental enhancement or something like bane or seeking?
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In other news, make sure you have a good perception, keep faerie fire memorized, and remember that produce flame benefits from your precise shot feat too.
Not a "flaming, shocking" bow, just a "shocking" bow.
I did not run the numbers on deadly aim, I will do that tonight. The problem with more negatives to hit is that has more impact on harder to hit targets...
Thnks for the advice.
Deadly Aim is really needed to make archery competitive. Though the fact it exists is awesome one of the better feats in the game.
Every bow you have the main and backup should be composite and have a + strength equal to your normal strength modifier so that you are always doing +x damage a shot. You could even have another bow if you were feeling up to it with a + strength at whatever yours is when buffed with Bull's strength.
Though a word of warning Bull's strength won't stack with any other strength boosting item that gives an enhancement bonus (Belt of Giant strength and such).
With those two alone your damage should be going up by at least by +4 from the Deadly Aim. Though you may want to consider dropping Many shot in favor of either Leadership if you can make it work for your character or Weapon Focus due to the fact you are taking -2 to hit from the Deadly Aim at your BAB.
On the magic weapon I would suggest doing any of the +1d6 enchants out there. it really will boost your damage.
All in all though your best is swapping for Deadly Aim and getting your main and backup bow composite.
You can in fact add enhancements to an already made item. Cost to upgrade is (cost of item after upgrade) - (cost of item before upgrade). And I'd go +2 before I go +1 elemental.
That is a fair point I will give that to Darigaaz. It would make more sense to add to your to hit after taking the feat to increase damage.
Her base str is 10.
You can in fact add enhancements to an already made item. Cost to upgrade is (cost of item after upgrade) - (cost of item before upgrade). And I'd go +2 before I go +1 elemental.
Why would you do this? I've run the numbers several times and unless you are needing an 18 or more to hit, the energy bow does more damage even though it hits less. It only hits one less out of 20 attacks but does d6-1 more damage per hit. If you need an 11 to hit with the +1 shocking bow, it does 16.5 more overall damage than the +2 bow over those 20 shots. That's almost two points per hit.
Deadly aim is an OPTION. If you're missing a lot, stop using it.
Deadly aim is an OPTION. If you're missing a lot, stop using it.
Well, if I have it but don't use it, then at least for that turn, it's as if I've got an open and unused feat slot that could be more gainfully utilized.
I have a question about deadly aim. If you have a +6/+1 BAB, does that mean the FIRST arrow gets a -2/+4 to the attack, but the second arrow gets a -1/+2?
My biggest problem with deadly aim is that with deadly aim and rapid shot I'm accepting a -4 on my attacks, and that disproportionately hurts my chances against higher AC opponents, which is precisely when I probably need as many feats working for me as possible.
If I had higher attack bonuses than my standard +11/+6 to start with, I'd be more willing to accept the additional -2 to take on deadly aim. If I get a +2 bow and deadly aim then that's actually a net -1 to get a +5 damage per hit... hmmm
well, I have to run the math. Guess I better add a line to my spreadsheet.
Leadership would be worth looking at, but she's a rather unique build and I would have to work hard to come up with a role play reason for my dryad-raised city-hating druid to have a bard henchman... lol
This would fit nicely in terms of RP with a city-hating druid.
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Buy bane arrows. Not a lot, 3-5 of the type reflecting the most dangerous creatures you'd likely encounter. make'm with special materials so you'd likely be better prepared. If your'e party has an arcane caster, pick up a scroll or 2 of flaming arrow. Or maybe an oil or 2.
I'd rather not lose many shot, as with the bonuses to your bow you'll really take advantage of each arrow getting the bonus, but deadly aim really is the better feat of the 2 at early levels. That said, it would still be worth getting later.
What is your'e UMD? do you have any ranks in it? If you did, I'd recommend gravity bow as well.
Finally, something else to consider, as you're getting to the level where DR is more prevalent, is the feat Cluster Shot. Sure, carrying different types of arrows could help, but eventually every archer comes across something they just aren't prepared for as far as DR. Cluster shot really helps here.
One last piece of advice, look in the book Elves of Golarion. They have many different types of none magical arrows that can be fairly useful as well. With enough ranks in craft alchemy and craft bowyer, you could make these arrows yourself and take advantage of the alchemist fire arrows and the arrow that break and do bleed damage every round.
No UMD, I thought about gravity bow, but we don't have anyone else in the party (except maybe the rogue) who could cast it.
Our GM restricts content to the core PF books at this time, so no fancy magic arrows.
On deadly aim vs manyshot. I simply am not seeing this the way other people see it. The bottom line is that since deadly aim gives an 8th level character a maximum of +4 damage per arrow, then if you swap out manyshot the way to compare the difference is to say that both combos get three arrows per round, but deadly aim gains an overall potential of +12 if all three arrows hit, while manyshot instead adds the full damage of another arrow, it should be clear that deadly aim is only beneficial if a single arrow does less than 12 damage. In my druid's case that is only true so long as she sticks with a generic +1 or +2 weapon. As soon as you add shocking (d6) manyshot beats deadly aim since each arrow does more individually than the cumulative bonus of deadly aim on the three remaining arrows (adding shocking takes my druid's average arrow damage up from 10 to 13.5) And this comparison is only true for cases where all three arrows hit. If you have a 50% chance to hit with "manyshot" then you have only a 40% chance to hit with "deadly aim" so you lose even more damage that way.
My takeaway is that deadly aim is better if your individual arrow damage totally sucks, but otherwise manyshot is better. Buying an energy bow pushes my druid over that line, so manyshot seems to be a better choice.
You can in fact add enhancements to an already made item. Cost to upgrade is (cost of item after upgrade) - (cost of item before upgrade). And I'd go +2 before I go +1 elemental.Why would you do this? I've run the numbers several times and unless you are needing an 18 or more to hit, the energy bow does more damage even though it hits less. It only hits one less out of 20 attacks but does d6-1 more damage per hit. If you need an 11 to hit with the +1 shocking bow, it does 16.5 more overall damage than the +2 bow over those 20 shots. That's almost two points per hit.
Because static plusses are multiplied on crits and at +3 and higher you start overcoming DRs other than magic.
Because static plusses are multiplied on crits and at +3 and higher you start overcoming DRs other than magic.You can in fact add enhancements to an already made item. Cost to upgrade is (cost of item after upgrade) - (cost of item before upgrade). And I'd go +2 before I go +1 elemental.Why would you do this? I've run the numbers several times and unless you are needing an 18 or more to hit, the energy bow does more damage even though it hits less. It only hits one less out of 20 attacks but does d6-1 more damage per hit. If you need an 11 to hit with the +1 shocking bow, it does 16.5 more overall damage than the +2 bow over those 20 shots. That's almost two points per hit.
OK, I guess I better factor crits in then. Especially since Aspect of the Falcon gives bows a crit range of 19-20...
Also, upgrading a +1 bow to a +2 bow would then cost 6,000g, right?
Doing that and swapping out manyshot for deadly aim would mean:
Average arrow damage = 11.5 on average. On a crit that would be 34.5 on average. So if a creature has DR 10, then I'm only doing 1.5 damage on average without crits. A crit on a DR 10 creature would be
Keeping manyshot and buying the +1 shocking bow would be 10 on average, with a crit being 23 damage. DR 10 would mean the arrow does no damage unless it's a crit, which then would do 15.5 damage.
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OK, I guess I better factor crits in then. Especially since Aspect of the Falcon gives bows a crit range of 19-20...Because static plusses are multiplied on crits and at +3 and higher you start overcoming DRs other than magic.You can in fact add enhancements to an already made item. Cost to upgrade is (cost of item after upgrade) - (cost of item before upgrade). And I'd go +2 before I go +1 elemental.Why would you do this? I've run the numbers several times and unless you are needing an 18 or more to hit, the energy bow does more damage even though it hits less. It only hits one less out of 20 attacks but does d6-1 more damage per hit. If you need an 11 to hit with the +1 shocking bow, it does 16.5 more overall damage than the +2 bow over those 20 shots. That's almost two points per hit.
1) Elemental resists can eat up a lot of that damage.
2) As damage scales up +hit becomes more valuable. Buffs, ability scores boosts, etc all matter.In your example the break point is 15 average damage...a lot of characters hit that. A 9th level fighter with 18 strength and pretty minimal buffing hits that: 4.5 from a long bow + 4 str + 2 weapon spec + 2 weapon training + 1 weapon + 2 bard song (or other buff). A smiting paladin would hit this earlier.
3) Extra damage is often wasted (a monster can only be so dead) while extra hits may not be.
Well, if I have it but don't use it, then at least for that turn, it's as if I've got an open and unused feat slot that could be more gainfully utilized.
Well, what's your option? Be prepared for only one situation? I personally have ranks in swim, but I actually drive most places. Yet I don't think it's a waste.
Characters who use every feat, every round, can usually be shut down very quickly. If you can't deal with darkness or fog or a wind wall, you're not going to be able to use ANY of your feats.
What then?
Well, if I have it but don't use it, then at least for that turn, it's as if I've got an open and unused feat slot that could be more gainfully utilized.
Well, what's your option? Be prepared for only one situation? I personally have ranks in swim, but I actually drive most places. Yet I don't think it's a waste.
Characters who use every feat, every round, can usually be shut down very quickly. If you can't deal with darkness or fog or a wind wall, you're not going to be able to use ANY of your feats.
What then?
The context of this discussion was entirely focused on feats to improve my druid's bow damage output. Obviously on rounds she's not using a bow, ALL of her bow feats are not used. So clearly I understand that feats are situational, as are skills and spellcasting.
But in this case I was speaking of the specific situation of using a bow to maximize damage. Options which are situational WITHIN that situation just reduce overall damage output and are likely counter to the goal of optimizing damage when using the bow.
As I attempted to point out, in the case of deadly aim choosing the option of not using it so I can hit a higher AC is not merely not using a feat on occasion, but is in fact not using a feat in precisely those situations when I need more damage the most.
I am not sold on deadly aim in addition to rapid shot. I am leery of attack penalties in the first place, and stacking them sets off all sorts of alarms. As individual arrow damage gets above 12 on average (at least in my case) the math seems to show replacing many shot with deadly aim to be a net loss in damage, even NOT factoring in the decrased hit chance. Since I can get my arrow damage average over 12 just by purchasing a shocking bow, well, that sort of seals the deal for me.
Yes, in the case of high damage resistance deadly aim can be superior, but in those cases I am probably switching to spells instead of arrows anyway.
Well, to me, optimizing for bow use means accounting for the variety of things you might be shooting at.
But, we can disagree, and that's fine.
I would go with the shocking bow and a few specially enchanted arrows for the bad guys that have resistance/ immunity.
I think your feats are fine, if you could make room for weapon focus without losing any of the core feats, I'd go for it. My archer has all of the above plus clustered shots. Clustered shots has kept my character from doing minimal damage to alot of damage as we encountered quite a few elementals and other mobs with DR. If it isn't too late for your character you could pick up the heirloom weapon trait with another trait as feats. That would give you +1 to attack with a single bow plus another bonus (like saving throw). Good luck.
Well, to me, optimizing for bow use means accounting for the variety of things you might be shooting at.
But, we can disagree, and that's fine.
Right, and so far "accounting for the variety of things you might be shooting at" has meant dealing with the vast majority of enemies who don't have damage resistance and so take more damage from manyshot than from deadly aim. When damage resistance happens frequently enough that it becomes more advantageous to have deadly aim, then I may retrain the feat. But there are other ways that are even MORE efficient at overcoming damage resistance, like clustered shots.
And as I said, when we encounter damage resistance that's usually a damage resistant boss, and that's when she typically falls back on spells instead of her bow anyway.
"Clustered shots" is on my list. If the major benefit of "deadly aim" over "manyshot" is that it defeats damage resistance, I think "clustered shots" beats "deadly aim" in that area anyway.
Weapon focus has always been a core feat for my melee characters. For ranged characters I've never seen it work out as a better option than any of the core "point blank shot" feat tree options. It would be nice to have, but so far it hasn't been good enough to merit taking it.
And at some point in her career she's going to have to take "natural spell" and actually be a druid...
She was converted over from a 3.5 character and we didn't convert traits. Let me ask my GM if he would allow taking a trait now. Even if he did allow traits, he may not allow "heirloom weapon" since this character has been adventuring for a couple of years now and has never mentioned any such weapon.
I would go with the shocking bow and a few specially enchanted arrows for the bad guys that have resistance/ immunity.
Are there any enchanted arrows (other than those you have to enchant 50 at a time) that are in the core books, including ultimate magic? The ones I've seen on the PF OGC site are all from special settings.
Deadly aim is almost always a damage increase, especially with the number of arrows you're firing. I forget the calculation, but there are very few situations where you wouldn't want to use it.
If it is a free feat, sure. If I have to compare it to other feats which also increase damage, then the question is which one is more effective. The recommendation for me to swap "manyshot" for "deadly aim" led me to develop a spreadsheet to compare the two, and the result of that comparison, as I have repeatedly posted in this thread, is that once an individual arrow's average damage reaches a threshold, "manyshot" does more damage on average than "deadly aim". You are welcome to do the comparison yourself.
Are there any enchanted arrows (other than those you have to enchant 50 at a time) that are in the core books, including ultimate magic? The ones I've seen on the PF OGC site are all from special settings.
I was thinking along the lines of mithril,iron and adamantine, Arrows of Slaying for those beasts that you might expect to have trouble with.
A bundle of +5 arrows would do the trick as well.
I'm saying get deadly aim next, not instead of manyshot. Clustered shots is after that.
Ah. That makes perfect sense. I apologize for misunderstanding.
At some point I have to decide if she is ever going to take more traditional druid feats too... right now I have "natural spell" penciled in as her next feat.
I originally estimated that level 10 would be as high as this character would be likely to get. If she ends up getting to level 16, I may end up regretting the whole archery concept...
One thing I wish is that some of the awesome ranger spells were available to druids too...
I am going to end up adding sonic damage to my +1 bow and sticking with my existing feats I guess. That whole "buff up and use a magic compound bow" is still pretty tempting still...
Decide how much you want archery to factor into your combat. You can't fight with a bow while wildshaped either, so you may want natural spell so you have some reason to do so.
This is a rather unique druid concept. She is a custom race half dryad/half elf. Her bow use was part of her concept since dryads are primarily archers when not casting spells. That's where the whole concept originated.
At least PBS and precise shot are beneficial to her ray attacks too. Rapid shot and many shot are more specific to the bow.
With a str of 10 I don't see her wildshaping for melee combat, but I can see her wildshaping into a bird and casting buff or battlefield control while flying above the battle.
There is the option of taking a few fighter levels to finish off your bow feats. You'll lose a level of casting, but you'll be a much better archer for it.
Heh, that would blow the minds of my gaming group... And as much as I am intrigued by that possibility it does introduce certain role playing complications.
Basically I role play her as still thinking of herself as a dryad, meaning she is a nature-worshipping goddess who defends nature with spells and bow. Taking fighter levels doesn't seem to fit that concept on the surface, but fighter levels are just mechanical constructs that I, as the player, choose. There's no reason to play her as if she understands that she now has "fighter levels."
Of course once I cross that bridge, all sorts of things start opening up. Barbarian levels? Witch? Oracle?
Yikes, that's likely to make my head hurt. :)