Heavy Crossbow Size


Advice


Hello,

I wanted to know if there are any other stackable methods to increase a heavy crossbow's size category besides Gravity Bow. I know Enlarge Person doesn't work for ranged, I can't wield a heavy crossbow larger then my character, and Impact Weapon is for melee weapons only. Is there anything else that would work?


You could use Warpriest's sacred weapon damage if you take Weapon Focus. I suppose you could dip Wizard or Ranger or just UMD a wand of Gravity Bow. That's about all I can think of. It will lock you into a specific class, but it should stack with Gravity Bow.

Silver Crusade

You could get permanent Enlarge person on yourself, and just buy a large sized crossbow.

You could also play a warpriest, their weapon focused weapons scale up eventually.

I am unaware of options other than that


OK, cool. Thought I'd ask since I keep find conflicting info out there suggesting there might be a way to get heavy crossbows up three size categories somehow. Haven't checked out the warpriest, I'll do so later.

If I don't want Enlarge Person to be permanent, would the following work:

(Downtime) Give the large crossbow Called and Endless Ammunition

1) Drop the crossbow (free action)

2) Use Juggernaut's Pauldrons to Enlarge Person "on command" (Swift action? Free action...?)

3) Call the crossbow to hand (free action)

4) Fire the crossbow (Standard action)

I know this is really expensive, but I just want to know if it makes sense from a rules/thematic standpoint.


Pretty sure #2 is a standard action.

You could go with a permanent enlarge and have an item that lets you reduce down. Voila :)


OK, so I'd have a slotless item that gives a continuous Reduce Person effect on me for as long as desired, right? And then I could remove the "Reducing Rock" from my pouch as a move, drop it as a free, call my crossbow as a free, and fire as a standard. That might work.

One problem: Called is only for weapons, where-as this will be a wonderous item. Is there a spell that would allow me to recall the item to my person when desired?


It's important to note that using called is not a free aciton. It's a swift action.

A slotless continuous item of reduce person would be a custom item that would need to be approved by your GM. And beyond that if you're really set on using a crossbow, I would highly suggest you use a light crossbow instead of a heavy crossbow, because it will allow you to make iterative attacks. Which will be more effective in the long run than a single high damage dice attack which you can only make once a round.

Sure, eventually you could reload the heavy crossbow as a free action with crossbow mastery. But it's an extra feat to spend, and the damage difference for the base weapons is 1d8 vs 1d10. When enlarged it's 2d6 vs 2d8. A difference of two points of damage but requires the expenditure of a feat, a feat which can probably be spent on something more advantageous.

If you're playing a ranged attacker who is doing something other full attacking versus a standard action attack you're setting yourself up for failure.


Claxon wrote:

It's important to note that using called is not a free aciton. It's a swift action.

A slotless continuous item of reduce person would be a custom item that would need to be approved by your GM. And beyond that if you're really set on using a crossbow, I would highly suggest you use a light crossbow instead of a heavy crossbow, because it will allow you to make iterative attacks. Which will be more effective in the long run than a single high damage dice attack which you can only make once a round.

Sure, eventually you could reload the heavy crossbow as a free action with crossbow mastery. But it's an extra feat to spend, and the damage difference for the base weapons is 1d8 vs 1d10. When enlarged it's 2d6 vs 2d8. A difference of two points of damage but requires the expenditure of a feat, a feat which can probably be spent on something more advantageous.

If you're playing a ranged attacker who is doing something other full attacking versus a standard action attack you're setting yourself up for failure.

Yeah, you're right. Still haven't used a swift action, so that's fine.

And yes, you're right, I would need GM approval. It's not hard to get in my group, but it does make this iffy. That, and the fact that it would take a move action to retrieve the reduce person effect makes me think it's just not possible to do.

Then again, while writing this, I just realized I may have been on the right track previously and simply overthought it a bit - Since the Juggernaught's Pauldrons allow me to Enlarge myself on command infinitely, there's nothing saying I can't simply *be* enlarged all the time I'm adventuring and shrink myself back when we reach town. Then, as part of our preparations as we set off, I put down the Large Crossbow and bolts, Enlarge, pick them back up, and head off. Sure, it means that I wouldn't be able to use the thing immediately if we were caught off guard in town, but at that point they've either engaged us in melee already making the point moot or I'll scramble for cover the first round if they're still at range, and my initial idea (drop crossbow as Free, enlarge as Standard, call as Swift) still leaves the move action to use to run behind a wall with so I can move up from cover to cover. I'd lose an action to "scrambled preparation", but then, who doesn't in off-guard ambushes?

I also agree with your assessment that Light Crossbow may be better here because it would allow reloading as a free action with 1 feat instead of 4 (Point Blank, Rapid Shot and Rapid Reload are pre-reqs to Crossbow Mastery), which allows me to still move and fire each turn like I want.

In most instances, I'd agree with you on the full-round and iterative attacks points, but not in this one (otherwise, why even bother asking about the crossbows in the first place, just get a composite longbow and stand there while they come to you or die). I'm trying to build more of a mobile fighter this time, someone who can run all over the battlefield when needed, which means I want to try and keep my move action available as much as possible yet still do large amounts of damage each turn when I hit with my standard. Vital Strike would let me do this since it only requires a standard attack action to activate, so I could run around the battlefield and still potentially hit things really hard when I get there. True, it means I have one die roll to hit with...but if I pump up my attack as much as I can (opening volley if they're too far to move up to yet, Fighter BAB, Weapon Focus, etc), the likelihood of a normal miss will be low for all but the most heavily defended opponents.

I'd already planned to have a decent ranged weapon due to having Opening Volley at early levels, shooting them as I move up so I could hopefully move in and hit with a +4 bonus next round, but when I realized I could combine Vital Strike with ranged attacks, the question then became which weapon is better with a single attack action per round. Composite Longbows are still great, but due to a higher threat range (taking Improved Crit to make it 17-20) which works well with the Crit Focus tree I'm already following, I decided to go with crossbows. I started with Heavy because of higher damage, but Light will probably be good enough while still letting me move.

Anyway, thanks for the help, everyone!


Adventure Path Charter Subscriber; Pathfinder Rulebook, Starfinder Adventure Path, Starfinder Roleplaying Game, Starfinder Society Subscriber

Note that the crossbow enlarges with you if you are holding it when enlarge person activates (and remains Large size as long as stays in your possession during the effect). You only need to purchase Large ammunition, as items leaving your possession are the only ones that return to their "original size."

This means that you can carry Medium sized ammunition for when you are not enlarged and only need to have one crossbow.


If you really want to focus on crossbows I highly recommend you look at the boltace gunslinger archetype. It makes them significantly better. However, this doesn't solve the mobility issue you seem to be conerned with. While you may want to be mobile the only way to deal significant damage with ranged attacks is to make lots of them.

Your crossbow doesn't get to add strength to damage, so you're looking at enhancement bonus, deadly aim, and fighter training to increase your damage. All these things scale slowly. Even vital strike and it's follow ups can only help so much. It will never be "big damage" compared to a full attack.

The best option overall, if you want mobility and to full attack, is to play a ranger. You get an animal companion at level 4, and you ride them. You can make full attacks at no penalty so long as your mount moves only a single move action (instead of using both the move and standard action to move). Even if the moount does double move or run, it is a penalty to attack, but you can still full attack. Mounted archery is the bees knees. And mounted crossbows going to benefit the same way.

Mobility + full attack = winning


With a crossbow you can be viable as a crit focussed fighter AT HIGH LEVELS. Weapon Master is a good archetype for that also.

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