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- Damage is indeed lower, you have the benefit of range after all, you don't need the STR unless you find 1/2 point of damage really important. Classes with an additive bonus like Precision Ranger or Investigator do give a little more damage.
- Each 10 arrows is 1L bulk so 50 arrows is 5L and like 5 silver.
- Unless you are on a highly specialized campaign (like one full of Fiends)the arrows will end cheaper than a melee weapon made of the materials as you can choose when to shoot those arrows when they are relevant.
- Correct, just like melee weapons you need higher grade arrows for more powerful bows.
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No, its definitely NOT a trap.
You don't really have to worry very much about special materials, especially at low levels. Weakness to a material is MUCH more common than resistance to a material so lacking the material is much less of an issue than it was in PF1. Special materials are nice but not necessary.
I've always assumed that the L for arrows was for 10 of them, not 1. So, 50 arrows is only 1/2 a bulk. But even if that is incorrect, pack mules or bags of holding are fairly cheap :-).
You just enchant the bow for the basics (to hit and extra damage), not individual arrows.
Archers are quite viable characters. They do less damage than a melee combatant but not that much less and they do it at range.
Lots of choices, too. Warpriest with the appropriate god, ftr, ranger, monk, champion all can do it slightly differently but quite well. A rogue takes a lot of work. Swashbucklers and barbarians are right out :-).
A spellcaster/archer is also decent. Gives you something to do with your 3rd action as you spam electric arc or other non attack spells.
Damage is a bit lower
Ranged PC's don't have to move as much and can target creatures melee can't [like flying]. As such, you'll often get more attacks than melee does.
50 arrows is, I believe 5 bulk
10 arrows is L bulk so 50 arrows is 5L and 5 bulk of arrows is 500.
Special materials for bows are very expensive
Yes.
I'm very confused how magic bows and magic arrows interact. Trying to get that figured out in the rules forum. But it seems that firing a low-grade cold iron arrow from a very magical bow doesn't work?
Well, a cold iron arrow isn't a magic arrow. Technically only magic items have to be graded so any old cold iron arrow should do:
"Low-grade items can be used in the creation of magic items of up to 8th level, and they can hold runes of up to 8th level. Standard-grade items can be used to create magic items of up to 15th level and can hold runes of up to 15th level."Arrows are 0 level items and not magical... the rules are ambiguous enough that you'll see DM's rule either way though.
If the cost is a worry for you, take the Eldritch Archer archetype. They can get an ability called Precious Arrow that enchant a piece of ammunition to count as .
EDIT: A monk taking the Monastic Archer Stance feat can use the monks class ability to treat their unarmed attack as [magic, cold iron, silver or adamantine] with their bow attacks.
I personally do not make my players track ammunition unless there's some special circumstances or special ammo.
Archers really suffer in the early levels imo. You'll do very little damage compared to martial melee classes but the reach does get more important in higher levels.
You'll do very little damage compared to martial melee classes but the reach does get more important in higher levels.
It really depends on the number of flying foes you meet. You can check out the -1 level creatures for instance and see a fair amount of them [about 1/3rd] fly and that's as low as you go.
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How valuable ranged weapons are depends on your GM too. If your GM is constantly springing enemies in your face with lots of cover, it's different than if your GM lets you start combat at 500' across an open field.
Bows only do piercing damage. That's an issue.
Overall, archers aren't traps, but they're definitely not overpowered like they were in PF1. They're either appropriately powered or maybe slightly underpowered.
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Two class-specific comments:
For investigators, the range is important. If you Devise and roll low, you want a secondary target to attack.
Champion archers definitely lag behind non-champion archers and champion non-archers. You lose a big part of Divine Ally because the available runes are melee weapons only. It's not the end of the world but it's a definite step down.
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I wouldn't use an archer in a dungeon crawl campaign, but outside, they'd be wonderful (especially since they don't have to leave the safety of the party to go participate far away).
Also, more than in PF1, it's easier to be a switch-hitter. You'd only need maybe one feat (if that, depending on class) for a bread-n'-butter melee attack and you'll do fine in melee w/ a finesse weapon. (Not as fine as the melee specialist, but you won't be royally jammed up when bows don't work).
Archers, if you have Dex, Con, & Wis boosts, still have another boost to play with, giving you some versatility if you want Int or Cha skills, or bumping up that Str for some surprise melee damage (though I wouldn't go above 18 if focused on archery).
As for Rogue, the issue is that their extra source of damage (Sneak Attack) relies on a flat-footed enemy which can be hard past the first round. It'd be difficult of you to set that up at range, but if one of your allies does that regularly (say by tripping) then you'd be good to go. The Archer Dedication also has a way to make enemies flat-footed.
Archery is always nice as a ranged option. It will often save you actions in that you don't need to move. But if you are in any sort of situation where line of sight is a problem - ie a typical dungeon crawl you still will have to move a lot.
However it does less damage base. It relies heavily on critical hits - just because the best bows have deadly.
There aren't many good weapon options. The longbow and short bow variants just dominate everything else.
Volley sucks.
Another problem is all the lesser cover bonuses that the GM will hand out.
These small differences matter to damage a lot.
Personally I think Paizo have deliberately weakened all ranged attacks to encourage melee, as melee is considered more fun.
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I think being an archer exclusively is probably a bit worse than going melee.
That said, a dex based martial that uses bows as well as melee is in a much better position to contribute to every combat than an exclusively melee or exclusively ranged martial. In particular, the ranged capable character will be very advantaged in encounters happening outdoors. The cost of switch hitting is present, but the lack of depth in linear improvement feats or items for any particular fighting style makes a balance work with certain classes like the Monk or Ranger and possibly the Investigator or Rogue, though I haven't seen switch hitter Investigator in action and only minimal switch hitting rogue play.
We have an animal companion using precision Ranger in our party that because of the STR&DEX dualism is also doubling up as a switch hitter and he is generelly doing fine. May not be the flashiest character ever and can not hit the damage spikes that our Fighter or Barbarian are dishing out but in between hiding, commanding his animal companion to support the other melees and using hunted shot he is very consistently dealing damage to almost all our targets, especially when our melees are left in the dust because of fast and/or flying enemies.
A couple of things of note:
1) Before bags of holding are a thing, ammunition expandure can be an issue, especially if your adventure is taking place in the middle of nowhere and considering that crafting 10 arrows takes 4 days.
2) Setting and weapon selection can be an issue, mainly because of the volley trait, as ideally you would require 3 maxed out weapons, especially as a switch hitter (longbow, shortbow, melee weapon). Our ranger went for shotbow based on the close combat experiences of the first volume of our AP only to find himself in a lot of open space in the second volume.
3) We usually found the critical specialisation effect worthwhile (just remember that the floor most of the time is a suitable surface too), mostly costing the victim an action on its next turn, especially in comparison to other specialisation effects like our axe wielding fighter. Not everything can be a hammer, flail or sword.
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Archery at low levels is pretty bad (in my opinion) - the benefits of it are greatest then, because generally creatures are pretty slow and only have a land speed See my speeds table for reference but doing 1d6+0 damage is pretty bad - especially if the rest of your party wants to go melee, you aren't really getting any advantage.
By level 8 (weapon spec and first property rune) the damage is pretty good - 3d6+2 (12.5) compared to 2d12+1d6+6 (22.5) max that melee does, you're still significantly behind, but at least it's not 3.5 compared to 10.5.
By level 16, I wouldn't want to be a melee character any more, so many monsters just have abilities that say "if you're melee, get rekt loser", and the damage differential is even closer - 6d6+6 (27) for archery vs 3d12+3d6+11 (41) for melee - only 33% loss compared to ~50% at level 8 and 66% at level 1.
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I wouldn't use an archer in a dungeon crawl campaign
From my experience, archers are not that bad in dungeon crawling. I GM Abomination Vaults, and many times melee martials have been unable to get to the enemies, mostly because of choke points. Archers were always able to shoot, with cover, but it's better than spending an entire fight trying to Tumble Through an enemy (situation that happened yesterday to our Mountain Stance Monk).
I will even add that using choke points have been a common tactic of my players for tough fights, because getting swarmed by enemies is way worse than fighting them one by one.Another advantage of being a ranged character is that you force enemies to come to you. I've seen numerous melee martials being obliterated at round one because they need to move to the enemies. And the solution of delaying until enemies come is not always ideal (especially if the enemies have ranged options).
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I'm planning on playing a goblin archer for my first 2e game. I expect we'll do levels 1 to 10. I'm looking at magic items and starting to suspect being an archer is a bit of a trap.
Damage is a bit lower (need DEX and STR and only get half STR to damage). You run though a ton of ammo at low levels (ammo isn't recoverable, 50 arrows is, I believe 5 bulk and you are probably shooting 2 or 3 per round as a ranger or monk). If you are going on an expedition and expect to hit 10 encounters, you're gonna run out of arrows fast and then a pure archer is useless. Special materials for bows are very expensive for a long time (4 GP per arrow for cold iron and silver, 140 gold per arrow for Adamantine and they break on use). The blanches do exist and save money but take 2 actions. I'm very confused how magic bows and magic arrows interact. Trying to get that figured out in the rules forum. But it seems that firing a low-grade cold iron arrow from a very magical bow doesn't work?
- Damage is indeed lower, you have the benefit of range after all, you don't need the STR unless you find 1/2 point of damage really important. Classes with an additive bonus like Precision Ranger or Investigator do give a little more damage.
- Each 10 arrows is 1L bulk so 50 arrows is 5L and like 5 silver.
- Unless you are on a highly specialized campaign (like one full of Fiends)the arrows will end cheaper than a melee weapon made of the materials as you can choose when to shoot those arrows when they are relevant.
- Correct, just like melee weapons you need higher grade arrows for more powerful bows.
Kyrone really nailed it on the head here, IMO.
Damage is intentionally lower, because you can deal damage from range, meaning not needing to spend actions to position yourself as often, and not putting yourself in direct harms way. You can actually ignore strength for the most part, unless you really think the +2/3 damage is really worth it. Personally I don't think it is.
Also as stated, you have the wrong understanding of arrow bulk. Basic arrows are light and cheap.
As for specialized materials, you're not supposed to always be using them or have the ideal material for your enemy. The game isn't built with that expectation. If you look at enemies with resistances, you will note they tend to have reduced HP or AC to help compensate for that. If you have the right weapon material they become pretty easy (by comparison) to defeat. It's more supposed to be a reward for having the right material, than a punishment for not.
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No, Archery is most definitely not a trap. It's great for martials, but it's also great for spellcasters if they can get it, since it's a fantastic third action option if you're using a bow.
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The 2nd-best damage dealer in my party is a gnome rogue archer. She has used a simple tactic since 2nd level: she Hides behind a crate, pillar, low wall, tree, or underbrush and then shoots with her shortbow. This makes her opponent flat-footed and gives her sneak attack damage on the first shot. She often Hides again as her 3rd action, protecting herself from reprisal shots from the enemy and ready to start her next turn hidden.
Her Dexterity 18 aids both her Stealth and her archery. Most of our opponents have been lower level that the party, which improves her chances of hiding and of hitting. And a hidden target is less appealing than the other party members standing in plain sight, so the archer is seldom attacked. However, when she is attacked, she is separated from rescue by the rest of the party, so she does have risk.
She did not invest in Strength, because her thief racket gives her Dexterity to damage on melee attacks. She was in melee only at 1st level and once at 7th level.
If you play a home game where the GM often features big maps where you can see and shoot at things fro a distance, that's an exception and being an archer can be useful there.
I am converting the Ironfang Invasion adventure path to PF2. A lot of the encounters are outdoors in the Fangwood or Hollow Hills.
When I switched from playing in person to playing remotely via Roll20 last year, my maps grew bigger. My 22-square-by-22-square playmat fit nicely on my table, so that had been the default size of a battlefield that was not mapped in the module. Sometimes I had to pull out my bigger 30-square-by-30 square playmat to draw some dungeons. As for my homemade maps in Roll20, Fork in Battle Creek is 120 squares by 100 squares, Clearing with Gully is 62 squares by 48 squares, Clearing by Battle Creek is 48 squares by 62 squares, Burnt Blind is 65 squares by 53 squares, Forest Clearings is 90 squares by 60 squares, Wine Pool is 60 squares by 31 squares, Radya's Hollow is 100 squares by 100 squares, Slicer Beetle Nest is 85 squares by 50 squares, and Redburrow is 42 squares by 33 squares.
The playmat was artificially limiting the size of the battlefield. Likewise, many maps in modules are small to fit several on a page. Without those limits, the battlefield has plenty of distance for archers.
You run though a ton of ammo at low levels (ammo isn't recoverable, ... and you are probably shooting 2 or 3 per round as a ranger or monk). If you are going on an expedition and expect to hit 10 encounters, you're gonna run out of arrows fast and then a pure archer is useless.
In the first two modules, the PCs were in the Fangwood with no shop in reach to buy arrows. I dropped the 4-day-minimum on the Crafting rules, because I expected them to craft their own arrows. This was unnecessary, because looting arrows off of dead hobgoblin soldiers kept the rogue and ranger well stocked in arrows.
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No, Archery is most definitely not a trap. It's great for martials, but it's also great for spellcasters if they can get it, since it's a fantastic third action option if you're using a bow.
Bows are nice for most any spell caster.
Typically you want to stay at range, and most spells are two action cast.
And it leaves you a free hand to provide somatic or material components.
And then make an attack without spending an action to move, or directly positioning yourself in harms way.
Ranged attacks are great, and bows are the most efficient means of ranged attacks.
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Damage can feel low at low levels, but you can also get "free damage" at low levels when enemies are slower and lacking range by forcing them to waste actions closing. If you can scout out an encounter and set a few snares between yourself and the enemy, those enemies will often be dead before they close the distance.
If you've got dumb melee tactics with people rushing forward to offer their tasty flesh, this matters less, but if you can get your party to play smart it can be huge.
And even at low levels, certain builds can have rocking damage. My halfling precision crossbow ranger was a blast and did awesome damage.
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in official material, the monsters are seldom more than one turn's movement away from reaching you.
This is probably true, but only technically true. Even the slowest enemies have 15' movement, which is 45' in a round, and most maps were scaled to fit on a table (0.75-1" out of game = 5' in game), and most playing tables just don't have the space for a map that's big enough to accommodate that.
as soon as the fight becomes a melee close-quarters fight, your warm body is needed to diffuse the incoming enemy fire. Pathfinder just isn't the kind of game where you can afford the luxury of staying at range, because that means one fewer hero is there to soak the melee damage.
Pathfinder 1st Edition wasn't. Pathfinder 2nd Edition is different.
Under the assumption that combatants are going to rush at each other in the first round, and then only Step for the remainder of combat, I think you're correct. Someone's going to have to be there soaking up the melee damage.
And certainly, from my personal experience, that's a correct assumption a lot of the time. A lot of players do do that.
But should they?
I argue no. Sometimes it's inevitable, but those times are far less frequent than players think. I think there are three things that drive people to do it more often than they should.
1. Players that ported over from PF1 are primed to think that way. Archery did more damage relative to melee, and ACs could be bumped up to insane levels. Designating one character to soak up melee damage while the others pummeled it from afar was a damn fine strategy to do for every fight.
2. Players still think in terms of DPR, which is not correlated with awesomeness in PF2. In PF1, the full-round attack was unquestionably the best use of a round, and in-combat healing basically didn't exist to any significant degree, so the only question was how much damage one could deal in the time given.
3. Players don't realize the three actions in PF2 are not equally valuable. As a character, your first attack action is very valuable. But your second isn't, and I think people make second attacks way more often than they should, much less "crit farming" third attacks. Monsters, however, often rely on action economy for full effectiveness. A Strike-Grab-Constrict monster needs to begin their turn next to a melee character to have full effectiveness - the melee character Stepping away and forcing the monster to Step as their first action is a YUGE net positive. You're trading your 95% worthless third action for their 100% effective third action.
By design, Paizo has "opened up" the game. The maps are not huge, but they're bigger than PF1. There were several 10 square x 10 square maps in PFS1 that I suspect they make because nobody moved; by contrast, almost every combat in PFS2 has a full-page map that's at least 20 squares x 25 squares. Not "3 actions of movement" away, for sure (since rarely does combat start at the far corners of the map), but enough so that if your melee character wins initiative, I think it's pretty silly - but shockingly common - to Stride-Stride-Strike (hitting Ye Olde Trifecta of Getting Murdered: moving out of range of allies, ending next to the monster, and trading one Strike for a 3-action combo).
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I personally do not make my players track ammunition unless there's some special circumstances or special ammo.
Archers really suffer in the early levels imo. You'll do very little damage compared to martial melee classes but the reach does get more important in higher levels.
This is what I do as well, same goes with any RPG system we play, if there is ammo to track and it's not especially super valuable or specialized in some way I simply ask them to "buy enough to last" every time they go to town but often that isn't really needed because of loot being a thing and bows being a VERY common item for humanoid enemies.
As for doing less damage, that's true for SURE but you are also spot on about the range and it really makes a HUGE difference. A melee character will usually have to move once or twice between every enemy they target, that is unless they're already getting ganged up on which is not ideal for them. Archers however can typically just launch RIGHT into their routine without needing to move in order to get on the offensive, this can save them entire rounds of gear management, strides, buffing, and the like. They'll typically end up being the first person to "tag" an enemy and are able to really help provide focus fire on high-priority targets without endangering either themselves or their party (because as ranged instead of melee they aren't acting as part of the front line) by moving to the opponent "back row" to get at that mage or whatever.
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3. Players don't realize the three actions in PF2 are not equally valuable. As a character, your first attack action is very valuable. But your second isn't, and I think people make second attacks way more often than they should, much less "crit farming" third attacks. Monsters, however, often rely on action economy for full effectiveness. A Strike-Grab-Constrict monster needs to begin their turn next to a melee character to have full effectiveness - the melee character Stepping away and forcing the monster to Step as their first action is a YUGE net positive. You're trading your 95% worthless third action for their 100% effective third action.
Yeah, for martial characters making 3 attacks is almost always a bad strategy.
You definitely want to come up with an alternative 3rd action. Sometimes moving away from a hard hitting enemy that uses up multiple actions to perform that attack can be a very effective strategy. Especially if you're faster than they are.
People get too bogged down in PF1 thinking when everything had an AoO. So you never moved once you engaged someone in melee.
But PF2 isn't that game, and our way of thinking needs to change. Too many people fall into that trap, and make things happen in PF2 that also happened in PF1 but don't need to and shouldn't.
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Regarding Runes + Special Materials: I do not believe you need higher cost SM to benefit from the Runes your ranged weapon, if that were the case it would be DEVASTATING on high-level play and the impact is so severe that it would require immediate clarification in order to "correct" how every high level officially sanctionedd PFS game is played, full-stop.
It's always good to have a fallback Cantrip to attack with, it doesn't matter who you are but if you're asking about viability versus optimization, I'm not exactly entitled to speak on the topic but it's not really any kind of everpresent powergaming meta to create spellcaster archers, the options are solid for sure, but as with any Archetype it's not going to be as "powerful" as your Class chassis stuff no matter what.
AA : Meh, it's cool, reasonably powerful, and interesting but, again, archers aren't really my style so I can't say I "like" it in particular but I certainly don't hate it.
Ranged Champion: Yeah, you can do it, a Champion of Erastil would be a totally badass Archer character, kind of like a DNR Agent with actual divine authority.
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Thanks folks,
I found this extremely useful.Still have a few questions that probably belong in rules, but since we're talking bows already...
I don't think people are all agreeing, what is the bulk of 10 arrows? L? 1? 1 makes more sense to me, but I'm quickly getting to the point that I don't think common sense is what 2e bases things on. (cold iron dagger and two-handed sword cost the same in 2e etc.)
If you use a low-quality cold iron arrow, what happens if you have a level 12 bow?
Folks largely agreed that having a caster use a bow can be good. Does the reverse apply? Does it make sense to grab a combat cantrip and consider doing the "two attacks with one action" option and then burning two actions on a cantrip as a multi-class caster of some sort?
What do people think of arcane archer? I don't think it makes sense for me (as a ranger or monk I need dex and wisdom, getting chr too is a lot).
Is the ranged paladin a real option? Maybe shield and thrown weapon? Bow? I like the idea of a goblin archer paladin :-)
The bulk of 10 arrows is L, the bulk of 1 arrow is not given but could be easily misinterpreted as L given the arrow entry.
10 L items make bulk of 1. So if you had 100 arrows they're bulk 1, if you understand bulk of 10 arrows to be L. If however one arrow was bulk L, then 10 would be 1 bulk. However, if we look at the fact that a pavillion tent is bulk 12, and a heavy musical instrument (think piano) is bulk 16. Do we really think it makes sense for 100 arrows to have the same-ish bulk? No.
10 arrows are Light bulk. 1 arrow has negligible bulk.
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Thanks folks,
I found this extremely useful.Still have a few questions that probably belong in rules, but since we're talking bows already...
I don't think people are all agreeing, what is the bulk of 10 arrows? L? 1? 1 makes more sense to me, but I'm quickly getting to the point that I don't think common sense is what 2e bases things on. (cold iron dagger and two-handed sword cost the same in 2e etc.)
If you use a low-quality cold iron arrow, what happens if you have a level 12 bow?
Folks largely agreed that having a caster use a bow can be good. Does the reverse apply? Does it make sense to grab a combat cantrip and consider doing the "two attacks with one action" option and then burning two actions on a cantrip as a multi-class caster of some sort?
What do people think of arcane archer? I don't think it makes sense for me (as a ranger or monk I need dex and wisdom, getting chr too is a lot).
Is the ranged paladin a real option? Maybe shield and thrown weapon? Bow? I like the idea of a goblin archer paladin :-)
A cold iron dagger does not cost the same as a cold iron great sword. I think you're just misunderstahding the bulk rules there too I'm afraid.
Generally, cantrips make a better back up option for a melee character than a specialist archer who already has good range damage. There are some exceptions. Electric are is really nice on an Investigator for when your Strategem roll is bad, for example. But being able to cast ray of frost is really nice on a sword and board character because you can cast somatic spells with an occupied hand in PF2, so you have to waste a lot less actions juggling weapons to switch between ranged and melee.
In the game I'm running, my gunner ranger (I used the same stats for a crossbow to give her a bolt action hunting rifle because she wanted the flavor of a gun) is actually the most consistent damage dealer in the party because of her range.
Enemies actually use terrain and hazards to avoid being in melee range and typically make melee PCs come to them. The melee characters do deal more damage when they hit, but it's offset by the increased danger and occasionally having to move around obstacles. By contrast, the ranger consistently gets a shot off, typically hits, and deals a solid chunk of damage due to her precision edge.
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I don't think people are all agreeing, what is the bulk of 10 arrows? L? 1? 1 makes more sense to me, but I'm quickly getting to the point that I don't think common sense is what 2e bases things on. (cold iron dagger and two-handed sword cost the same in 2e etc.)
10 arrows is 1L bulk.
If you use a low-quality cold iron arrow, what happens if you have a level 12 bow?
I think this shouldn't really matter, as you are not enchanting the arrow, the damage comes from the bow. Not 100% on this one.
Folks largely agreed that having a caster use a bow can be good. Does the reverse apply? Does it make sense to grab a combat cantrip and consider doing the "two attacks with one action" option and then burning two actions on a cantrip as a multi-class caster of some sort?
This isn't really necessary. Picking up an attack cantrip is usually for a melee character that needs something to do when the enemy is out of range, but with a bow that isn't really a problem. If you need alternative damage types, alchemical bombs might be a better choice, cost no feats and damage even on a miss and takes advantage of your high Dex instead of needing Int/Wis/Cha for spell DCs.
What do people think of arcane archer? I don't think it makes sense for me (as a ranger or monk I need dex and wisdom, getting chr too is a lot).
Eldritch Archer is fun. They are a good way to change up your damage type (telekinetic projectile helps get around the Piercing only problem). Very similar damage to a normal Archer, difference is getting one really big hit instead of several small ones. Also you spells don't have to all be ones you can use with your bow, so grabbing a good utility spell like True Strike or Invisibility is nice.
Is the ranged paladin a real option? Maybe shield and thrown weapon? Bow? I like the idea of a goblin archer paladin :-)
Archer Paladin is a real option, but it means that you might have to be close in to use your paladin reactions (range 15ft) also you may want to take the Archer archetype, as it has better feats for archery than the primary champion list.
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But official APs rarely feature this. By far more common is the combat starts with the monster 60 ft or less away.
The most common fights are at close range with a choke point (in general a door) between you and the enemy. This single choke point is why you can't have "as much melee characters as you want in the front line". Because if the fight is tough, crossing the door with a melee is being as good as dead. So you have to hold the door, and you can only be one doing it.
I have seen tons of fights played that way by my players during Abomination Vaults. And that's why there's a limit in the number of melee characters you can have in a party.Now, clearly, you need at least one and preferably at least 2 melee martials. But beyond these 2 melee martials, adding an archer both expands the abilities of the party and doesn't reduce at all your damage output (it actually increases it as a second line melee is a useless melee).
So, hard disagree on archer uselfulness.
Finally, if you just stand back plinking arrows at the enemy, someone else has to bear the brunt of the attack.
You consider that enemies are always dividing their attacks between the multiple party members. It's far from being true. Single attackers will in general focus fire the guy who does the most damage/is the easiest one to hit. Multiple enemies will have harder time focusing on one single character but if they are intelligent, they tend to (mostly because of Flanking which encourages to at least attack 2 by 2).
So, adding an extra body won't necessarily divert attacks from others.Also, you consider that archers never soak damage. Which means that the enemies are always attacking from the front, always from melee range, etc... Archers are sometimes targetted. Especially if they score a critical hit (due to Deadly being a thing on bows). It generates more mobility in the fight, which is not necessarily bad for the party (AoOs are triggered).
In my opinion, you have one way to play (either as a GM or player) that enhances one type of characters. But the game provides a lot of situations where archers can shine. I know that around my tables, they are really valuable, and I use the official maps.
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I know the monastic archer/wolf stance switch hitter monk in the Age of Ashes game I've been running has been very effective. They carry a longbow and use their speed to stay at 50 foot range to flurry of blows in the skirmishing phase of combat. While that's happening, the melee fighter just stands with shield raised if the party is winning at ranged, forcing the enemy to come to them. I also allowed that player to take sturdy on his tower shield rather than a regular shield, so he's pretty set up for it. He tosses a returning javelin as well to chip in a little. When the enemy comes in, the monk just changes to wolf stance for 1 action and starts in with melee and flanking.
Ranged skirmishing is built into the system with 3 levels of cover. Monsters like the Erinyes specialize in it, with 40 foot fly speed, a longbow, and at will dimension door:
https://2e.aonprd.com/Monsters.aspx?ID=111
I think it would be very odd to come across an adventure that didn't have at least one mostly ranged encounter due to the way the battlefield or the monsters are set up.
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The most common fights are at close range with a choke point (in general a door) between you and the enemy. This single choke point is why you can't have "as much melee characters as you want in the front line".
Also known as the Diablo Dungeon Door Defense. Our party utilizes that tactic a lot.
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AHA! I knew it. If you have an entire party kiting monsters (beating a slow retreat to keep the distance) and your GM is okay with falling for that trick every time... I simply have no words for you. I am not playing fantasy to play the game that way. I play fantasy because mighty heroes boldly stride forward to take the fight to the enemy!
Everyone loves a good meat shield, and sounds like you're more than happy to play the role. That's great - and sometimes I'll even enable you by bringing my healbots that can pump out 80+ hp/day/level. Just promise to get Diehard so we can cycle you from Dying to full 3 times instead of 2.
Kudos to you!
Unfortunately, that has nothing to do with the effectiveness of archers. Just because you don't like using them doesn't mean they're not good.
Archers take the fight to the enemy ... they just don't take themselves to the fight.
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The answer to your question is that archery has lots of pluses and minuses. It is playable and not unbalanced too far either way. Personally I think melee has a slight edge over it. But the difference is not that great. Does it suit your party? If you have a good character concept then run with it. Play it if you want to.
with sexist undertones you have that softball is easier than hardball, and the presumption that everyone should be aiming for hardball in the first place.Not condoning or endorsing Zapp's choice of words, there's nothing sexist about using softball in that manner.
1. Men and women play softball.
2. Softball is unequivocally easier than hardball. The ball is bigger and heavier and far more inelastic, and pitchers cannot pitch a softball as fast as a hardball. That's physics, not sexism.
Yep. The game was originally played by only by men and is one of the few sports with near parity in the numbers of men and women playing in segregated or co-ed league. The slowball being easier definition is about the ease the sport can be modified to to allow for differing skill levels: this allows children, teenagers, adults and senior to 'easily' play the game.
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The joking about softball has goaded me into responding to the dialog between Zapp and thenobledrake.
And as soon as the fight becomes a melee close-quarters fight, your warm body is needed to diffuse the incoming enemy fire. Pathfinder just isn't the kind of game where you can afford the luxury of staying at range, because that means one fewer hero is there to soak the melee damage.
...so every member of the party has to be soaking up damage... but you can't soak your share "one turn's movement away"?
I'm confused. Not just because what you're describing doesn't match my experience (yes, of the official materials, don't start that whole "you must not play the APs then" junk you've done before when someone has differing experiences from yours), but also because it really looks like you're saying either no one can be non-melee, or that it's just "archers" that don't get to decide to try and keep their distance presumably because spellcasters are already in the party taking up all the can-be-ranged slots.
Yes, monsters have ranged attacks. And if the GM plays softball he's just going to allow you an artillery duel. That does not lessen my argument. If the GM plays softball *every build works*. So if you want to make the argument "playing an archer works fine, except when things get tough" that's fine. After all, you can play a low-level alchemist or wizard too. It's not a good choice, but you *can* do it.
You can soak your share "one turn's movement away". If the monsters let you. Of course, a GM not interested in softball simply ignores the archer and instead kills the hapless tank. Why? Because your choice means there is one less tank in the party.
I am saying that at high level a spellcaster carries his or her own weight. Any other configuration, you'd better get in the thick of it, and since you're in the thick of it, better bring a melee weapon.
In my Iron Gods campaign, under Pathfinder 1st Edition, the party had no squishy characters that needed the protection of a front line. They developed a mobile skirmishing style that focused on never getting into the thick of battle where the PCs would soak up damage. Instead, they would hit and move. The skald and fighter had reach weapons, the magus and gunslinger had ranged attacks, and the NPC bloodrager paired up on someone else's target to kill and move.
In my Ironfang Invasion campaign, under Pathfinder 2nd Edition, the stealthy party mastered ambushing the enemy. Even if they could not lure the enemy into prepared territory where the ranger had set up snares, they usually could attack one corner of the enemy forces and wipe that section out before the other forces could reach them. The enemies could not close around them.
In one mission the Ironfang Invasion party was killing off evil xulgath cultists in a cave system. I had the remaining xulgath in the lower caves group up into a single force as strong as the party. The party was at half hit points and the xulgath were at full hit points, so the party retreated up a 30-foot ladder of handholds to the upper caves. One xulgath warrior threw a spear at them as they climbed, and suddenly the players had a revelation: they had bows and all the xulgath had was spears (and a crossbow and one sorcerer with cantrips). They could win a ranged battle. Thus, they focused their shots on any xulgath climbing the ladder so that their enemy could not get into melee. This was the ranged equivalent of using a doorway as a bottleneck in melee.
I was not lobbing softballs at the party and allowing them an artillery duel. I ran a dynamic dungeon that was not going easy on the PCs. Nevertheless, through tactics that exploited the terrain, the party forced the artillery duel and they won.
I'll give my very simple experience.
Ranger Precision Archer is the most powerful and viable archer. The extra precision damage with gravity weapon focus spell makes that one big hit per round very good. And Twin Shot combining the damage against DR is also very good making the second shot nice and the action economy of twin shot nice for moving and setting up firing.
The archer becomes better as you level as you get more damage dice and specialization.
The archer is a very viable combat play-style for the Ranger Precision Archer. I've seen this first hand.
Fighter I am not sure about. They hit better and get some nice feats, but the lack of the precision dice can make it more painful and lower damage low level.
If you want the best current archer build, I would go precision ranger archer. Get an animal companion for some melee damage.
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I do think the costs for special material ammunition is just non functional - cold iron blanche and silversheen is probably what you should be using RAW (as the only other material weakness is orichalcum).
That being said its a tradeoff - unless you’re in a fiend heavy campaign, or a fey heavy one, 50-100 special material arrows will probably cover you the whole campaign. Making them 1/10th the price of melee weapons would probably be too good, seeing as you can buy them as you need rather than having the whole cost upfront. Something around 1/5 to 1/3 the price would work, in my view.
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Longbows are situational weapons in PF2. Using one, especially at low levels, even for fighters with point blank shot is often going to result in a worse attack then using a shortbow. -2 to attack is never worth 1 point of damage, and many lower level APs feature dungeons with 5 ft halls, and 4 square rooms. Honestly, if you run an AP with more than 4 players and you use only the maps provided in the books for every encounter, it is about 50/50 at best you are going to have 30ft and no cover to your enemy. It gets better at higher levels though as larger enemies often demand larger maps.
Before 4th level, there is very little reason to carry a Longbow as your primary weapon. However, the shortbow is an exceptional weapon in the tight-nit spaces of low level APs and will easily outpace a long bow for damage as you never have to move to try to keep range. By level 4, if being an archer and using a long bow is going to be your thing, you really need to spec into it with feats, which literally any character can do.
Longbows are situational weapons in PF2. Using one, especially at low levels, even for fighters with point blank shot is often going to result in a worse attack then using a shortbow. -2 to attack is never worth 1 point of damage, and many lower level APs feature dungeons with 5 ft halls, and 4 square rooms. Honestly, if you run an AP with more than 4 players and you use only the maps provided in the books for every encounter, it is about 50/50 at best you are going to have 30ft and no cover to your enemy. It gets better at higher levels though as larger enemies often demand larger maps.
Before 4th level, there is very little reason to carry a Longbow as your primary weapon. However, the shortbow is an exceptional weapon in the tight-nit spaces of low level APs and will easily outpace a long bow for damage as you never have to move to try to keep range. By level 4, if being an archer and using a long bow is going to be your thing, you really need to spec into it with feats, which literally any character can do.
It's not really 1 point of damage. It's a percentage chance to do an extra 1-2 points of damage and that percentage is dwarfed in comparison to the chance you are able to roll the same damage.
Personally I use both long and short when I play archers.
The most common fights are at close range with a choke point (in general a door) between you and the enemy. This single choke point is why you can't have "as much melee characters as you want in the front line".Also known as the Diablo Dungeon Door Defense. Our party utilizes that tactic a lot.
It's been around since the 70s with Gygax.
To this day DMs are still funneling their creatures to their doom, got no idea why.