What makes a +3 weapon

[SherpaDoug]

Some creatures can only be hit by +3 weapons.
Do Arrows of Piercing from a normal bow count? (+5 THACO arrows)
How about normal arrows fired from the Elven Court bow? (+3 bow)
How about +2 arrows from a +1 bow or a simillar combination?
Is it +3 THACO or +3 damage that is required?

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Evil around every corner. Be careful not to step in it!

Sherpa Doug

[Larry_OHF]

Good question!
I also would like to know, although in the past, I have never actually cared about the numbers part of the game. I usually play with the mentality that I have the biggest, best weapon in the area that can be had, and since there is no other obtainable until I get past this or that bad guy, then this sword is the one that can handle the job. I don't know if that is correct procedure, thinking that the game designers will set me up in such fashion, but it has worked thus far.

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Larry,
Loyal guardian of the OHF
Devoted member of the Ironworks
Only member of the Elite Bodyguard to Rikard (the fool that takes the bullet)
Ertai's back-up
Memnoch's chief look-out
Member of the Ancients club

[Diablo]

i think in the case of bows it is oth the arrows which determine the3 enchantment. for instance if you have the elven court bow but normal arrows it owuld not work on say an iron golem. by the way the best thing for kicking iron and adamantite golems is tansherons bow(purchased for 7750 from the merchant in the trademeet market once oyu have done the djinn quest

[sunder]

Well there are a few problems with figuring that out. one, Alot of the descriptions of the bows don't accurately discribe their Thaco and damage correctly, some are confusing. Like the Elven court bow +3 says it has a Thaco bonus of +4, Some bows give Thaco bonuses, but don't say anything about damage.

How D&D worked is that if you have a +3 bow, its can hit monsters that can only be hit by +3 magical weapons, even if you use a normal arrow. If you have a bow+2 and shoot +1 arrows, then the total bonus is +3.
Baldur's Gate 2 seems a bit screwy in this method, kinda hard to figure out just what bows do what. If you have a +3 bow and shoot +2 arrows, they should be able to damage +5 creatues. (+3 and +2)
In the case of variable bonuses (+1 to hit, +3 damage or +4 to hit, +2 damage, the lowest number is suppose to be the one you use to determine what you can hit, thus a +4 to hit/+2 damage bow could not damage a monster that needs +3 to hit.
Of course, BG doesn't quite match up to what D&D was.