Bow or Crossbow??

[kirdie]

Which one is better?? Esp. for my elfen mages with high dex

[Larry_OHF]

I always choose the bow, if only for the role-playing reason. I mean...I do not think that the crossbow is right in the hands of an elf. A bow is much more realistic.

[flibulzbuth]

If you go with bows, it's best to put a feat point in rapid shot if you have a high dex. Otherwise, heavy crossbows can do more damage (1d10, compared to 1d8 for longbow and composite longbow). The tradeoff is that the feat point could (and should, imho) be spared for caster related feats.

Anyway, you should do as you wish since your casters won't shoot very often. In my case, they only use their bows when i'm too lazy to select spells. [img]smile.gif[/img]

[Zoltan]

Bow for elves,
Crossbow for mages..
Bows for thieves,
Crossbow for bards..

[Zateel]

Even a pure wizard or sorcerer gets a second attack at level 12, sooner if you're multi-classed. If you go with crossbow, you can only fire one shot per round, regardless. At 12th level with the rapid shot feat, you could launch three arrows with a bow. If you're an elf, martial weapon bow is a free feat anyway. I have one of each, myself.

[Zoltan]

in level 12 you get 2 attacks. but it's only for bow?? it also effects crossbow too? I heard about there's some magical crossbows which makes 3 attacks each round

[Ishanda]

Come to think of it, I think that Auril boss guy thingy on the same map as the crashed ship has a crossbow that fires 3 per round, cause it seems to be the same speed as my bow, which is 3 per round. 3 or 2 either one, fast, fast fast

[Magness]

flibulzbuth is correct. The feat point often ends up being the deciding factor for me. In my first party, I armed my cleric with a crossbow (to save the feat point). I did arm my rogue and bard with bows.

I believe that all party members should have a ranged option, be it bow, xbow, sling, darts, or other throwing weapons. Rather than charing into battle, I prefer to have my party get in a salvo or 2 with ranged weapons before my melee types have to switch to melee weapons.

Be careful using darts as a wizard's primary ranged weapon. Darts' short range will often have your wizard charging to get in range of their target, thus exposing themselves. Either hold off on throwing until close range or open fire with a sling at longer range and switch to darts at close range. BTW, I tended to use darts simply as an excuse to expend them rather than waste precious invenroy space. Once I got back to a merchant, I'd sell all but the very best ones. I did like the "returning" darts. Great to use when ammo was running low and I didn't want to waste it on weaker enemies.

BTW, I miss the ammo belt from BG2-ToB. There's so much good ammo and it uses up space in the bags of holding like crazy.

[DraconisRex]

Bow or X-bow selection? Simple, it's not worth spending a feat point over. Those that can't use bows, for the most part, aren't going to be good with a bow if you put a feat point into it for the first half of the game. And by the time they get good at their "first" attack, they're usually too busy casting huge damage or buff spells.

Now, if the character is going to be an "archer," that's a whole different story. In that case, Composite Bows win hand's down. Example, I've got a ranger "archer" type character. He sits in the back while the two tanks take it to the enemy.

He's a character designed to be an archer from the beginning: 16 strength, 17 dexterity (from the beginning), 17 (14 to start) constitution. As he's level 12, I've really increased his CON, though the last one was a mistake (was half-asleep) and I'll have to go DEX & CON instead of DEX & STR to finish him out.

Also, I took point-blank-shot (or what ever it's called) and rapid shot. And he uses a Composite bow which allows a STR modifier to his missile attacks. So, he gets a +3 STR damage modifier, +3 to hit for dex, +2 to hit for bow, +1 to hit for weapon specialization, +2 damage for weapon specializtion and -2 to hit for rapid shot.

With all that stuff going on, his attack profile goes: 19/19/14/9 The dwarf fighter (20 STR) and the elf fighter (Weapon Finesse, 20 DEX) both go: 22/17/12.