Deadly Archery

[Rocmistro]

Mich: A fair comparison. The Elf is the Field Goal kicker who got the 40 yard field goal 3 seconds before the clock ended to save the game, while the Hobbit is the running back who rushed for 130 yards that game and scored 2 touchdowns, none of which came at a "dramatic" moment.

We can call it a day, guys. It was well delivered arguments on all sides. I get the maths. I just think you guys are not properly valuing 2 things:

-the MWE's ability to produce piercing blows exactly when and where he wants to, with almost nothing in cold hell to stop him. In any random dice RPG, the ability to devote resources (in this case, hope) to almost virtually assure the outcome you want, is a premium privilege. In this case, I think it suits the dramatic "high maintenance" image of Elves, fits the fluff, and I think Francesco and company have done stellar job of fitting mechanics to cinematics.

-the marginal utility in static bonus, given the right stat array. +4 jump to +7 or +8 is very useful. I don't care what the math-hammer says, my play experience suggests to me otherwise. Especially when there's the opportunity for a piercing blow on the other end of it.

[Glorelendil]

Oh but this topic is so juicy! We can't drop it now.

1) It's a minimum 5 without the Virtue because bow is favoured for Mirkwood Elves. And thus for the "best case" background it's 5 vs. 9, not 4 vs. 8. It seems like it's the same thing, but because of the probability distribution of dice pools that actually makes it significantly less important. In other words, increasing +1 to +5 is waaaaay more powerful than increasing +5 to +9, even though the absolute difference is the same.

2) It's true that Mirkwood Elves can get a lot of pierces, but it's with a TN of 14 since they are stuck* with normal bows.

3) Even if it's true that it's a good virtue for a Noble Blood elf with bow skill of 2 (which I refute, but let's go with it for a second), all that would mean is that it's a decent virtue for the worst archers in the culture. If you are trying to make a good archer you'll take high body and skill 3. So it doesn't address the paradox that Mirkwood Elves are famous for their archery. Again, it's like Spear of King Bladorthin: it makes a character less bad at something that isn't his primary focus.

4) A guy I knew, a firefighter no less, swore that motorcycle helmets are dangerous. He once responded to a call in which a motorcyclist had crashed, slid across the pavement, and as he bounced up over the curb his helmet snagged on the curb and broke his neck. This incident so affected him, because he was there, that it assumed more importance in his calculations than all the abstract statistics.** If enough people play TOR, some of them are going to see Deadly Archery shine because of how the dice fall.

* Ok, Mirkwood Elves can take Great Bow, and even make it favoured, or they can make their normal bow Fell, but that's all at additional opportunity cost so can't really be counted when assessing the value of a single Virtue.
** In all honesty, I think the firefighter was simply looking to justify riding without a helmet himself.

[Rocmistro]

Oh but this topic is so juicy! We can't drop it now.

1) It's a minimum 5 without the Virtue because bow is favoured for Mirkwood Elves. And thus for the "best case" background it's 5 vs. 9, not 4 vs. 8. It seems like it's the same thing, but because of the probability distribution of dice pools that actually makes it significantly less important. In other words, increasing +1 to +5 is waaaaay more powerful than increasing +5 to +9, even though the absolute difference is the same.

2) It's true that Mirkwood Elves can get a lot of pierces, but it's with a TN of 14 since they are stuck* with normal bows.

3) Even if it's true that it's a good virtue for a Noble Blood elf with bow skill of 2 (which I refute, but let's go with it for a second), all that would mean is that it's a decent virtue for the worst archers in the culture. If you are trying to make a good archer you'll take high body and skill 3. So it doesn't address the paradox that Mirkwood Elves are famous for their archery. Again, it's like Spear of King Bladorthin: it makes a character less bad at something that isn't his primary focus.

4) A guy I knew, a firefighter no less, swore that motorcycle helmets are dangerous. He once responded to a call in which a motorcyclist had crashed, slid across the pavement, and as he bounced up over the curb his helmet snagged on the curb and broke his neck. This incident so affected him, because he was there, that it assumed more importance in his calculations than all the abstract statistics.** If enough people play TOR, some of them are going to see Deadly Archery shine because of how the dice fall.

* Ok, Mirkwood Elves can take Great Bow, and even make it favoured, or they can make their normal bow Fell, but that's all at additional opportunity cost so can't really be counted when assessing the value of a single Virtue.
** In all honesty, I think the firefighter was simply looking to justify riding without a helmet himself.

Oh ok you got me!

1. *If* you take favored bow and *if* you take a 5/8 body. Yes. But not everyone wants to or will do that. I happen to think, personally, that the most valid MWE stat array is the 4/4/6. So, yes I would agree Deadly Archer is not good for a 5/8 body, 2 heart elf. He's getting an additional +2 bonus on top of +8, and that's not good. I agree . I've already conceded that. Helm of Awe isn't great for a Dwarf with Awe: 0.

2. Again, if you default to the favored bow. Take a great bow, now and add +2 to injury. At-will TN 18 shots, Glor. Tell me that's not juicy.

3. I'm just providing that as a possible use, because bow skill 2-3 costs more than the (potentially 4 XP, but could be higher) that you'd spend on Deadly Archery. I don't think it's the optimal use of the virtue, agreed, but it certainly does (or at least, can) cost less XP than getting bow skill 3.

4. I get your point, but I'd also state that I don't think I've ever seen this build in action (whether it popped an Evil Kaneval 40 truck wheelie or crashed and burned with helmet), so it's all just me theorycrafting. Now just please tell me TN: 18 at-will piercing blows on just about any terms sucks and I will concede to you that Deadly Archery sucks.

* I disagree. You have to assess the possible synergies in order to appreciate the value of all of them. It's for the same reason that Skin-coat works for a Beorning but not for a Hobbit. Playing a Beorning involves managing, among other things, when exactly you get wounded. There are time you might want to be and obviously times you don't. The Skin-Coat virtue, a Helm, and ample use of invoking your Body Score, as opposed to relying on the randomness of dice are all key ingredients to knowing exactly what your bonus to a protection test is going to be enough to succeed, and when you want to fail it. And in fact, ultimately, I would say what is more important to me in this discussion is not "winning" the Deadly Archery argument, but rather in leaving readers with the proper perspective that you can't assess a Virtue without considering it in light of it's synergies, and the overall character "build" it will belong to.

Let me ask you this, Glor: Let's compare a 3rd edition Rogue, who's got 10d6 sneak attack damage and poison riding on a successful opening snipe shot, vs. a ranged fighter with 4 attacks. They both have pretty ample chances to hit. Who's going to get more excited over a +2 bonus to hit?

[Michebugio]

1. *If* you take favored bow and *if* you take a 5/8 body. Yes. But not everyone wants to or will do that. I happen to think, personally, that the most valid MWE stat array is the 4/4/6. So, yes I would agree Deadly Archer is not good for a 5/8 body, 2 heart elf. He's getting an additional +2 bonus on top of +8, and that's not good. I agree . I've already conceded that. Helm of Awe isn't great for a Dwarf with Awe: 0.

1. We've already seen the (mediocre) maths in the best case scenario, just remember that any other choice for an elf is even worse. And by the way, the usefulness of a Helm of Awe is maximized with Awe 0, since it effectively doubles the (already poor) chance of a success, and it gets comparatively lower at higher ranks (since the contribution of the Action Dice to the outcome gets lesser and lesser): so, like Deadly Archery, it's a benefit good for low numbers of Success dices, which becomes rapidly obsolete at higher ranks.

2. Again, if you default to the favored bow. Take a great bow, now and add +2 to injury. At-will TN 18 shots, Glor. Tell me that's not juicy.

As Glor said, you're just wasting opportunity cost. Deadly Archery (let's say it's taken with Wis 2 at character creation, so "free"), plus Stinging Arrow (taken at Wis 3, 6 Exp), plus Valour 2 to get Fell (4 Exp), plus 2 ranks in Great Bow (6 Exp) = 16 Exp.
You have now "at will" (not so true, actually: against Parry 18 you still have a 30% chance to FAIL, wasting 2 Hope points in the process) TN 18 shots at the cost of 2 damn Hope points each shot.

Opportunity alternative of those 16 Exp: you get a free Fell Bow with Valour 2 at character creation, and you bring Bow to 4 (exactly 16 Exp). With this combination you have TN 16 Piercing Blows roughly 50% of the times at no cost (through Called Shots, of course). And you still have the choice of upgrading a miss into a hit invoking Favoured Body, which can be as high as 9 (so even better than the +8 of a Noble Elf).

3. I'm just providing that as a possible use, because bow skill 2-3 costs more than the (potentially 4 XP, but could be higher) that you'd spend on Deadly Archery. I don't think it's the optimal use of the virtue, agreed, but it certainly does (or at least, can) cost less XP than getting bow skill 3.

See above. And come on, we can't forget we're still talking about 2 Hope points for each shot when the alternative is Hope-free. Who the hell has that much Hope to spend in TOR??

[Rocmistro]

UGH! The point is not to fire every shot at a 2 point premium. The point is you have absolute control over when, where and what you kill, and pay (at most) 2 hope points to do that. You are paying for the certainty and control, not for overall battlefield domination.

[Michebugio]

UGH! The point is not to fire every shot at a 2 point premium. The point is you have absolute control over when, where and what you kill, and pay (at most) 2 hope points to do that. You are paying for the certainty and control, not for overall battlefield domination.

Before we continue, let's be clear: with Great Bow 2 (+8, Body 4 and Heart 4) it's not "absolute" certainty, it's roughly 67% chance to hit against Parry 18.

With Bow 4, you have roughly a 50% chance to score a Piercing Blow against Parry 18, through a Called Shot. No cost in Hope, or 1 Hope to add up to +9 to a bad roll.

And you're essentially paying 16 Exp (plus 2 Hope points when the moment arises) to have this (not so absolute) control in a handful of shots in the whole campaign, while being a mediocre archer in any other attack roll (i.e. any roll where you don't spend Hope: the vast majority of your attack rolls).

The alternative is being always an excellent archer at no Hope cost (and -2 Injury TN, conceded).

[Rocmistro]

Ok. Great Bow 2 gets you through the lower levels. I'm curious how the percentages change at parry ratings of 3-5 instead of 6, which is admittedly a high parry rating, but, I made the big claim so I have to stick with it.

I'm also curious how it changes when I get to Great Bow 3, but, granted, that's 6 more XP. I realize I didn't explicitly state it, but the long term of this character build was to keep pace and eventually get to Great Bow 3 and/or possibly 4. That might seem like I'm moving the goal posts, but I'm really not.

I don't consider called shots, even at weapon skill 4, to be a reliable way to produce piercing blows on your terms.

The 16 XP, though, Mich, is not just "wasted" on this build. You're still dishing out 7 damage per shot, with the same chances for TN: 18 piercing blows of opportunity as the regular bow guy.

My "build" also assumes a stat array which includes more hope, more endurance, and better parry than the other guy. Those things can't simply be excluded in the analysis. A single point of parry can be the difference between being forced to make a protection test...one that you might spend hope on and not. A couple points of endurance might be the difference between your Bow 4 guy making a weary shot and my Bow 2 guy making a non-weary shot. I don't know how you model that into this discussion, but at the very least one must concede that a higher heart and higher wits is superior to lower heart/lower wits.

[Michebugio]

Ok. Great Bow 2 gets you through the lower levels. I'm curious how the percentages change at parry ratings of 3-5 instead of 6, which is admittedly a high parry rating, but, I made the big claim so I have to stick with it.
[...]
I don't consider called shots, even at weapon skill 4, to be a reliable way to produce piercing blows on your terms.

Here you are: at Parry 4 (TN 16), Great Bow +Deadly Archery stands at 87%, much more reliable of course.

On the other hand, Bow 4 still stands at 50% (to both hit and get a Pierce), since it depends on the probability to score a Tengwar more than actually hitting the TN (see below in this paragraph). But it is Hope free, and you're still avoiding the fact that, without spending those 2 Hope points, your build has an average hit chance against TN 16 of 27%! You may be dishing out 7 Damage per shot as you say, but you're missing 3 out of 4 times before you land a blow, while my build stands on a solid 79% hit chance against TN 16 at no cost.

The 16 XP, though, Mich, is not just "wasted" on this build. You're still dishing out 7 damage per shot, with the same chances for TN: 18 piercing blows of opportunity as the regular bow guy.

Except that you're spending 2 Hope for that, and I'm not...

[Glorelendil]

1. *If* you take favored bow and *if* you take a 5/8 body. Yes. But not everyone wants to or will do that. I happen to think, personally, that the most valid MWE stat array is the 4/4/6. So, yes I would agree Deadly Archer is not good for a 5/8 body, 2 heart elf. He's getting an additional +2 bonus on top of +8, and that's not good. I agree . I've already conceded that. Helm of Awe isn't great for a Dwarf with Awe: 0.

Oops, misunderstanding. I didn't mean 5/8 body. I meant that if you take the minimum body (4) and give it the lowest favoured attribute (+1) you still have a minimum of 5. If you then add the maximum Heart (4, if you went Noble Blood), the difference is +9 instead of +5 if you didn't take the virtue.

2. Again, if you default to the favored bow. Take a great bow, now and add +2 to injury. At-will TN 18 shots, Glor. Tell me that's not juicy.

That's crazy. Woodland Bow is statistically AWESOME and you can't get it as a Great Bow. And you lose the favoured bonus, costing another point of Wisdom to get it back. And if you're arguing that +4 to attribute bonuses is good, then you have to also argue that +3 (for maximum favoured) is 75% as good, and it's free.

So, yeah, a TN 18 bow with 7 damage is sweet...but the opportunity costs for wood elves are waaaaaay too high.

Now just please tell me TN: 18 at-will piercing blows on just about any terms sucks and I will concede to you that Deadly Archery sucks.

I've already argued that Great Bow is a bad idea, but if that's what you're trying to build why on earth would you take Body of 4 and leave skill at 2? With Body of 6 and skill of 3 you're almost never going to miss. The odds of the extra +2 (Body 4, Heart 4) making the critical difference are slim. AND you're going to get 2 extra damage for every tengwar.

So, again, if you intentionally build a mathematically bad archer (take low body, spend XP leveling a weapon that's not favoured but stopping at skill:2) then the bonus becomes helpful.

But is that extreme edge case really an argument that it's a good virtue?

Your Pierce Monkey is pretty good when he spends Hope, but only marginally more so than if he didn't take Deadly Archery. And on all the other rounds that he doesn't spend Hope he's a worse archer than other cultures, and worse than other elves who stick with normal bow, and he spent extra XP to get there.

[Hermes Serpent]

I've been reading this thread with interest and I've not seen any comment about Opening Volley where the Parry of a Shield is doubled (Revised rules p171). The Woodland Bow armed Elf gets an extra shot during that part of the combat and obviously that helps them in evening the odds a little.

What is the best option for a Woodland bow-armed Elf with an Opening volley? Does the extra shot provide enough benefit to overcome some of the other handicaps?