Deadly Archery

[Glorelendil]

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?

A free shot is mathematically pretty great. Statistically it goes down the longer combat lasts, but most TOR combats I've seen typically don't last very long (except when fighting Snow Trolls...). The shield rule is only a problem if all the enemies have shields.

It's almost impossible to determine if it "overcomes the other handicaps", by which I think you mean lower damage and lower injury than Great Bows. It really depends on the Protection of the opponents. But, even then, getting that opponent closer to being Weary sooner in the fight is a good thing.

[Rocmistro]

Glor:

I didn't realize that Woodland Bow was not available on a Great Bow, so my bad on that one. But it doesn't crush the concept because you can still take an opening volley (just not 2) and having parsed this out with you guys, maybe the opportunity cost of Woodland bow is not worth the Great Bow: 3

So...with 16 XP now we're looking at:

Wisdom 2 (free): Deadly Archery
Wisdom 3 (6 xp): Elf Magic
Valor 2 (4 xp): Keen Great Bow (TN: 18)

Great Bow-3: 6 xp

And you're not taking the great bow for damage*. You're taking it for Injury TN. And the opportunity costs is minimal because all you're doing is taking the starting package for Spears instead of favored Bow, thus making you a plausible early-game melee combatant in addition to building yourself for shooting.

*This of course follows suit with my one damage path theory of character building, so I suppose one must buy into that first before joining me on this.

[Rocmistro]

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?

A free shot is mathematically pretty great. Statistically it goes down the longer combat lasts, but most TOR combats I've seen typically don't last very long (except when fighting Snow Trolls...). The shield rule is only a problem if all the enemies have shields.

It's almost impossible to determine if it "overcomes the other handicaps", by which I think you mean lower damage and lower injury than Great Bows. It really depends on the Protection of the opponents. But, even then, getting that opponent closer to being Weary sooner in the fight is a good thing.

I might also argue that the enhanced distanced of Great Bow range should allow for additional opening volleys when open distance is a factor. For the LM to exclude that is disregarding some of the utility of the weapon.

[Michebugio]

Great Bow-3: 6 xp

You mean Great Bow 2.

By the way, I'm literally amazed looking at how everybody keeps ignoring the fact that to do what it does the Great Bow build must spend 2 Hope points on a shot, otherwise he'll stand on a sloppy 27% chance to hit a TN 16!

2. Hope. points. to. have. a. decent. hit. chance.

[Glorelendil]

You're putting a lot of value on the "On Demand" part of this. That is, being able to spend Hope to get a guaranteed Pierce. Because it's still not guaranteed...you could still miss by more than 8. It's only guaranteed, and the virtue only kicks in, if you missed by an amount that's greater than your Body but less than Body + Heart. And even then the target gets to roll Protection.

Contrast this with a Barding with a favoured Body of 9 (no Virtue spent) making Called Shots with skill: 4. He's going to get an awful lot of Pierces, and only spending Hope on some of them.

And if you look at the times when Pierces are really important, it's against adversaries (like Snow Trolls) with Great Size, and usually with stupidly high Protection. You need a lot of Pierces with high Injuries to bring them down. Are you going to spend 2 Hope multiple times in one fight?

Sure, a Pierce Monkey can drop goblins every round, but there's not a ton of value to that. Not for the opportunity costs described. For a Pierce Monkey to be really valuable he has to produce a lot of Pierces, not just one Pierce more or less on demand.

[Glorelendil]

I'll tell you what. I'll sim it out. Give me your XP expenditure and your build, and your adversary of choice, and I'll run your toon against that adversary, versus a toon of my choice against that same adversary, 100,000 times each. I'll print out average rounds-to-kill, and Hope spent to do so. (I'll assume somebody else is tanking the thing and not dying...)

[Rocmistro]

Mich, that's not not how it's designed to work. That's not how the player manages his shots and I've mentioned this multiple times already, so stop being dishonest. And I've also mentioned it's not the intent for that build to linger at skill 3 for the entirety of his adventuring career.

This is how it works.

At low levels (ie, Great Bow skill 2). He fires when opportunities present them self:

1. if his shot misses and produced no edge, tengwars, or cannot drop a foe with said shot, he does not spend any hope. (pretty much the same as EVERY OTHER ARCHER in the game with a ranged skill of 2.)

2. if his shot misses with edge, or he gets sufficient tengwars (his judgment), then he adds a point of hope to make it hit (ie, pretty much the same as EVERY OTHER ARCHER in the game with a ranged skill of 2.*)

3. if he has to absolutely make a critical shot, because the dramatic climax of the combat encounter demands it, and his shot misses and produces no edge, then he adds 2 points of hope to hit with a piercing blow.* (ie, a privilege he enjoys, unlike ANY OTHER archer in the game.)

* The Deadly Archery virtue gives him the extra marginal bonus to hit in scenarios 2 and 3 that he otherwise might not have...in effect it "extends" his failure to success conversion range. It provides opportunity benefit in scenario 2 and certainty benefit in scenario 3, and as his Great Bow skill matures, it broadens the circumstances under which he gets to deploy his piercing blows.

At no point have I ever suggested or reasoned as a strength of the build that the character is missing shots every round, and thus spending double hope points, every round, in order to succeed on dramatically insignificant shots.

Let me ask you guys a different question:

Is one Virtue worth 1-2 points of Hope and 1-2 points of Endurance Because essentially, that's the trade-off you are getting by taking a 4/4/6 stat array and still ultimately getting the +8 bonus to hit (with Deadly Archery), which is essentially the same bonus you get from a 5/8 favored Bow (and close to the same bonus you get from 6/9 favored bow). I'm kinda thinking it is, combined with the additional benefit you get from higher TN's to Injury.

Let's break it down:

You guys: Envoy of King 6(9)/2/6 (is this essentially what you are suggesting?)
Endurance: 24
Hope: 10

Bow: 4 (10 XP), I'll assume you put the 6 starting experience to get Bow to 3 at character creation. or we can do it the other way if you want, which gives a more robust assortment of Common skills.
Damage: 5/11/17 edge: 10, injury: 16

Valor: 2 Keen +2 (or did you want something else?)
Wisdom: 2 (4xp) Stinging Arrow.

Me: Noble Blood 4(5)/4/6
Endurance: 26
Hope: 12

Great Bow: 3 (6 XP). and I'm putting the same 6 starting experience to get Great Bow 2 at character creation.
Damage: 7/11/15 edge: 10, injury: 18

Valor: 2 Keen
Wisdom: 3 (10 XP) Deadly Archery, Stinging Arrow

So what are the practical differences here Mich/Glor? My guy has:
-more endurance
-more hope
-a better chance of converting piercing blow to kills
-higher resistance to corruption
-better melee combat skills
-longer range of weapon delivery (not huge, but neither is it insignificant)

Your guy has:
-a better base chance to hit (4 dice vs. 3)
-better extraordinary success damage
-greater likelihood to produce great and extraordinary successes
-a slightly better chance of converting a failure to hit (+9 vs. +8)

So with comparing these 2 builds, are you really going to tell me that Deadly Archery sucks (or rather, that it needs to be buffed, which is what the OP suggested. Your build does what it does better (endurance damage delivery), and mine does what it does better (converts piercing blows to kills). I get some marginal other befits with mine, and you get none with yours.

[Rocmistro]

I'll tell you what. I'll sim it out. Give me your XP expenditure and your build, and your adversary of choice, and I'll run your toon against that adversary, versus a toon of my choice against that same adversary, 100,000 times each. I'll print out average rounds-to-kill, and Hope spent to do so. (I'll assume somebody else is tanking the thing and not dying...)

See my last post for a build. I'm not against running a simulator, but I don't think that ultimately tells us anything, because the whole point of this build is not for sustained damage measuring. Combats, in real-game, don't work like that. I already know your simulator will point to Mich's (or your) Wood Elf and a combat simulator doesn't need to be run to weigh the comparisons I put forth in my 2 builds above. They are pretty much self evident.

[Angelalex242]

And then you realize the envoy of the king elf with a favored body of 8 or 9 yawns loudly at deadly archery and there's no way to make it useful for him.

That's why I kinda wanted deadly archery to work more like Fair Shot. Then any brand of elf gets a lot out of it.

[Glorelendil]

Oh, I'm not going to test for damage output. I'm going to test for Pierces, how often the virtue makes a difference, and what the average Hope cost is to kill opponents.

EDIT: Although, I'll also track damage, because the opportunity cost of getting those Pierces should be measured.