Deadly Archery

[Glorelendil]

I like the basic idea, and might argue for it being combined with some of my above suggestions (or the one in the other thread, where I suggested allowing Break Armor and Maiming Shot as additional Called Shot options).

When using Called Shot and rolling a Great Success, your target rolls one less Success die on its Protection test, or two fewer on an Extraordinary Success.

Any time you spend Hope on an attack with your bow you may choose to increase either its Damage or its Injury by X (not sure exactly what X should be. Maybe your favoured Heart bonus.)

These two seem slightly overpowered, especially the first (well, and the second if going with Injury). The second going with damage seems reasonable enough.

OOPS! That first one was supposed to read Prepared Shot. I'll fix it.

On the second one, it totally depends on the value of X.

EDIT:
To expand a bit on the second one, let's say it is your favoured Heart bonus, i.e. +1 to +3 range. Take the maximum, +3. That means that when you spend Hope your regular bow has an Injury rating 1 higher than a Great Bow. How often are you actually going to spend Hope? And in terms of synergy with Woodland Bow, it would be fabulous at taking out mooks, if that's really want you want to spend your Hope on. But it would be tough to exploit it for taking out Great Size opponents, because you really want to wait until they are Weary (0 Hate or Endurance) before spending Hope to fish for Wounds. And that's not going to be in the opening Volley.

(It did just occur to me that maybe you read "favoured Heart bonus" and thought I meant the full favoured Heart score, which could be as high as 7, and not just the bonus. I chose that rather than Heart to make it 1 to 3 instead of 2 to 4.)

[Deadmanwalking]

So, here's my current thought on my version of this (I thought of adding a fourth option, but couldn't think of anything really good). I considered adding some sort of Injury-booster, but I just realized there's a problem with adding any such thing to Deadly Archery these days: Elves of Lorien use Greatbows and have access to Deadly Archery.

Deadly Archery

...their small knives... would have been of no use against the arrows of the Elves that could hit a bird’s eye in the dark.

Most members of your kin possess a natural talent for hitting the mark when using their bows. You seem to
possess that quality yourself, as your arrows find their target with uncanny precision.

When you first gain this Virtue you learn the secrets of One With The Wind, and may gain Crippling Shot or Superlative Speed by spending a Fellowship Phase undertaking training your archery skills and expending 1 point of experience.

One With The Wind: You ignore difficulty penalties from adverse conditions such as wind or darkness when shooting a bow, and the range of your bow attacks is doubled. Additionally, if you spend Hope on your attack, you may add your basic Heart to the attack as well as your Body.

Crippling Shot: When making Called Shots with a bow or great bow, you may also use the Maiming Strike and Break Armor Called Shot options, despite those normally only being available to other weapon types. Additionally, if you spend Hope on any attack, you may add your basic Heart to the base damage of the weapon as well as both Body and basic Heart on the attack.

Superlative Speed: When in rearward stance and using a bow or great bow, you may add your basic Heart to your Parry for purposes of avoiding melee attacks (such as those from foes with Fell Speed) only. You may also ignore the effects of Snake-like Speed and Wicked Cunning.

[Glorelendil]

I'm confused what you mean by "ignoring Deadly Elusiveness." Perhaps you are reading the description of the ability to say that you can't be in Rearward Stance and attack creatures that possess it? If so, I believe that's incorrect: you must be in either Forward or Rearward, but not Open/Defensive.

It does occur to me that the quote used for Deadly Archery would be perfect instead for Woodland Bow: "small knives are no use against...", i.e. they will shoot you before you even get close enough to stab them.

Great point about Lorien Elves. That complicates things; you really don't want an Injury increase in any circumstance because of that. At least not a controllable one. (For example, increasing Injury when rolling a Gandalf might be ok.)

I think we agree on some form of ignoring hindering conditions. I like it because it's situational, not across-the-board.

[Deadmanwalking]

Crap, I was confusing Deadly Elusiveness and Wicked Cunning (I always do that when not looking right at 'em). Fixed to say what I meant now.

And yeah, I was trying to brainstorm an Injury enhancer that wasn't broken...and realized that with Elves of Lorien around it was impossible. The ignoring hindering conditions and other effects all seemed reasonable, though.

[zedturtle]

I think we agree on some form of ignoring hindering conditions. I like it because it's situational, not across-the-board.

The longer the debate rages, the more I think about just starting to be very strict about situational/range modifiers to bow shots and then allow Deadly Archery to ignore such modifiers. A conditional but common effective bonus of +2/+4 is not too bad.

[Glorelendil]

Crap, I was confusing Deadly Elusiveness and Wicked Cunning (I always do that when not looking right at 'em). Fixed to say what I meant now.

And yeah, I was trying to brainstorm an Injury enhancer that wasn't broken...and realized that with Elves of Lorien around it was impossible. The ignoring hindering conditions and other effects all seemed reasonable, though.

I was trying to think of something to add that would make them less weak versus Great Size adversaries, but maybe the way to look at it is that by getting an extra attack at the start of combat they help get their targets to Weary faster, resulting in fewer devastating attacks.

But one final consideration about Mirkwood Elves: although Woodland Bow is great, it's not as a great as a fully decked out enchanted bow. Cultures that have their best combat enhancers as virtues, not rewards, don't face this trade-off. E.g.., a Hobbit can have Fair Shot and an enchanted bow. Just another argument for a buffed Deadly Archery.

[Glorelendil]

I think we agree on some form of ignoring hindering conditions. I like it because it's situational, not across-the-board.

The longer the debate rages, the more I think about just starting to be very strict about situational/range modifiers to bow shots and then allow Deadly Archery to ignore such modifiers. A conditional but common effective bonus of +2/+4 is not too bad.

Agreed. Or reduce it one step, at least.

EDIT:

Ok, BUT.....

This flies in the face of everything I just said about Injury, but one mechanic that just occurred to me that I haven't heard proposed: instead of increasing injury (already done) or decreasing Protection dice (already done), how about giving adversaries Disadvantage (roll two Feat dice, take worst) on their Protection tests?

[Insect King]

Deadly Archery

One With The Wind: You ignore difficulty penalties from adverse conditions such as wind or darkness when shooting a bow, and the range of your bow attacks is doubled. Additionally, if you spend Hope on your attack, you may add your basic Heart to the attack as well as your Body.

An extra bump on top of the standard version is okay. Would this cancellation apply to all -2/-4 situational penalties?

Crippling Shot: When making Called Shots with a bow or great bow, you may also use the Maiming Strike and Break Armor Called Shot options, despite those normally only being available to other weapon types. Additionally, if you spend Hope on any attack, you may add your basic Heart to the base damage of the weapon as well as both Body and basic Heart on the attack.

Using maim and break armour is okay but I'd lump them with One with the Wind. A question: do you add basic Heart twice as well as Body to your character's Bow attack if you spend one Hope?

Superlative Speed: When in rearward stance and using a bow or great bow, you may add your basic Heart to your Parry for purposes of avoiding melee attacks (such as those from foes with Fell Speed) only. You may also ignore the effects of Snake-like Speed and Wicked Cunning.

Do you mean the character gets a permanent bump of +2 (or thereabouts) to his parry rating or only when using a bow? Also, Wicked Cunning boosts the creature's Parry rating; it doesn't do anything to boost its ability to attack. Do you mean to say that the PC can choose to ignore Wicked Cunning with her or his bow attack?

I know Fell Speed indicates an opponent's ability to engage or withdraw from attacking any stance at the beginning of every round but what does that specifically have to do with attacking? It seems redundant.

Cheers,

Chris.

[Deadmanwalking]

An extra bump on top of the standard version is okay. Would this cancellation apply to all -2/-4 situational penalties?

Not if an enemy had a spell that made you hindered or something, but most of them, yeah.

Using maim and break armour is okay but I'd lump them with One with the Wind.

That's actually a pretty powerful ability. Look at the Woodmen's Bearded Axe, for an example of a similar ability costing a whole Reward. This version isn't quite as good, but still seems worth an xp. Especially as it's combined with a situational damage boost.

A question: do you add basic Heart twice as well as Body to your character's Bow attack if you spend one Hope?

No. I was aiming to be inclusive of the previous version. You add Body + Heart to hit, then Heart to damage, that's all.

Do you mean the character gets a permanent bump of +2 (or thereabouts) to his parry rating or only when using a bow? Also, Wicked Cunning boosts the creature's Parry rating; it doesn't do anything to boost its ability to attack. Do you mean to say that the PC can choose to ignore Wicked Cunning with her or his bow attack?

Only when using a bow. And only against melee attacks, not against being shot at. And yeah, you get to attack their normal Parry rating, that's what's cool about it.

I know Fell Speed indicates an opponent's ability to engage or withdraw from attacking any stance at the beginning of every round but what does that specifically have to do with attacking? It seems redundant.

Creatures with Fell Speed can attack archers with their melee attacks (something most foes can't do), they were an example of a situation where the conditional Parry bonus would actually be useful.

[Deadmanwalking]

This flies in the face of everything I just said about Injury, but one mechanic that just occurred to me that I haven't heard proposed: instead of increasing injury (already done) or decreasing Protection dice (already done), how about giving adversaries Disadvantage (roll two Feat dice, take worst) on their Protection tests?

Dalish Longbow already does this, but on Gandalf runes only. That does mean it's reasonable on a Greatbow and thus a possible option, but probably not any more commonly than that...and it's sorta stealing someone else's mechanic.