Originally Posted by
Vargouille
A reminder that we don't expect this to be the last time we touch the Arcane Archer tree. We are sad we can't get to everything we'd like to right now, but realistically we're looking at a lot of work for update 29 coming soon, and we didn't want to push Arcane Archer entirely out of 2015. We do appreciate the many ideas here, though (some of which mirror ideas we've been thinking of anyway, or which are better than ideas we'd been thinking).
Slaying Arrows are so ridiculously powerful that we're pretty sure there's range somewhere between for "pulling back" and "meh". We also don't have any specific plans for Slaying Arrow right now - any changes to it are going to be dependent on DPS testing. Part of the reason for this is because we feel having so much of the power of AA in this one ability isn't healthy and also makes it harder to balance the tree. We would not want to have to nerf everything else in the tree just to make Slayer Arrow extra super powerful. (For instance, if we find we have to drop 250 to 200... it's still going to be incredibly awesome.)
As mentioned several times, we have more changes planned. Just not Soontm, unfortunately.
An interesting idea, but Manyshot is intended to be essentially class-agnostic. That doesn't mean it's entirely impossible, but we wouldn't want to the word "Ranger" to show up anywhere directly in the ManyShot feat.
We could add new automatically granted feats to the Ranger class that affect Manyshot, but we tend to shy away from that if there's another way. Still, duration of abilities another interesting knob we could adjust, and it's good to remember all the tools in the toolbox.
Doubleshot and Manyshot both create additional real arrows in the world, each making their own separate, constant collision checks as they fly through the air.
It's not ideal. It's also deep in the code and risky to touch.
Additionally, it's not merely the collision checks that cause issues. Adding all of the extra on-hit effects (including damage effects) is not insignificant, and something we try to cut down on when we can. (For instance, in designing new items and abilities, etc.)