How good is the silver longbow?

[Lonnbeimnech]

If there was a weapon that did one damage per hit, and on a 20 it did one million. It would do an average of 50,000.9 damage.

Bit if you swung it 4 times, and didn't roll a 20, it would seem pretty lousy.

[Waaye]

Then I'll respond to the OP.[...]

When will you do that? You still have not posted any empirical test data. Of course, to be valid it would have to come from someone with a 28 point build character on their first time through. I doubt anyone that has posted so far is in that category.

[Waaye]

[...]Bit if you swung it 4 times, and didn't roll a 20, it would seem pretty lousy.

Your analogy is not clear to me. For the average player the +5 Elements (air) bow will hit more often than the +3 silver bow and when it does hit it will do more base damage. If the silver bow does hit it has twice the chance of doing an extra 12-39 critical damage. The Air bow crits half as often but for an extra 18-51 plus 2-20 electrical. Am I understanding how that works?

[FestusHood]

Your analogy is not clear to me. For the average player the +5 Elements (air) bow will hit more often than the +3 silver bow and when it does hit it will do more base damage. If the silver bow does hit it has twice the chance of doing an extra 12-39 critical damage. The Air bow crits half as often but for an extra 18-51 plus 2-20 electrical. Am I understanding how that works?

The math being used by the game engine is the same math that has been tested by players, and posted in this thread.

Yes, in an extremely small sample size, the math may not, in fact probably won't work out. You are asking people to perform empirical tests to see if the math holds up. You haven't done that yourself yet.

You sound like someone who flipped a coin twice, came up heads both times and then proclaims " See that? the math is garbage".

[Therrias]

Your analogy is not clear to me. For the average player the +5 Elements (air) bow will hit more often than the +3 silver bow and when it does hit it will do more base damage. If the silver bow does hit it has twice the chance of doing an extra 12-39 critical damage. The Air bow crits half as often but for an extra 18-51 plus 2-20 electrical. Am I understanding how that works?

DDO works differently than P&P. Missing on attacks is not an issue for a ranged combat build. The difference in accuracy between a +3 bow and a +5 bow is not 10% (like in P&P), it's something like 2%.

[Waaye]

The math being used by the game engine[...]

That math is proprietary and no one outside of Turbine should know what it is. Are you saying that some players have disassembled the client in violation of the EULA?

DDO works differently than P&P. Missing on attacks is not an issue for a ranged combat build. The difference in accuracy between a +3 bow and a +5 bow is not 10% (like in P&P), it's something like 2%.

Is such a build even possible for someone with 28 points on their first time through without sacrificing something important? Let us suppose that the bows did hit at the same rate. The silver bow crits twice as often for just over half of the damage. When both bows are not critting the the Air bow is doing considerably more damage. That is exactly what I observed. The Air bow brought the at-level mobs down significantly faster than the silver bow. What does your testing show?

[Ancient]

You sound like someone who flipped a coin twice, came up heads both times and then proclaims " See that? the math is garbage".

Exactly, and if they had put half the time into collecting data that they put into arguing in this thread... they would have seen the initial data was not right.

[Ancient]

That math is proprietary and no one outside of Turbine should know what it is. Are you saying that some players have disassembled the client in violation of the EULA?

It shows you the dice roll, it isn't rocket science.

[sephiroth1084]

Yes, I read the theoretical stuff and my silver bow must be busted because it never worked that well.

Theory is irrelevant because only actual damage can bring down a mob or a boss.

Of course the only way to test how the bows will work for low-level characters is to actually test them using a low-level character. With high-level characters the chance to miss with the bows will be the same and the silver bow will look better than the +3 bow it really is.

What does your character look like? What is your Str? Your Dex? Your Wis (if you use Zen Archery)? What feats do you have? These are incredibly relevant to your performance.

While I don't have a running log of usage with various bows, I can say that, across 3 archer lives, I've noticed that the Silver Longbow performs distinctly better than any other bow I have until I hit level 16--that includes the Thornlord, the Bow of Elements (Air), a variety of <element> of Greater Bane bows, and a Lit II greensteel.

The performance difference is marked because I get far more 1-shot kills with the Silver Longbow than with any of the others--soloing through the Desert at level 11 and 12 I was frequently one-shotting stuff with the Silver Longbow, while requiring 2, 3, or 4 shots from the others bows most of the time. Sure, when it doesn't crit the Silver Longbow is a bit weaker, and if you compare killing a monster or two with a variety of bows where none of them are criting, then the Silver Longbow is going to look a little weaker (although, +2 to-hit and damage shouldn't make much of a difference when the Silver Longbow is still rolling a 1d6 more than the Bow of Elements).

A test of a handful of shots isn't at all conclusive. That's like flipping a coin 5 times, getting heads all 5 times, and concluding that you have a 100% chance to flip heads, or declaring that the coin must be weighted, or rigged, or otherwise not functioning properly. Statistics don't play out their relevance over incredibly small sample sets.

That math is proprietary and no one outside of Turbine should know what it is. Are you saying that some players have disassembled the client in violation of the EULA?

The math isn't a mystery here. We, the gaming community, are aware of the to-hit and AC formulas in the game, and we know how crits are determined, and how damage is determined. The most you could say about there being a mystery is that we don't really know exactly how Turbine's random number generator works, how good it is, in light of the fact that RNGs are a misnomer, being incapable of producing truly random numbers.

Is such a build even possible for someone with 28 points on their first time through without sacrificing something important? Let us suppose that the bows did hit at the same rate. The silver bow crits twice as often for just over half of the damage. When both bows are not critting the the Air bow is doing considerably more damage. That is exactly what I observed. The Air bow brought the at-level mobs down significantly faster than the silver bow. What does your testing show?

The Bow of the Elements is 1.5[1d8] +5, +1d6, +2d10 on crits = 12 + 10 on crits
The Silver Longbow is 1d10 +3, +2d6 = 12.5

Those are the average results of just the base damage on the bows, not accounting for anything else...what they add up to. Against evil targets, the Silver Longbow deals more damage, all on its own, before even figuring in crits. The base dice are close to being the same if you aren't adding any effects to them (BoE's is 4.5 + 2.25, while Silver's is 5.5), while Silver is rolling an additional d6. The BoE is rolling slightly higher crits, but the Silver is getting twice as many of those.


The Bow of the Elements is not dealing significantly more damage, and the conclusion you've reached isn't even supported by your own numbers, which show all of your bows to be about 1 shot apart at max on how long it takes to kill something: 4 shots vs. 5 isn't an incredibly large margin, especially if you consider that the creatures you're attacking could be at only a sliver of HP at the end of the 4th shot on the ones where number 5 downs them.

If you want to just use whichever bow you feel most comfortable with, go right ahead, but that doesn't mean you're using the best bow for the situation.

Here are my calculations using Barrage (a handy DPS calculator for DDO), assuming a base damage bonus of +15 on the Silver Longbow (and more for the bows with a higher enhancement bonus)--15 would be, say, a +8 bonus from Str (16 base +6 item +2 tome +2 Ram's Might...a Rage potion could replace the tome; racial or class enhancement bonuses to Str could cut the requirements down a bit as well), +3 from the enhancement, +4 Deadly easily enough, though the configuration could change in a few ways to still reach that value. No Seeker, and no other effects worked in (if you have Arcane Archer Elemental Imbues up, the Silver Longbow gains more of a bonus thanks to more crits). The numbers are presented for each bow with and without Improved Critical:

silver 30.23
silver IC 34.33

elements 28.81
elements IC 31.74

thorn 27.04
thorn IC 29.61

Those are average damage per shot figures, accounting for crits and such over, I think, 20 shots.

[Waaye]

It shows you the dice roll, it isn't rocket science.

Honestly, it shows you a text field that could say Damage: Purple + Petunias. The actual calculation may or not be the same. How can anyone know for sure without empirical testing. Even if the text is correct the Air Bow damage range should be 6.5 -17, shouldn't it?

Still not one response that is on topic, How odd.

[sephiroth1084]

Is such a build even possible for someone with 28 points on their first time through without sacrificing something important? Let us suppose that the bows did hit at the same rate. The silver bow crits twice as often for just over half of the damage. When both bows are not critting the the Air bow is doing considerably more damage. That is exactly what I observed. The Air bow brought the at-level mobs down significantly faster than the silver bow. What does your testing show?

When to-hit was still strictly based on the d20, then, yes, a +2 difference meant a 10% difference in to-hit.

• Monster’s chance to hit: (Monster’s Attack Bonus + 10.5) / (Target’s Armor Class * 2)
• Player’s chance to hit: (Player’s Attack Bonus + 10.5) / (Target’s Armor Class * 2) + 20% proficiency bonus, rounded to nearest 5%

So, let's say your target has a 50 AC and you have a 30 to-hit with the Silver Longbow, and a 32 with the Bow of Elements.
Silver Longbow is at a 60% chance to hit. (30+10.5)/(50*2) + 0.2 = 0.605 rounded to nearest 5% is 60
Bow of the Elements is at a 60% chance to hit. (32+10.5)/(50*2) + 0.2 = 0.625 rounded to nearest 5% is 60

You can plug in differing numbers as you choose--I couldn't find the exact AC for the specific monsters you were facing, but it doesn't really matter all that much if you raise or lower those values, because the formulas hold up pretty well.

Assume +30 to-hit vs. AC 100:
Silver 40% (.4025)
Elements 40% (.4125)

That's a difference in AC of 50 points, yet only a difference in success for hitting of 20%. How do yo think a +2 bonus to-hit is going to make an impact there?

[sephiroth1084]

Still not one response that is on topic, How odd.

Read my posts: not only do I offer you numbers, but I also give you some anecdotal data from my experience using a variety of bows.

[Ancient]

Honestly, it shows you a text field that could say Damage: Purple + Petunias.

The hit roll... You did claim air was better because it hit more.

[Waaye]

[...]You can plug in differing numbers as you choose[...]

Why would I do that when I don't know where the equations came from? For dice games there is a lot of rounding. With computers rounding a floating point number takes extra time and loses information. It is easier and better not to round the value unless really needed for some reason. The empirical data suggests the values were not rounded and your supposition is incorrect. What does your actual in-game testing show?

[sephiroth1084]

Why would I do that when I don't know where the equations came from? For dice games there is a lot of rounding. With computers rounding a floating point number takes extra time and loses information. It is easier and better not to round the value unless really needed for some reason. The empirical data suggests the values were not rounded and your supposition is incorrect. What does your actual in-game testing show?

Which equations? Damage equations? Those are easy: take the base damage die for your weapon (d10 for Silver Longbow), and take its average value (5.5), then add bonuses to that, like the weapon's enhancement, Str, etc...figure those for 19 hits and 1 miss for your automatic miss on a rolled 1. Add the multiplied figures for crits for the number of crits in 20 swings.

If you mean the to-hit formulas, I don't recall where the d20 comes into our to-hit bonus now, but those are the official formulas given to us by Turbine when they went and changed everything over a year ago.

And I did provide you with some empirical observation: the Silver Longbow gets more 1-shot kills than the other bows. I also showed you that it has virtually the same damage as the Bow of the Elements just looking at their base damage profiles. It is an observed, and mathematically proven, fact that very small bonuses for to-hit make no actual difference in game play, unless they push you over the cusp into the next 5% bracket--so, at best, your Bow of the Elements is giving you a +5% boost in success at landing attacks. Back when we were still working off the d20, no one would ever suggest using an overall stronger weapon over one with a +1 to-hit advantage (5%) unless you couldn't hit your target otherwise (going from 95% miss chance to 90%).

[Edit] To be more clear, I ran some whole quests, and about half of a few different explorer areas trying one bow of the group--in particular, Silver Longbow vs. Lit II, which is [1.5]1d8, +5 enhancement, Holy, Shocking Burst, Shocking Blast (basically Shocking Burst a second time with an additional 3d6 electric damage on vorpals), and Lightning Strike (average of about 450 damage on 2% of attacks), which seems like it should be much better, but it wasn't. Not by the numbers, and not by my experience. I think it worked out to be a little ahead according to Barrage, at my base damage for those tests (I think in the mid-20s/low-30s for that), until I removed the Lightning Strike, and the Lit II fell behind. The Lit II is a little better against a boss with a ton of HP, because if you're attacking 100, 500, 1,000 times, that 2% is going to come up often enough to be relevant, but against normal mobs, even those that may take a dozen hits to drop, having the more reliable crits (10% more) proved more worthwhile, because it meant killing more mobs more quickly, instead of one mob really fast, and the extra crits are less likely to end up just being overkill the way the Lightning Strike could be. That was a tough pill to swallow--that my ml 12, raid-crafted weapon worth several million plat, and the product of a dozen or more runs through The Shroud was simply not as good as my ml 6 (now 8) bow from the end chest of a short-ish quest that could be purchased on the Auction House for a hundred thousand plat, but it was the case all the same, both by the numbers, and on paper. If I had fewer on-crit effects (I had several), the Lit II would have been a bit further ahead...maybe.

[IlmethSoultaker]

You still have not posted any empirical test data.

Neither have you. A sample of 5 with only one of your bows hitting for critical damage isn't empirical data. Why are you so bent on arguing when you're the one trying to figure out which weapon is better? You know what your set up (which still hasn't been told to anyone), and you've only done 5 samples.

Like I said, it is incompetent testing by what seems like someone who doesn't actually care to find the answer, but wants to argue that their sample size of 5 is better than anecdotal evidence from someone else who has played multiple lives. A small sample like that is far worse than anything anecdotal. You didn't even test enough to get a critical hit from each bow. That's pathetic.

[Waaye]

Which equations?[,,,]

Every equation posted in this thread without anything to show that Turbine is using those calculations in DDO.

6 X 9 = 42 is also an equation but there may be something fundamentally wrong with it.

Why is no one taking a few minutes to go into the game with a L10 character and try the different bows to see how they compare? Then they can post the results and we can all look at some actual data and stop debating how many angels can dance on the head of a pin, or whatever.

Of course that probably happened quite some time ago and nobody wants to post their results. How odd.

[Ancient]

You want results, make a good first effort. 100 shots each bow, on the same type of mob. Record the hit roll, hit/miss result and the damage.

Then others will know you are serious.

[Qhualor]

this thread went about 1 page too long. /facepalm

[sifubob]

this thread went about 1 page too long. /facepalm

I agree with that... this thread is pointlessly stupid...