Ranger: Arcane Archer Changes (Early Autumn Edition)

**blerkington** · 10-09-2015, 10:19 PM

Originally Posted by Grailhawk

So his suggestion to treat bows like two handed weapons is legitimate and should be done. But saying that a Ranger will need to max out 6 types of spell power is an exaggeration at best and a lie at worst.

Devotion, Force and one Elemental is what a Ranger will need if you want to swap Force or the Elemental for Potency that can work yes there will be some gearing involved but it won't be that difficult.

Hi,

No, I don't think it would be worthwhile to gear for spellpower in all areas. A main and an alternate seems like a good balance between convenience and being able to hit high spellpower values for the preferred primary imbues.

The fact that the AA secondary imbues allow you to bypass some DR also helps this situation too, because it could remove the need to slot augments for that purpose. Now that DR is a serious defence again in newer content, that ability seems more valuable than before.

Since potency boosts healing and all forms of spell damage, people who are more interested in convenience than power could get away with just that one effect. Maybe we will also start to see some new named bows which have potency, devotion, or elemental spellpower boosts on them.

Thanks.

**J-mann** · 10-10-2015, 12:37 AM

Originally Posted by Aletys

I've never actually tested it, but have always been assured that they were the same bonus, so I went searching. Based on the thread below, the arrows don't add anything other than the enhancement bonus, and that does not stack with the bow bonus. Apparently they were different in 3.0, but not in 3.5 (I'm quoting the thread on this).

https://www.ddo.com/forums/showthrea...-Mean-Anything

Yes I noticed that when I searched stacking and ddo, but at one point they did change the rules, not sure if it was with 3.0 or 3.5, but in 2ed It worked that the bow was for to hit and the arrows for damage AND dr breaking (I know this for sure.... many many hours playing baulders gate

). I think it might have been 3.5 because I thought it operated the same in my old 3.0 players/dm handbooks.

**mikarddo** · 10-10-2015, 02:11 AM

Originally Posted by Aletys

Unless I'm misunderstanding the explanation, by changing Manyshot to Doubleshot, Rangers will be losing out on a whole bunch of proc's that are dependent on hits, not on damage.

So no, bad idea.

Hmm, dont procs double when a shot triggers doubleshot? Thats very odd and should ofc be changed if it does not.

**Aletys** · 10-10-2015, 04:36 AM

Originally Posted by Grailhawk

Clearly you have never played a caster, even casters who get a lot more then Elemental Arrows out of elemental spell power don't max every elemental spell power (most of them at least, maybe 1% or 2% of all casters build an Elemetalist but they don't need to that is just their choice). Pic 2 to keep maxed (Force/Acid for instance) or close to maxed since augments aren't going to max a spell power. You really just want all power handed to you with no need to work don't you?

Actually, I do play spellcasters, both divine & arcane, and I keep several sets of spellpower/focus weapons which are hot-keyed, & swap back & forth depending on what I'm casting. It's a royal pain & takes a way too much inventory, but it's effective.

**CeltEireson** · 10-10-2015, 05:34 AM

Originally Posted by Grailhawk

So his suggestion to treat bows like two handed weapons is legitimate and should be done. But saying that a Ranger will need to max out 6 types of spell power is an exaggeration at best and a lie at worst.

Devotion, Force and one Elemental is what a Ranger will need if you want to swap Force or the Elemental for Potency that can work yes there will be some gearing involved but it won't be that difficult.

Of course it all depends on what % of spellpower the devs choose to use - I was looking at 100% which is the maximum they're likely look at. its certainly possible they go for lower. Even 50% spellpower factoring in would still be worth it but until they give an indication of what level of spellpower affects the arrows itll be hard to know whether its worth putting the effort in to get spellpower to a high level.

**Grace_ana** · 10-10-2015, 01:17 PM

It would be nice if Lamma would open and stay open for more than a couple days so that we can actually test and give solid numbers regarding why the proposed changes are lacking. As it is, I think the numbers given so far are telling, but I would like to make several builds and work them out to post numbers. I don't currently have an archer capped since I'm in the middle of a TR, but if someone that does can make a comparison of live vs. proposed, that would also be good.

Just please, dev team, consider the following:

1. We all have different work schedules and RL demands, so please don't toss up Lamma during the week and then take it down againshortly thereafter. Last time I think it went up on a Thursday and came down on a Sunday, giving people almost zero time to actually test a thing. I know I worked Thurs and Fri, was sick on Sat, and then tried to test on Sun with no luck. It's frustrating.

2. Please take our testing into consideration for another round of discussion before doing anything. I recall most of the other class passes taking several rounds of Lamma builds, with feedback and changes being made during before the final product was released. In contrast, the ranger passes have felt really rushed and as if only relatively superficial things were changed (excepting the crit bonuses).

3. I would still prefer the entirety of changes be done at once - the full AA tree plus manyshot/10K. There's just no way to properly test out the changes without having them in full.

**Bennum** · 10-10-2015, 02:46 PM

Originally Posted by Basura_Grande

Since they added ranged-power, and even after the recent buffs to tempest where stuff got much better, it was worth throwing a manyshot into a pile of mobs every time it was off timer. IPS hits more targets than Dance of Death.

With these new changes I'm not so sure.

Exactly, previously I had a reason to use a bow. If manyshot gets nerfed any farther away from my melee dps why range at all. 90 precent of the time swords are better unless the live manyshot is up and even then it just competes and isn't better.

**Kielbasa** · 10-10-2015, 05:04 PM

As others have stated imbues should scale with ranged power. The storm dancer, venomed blades, and knight of the chalice light damage all scale off melee power. This is a ranged damage enhancement tree thus should use ranged power otherwise why was it implemented in the first place? Please don't ruin the tree by forcing people to try and fit spell power into their gear layout.

Xionanx · 10-10-2015, 05:29 PM

You know, the Imbues scaling with spell power is the one thing I have 0 complaints about in this update.

IMO the changes to "Elemental" Imbues are spot on and make sense thematically. If anything, the other classes who are adding "light" damage or "elemental" damage to their attacks should ALSO be affected by spell power.

But for those complaining about the imbues be affected by spell power, can you honestly tell me you have a RP or MP GREATER then what is easily obtainable via +spell power items? Making it RP/MP would actually WEAKEN the elemental imbues significantly.

**Stoner81** · 10-10-2015, 05:36 PM

Daft idea here but how about making Manyshot a clickie like Cleave is? Have it have say a 12 second cooldown or something like that and that would solve the problem of the lag but it might be a nerf to DPS depending on calcs. On the upside though you wouldn't have the 2 minute cooldown after a 20 second burst so I don't know if it would help either way but it's the only suggestion that hasn't been suggested (I think)

Stoner81.

**Grailhawk** · 10-10-2015, 06:15 PM

Originally Posted by Xionanx

You know, the Imbues scaling with spell power is the one thing I have 0 complaints about in this update.

IMO the changes to "Elemental" Imbues are spot on and make sense thematically. If anything, the other classes who are adding "light" damage or "elemental" damage to their attacks should ALSO be affected by spell power.

But for those complaining about the imbues be affected by spell power, can you honestly tell me you have a RP or MP GREATER then what is easily obtainable via +spell power items? Making it RP/MP would actually WEAKEN the elemental imbues significantly.

QTF this is spot on

**blerkington** · 10-10-2015, 08:37 PM

Hi,

Two other areas of the current AA tree which really could use improvement are:

True Strike: This seems pretty useless to me, just filler. Maybe it could gain a small boost to damage as well, or be replaced completely with a passive ability which gives +2/3/5% chance to hit, +3/6/10% fortification bypass, or something else minor but actually worth taking.

Action Boosts: These are pretty terrible too, and I find myself wondering who, if anyone, uses them. I guess they might be useful to someone running in LD as an extra source of boosts, but in themselves they are bad. What about changing it so there is a choice of haste boost and sprint boost instead?

Thanks.

**Erdrique** · 10-10-2015, 08:50 PM

Some interesting thoughts here on the Arcane Archer revamp. I'll be looking forward to the changes in the elemental damage arrows but I'm a little concerned about the capstone in the tree. Since the DC's will be based on wisdom (as proposed) wouldn't be helpful to have that capstone also give a wisdom bonus and a dex bonus? Or maybe a selector for either or? Just a thought here. I just don't see a lot of Arcane Archers maxing out their Wisdom scores but maybe after this change goes live I will be proven wrong.

**Ultria** · 10-11-2015, 05:39 AM

Originally Posted by Vargouille

[*]Elemental Arrows (Corrosive, Flaming, Frost, Shock)

Increase base damage to 1d8.
Damage scales with Spell Power. Exact amount TBD.
Each additional Elemental Arrows increases damage by +1 die.
Each enhancement tier from 2-5 has a new multiple choice option, "Elemental Damage", that increases damage by +2 dice (for a maximum of 7 dice if you select only one damage type).
Tier 5 Elemental Arrow damage (Improved) also scales with Spell Power.
Force Arrows scales number of dice with Elemental Arrows, and also scales with spellpower

What I get from this is AA (both Elf and Ranger) will get 1d8 base ele up to 4d8 with all ele types. That is pretty unambiguous.

The part that I do find ambiguous is the "Elemental Damage". Is it that you can chose to add 2d8 at each tier to a specific damage type and can simply chose the same type multiple times and it is added to the already existing damage.

Does this mean that it would be 11d8 for one element and 4d8 for the rest? This would be somewhat balanced with SA and KotC actually. SA dice are handed out like party favors, but fort keeps SA in check. KotC is unstoppable (IIRC, bonus: vampires are weak to it) but also brings ghost touch, vorpals undead, and capstone makes everything good. The elemental damage can be resisted and immuned by many things, forcing a stance change or respec. Even 7d8 would be substantial compared to the current 1d6, but pretty weak compared to SA and KotC.

It only would take 6 levels of Ranger to get 4d8/11d8 from AA (T5 takes 5 levels and CL12) and Metalline Arrows (Ranger 6). It also gives Bow Strength, Rapid Shot, and Manyshot.

14 Paladin would give 3d6 from KotC, Holy Sword (14 min of +1 crit threat and multi), full BAB, Fear Immunity, and Divine Might.

14 Rouge gives 11d6 SA (and more if you go halfling or human), 1d8 poison dmg, loads of skill points, traps, improved evasion and opportunist.

14 Warlock has two interesting tress. Enlighted Spirit gives 3d6 light dmg (that scales with spell power), fear immunity, 5d6 + 7d4 Eldritch Aura, and spells. Soul Eater lets you do dirty things with 4d10 Consume debuffs and 2d6 extra dmg vs Consume targets.

This would make for some very interesting 6 Ranger splash builds.

**Arlathen** · 10-11-2015, 06:14 AM

~~~ The Manyshot & 10K Stars Conumdrum ~~~

I've been keeping up with the thread and I still don't see a solution to 10K Stars & Manyshot conumdrum when comparing Monkcher style builds against Pure Archers that don't take Monk levels for 10K Stars.

I took a look at some (dodgy) math, and based on 1 arrow per second and enough Wisdom to make 10K Stars shoot at 2.5 Arrows per volley on average, I reached the following basic Rates of Fire calculated over a two minute time period:

Manyshot / 10K Stars / No Doubleshot: 2.25 Arrows Per second
* The Monkcher

Doubleshot 75%, No Manyshot: 1.75 Arrows Per second (Obvious

)
* A more a-typical full time archer, Doubleshot based build

Doubleshot 75%, Manyshot: 1.88 Arrows Per second
* Previous build but with Manyshot use factored in

Doubleshot 27%, Manyshot: 1.64 Arrows Per second
* This represent a Melee-orientated Ranger that needs to bust out the Bow

Interestingly, based on 1 arrows per second there's an intersection where more and more Doubleshot outweighs using Manyshot with the current penalty:

Doubleshot 100%, No Manyshot: 2.00 Arrows Per second

Doubleshot 100%, Manyshot: 2.00 Arrows Per second

Doubleshot 133%, No Manyshot: 2.33 Arrows Per second
Doubleshot 133%, Manyshot: 2.165 Arrows Per second

These figures will all scale on the same ratio, so the actual number of arrows shot at BAB28 for example isnt needed for my purposes.

In short even these simple calculations show me how far ahead the Monkcher is in terms of basic Rate of Fire and why its a successful build over a non-Monk build. But in terms of making changes to Manyshot, 10K stars, and factoring in the following goals:

1. Reduce the number of actual projectiles shot
2. Ensure that non-Monk, Full time Archer is a viable top tier build
3. Ensure that Monkcher remains a viable top tier build
4. Not obliterate 10 Thousand Stars for Archery use
5. Retain Manyshots 20 seconds of 'Quick Barrage' use for melee orientated Rangers

~~ I think I have a solution ~~

The Premise
Essentially, what the idea boils down to is that Manyshot becomes the de-facto feat for improving ranged Rate of Fire, while still allowing 10 Thousand Stars to contribute.

Manyshot
I propose that Manyshot is actually a feat that grants two sub feats, as follows:

1. Quickshots
20 second duration, 30 second cooldown. While wielding a Bow weapon, activate to grant a bonus to Doubleshot equal to 4x BAB. While Quickshots is active, your Doubleshot may produce a third arrow if it rises above 100%.

Activating Quickshots puts Bombardment on a 30 second cooldown as well.

2. Bombardment
20 seconds duration, 120 seconds cooldown. While wielding a Bow weapon, activate to shoot two arrows per second for 20 seconds, and the characters Doubleshot ability is set to 100% for the duration of the ability.

Activating Bombardment puts Quickshots on a 120 second cooldown as well.

(I couldn't think of better names, feel free to change to suit).

10 Thousand Stars
This feat also comes with the following changes:

1. The feat is restricted to Throwing Weapons only.
2. The feat has a passive component added: The character gains a Doubleshot bonus equal to half their current Monk level.

Doubleshot

1. The Doubleshot penalty is removed from both Manyshot and 10 Thousand stars.

Results
I think this would accomplish the goals set out above, as:

1. Introduces additional flexibility to the Manyshot feat adding to how the Archer wants to play.

2. Quickshots becomes the defacto Rate of Fire increase, available to any Archer build

3. Quickshots should provide a general increase in the actual amount of arrows shot over time, keeping Fury of Wild adrenaline shots relevant as well the regeneration of Adrenaline attacks

4. Bombardment still allows for a 20 second ... well, bombardment... of 4 arrows per shot that we're still used too on our Melee Ranger builds

5. Bombardment still allows for a nice big burst of damage if needed on a full-time Archer build, at the expense of not using Quickshots for some time afterwards

6. Bombardments use of a defined Doubleshot percentage should reduce lag cost over the current 4 arrow design of Manyshot

7. 10 Thousand stars is still a relevant feat to take for Archer use, as it provides an extra 3-10% in terms of overall Doubleshot ability, without making a non-monk build almost 40% behind in terms of Rate of Fire. In plainer English, it won't suck to build a non-Monk archer but doing so still gives slight edge based on actual number of chosen Monk levels.

8. Using Doubleshot percentages should reduce the penalty of shooting multiple arrows in terms of lag cost

9. Doubleshot ceiling is only exceeded when Quickshots in use, tying it to a specific feat rather than making it generally available and avoids 'Doublestrike-Ceiling-Discussions'.

And, finally:

* Arcane Archer is completely freed from the discussion of Manyshot vs. 10K Stars, and can be balanced around it being a 'general' Ranged tree available to any Elf, Sun Elf or Half Elf archer, instead of being limited by Rate of Fire discussion elsewhere.

* Discussions about some small Alacrity bonuses in Arcane Archer can be entered into, with the knowledge it won't be unbalancing one build against another. This of course would need to be balanced against Quickshots ability to provide a defined amount of native Rate of Fire increase.

* Smaller amounts of Ranged Power can be used judiciously to level out balance issues.

There you go. Hope that Helps

**archerforever** · 10-11-2015, 08:27 AM

I really love theses change and all your work on it !!! Just giving my opinion on some point :

1- DC of Terror, Paralyzing, Banishing, and Smiting Arrows based on wisdom is the good thing to do. Many peoples are crying about it and wanna have this based on dexterity, it just ridiculous. Maybe we can imagine something like "Each has a saving throw of 20 + Wisdom Modifier OR Intelligence Modifier Or Charisma Modifier ( The highest apply) + Enchantment Spell Bonuses. This can bring more variety.

2- Elemental Arrows scaling with spell power : I just have to say thanks !!! This was one of my suggestion and I m happy of your attention !!! Some peoples are saying "There really isn't any room in their gear set for this" to have spell power as combustion ect... Theses person must be blind because there are plenty of stuff giving spell power and in all case, you just need a bow with a red slot to get it... EASY !

3- Shadow Arrows (Core, 18 levels of Ranger): I dont think that the "+1 Competence bonus to Critical Damage Multiplier" is the best thing to get for AA. Because doing so, you just want AA playing as furyshooter with slaying arrow.
Maybe a high ranged alacrity as rogue mechanic could be better, something like +50% attack speed with bows. Dont forget that Bows are 33% firing and 67% reload for the full animation, so multiply the change in speed by 66% (a 10% bonus to ranged speed nets 6.6%)
OR a 100% doubleshot and your others doubleshot bonus gives you a chance for a 3rd arrow.
OR something like my "Nimble Shot" suggestion https://www.ddo.com/forums/showthrea...=archerforever

4- You really have to remove the doubleshot penality after using manyshot, it s killing all the work to have this hard doubleshot bonus

5- Mystical Archer (Core, 20 levels of Ranger): +4 Dex and +20% doubleshot. I think you can find something much better for a Capstone, just remove the doubleshot bonus and give some spell power, maybe AoE damages for elemental arrows or something different but plz not a doubleshot bonus.

6- Slaying Arrow: Be careful when reworking this skill, it s the only thing making arcane archers avaible in DPS for high EE quests as fury shooter. ( Now DwS can be avaible too with the new Headshot but it s both tier 5)

7- Shattermantle Shot : Make it an AoE centered on your target, doing -1/-2/-3 to all save and spell resistance, max 5 stack ( no AoE damage, just a debuff)

**mikarddo** · 10-11-2015, 08:47 AM

Originally Posted by Arlathen