I think its important to remember that ALL combat in Skyrim is meant to be deadlier. It seems they practically took Deadly Reflexes (a mod for Oblivion that made combat faster, harder, and deadlier) and put it into Skyrim.

Stock? Trigger housing? Last time I checked, there is no stock or trigger, let alone trigger housing, on a bow...


One guy, besides you, has said 1 thing about guns. So I dont know where you are getting this rant from. As for you saying being an archer means you should concentrate on sneak, I think that is stupid. When bows were used often, archers didnt have to sneak around for a good shot. They AIMED for a good shot. Archer=/=sniper. You can have a sniper type archer, but not all archers are meant to be snipers.

I do not claim to be any kind of authority, but when you see archers in the movies, there are usually a whole lot of them all firing at once on command, taking out hoards of infantry (thinking Brave Heart and LOTR - and heaven help he who comments on the realism {or lack thereof} of Braveheart})
That being said, I do like playing the sniper archer.

K, hordes of archers shooting hordes of enemies, aim at the mass and shoot. A few archers shooting at a few enemies is what I meant...l

Very informative.

Crossbows, at least in the way that I view them, is a weapon for a thief or assassin type character. Something small and quick to use with a poisoned dart or a harrassing type weapon to pull an enemy towards you. Crossbows are a "once in a fight" kind of weapon, you use it once for the desired effect and then you switch to a melee weapon.

What I want to know is, if I aim for an enemy's leg and hit it, is he going to react like he just got shot in the leg with an arrow ie. go down to one knee or fall to the ground, or is he going to turn to me and start charging? It would be so much better if I hit someone in the leg, they go down to a knee, or better yet reach for it to snap it off, giving me time to let fly another one, right for their chest or head.

Realism is the key.

I disagree with your view on crossbows. They arent very small or quick, and they make more noise then a normal bow(I think). And depending on distance, you could probly get 2-3 shots off rather then one. But anyways, they were mostly used so that a guy with little to no training, could do something effectively. A bow takes alot more training and skill to use then a crossbow.

Here's the way I see it ...

Bow use appears to have 3 stages: Drawing the Arrow, Nocking the Arrow & Drawing Back, and finally Firing the Arrow. There could be more complications built into the system for these various phases of the act of firing a bow, such that at high levels, once all restrictions are removed, you indeed feel powerful using a bow because you know all the problems that could go wrong because you lived them from level 1 up.

Say in the beginning with Drawing the Arrow --- your arrow could catch on other arrows, causing you to draw out 2-3 more arrows that go flying onto the ground (wasted during combat but you can retreive them after) ... This would reflect how horrible you are about how you fill your arrows (not stacking them properly to avoid them grabbing each other) in their holder which goes over your shoulder behind you. Also, you could miss putting your fingers around the arrow a few times, expanding your "grab" time 1-2 seconds. Man, that would svck, but it would demonstrate your geniune need for improvement. And give you something to strive for. Each point of development received in Archery can help negate some of these restrictions, or you might need a "Draw" skill for Archery independently.

And with Nocking the Arrow, you could miss fitting the arrow into the groove, or fail to rotate the groove properly to fit with the string, slowing you down. Perhaps you would even have a "knocking" portion of the Archery skill that can independently be improved, the same with Drawing an Arrow. Thre could be some way to indicate failure here that you can see on-screen so you know you've failed: an indicator, because the movements are too small to see.

With firing an arrow, the problem you could have might be poorly-developed "Draw" muscles (partially based on a lack of strength, and partially based on not having developed muscle memory for how to properly fire the arrow at your target.) As your Archery skill improves, this one is improved by default. But improving your Strength stat would also improve this too.

Also, while the skill is low, you could miss your target a lot more frequently. Since arrows are awesome in Skyrim, missing would totally svck, but would help to offset the power of striking the enemy at all. More missing would indicate your need for improvement, and later, not missing would seem more and more like its own achievement.

As you become a great Archer, then finally, you will see your character blow through the process more and more rapidly, looking more and more (at the highest levels) like Legolas of the Lord of the Rings, able to draw, knock, draw, and fire your bow 2 times a second, which could be indicated in game by having two arrows appear to fire out of your bow for each one time you do the process, with one arrow slighty staggered behind the first one. This because it would be impossible for you to actually fire two times a second in game due to framerate and object mechanics which movies can circumvent with special effects and by speeding up the film slightly to trick your eyes.

In this way, Archery could become its own quest for development, offering a lot of value in improving it, and when you are a great archer, you're definitely set apart from the majority of bow weilders who cannot do the things you can do with it.

Whoa, Succellus my man. I would hate to see what kind of restaurant Morrowind was. Some kind of shanty town restaurant where your trying to eat your grool while it rained through the ceiling on you, that would be Morrowind. But at least the main entrance looked beautiful (main quest line).



The only way your getting 2-3 shots off is if the person is 300 yards away or they are standing still letting you shoot them. Crossbows are SLOOOOOOOWWW at reloading and require you to remain stationary while doing it. Bows however you can get 2-3 shots off depending on their distance.

Didn't say that they were meant to be snipers... by the way to get the critical with out taking damage ya you focus on sneak seems rather stupid itself to announce "HEY IM HERE COME KILL ME" unless your thinking of an interchangeable class where you get the guy over with arrows and switch to a melee in witch case your not an archer your a melee with a bow...

yes a sniper is based off stealth. if your only with a long range weapon fighting a melee up close your going to die quickly... and about the gun thing i was simply replying to the first guy that said it...

oh ffs, can′t somthing just be simple and something you pick up and do? Geeze some people are just gameplay Masochist

While I liked the fact that Crossbows were included in Morrowind, they were badly done.

Crossbows in reality ranged in power and size from light and fast "birding" weapons to slow and heavy weapons of war. The small types could be pulled back by hand and reloaded quickly, didn't require much training to use, and were light enough to be carried from a belt loop or hung over the back. They weren't very effective at killing people, and would have been all but useless against armor. The heavy types, designed to be powerful enough to penetrate armor and kill, were either drawn back with a crank or placed against the ground and reset using the back muscles. Either way, the larger bows took several (or many) seconds of rather awkward movements to reload, during which time you were effectively "out of combat". If close-assaulted, a crossbowman either had to drop the bow and draw a melee weapon or use the bow as a club. Reloading in combat just wasn't an option. A few specific examples of medieval crossbows include either a spike or mace head to allow the crossbow to be used as a makeshift melee weapon in an emergency; most didn't even bother with that. If you got attacked, you either used another weapon or died.

In Morrowind, all weapon types could deliver anywhere from their minimum to maximum power, depending on how much of the weapon's "draw time" you spent "charging" the attack. You could rush a shot for minimum damage, hold the button and wait for it to reach full potential, or anywhere in between. The annoying problem with crossbows in MW, or an exploit if you chose to use it, was that the minimum and maximum damage values on crossbows were identical. You could rush the shot and fire "machine-gun" fashion at full damage. They were absurdly overpowered because of it. More realistically, they should have only had one damage value, but little or NO ability to rush the shot.

If they can make crossbows work PROPERLY in Skyrim, I'd like to see them back. If they can't solve the problems, then I can understand not including them, but won't be happy about it.

A nearly-pure archer was almost impossible to do in MW at low levels, but eventually became viable in most combat situations if combined with Sneak. I eventually "retired" my one MW character's bow and had him start throwing ranged spells, after it got far too easy to take down almost anything in the game with just a couple of plain iron arrows, and not take a hit in return. A nearly-pure archer was relatively easy to do in OB at first, but got increasingly difficult as the hitpoints of opponents steadily increased, far faster than your ability to do damage. Hopefully, Skyrim will improve on both.

The answer is yes and no. To the end player, it is pretty much "you pick up a bow and shoot it" ... or it should seem that way to them, but the mechanics for how it would work are complex BEHIND THE SCENES. That's what we are discussing here in this forum. To come here and say essentially "why are you all sitting here gabbing about nothing?" which is what your trollish comments were basically about is counterproductive and frankly, unkind. We are interested in the mechanics behind this even if you are not. And in truth, NO, you can't just pick up a bow and shoot it in real life with any degree of accuracy or speed.

If you had to draw an arrow, knock it, pull aim, and shoot a bear that was about to get you from 20 yards, and you only had one shot, bearing in mind you paralyzing fear in that instant, could you do it? Could you make the kill shot through the eye into the brain without having practiced over and over again for years and years to develop the automatic muscle memory that would allow you to overcome your fear and make the interconnected series of small detailed movements required, and have the mental werewithal (the nerves) to hold steady while you aimed for its eye, countering for the rocking motion of it's very large body as it ran snarling towards you?

I don't think so. But a 50th level Archer probably could, not that he wouldnt' be in shock after the event, mind you.

Personally I want to have archery and melle fights while riding horses like in real battles. Maybe one day

is it possible to fire a bow while running? this always seemed wacky to me. if you had to stand still while firing it would easily compensate for a more powerful shot

I'm all for more damage. maybe shots to the face do more damage than shots to the foot? bowmen in oblivion were a joke(i took a horde mudcrabs more seriously). i am a melee man myself but, anything improving realism is a plus. throwing spears maybe......