Since this thread is easy on the eye, I've added some ideas I have for the game. You guys are welcome to comment & share your opinions.

Here is my idea for :

• Bow's mechanics & crafted arrows ( this suggestion was made by Davelantor, awesome idea , sadly removed for NDA )

Simply put I think bow's range is a lot further than the designed "soft lock". With that said I think balancing the damage of heavy melee weapons, bows and even element staves is something they did well. Your charge-up left click ( just like TES ) is much appreciated but when you quickly acknowledge a target is progressively distancing from yourself. ex. leaving the soft lock range of your ranged weapon attacks & skills, I think we can all agree that a bow, in the right hands can achieve the required elevation to land that arrow or two required to win the fight. Or picture the setting : you retreating up a hill and slightly arching the shot higher to land a success projectile at the targets 40-50 metres behind the enemy in melee range approaching from the elevation's base.

I understand archery range doesnt feel "right" but in a multiplayer game (especially in a pvp multiplayer game) balance needs to have priority over realism.

Bows are available to anyone and if they had a greater range by default you would see everyone fighting with a bow shooting pew pew like it was planetside

Also there are no arrows.

I dont know... maybe you could enchant a bow sacrificing damage for range? Could be a decent solution.

Well I am not talking about launching an arrow across Cyrodiil, but if the range for bows' attacks would be adjusted from the 28-31ish metres ( which btw is the end of the road for all projectiles launched as well as the "soft lock" ) to mm maybe it's double? I think that's fair enough

LOL you want to DOUBLE the range of a weapon without affecting game balance?

Im not a DEV but as a humble total war modder i can tell you that any change above 10% heavily affects the gameplay and needs to be tested/tuned... forever.

100% more range on bows would require a complete redesign of every skill/weapon line.

I know you can't compare ESO to Skyrim, but my main character in Skyrim - my Dragbone bone is rated at 418 damage (with various items enchanted for Archery)

Bows are ridiculously powerful in TESO at higher levels. They're so fine its not even funny.

1 easy fix would be to reduce the "hit box" when you soft target some one, I fear it may be too big, if you want to switch target you usually target another one or move 90o, it's kinnda svcky ><.

As to having arrows, it has been discussed and apparently it's not balanced since those who perform melee aren't limited by anything, so logically neither should bowmen.

I wouldn't mind since I'm pretty careful about my ammunition, but if they do implement it, it needs to not use a slot and pretty much stack to infinity which again people can argue its not realistic.... so yea, it's impossible to keep everyone happy.

In the end though it would be too trivial and more of an annoyance to worry about crafting those arrows, I think this small sacrifice of inbuilt arrows doesn't hurt much at all.

I think bows should work a lot like they do in Skyrim, but with just enough range to get an arrow from one keep to another in Cyrodiil if you aim it right. Like tiny ICBMs.

Considering they still hit like wet noodles with a really stupid long draw time, sure why not?

Ability range is increased by skill points. so you'll still have stupid long range eventually, just not normal bow shots.

*cough* dunno how You played, but, they don't hit anymore like soft noodles than a 2h melee weapon.. 1h+shield, now, that's a different kind of soft noodle.
This is all from beta experience, but I leveled a Nord up using 1h+shield (lvl 15), then an Orc 2h melee (also lvl 15), a somewhat sneaky Khajiit using daggers (lvl 10) and finally started feeling comfortable with a Wood Elf (lvl 15) using a bow (saying it to get some sort of credibility).
Every white/soft attack is basically just a filler (for all weapon types), but a sneak attack as an opener with a bow.. they don't even get to melee range before they drop..

And my sorcerer one shot things with crystal shard.

Sneak attacks didn't even come close with the bow, and I played one in the last beta test. And the one before it. Yes, the damage was upped. Still does less damage than the mage does. And the range is abysmal. You don't use special attacks from sneak. If my heavy sneak attack only has a range of X but my special attacks have a range of Y, there's very little incentive for me to worry about the range on specials when my normal attacks have an absurdly short range.

If you one shot things then I can't help but think that you outleveled the mobs or were heavily over geared, which has nothing to do with the class/ability itself.
You found normal attacks having a short range? I honestly didn't have any problems with that, I only noticed how terrible some special attacks were. They couldn't fullfil it's purpose because it was out of range, rendering it useless 90% of the time.

Edit: I think this might violate the NDA btw.. hrm..

Well, lets compare and see who should do more damage. Magically conjured exploding ball of fiery death v.s. a pointy stick.

...

Mage wins!