Hey guys,

I picked up Skyrim again yesterday and instead of picking up my High elf mage I decided to make a new character. I have never really played an Archer in any of the Elderscrolls games and so thats what I am going to be this play through.

The race is woodelf, I am currently level 3. But I have recenetly been thinking about endgame/late game.

What bows should I use? should I invest in smithing? Should I get boundbow?

My question is:

Is boundbow better than using an actual bow? - i.e a Dragonbone bow fully smithed and enchanted?

I am going to be using a dagger for close combat (maybe dual daggers)

The plan was to have a powerful bow as my main weapon and then a weak enchanted soul trap bow; but I am thinking of using BBow with the soul trap perk. What do you think?

Also, as this is my first archer (give me a mage any day!) what other perks/stats/equipment do you reconmend?

Mystic Bound Bow with 100 in archery and perks is end game suitable. Perhaps a piece or two of gear with a fortify archery enchantment. Playing on Master or Legendary may be a bit of a challenge though.

There's so many different types of archers. It all really depends on what kind of archer you want to be. If you're looking for draw speed then the Forsworn bow is excellent. Of course if you want power then the obvious Ebony, Daedric and Dragonbone are the best. The cool thing about the bound bow is if you take the mystic binding perk from the conjuration tree, it will do as much base damage as a daedric bow, and it weighs nothing.

Check out the various archer builds on the Skyrim Blog.

http://theskyrimblog.ning.com/group/character-building/forum/topic/listForTag?tag=Character+Build+Archer

Weapons that you create will always be more powerful than the Bound Bow.

An enchanted Ebony Bow (with Fire Damage) is lighter than a Dragonbone bow Sir.

And IMHO offers the best Weight to Damage Ratio.

Especially when knocked with an Ebony or the most- prized Daedric Arrow delivering significant stopping power.

I had to add the http://www.nexusmods.com/skyrim/mods/601 mod to my load order.

The force of impact literally knocked the target off their feet and threw them back several feet.

Like Dirty Harry Sir for the age of yore.

some interesting stuff here

ok so, due to my "magical" background (I just always play a wizard/battlemage) I am thinking of playing something like an Arcane archer.

What are your thoughts/tips on this??

Get the mystic perk in conjuration as quickly as you can. With it, Bound Bow becomes Mystic Bound Bow. 24 base damage - highest in game - and levels archery the fastest of all bows.

Freakin awesome build.

http://theskyrimblog.ning.com/group/character-building/forum/topics/character-build-the-arcane-archer

Yes I agree. Freakin awesome build indeed. My assassin types more often than not turn out to be Spell users, (Bound Weapons, Illusion methods, etc.) and I am quite satisfied with that.

I played something somewhat similar, but used alteration with mage armor(and robes), and conjuration(mostly necromancy). I used bound bow and enchanting and it was extremely effective, even on legendary difficulty(the higher the difficulty, the more + archery damage enchantments you'll probably want)