How much damage do you think a pure archer's bow should do before it is OP? I am playing an arcane archer right now, using some mods to make bound weapons better. Just wondering what your opinions on this are?

Before it's OP, my guess is about 100-150, not counting the arrow damage.

OP is subjective. Is it OP to YOU?

What one person may consider OP, another person may say is right on perfect.

Depends on what difficulty you play on. Me...I play on either master or legendary and I find any where in the 200-250 range fine. You drop lower lv mobs in a single hit, higher lv mobs wearing heavy armor take 3 maybe 4 hits before they drop ( when sneaking for the critical hit bonus ). I never exceed 300 damage, anything over that makes the game a cake walk even without the sneak skill and it's perks.

What's the max damage of a Dragonbone Bow, with all the archery perks and improved to Legendary?

180ish, I think

Maybe around 200-300?

I was guessing around 200 base damage. Then one can figure in enchantments, potions and sneak attacks. That can get into the thousands when needed.

Look what I found.... Random Google search from some bla, bla, forum.

I agree with the Khajiit.

Nice find It's still easier to do the resto potion loop to make super smithing potions though

However much a death lord ebony archer does to an unarmored character on adept. That would be by game standards fair and far from over-powered.

For me personally, 100-125 is the farthest I'll ever go on raw firepower for a bow. As for enchantments, an 80% (100% with necromage)buff to damage is all I'd ever take for any of the three weapon tree's. That's me though.

While this was what I was really looking for...

I thought the way it was broken down to show the different effects was interesting.

Yeah, OP is really what feels good to you. There's a difference between OP and balance too, they're often confused because they do have some overlap, but aren't mutually exclusive or inclusive in any case.

When something in a game is balanced in the context of a single player game, it means it's as rewarding and viable as the other options. Everything can be equally OP and it'd be balanced, the issue would then come in on the difficulty curve which itself can be balance against the player, and this is where the confusing overlap happens.

Anyway, I had to get that out of the way because any thread that talks about OP quickly devolves into Pro-Balance V. No Balance.

If you want my opinion on where OP starts to happen in terms of actually svcking the fun out of the game, it's when you kill the strongest enemies so fast that they never had a chance at retaliation, which turns the combat into a minor delay, instead of an exhilerating thrill. Generally you want to be killing the strongest non-dragon enemies in between four to twelve power attacks, depending on the actual target and weapon. Two-handed weapons should be able to take out your basic Bandit Chief in two or three power attacks from full health, given the nature of combat they'll usually die in one quick combo if they don't block you which is fine at endgame. For a one-handed Sword, you should around five depending on how far you've taken smithing. (The gap narrows between 1h and 2h at high smithing potency) A non-sneak attack archer should be able to put down an enemy in about the same number of shots as a greatsword or mace. With the advantage of range, it doesn't seem like a good idea to put it in line with a warhammer but you could also argue the cost of ammo.

So hard numbers then. On Master difficulty (Increase by 50% for Legendary, decrease by half for Adept) You're looking at numbers around:

non-dagger 1handed: 90-130

Two-Handed 120-180

Bow - 110-140 (Before Arrows)

Also, for max difficulty balance, I suggest keeping your armor at around 450-500 tops. This is about triple durability before you factor in blocking. When you reach 5x (567 AR) everything but mages are just kind of tickle wands.

IMHO if you're "one hitting" bosses, you're OP.