My problem with it was just in the setup of the three primary 'classes'.

I wanted to make a PURE thief and only use perks on the thief trees, but I quickly noted that there are no weapon perk trees for thieves, so I had to cheat and pick bows from the warrior skills.

I see it as Blades = Warriors, Bows = Rogues and Spells = Mages. And it's not like it wasn't like this in the prior games, Skyrim just changed it for some reason.

they broke it down to combat, magic, stealth. And to keep things balanced between them, swapped some around to fit (personally I would have just had skills... and found other benefits to the mage/thief/warrior stones closer to the morrowind birthsigns)

True it's odd that they removed classes but kept the class designation on skills.

Archers aren't warriors IMO. IMO the longbow/shortbow is best suited for hunters & stealth characters. A crossbow however is a warrior's tool, which was in Morrowind then removed from Oblivion & wasn't in Skyrim originally until DLC.

If you want faster leveling across various weapon types or skills etc... just pick the Lovers stone.

My badarse archer Olfrid Frost-Veins disagrees with you.

Who's that yummy girl in your avatar Harry?

Archers are more skirmishers than warriors. But in these games you can mix & match what you like.

In a way yes, a true warrior would be trained to use a bow and a true warrior would use any tool at his/her disposal when he/she needs to.

You didn't answer my question.

Oh, that was directed at me ? thought you were asking someone named Harry

That's Allison Scagliotti from the T.V show Warehouse 13, where she plays the awsome Claudia.

Looks like Josh's old girlfriend.

EDIT: Looked it up ... she is. Looking good.

As far as I am concerned, use of ranged weapons is a required skill for any capable warrior Sir.
Whether that be firing a few into a charging foe before drawing your sword, taking out sentries or popping a cap in some dope's vitals for a bag o' pepper from 90 paces.

Actually the Dovahkiin is still a warrior no matter what he or she does unless it is a pacifist playthrough but that can really only get you so far until you have to fight. because they generally specialize in combat or warfare.

In fact the Dovahkiin's daily routine essentially revolves around combat or warfare.

Want to retrieve a lost item for someone? Go to random dungeon and fight your way to the item

want a new weapon? random dungeon and slay everything you can

In fact the Spartans of ancient Greece utilized archers.

Toxotai were the ancient greek archers and the Spartans were not stupid, they were far from stupid.

The battle of thermopolyae most likely did not have very many greek archers because up until the Persians managed to get behind the famous 300 plus (it was not just Spartans at the famous last stand by the way) the greeks were in a pretty good defensive position and even then the Spartans managed to hold the Persians long enough for their allies to retreat. The whole thing about retreating for Spartans being illegal was a myth, they could have taken advantage of a strategic retreat then and there but didn't.

That said the Navy Seals are still considered to be warriors and yet they generally use stealth as best as they can. If anything a Dovahkiin using stealth would be akin to the Navy Seals and other Special Forces teams around the world who use stealth to do their job as cleanly and efficiently as possible. Another upside to warriors using stealth is that it also helps limit the amount of unwanted casualties since open combat could result in more deaths than you want to and both the Navy Seals and the Dovahkiin can do this to great effect just that one does it in real life and the other in a video game.

Heh, no longer sure what the question is. Gonna babble for a bit and hope something makes sense...

Historically, military archers were most definitely warriors, not "rogues" (though in Western Europe at least, professional archers tended to be commoners rather than nobility). Given the amount of training required (crossbows aside), archers were held in some degree of esteem and/or value. How much value varied across cultures, but generally not negative.

The association between archery and stealth comes from hunting, of course - but let's not forget that bow hunting was regularly engaged in by nobility and other upper class folk in various cultures. The hunt was a chance to show one's prowess with the chase and the bow, so again not exactly a dishonorable thing.

The association between archery and thievery always struck me as odd, however - if you're sneaking through windows and other tight spaces, a bow across your back would seem to get in the way... I guess the association was made only because of the stealth connection, or because so many RPGs use Agility or Dexterity to "rule" archery and various thiefly skills.

Skyrim-wise, Archery is considered a http://uesp.net/wiki/Skyrim:Skills skill, but ruled by the http://uesp.net/wiki/Skyrim:The_Guardian_Stones (see notes section). However, the Unofficial Skyrim Patch puts Archery back under the Warrior Stone with the other Combat skills.

If the OP is trying to decide which stone to use, I'd be tempted to decide based on armor, not weapons. Archery can level up pretty quickly on its own - you probably wouldn't really need a boost until you get into the 60s or 70s.

Personally, I tend to choose Guardian Stones for "off" skills - skills that I'll want to level up, but which I won't use often enough to level quickly. For example, I'm running an Illusionist assassin who has the Warrior Stone, strictly for the One-Handed skill. The character uses daggers and occasionally bound swords, but doesn't go toe-to-toe often enough for One-handed to level up decently without help.

She's absolutely gorgeous.

In the words of Uncle Dave Macon: "A red headed woman will make a grey rabbit love a hound."

Actually I can see Archery being a mix of combat and stealth.

It is a combat skill but ruled by the thief stone right? Perhaps that one is not really a bug.

That said you are right when you say that archers were historically considered to be warriors.

In fact most modern special force units are trained to use stealth and like I said they are also considered to be warriors.

Stealth is not dishonorable in any way since there will be situations in which bum rushing your enemies will result in unnecessary deaths and in those situations even the most honorable warrior would settle for a potentially quicker and potentially more efficient method of getting their job done.

Personally, I don't think it's a "bug" - I think the developers wanted it that way. The Thief skill set is severely lacking in offense compared to the other two groups, so I'm sure the devs felt the need to put something there. Only two weapon skills make sense - One-Handed and Archery - but since One-Handed is needed by heavy armor sword-and-board types, Archery got shuffled over.

Exactly, was there anything from the developers stating that archery being ruled by the thief stone being a bug?

Either ways I still have to say that archers, assassins, and thieves who are even remotely specialized in combat or warfare in anyway can still be considered warriors. Same with mages.

Which makes me reconsider the warrior/mage/rogue triangle of role playing to fit better as this: open combat warrior/magic warrior/stealth warrior.

The only reason I thought it was a mistake is that it seems to be one of the only skills that isn't attributed to the same class. The Warrior Constellation skill should be attributed to The Warrior Stone, shouldn't it? All the other skills, to my knowledge, do this.

Archery is a skill that can either aid an assassin, rogue, ranger, but it also can be a combat based skill.

A secondary weapon for a warrior, fighter or barbarian.

Use for a witchunter or inquistor.

But also Arcane Archers, are more warriors with explody spells. [think dragon's dogma rather than skyrim]

Not all archers are thieves. Not all warriors are archers. Warrior is as much a profession as a class, especially in Skyrim where there are no true classes except for NPC skillsets. A fine example of a typical warrior-archer would be an English longbowman during the high Middle Ages: Padded armor, helmet, blade and longbow.