Bow + arrow idea.

[Cutriss]

I would support having a separate inventory tab for ammunition/throwing-type weapons, since they wouldn't go in your "pack", but in a separate "combat pouch" where you could reach them during fighting.

I don't think it's *needed* right now but I think it would be a welcome improvement. I always believed that there should have been a similar structure in XI for ninja tools.

[Catapult]

Archer is arguably the most powerful DoW class at the moment, and people are looking for ways to make it even more appealing and easy to pick up?

Somebody get me a stiff drink to drown this concept in...

[Phenidate]

Archer is arguably the most powerful DoW class at the moment, and people are looking for ways to make it even more appealing and easy to pick up?

Somebody get me a stiff drink to drown this concept in...

Because there's no way a class could be balanced during all these massive, game changing alterations to the way combat is handled in the game, right?

How I'd like to see ammunition handled?

1. Standard ammunition is free/infinite. Should it do the BEST damage efficiently? No, it shouldn't. Should be garbage suited for filler or last resort. You shouldn't even want to use it for farming past a certain level.
2. Better ammo is not infinite, its crafted. You craft good DPS arrows with all the nice things like your precious accuracy and stat boosts on these. Again, not infinite.
3. Other. Arrows that have a chance to inflict sleep, explode, what ever. Still not infinite here. Just adds room for some spice in the mix.

ARCs looking to remain competitive in DPS will not use the cheap, free arrows. They will purchase the better arrows. The precious carpenters market will remain open for business, perhaps with an even better leg up over miserly ARCs who try to scrape by on the crappy weathered arrows.

Bonus side effects may include: freeing up beginner archers who have no clue what they are doing for the first 10 ranks. What was all that complaining about a steep learning curve? Oh, well, here's a way we might loosen that hairpin turn up.
After the beginner ranks the free ammo should become an obviously inadequate ammo. Stick in a tutorial quest at, say, rank 8 where they learn about better arrows and where they can acquire more.

With the above, it would be nice if you could swap to your higher quality ammo with a toggle. Ditch the reload mechanic (Yes, its now redundant; consider the fact that in game terms you are loading about 100 times what you used to be able to fire before reloading) Just 'equip' the arrow type to your quiver as your primary ammo. Have a skill that toggles between the cheapo freebie ammo and the good ammo you are packing in your inventory.

That's my 2 cents. No refunds, no tag-backs, no backsies.

[Alxa]

With the recipe fixes in patch 1.19 it will be possible to make arrows easily.

Does this mean the realism aspect currently in the crafting will go out the window? I find arrows really easy to make right now because one craft of each sub part makes 12, and 12 crafts of arrows make 4000 arrows.

The only problem I currently see with crafting arrows is the rank carpenter required to make an equivalent level arrows, at 31 carpentry the lvl 28 arrow is a difficult synth. If anything please don't change the required ingredients but lower the rank for arrow crafting and increase the number made (and allow more then 1k to stack).

[northernsky]

Regarding OP's suggestion, if you have infinite arrows, would you need to "repair" your arrow slot? i-e the same way a gladiator repairs both its sword and shield?

I think that crafting and buying arrows serves the same purpose, but with a more realistic and fun approach than repairing. Maybe they should just make the ability that you shoot weak straw arrows automatically when you run out of arrows instead of having to trigger it manually on the action bar (don't remember the name of the ability).

[Shyd]

I never mind dealing with purchasing arrows.

I never mind crafting arrows.

Only seems "logical" they are consumable.

Having "one" arrow is lame.

Several moves fire multiple arrows, having one arrow in that situation is imo SOL.

[Celtodeno]

Why not leave it the way it is? I like the manual input since you can control the flow of battle and manage your hate. In XI as a ranger I was sometimes asked to slow down in pts and I could easily accommodate this request if I wanted to without disengaging. In Aion Rangers had an autoattack and it consumed arrows but there was only one type of arrow, not different types like in this game and XI. Also the autoattack was pretty weak and it was better to just rotate abilities.

Archers are already very strong in this game and they are this game's ranged attackers. They SHOULD be at a disadvantage at close range, that's the trade off for being an excellent ranged attacker.

Agreed! If you are worried about your melee attack as an archer, i dont think you really wanna be an archer. I cant think of a single final fantasy game where the physical range class had an equal melee component. If i remember correctly, if Tactics you had to be a certain distance away to attack.

Keep archers strong, dont dilute them with Infinite Arrows and Melee Attacks!

[Shyd]

On a side note when you throw ranged weapons you have a chance to retrieve it.

[Linkurrra]

Make Archer AA a "Kick Attack" that sometimes knocks back the enemy, then you can use a (working) ShadowBind or (working) Bind spell to get in some good WS's that are distance dependent.

Now that is a kick ass idea! OMG that turned out to be a bad pun! lol

I'm sure the tank would not be appreciative of the Archer coming into Melee range just to kick the mob out of melee range, where the tank can't tank anymore until he moves within range of the mob again.

Awesome idea for Solo, but terrible idea for party.

[Davorok]

Now that is a kick ass idea! OMG that turned out to be a bad pun! lol

I'm sure the tank would not be appreciative of the Archer coming into Melee range just to kick the mob out of melee range, where the tank can't tank anymore until he moves within range of the mob again.

Awesome idea for Solo, but terrible idea for party.

Why would an Archer in a party walk up to the mob? He wouldn't, however if the Archer gets hate/enmity, he could "kick" the mob back towards the tank and melees.

It's just a thought anyway. I personally would rather Kick the mob rather than Punch in any situation and makes more sense to me seeing that a Bow is a Two-Handed Weapon.