Game balance: Archery

[NQNStudios]

I have a vague memory of people saying that archery has always been a broken, useless skill in BoE. From my own experience playing OBoE I'd say this still feels like the case. Even at level 1 it feels like my archers almost always miss and definitely never measure up in overall damage output compared to spellcasters and melee fighters.

I'm also not sure where thrown missiles fit in.

I think we should fix this, even if it changes game balance from the original experience. No one wants to be deceived into wasting skill points in something that is just bad.

This will need to have a feature flag so old replays stay the same.

[CelticMinstrel]

Originally, archery was broken because the calculations for archery were referencing the wrong skill. That has long since been fixed, so it shouldn't be as broken now as it was in legacy BoE.

Even at level 1

What do you mean? Level 1 is the weakest, so you'd expect it not to be that great. Shouldn't you be testing at higher levels?

[NQNStudios]

Well, at level 1 with prebuilt characters carrying only a bow and arrow, it feels frustrating that those characters can't adequately contribute to combat by having them do the thing that seems intended.

[josefwk]

For what it's worth, compared to Blades of Exile, OpenBoE has already buffed arrows, javelins, and throwing knives by reducing cost and increasing damage. OpenBoE has buffed (reduced) the cost of bolts as well.

[NQNStudios]

I could be altogether wrong about this. Every time I actually play the game for a solid session, I end up stopping because I've found new bugs to fix. I haven't even gone through a full level progression.

[NQNStudios]

Aha! This might be evidence that we can change this without making our own guesswork about what the values should be:

#264

Although... I've mostly been testing in VoDT which supposedly has the buffed values already...