Crossbow - too OP?

[sona]

Hey folks,

I've been thinking about how I've been wanting a crossbow lately, and then I've been thinking about -why- I want a crossbow lately. Relatively rare items, you need to be part of a lucky, and very tiny subset of the player base. This is a good thing, because if anyone has seen the reliable min-max damage on a crossbow, you give no shits about the RT on it. You will simply want one. To that end, can we either do one of three things? make crossbows widely available (and excessively expensive), remove crossbows from the game, or re-balance crossbows to be more in line with other projectile weapons mechanically, and less like a celestium powered donkey punch to some poor tainted person.

Breaking it down a bit, from what I've seen, a min dam range of about 100 (a bit less actually, but still), and a max of over 200 damage (nearly 250 actually). Was this an escapee of pre-QC days? Maybe, I'm not sure at all. But compared to any other projectile weapon in the game, this thing reigns supreme. the 10-12 sec RT is a bit of an annoyance, and you could chance a max damage shot with another weapon that would be around the crossbow's minimum, but 25-50% of the time, you'll be firing between 1-50 damage/round. Percentages aren't entirely accurate as per RNG gods, but still. If this weapon isn't too OP, just make it available to everyone, instead of putting it in the hands of a few people. Because as I've said, I've been wanting this weapon now, after seeing it perform mostly because it's basically 1-hit kill city for life after that.

[Noctere]

I have spent a lot of time and a lot of number crunching balancing the crossbow. Even so you should know that even as a GM, NONE of my personal characters own one. Not just because they are rare but frankly, I don't need one. Granted, I would like a celestium warhammer or a blessed super armor but they are meant to be rare for a reason and not every Tom, Richard and Harry should have one.

The crossbow has more restrictions than any other weapon in the game. For example, try hitting someone when they are stuck reloading it, fun things happen. Crossbows are the hardest weapon to skill up because of slow rounds, heavy energy drain and if you look at the damage in comparison to something such as a longsword you will find that the damage is about the same but only shortened into a single round as opposed to two rounds. So instead of doing about 120 damage in two rounds, you are doing about 120 in one. People always seem to freak when they see huge numbers but not realize that another weapon can do the same damage but just with more strikes.

One of the reasons why the crossbow was created was because it was highly requested and we wanted a weapon to work differently than the others. It would be very boring indeed if every weapon was super cookie cutter the same. The real issue as I see it as how it is used with stealth combat and defended against with someone who is using stealth against you. If you see a crossbow bolt streak across and miss you... don't stick around or prepare to use anti stealth methods to defend yourself. There is still an element of luck involved for them to get a killer blow against another player. It also possible that further negative factors may be implemented when it is used during stealth.

It should also be known that there are range weapons that exceed the damage output of the crossbow, they do not have as high a number cap but overall they consistently output far more damage. These weapons are also rare and are only owned by a few characters.

[sona]

I think the real problem is the minimum damage threshold is still enough to pretty much instant kill someone. And that's the -worst- damage they're possible of outputting. If I hit minimum damage threshold on any other ranged weapon 5-10 times, would it even come closs to the crossbow's minimum damage threshold?

We need to be honest in the hitting someone on misfires- these weapons are used from stealth. You have 1-2 chances to find someone during crossbow cooldown times (or run away), RT on search is 5 seconds. one failed search and crossbow user gets away. It'll take you a few moments to likely even type in "search", so even if you do succeed the search, there's a reasonable chance the crossbow user will get away/try again. "the further negative measures may be implemented vs stealth" suggests that they are not currently, and it's still pretty unbalanced.

rarity and cost aside, having anything like this on grid with it's current iteration is about as fun to be on the receiving end as any percentage of a playerbase habing an instant kill button. Or an obedient drakolin mount. I'm saying this as someone who doesn't own one, considering possible mechanics setups (marksmanship will balance low crossbow skill, you just might not get aimed target successes as much- but when you're shooting with a proverbial ballistae, you're in hand grenade territory). If I were on the receiving end of one of these things, it's a pretty "game over" scenario.

put in a magical anti-stealth item, with an 90% chance of revealing anyone in the area who's hidden being revealed and rooted for 5 seconds, and you've got someone akin to crossbow level power. Give it a 12 sec RT and a similar chance to misfire though. To keep it fair.

[Dakhal]

geo/pyro/aero
3 RT
cast

suddenly whole room is dead

I get that we're talking projectile weapons, but it is not the king of damage you make it out to be. Yes, it is powerful. Yes, it is rare. And yes, there are people out there that shouldn't have them but do.

You know what I want? Revolvers. What do I have? Crossbows. I don't value a crossbow as an open-combat weapon. Sure, if I were playing a support character that was praying RNG didn't deign the NPC to attack me, or I had a guard.. I might want to use them more. But they are impossible to use short of retreating each shot.

I have seen a crossbow shot do at little as 60 damage on an unarmored person. This is low-range, but possible. Crossbows have a massive damage fall-off if the person is wearing any form of armour, in line with a lot of Claw techniques, even.

Why has nobody complained about assassinate? It's just as much of an instant kill button as you're claiming crossbows to be, given they suffer the same damage fall-offs with armour.

If you wear no armour and you're going against someone that wants to kill you, don't expect to have a good time if they're a stealther and you can't find them. This doesn't just apply to crossbows.

[Tamsin]

It also possible that further negative factors may be implemented when it is used during stealth.

I think this would be good for ranged stealth combat in general ( indeed of course including lightning casts if they don't already work like pyromancy, which seems to reveal my position within a cast or two very reliably, which is great :D)

[preiman]

as someone that has played with acrossbow a little, it really isn't all that OP, and keep in mind I am saying that as a person who will more likely have one pointed at me than the other way around, some adjustments to how it handles stealth might be so bad though. at the risk of getting too off topic, my Light should also hurt my ability to hide, at least it should be nearly impossible to stay hidden once I've fired a Spear of Light or sundisk

[sona]

I'll have a better idea if/when I get one myself. It just seemed a bit over the top. I say that as someone who hasn't been on the receiving end, but rather from the perspective of, "wow, I'd be pretty much unstoppable with one of those and high stealth." At least in regards to PvE. CvC is an entirely different kettle of fish, and one I prefer to stay away from.

I'm sure there's a good number of instant kill combos/abilities/tools that are pretty one sided. But if I find something that actually gives me pause, "should I have that?" I also consider, "hey, wait. Should anyone really have anything like this?".

[Noctere]

You will now notice that is a little more difficult to remain hidden to stand up, or otherwise move to reload a large unwieldy crossbow. However, this change does not affect an already loaded crossbow.

[sona]

This sounds like a pretty good update to me. :)