Talk:Bow Combat/@comment-24019647-20150706065447

I like this article and I think it needs to be expanded upon to account for accuracy and power.

Firstly, it's really freakin' hard to hit anything accurately with a bow, unless one has trained for years, which few of our characters have; however, as this seemingly obvious fact is not as well-known as it should be, we have some roleplayers running around autohitting with bows and claiming to have made a non-negotiable kill for reasons which are extremely shaky at best.

Secondly, bows are really not as deadly as we seem to think they are. I would expect Magic bows and up (as a very rough estimate) to be reliably lethal if quality ammunition is lethal, but under that, I'd say they would certainly maim but not kill with a single shot unless placement is spot-on.

We can reasonably estimate from this basis the power of crossbows as well.

How seriously we want to take these facts should depend on whether we want to lean towards game mechanics or realism.