I agree that it's quite hard to effectively use bows and such weapons at close range, but that doesn't mean that you shouldn't be able to do so. Drawing a bow or a crossbow and aiming should waste more time than swinging melee weapons. It could be even slower when there are enemies at melee range.

I think there should simply be a big to hit penalty when using at low range, possibly reduced by high dex. An expert archer should still be able to duck under the troll's attack, quickly cock a quarrel and send a bolt through the monster's skull as it swings its weapon for a second attack.

Heh, true. Maybe a percentage of failing, then.

Seconding the to-hit penalty.

Crossbows should probably require a higher energy point cost in exchange for their power.

Sounds like a a sensible idea.

One thing I'd like to see (but will never happen I guess) would be archers firing at monsters from on high. When I see Adom, I don't see all the landscape being completelt flat. If you were an archer, and happened to be in the mountainous areas, being on higher ground and shooting down onto people would be cool.

Probably hard to implement though. I dunno, I'm not a programmer :P

I like a penalty to hit implentation myself. And unless crossbows are changed to differentiate themselves more from bows, i think the energy cost is just fine, because isn't one melee attack supposed to represent an "opening" or something in a swirling melee, while an archer, while taking longer to get off his strike, only makes one?

I dunno, just my thoughts here.

Well, I know that a crossbow takes far longer to load up than a bow. It would justify the higher damage that crossbows already dealt in ADOM for JADE.

Shooting at point blank range shouldn't really necessitate that much of a tohit penalty, since, they are sorta right there and easy to hit.

You would be massively opening yourself up for attack, so, you would face a massive DV penalty for doing so, and, open yourself up for some additional counterattacks by your opponent.

Plus using a bow and a shield at the same time should really be impossible, that DV/PV should definitely be negated at all times after firing a shot.

Reloading a crossbow realistically should take some time.

And perhaps if you get hit while reloading, you have a chance of screwing up or dropping the ammo or something like that.

I think it's even more unrealistic to eat a meal or read a book or smith or many other things that you can do in ADOM while that big ugly troll is whacking you.

yes you're right about that, but who says the game is supposed to be realistic? Games are about having fun, not whats realistic.

That's right, and in some cases more realistic means less fun. But no archery at close range is more realistic and in my opinion more fun because archery is too easy in ADOM. I would suggest that the damage is 1/4 of the normal damage at range 1. Also I think it would be better when the chance to hit decreases at longer range, I still remember my archer (because it still is the only character I won the game with) that could teleport to the other side of the map and then shoot on a creep with winged arrows until it was close again, then teleport again etc. (used it to kill the shopkeeper from the casino)

Very true. What if instead of having a higher energy cost for an attack though, it was slightly lower(say 600) but before they can attack, they need to reload(900) putting the total at 1500 EP. This opens up some interesting possibilities - players can walk around with a crossbow loaded, shoot it extremely fast, then go into melee or whatever and reload after the fight.

I disagree. Have you guys not seen Lord of the Rings?? ;) I am no big LOTR-fan btw, but I love how.. What's the name of that uber-archer..? Legolas? Anyway when they get ambushed by orcs before encountering the Balrog, he just aims and shoots arrows like a machinegun, and at close range too.
Yes realism is more fun..to a certain extent. However, ADOM/JADE is in a -fantasy-world. An uber-archer in a fantasy world have no problems reloading and shooting arrows at close range, rather the opposite; The target is easy to hit with even more precision, and arrows hit even harder.

There's a difference between shooting at close range, and shooting when a sword is penetrating your gut.

I think most classes should either have a gigantic to hit loss or be inable to shoot while adjacent to a creature. This is because most monsters except the extremely miniscule can easily just push any part of your bow/crossbow aside and force you to miss or otherwise fail to shoot properly. Possibly a talent(s?), high DV, high weapon skill, high Archery skill, or ranged-type class ability could help combat this. If you want to be an uber-archer, you have to put the necessary effort into increasing your uber-archer skills/talents into being so. If you're a flat-footed, magic-wielding magus, I don't see how you'll be able to expertly riddle your average orc, let alone a hulking troll, with point-blank missile fire.

Um, dunno why I voted against it, as there are some really nice ideas. FOA this thing about preloading crossbow. But I'm against massive penalties to-hit. IMO Andur's version is best

But wouldn't the monster be an easy target at close range? And wouldn't the arrow/quarrel have more power? IDK, it would take longer with a rat nipping at your heels while trying to load a bow/crossbow

How about a new Tactic factor for archery? After all, an archer would have three obvious choices when it comes to firing at a close foe:

1. Shoot fast
2. Shoot well
3. Shoot safely

For the first case, speed would be the priority, allowing them to shoot more arrows. However, this would come with penalties to to-hit and to DV. For the second case, accuracy would be what matters most, and therefore maximise to-hit... but this would result in speed and DV penalties. And finally, shooting safely would place emphasis on safety, thereby maximising DV... but with penalties to to-hit and to speed. Of course, there would also be an option to place the three equally, producing lesser penalties to each of the three.

Obviously, shooting safely is less important for long-distance archery... but when up close, safety becomes a major concern. As with normal Tactics in ADoM, switching archery tactic would take no extra time, so the player can switch to setting 3 if a foe gets too close. And perhaps Archers, at a certain level, get the ability to do two of the three at a time, thereby shooting, say, fast and safely, to the detriment of accuracy.

As for the crossbow issue, I'd definitely like to see a "reload speed" for each type of long-distance weapon. Crossbows should be more powerful, but slower, slings should be almost instantaneous to load but fairly weak. There should also be ego versions of these that modify the reload speed, such as the "Auto-loading Crossbow", which would be quite rapid to reload (still affected by tactics, though). Similar ego versions could also impact tactics, so you might have a "Bow of Focus", which would enable the user to shoot without penalty to accuracy, irrespective of archery tactic - it wouldn't so much increase the to-hit of the bow itself, but would avoid any loss in to-hit if using a different tactic. Obviously, this weapon would be quite a boon for high-level archers, who could choose the appropriate tactic to have zero penalty. Hence, these would be quite rare.

I would suggest the same be true for spells... in ADOM, at least, they're way more imbalanced than missiles are anyway.

It does make sense for the same tactic to apply to both missiles and target-type magic. It should only apply to those that "target", though - which, I'd like to see such a spell type introduced.

In fact, I think there should be four "types" of elemental attack magic. There should be the "melee" type (think Burning Hands), the "bolt" type (choose a direction, it will hit everything along the way... but this sort of attack should be toned down significantly in JADE, with perhaps the non-bouncing ones being slightly more powerful than the bouncing ones), the "ball" type (pretty obvious), and then this type - like a normal missile, but magical.

The ball and bolt types shouldn't be dependent on tactics. The melee type should work with the normal melee tactics. The missile type should work with my idea for missile tactics.