Bow damage formula?

[Goregasmic]

Do we know the formula? After some googling I haven't found anything conclusive.

I remember reading somewhere the damage bonus followed that formula:

45+dly weaps = base + (delay - 31)/3
where base = ((level-7)/3)

but then I can't find the source anymore.

I also read a torven post saying it is basically: bow damage + arrow damage + mh damage bonus so basically it would be the good old ((Offense+STR)/100) formula applied to bows then split into a d20? Right now i have a 12dmg bow with 5dmg arrows and 23 damage bonus which yields 50 but I'll hit anywhere between 27 and 64 or so (non crit, no double damage) often in the low 30s range.

And yeah before anyone says it I know bow damage isn't very significant but it is hard to tell which bow is better/worse if you don't even know on which basis the damage is calculated.

Thanks.

[Cecily]

Thank you for your question. Always happy to help new players. Get an Earthshaker or Weighted Axe. Will improve your damage more than anything else. Wouldn't think too hard about it because it's busted. 8 dmg arrows are nice. 3 or 1 dmg work fine.

[Snaggles]

IMHO, the issue with bows is arrow burn rate since it’s a limited resource. Even if bracer arrows and you can last the fight, it adds to the downtime of making more. In big fights or solo challenges it’s a matter of if you can kill the mob with all your stacks.

For comparing bows I do the damage + arrow + damage bonus / delay. Really though, the exquisite/priceless/primal has the ideal speed to take advantage of the Earthshaker damage bonus and the ratio so be efficient per shot. I’ve done mid 40’s off disc with bracer arrows on Zlexak and about 100 on disc (vs HoT trash) with an Exquisite. Higher damage bows just give you a bigger gas tank to keep on plunking.

There are cases for the Windsaber or Bow of the Destroyer but my workhorse for a long time was an Exquisite. I’ve not yet had the Dagarn crack over 100dps but parsing it is annoying. The Windstriker has a pretty meh ratio but is the end goal for racers and efficient arrow use. I still need mine [You must be logged in to view images. Log in or Register.] .

[Goregasmic]

Originally Posted by Cecily [You must be logged in to view images. Log in or Register.]

Thank you for your question. Always happy to help new players. Get an Earthshaker or Weighted Axe. Will improve your damage more than anything else. Wouldn't think too hard about it because it's busted. 8 dmg arrows are nice. 3 or 1 dmg work fine.

Leveling a ranger (52) right now so it would be an earthshaker. It is on the shopping list but a bit farther down the priority list. I'm trying to get fletching up there for more arrow options too but I got a tolan's bracer today also.

Basically I leveled to ~48 solo with a fungi just facetanking with a shovel but now it seems like even with swarmcaller swaps it is getting tedious so I figured I'd get more arrows in to cheese it as difficulty increases.

I'm looking at bow options and snaggles did a good run down in another thread but it is kind of hard to know how faster bows with lower ratios would fare against slower bow with higher damage so the actual formula would help a lot.

[Goregasmic]

Originally Posted by Snaggles [You must be logged in to view images. Log in or Register.]

IMHO, the issue with bows is arrow burn rate since it’s a limited resource. Even if bracer arrows and you can last the fight, it adds to the downtime of making more. In big fights or solo challenges it’s a matter of if you can kill the mob with all your stacks.

For comparing bows I do the damage + arrow + damage bonus / delay. Really though, the exquisite/priceless/primal has the ideal speed to take advantage of the Earthshaker damage bonus and the ratio so be efficient per shot. I’ve done mid 40’s off disc with bracer arrows on Zlexak and about 100 on disc (vs HoT trash) with an Exquisite. Higher damage bows just give you a bigger gas tank to keep on plunking.

There are cases for the Windsaber or Bow of the Destroyer but my workhorse for a long time was an Exquisite. I’ve not yet had the Dagarn crack over 100dps but parsing it is annoying. The Windstriker has a pretty meh ratio but is the end goal for racers and efficient arrow use.

Yeah I've been thinking about what we said last time and yeah, windsaber/dagarn seem annoying to use and while the slower ones like WBoRZ are much easier on arrows it kinda feels like the damage bonus would be lost on them. It seems like Exquisite would strike a nice middle ground but without the formula it is kinda hard to know what's what if you don't own them to parse them.

Without a better formula I guess (damage + arrow + damage bonus)/delay will have to do.

[Snaggles]

Tolan arrows, Fleeting Quiver, SCHW’s, and a slow 2h (anything 50+ delay) will burn up highkeep. Los HP is the goal above all else.

[Goregasmic]

Originally Posted by Snaggles [You must be logged in to view images. Log in or Register.]

Tolan arrows, Fleeting Quiver, SCHW’s, and a slow 2h (anything 50+ delay) will burn up highkeep. Los HP is the goal above all else.

Yeah I have fungi/tolan's/seahorse belt and an AP (42/49). The next 2 step ups would be tantor's or Earthshaker but tantor's is worth almost as much as ES so might as well go for ES. Fleeting quiver is up next on the wishlist.

My bow skill is maxed but I mainly just pulled with it. Up to 48 I just face tanked unlimited WL panthers (33-37) basically so I never cared that much for bows but when I switched to CS wyverns (38-42) I could barely chain 2 if swarmcaller didn't proc early. Panthers have 2khp and wyverns 3k, which seemed some of the lowest in the 38-42 bracket. The 42-46 bracket seem to hover around 4.5khp so I'm bracing myself and I guess I'll have to be more creative.

According to the wiki HHK nobles are 38-42 too. I've avoided them because I was under the impression there weren't that many and it seems a very popular spot?

[DeathsSilkyMist]

Snaggles PM'ed me with a similar question about archery, but more specifically about BFG. I'll post my initial findings reply here:

I did some initial research and a bit of testing. According to the EQEMU code, an archery attack uses the same function as a regular melee attack for the damage calculation. There is a switch case for archery to use DEX instead of STR, but idk if that applies to P99. The only thing I don't know is if p99 uses STR, DEX, or neither in the damage calculation.

This is probably why bows in the range slot still get the main hand damage bonus from whatever is in your primary hand, because it is using the same function for damage as melee calculations. My SK is indeed getting the 110 damage bonus from using a weighted axe on blue.

I looked at this video:

https://youtu.be/elAYmxcDOrM?si=y9Z4RbPvDFBs-a0W

And saw some damage numbers. The guy was using a UI that simplified his incomming text, so I am not sure if that was hiding if a hit was a crit or not.

He trueshotted with BFG. I believe his max damage without crit was around 346, and I think he crit for like 567 once.

Looking at my DPS calculator, these numbers are close to a Warrior who who is using a 59 damage 50 delay 1h weapon. I used Warrior instead of Ranger so I could see the crit number. This makes sense, as BFG with an 8 damage arrow would be (20 + 8) * 2.1 (trueshot multiplier) = 59 damage.

I do not know if the double damage for stationary targets thing when using archery exists on p99. I can't test it myself.

Under my current assumptions, you would calculate a BFG without trueshot and without stationary double damage as a 28/50 damage 1h weapon with bow crits basically.

This is just my initial, rough conclusion. Without my own Ranger to test this, I can't say this is true for sure. But according to my DPS calculator you'd get like 84 DPS with BFG + 8 Damage Arrows/Claw (no trueshot) and like 105 DPS with Baton/Claw. This isn't including bow crits, so BFG dps might go up to like 90ish DPS with crits. My calculator shows like a 5% boost to Warrior DPS with critical hits (not crippling blows).

With trueshot BFG does like 125 DPS not including crits.

Hope this helps!

[Snaggles]

Originally Posted by Goregasmic [You must be logged in to view images. Log in or Register.]

Yeah I have fungi/tolan's/seahorse belt and an AP (42/49). The next 2 step ups would be tantor's or Earthshaker but tantor's is worth almost as much as ES so might as well go for ES. Fleeting quiver is up next on the wishlist.

My bow skill is maxed but I mainly just pulled with it. Up to 48 I just face tanked unlimited WL panthers (33-37) basically so I never cared that much for bows but when I switched to CS wyverns (38-42) I could barely chain 2 if swarmcaller didn't proc early. Panthers have 2khp and wyverns 3k, which seemed some of the lowest in the 38-42 bracket. The 42-46 bracket seem to hover around 4.5khp so I'm bracing myself and I guess I'll have to be more creative.

According to the wiki HHK nobles are 38-42 too. I've avoided them because I was under the impression there weren't that many and it seems a very popular spot?

I want to say bards are blue to 55. Nobles are a coin flip blue at 56. They have low 2k hps so go down easy with arrows. On blue they are not camped at all (usually). Not sure on green. Back then I used my Huntsman bow and it was fun but the DD will occasionally break root early.

Harmony won’t split them up. Gotta root and root, then go to work. Or snare and haul to the zone and split them that way.

[Cecily]

Originally Posted by Snaggles [You must be logged in to view images. Log in or Register.]

IMHO, the issue with bows is arrow burn rate since it’s a limited resource. Even if bracer arrows and you can last the fight, it adds to the downtime of making more. In big fights or solo challenges it’s a matter of if you can kill the mob with all your stacks.

For comparing bows I do the damage + arrow + damage bonus / delay. Really though, the exquisite/priceless/primal has the ideal speed to take advantage of the Earthshaker damage bonus and the ratio so be efficient per shot. I’ve done mid 40’s off disc with bracer arrows on Zlexak and about 100 on disc (vs HoT trash) with an Exquisite. Higher damage bows just give you a bigger gas tank to keep on plunking.

There are cases for the Windsaber or Bow of the Destroyer but my workhorse for a long time was an Exquisite. I’ve not yet had the Dagarn crack over 100dps but parsing it is annoying. The Windstriker has a pretty meh ratio but is the end goal for racers and efficient arrow use. I still need mine [You must be logged in to view images. Log in or Register.] .

Windstriker is neat because how hard it nails things when the shitty bow accuracy works. The unresistable 100 nukes are cool, too. It's just not fun to use with the delay. It does respect your arrow supply more than any other option, however.

I agree with ~32/35 being the sweet spot for rangers. I ran Primal bow as my main bow. That ratio hurts. Non-rangers abusing weighted axes etc get more benefit from the quicker bows, but rangers have Trueshot and double damage passives that benefit more from the higher base damage. And again, like you mention, running out of arrows sucks so balanced damage and moderate delay is optimal.

You're gonna be running Tolan arrows primarily (3 dmg 50 range) and 1 - 6 / 150s for fancy occasions like AEs or FTE. Any other option isn't a good choice unless you wanna throw away a bunch of 8 dmgs into a BFG trueshot burn to play rogue for a mob. Too expensive and range sucks on them.