Bows

I have to wholehartedly agree that any bow or crossbow addition should not be pursued in favor of actually making melee weapons work somehow.

Daryl Dixon is a wuss and his hype will pass, just like that of Spice Girls has passed before I went in torpor

ReverendRevolver wrote:

So, a vampire is like a human, in that its probably madexof water. But they never include a combat penalty with being shot by a high velocity bullet, like a 357 magnum to compensate for hydrostatic shock( im probably misremebering the name, but its a legit physics and ballistics thing).

Vampire explicitely don't follow the rule of physics anyway, even more so once discipline are factored in. So, while hydrostatic shock is a real mayhem to a human, it's admissible that something which violate thermodynamics every day and night by simply moving won't be impressed by that.

I agree with you (and kombainas) that melee weapon are mostly worthless now, but it's something different from needing to have 10 types of weapons. Having the current selection of bastard sword, tiger claw, and meat hook useable is enough for me.

Ohlmann, the only one of those i consider playable is the meat hook.

Seriously joulma-blah-blahs axe was a atep in the right direction for melee weapons working. It, bundi, and meat hook are some of the best, alomg with talbits chainsaw, walking stick, and to some degree crimson sentenal. Nuln shouldnt be tremere specific, but oh well. Kerrie and dagger at least include a new application to the melee combatniche, ao they arexok.

But we arexmissing cheap n useful melee weaponz. No non unique meleexweapon will probably ever be as good as a 44, but being closer in awesomeness would be ideal.

Overall, I wouldn't try to mirror guns so closely. I'd be more interested if they did different things. The clear parallels seem to make the bows come off worse (compared with Saturday Night Special or Magnum), or be a bargain (compared with Deer Rifle). A weak bow with no maneuver but first strike? A cheap weapon which does more damage against animals and mortals? I don't know what's right, but I'd rather see something different.

direwolf wrote:

Bow

1
Weapon. Bow.
1R damage with an optional maneuver. At long range an opposing vampire with auspex or celerity may dodge as a strike.

Compound Bow

2
Weapon. Bow.
2R damage with an optional maneuver. Deals one less damage at close range.

These two, at least, are obviously weaker than their gun counterparts - .44 Magnum and Saturday Night Special. You can't easily fix that with pool - the difference between one pool and two pool is too coarse. (Imagine if the game had fractional pool, or everything was scaled up to 100 pool or something.)

So then you basically need to play an Arrow card to make them better. And since Ammo is relatively little-played with guns, would you want to play it with a Bow?

direwolf wrote:

Crossbow

2 1
Weapon. Bow.
Tap to strike: 3R damage. Bearer may untap a crossbow as a strike.

Interesting, in that it's once-per-go-round-the-table in a lot of cases. Certainly once per combat in most cases.

direwolf wrote:

Hand Crossbow

1 0
Weapon. Bow.
Tap to strike for 1R damage. If bearer strikes with a Hand Crossbow, he or she may tap a second Hand Crossbow for an additional strike: 1R damage. When equipping with a Hand Crossbow, the minion may equip with a second Hand Crossbow in your hand for an additional Pool.

Interesting, but two cards in hand at once can be surprisingly annoying to achieve, doing funny things to deck flow. How many do you have in your deck? That sort of thing.

direwolf wrote:

Hunting Bow
1
Weapon. Bow.
1R damage with two optional maneuvers each combat. Not usable at close range.

Technical gripe - "usable" is slightly annoying, because maneuvering is using it. "Cannot be used to strike at close range." I could see this getting use, when two maneuvers is a lot.

direwolf wrote:

Airrow Stealth
2
Weapon. Bow.
3R damage once each round. Only usable at long range. If the bearer blocks an action, he or she may, before range is determined, set the range for the first round of the resulting combat to long; if he or she does so, skip the determine range step that round, and the bearer's initial strike that round must be with this weapon.

Unconvinced by the merits of duplicating Sniper Rifle so closely. Would rather see something more inventive.

direwolf wrote:

"Ammo" cards do not convert to "Arrow" cards easily because they would not makes sense. How would "Dragon's Breath Arrows" burn a bow? How would you get an additional strike with "Caseless Arrows?"

Question! Is an Ivory Bow a Bow? Can it use Ammo cards? Because Ivory Bow is already quite good.

direwolf wrote:

Razer-tipped Arrows.

Arrow.
Only usable before resolution of a bow's strike. The bow inflicts +1 damage each strike for the remainder of this combat. No more than one arrow card can be used on a bow each combat.

So the Saturday Night Special bow is still basically just worse than an SNS -since the SNS can play Manstopper Rounds.

Note also that Manstopper Rounds is quite poor these days unless you can hit 2 additional strikes, because Target [Blah] can be much easier, and not require a gun (e.g. if you haven't equipped one yet). And if you can reliably hit 2 additional strikes, play Glaser Rounds for +4 damage, rather than Manstopper Round's +3.

direwolf wrote:

Phosphorous Arrow

1
Arrow.
Only usable before resolution of a bow's strike. The bow inflicts aggravated damage on it's next strike. Only one may be played per strike. (They cost a pool, so you can play more than one of these on a bow, but card text on other arrow cards prevents you from playing it with another ammo card.)

Next strike or this strike? This seems likely to get confusing.

direwolf wrote:

Wooden Arrow

Arrow.
Only usable before resolution of a bow's strike. If any damage from this bow is successfully inflicted on an opposing vampire, that vampire does not untap as normal on his or her next untap phase.. No more than one arrow card can be used on a bow each combat.

Wording point: I'd go with something more like "If any damage from this strike..."

One of the more interesting arrows, but if I'm playing an additional combat card, would I rather not have something that put them in torpor or something? It obviously has its uses, but I'd be concerned that they'd be a bit too fringe to justify using it regularly.

(All Ammo cards have the problem of not being Target Head or Vitals, which are extremely good. Obviously, you can stack an Ammo/Arrow+a Target, but that starts getting meh.)

direwolf wrote:

Barbed Arrow

Arrow.
Only usable before resolution of a bow's strike. If any damage from this bow is successfully inflicted on an opposing minion, put this card on the opposing minion. Maneuvers cost the opposing minion an additional blood or life. The minion with this card may burn this card at any time by taking 1 unpreventable damage. No more than one arrow card can be used on a bow each combat.

Quite weak. It's almost like +1 damage that I don't have to take if I don't want to. If I know my deck has no maneuvers, I'll just ignore it.

direwolf wrote:

Incongruous Displacement

1
Usable by a vampire not involved in combat.
Choose a gun or bow in combat. A chosen gun is no longer a gun, but is a bow instead. A chosen bow is no longer a bow, it is a gun instead. Lasts until the end of combat.
Put this card on a non-unique weapon. This weapon cannot be used in combat. The minion who played this card may steal the weapon as a +1 stealth action. Burn this card when possession of the weapon changes.

Bit weird. As a hoser, do I see enough guns using ammo to care? (Or bows using arrows?) At superior, Reformation (chi+anarch) seems a lot better, and that doesn't exactly set the world alight.

direwolf wrote:

Guerilla

Requires an Anarch with a gun or bow.
Deal weapon damage to a minion or retainer controlled by another Methuselah. +1 stealth if a bow is used. If this action is blocked by a titled Camarilla or Sabbat vampire, and the blocking vampire is ready at the end of combat, burn the chosen weapon.

I quite like this - I've tried a similar thing myself in the past, years ago. What I find weird is "+1 stealth if a bow is used". Really? I figure I'm much less likely to attract attention walking round with a .44 Magnum bulging in my jacket than I would carrying around a composite bow. Now obviously, the +1 stealth is an interesting way of making the bow more interesting, but it feels somewhat weird to me.

Wording points: Add a . (Unnecessary but helpful.) Add "Choose a bow or gun possessed by this Anarch..." at the start, to clear up announcing the choice.

jamesatzephyr wrote:

Really? I figure I'm much less likely to attract attention walking round with a .44 Magnum bulging in my jacket than I would carrying around a composite bow. Now obviously, the +1 stealth is an interesting way of making the bow more interesting, but it feels somewhat weird to me.

Depend on the country and context. Where I live, people would freak out if you had any kind of firearm on you, while sport bow are uncommon but not the least problematic. Of course, barbed or otherwise aggressive-looking arrow may be another matter.

The last part, guerilla, id meant to say something before.

For the record, the bow not makng noise would be the purpose of tbe stealth, but i digress.

I think an action or a reaction that works like touch of pain but with a guns strike damage, should be printex. Or both.

But not at stealth. Why? Im why. People who are dormant in my meta are why.

All you need is weenie fortitdue with sawed offs and its a huge pain. @1 stealth, deal 3 damage, freakdrive or forced march if your really cool, then bums rush. You get one shot, so make sure you use either manstopper rounds or scatter shotand disnegage, then target vitals or head. Youve done 10 damage in 2 actions best case senario. But really, rushing first then using guerilla to snipe whoever go hurt most at stealth makes me nervous. Add in a justicar with presence and fortitude, and a few perpetual care and you have a deck.

Missing the stealth, you still have a deck, just a less awesome one.

But i truly believe a guerilla type card and its matching reaction card would be cool. It would give weenies with guns more awesome, thus enabling ay options. If you can do damage to a minion as an action, or to lets say someone bleeding you, and get suppreszing fire to make computer hack bleeds with leverage land, theres a completely new archetype with nothing but 2 new cards printed.
Sounds efficient to me.
Add in nra pac and or some anarch tech, theres another deck. Add a discipline, another. Make all the weenjes sabbat, you gain abbot and hungry coyote, and have another deck.

Is it tier one? No, but it could win a tournament if played right. Its better than horseshoes and touch of pain, hands down.