Charge Shot improvement

Charged shot would be a lot more fun to use if you didn’t have to hold the trigger to charge it… basically your slingbow would become a capacitor that charges in between shots with no damage boost when firing rapidly. Could even add a charging bar with a “green” zone that guarantees a crit if you fire 0.6-0.4 seconds before reaching full charge as a sort of skill shot challenge.

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Agreed, also seems to be lacking a bit in power last I looked at it.

I specced my hunter with a charge shot for high tier RR’s, but abandoned it due to limited use in meteors. My gatherer does better with max damage critfists and sneak

I’d much rather see them increase the damage and the time to charge and have it charge automatically, so even if it took me 30 seconds of not shooting in order to get my charge up, it actually had significant value for the first shot if/when I needed it. This would be something that many explorers/miners, etc… that aren’t necessarily combat focused could use to help with survival without having it be too overpowered. Anyways… just my thoughts on it.

For a pure combat focused build there is pretty much no worthwhile value in charged shot, it just doesn’t do enough damage, and the time it takes between shots makes it not worthwhile for this type of build.

But in a non-combat character the ability to charge up a shot for a longer period of time automatically would allow you to be able to better handle surprise visits from cuddletrunks, or hoppers etc… without having an entirely focused combat build, or without having to take time you don’t have to try and charge up your shots.

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Exactly! Please make this skill useful! In its current state it doesn’t increase DPS for hunters and isn’t useful enough for non-combat roles.

Or instead of a guaranteed crit, the green zone could cut the charge time of your next shot in half.

When I tested charge shot on my hunter it didn’t increase DPS because in the time it took to charge I could have just fired 3 or 4 normal shots for even more damage.

Also, maybe have a 3rd option: Charge Shot, Rapid Fire, or Armor Penetration. The NPC power creep is real.

Yet another option would be to reduce the charge time by 90%…

Still wouldn’t be worth using without a damage increase. Honestly the only bows I use are bows that are rapid fire with fast travel speeds and low bullet weight. I find the speed at which I can fire this far outweights any of the actual combat options. Rapid Fire simply doesn’t fire fast enough, and charged shot doesn’t provide enough benefit. I can actually fire my own bow significantly faster than rapid fire, and I can fire so many more shots in the time it takes me to charge that there just isn’t any point in using either of the actual combat skills. And right now there is simply no advantage to crafting and using slower higher damage bows to optimize charged shot.

The travel speed and lightweight bullet means I can take advantage of the full range without actually adding range to the weapon, and the increased action speed means I can shoot it so fast that it just melts most targets within seconds. I can land 3-4 shots on a roadrunner with this bow before it even starts to run away. Compare that to a high damage Diamond bow for example and I can get 2-3x the damage output with this ruby bow than I can a high damage focused Diamond bow. Plus I have the added advantage of extra range and basically no bullet drop given the weight and speed of the projectiles. On top of all of that, this bow is relatively easy to craft making it cost less in the long run as well.

If you haven’t tried out a bow like this I highly recommend it, you won’t go back to using any other bows after trying one of these. Note that these should be made out of Ruby for the best effect, simply the best balance I have found for power and speed. Diamond bows with the same stats hit harder per shot, but are so much slower that they aren’t worth it, while Topaz for example is faster, but just doesn’t hit hard enough.

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Thanks for the input! I tried hunting on T6 once but everything was so tanky and could take 2/3 of my health in seconds - not my idea of fun.

I did watch a video once of someone crafting a diamond slingbow with multishot and ultra heavy projectiles… they basically had to dig a pit for the mobs to fall in then drop “anvils” on their heads :rofl: not practical by any means but hilarious.

The bows I posted above will handle everything on the normal T6 and below planets except for the very highest tier mobs with massive armor and resistances. Things I was unable to take out with normal high damage diamond bows just melt under this ruby bow because of how quickly you can fire it. The top tier mobs on Exo’s and maybe T6 planets could give you a hard time but these bows are significantly better than any other’s I have tried. If you’d like to give one a shot let me know your ingame character name and I can temporarily give you access to my private shop to pick one up.

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I kind of settled with the Charge Epic and Heavy Multishot bow. Not using the heavy projectiles. Love the damage going often over 20.000

Rapid firing seems to me a waste of durability, on fast moving mobs (cuttletrunks/wildstock), I personally miss often :face_with_raised_eyebrow:

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you would miss far less if you had no bullet drop and your bullets landed on target almost instantly and actually reached their maximum range. Which is pretty much the whole premise behind the Ruby bow posted above. On top of that it shoots insanely fast. Yes, it will likely wear out faster than a higher damage but slower bow, but its also more effective, and likely cheaper to produce as well. I can generally get a round of bows forged in just a couple of attempts, unlike tools which often take 20+ attempts to get a decent forge I can generally get the bows out in as few as 3 attempts or so. Since forging is generally the most expensive part of the process, being able to reliable forge in very few attempts actually saves quite a bit of money on the craft. So yes wear is greater, and the bows will likely break sooner, but they also generally cost much less and are much less hassle to craft. Even if I found a more effective bow unless it can also compete in cost and ease to craft, I would still likely use these ruby bows as my standard weapon of choice, then just have a secondary bow to swap out for special occasions. Some day I will get around to creating a true Rift Sniper bow, but given the costs and the lack of value in charged shot, it just kinda seems like a waste of money and resources. I have the forging materials, and I have several dozen Rift bows already crafted, I just can’t justify wasting those resources on what will likely be an inferior weapon to what I already have at a fraction of the cost.

On top of that, other than the super high mobs, most things are dead before they can move, so aiming is far less of an issue than you might think. If I can drop 6 shots on a cuttletrunk before it can even move, its pretty much dead before it can even do anything. Like I stated previously, even on roadrunners, I can generally land 3+ shots before they start to run away, they are dead before they even know what hit them. This is the case for most normal mobs, only the highest armored and resistant critters will give you a problem, and honestly I have yet to find any bow that will reliably take down those mobs in a reasonable amount of time. It is likely only an insanely expensive specially crafted Rift bow would be able to take down those kinds of mobs, and at the cost for something like that, it just doesn’t seem worth doing, especially since 90% of most peoples game play would be easily served by the Ruby bow.

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I see, I didnt really knew the whole mechanism, thought its just normal shots, only faster firing. Will test it. I can understand in Circarpous you get the job done well, but still having my doubts on how useful this is on T6+ planets.
Other than that, all you say makes sense. :+1:

Very nice case you made there for the ruby bow! Ofc you could put the same forge on a diamond if someone wanted a bit more armour penetration traded for speed; this would only really make a difference to high tiered mobs in prolonged engagements. Would be an interesting comparison to see actual dps landed at different tiers between the two

You absolutely can, and I have done it. The DPS drop is noticeable. Yes the Diamond bow hits harder per shot, but is so much slower than the Ruby, and the Ruby is only slightly less damage, that the difference in the actual DPS output is pretty big.

Its not really about the tier of the planet, but more about the armor and resistance of your target. As I mentioned before, if you run up against a crazily heavy armored and resistance mob, then these don’t work well (though I have yet to see a bow that does against them). So regular mobs on T7’s it will handle just fine, but get one of those super armored and resistant to everything mobs, and ya it’s just not enough, but neither is any other bow either. On T6 and below those super armored mobs are very rare, and this bow will handle 99% of the mobs you encounter, it is only those super high end mobs that it has problems with. Buy like I mentioned previously, this bow will melt away mobs that I was unable to take out at all with higher damaged Diamond bows.

Is there still room for a hard hitting Rift bow, certainly. But for 99% of what you are doing, the ruby bow will do a great job and help you save wear on your expensive Rift bow.

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So what is good for the ultra-tanky mobs? Or are they just a pain no matter what?

Well… generally speaking they’re just a pain no matter what in my experience. However, super heavy hitting shotgun builds can take them down, but it requires basically melee range and things like cuddletrunks are a huge hassle since they normally try to keep enough distance that you can’t shoot them with a heavy shotgun based build. You end up having to grapple them and trying to drag them close enough to you to get in range. When dealing with a high end cuddle trunk that’s very risky and is likely to result in death once they drop a bomb or plasma grenade (whatever that shot is called). So its doable, but it requires a very specific bow, is likely to result in your death and can be extremely frustrating.

Wildstock also has a problem with this build in that once they start a charge, that charge completes no matter what, even if you kill the wildstock in mid charge, the animal will drop but the charge will still hit you, again likely resulting in your death. Again you also have to basically be in melee range, which also means you aren’t able to dodge the charges as well either.

Generally speaking the super high level mobs are a pain no matter what and even if you have the equipment to kill them, they aren’t generally worth the effort (at least not solo). If you’re on a meteor hunt with a big party, then its much less of an issue as everyone helps take down the big mobs and you don’t have to depend on your solo damage alone to handle them.

But the highest hitting bows I have seen are shotgun builds (each projectile does less damage, but with 5 projectiles if all 5 hit, it adds up to more than a single shot bow by a fair margin). If you add Max Damage, and then Heavy Projectile on top of that you can add quite a bit of damage. But the cost is a crazy short range and a massive bullet drop. Thus the reason why you basically have to be in melee range for this strategy to really work.

I’ve played around with the build before and it can be fun, but I don’t find it a good strategy to use on a regular basis, yes you can kill the mobs, but with all the extra deaths you get because of it is it really worth it? Certainly worth trying out if it sounds interesting to you, some people do enjoy that type of build, I just don’t find it to be particularly “effective” for overall positive gains given the trade offs it requires.