Short Bow skill
General Information
Historically short bows are bows fashioned from a single material (traditionally wood in most cultures) and stringed with any number of things. Like longbows they lack the composite bows' defined recurve; they are generally much shorter than long bows, however, which made them popular weapons for use on horseback. Within Dragonrealms there are three categories of standard bow (from shortest roundtime to longest roundtime): short bow, longbow and composite bow.
Short bows are the lightest of all bow classes, having a default load time of two seconds. They are versatile weapons, powerful but easily stored in many containers. Of all the bow classes, short bows generally have the best balance (damage bonus from agility), making them popular among smaller races who have very large penalties to strength.
Capped player-made short bows have the highest balance on a standard bow-type available in-game, slightly edging out capped player-made longbows. Their small load time is an attractive feature. A capped short bow combined with capped arrows is an amazingly powerful weapon, though many players opt for longbows to maximize their damage potential.
Advantages and Disadvantages
Advantages
- Large damage and accuracy bonuses when using the AIM verb.
- Lowest load time of all bow types
- Highest balance of all standard bow types
- Can be fletched by players
Disadvantages
- Inability to use shield when aiming a bow
- Lower attack potential than longbows
Note: Returning players or players who do not frequent the Dragonrealms billboards should note that the evasion penalty once applied to using bows was removed after the 3x agility modifier was lowered to a standard modifier. Bows no longer have an evasion penalty associated with them.
Guild-Specific Abilities
- Barbarians and Rangers: Dual Load
- Barbarians and Paladins have the ability to parry arrows within the range of their weapon. While this is mostly attributable to melee, players using pole arms or pole-range weapons like greatswords will be able to parry arrows at pole as well. This is a direct defense contest of bow skills vs. parry skill.
- Shield primary (Paladins) and secondary (Barbarians, Rangers, Traders) guild have the ability to load their bows while wearing an arm-worn shield by down-sizing their shields (Paladins using medium shields, secondary guilds using small shields). Note that this adds a 3-second roundtime penalty to the loading process Requirements: Wearing a smaller arm-worn shield than the maximum allowed by your guild.
- Rangers have the ability to fletch hunter's bows.