Archery question

[Scott Adams]

At 12:43 PM 4/19/01 -0400, you wrote:
>|| I have a huge problem with the "row for bow" system. Even though,
>|| apparently, that is what it does indeed state in the book,
>|| it totally goes
>|| against the rest of the entire system. I DO NOT agree that
>|| guns and bows
>|| are "point and pull" weapons. I took one too many archery classes to
>|| believe that.
>
>There are many differnt systems in P&P, as you well know.  Witness the
>various differing systems used to handle swimming, Climbing and Influence.

Darn good point :)

>I do agree that using it straight is somewhat unreasonable, but bows are
>pretty much a "fire and forget" system.  At most ranges you are targeting a
>most-likely landing point, not bobbing and weaving in order to stay on
>target (which is what the OCV-DCV simulates).

Yep.

>
>I do shoot archery to some degree, so I have at least some common
>experience. (EL0, EL1 at best :).  AT a 20 yard target (60', or 6" -- Short
>range with my composite bow, a +7) Assigning me a 65% chance to hit a
>combat-aware and moving mansized target is probably being a bit generous; I
>get about 80% on a non-moving target so I guess it's ok.

I also get similar results but with a simple bow.   But I've not done it in a
few years.

>
>However, I know several people I would easily classify as EL8+, but with
>about the same "CEL" as me scoring a lot of "deadlies" and "Severe" hits at
>that same range, moreso then would be justified by an extra 7% to hit.

Yeah there is a HS in town that does Archery and some of them are real good
but it is distance and at times random chance that determines success.

>
>Obviously, many of the rules in P&P are for simulation only and should just
>invoke SoD as 'P&P physics' :}

Yeah heck.  If you wanted to take into reality we are forgetting gravity, wind
and
other things we should use in the rules :).  I remeber reading a brief
essay on
a
monk did in the middle ages on bow weapons and he did quite a study on it
and it had alot of that stuff (as far as the science went) in it.

>Well, taking a real squinty-eyed look at the table shows that 1 CEL ~~ 2 EL
>in hitting effectiveness (basically). If you used the row level as a bonus
>(inverting the sign, of course), a +8 bonus is effectivly the same as
>getting +4 CEL.  However, the -8 on the roll weights it toward the deadly
>hits, instead of spreading it over the entire hit range.  EL alone should do
>that.

Yep.  EL is pretty much shakiness of hands and Eyes.  It determines if your
shot is solid or shaky and if your eye is good in effect.

>
>Perhaps a slight change in process will do this justice.  First off, I doubt
>SB is a help in missile fire any more then DB is in defending against it.
>StB makes sense (being able to remain steady and hold the bow string while
>aiming) as does AB on the defense.  Perhaps one needs to make a RCV (Ranged
>Combat Value) of CEL+StB and a RDV (Ranged Dodge Value) of CEL+AB.  Purists,
>like Marcel :} can just use OCV and DCV for simplicity.

Hehe...that's a compromise I guess.  SB only affects damage in effect if your
stronger the bolt has more power behind it.

>The problem is what to do with the bow values.  I'll create an excel table
>(which I will send to Wout) with all the ranged weapon values converted to
>TABLE modifiers (not roll modifiers).


>
>We'll see how that works this or next weekend.
>       -- Burton

But we are forgetting if Snider put this rule into affect per Alex's questions
then
hes god and we should not go against the grain :)  (well...ok maybe we should
but i think that's how they wanted it done...)