Does anyone else have a problem with D20 missile?

[Ridley's Cohort]

First of all, that archer is in bad shape when it comes to a one-on-one fight against someone with a Ready Action.

It gets worse in a muliple person melee. Without a threatened area you can be easily flanked or cornered if you are unprotected.

A savvy grunt does not have any problems against an archer he gets a chance to close with. If you are having difficulty you need to work on better tactics.

One of my favorite little tricks when I have an opening is to Run so that I am behind the archer. They usually don't anticipate that extra bit of movement. Now the archer can either double move to reposition himself--losing his own attack action, or 5' step towards my closing comrades. I win either way. If he double moves he is taking himself out of the picture or still open for a Charge. If he 5' steps I will just Ready an action and get the AoO if he tries to use the bow.

 

[Shard O'Glase]

What's really sick are the mounted archers, can we say full attack and a whole lot of movement so I can keep my distance.

Though my only real beef with ranged weapons in general is the range categories are way to big. Sure a bow can probably fire a couple thousand feat. But to say that at 100' a person is just as easy to hit with some bows as a person is at 20' is just really silly. And at 200'what are they at a big whopping -2 or at worst a 10% less chance to hit. I prefer hero's ranged catergories in that a penalty pops up relatively quickly, but the penalty grows somewhat slower. I think basically each range catefory doubles. So for example give a long bow a range category of 30', its 1st is 30' 2nd would be 31-90', 3rd would be 91-210' etc. I think in the hero system the no penalty range caterory is 0-8 meters(or 0-4 hexes). But ehy maybe that's just me but something at 100' looks quite a bit smaller to me than something about 20' away and therefore would be a bit more difficult to hit.

 

[Elder-Basilisk]

That would be another reasonable way of dealing with it although you would have to make sure not to apply any bow specific feats, items, or enhancements to the roll and to use the archer's strength mod rather than his dex. . . .

True, but you might want to allow the archer an opposed attack roll at a -4, treating the bow as an improvised melee weapon.

 

[SableWyvern]

That would be another reasonable way of dealing with it although you would have to make sure not to apply any bow specific feats, items, or enhancements to the roll and to use the archer's strength mod rather than his dex. . . .

You are also going to have to allow the same process for virtually all sunder attempts on carried items.

Also, if you are holding a bow in such a fashion as to be capable of using it as an improvised weapon, it's going to be hard to fire an arrow from it, and vice versa. As such, I would only allow opposed checks if an item (be it a bow, wand or anything else) was actually being used to make melee attacks.

 

[Xarlen]

What's really sick are the mounted archers, can we say full attack and a whole lot of movement so I can keep my distance.

Horse. Kill the Horse. Blind the horse. Cause Fear the horse. Let's see that archer get potshots when his horse is fleeing in mortal terror.

 

[Shard O'Glase]

Horse. Kill the Horse. Blind the horse. Cause Fear the horse. Let's see that archer get potshots when his horse is fleeing in mortal terror.

at low levels sure maybe. But if I'ma mounted character you better bet I'm riding a stone horse at the least by at the latest 7th level.

 

[Xarlen]

Stone horse?

 

[Shard O'Glase]

Stone horse?

I think that's what it's called. It's a magic item, basically a permanently animated block of stone carved like a horse. It works like a horse, but has DR10. Only problem is healing it, you either have to turn stone to flesh and then heal it, or feed it gems. Now it can still take damage, but it takes so little damage most foes would find attacking it a fruitless task, especially when somoone is pepering you with arrows, or smacking you down with spells.

 

[hong]

Now it can still take damage, but it takes so little damage most foes would find attacking it a fruitless task, especially when somoone is pepering you with arrows, or smacking you down with spells.

D00d, if you can get a stone horse, I am sure the bad guys can get ways of dealing with it.

 

[Shard O'Glase]

D00d, if you can get a stone horse, I am sure the bad guys can get ways of dealing with it.

Sure the DM can screw you over whenever he wants. But sometimes if he does it you know he is doing it to screw you over, and not because it makes sense. Foes targeting something with a hardness of 10, when they have many other problems to deal with at least tends to show DMs trying to screw you over and not because it makes sense.