crossbow for hero suck...

[Kanjejou]

no special shot meaning once the battle line is drawn bow user will hit harder every time
why dont hey have a special shot? for three point

[アンジェル]

Originally posted by Kanjejou:

crossbow for hero suck...
no special shot meaning once the battle line is drawn bow user will hit harder every time
why dont hey have a special shot? for three point

They have other advantages. And there are better crossbows. Skypiercer and Ricochet are killer weapons.

[CrUsHeR]

Honestly i never really pondered the question of warfare heroes.
Reason is that support+magic heroes make your armies so much more powerful.

If you have a fighter hero, he needs great loot to perform similar to a unit which may not be available at all. He also usually lacks the core abilities of units; example a High Archer Hero never gets the Seeker Missiles from being Awakened, meaning he always has 1 less range than your archer units. He doesn't get the Seeker Missiles unit enchant, another 1 less range than Legendary rank archers. He doesn't get the Amp-Arrows upgrade, so no chain lightning multihits. And so on.

Additionally, he needs to invest into his warfare skills first to not be a liability to his army, which means you do not get to take the support skills including precision- and endurance training early on, which really really bogs down the whole army performance massively.

Abilities also vary a lot between cultures; example High and Dark get the Exposing Light and Sundering Curse respectively, turning them into upgraded versions of the Awakener and Warlock. So it would be really stupid to spec into something else with any hero.

[Seswatha]

Mobility, killing momentum and ignoring 5 armor makes crossbows way better than bows in my opinion.

[deadsanta]

Originally posted by Seswatha:

Mobility, killing momentum and ignoring 5 armor makes crossbows way better than bows in my opinion.

+weapon dmg adds are just better x3 rather than x1.5 for an xbow, and the elemental damage ignores all armor anyway, goes up against RES. Then there are like 10 games in a row where you never even get an xbow upgrade, at all, but I've had numerous monster bow and eagle bows. But let's face it: All archery sucks compared to 1h/s, magic, or lance.

Weaver > all.

[Seswatha]

Originally posted by deadsanta:

Originally posted by Seswatha:

Mobility, killing momentum and ignoring 5 armor makes crossbows way better than bows in my opinion.

+weapon dmg adds are just better x3 rather than x1.5 for an xbow, and the elemental damage ignores all armor anyway, goes up against RES. Then there are like 10 games in a row where you never even get an xbow upgrade, at all, but I've had numerous monster bow and eagle bows. But let's face it: All archery sucks compared to 1h/s, magic, or lance.

Weaver > all.

They do but they aren't very strong hero skills in my opinion, there's often better stuff to spend skill points on, plus you won't get too many of them unless you're spamming t1 tomes anyway. And even if you have a lot of elemental damage skills with a bow, it's not like you won't still deal a good chunk of physical damage, plus you're not ignoring resistance either. Whereas a crossbow can ignore the elemental damage perks and deal full physical damage while ignoring 5 armour, which in practice would be smth like +66% damage multiplier for targets with 5 or more armour.

From MP experience you don't want a hero with a melee weapon, they will get focused down, especially if it's your ruler. You can give sword + shield to a mage just for tanking and cast magic aoes from range anyway tho.

From SP both lance and crossbow are quite good for killing 2 units per turn.

Weaver is good though it's getting indirectly nerfed a bit with Spur to Action and Summon nerfs. Still top tier.

[HolyGrail]

Originally posted by deadsanta:

Originally posted by Seswatha:

Mobility, killing momentum and ignoring 5 armor makes crossbows way better than bows in my opinion.

Weaver > all.

God your army composition must be SOOOOOOO fun

[The Doctor]

It's not the best but being able to move several hexes to get a good shot, have one action point left and deliver a very hard hit is not to be sneezed at.

Having said that, I wouldn't pick a crossbow for my hero. If I wanted ranged, I'd go with magic instead.

[Howell-Barrex Soldier Ja'kala]

IMO Trueshot is the only ranged weapon worth using on a hero base 5 range, can be used in enemy zone of control, always has 100% accuracy, and killing momentum refund lets you hit a target twice with it

[StopSolo&HelpTeam]

My somewhat-mage countess uses a crossbow, and I don't even build her as an archer.

Xbow hits as hard as a staff while allowing to stay on horse. To do the same amount of damage a globe would require two actions.

So I can spend 3 actions positioning myself, then cast a 3 action spell the next turn. Between the two, I shoot a free quarrel.

[Aluminum Elite Master]

Originally posted by SR:

Xbow hits as hard as a staff while allowing to stay on horse. To do the same amount of damage a globe would require two actions.

This is a good observation, and something I noticed, too.

I like x-bow if there's a good mount I have. It's a non-magic staff without the limitation on a mount. Unicorn mount + x-bow means I can often get in range of almost anything on the tactical map after the first turn... good movement, then it also has blink/teleport.

[PrawnWonton]

Crossbow units should be treated similar to skirmishers, with being able to move and shoot for full damage. This means you should be flanking all the time.

If you sit in a battle line and trade hits with archers, you will do less damage. If you run around and flank, you will do more. This is why arbalests are very underrated when people use them like archers.

There are some killer higher tier hero crossbows. But like all weapons, if you are stuck with low tier ones they aren't that great.

[M0rgi]

Before you get killing momentum bows are better after getting it i would rather have a crosbow then bow just because of better mobility

[Dent]

Arbalests are fragile though.