I just realised how insane is Devourer of Metal in E-kun hands.

[ptirodaktill]

4d6 base dmg with huricane bow+enlarge humanoid. 19-20 crit range feat free and x3 crits. And e-kun can become a Shelin inquisitor with luck domain. His dmg output is quite insane for most part of the game, till mirror bow get to play. Also you can let Regongar to enchant that bow for some extra juice =)

[forkofspite]

It's an excellent bow throughout the game, and generally superior to the mirror bow (might be remembering incorrectly, but I think damage reduction applies to each of the extra "mirrored" attacks even if you have the clustered shot feat). There are only two bows I would consider using over the devourer:

* A bow you can import via Varnhold's Lot, but it's useless in some circumstances
* A late-game bow with a natural 19-20 crit range (so improved crit makes it 17-20)

Be careful with enlarge person and the devourer of metal. The bow itself imposes a -2 penalty on attack rolls, and enlarge person imposes an extra -2 penalty on attack rolls (-1 for size and -1 for reduced dex). The extra damage is good - averages 4.5 per hit (extra d6 from size and extra +1 from strength increase) - but sometimes need to be careful stacking on too many penalties to attack rolls.

[grognardgary]

Originally posted by forkofspite:

It's an excellent bow throughout the game, and generally superior to the mirror bow (might be remembering incorrectly, but I think damage reduction applies to each of the extra "mirrored" attacks even if you have the clustered shot feat). There are only two bows I would consider using over the devourer:

* A bow you can import via Varnhold's Lot, but it's useless in some circumstances
* A late-game bow with a natural 19-20 crit range (so improved crit makes it 17-20)

Be careful with enlarge person and the devourer of metal. The bow itself imposes a -2 penalty on attack rolls, and enlarge person imposes an extra -2 penalty on attack rolls (-1 for size and -1 for reduced dex). The extra damage is good - averages 4.5 per hit (extra d6 from size and extra +1 from strength increase) - but sometimes need to be careful stacking on too many penalties to attack rolls.

Does it work with hurricane bow?

[ptirodaktill]

Hurricane bow stack with enlargement/legandary proportions.
Touch of good + greater invis early on, then shatter defence later on and you never miss outside of nat 1.

[Frostfeather]

Devourer of Metal is fantastic, yeah.

But Mythslayer's eventual 8d8+5 damage per hit with a higher crit range is fun too. And you can grab it shortly after you can get Devourer.

[Jeffreyac]

Originally posted by forkofspite:

Be careful with enlarge person and the devourer of metal. The bow itself imposes a -2 penalty on attack rolls,

ah-HA! My main is also a full ranger, and uses devourer of metal. Recently I added Ekun, mostly because I was running companion quests, but I found I liked having two bows and two pets running around wrecking things - but I could never figure out why Ekun seemed to be more accurate than my ranger despite similar ability scores, level, and feats...

I finally chalked it up to my imagination, not really digging into it - but if my main uses devourer, and Ekun has a +1 frost bow, I think, then maybe it's the penalty from the bow...

[ptirodaktill]

Mirror bow is its own thing. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=MI4Qb6wXO-k
Eldrich scounderl-АТ-Vivi can reach 15d6 with it.

[Orion Pax]

Yeah two archers in a team is really strong. They are efficient damage dealer because they almost always should be able to land a full round of attacks. And once they kill something, they pivot to target something else. A melee can only do that if there is something next to what they kill.

As for longbows, unfortunately there seems to be a dearth of strong bows other than Devourer for much of the game, until the end where there are a ton of options. Mirror Bow is a great one. I really dig Hunter's Blessing (from the same artisan, level 5), as it gives a big sacred bonus to DEX and does holy damage.

Probably the 1st really good bow after Devourer is available after Varnhold Vanishing, if you've completed the Varnhold's Lot DLC: Longbow of the Cold Moon. Only thing with that one is if an enemy is immune to cold, it won't do any damage.

Oddly, the wiki page is missing a lot of info on longbows.

[Aeon]

Originally posted by Jeffreyac:

Originally posted by forkofspite:

I finally chalked it up to my imagination, not really digging into it - but if my main uses devourer, and Ekun has a +1 frost bow, I think, then maybe it's the penalty from the bow...

That frost bow is purely cold dmg right? Maybe because of that, it uses touch AC instead of normal AC? (Touch AC is generally lower than normal AC)

[Janthis]

I've also got Ekun with that bow in my party and I think he's tied with Amiri for highest DPS, easily first place if we also count his wolf. Do people usually keep him as straight ranger or is it useful to add some other classes in?

[Orion Pax]

Originally posted by Johnny_B_80:

I've also got Ekun with that bow in my party and I think he's tied with Amiri for highest DPS, easily first place if we also count his wolf. Do people usually keep him as straight ranger or is it useful to add some other classes in?

Both are common and strong. Ranger keeps full BAB, continues progression of Favored Enemy & Terrain bonuses, and spells too. Spells aren’t Rangers' main thing, but they do have some key buffs that help, like Hurricane Bow, Barkskin, and buffs for your pet.

One issue with multiclassing is if you go to a class that does not support a pet, the pet will stall levels.

So a common combo is 3 levels of Sacred Huntsmaster (an Inquisitor subclass), because it keeps your pet progression, and at level 3 you get a free Teamwork feat, which applies to you and your pet. (Most take Outflank). This makes your pet much better melee teammate, even if it doesn’t do lots of damage, now it can be a flanking partner for any other melee to give that Outflank attack bonus and Crit attack of opportunity.

Also helpful are a few Inquisitor spells: True Strike, Divine Favor, Shield of Faith (a good pet buff), among others.

I tend to take those 3 levels pretty early with Ekun to get to Outflank, like Ranger to 6 or 7 and then the 3 Sacred Huntsmaster levels. With a main character or merc, likely as early as possible to take Outflank at level 5 with 3rd Huntsmaster level.

[ptirodaktill]

Originally posted by Johnny_B_80:

I've also got Ekun with that bow in my party and I think he's tied with Amiri for highest DPS, easily first place if we also count his wolf. Do people usually keep him as straight ranger or is it useful to add some other classes in?

Inquisitor scale better with both dmg and AB, it also fit him stat-wise. Cons of inquisitor is that a lot of his buffs are round/lvl and require pre-fight activation to get most of it.The pet is overrated in terms of what it does in combat. Out of all companions Nok-Nok has the most DPR potential, followed by Ekun and Octavia.

[Chan]

Even better in the hands of a fighter bow user because you can compensate for the negatives very easily. Currently deleting most enemies on unfair with a fighter and it's just awesome.

[ptirodaktill]

Fighter is the worst out there .You can`t benefit of early feats as archer and you loose both huricane bow and aspec of falcon. Also Ranger scale better that fighter against Favored Enemies for entire game.

[Frostfeather]

Originally posted by ptirodaktill:

Fighter is the worst out there .You can`t benefit of early feats as archer and you loose both huricane bow and aspec of falcon. Also Ranger scale better that fighter against Favored Enemies for entire game.

Eh, Fighter is one of the better archer choices for the very early game *because* of the Feats, especially on Unfair.

I'm sure straight-up Fighter isn't quite as min/maxed for damage by the end of the game, but you could always multiclass for Hurricane Bow. Or you can use items for Hurricane Bow and Aspect for harder fights (you don't need it for trash anyway).

And Fighter archer has a sort of niche as an archer/offtank hybrid with Point Blank Master. Just saying, it's a bit misleading to say they're the "worst".

[Orion Pax]

For martial builds in general, a timely Fighter dip is always, well timely. It gets you an extra feat right now and keeps your BAB up. The latter also helps with feat progression for lower BAB classes, as many important feats require certain BABs.

All that to say, if your main jam isn't' Fighter all the way, it's first 2 levels are still there for you if you want to grab some feats. I wouldn't do that with Ekun though, since it nerfs the pet without a good enough return IMHO.