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Crossbows Enhanced Plus Slingbow

Tired of your enemies looking like pin-cushions? Want to kill enemies with fewer bolts, but without making crossbows too overpowered?
Well maybe this mod is for you then!

Crossbows are extremely powerful in Kenshi. A combination of their ability to flinch repeatedly, high DPS, and high bleedout rates can make crossbows potent even as a short-range weapon.

This mod aims to fix all of these problems as well as adding an extra item, mostly for fun. Firstly, there are stat tweaks and secondly, there is a new item called the Modified Slingbow.

Stat Tweaks:
-ALL CROSSBOWS: ~50% increased damage (rounded up), ~50% slower reload (rounded down), and 25% reduced bleed rate (not scaled, a flat 25% reduction, i.e. Tooth Picks have 25% bleed instead of 50% bleed). This should (in theory) mean that crossbows have approximately the same raw damage output as vanilla Kenshi, but with less bleed. This means crossbows are slightly nerfed overall and are less about constant damage and more about burst damage.
-Spring Bat: Bleeding was only reduced by 10% instead of 25%. Bolts [Heavies] just feel like they'd puncture pretty deep and the Spring Bat felt like it could use some love.

What this means in terms of strategy is that you have to place your archers further from the fight and allow them even more space to reload. This forces you to either have a strong defensive line in your squad to prevent enemies from reaching your archers or to have your archers at least somewhat proficient in melee combat. However, with proper strategy, you should still see almost the same high damage output that vanilla crossbows can achieve.

New Item:
Modified Slingbow - Same damage and reload stats as the Junkbow, but with far lower bleed, slightly worse range, and slightly worse accuracy.

The ammo for the Modified Slingbow is a new item called Small Rocks. Small Rocks can be gathered by building a Small Rock Pile, which has no building requirements. You find Small Rock Pile under CAMPING category and Ammo subsection of the build menu. The Small Rock Pile is dependent on Stone %, but even with a low Stone %, it still does not take long to gather. This is why the Modified Slingbow is so weak, it essentially has infinite ammo. You just have to stop and gather the ammo first.

The Modified Slingbow is sold at shops you would typically find crossbows and can be crafted after unlocking Crossbow Crafting.

If you just want the new Slingbow item without the rest of the crossbow changes, see my standalone version below:
https://steamcommunity.com/sharedfiles/filedetails/?id=2896972489

You can also install both. This mod uses slightly altered names from my Slingbow Vanilla Standalone mod, so both are compatible as well. Installing both makes sense if you still want at least one crossbow with low damage and fast reload for the purpose of training your squad.

I'd also highly recommend installing No More Light Stagger as well. Even with the slower reload speeds, it still feels really easy to flinch in Kenshi and I like this mod a lot. It's located at the link below:
https://steamcommunity.com/sharedfiles/filedetails/?id=2699872745

You can also pair this mod with Better Crossbows, located at the following link:
https://steamcommunity.com/sharedfiles/filedetails/?id=2116113418

Better Crossbows makes interesting stat changes that make each crossbow viable in certain situations, rather than just almost always selecting Eagle Cross as your best choice. My only issue with Better Crossbows is the insane buff to crossbow reload speed. So if you want to use both mods, you MUST make sure Crossbows Enhanced Plus Slingbow is LOWER in your mod order. Otherwise you'll have increased damage AND super fast-firing crossbows. Of course, if that sounds appealing to you, then go for it and swap the order!

This mod edits vanilla crossbows, so you if you want to keep the changes made by this mod, make sure it's lower than any other crossbow mods you have that edit damage, reload speed, or bleed rate. The Slingbow is a new addition, rather than a vanilla edit, so it should still show up in most cases.

P.S. The previous version of this mod was a 100% change to both damage and reload (aka double damage, doubly slow reload) rather than 50%. After many hours of playtesting, I decided that this swung crossbows too far into the burst damage category. Hopefully the 50% changes will be a nice middle ground. Please let me know how you feel about the new stat changes! I'm open to feedback and really want to make slower firing, more powerful vanilla crossbows without breaking the balance of the game.

If you enjoy my mod, feel free to hit that 👍
Positive ratings let me know I'm doing a good job! 😊
I appreciate all feedback, so please leave a comment! I read every single one of them!

I'm also working on updating all my old mods, so I'd love it if you checked them out. They're featured on my workshop page:
https://steamcommunity.com/id/2PercentNate/myworkshopfiles/?appid=233860

Permissions & Use
Feel free to translate, edit, chop up, deep fry, or otherwise modify my mods to your heart’s content. All of my mods are freely distributed. If you end up editing one, I’d really appreciate receiving credit with a link to the original mod. It’s not required, but it would make my day! 😊