# Greatbow balance

**URL:** <https://discourse.cataclysmdda.org/t/greatbow-balance/17474>\
**Category:** The Drawing Board\
**Created:** [November 13, 2018, 9:59pm UTC](https://discourse.cataclysmdda.org/t/greatbow-balance/17474 "2018-11-13T21:59:03Z")\
**Posts on this page:** 1\
**Showing post:** 12

<div class="post-metadata">

**Author:** ![Tamior](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/t/41988e/32.png) [@Tamior](https://discourse.cataclysmdda.org/u/Tamior)\
**Post date:** [November 14, 2018, 10:52am UTC](https://discourse.cataclysmdda.org/t/greatbow-balance/17474/12 "2018-11-14T10:52:51Z")

</div>

> [@Bows, Crossbows and Their Balance](https://discourse.cataclysmdda.org/t/bows-crossbows-and-their-balance/17067/187):
>
> Due to the size and shape you have a relatively small window wherein you can actually use your muscles, whereas a bow basically allows you to use your full upper body strength from the end of one arm to your chin/jaw.

You can use your whole upper body to trust a spear as well. Not to mention the spear will have your whole weight behind the hit and you can keep applying the force after the initial impact.  
All-in-all I don’t see any good reason why bow will scale the damage with raw user strength more that a melee weapon would.

> [@Bows, Crossbows and Their Balance](https://discourse.cataclysmdda.org/t/bows-crossbows-and-their-balance/17067/187):
>
> Is it realistic? Sounds like melee might have a scaling issue, maybe. Not my field of expertise.

But that’s literally the whole issue.  
You are introducing a bow that effectively scales the damage with strength at 350% the rate melee weapons do.  
What exactly is your baseline for greatbow having +25 damage over longbow? Why not +7, as a spear would? Why not +60?

> [@Bows, Crossbows and Their Balance](https://discourse.cataclysmdda.org/t/bows-crossbows-and-their-balance/17067/187):
>
> In terms of game balance, the issue is that you’re comparing a bottom end spear to a mid-ish range bow, one that requires a specific build to even use. You can’t argue that the general balance is off because the average player literally can’t even use the weapon without substantial mutations or bionics

Again, ANY build can start with 18 str no matter the mutations or bionics. That’s a simple fact of how the game actually works.  
And we are talking about damage scaling here, and damage scales with strength the same for all spears and all melee weapons (high end or low end or whatever).

Actually, can you please specify what exactly is your position here:

- greatbow is a “unique” weapon that should not be balanced with how the rest of the weapons in the game scale?
- greatbow is still a normal bow and, thus, 31 base damage with 16 min str and 27 base damage with 14 min str bows can also be introduced?

---

_[View the full topic](https://discourse.cataclysmdda.org/t/greatbow-balance/17474)._