Quick Note on the Serpent Bow to clarify. You CAN hold it in your offhand to get the bonus poison buildup of the serpent bow ITSELF, but if the bow you fire the arrows with is not the Serpent Bow, the status arrows won't get the bonus arcane scaling. On the Serpent Bow Status sheet at the 12:35 mark, the bonus you can get by holding this bow in your offhand is in the brackets under the Arcane. The Arrow status buildup on the same screen is for when you fire with the Serpent Bow.
So hang on- you mean if you're using a serpent bow in your right hand, but have one also in your off hand (on your back), youll get increased poison buildup? Thats sick!
One small thing about the Black Bow: it slows you down when shooting on horseback, like any other longbow. The "true" shortbows can be fired when gallopping.
In DS1 there was an extremely obscure mechanic where headshots did something like 10-30% damage to metal helmeted targets depending on whether the helmet was open-faced!
@@FloraOfTheCats Maybe it was just around at the right time of my life, but I've played everything From's made except Sekiro, and I think they haven't topped DS1 as either a single player or multiplayer experience. The multiplayer largely benefitted from jank mechanics, the two covenants were good. There were toggle escapes, counter BSes, dead angles on almost anything, yet the whole game always felt somehow clicked-in in a way. Hosts had no advantage besides estus, which was easy to punish with a BS, or chain BS if you just didn't like them. Of course those were escapable if you really knew what you were doing. It felt like knowing the jank let you do anything.
The golem archers dropping regular greatarrows far more often than the golem greatarrows is seriously one of the least well-known shames in the game. I seriously hope that, when the inevitable DLC is released, a vendor pops up that actually sells golem greatarrows and (somewhat) rights this strange wrong. Make them over 1000 runes a pop if you must so the normal greatarrows are still a decent budget option.
@@craigslaunwhite579 I would love some, have none of them. Anything you want for your character? I’m on PS and have most other things if you want anything?
it literally doesn't even make sense either. They even drop 2 different kinds of golem arrows why did they feel the need to make them drop regular ass ones too?
I know it’s been nearly a year since this was posted, but in case anyone scrolls the comments- golden arrows (with fully upgraded bow) one shot skeletons and Beastman skeletons, you don’t need to kill them twice. They come in super handy in catacombs, graves, and Farum Azula
Something very important about Might Shot on the Serpent Bow is that it has extra increased status build up (not just poison). I tested this with bleed arrows yesterday. Pretty cool! I think it’s the most fun PVE bow
To make it clear in text form: The Serpent Bow increases poison buildup as a "passive effect". But it also has arcane scaling, which allows any other status that scales with arc to scale said status on the arrow with your arc stat.
Pretty sure every bow has increased status build up if you use mighty shot. That's just a quality of mighty shot, not of the serpent bow specifically. Could be wrong tho, but don't think I am
Can confirm. However, to clarify, Serpent Bow's arcane scaling was fixed so it now applies status quicker than any other bow. Serpent Bow was poisoning targets at least twice as fast as Black Bow with just basic shots. Pretty good for applying ranged status pressure. Took like three arrows to bleed a frost troll.
Just quickly advocating for the harp bow. It's the lowest weight shortbow which actually translates to similar AR at lower investments when you calculate the damage bonus to the arrows, too. It also drains less stamina compared to the other bows. It's not a lot less, but it is noticeable. My build is actually a faith build based around optimizing bestial sling and the lower shortbow weight directly translates to higher bestial sling damage. It also makes pretty noises.
Thank you for advocating for the harp bow. It's a shame you can't even infuse it with an ash of war. Still fun to use and works with the dancer talisman.
I’m making a tarnished nomadic merchant build using faith as well. The harp bow is the main weapon with the madness incantations for support. It’s pretty cool and a fun thematic package with the harp bow similar to the instruments the other merchants have.
1:44 - Both of the fletched shatter shard and rainbow stone arrows are uncraftable, despite their descriptions stating otherwise - we need to raise some awareness about this or it’ll never get fixed!
Theres something incredibly important you didn't mention. ELEMENTAL ARROWS HAVE SCALING!!! If an arrow has an element, and the bow scales with that element, the arrows will deal more damage. This means Lightning arrows are actually very good, since they scale with dex on all bows. And extremely well by my calculations, doing 4-5 extra damage per point in Dex.
It pretty much is but golden arrows, they kill skeleton (tombs and beast men) without needing to hit them again when they reform, if your bow is upgraded you can one shot them and they won’t reappear, holy damage kills them outright, no reforming
Fletched arrows should have flown faster for PVP or something as it's so easy to dodge arrows. But the main advantage of having both Fletched and normal is it doubles your arrow pool for that status. Arrow crafting should yield more per craft though, it's pretty lame resting at sites of grace to then go and collect more resources and you use soo many arrows to fight a boss compared to no time investment in melee or magic. They could have at least made enemies and items respawn over time in open areas so you don't need to always rest etc. One thing I think Monster Hunter did really well. Also it was very disappointing to see drawstring greases weren't for bows or that successive hit effects aren't effected by bows.
I main bows, and switch out my equip based on what I'm up against in PvE. Black Bow for NPC invaders and other agile enemies, Pulley Bow for sniping to clear out mobs, and Longbow with Rain of Arrows for dragons and other large slow enemies.
I’ve found the Erdtree Greatbow to be very powerful when stacking buffs correctly, it also helps that you can buff it directly with your physick flask, very solid secondary weapon for a strength faith build
For those looking to do a bow only run: Longbow/albinauric bow with rain of arrows is going to be your go to for applying status especially to large bosses. Wish I could say I found the serpent bow to be more effective, but it's basically just a pvp/single small target bow. Radahn spears + lion greatbow with the ash of war is going to be your boss shredder if they have high status resistance.
Black Bow with Barrage and Bleed Arrows are viable as well, especially if you have Lord of Blood's Exhultation, Spear or Arrow's Sting, and Shard of Alexander Talismans.
@@joeyjones9041 oh absolutely. It's just that in my run I didn't end up getting much use out of it for fighting the big bosses when I could proc bleed with just one or two rain of arrows. I mostly just used the black bow for clearing small enemies, mobs, npc invadors, and for pvp
looks like 1.7x in the spreadsheet, slow animation tho, even end delay iirc on that topic barrage is 0.75x per shot, I assume pulley xbow deals 1.0x3 but don't actually know
This video is a gold mine of information. Thx you so much. I hesitated between black bow and serpent bow for a status build (the 2 upgrade with somber stones to make it even worse). I think ill go for the serpent bow.
Edit: Good job as always, Chrightt. Not sure if anyone has mentioned it yet or not but I'm fairly certain you can apply the Golden Great Arrow's version of Golden Vow on enemies as an invader. I haven't tested it out personally but from what I've seen from dangitjim's videos, this is the case.
@@Chrightt pretty sure, ye. I just recall dangitjim using it on the haligtree knights in an invasion video but I imagine it has to have applications to other enemies when you're an invader as well. I'm curious to see if it would be the PvE or PvP buff applied to them or not. Just an open thought. lol
I know it might not be worth to cover in a whole new video, but would you be interested digging deeper into Ballistas? (Jar Cannon and Hand Ballista respectively) I know everyone who uses them just applies some buffs and calls it a day, but I was curious to see if there was more to it. For example, are the elemental bolts affected by scorpion charms and tears? do the bolts do poise damage? (I know stormwing arrows do) If so, are they affected by the stonebarb tear and such? Is the ballista damage affected by jumping attacks buffs? What about thrusting damage? (Spear Talisman) Are they affected by RKR? Anyways, love your content, keep it up!
The only reason I like Fletched vs Unfletched is that it lets me have two stacks of essentially the same arrow. Really handy for taking out some annoying bosses and mini-bosses. Lion Greatbow is my favorite bow in the whole game. Thanks for letting me know that the Radahn Spears are the best option for it and that it double-stacks with two of the bows.
@@Chrightt I mean, I tend to have enough for that just so I can have the foul-foot too. But yeah, walking int Castle Sol with two stacks of poison and rot arrows because some use feathers and other don't means that I have nearly FOUR HUNDRED arrows to pelt the Commander with from a safe spot outside the boss arena XD
Chright I just wanted to let you know I actually have a pen and paper when ever you upload idk if it means anything but I just wanted to let you know there’s someone who takes notes on your analysis
I don't get why Fromsoft didn't allow affinities on bows. It feels deliberately restrictive and not in a good way. I prefer having to deal with decent bow builds in PVP than have them be regulated into "weak and forgettable" (except Lion's Greatbow ofc)
It's silly. I think they were afraid it'd be op but with resistance resetting like I doubt it. It's frustrating and really underpowered bows. Why can we make a bow a quality or keen bow??? So odd
Bow base scaling is terrible, so it ends up feeling like bow affinity was the intention from the beginning, but then they skimped and didn't do it. No affinity would be more acceptable if there were more bows with elemental damage like the Horn Bow, and if they were actually good. A bow that deals magic damage is worthless if it's just crappier than it's peers in pretty much every way. This is one thing I hope they will change with patches, but I am not too optimistic. Arrows are already so slow that a player drinking their flask and slow walking can side-step them. They should at least deal good damage. Between the annoyance of having to shoot enemies like 8+ times to kill them (I'm cringing just thinking about fighting late-game enemies with bows) and having to constantly stock ammo, it feels like bows just weren't intended to be primary weapons. But I think that anything should be viable as a primary weapon. I don't see the harm in giving bows a boost, and making certain ammo easier to get (Golem Great Arrows).
@@lammyjammy i think they think that bows remove a key element of the game, rolling with I frames and timing dodges, but that's not true in practice since bosses are so big and mobile and mostly have long range attacks. So it's a weird combination of like, the game being ready for bows, but them not giving people options to use them seriously in the game. They compensate with mechanisms (headshots) but with a bad aiming mechanic it's like silly
A quick note: The erdtree bow is one of my favorite PVE options as a bow, since it gets a massive damage bonus + permakill effect vs skeletons, which is really useful in areas like farum azula with large packs of them or enemy skelly snipers. Edit: Also, for a question,does the horn bow have any effect on cold status scaling since it has int scaling?
@@TroidHunter cold status only scales with weapon upgrade level. Cold infusions add Magic damage, which scales with Intelligence, and Cold-based weapon arts usually have a Magic damage component that scales with Intelligence, but the status itself does not. Cold, Death, and Scarlet Rot statuses do not scale with any character stat.
@@joemency2242 madness does scale with Arcane, such as the Frenzy Flame incantations, if used with Dragon Communion seal, the only one with Arcane scaling. For melee weapons, the weapon would have to have Arcane scaling, and the only "weapon" that has Madness and can have Arcane scaling is Fingerprint Stone Greatshield. There's no grease or weapon buff spell for Madness buildup, right now.
I'd imagine the erdtree great bow could outperform any bow against undead. I'd hope that's the case. Not sure if Skeletons resist thrust damage like they do in previous games.
The regular standing shot of the Black Bow is slow like regular bows. This is why I prefer short bows. Having to sprint, jump, or roll to shoot arrows quickly isn’t always the best choice.
Perfect timing! Just yesterday I started a sort of challenge run with some friends and I went with bow only, but I was thinking to mix some support incantations. Do you have any recommendations on this approach? (PVE) Bow only with some faith. Great video!
I think flame grant me strength would be best, it gives more damage than golden vow(20% VS 15% PVE) and a small stamina regen buff which helps a lot with light bows.
I think if you're going to be doing it with friends you can value raw damage and support a bit more. Basically, I would pick a bow over a light bow as even with black bow you're losing a chunk of AR for having moves like dodge attack. I would probably go for an infusable option like the Albinauric on a dex leaning build with something like rain of arrows to help clear AoE/boss and do aimed shots the rest of the time with incantation support.
Something to note is that the Black Bow cannot be used while galloping on torrent but other light bows can. This is likely to effect your choice for pve on a bow run.
Maybe if you're only using one bow the whole run and rely too much on horse combat in the open world. Even then, that advantage doesn't outweigh everything else the black bow has going for it.
@@overlorddante I mention it mostly because using a short bow while galloping is fun as hell and can help with some really hard bosses like Radahn if you use rot and poison arrows. It is also worth noting the red branch bow in particular has very similar damage to composite but is lighter and less str required. When it comes to PVE i just don't think it is so black and white
@@badthunder115 Dwelling Arrows are nice if you know the enemy is weak to magic damage. They also get a damage bonus when used with the Horn Bow, and can be purchased from a merchant.
@@badthunder115 sorry for the dely, i just suggested those two because you can purchase an inffinite amount of those ones from vendors and don't have to craft
@@daveb305 don't worry man and I must say I don't really use bows but on my arcane build I like the serpent arrows and normal arrows because it builds so much poison that one serpent arrow usually get the proc also the regular ones I use them for damage and if the enemy has low immunity the poisoning passive procs with one or two arrows Sadly the sleep ones and the rot ones are limited and as far as I know there is no not crafted rot arrow
You said the full moveset of a lightbow is on the black bow but that isnt entirely true. The standard light attacks are slow on black bow and also you cant use them on horse back like the other light bows. This is very small difference but for pvp having a faster r1 might come in handy in situations. Personally im gonna go for missbegotten on a strength build as i want that faster r1.
Ah yes, this is true. I was definitely speaking more in terms of PVP for this part xD where you would either just do the non-regular attacks and obviously no mount.
One thing you didn’t mention is whether 2 Radahns has a higher AR for the Radahn Spear than off-hand Radahn + Golem. I think you implied that it didn’t, right?
You are wrong about Serpent Bow. If you hold Serpent Bow in left hand and shoot stuff with a different bow or crossbow held in right hand, it will get poison build up. I tested this myself yesterday with Pulley Crossbow.
Whatever amount of poison it adds to other bows has to be tiny. I legit tried this yesterday and I killed a troll with over 15 arrows testing this and never got a poison. It’s basically useless
Sorry about this. I think I forgot to subtract the decay when I held it off-hand especially considering the time I had to wait for stamina to come back or something. I went to re-test it. The base poison buildup does indeed carry over to the main bow, just not the arcane scaling for firing status arrows. Added a pin.
@@Chrightt it wasn't that bad, it just startled me a bit and made some of the commentary a bit harder to hear over the gameplay itself But like i said, great video as always, this one in particular is extra nice because bows are probably the most interesting weapons to use in Souls games
I read in reddit, it's said that fire arrow and golden arrow scale with faith scale of Erdtree Bow. So if my build is Dex/Faith, against beast type enemies that is weak against fire, is it better to use Erdtree Bow than Albinauric Bow?
Hello Crightt, thanks very much for producing the most valuable Elden Ring content on UA-cam. I have a question regarding the stacking of the Lion great bow passive. Would holding two of these and using Radahn's spears as ammunition not beat the Golem AR in all cases? You mention that having a Golem primary and Lion secondary is optimal, is that because the Golem AR is high enough that it outdoes even the multiplicative double Lion passive? I ask because I am interested in a build entirely centered around maximizing the damage of Radahn's rain
Yes, it wouldn't outdo the golem's. The base AR of the Golem's typically beats firing with the Radahn's. For reference you can see my other vid too: ua-cam.com/video/7aou7T44aZs/v-deo.html
You said the Lion's bonus is applied after defense calculations. Does this mean defense is calculated form raw AR*MV only? Also are buffs applied over the reduced damage (after defense calculations) or on the full amount (before defense calculations)?
There are a lot of weapons which are objectively worse and serve virtually no purpose, and I can't fathom a reason for their addition to the game other than a dopamine trigger when you find them as treasure. FromSoftware works in mysterious ways
What is the use case for bows to supplement a pve build? You made offhand comments about using bows as utility for a non-bow build (eg rather than deliberately going quality stat spread to maximize how damage). But what does using a bow for utility entail? Is it just using the bow to pull an enemy from a group before switching to melee to actually fight it? If that is the use case, does it matter which bow and arrow to use? Shouldn't you just go for the bow with the lowest stat reqs or lightest weight, and use the cheapest arrows? And if it is for applying status, a 15 faith and 12 arcane investment will grant any build access to rotten breath and dragonice, both of which can fully apply either scarlet rot, or Frostbite the status to most bosses in a single burst if you have over 108 fp, even if you do not invest any additional faith or arcane. You can just open any boss fight with one or both of those two moves to instantly guarantee the status on a non-immune boss. As for applying poison on a build that doesn't have poison infused into one of the melee weapons that the build powerstancing, is it actually worth the time to switch to bow to apply the poison when poison does so little damage? Effective dps of the status bow is much lower than effective dps of powerstancing melee, right? Would the total damage you gain from poison throughout the fight, even match the damage you lose from not powerstance striking the target with melee dps during that time? On top of that, is it worth carrying the additional weight of a bow just for status application? Dragon communion seal has zero weight, and can apply rot or ice on virtually any non-immune target in a single cast. Infusing one of your melee weapons with poison/occult costs zero weight. Using a poison bow takes a lot of weight, and costs a lot of effective dps during a boss fight, never mind the cost of arrows. So what is the actual use case for a bow in PvE other than cheesing an enemy who cannot get to you?
@@juli3754 How are they more fun than spells and incantations? They seem to serve the same function but do a worse job at it and have less variety. As for cool, I guess that's subjective. But if something gets power creeped or outclassed by a bunch of other options, I have a hard time finding it cool.
A ranged attack on a non spellcasting build. The situation comes up more often then you might think, especially if you have a more methodical playstyle like myself. When you have a bow, you just kind of think "Oh, that might be useful here." I used the shit out of the dragonrider bow in DS2, even though I got it on a whim. Actual example of uses include: Killing snipers without having to run seven hundred miles to get to where they are, especially if they are overwatching for other enemies. Luring out smaller enemies supporting a bigger enemy so you can fight them one on one. Getting sneak attack damage bonus when getting close undetected would be impossible. Etc.
Personally, I think for PVE, bow is not that strong but definitely a different play style. I would mostly use bows to pick off targets to prevent engaging in groups. With status effect arrows + barrage you can also effectively apply status effects from afar as a str/dex build on bosses you might be struggling with. I think bows are more of a way to help you decrease the difficulty of some battles through a different approach for PVE. As for speed, bows definitely won't make you faster, but I'd still want to pick a good bow if I were to use it. Because if I were to use bows it would be from a distance anyway, I prefer having bows do their job of eliminating the enemy at a far range rather than allowing them close. It also allow for better ammo efficiency. If you want to try easy bow gameplay I suggest trying out Rain of Arrows and just using the bow for the weapon art. You will definitely find yourself gaining a good ranged option for your PVE run.
Why does sleep dip into every class? Faith users get the torch, not that great. Arcane users get bows, sort of. And intelligence users get the sword, typically the best option.
Indeed it does, but because of the very low portion of damage it takes up defense usually kills the damage first before it gets buffed by an insignificant multiplier. Zero times 1.35 is still zero (an exaggeration, of course xD)
They slap. On a shortbow they interrupt most casters quickly. I use them fighting mages. The second the anim begins hit them with one and they fall out of the animation. Stupidly underrated
I am planning a debuff and status effect video, but probably not asap. Blackflame doesn't stack with itself and ticks 0.1% max HP + 1 damage per 0.1s for 2 seconds.
If you want the light bow moveset yeah. Otherwise, you can go with a regular bow instead like the serpent's to increase buildup or the pulley, for example, for more damage. It depends on how you use your bows. Some people only use it to snipe so gaining a running shot doesn't help them.
Is helpful to analyze fewer items at a time. And there are an awful lot of sword categories. And if your compare two sword videos to these two ranged options there are similarities... mechanics encourage different range, different handling of ashes of war, etc... That said, I'd expect ballistas to be included with crossbows, since they are treated very similarly to each other, and there are not enough of the two to warrant separate videos.
PC you can do saved file dupes so you can just pass it over and over to a friend or have them pass it back. There are also those with cheated stuff yeah.
Did you try clicking it? It is a perma link so it shouldn't expire. If it doesn't work, try pasting the link into your discord app. Pasted here once again from my server: discord.gg/h8Wxa2fbXG
Quick Note on the Serpent Bow to clarify. You CAN hold it in your offhand to get the bonus poison buildup of the serpent bow ITSELF, but if the bow you fire the arrows with is not the Serpent Bow, the status arrows won't get the bonus arcane scaling. On the Serpent Bow Status sheet at the 12:35 mark, the bonus you can get by holding this bow in your offhand is in the brackets under the Arcane. The Arrow status buildup on the same screen is for when you fire with the Serpent Bow.
Is there a good farming spot for the storm wing feathers?
Does that mean you maximize status buildup by using two of them?
So hang on- you mean if you're using a serpent bow in your right hand, but have one also in your off hand (on your back), youll get increased poison buildup? Thats sick!
Does it put poison on normal arrows too, or just increases poison on already poisoned arrows?
Didnt they patch this? I remember it being patched a long time ago but may be wrong.
One small thing about the Black Bow: it slows you down when shooting on horseback, like any other longbow. The "true" shortbows can be fired when gallopping.
which is important to consider when fighting fire giant i suppose
Crightt my dude im gonna be honest here, i have massive hangover so im gonna skip to the summary but i'll rewatch these videos like 2-3 times anyways
In DS1 there was an extremely obscure mechanic where headshots did something like 10-30% damage to metal helmeted targets depending on whether the helmet was open-faced!
man, thats so cool... shoutouts to old janky games having really weird mechanics
@@FloraOfTheCats Maybe it was just around at the right time of my life, but I've played everything From's made except Sekiro, and I think they haven't topped DS1 as either a single player or multiplayer experience. The multiplayer largely benefitted from jank mechanics, the two covenants were good. There were toggle escapes, counter BSes, dead angles on almost anything, yet the whole game always felt somehow clicked-in in a way. Hosts had no advantage besides estus, which was easy to punish with a BS, or chain BS if you just didn't like them. Of course those were escapable if you really knew what you were doing. It felt like knowing the jank let you do anything.
@@cinemaspins2947 "the multiplayer jank largely benefitted from jank mechanics" 🤡
@@hobosorcerer I am jank
@@cinemaspins2947 youre being silly, dont let nostalgia cloud your eyes.
The golem archers dropping regular greatarrows far more often than the golem greatarrows is seriously one of the least well-known shames in the game. I seriously hope that, when the inevitable DLC is released, a vendor pops up that actually sells golem greatarrows and (somewhat) rights this strange wrong. Make them over 1000 runes a pop if you must so the normal greatarrows are still a decent budget option.
please yes the farm is the only reason i haven't used greatbows, literally hours with not a single golem arrow is insane :(
I have hordes of the Golem great arrows. If you play on PS I can give you as many as you want.
@@craigslaunwhite579 thanks for the offer but im on PC :')
@@craigslaunwhite579 I would love some, have none of them. Anything you want for your character? I’m on PS and have most other things if you want anything?
it literally doesn't even make sense either. They even drop 2 different kinds of golem arrows why did they feel the need to make them drop regular ass ones too?
I know it’s been nearly a year since this was posted, but in case anyone scrolls the comments- golden arrows (with fully upgraded bow) one shot skeletons and Beastman skeletons, you don’t need to kill them twice. They come in super handy in catacombs, graves, and Farum Azula
Something very important about Might Shot on the Serpent Bow is that it has extra increased status build up (not just poison). I tested this with bleed arrows yesterday. Pretty cool! I think it’s the most fun PVE bow
To make it clear in text form: The Serpent Bow increases poison buildup as a "passive effect". But it also has arcane scaling, which allows any other status that scales with arc to scale said status on the arrow with your arc stat.
I can instantly poison anyone when using mighty shot on serpent bow, its perfect for level 50 builds.
Pretty sure every bow has increased status build up if you use mighty shot. That's just a quality of mighty shot, not of the serpent bow specifically. Could be wrong tho, but don't think I am
Can confirm.
However, to clarify, Serpent Bow's arcane scaling was fixed so it now applies status quicker than any other bow.
Serpent Bow was poisoning targets at least twice as fast as Black Bow with just basic shots. Pretty good for applying ranged status pressure.
Took like three arrows to bleed a frost troll.
Just quickly advocating for the harp bow. It's the lowest weight shortbow which actually translates to similar AR at lower investments when you calculate the damage bonus to the arrows, too. It also drains less stamina compared to the other bows. It's not a lot less, but it is noticeable. My build is actually a faith build based around optimizing bestial sling and the lower shortbow weight directly translates to higher bestial sling damage. It also makes pretty noises.
Thank you for advocating for the harp bow. It's a shame you can't even infuse it with an ash of war. Still fun to use and works with the dancer talisman.
I’m making a tarnished nomadic merchant build using faith as well. The harp bow is the main weapon with the madness incantations for support. It’s pretty cool and a fun thematic package with the harp bow similar to the instruments the other merchants have.
1:44 - Both of the fletched shatter shard and rainbow stone arrows are uncraftable, despite their descriptions stating otherwise - we need to raise some awareness about this or it’ll never get fixed!
Tbh I only use rainbow arrows to dunk on people Im winning against easily.
are you sure? becase i swear ive made fletched of both of those back before the servers were fixed at launch
@@shadowsheringon can't make them anymore anyway. Only way I get them is duping or cheats.
@@shadowsheringon I bet they're one of those things that was only in version 1.0
I love this content, thanks so much for what you do.
My pleasure!
Theres something incredibly important you didn't mention. ELEMENTAL ARROWS HAVE SCALING!!!
If an arrow has an element, and the bow scales with that element, the arrows will deal more damage. This means Lightning arrows are actually very good, since they scale with dex on all bows. And extremely well by my calculations, doing 4-5 extra damage per point in Dex.
You forgot to mention that Mighty Shot increases the effective range and bypasses blocks, but this is otherwise pretty complete.
It pretty much is but golden arrows, they kill skeleton (tombs and beast men) without needing to hit them again when they reform, if your bow is upgraded you can one shot them and they won’t reappear, holy damage kills them outright, no reforming
@@Heywhatsupmyman
Golden Arrows do indeed do that, but not all sources of holy damage do, like with haligbone arrows/bolts.
Fletched arrows should have flown faster for PVP or something as it's so easy to dodge arrows. But the main advantage of having both Fletched and normal is it doubles your arrow pool for that status.
Arrow crafting should yield more per craft though, it's pretty lame resting at sites of grace to then go and collect more resources and you use soo many arrows to fight a boss compared to no time investment in melee or magic. They could have at least made enemies and items respawn over time in open areas so you don't need to always rest etc. One thing I think Monster Hunter did really well.
Also it was very disappointing to see drawstring greases weren't for bows or that successive hit effects aren't effected by bows.
Love the fact you made a bow guide before a scythe guide
I main bows, and switch out my equip based on what I'm up against in PvE.
Black Bow for NPC invaders and other agile enemies, Pulley Bow for sniping to clear out mobs, and Longbow with Rain of Arrows for dragons and other large slow enemies.
Advantage of skyshot is that if you can lock on, it is in range. It's good to pull or knock guards off of ballistas.
Yeah I think any ash of war that ignores line of sight requirements in one way or another is a good one
This was an amazing bow explanation video. I found the great bow today and couldn’t figure out why my arrows were not working .
Great stuff! Seems like unless you want to use great bows, the Black Bow is a pretty clear winner.
I’ve found the Erdtree Greatbow to be very powerful when stacking buffs correctly, it also helps that you can buff it directly with your physick flask, very solid secondary weapon for a strength faith build
Based Chrightt continues to prove he is the real Wiki
For those looking to do a bow only run:
Longbow/albinauric bow with rain of arrows is going to be your go to for applying status especially to large bosses. Wish I could say I found the serpent bow to be more effective, but it's basically just a pvp/single small target bow.
Radahn spears + lion greatbow with the ash of war is going to be your boss shredder if they have high status resistance.
Black Bow with Barrage and Bleed Arrows are viable as well, especially if you have Lord of Blood's Exhultation, Spear or Arrow's Sting, and Shard of Alexander Talismans.
@@joeyjones9041 oh absolutely. It's just that in my run I didn't end up getting much use out of it for fighting the big bosses when I could proc bleed with just one or two rain of arrows. I mostly just used the black bow for clearing small enemies, mobs, npc invadors, and for pvp
Bow only is the most fun I ever had in this game.
Can't confirm this but i think mighty shot increase status build up per arrow.
Might not actually be a thing, need to check again.
looks like 1.7x in the spreadsheet, slow animation tho, even end delay iirc
on that topic barrage is 0.75x per shot, I assume pulley xbow deals 1.0x3 but don't actually know
I just started a second run, and will be using some bows for an arcane build, Thanks for your work, dude.
This video is a gold mine of information. Thx you so much. I hesitated between black bow and serpent bow for a status build (the 2 upgrade with somber stones to make it even worse). I think ill go for the serpent bow.
Edit: Good job as always, Chrightt.
Not sure if anyone has mentioned it yet or not but I'm fairly certain you can apply the Golden Great Arrow's version of Golden Vow on enemies as an invader. I haven't tested it out personally but from what I've seen from dangitjim's videos, this is the case.
LMAO, you mean applying golden vow on monsters? 😂 Kinda funny.
@@Chrightt pretty sure, ye. I just recall dangitjim using it on the haligtree knights in an invasion video but I imagine it has to have applications to other enemies when you're an invader as well. I'm curious to see if it would be the PvE or PvP buff applied to them or not. Just an open thought. lol
Since the day I found your channel, around 5 months ago or so, I was waiting for the day you'd cover bows.
Great stuff Chrightt, keep it up!
You should do a video about optimized consumables builds. Like what pots/items are best along with best farming methods.
volcano pots are your best reliable damaging pots imo, the aoe burn can do a lot if something stays in it for the full 2-3s duration.
The neat thing about Golden arrow ig is that it cost no fp to get golden vow even in pvp, even if said passive is weak.
Sorry, not quite sure I understand this...could you explain a bit more? Thanks :)
@@senecauk8363 the buff is just shoot at floor, 0 fp spent
I wish there were more ashes for bows. Awesome video capoo keep it up
Thanks for the video, although I am not really into using bows but I must respect your effort.
I mainly use the standard light bow with barrage on it and either bleed or sleep arrows. You can slap it on any build as a status tool.
I know it might not be worth to cover in a whole new video, but would you be interested digging deeper into Ballistas? (Jar Cannon and Hand Ballista respectively) I know everyone who uses them just applies some buffs and calls it a day, but I was curious to see if there was more to it. For example, are the elemental bolts affected by scorpion charms and tears? do the bolts do poise damage? (I know stormwing arrows do) If so, are they affected by the stonebarb tear and such? Is the ballista damage affected by jumping attacks buffs? What about thrusting damage? (Spear Talisman) Are they affected by RKR? Anyways, love your content, keep it up!
Ballistas will come with Crossbows although not soon. They actually function differently from bows, so I decided to not cover them together.
Best ER tech content. Thank you for blessing us Chrightt
Very complicated but very useful thanks man.
The only reason I like Fletched vs Unfletched is that it lets me have two stacks of essentially the same arrow. Really handy for taking out some annoying bosses and mini-bosses.
Lion Greatbow is my favorite bow in the whole game. Thanks for letting me know that the Radahn Spears are the best option for it and that it double-stacks with two of the bows.
Good point on the fletched vs unfletched. I suppose its also good if you don't want to farm feathers.
@@Chrightt I mean, I tend to have enough for that just so I can have the foul-foot too. But yeah, walking int Castle Sol with two stacks of poison and rot arrows because some use feathers and other don't means that I have nearly FOUR HUNDRED arrows to pelt the Commander with from a safe spot outside the boss arena XD
thanks for all you do for the community man, I wish you all the success!!
Mighty Shot also ignores shields partially, about 60%. Kinda like Impaling Thrust.
Chright flexing how he doesn't need to farm for golem arrows
Me a console player: Hold my USB
The blackbow is actually such a fun weapon.
Archery is actually a fun pve build… or it would if half the bosses didn’t input read and dodge.
Great analysis, super helpful for my bow only run.
Chright I just wanted to let you know I actually have a pen and paper when ever you upload idk if it means anything but I just wanted to let you know there’s someone who takes notes on your analysis
❤️ Hope you find my videos useful then!
I don't get why Fromsoft didn't allow affinities on bows. It feels deliberately restrictive and not in a good way. I prefer having to deal with decent bow builds in PVP than have them be regulated into "weak and forgettable" (except Lion's Greatbow ofc)
It's silly. I think they were afraid it'd be op but with resistance resetting like I doubt it. It's frustrating and really underpowered bows. Why can we make a bow a quality or keen bow??? So odd
Bow base scaling is terrible, so it ends up feeling like bow affinity was the intention from the beginning, but then they skimped and didn't do it. No affinity would be more acceptable if there were more bows with elemental damage like the Horn Bow, and if they were actually good. A bow that deals magic damage is worthless if it's just crappier than it's peers in pretty much every way.
This is one thing I hope they will change with patches, but I am not too optimistic. Arrows are already so slow that a player drinking their flask and slow walking can side-step them. They should at least deal good damage. Between the annoyance of having to shoot enemies like 8+ times to kill them (I'm cringing just thinking about fighting late-game enemies with bows) and having to constantly stock ammo, it feels like bows just weren't intended to be primary weapons. But I think that anything should be viable as a primary weapon. I don't see the harm in giving bows a boost, and making certain ammo easier to get (Golem Great Arrows).
@@lammyjammy i think they think that bows remove a key element of the game, rolling with I frames and timing dodges, but that's not true in practice since bosses are so big and mobile and mostly have long range attacks. So it's a weird combination of like, the game being ready for bows, but them not giving people options to use them seriously in the game. They compensate with mechanisms (headshots) but with a bad aiming mechanic it's like silly
A quick note: The erdtree bow is one of my favorite PVE options as a bow, since it gets a massive damage bonus + permakill effect vs skeletons, which is really useful in areas like farum azula with large packs of them or enemy skelly snipers.
Edit: Also, for a question,does the horn bow have any effect on cold status scaling since it has int scaling?
Cold status doesn't scale with Int
@@Sljm8D I recall something scaling cold status but maybe it was just to do with infusions or something
@@TroidHunter cold status only scales with weapon upgrade level.
Cold infusions add Magic damage, which scales with Intelligence, and Cold-based weapon arts usually have a Magic damage component that scales with Intelligence, but the status itself does not.
Cold, Death, and Scarlet Rot statuses do not scale with any character stat.
@@Sljm8D madness as well right?
@@joemency2242 madness does scale with Arcane, such as the Frenzy Flame incantations, if used with Dragon Communion seal, the only one with Arcane scaling.
For melee weapons, the weapon would have to have Arcane scaling, and the only "weapon" that has Madness and can have Arcane scaling is Fingerprint Stone Greatshield. There's no grease or weapon buff spell for Madness buildup, right now.
I've been waiting for this video for so long
Invaluable info, man. Much appreciated
I'd imagine the erdtree great bow could outperform any bow against undead. I'd hope that's the case.
Not sure if Skeletons resist thrust damage like they do in previous games.
congratulations
The best bow tutorial of youtube.
Thank you for ur effort and time to help the bow art in elden ring :)
Thank you for your work
If infuse with enchant shot, some buff and dwelling arrow, horn bow is best bow to snipe some guy in pvp with 700 ar max and 360 ar when no buff
The regular standing shot of the Black Bow is slow like regular bows. This is why I prefer short bows. Having to sprint, jump, or roll to shoot arrows quickly isn’t always the best choice.
Theoretically wouldn't the erdtree bows be good beings all dmg scale via faith?
Perfect timing! Just yesterday I started a sort of challenge run with some friends and I went with bow only, but I was thinking to mix some support incantations. Do you have any recommendations on this approach? (PVE) Bow only with some faith.
Great video!
I think flame grant me strength would be best, it gives more damage than golden vow(20% VS 15% PVE) and a small stamina regen buff which helps a lot with light bows.
I think if you're going to be doing it with friends you can value raw damage and support a bit more. Basically, I would pick a bow over a light bow as even with black bow you're losing a chunk of AR for having moves like dodge attack. I would probably go for an infusable option like the Albinauric on a dex leaning build with something like rain of arrows to help clear AoE/boss and do aimed shots the rest of the time with incantation support.
Something to note is that the Black Bow cannot be used while galloping on torrent but other light bows can. This is likely to effect your choice for pve on a bow run.
Maybe if you're only using one bow the whole run and rely too much on horse combat in the open world. Even then, that advantage doesn't outweigh everything else the black bow has going for it.
@@overlorddante I mention it mostly because using a short bow while galloping is fun as hell and can help with some really hard bosses like Radahn if you use rot and poison arrows. It is also worth noting the red branch bow in particular has very similar damage to composite but is lighter and less str required. When it comes to PVE i just don't think it is so black and white
Ufff...i considert to try a Bow only build but too much Brainwork haha xD Thanks a Lot for your efforts with this detailed Video
hell yeah best subclass, let's go
Damn, as a faith build, I invested so many stones into upgrading both erdtree bows...
RIP 😭
Bows are actually incredibly fun. Stick to the purchasable arrows like dwelling and serpent
Why the dwelling arrows? They work better or is just an example
@@badthunder115 Dwelling Arrows are nice if you know the enemy is weak to magic damage. They also get a damage bonus when used with the Horn Bow, and can be purchased from a merchant.
@@badthunder115 sorry for the dely, i just suggested those two because you can purchase an inffinite amount of those ones from vendors and don't have to craft
@@daveb305 don't worry man and I must say I don't really use bows but on my arcane build I like the serpent arrows and normal arrows because it builds so much poison that one serpent arrow usually get the proc also the regular ones I use them for damage and if the enemy has low immunity the poisoning passive procs with one or two arrows
Sadly the sleep ones and the rot ones are limited and as far as I know there is no not crafted rot arrow
Thankyou
Fortune favours the bowed
Hey well done and thank you.
You said the full moveset of a lightbow is on the black bow but that isnt entirely true. The standard light attacks are slow on black bow and also you cant use them on horse back like the other light bows. This is very small difference but for pvp having a faster r1 might come in handy in situations. Personally im gonna go for missbegotten on a strength build as i want that faster r1.
Ah yes, this is true. I was definitely speaking more in terms of PVP for this part xD where you would either just do the non-regular attacks and obviously no mount.
I love da pulley bow 🥺
One thing you didn’t mention is whether 2 Radahns has a higher AR for the Radahn Spear than off-hand Radahn + Golem. I think you implied that it didn’t, right?
Golem's + Radahn will do better than Radahn's + Radahn's because 1x Golem is slightly better than 1x Radahn's.
You are wrong about Serpent Bow. If you hold Serpent Bow in left hand and shoot stuff with a different bow or crossbow held in right hand, it will get poison build up. I tested this myself yesterday with Pulley Crossbow.
Whatever amount of poison it adds to other bows has to be tiny. I legit tried this yesterday and I killed a troll with over 15 arrows testing this and never got a poison. It’s basically useless
Sorry about this. I think I forgot to subtract the decay when I held it off-hand especially considering the time I had to wait for stamina to come back or something. I went to re-test it. The base poison buildup does indeed carry over to the main bow, just not the arcane scaling for firing status arrows. Added a pin.
@@Chrightt so if a have the serpent bow on the offhand and I use rain of arrows all those arrows gets poison?
Hey Chrightt, great stuff as always but i felt the gameplay volume was a bit loud, scared the shit outta me with the headphones lol
Opps. Maybe I missed tuning down one of them. Sorry.
@@Chrightt it wasn't that bad, it just startled me a bit and made some of the commentary a bit harder to hear over the gameplay itself
But like i said, great video as always, this one in particular is extra nice because bows are probably the most interesting weapons to use in Souls games
I read in reddit, it's said that fire arrow and golden arrow scale with faith scale of Erdtree Bow. So if my build is Dex/Faith, against beast type enemies that is weak against fire, is it better to use Erdtree Bow than Albinauric Bow?
Thank u
Hello Crightt, thanks very much for producing the most valuable Elden Ring content on UA-cam. I have a question regarding the stacking of the Lion great bow passive. Would holding two of these and using Radahn's spears as ammunition not beat the Golem AR in all cases? You mention that having a Golem primary and Lion secondary is optimal, is that because the Golem AR is high enough that it outdoes even the multiplicative double Lion passive?
I ask because I am interested in a build entirely centered around maximizing the damage of Radahn's rain
Yes, it wouldn't outdo the golem's. The base AR of the Golem's typically beats firing with the Radahn's. For reference you can see my other vid too: ua-cam.com/video/7aou7T44aZs/v-deo.html
For barrage, winged sword talisman and milicents talisman, do they work with that ash of war?
does the horn bow effect frost arrows at all?
You said the Lion's bonus is applied after defense calculations. Does this mean defense is calculated form raw AR*MV only? Also are buffs applied over the reduced damage (after defense calculations) or on the full amount (before defense calculations)?
Is the status buildup on headshots also a 1.5x multiplier, I've been wondering
iirc headshot is 1.5x just for the damage and if you hit player/stunnable target there is an additional stun/stagger animation independent of poise.
Did they make misbegotten bow infusable? I can infuse mine
15:48 How do you show the hitbox? Is there a mod for it?
There are a lot of weapons which are objectively worse and serve virtually no purpose, and I can't fathom a reason for their addition to the game other than a dopamine trigger when you find them as treasure. FromSoftware works in mysterious ways
Well done 👍✅👍
What is the use case for bows to supplement a pve build? You made offhand comments about using bows as utility for a non-bow build (eg rather than deliberately going quality stat spread to maximize how damage). But what does using a bow for utility entail?
Is it just using the bow to pull an enemy from a group before switching to melee to actually fight it? If that is the use case, does it matter which bow and arrow to use? Shouldn't you just go for the bow with the lowest stat reqs or lightest weight, and use the cheapest arrows?
And if it is for applying status, a 15 faith and 12 arcane investment will grant any build access to rotten breath and dragonice, both of which can fully apply either scarlet rot, or Frostbite the status to most bosses in a single burst if you have over 108 fp, even if you do not invest any additional faith or arcane. You can just open any boss fight with one or both of those two moves to instantly guarantee the status on a non-immune boss.
As for applying poison on a build that doesn't have poison infused into one of the melee weapons that the build powerstancing, is it actually worth the time to switch to bow to apply the poison when poison does so little damage? Effective dps of the status bow is much lower than effective dps of powerstancing melee, right? Would the total damage you gain from poison throughout the fight, even match the damage you lose from not powerstance striking the target with melee dps during that time?
On top of that, is it worth carrying the additional weight of a bow just for status application? Dragon communion seal has zero weight, and can apply rot or ice on virtually any non-immune target in a single cast. Infusing one of your melee weapons with poison/occult costs zero weight. Using a poison bow takes a lot of weight, and costs a lot of effective dps during a boss fight, never mind the cost of arrows.
So what is the actual use case for a bow in PvE other than cheesing an enemy who cannot get to you?
It's fun, silent, and cool
@@juli3754 How are they more fun than spells and incantations? They seem to serve the same function but do a worse job at it and have less variety.
As for cool, I guess that's subjective. But if something gets power creeped or outclassed by a bunch of other options, I have a hard time finding it cool.
Different strokes different folks babe
A ranged attack on a non spellcasting build. The situation comes up more often then you might think, especially if you have a more methodical playstyle like myself. When you have a bow, you just kind of think "Oh, that might be useful here." I used the shit out of the dragonrider bow in DS2, even though I got it on a whim.
Actual example of uses include:
Killing snipers without having to run seven hundred miles to get to where they are, especially if they are overwatching for other enemies.
Luring out smaller enemies supporting a bigger enemy so you can fight them one on one.
Getting sneak attack damage bonus when getting close undetected would be impossible.
Etc.
Personally, I think for PVE, bow is not that strong but definitely a different play style. I would mostly use bows to pick off targets to prevent engaging in groups. With status effect arrows + barrage you can also effectively apply status effects from afar as a str/dex build on bosses you might be struggling with. I think bows are more of a way to help you decrease the difficulty of some battles through a different approach for PVE.
As for speed, bows definitely won't make you faster, but I'd still want to pick a good bow if I were to use it. Because if I were to use bows it would be from a distance anyway, I prefer having bows do their job of eliminating the enemy at a far range rather than allowing them close. It also allow for better ammo efficiency. If you want to try easy bow gameplay I suggest trying out Rain of Arrows and just using the bow for the weapon art. You will definitely find yourself gaining a good ranged option for your PVE run.
7:30
Me too, Chrightt, me too.
😂 Seriously have no idea what sky shot is intended for.
Why does sleep dip into every class? Faith users get the torch, not that great. Arcane users get bows, sort of. And intelligence users get the sword, typically the best option.
Question about elemental damage from split arrows... do buffs like flame grant me strength & terra magica apply to such damage?
Indeed it does, but because of the very low portion of damage it takes up defense usually kills the damage first before it gets buffed by an insignificant multiplier. Zero times 1.35 is still zero (an exaggeration, of course xD)
YES
I complain about the poor damage of longbows and people just tell me to use a greatbow and that's kind of the whole problem isn't it
Are scaling modifiers applied before or after the arrow AR is added to the bow?
Before. This is why bow damage drop offs a lot.
why the golem arrows are farmeable easier on PC? I dont understand that part
You can trade with your friends and use saved files so that you get an infinite supply.
I wish bows were better : (
I'm gonna use golem magic arrows and you can't stop me
why is being on PC make it easier to get some of the arrows? like the Golems?
easier trading and people use saved file copying/cheat engine to just get stacks of them to skip the arduous farm.
forgot the red branch bow? or did I miss it ?
It's there in the lightbow section.
crossbow vid when?
Damn i didnt even know those storm arrows did any poise damage, they might be really useful for a pure storm tempest build
the hawk feathers are slow to get though, you have to farm stormveil, or the odd other
They slap. On a shortbow they interrupt most casters quickly. I use them fighting mages. The second the anim begins hit them with one and they fall out of the animation. Stupidly underrated
Cool vid. Thx
Yo, i love your vids can you explain how blackflame's damage over time works? Like how much it will do and if it stacks with itself?
I am planning a debuff and status effect video, but probably not asap. Blackflame doesn't stack with itself and ticks 0.1% max HP + 1 damage per 0.1s for 2 seconds.
golem great arrows are so horrendously awful to farm why isn't there a shop for them they're so cool ;_;
Hey man I hate to ask I know there's a lot of comments but is the black bow also the best for PVE? thanks
If you want the light bow moveset yeah. Otherwise, you can go with a regular bow instead like the serpent's to increase buildup or the pulley, for example, for more damage. It depends on how you use your bows. Some people only use it to snipe so gaining a running shot doesn't help them.
@@Chrightt thanks so much for replying your videos awesome bro
Are crossbows so different from bows that you do an extra video for them?
Is helpful to analyze fewer items at a time.
And there are an awful lot of sword categories.
And if your compare two sword videos to these two ranged options there are similarities... mechanics encourage different range, different handling of ashes of war, etc...
That said, I'd expect ballistas to be included with crossbows, since they are treated very similarly to each other, and there are not enough of the two to warrant separate videos.
@@andy4an makes sense. I also didn't really notice any differences between the crossbows besides weight and stat req so why bother with a video?
HARP BOW.
So how do PC users get golem greatarrows? Hacks?
PC you can do saved file dupes so you can just pass it over and over to a friend or have them pass it back. There are also those with cheated stuff yeah.
Love your videos but your volume is too low
Just tried to join the discord link. Says invalid or expired?
Did you try clicking it? It is a perma link so it shouldn't expire. If it doesn't work, try pasting the link into your discord app. Pasted here once again from my server: discord.gg/h8Wxa2fbXG
@@Chrightt Was something up with the browser on my phone. Managed to join now. Thanks.