Sn1perJohnE
2008-07-01, 06:27 PM
The complete (when finished) guide to the bowman, with personal experiences from other bowman.
I would like to note, that this is not just a copy-paste of an already existing guide, though many elements may be derived from said guides. This guide is essentially a ground up guide of bowman.
The Bowman Basics
I Wanna Be A Bowman, Please
To become a bowman, you must first be level 10, with a minimum of 25 DEX. You must head to Henesys, through the portal under the Mushroom Park sign, and head all the way to the right, to the tree/building.
What About My Stats?
As a bowman, there are two different paths you can take, both with variations in style and builds.
The two stats that will be raised throughout your Bowman career is DEX and STR. Dex acts as the main part of a Bowman's damage range, increasing DEX will boost your damage overall. STR acts as a stabilizer to a Bowman's damage range, increasing STR will increase the minimum damage of a Bowman, and after so many point, increase the max damage of the damage range.
There are three main variations to stat builds.
The normal one consists of increasing STR and DEX normally for your weapon, and stop adding STR when you know which weapon you want to stop at. Usually, most Bowmen will opt to cap their dex a little below their highest level equip, and use STR adding equips to be able to equip the weapon, while adding those extra points into DEX. This Build will require little funding to make it an awesome Bowman.
This build has two variation, Low STR build is common, and consists of capping STR at a lower amount, and using STR clothes, capes, and the STR bonus from a Zakum Helm to be able to equip the highest level weapon they will use. For most Low STR builds, STR is capped at around 75. The other variation is newer in light of the release of overall STR scrolls. This variation is Super Low-STR, and uses the fact that all Bowman overalls only have a DEX requirement to equip, and certain ones have 6 STR on them clean. With these two factors taken into consideration, it would be possible to equip an high level Bow with a Z-Helm, a decent STR scrolled overall, and a STR cape, with barely any STR added at all. The Low-STR will require some funding to make it a awesome Bowman, but mainly for a STR cape, and Z-Helm. The Super STR-less will require a larger amount of funding, but has major benefits to it.
The STR-less build is very literal, in that you leave STR alone throughout being a Bowman, and add nothing but DEX. STR-less builds consist of using stat-less weapons, or weapons that have no stat requirement to equip, such as the Maple Weapons, and the Bow of Magical Destruction for Bows. The STR-less build can require very little funding, to a lot, depending the supply of BoMDs and Maple Weapons.
The Path Of The Bow
The Bow is one of two weapon types available to a Bowman. The bow has some advantages over the other weapon choice, crossbows. and the enjoyment of their face not being covered almost completely by the weapon. The main downside to Bows, is both the average attack on the bows, and the formula used for bows.
The Path Of The Crossbow
The Crossbow, or Xbow, is the second type of weapon available to a Bowman. The major upside to Xbows, is the increased average attack the Xbow has over its bow counterpart. Where a LVL 90 bow would have 90 clean attack on average, an LVL 90 Xbow would be 93 attack clean on average. The damage formula also gives the Xbow an advantage. With a 106 attack Bow on my Ranger, i had a high damage range of 19xx, but with an 104 Xbow, my high damage range was around 20xx, easily more damage with a weapon of less attack. The main downside to Xbows, is the look of it. At higher LVLs of Xbows, the size of the weapon is noticeable, as it will tend to cover most of your face when equipped, if not all of it.
The Firing speed of both Bows and Xbows has been thrown into question. Some other guides list that there is a slight difference of shots/minute between the two, mainly because Xbows firing animation plays through fully, with the arrow actually firing at the end of the animation, while Bows have the arrow firing more towards the beginning to middle of the animation. I plan to test this myself by using the stopwatch on my cell phone and firing both and Xbow and Bow without booster or SA, using normal arrows for 1 minute, and the amount of arrows used will give the shot/minute. That Number I will bring to you when i am finished with the test.
Firing Speed Results
Using a Normal Speed Bow And an Normal Speed Xbow with no booster for either. I had with me 100 arrows of each and fired for 1 minute timed on my cell phone stopwatch. The results are.... 75 Arrows Shot With BOW/Minute, and 71 Arrows Shot with XBOW/Minute. This shows that there is a clear speed advantage with Bows over Xbows, but Xbows do have the increased damage.
Stat Distribution
For Bowman, DEX is the single most important stat there is, and for Bow users, STR is the second.
For Bow Users, you Should keep your STR at 5 above your level, so if you are level 30, your STR should be at 35.
For Xbow users, keeping your STR equal to your level is all that is needed.
First Job Skills
For the First Job Bowman, there are three skills that need to be maxed, these skills are:
The Blessing of Amazon: It adds Accuracy, even though Bowman get massive amounts of Accuracy alone from the high amount of DEX we have, having the Accuracy from Blessing of Amazon allows us to attack certain higher level monsters ahead of other classes.
The Eye of Amazon: This increases the distance our arrows go, since we are a ranged class, the father we are from the enemy, the less damage you may take while training.
Critical Shot: This is an absolute must, as this single skill allows Bowman to compete on the same level as other classes, by giving Bowman a boost in the damage they are able to deal, adding 100% more damage to the attack. With my high damage range of 19xx, i hit about 19xx with a normal arrow, but with a good critical shot, i hit upwards of 41xx.
Arrow Blow Vs. Dual Shot
For most new Bowman, this is one of the most confusing parts of the Bowman job: whether to use one high damage attack or to use two attacks in one, with lower damage for each attack.
Arrow Blow: This attack skill gives a major amount of damage in the form of a single arrow. Many argue that Arrow Blow is the best way to go, for certain reasons, like seeing high numbers, as well as needing less MP to use than Dual Shot.
Double Shot: This attack skill deals higher than normal damage over 2 arrows, giving the same total damage as Arrow Blow, at the increased MP cost. The main and most reasonable reason people say to go with Dual Shot, is because when Critical Shot is added to the equation, Dual Shot out damages Arrow Blow.
In Simplified Terms
Critical shot does not give x2 damage it gives an extra 100% damage. AB with crit = 360%. DS with 1 crit = 360% with 2 crits = 460%.
Arrow Blow Update: As of the last patch, certain changes have been made to many skills, Arrow Blow included. The damage of Arrow Blow has been increased, so that at max, it should hit 290% damage, but due to an error, it currently still deals 260% when max, but at level 19, it does 283% damage, bringing it close to the damage that Double Shot produces with Criticals put into the equation.
Hunter or Crossbowman
So, you have made it to level 30, and you are ready to make your job advancement. Well, head back to Henesys, and back to where you made the first job advancement. After talking to Athena, head to the main Henesys map, and continue heading right along the top platform. Go through the portal, and head to the upper right hand corner of the map. Once there, talk to the Job Instructor to begin the job advancement test. You must collect 30 dark marbles, once collected, talk to the Instructor, they will give you a medal, which you must take back to Athena.
Now comes the hard part, you must choose whether or not you want to use Bows or Xbows for the rest of you Bowman career. With Bows, you get speed, with Xbows, you get power. Once you choose, all the skills you attain for your choice will only be usable with that weapon.
Common Ground: Shared Skills
These next skills are shared between both Hunters and Crossbowman.
Bow Mastery: This is an important skill, not only does it give you a little more Accuracy bonus, but it will also stabilize your damage by increasing the minimum damage on your damage range.
Final Attack: This skill is one of the skills that is full of controversy within both Hunters and Crossbowman. What the skill does is include a powerful attack at the end of an skill attack such as Arrow Blow or Double Shot. The controversy behind it stems from the fact that it does not work with ANY of the third or fourth job skills, meaning that after third job, the points put into Final Attack almost seem useless. But for those that do decide to put points into it, it is IMPERATIVE that it is maxed. You don't want to put just a few points in it, you either max it, or don't even touch it. For those that do max it, an increased training speed has been seen, because at max, it deals 250% damage when it activates. But this is still an optional skill, and will forever be debated as to max it or not.
Booster: This skill is a skill seen in every job, and is always nice to have. The skill itself increases the attack speed while it is activated. So with a bow of normal speed, you will have a slightly faster attack speed.
Soul Arrow: Another important skill, this one frees up the Use part of Bowman Inventories, by allowing no arrows to be needed to attack. The only draw back, albeit a very minimal draw back, is that Attack boosting arrows (diamond arrows, bronze arrows, red arrows) will be negated, and the damage range boost from them will not appear with the damage you actually deal. A personal recommendation I would make about Soul Arrow, is to not completely max it. With Booster, the duration of the skill at max is 200 seconds, but with Soul Arrow, it is more, at max, it lasts 600 seconds! So as to keep duration times equal, not maxing Soul Arrow is kinda nice, but other than just keeping skill times close to each other, there is no other reason to not max it other than the fact that you have 5 less MP used at a lower where the duration time is closer to the 200 seconds of Booster.
Power Knock-Back: This is a really nifty skill, and literally helps out in a tight situation. As a Bowman, you can use the Bow or Xbow equipped to push back the enemy in front of you when you cant fire an arrow. What Power Knock-Back does is build on this and allows for there to be damage dealt and knock multiple enemies back at once. So if an enemy spawns in front of you, you can simply use this skill, deal damage to them and fire arrows at them without losing much training speed.
The Hunter Skill
Coming Soon!
*credits: wobbufet.
(under construction)
I would like to note, that this is not just a copy-paste of an already existing guide, though many elements may be derived from said guides. This guide is essentially a ground up guide of bowman.
The Bowman Basics
I Wanna Be A Bowman, Please
To become a bowman, you must first be level 10, with a minimum of 25 DEX. You must head to Henesys, through the portal under the Mushroom Park sign, and head all the way to the right, to the tree/building.
What About My Stats?
As a bowman, there are two different paths you can take, both with variations in style and builds.
The two stats that will be raised throughout your Bowman career is DEX and STR. Dex acts as the main part of a Bowman's damage range, increasing DEX will boost your damage overall. STR acts as a stabilizer to a Bowman's damage range, increasing STR will increase the minimum damage of a Bowman, and after so many point, increase the max damage of the damage range.
There are three main variations to stat builds.
The normal one consists of increasing STR and DEX normally for your weapon, and stop adding STR when you know which weapon you want to stop at. Usually, most Bowmen will opt to cap their dex a little below their highest level equip, and use STR adding equips to be able to equip the weapon, while adding those extra points into DEX. This Build will require little funding to make it an awesome Bowman.
This build has two variation, Low STR build is common, and consists of capping STR at a lower amount, and using STR clothes, capes, and the STR bonus from a Zakum Helm to be able to equip the highest level weapon they will use. For most Low STR builds, STR is capped at around 75. The other variation is newer in light of the release of overall STR scrolls. This variation is Super Low-STR, and uses the fact that all Bowman overalls only have a DEX requirement to equip, and certain ones have 6 STR on them clean. With these two factors taken into consideration, it would be possible to equip an high level Bow with a Z-Helm, a decent STR scrolled overall, and a STR cape, with barely any STR added at all. The Low-STR will require some funding to make it a awesome Bowman, but mainly for a STR cape, and Z-Helm. The Super STR-less will require a larger amount of funding, but has major benefits to it.
The STR-less build is very literal, in that you leave STR alone throughout being a Bowman, and add nothing but DEX. STR-less builds consist of using stat-less weapons, or weapons that have no stat requirement to equip, such as the Maple Weapons, and the Bow of Magical Destruction for Bows. The STR-less build can require very little funding, to a lot, depending the supply of BoMDs and Maple Weapons.
The Path Of The Bow
The Bow is one of two weapon types available to a Bowman. The bow has some advantages over the other weapon choice, crossbows. and the enjoyment of their face not being covered almost completely by the weapon. The main downside to Bows, is both the average attack on the bows, and the formula used for bows.
The Path Of The Crossbow
The Crossbow, or Xbow, is the second type of weapon available to a Bowman. The major upside to Xbows, is the increased average attack the Xbow has over its bow counterpart. Where a LVL 90 bow would have 90 clean attack on average, an LVL 90 Xbow would be 93 attack clean on average. The damage formula also gives the Xbow an advantage. With a 106 attack Bow on my Ranger, i had a high damage range of 19xx, but with an 104 Xbow, my high damage range was around 20xx, easily more damage with a weapon of less attack. The main downside to Xbows, is the look of it. At higher LVLs of Xbows, the size of the weapon is noticeable, as it will tend to cover most of your face when equipped, if not all of it.
The Firing speed of both Bows and Xbows has been thrown into question. Some other guides list that there is a slight difference of shots/minute between the two, mainly because Xbows firing animation plays through fully, with the arrow actually firing at the end of the animation, while Bows have the arrow firing more towards the beginning to middle of the animation. I plan to test this myself by using the stopwatch on my cell phone and firing both and Xbow and Bow without booster or SA, using normal arrows for 1 minute, and the amount of arrows used will give the shot/minute. That Number I will bring to you when i am finished with the test.
Firing Speed Results
Using a Normal Speed Bow And an Normal Speed Xbow with no booster for either. I had with me 100 arrows of each and fired for 1 minute timed on my cell phone stopwatch. The results are.... 75 Arrows Shot With BOW/Minute, and 71 Arrows Shot with XBOW/Minute. This shows that there is a clear speed advantage with Bows over Xbows, but Xbows do have the increased damage.
Stat Distribution
For Bowman, DEX is the single most important stat there is, and for Bow users, STR is the second.
For Bow Users, you Should keep your STR at 5 above your level, so if you are level 30, your STR should be at 35.
For Xbow users, keeping your STR equal to your level is all that is needed.
First Job Skills
For the First Job Bowman, there are three skills that need to be maxed, these skills are:
The Blessing of Amazon: It adds Accuracy, even though Bowman get massive amounts of Accuracy alone from the high amount of DEX we have, having the Accuracy from Blessing of Amazon allows us to attack certain higher level monsters ahead of other classes.
The Eye of Amazon: This increases the distance our arrows go, since we are a ranged class, the father we are from the enemy, the less damage you may take while training.
Critical Shot: This is an absolute must, as this single skill allows Bowman to compete on the same level as other classes, by giving Bowman a boost in the damage they are able to deal, adding 100% more damage to the attack. With my high damage range of 19xx, i hit about 19xx with a normal arrow, but with a good critical shot, i hit upwards of 41xx.
Arrow Blow Vs. Dual Shot
For most new Bowman, this is one of the most confusing parts of the Bowman job: whether to use one high damage attack or to use two attacks in one, with lower damage for each attack.
Arrow Blow: This attack skill gives a major amount of damage in the form of a single arrow. Many argue that Arrow Blow is the best way to go, for certain reasons, like seeing high numbers, as well as needing less MP to use than Dual Shot.
Double Shot: This attack skill deals higher than normal damage over 2 arrows, giving the same total damage as Arrow Blow, at the increased MP cost. The main and most reasonable reason people say to go with Dual Shot, is because when Critical Shot is added to the equation, Dual Shot out damages Arrow Blow.
In Simplified Terms
Critical shot does not give x2 damage it gives an extra 100% damage. AB with crit = 360%. DS with 1 crit = 360% with 2 crits = 460%.
Arrow Blow Update: As of the last patch, certain changes have been made to many skills, Arrow Blow included. The damage of Arrow Blow has been increased, so that at max, it should hit 290% damage, but due to an error, it currently still deals 260% when max, but at level 19, it does 283% damage, bringing it close to the damage that Double Shot produces with Criticals put into the equation.
Hunter or Crossbowman
So, you have made it to level 30, and you are ready to make your job advancement. Well, head back to Henesys, and back to where you made the first job advancement. After talking to Athena, head to the main Henesys map, and continue heading right along the top platform. Go through the portal, and head to the upper right hand corner of the map. Once there, talk to the Job Instructor to begin the job advancement test. You must collect 30 dark marbles, once collected, talk to the Instructor, they will give you a medal, which you must take back to Athena.
Now comes the hard part, you must choose whether or not you want to use Bows or Xbows for the rest of you Bowman career. With Bows, you get speed, with Xbows, you get power. Once you choose, all the skills you attain for your choice will only be usable with that weapon.
Common Ground: Shared Skills
These next skills are shared between both Hunters and Crossbowman.
Bow Mastery: This is an important skill, not only does it give you a little more Accuracy bonus, but it will also stabilize your damage by increasing the minimum damage on your damage range.
Final Attack: This skill is one of the skills that is full of controversy within both Hunters and Crossbowman. What the skill does is include a powerful attack at the end of an skill attack such as Arrow Blow or Double Shot. The controversy behind it stems from the fact that it does not work with ANY of the third or fourth job skills, meaning that after third job, the points put into Final Attack almost seem useless. But for those that do decide to put points into it, it is IMPERATIVE that it is maxed. You don't want to put just a few points in it, you either max it, or don't even touch it. For those that do max it, an increased training speed has been seen, because at max, it deals 250% damage when it activates. But this is still an optional skill, and will forever be debated as to max it or not.
Booster: This skill is a skill seen in every job, and is always nice to have. The skill itself increases the attack speed while it is activated. So with a bow of normal speed, you will have a slightly faster attack speed.
Soul Arrow: Another important skill, this one frees up the Use part of Bowman Inventories, by allowing no arrows to be needed to attack. The only draw back, albeit a very minimal draw back, is that Attack boosting arrows (diamond arrows, bronze arrows, red arrows) will be negated, and the damage range boost from them will not appear with the damage you actually deal. A personal recommendation I would make about Soul Arrow, is to not completely max it. With Booster, the duration of the skill at max is 200 seconds, but with Soul Arrow, it is more, at max, it lasts 600 seconds! So as to keep duration times equal, not maxing Soul Arrow is kinda nice, but other than just keeping skill times close to each other, there is no other reason to not max it other than the fact that you have 5 less MP used at a lower where the duration time is closer to the 200 seconds of Booster.
Power Knock-Back: This is a really nifty skill, and literally helps out in a tight situation. As a Bowman, you can use the Bow or Xbow equipped to push back the enemy in front of you when you cant fire an arrow. What Power Knock-Back does is build on this and allows for there to be damage dealt and knock multiple enemies back at once. So if an enemy spawns in front of you, you can simply use this skill, deal damage to them and fire arrows at them without losing much training speed.
The Hunter Skill
Coming Soon!
*credits: wobbufet.
(under construction)