Why Bowspam is a terrible strategy for an Archer.

I'd quite like to put out a little more lengthy in response to the chemist scenario, and as I haven't gotten round to that yet, expect to see something a bit later. In the meantime:

Translating from theory into practise isn't perfect, I completely understand. It's why I made a lot of the math in the post pretty conservative, to eliminate as many potential disputes as I could even when I did put it into practise. I also tried to cover my back by explaining other scenarios, for example even if they did knock players back further than they could physically make up, deliberately to reduce translation even further. Even then, yeah it's theory based on experience in game with a bit of math thrown in, it's never going to be a perfect translation. The problem is, even if I were to show gameplay and make a video showing good archers vs bowspammers, it still wouldn't fully translate. Given how many scenarios I went through to make this post, going through another one with all the complex variables involved in archery (it doesn't sound like a lot, but believe me, there are more than you think) it means I'd never be able to perfectly encompass it that way either. If anything, given the number of scenarios I'd be able to realistically cover in 1 video without it being too long, it would be less accurate than the theory! Also there's the fact I did this in 2 hours and I didn't have any recording equipment on my computer, which doesn't help

Firstly, I can't believe you actually posted this. Secondly, this introduces a new variable in which you can't necessarily see the enemy you're facing. Assuming you don't know if an enemy ninja is even stalking you, don't bowspam anyway because you'll look like a complete idiot and you'd be wasting a massive amount of arrows anyway. If you do know that a ninja is stalking you, a much better strategy is to play it smart. A ninja is going to try and surprise you by moving in a specific way to gain a shot from you from the side or behind. In this scenario, it makes more sense for you to be mobile. If you're running around twisting and turning, it can be much more difficult to get a clear shot from behind, making the ninja waste time and resources (invis powder). The best tactic for a ninja is using a sword in a 1v1 because by the time you've hit them with the bow you'll have probably taken masive damage, so my advice would be to run around, try and fake them by moving in a straight line in 1 direction every so often, and then turning 180 degrees and firing a low power shot. Since you're moving in 1 direction, they may see this as an opportunity, like you think they've gone elsewhere. This means they're likely to try take the opportunity from behind. A lower power arrow in this case is more likely to hit and deal some nice initial damage before finishing off with a sword. It's basically just a way to maximise your damage output with the arrows whilst lowering their invis powder efficiency.

<3

oh and given I wrote the whole thing, I also read the whole thing, @Admiral_Munson do I get a medal?

 

Yeah, I had to kill some time on a what was to be a 5 hour trip home *shrugs. Put in like an hour the day before and finished it off then. Though the amount of time I spent on writing it is kind of irrelevant to the topic itself

 

I don't expect you to write an essay like me, I just wanted to cover all bases. If you don't care that's fine. It's like I said right at the beginning, if you are just doing it for the lols, for the fun, because you can, then that's not why I'm here. I'm here to denounce the point of bowspamming as a legitimate tactic, not just as someone screwing around.

Yes, absolutely, and I tried to encompass that at the start too. I had to use the damage and knockback scales of a particular arrow alone to get stats for the bowspam as a whole, which is why it might have seemed to look that way. Yes, using lower power arrows is a legitimate tactic and it can be useful, it's the rapid and excessive use of them that I have a problem

Again, I'm not here to debate where you're just doing it for fun or not, I'm here to talk about whether it's a legitimate tactic. If you don't care then that's fine, I set that out at the start deliberately so people with your mindset didn't have to worry about my long essay. As a competitive and useful tactic, it's pointless, but to give you a bit of fun of course that's up to what you'd consider to be fun

Read the damage section and you'll understand, but basically the damage efficiency of a sword is much, much higher than any bowspam strategy, and you're still as much at risk from incoming damage (sometimes even moreso, given ctf is a team game and lack of mobility

My argument to that would be I and quite a number of other arhcers can stay on an open playing field and not have to bowspam to get a 10/20 ks without a problem. Camping is a whole different ball game, and probably worth another thread on it's own, but basically it's perfectly possible to do that, it's just about being able to use your sword and your bow equally well. With that said, this sentence does imply that you do care about killstreaks and thereby kills, despite you saying earlier in the post you didn't

Explaining your points in a longer literary style can add depth not achievable in 20 words. Believe me, there are longer prose on much more boring topics than this. Again, this is irrelevant to the context of the thread

 

Again, explained this in the first part of the post, if you're doing it for fun then there's no problem of that. I set that out right at the start deliberately for that very reason. My quarrel is not with people doing it, my problem is when people say it's a fundamentally useful tactic, when in reality that isn't the case.

Just because you have it as a tool, doesn't mean that it's the best tool for the job, which is again what I'm trying to explain here. Yes an archer COULD bowspam, that doesn't mean that there's not a better tactic available.

Well that comes down to the player trying to kill you, doesn't it. If that player is going to follow you if you run or not, then knocking them back a bit with a couple arrows to try get a headshot on the flag carrier is a good thing. Firing those arrows will obviously lose you mobility and take time, which you might not actually have to recover. It's about judging the situation right in that case

Ok first of all, that archer sword is not sorry. I proved already that the damage output per second of that sword is in fact higher than the bow at short range (which is in the damage section, I suggest you read it) Yes, ultimately it does mean if you use the sword you're going to increase damage taken. CTF is however a team game, and with bowspam you're also reducing mobility. This means you're putting yourself in risk of being attacked very easily by a number of other players, particularly other archers whom you haven't seen as you'd be a sitting duck. Also no, against a competent ninja you CAN survive as an archer. Against the others you'd not as likely survive, but equally you wouldn't as likely survive bowspamming, because they can strafe your bowspam and get even more damage on you more easily. If they can't, well then that doesn't really fit the definition of competent.

No, it's not. This is an excuse and if you'd read the post and understood the argument I was trying to put forward you'd understand some of the stuff you're trying to bring up here is stuff I have already addressed. An example of this is the "sorry excuse for a sword" you put out where I already put in the damage section as having a higher damage output than the bow at maximum efficiency at short range, and that's just in this post! I don't really care what people are annoyed about more, I care about people trying to justify this as a legitimate tactic when in the vast majority of situations it doesn't hold up.

This is where things get messy, because there's a lot of potential terrain you could be fighting on. A lot of archers do prefer to use higher ground, and yes this does actually slow you down to the point where you can knock them back more than they can physically recover. This is where in part the strafing and arrows needed to get into sniping range comes into play. Assuming the player isn't even moving and already 5 blocks from the player, you're gonna need 5 arrows to kill the guy, but factoring in the potential strafes and ground recovery, it's going to take more like 3 times that (at least). This means that you're losing a hell of a lot of potential damage with those arrows that could be realistically used to headshot someone. I also neglected to mention what about when 2 or more archers bowspam the same player in the same location, and again it really complicates matters. Theory doesn't always perfectly get transferred into practise, but some of the same things remain. If you do manage to knock them back into snipe range, you'll have done serious damage to the target anyway, you'll have wasted a lot of your time where you're potentially useful to your team (which as an archer time is of the essence to be able to deal with an enemy offense/flag bearer) and resources.

Terrain again is probably worth a thread of its own due to the massive number of variables involved. Being on higher ground, due to it being rather steep can impact on the archers mobility, and prove to be more visible than other areas, making you vulnerable to other archers. It's really about your choice of terrain. Some good archers won't even go for higher ground deliberately for those reasons.