The other day I went to the collage of winterhold, to pick up my new flesh spell,
But while I was there, I found the Paralyze spell.
Which resulted in me going exploring with the paralyze spell as my 1st weapon and my bound bow as my 2nd.

I found this setup extremely effective;
Paralyze a target, summon/take out your bow and then shoot them nice and safely.
Basicly situations with about 5 monsters will result in using paralyze 5 times, shoot the first one you paralyzed and then shoot all the others or just reparalyze them.

I'm debating if I should keep using it or use it less, It's kinda breaking the danger/challange.

I'm still waiting for Mass paralyze and will post my opinions about that aswell, but I think it might be even worse...
Anyways, they were some nice and easy dungeons, hehe


Edit;

I understand where your coming from,
the first levels you'll getting your build together and are having some issue's with certain monsters,
while your focussing on probaly one or two questlines,
While later on, you become much more powerfull and certain quests just aren't appealing.

My tip to this is that you'd try some deadric quests,
or maybe some tiny ones, like going to a village and helping out the town, instead of doing the major quests.

I tend to explore caves when I'm unsure of what to do/ just feel like it.

Try it out, It'll extend the life time of the game much much more.

I've been messing around for a little bit,
and I think I might've found a nice adition to this class.

I found this quite alot of fun for a while, ofcourse it isn't in for the long haul, but it'll keep you busy;

The Paralyzer, Basicly an arcane archer focused on paralyzing.
Because there are so many ways in skyrim to paralyze, it isn't too hard.

My main choice was the Paralyzing perk in archery and have paralyze in one hand and bound bow in the other.
Ofcourse if there would be a group I'd switch to Mass Paralyze.
Something you can also try it paralyzing potions or the Serpant stone.

If anyone tried this out yet, please, share your experience!

Yeah, I'm slooowwwwwly working my way up Alteration toward the paralyze spell. It'll be awhile.

But I was wondering if it would be game-breaking.

By the time I can cast paralyze, I will have Power Shot, and be getting a 50% stagger, which is just about as good - maybe better, in fact, since the foe doesn't fall down when staggered and is therefore easier to hit.

As a side note, I really wish there were some more unique bows in this game. I can think of exactly one, and I won't be getting it on this playthrough:
Ah well. Conjuration hit 38 last night, so my next stop is the College, where I plan to spend some of my septims on training that skill up to where it needs to be so I can just buy Bound Bow.

I'm not sure if you can call paralyze Game-Breaking,
Though it's defenitly powerfull, higher level monsters will just resist it,
and even with the lower-cost perk for expert level, with 100 Alteration it still costs 130 mana.
And on top of that, you can't realy use a bow while casting it.

My conclusion would be that it's an interesting touch on the gameplay, powerfull, yes, but ineresting.
Like I was saying before, if your feeling too powerfull, try and go up a difficulty level

paralyze spell is the realm of the spellsword, it doesnt mesh well with archery, might better to enchant a bow with paralyze- although paralysis weapons make the game dumb to play.

Not necessarily,
Casting a paralyze spell/having a paralyze enchantment is extremely usefull for archers, especialy the under-geared ones.
You have a few seconds to shoot someone while their not a threat to you, which can be key with tought situations.

You can quickly buy yourself some time when using the paralyze spell.
Especialy for an arcane archer, this is the closest thing to having enchanted arrows.

...Of course not necessarily....
The point I make is that it does not mesh well with the weapon since you cannot use your main form of attack without putting it away. You already have paralysis potions and can enchant the weapon, therefore it is more suited to say a sword/spell build- something that does not compromise its attack to utilize it.

Yes thats the problem, Thought I found the element of paralyzis tends to blend well with the archery class.
Thats why I suggested the paralyze perk in archery and take an enchanted bow.

I agree with your point that the mage form, the most reliaable form is rather, annoying to use with a 2 handed bow.

Eh, I'm not having such a tough time using spells alongside my bow. Switching from the bow to the spell is pretty much instantaneous. So if someone is charging at me and I need to stop them fast, going for a Paralyze spell a lot of times will be faster than nocking and drawing another arrow with a paralysis poison.

That's the fun thing about this playstyle, actually... yeah, you're an archer, but you want to blend archery with what magic you have at your disposal. And sometimes you have to run.

Last night I had a terrifying time in a Dwemer ruin. I had managed to climb up some stairs past a couple of those spinning blade-traps. I knew that if I ran into trouble beyond the stairs, I wouldn't just be able to run back, because the traps were right there. Well, of course I ran into trouble. A couple of Dwarven spheres popped out of ducts in the wall, and I barely had time to slap down a rune, throw up my Stoneflesh spell, and do a bit of scrambling around in the very tight quarters of the room, getting off a couple of shots and bow-bashes.

I realized quickly that I wasn't going to be able to take them out, so I downed what few health potions I had left, took a deep breath, and ran/jumped down those deadly trapped stairs, hugging the wall so that I just missed the spinning blades.

The Dwemer spheres weren't so lucky.

Finally got the Bound Bow as well. Level 20. About damn time. Haven't had much of a chance to use it yet, but I like what I've seen so far.

I believe, not counting enchantments, the bound bow is the strongest bow in the game if your not forging your own bow.
Also, Yeh, I realy enjoy paralyze, just so you can get some magic while in combat.
I still need the perk which makes runes take up less magicka, aswell as place them further away.
Now runes take up so much magica for very little damage they do, unupgraded ofcourse, it's just not worth it for me.

Well, it's been awhile, but I think I'm nearing the end of my Arcane Archer playthrough. I'm level 29 currently - I know that seems low to a lot of people, but I just run out of stuff to do at higher levels. In a couple of quests I will be done with the College of Winterhold questline (and I never really wanted to go that far in it, either; it just goes fast). Never did anything in the Main Quest other than open up dragons (and I've had plenty of dragon encounters). Not joining the Legion or Stormcloaks, Companions or Thieves' Guild or Dark Brotherhood.

I've basically been wandering the land, doing odd quests here and there, looking for powerful artifacts, that sort of thing.

Anyway, here's how the build looks at this point: http://skyrimcalculator.com/#129533

That's from memory, so some of the perks may not be right, but it's close.

I'm still using runes to good effect - they're not doing much damage against some enemies, but they do help, and their main function (to channel foes toward my position) is working just fine.

My next perk will probably be to grab Adept Conjuration; that bound bow eats up the Magicka. If I cast Stoneflesh, then a rune, I can't cast bound bow unless I wait a few seconds. So I switch it up between the bound bow and my physical bows.

I have 3 main bows I'm using besides the bound one: one that absorbs health (14 points I think; haven't used it much); one that does fire damage (around 20 pts I believe), and one that does shock. Bound bow keeps my soul gems (and the black star!) charged up. I have so many filled soul gems I ended up leaving a bunch at the College.

My sneak skill is in the low 50s, but it's unperked. I use it occasionally, but most of the time there's just no need.

Having Steady Hand (only 1 perk - that's slow enough), Quick Draw, and Ranger is incredibly great. I can actually duck in and out of cover and keep away from spells. I've seen other people say Ranger isn't fun because it makes kiting too easy, but I love it for this kind of character - an agile archer who can weave in and out of combat and avoid the blows of his enemies.

So far I've only had 2 deaths - both of which I figure "didn't count" because the kids were making noise. One was against a snow bear. For some reason instead of reaching for a health potion, I tried to draw another arrow; he swatted me; I died. The other was against some bandits; I was trying to rush through a fort and wasn't paying attention.

So it's a very viable playstyle, though it really becomes powerful right around now. And once my characters 'really start to become powerful', I start to lose interest. Oh well. I still have a couple Daedric quests I could look into, I suppose, and I need to finish Kyne's Trials, and visit Labyrinthian... but the game doesn't really have a lot of content for a pure archer. There's some great artifacts if you like swords or hammers or armor or casting spells, but I seem to have designed a character who doesn't care about most of the rewards Skyrim has to offer.

Since I have the 1.6 beta with mounted combat, I'm contemplating getting this guy a horse and trying the archer... but the forced 3rd person makes shooting pretty difficult. Ah well.

Hope everyone else is enjoying their builds.

Good job.

I, too, have pressed forward on my Arcane Archer and am just loving it so far. Not quite completely perked on Enchanting so still have to make do with single enchants (mostly to reduce Dest costs for runes, leaving enough to also cast xFlesh spells). Looking forward to getting double enchants to really make this girl sing.

And I'm about the same as you Jaber -- once I get to a certain level of power, the will to continue falls off. I'll have to pick a questline and just finish it. Maybe MQ? Haven't done that one yet. **contemplates the prospect of non-sneak archer vs dragons**

Actually, the MQ would probably be great for an archer. I find it practically impossible to hit flying dragons, but if you wait until they're hovering or until they land you can usually get a couple of shots in. And I find that most of the time I don't get sneak attacks against dragons anyway; it's rare that you can sneak up on them, except in specific locations.

Hmm. *Maybe* I will give that a shot. I have only done the MQ once, with a very Nordic character (a gung-ho 'heir of Ysgramor' type who also did the Companions). My Altmer arcane archer might not really fit the whole mood, but on the other hand, he is the biggest badass in Skyrim right now

The biggest problem I have is that I usually quit characters right after I get them just how I wanted them. So I don't get to enjoy the sweet perks, gear, etc. Well, I'll push on through the College questline and then see how I feel about the rest of it...