Are the crossbows useful and good or just annoying beacuse of its long cooldown between the shots?

good damage per shot but kinda annoying with the drawback

That sounds like it will be awesome when you get it, but after a while you get tired of it? Or am I foolishly mistaken?

As long as you have the quickshot perk for the bow the reload is very short

It's a good change of pace and it would suit certain characters. The crossbow is supposed to feel different.

Can somebody tell me if enemies in the base game carry crossbows?

Now...even before release people say it Is slow to reload...But its actually the same speed as a mid level archery skilled character...I mean come one, It aint a machinegun what do people expect...its quite fast if I say so myself.

Is the reload sped up by the Quick Shot perk?

This here is right its a crossbow its slower and more powerful the way it should be and I am glad its done a little slower.

Yes, Eclipse.

I saw some vigilant's carrying them.

hey guys a quick crossbow question. does one need the dwarven smithing perk to obtain the dwarven crossbow or is it obtained otherwise? cheers

Jakel, you can obtain it without the perk, if you are Dawnguard faction.

Crossbows are supposed to take a bit to load, so I kinda expected it. And, it does it's job well. I need to enchant mine, so I can have my "Red Mountain Shotgun" back...Old reliable weapon from my Morrowind days.

It's meant to be used for sneak attacks. The higher base damage will result in more one-shot kills, and the slower rate of fire isn't much of an issue if you're sneaking.

Gossi you just put a smile on my face:)

That's awesome I wonder if bandits and the like will carry them as well I hope so. It would give the ranged combat more variety when fighting the ranged enemies.

AS long as you have the quickshot perk, it should be fairly fast.

Awesome

.

Does anyone know how much the extra sneak dmg is?

Slow but powerful. As a sneak character I definitely love using these, but they're annoying in close combat.

This is one of the beauties of these things great from fat sway useless up close these add great ranged versatility to your ranged bow users its a fit that's been missing wince Morrowind and I am glad of their return to the game.

I really liked the crossbows

so far i've always done a sneak-archer but in preparation for dawnguard/crossbows i was thinking of making a Heavy Armor Archer/Crossbow. Do the Crossbows do enough damage where you do not need to have sneak attacks in order to do a large amount of damage?

They're awesome... and versatile.

I really like them against multiple opponents in combo with stealth and open melee.
They're a great 1 shot power-open for mass melee combat, they're great at close range (the melee smack to the jaw followed by a point blank bolt in the chest).
They're awesome to whip out for a single shot at some straggler keeping himself at range and then switch back to melee.

Next thing I'm testing is if they can be assigned as the "bow" for kinect, I find myself switching between crossbow and melee during certain circumstances more often than I did with the bow.

The weapon itself feels satisfying to use, the bolts release and smack home with a nice feeling of force.
It's also a very satisfying assassination weapon.

I find them really good. Sure they have a reload time but with the perk its really not that bad and having a reload time like that is good for the RP. I find the Crossbows badass.