Define long range. Bows aren't good at long ranges anyways (real life, not the game). The archery is pretty good in this game to me. I agree the disappearing arrows is firking stupid, but at the range they disappear, in my experience, is farther than a short bow or long bow could be effectively used anyways. (in real life) How ever i must agree that through sheer quantity of arrows I should be able to, a couple hundred yards away, make it rain, eventually hitting someone. But like I said before, longbows and short bows are only really good for about 75yards anyways. Thats assuming every bow aside from the long bow is a short bow.

Anyways, I think its fine since its an unrealistic videogame anyways.

Edit: My parenthesis are in correlation to what was said before them. Upon re reading this, the second one seems out of place.

Here is what i found out.. If you want a headshot (I dont like them but we are all different). Aim for the throat/neck.

Unless its at larger distance, then you actually might have to aim for the center of his head..

I adjusted to aiming lower than usual. You shoot a tad higher than the HUD target.

I think it takes skill and mimics actual real life archery. But we can call it broken if you want.

Theres nothing wrong with the archery as far as I can see.

The sights set right for a decent range.

Having been an archer for many years and actually having the pleasure of firing a real english longbow (120lb pull at my draw length.. which hurts.. a lot)

I think people are treating bows as sniper rifles, the range isnt that great, only really useful to a max of 250 yards.

you need to compensate for distance, if your close you need to aim a little low because they do go up before the come down. At medium range you can aim more normally, at long range you need to aim up ect ect. Gravity is a [censored]. I have had no issue hitting people with arrows. 50 or so out of my 70 murders have been with a bow

Bows are crap at short range (unless the modern compound bows). But longbows and "Short bows" (Recurve i guess?) are yes crap, both in short and long ways... Thats why they invented the crossbows (Which is good close range and crap long range)

However a bow dont really have a maximum range more then what gravity defines. Just aim high and gravity takes care of the rest. However i can tell that bows are useless at close range, you can not fire a long bow in close distance like in Skyrim dungeons. Since the arrow won't build enough velocity to make a good penetration. Especially not if the target is armored. You can actually grab an arrow with your hand that is fired from a longbow .

BUT this is not real life Its a game.. And i dont sit around and judging how arrows dont fly as they do in real life. Just made a small point.

http://i43.tinypic.com/aniv9.jpg

Skyrim needs archery lessons from Gothic 3. Arrows go straight where you aim initially and then gravity kicks in after a point, where velocity is lost. Basically how a real bow shoots. The arrow flies straight initially and then begins to drop. You aim up to compensate for the effect of gravity. Longer range, aim higher. It takes a while to get used to shooting a bow in Gothic 3 but once you learn to judge the distance and the effect of gravity relative to distance (also factoring in the terrain, uphill or downhill) it's easy enough to shoot a bow. Skyrim tries too hard to automate all these things and it ends up feeling "clunky" and "wrong" (took me a few days to learn that I needed to shoot at the ground in front of the deer to hit it in the head...)

But arrows should have maximum velocity right after releasing the bow string. Knock-down power must be what your referring too, because when I go hunting (rifle not bow) and I shoot game up close, they tend to run for a bit unless I get a direct heart or head shot (also ive only shot one deer in the head and it was by accident). But if I shoot at something 200-300 yards away, they will smack the ground hard and die instantly and all I have to do is get them towards the front of the body.

Anyways, just sayin. I think stopping power is what you were referring too. Not sure what the proper name for it is, I just call it knock-down power.

I use the bow in-game exclusively as my weapon, you're just doing it wrong apparently. It isn't a sniper rifle, you need to learn how to fire an arrow, it's not going to give you an instant headshot right where your reticule is lined up.

I do archery for sport.

On a recurve or compund bow, there is a sight, a small plastic cross in a circle mounted above the arrow nock. You can move it left, right, up, down with screws. Once you have built up a good, consistent shooting posture and all your arrows land close together in a small circle, you can move the sight so that this small circle ends up in the centre.

This is all well and good for the distance you happen to be shooting at at the time. If you move further away from your target, you will need to adjust the sight downwards (so you are aiming higher). Same as if you move closer to your target, you will need to adjust the sight upwards.

The "sight" in the game has simply been set assuming a distance of around 50 metres. Keeping this in mind, it won't be accurate for distances exceeding this or below this and you need to adjust your aim accordingly, since you can't adjust the sight. In Oblivion, the sight was set for a distance of about 20 metres. This means that all close-range shooting was accurate and for longer distances you had to adjust your aim.

On my longbow, I don't have a sight. Instead, with practice and observation, I have marked several lines with duct tape on the bottom for various distances: 30, 40, 50, 100, and 150 metres. By aiming the bow high and lining up the target with the line, and having a consistent draw length of course, I can be pretty accurate with getting the arrow to travel far enough for long-range targets.

If you want a arrow to fly true, go to the moon and shoot. That arrow will not stop until it hits something. You know that game, humm what is it, have not played it for awhile? Oh yes Mass Effect2. When you in the Citadel, listen to the Officer what he say to his men about shooting things in space.

The bow seems to shoot, randomly, off-center... (Left and right.) Then it stops, and just lands where the target actually is. It is not the wind. It is a glitch.

The only real bug I have seen with arrows... Once in a while, they STOP doing DAMAGE... You can unleash hundreds of arrows, and the creature never looses any more health. (Happens at about 20% health on most creatures. Only about 1/100th of the time.)

I once thought it was the wind, or the arrows I was using...

That should actually be a feature... Some arrows and bows should be sloppy shooting, when you are low-level... And get better with time. The iron arrows should also ignite fumes or oils, when they spark on a surface. I see the sparks some-times, but that never ignites fumes or oil-slicks.

(Sorry, the cross-hairs could be dead-on, based on the targets distance, accounting for the arch. But that should also be a perk, or an "earned perception" with skill-level.)

Though, it is not difficult to adjust, once you miss one or two shots.

Arrows make great distractions. Shoot some down a hall, and enemies will go check-out the noise.

By default the arrow shoots above the crosshair, meaning that at short range you need to aim below the target. There are ini settings that can be used in PC version to make the arrows fly where you aim at.

Add to My documents\My Games\Skyrim\Skyrim.ini

[Combat]f1PArrowTiltUpAngle=0.7f3PArrowTiltUpAngle=0.7

(Default values for both are 2.0)

Those values were suggested by Spookyfx, who made the comabt archery mod for Oblivion that was inspiration for Skyrim's archery. I have no trouble hitting anything with those settings.

Arrows follow an arc in Skyrim. The game cross hair applies a small compensation in the same way a leaf sight would do. It works well for bipedal targets but shooting at a wolf, rat or mudcrab from short distance usually results in the arrow flying over the target, which is about right. I'm glad they didn't take wind into consideration as Skyrim is already enough action oriented as it is.

Wrong, I was explaining how I made it work for me. Don't try and twist my words. I've been finding the bow and arrow increasingly useful because I've been able to work round the apparent break in the system. Quit moaning because your playstyle is too rigid and adapt.


This. Thank you for that explaination, shame people aren't going to listen


Awesome, simply awesome... yet, they'll still say it's broken. Personally, I think this video is conclusive proof that the bow and arrow work perfectly fine.


Actually, gravity acts upon a projectile as soon as it leave the launcher; be it a bullet from a gun, an arrow from a bow or a "stone" from a catapault. If it were to only act upon something that was slowing down, then the laws of physics lies to us.

I know I've quoted loads of posts, and probably brought something back that would rather have been left, but my internet cut out last night and I felt compelled to finish what I started.

The only time I have a problem is aiming up at something, like an archer on a wall/rampart. The reticule will be on his chest, but the arrow goes way over his head.

I actually love those shots. I know this verges on meme, but aim for his knee

I've seen this mentioned a few times in this topic but im really stuck when trying to shoot an arrow. No matter what i try the arrow just wont go further then a few meters. When i tried starting a new game i have no difficulties at all and the arrows working fine. When going back to my leveled toon (lvl 27) i have the same problem again. Any solution to that, i tried adding the 2 lines to the ini file but it doesnt help at all.

Quoted for truth. Other than I've missed a couple shots on really long range, but the little dust cloud told me how to adjust my aim and the next one was a kill shot

I and a few others have tried to explain this concept a few times in this tread but people either dont understand or refuse to listen and continue to rant. The in game sight works like a realistic sight.

My play has morphed into near pure archery. I find that I can put an arrow thru the head of about anyone at near any distance; of course that doesn’t meat they always die.

SORRY i totally disagree with this.i have taken people out half way up mountains/hills,i also use my bow constantly,i have made hits that are so far away that i cant even tell what the race/character is im trying to hit and only find out whent the hit has been SUCCESFULL.
the archer skill is miles,miles,miles better than oblivion and i have found very easy to use and HIT.the further the character is the higher ABOVE the character you fire......just like a real bow i suppose?

im afraid u have also missed one of the best perks for the archery which is slow time.........anyway how is ur archery at 100 if you are so garbage at it????

In short distances it will be a bit higher, like IRL. But over long distances you will need to aim higher, again, like IRL.