I find it rather frustrating that if you're trying to long-shot a target, the minute you set a distinct amount of space between yourself and the person, the arrow will essentially just....disappear the minute it leaves your bow. I have tried re-adjusting my aim in every shape and form to see if perhaps you had to take gravity and the wind in mind, but I think you just genuinely can't hit targets from a nice long distance, as if the game suddenly thinks you're not trying to attack anyone as no one is in the "attack" radius set by the devs. Anyone else find it annoying?

I understand that arrows, based on the materials they are made with, are far more susceptible to being affected at long distances...but you would've thought if you're using a daedric bow, such feats could be possible.

Does anyone know the exact point where the game renders your arrow useless?

If you're on xbox, it's pretty much the actor draw distance. Some creatures, such as mammoths and dragons, can be seen even in the distance. You won't be able to hit them from this range, though..
If you're on pc, it's quite easy to remove the range limit - along with other 'features' such as auto-aim!

From what I've seen and experienced (on PS3), it seems that there is a slight arrow drop for longer shots. I've aimed high on a few of the extreme ranges and hit the target. But there is an extent to this. The maximum distance I've made shots is about 200 yards, mayyybe a little more by aiming a few pixels above the target but not much, otherwise the shot goes who knows where. This is depending on the bow I'm using. It looks like the "higher" level bows (i.e. Daedric and Ebony) have a longer "range" than a lower bow as well as obviously dealing more damage due to the power of the bow.

It's mostly just practice. Find a nice wooden post somewhere with no NPCs, townsfolk, bystanders, animals, etc. http://www.uesp.net/wiki/Skyrim:Angi is a good place to practice long range shots because the arrows will either be in the wood of the target, or behind in the snow so you can judge your shots a little better.

Ah right. A shame you can't do that on Xbox, as in real life, there is no range limit, just range accuracy!

This pisses me off too. It's kind of hard to RP the best shot in Skyrim when you can't hit a target 200 yards away.

I never had any problems with the distance, being a born chicken hopeless at fighting I often perch up somewhere safe and pick them off. If I cannot see them reasonably clearly with normal vision I would not expect to be able to shoot them. That distance seemed to be the same for larger things you could see, the arrows never went any further just because the target was bigger. You can shoot a lot further in the game than you could with a similar bow in real life, and with less drift. I play on the Xbox 360, but had a go at the PC version and it seemed to be the same. Very occasionally the draw distance (if that is the right term) on the Xbox 360 was less than expected and the sods did not appear to be there, even though I knew they were, luck of the draw, I just went closer till they appeared. That usually happened when I was much higher than what I was trying to shoot.

Even harder when some crappy slow mo shot shows you the shot in a way you didnt [censored]ing want it to.

I have made some insane distance shots on Xbox so i can only advise to aim high

Archery is rubbish. I have seen so many bugs when using bows. My archer was a broken mess with no defense, could'nt hit to save her life and had no defense.

You can't hit anything long range.
Nevermind long range, short range does'nt work either most of the time.

Yeah, if you have PC, you can snipe targets from pretty impressive distances. Try adjusting actor draw distance, maybe that will help.

What pisses me off is that the PC shoots the arrow in an arc, rather than parallel to the ground, this means, that in order to hit a target a close range, you have to aim down, not up or level. And how far it shoots up is different with every bow, meaning judging how much I have to adjust my aim to compensate for gravity is much more arbitarily difficult. Especially shooting at a target much higher up than you.

However, I have not heard anyone complainig about this, so I assume 'tis only me

Closer to release there were some threads about this. And there are ini tweaks to disable it.

To make arrows fire where the crosshair points, instead of above it like in the default game, add to Skyrim.ini:

[Combat]fMagnetismStrafeHeadingMult=0.0fMagnetismLookingMult=0.0f1PArrowTiltUpAngle=0.7f3PArrowTiltUpAngle=0.7

They still fly in arcs of course, but this should make aiming easier.

To make arrows hit any visible target, add to Skyrim.ini:

[Actor]fVisibleNavmeshMoveDist=12288.0000

Uh, okay, how do you do this?

Giants seem to know the exact distance that my arrows can reach, when I'm shooting them from some perch that they can't reach. I'll be able to clearly see them, but my arrows won't reach, no matter how high or low I aim. I'll just have to stay in sneak mode and wait for my character to get the "hidden" notice, and the giants walk back to where I can hit them from.

The lack of range also makes it a pain when fighting aerial dragons.

^This, practice shooting from different distances and at the Hawks in Solitude, you will get the hang of it

I don't have much problem on xbox.
I can hit targets that I can barely even see,without the zoom perk.
Human type targerts are easier to hit since you don't have to quite so accurate with the drop.
The only problems I have is when I use the zoom perk and can still barely see the target.But that range is an incredibely long shot so I expect to miss sometimes.
As someone already said,being below the target does get tricky.

Add the lines under the corresponding headings to the Skyrim.ini located in My Documents\My Games\Skyrim\ folder (do no edit the one in Skyrim install folder!). Those headings may not exist in the ini file, in which case add them too. Order doesn't matter.

Don't listen to people saying that you need to practice your aiming; you're right, this is a bug. I spent hours the other day practicing long range archery, and there is definitely a magical distance at which arrows will not hit targets, but WILL hit the ground and WILL alert the enemy you were trying to hit. I'm familiar with arrow drop and have made some pretty solid shots before. But once you're at about the non-zoom draw distance of an NPC, arrows will not register.

It's not like I NEED that much distance to kill someone, I just want to feel like a super sniper.


Only other possible explanation is that this is one of those bugs that only affects some users...but even then it is still a bug, and has nothing to do with aiming. I've tried high altitude shots from mountain crevices to polar bears and sniping in the plains on mammoths. Both fail at a certain distance.

Did you adjust the Object and Actor Fade distances when doing your testing? If the game fades the arrows out after a certain distance, then your not going to hit distant targets. I have the fade values set farther out than stock, but not all the way to the right. Anyway, I can hit distant things with my bow and arrow.

I have all distances at max (of what the game allows from the options) and my arrows pass trough enemies past certain distance. Increasing the fVisibleNavMeshMoveDist setting allows arrows to hit those targets.