I’ve been giving bows some thought since the patch and think there’s room for potential improvement although how they are now is okay (I guess)…
I was thinking something along the lines of, bow attacks should still cost stamina but don’t build up focus but the higher focus you have the higher damage your bow does. This will make ranged players need to take the “risk” of melee (or drink focus potion) to build up focus but the pay off is higher damage bow attacks to finish off enemies/start engagements.
I also thought firing X amount of arrows in quick succession could increase the fire rate of further arrows for a limited time so that potentially you may be able to get an extra arrow or two off before having to dodge out of the way.
Building on this a little more, (and I expect not everyone will agree) but I think we should have to craft arrows (and consume when firing) so that firing the bow is more calculated rather than just spam shooting from a corner/ledge endlessly. There could be different levels of quiver we can craft that increase the number of arrows we carry as well as different quality arrows that cost more/less materials for better flight speed/damage.
Having a few extra things to craft aside from bows would give a ranger play style a little more depth and the focus meter build up affecting the damage you do would play into the whole focusing on your shot rather than doing rune attacks etc, although bow rune attacks would benefit from that higher focus meter damage but obviously cost focus to cast too (so you can’t spam those and become too OP either).
If we do have arrows and quivers then making the quiver visible on the character when you have a bow equipped would be cool as well.
I’m really interested to see if anyone else has come up with any ideas on bow gameplay or if you feel my concept is good (or has huge flaws I’ve not thought of) or indeed even if you think bows are completely fine as they are, no changes necessary 