Saw Sygian Nightmare Bow and noticed it wasn't ranger useable and it made me scatch my head. I'm not an expert on gear, however having played a ranger since 1999, I'm not sure I have ever seen a bow excluded to rangers before. And this isn't a class item, it has all other bow useable classes . It would be similar to seeing a dagger that is available to all melee classes that have piercing ability except rogues. Hopefully this is an oversight not the future of gear itemization. Ruv
It was an odd choice, this was pointed out but it's intended. The ratio gain is so minor that you'd probably not even notice if this was changed either, but... Meh.
The only Bow uploaded to eqitems to date with atleast 1hp that can't be equipped by a Ranger. Adarra's bow of the Unseen MAGIC ITEM LORE ITEM NO TRADE PLACEABLE Slot: RANGE Skill: Archery Atk Delay: 50 DMG: 30 AC: 7 STR: +7 DEX: +7 STA: +7 HP: +15 SV MAGIC: +7 SV POISON: +15 WT: 0.5 Range: 150 Size: MEDIUM Class: ROG Race: ALL except ERU HIE TRL OGR IKS Slot 1, Type 4 (Weapon: General) Slot 2, Type 20 (Ornamentation) 9 of the 268 Bows with 0 HP also can't be equipped by Rangers but I got lazy after finding Warrior Range (Test), Paladin Range (Test), Broken Blowgun of the Forest and Kyv Bow on the following list and can't figure out how to search for not Ranger usable, just how to search for Ranger usable which has 259 results. http://eqitems.13th-floor.org/items...next_3=0&field_4=&compare_4=&text_4=&next_4=0 The logical reason to exclude Rangers is if the ratio is too good for the class, Knight only 2h being kept out of the hands of Zerks especially and Knight onyl 1h being kept out of the hands of duel-wielders. If that was the case you would expect the ratio on the Bow that Rangers can't use to be signifigantly better.
I will bet this one was changed by raid community request. Rangers hate it when the other melees bid on their bows just for pulling weapons and the other melees hate feeling like jerks taking a bow from a Ranger. Now that they're separate this expansion, there's no room to argue. It's either a melee bow or a ranger bow. With the class differentiation, there is no point in whining about the ratio since they're designed for different classes.
I agree that it's an odd choice. From an RP perspective, a ranger should be able to use any bow in the game. Similarly, a warrior (and maybe monk) should be able to use any melee weapon. Warriors have trained to master all weapon types and should therefore be able to wield anything they can hold as a weapon. Casters and priests should be restricted from using certain types of weapons, mainly based on religion or secular preferences. Berserkers should be able to wield any 2HB/2HS/2HP in the game for similar reasons as the warrior, but limited because of their specialization. Other classes/races could have inherent abilities, e.g., a dwarf should be able to use any hammer in the game.
Trust me, the RP aspect of the game was thrown out years ago...have you not noticed Zerker's being able to drop agro?
When I saw this in beta I knew instantly this would become a sore point among the Rangers. I was very surprised when i saw that the bows the Rangers cannot equip were not only the better ratio but also the better looking bows. I have to say I was really disappointed in the graphics of the "Ranger Only Bow's" they look like squiggly sticks where as the Non Ranger bows are very ornate and fancy. I can't understand why this was decided to be put this way but since it was I guess we will have to see how it plays out.
So the logic is to give rogues class only daggers with the best piercing ratio in the game, yet the best ratio bow isn't usable by a ranger. I'm sure it makes sense somehow......to some one.......like maybe an insane ranja hating monk.
Anybody can pick one example to make their point without looking at the bigger picture. How about zerkers with 2handers? They don't get the best ratio weapons available, either. The point of them being separated is that we no longer need to compete for bows we can use. The ranger-only version is tuned for rangers and the non-ranger one can have 2x the ratio for all we care, it won't change anything.
The difference between us getting that bow and not is probably less than 1k dps on a burn, it's really that minor. Toss a Berserker a weapon that is 1-2 tiers above what they can get? That's a large gain, completely different.
