Moonfire Bow after Patch 4.6 , suggestion for this weapon.
Moonfire Bow have become much worse than the other ranged weapons now , it have only 4 charged shots before cooldown , haven’t “Conservative shooter” Perk ( restore 1 ammo on headshot ) and much less damage against Monsters than the other ranged weapons , especially with bodyshots. It’s not even possible now to kill Packmasters with one charged headshot , using +20% Damage vs Skaven stats.
Suggestions :
1 - Increase basic bodyshot&headshot damage or Dot for Moonfire Bow , to , at least , be able to kill the Packmasters with only one Charged Headshot and have some more damage against Monsters. If it is a “Sniper” ranged weapon now , players should be able to kill all special enemies with only one charged headshot (Dot + shot damage).
2 - Make available “Conservative shooter” Perk or Increase number of available shots before cooldown for Moonfire Bow.
3 - Remove a middle attack charge , like Longbow have , will be only 2 & 6 Dot ticks.
And about lore of WH:FB. How can magical bow have much less damage than ordinary ranged weapons ? Very strange.
It’s good idea about “Sniper” Moonfire Bow , need to have better aim and reaction. But poorly implemented , like noone has tested and compared Moonfire Bow changes with other ranged weapons on all enemy types on Cataclysm difficulty before release.
Packmaster +20%vsSkaven Charged Headshot.
Longbow vs Monster , “Conservative shooter” Perk.
This is an example of , how much better a Longbow is than a Moonfire bow, especially against monsters. Damage without stopping.
The problem with the present design of the bow overall is that if its buffed in any way to have more damage or shots then its just competing more with longbow. At some point it might just render longbow useless entirely.
The nerfs made the weapons fill the same niche but with the catch of moonbow now being a longbow for dummies.
It’s good idea about faster ticks , but , in my opinion , the main required buff for Moonfire Bow now is an increase Headshot damage or Dot damage from the charged shot , to have some more damage against Monsters and Packmasters. It’s just a shame for “Sniper” ranged weapon , when you can not kill the Packmaster with one charged headshot +20% Power vs Skaven & +7% Power Talent. And all other ranged weapons deal much more damage against Monsters.
So , in my opinion , some charged Headshot damage/Dot insrease is needed now.
Personally I like the idea of it being more of a buff upkeep weapon, as some have described it around here currently. I’d consider leaning more into that identity and maybe give it 10-20% bonus crit chance on charged shots for more reliable Hunter upkeep. Its damage doesn’t seem to scale all that well with crits so I don’t think that would make a large difference to its damage output, mostly give you more of a reason to charge it and have it play a bit nicer with a Hunter focused playstyle.
Personally i do really not like this whole concept of a “stat-stick” weapon whatsoever, no sir, not at all.
Its just the bare skeleton of a fun, standalone weapon with its own clear ups&downs that now just serves to augment another weapon. Really, if pumping steroids into the melee to brute force stuff is the idea then i´d rather just bring another melee weapon for versatility.
No, I don’t think it needs much of a boost, as it has its place and requires you to actually make a choice. With the correct Break Points you can do the following on Cata:
Breakpoints: 10% monster, 20% skaven, 10% chaos
One shot-bodyshot Assasin with full charged arrow
Two shot-headshot all specials except wargor with quick fire arrows
Two shot-bodyshot all specials except wargor with quick charged arrows
Considering this is Cata, has infinite ammo, does not leave you open by requiring manual reload, and can 2SBS every special, it is a very good weapon for players who cannot hit headshots and aren’t playing Waystalker. You are also free to run Barrage or Hunter to fish for more Power. On Legend, it even has fantastic elite BPs to kill man-sized elites easily. Javelin starts to struggle on Cata because it does not have many 1SBS BPs, and 2 moonfire shots are faster and easier than 2 javelins.
If you are sufficiently skilled to land headshots for ammo sustain via Conservative Shooter, then you can run Longbow (or even Javelin if you can).
A change I’d agree with is making Waystalker more compatible with it, now that it is nerfed to reasonable power. Her passive should double the max Energy of the Energy bar, like with all other ranged weapons. Or perhaps she gets double the energy recharge rate, so she regains arrows faster.
Depending on pickrate, they could perhaps buff it by slightly increasing the max Energy so that it can hold more arrows. But we should wait to see.
If you had read my entire post, you would have seen that I already agree with and suggest making WS passive work with MFB. I had forgotten about HM’s talent to boost ammo max and Shade’s Bloodfletcher. I’m fine with making it work with HM, but not sure on Shade. If it works on blood fletcher, which regains ammo and not increases max, then it would have to then work with Conservative Shooter and Scrounger, at which point you’re imitating Longbow too closely.
About Breakpoints. For example , even Hagbane Shortbow (the main profile is a crowd conrol) have a better Breakpoints , than the Moonfire Bow now : just +10%Skaven +10%Chaos on Charm to kill all special enemies with only two charged bodyshots ; +10%Skaven on Charm , +10%Armoured on the weapon and Barrage trait to kill Stormvermins with two bodyshots . Fast shots , crowd control , not neccessary to aim headshots. And there was a buff for headshots Dot for Hagbane Shortbow.
Swift Bow : high crit chance for Hunter perk or for Scrounger perk , additional headshot damage , much faster attack speed , horde control , shots without stopping for cooldown , very good synergy with Waystalker , especially with Serrated Shot talent.
Longbow/Briar Javelins : just train your aim for a bit and these two ranged weapons will destroy the Moonfire Bow in all aspects with Conservative Shooter perk.
Moonfire Bow have a playble Breakpoints against all , except Packmasters. And have too small damage against Monsters. The Packmasters is a “Monsters” class of the enemies. So , there is a good variant for Moonfire Bow - add additional basic damage against “Monsters” class of the enemies , to be able to kill the Packmasters with only 1 charged headshot on Cataclysm (headshot damage + Dot) , especially , when the players use +20% Damage vs Skaven stats. This should be better than just increasing the basic damage against all enemies classes , but it’s also a way to improve this weapon.
About count of available shots. Moonfire bow have only 4 charged shots now and there are no ways to restore the energy , that makes this ranged weapon worse than others , especially for high/maximum Twitch settings or for deed with special enemies (Seek and Destroy). The increasing of Energy by 3-4 additional charged shots should be enough. Or just increase an energy recovery speed for Moonfire bow.
But the Conservative Shooter perk isn’t bad idea too , the rework made this ranged weapon “Sniper” (the main damage is on Headshots), so , it’s not a problem.
In general , there are only two problems with Moonfire Bow after 4.6 Patch. Low damage against “Monsters” and number of available shots.
So, the main thing is to increase a shot damage/Dot or add additional basic damage vs “Monsters” class on the enemies. And increase Energy recovery speed or number of available charged shots by 3-4 before cooldown.
There are many good suggestions about buff for Moonfire Bow. Anyway , this ranged weapon need some buffs 100%.
Problem with the present iteration of moonfire is that it basically cannot be buffed without it starting to override longbow really hard. They have the exact same functions but if moonbow loses out on the downsides of downtimes + lower damage then its just a p2w option.
Weapon needs a rework to become something different entirely.
That’s right. I agree with total rework of Moonfire Bow , It’s just a weaker version of Longbow right now , that performs the same functions.
But , some buffs for Moonfire Bow will be good variant also , in my opinion. It’s a Coop game , all weapons must be interesting and good playable , have different playstyles with adequate Breakpoints , not be the weaker copy of other weapons.
Moonfire Bow requires some changes/buffs/rework anyway.
While i in principle agree with this, the problem is that if moonbow gets buffed then what basically happens is that they just switch places so to write. Instead of moonbow being the weaker option that no one with good aim should ever use then it becomes “longbow doesnt do anything that moonbow can’t but its harder to use and you dont get anything for it”.
I do not think there is any way around this at all, one of the bows is just always going to be better as long as they are so similar to eachother. And if they are to be like this then its better for longbow to be stronger even if it means moonbow must be kinda bad.
I alredy suggested in another thread but i belive the only thing needed for moonbow is a 20%ish increase in the dot tickrate.
The weapon has good and balanced special and elite breakpoints, the problem is that it takes too long to kill the target so teamates often shoot it anyway, wasting ammo, beacause the special was dead anyway, and time that could have been dedicated to something else. This design is very bad for coop game.
I want to see the AOE be returned to the bow. It makes the hits look and feel satisfying. The AOE can be splash damage without any dot damage if balance is such a concern.
Oh and Kerillians Waystalker career should increase the ammo pool of the Moonfire bow, not sue why it doesn’t already.
At this point i would have changed Moonfire completely to give it a new and different role alltogether.
Low damage and no DoT but high stagger and a potential debuff. I imagine light shots with an AoE that stagger infantry and a charged shot without AoE that staggers armored, with the potential of hitting the head of monster and super armor with a charged shot to stagger a boss, a CW doing an overhead or even freeing someone out of a packrat.
Potential debuffs can be “takes 10% more damage from all sources” or “movement speed is lowered by like 30%”.
This would make the weapon highly supportive with mechanics that the other ranged weapons dont have and thus would not really compete with them anymore. But i am a dreamer. Fatshark will most likely not go down this way and rather extreme balance their weapons. Either they are too good or garbage. I have seen that one before.
