Moonfire Bow - Seems underpowered

Warhammer: Vermintide 2 Gameplay Feedback
1

I recently got back into the game, and I’m slowly trying out all the new (to me) weapons, including the Moonfire Bow. I’m unfamiliar with previous balance iterations.

It’s a neat weapon for sure, but I think it’s under-powered, especially when comparing it with the Javelin and Longbow. I run the head shot-for-ammunition trait on both of those weapons, and rarely run out of ammo on the longbow. I prefer them to others because they allow you to quickly take out specials and confirm the kill right away (When a head shot lands). They’re also not bad for dealing with Berserkers, or whittling down heavier enemies. Basically, immediate threats are immediately dealt with. The Moonfire bow takes a couple of seconds to confirm a kill, and in practice this often means that another player will kill whatever it is that I’ve shot already because they either don’t know whether it will die, or aren’t aware of the mechanics of the Moonfire Bow. But that’s just a little irritating, and a waste of their ammo.

The Moonfire bow at the moment is really a weapon that’s best suited for specials. It’s like the anti-range build item. Because its ammunition pool is so small that using it in other situations (like when you want range for bersekers) leaves you vulnerable when you’d actually need it for specials. And the damage it outputs doesn’t really justify that limitation.

It can’t continuously combo with headshots like any other ranged weapon. It benefits from very few ranged-specific class passives and talents (notably nothing that adds ammunition, which would I think translate to a longer energy bar). Its burst damage is decent when the clip is unloaded, if they’re fully charged headshots, and that’s about its only strength, along with unlimited ammunition. With the caveat that while unlimited its a limited clip/quiver.

I don’t know, I feel like I’m not expressing myself very well. But while I really like the concept of the weapon, and it can be used as a special-only tool. It’s not great at that, it doesn’t really excel in any area, the lack of interaction with class talents/passives is disappointing, and the low shot capacity isn’t justified by the damage, or put another way, the strengths don’t compensate for the flaws.

Just my impression. It’s a fun looking weapon, just feels like a novelty item in use, and not competitive. Thanks for reading.

7 Likes
2

The weapon used to be OP. It did AOE like hagbane with blue puffs of fire and the fire damage over time used to be quite immense, with more damage in 1 charged shot than any ranged weapon in the game besides maybe trollhammer.

Now it’s been gutted and it’s essentially like having a longbow with unlimited ammo that takes extra time to kill targets; not even very novel.

IMO, they should’ve left big AOE on the charged shot but reduced the damage to single targets so that it’s a crowd control weapon that’s not as good as Hagbane, but can also with decent single target damage on non-charged headshots.

Either that or should’ve just left it as it was but made it require more time to recharge and had fewer shots per full bar of charge.

5 Likes
3

Baseball bat-style balance, went directly from somewhat OP (cata) to UP with no stops in between.

4

While the Moonfire Bow needed to be nerfed back then, no one asked for it to be made just like the Longbow, but worse. It lost its identity. Fatshark should have simply nerfed its charge or charge regen to reduce spamming, and nerfed its friendly fire.

5

Javelin makes for a bad comparison IMO as it’s OP.
I think moonbow was nerfed too much, but the idea behind the changes (besides nerfing a ridiculously OP weapon) was to have it as a low skill weapon, something that outperforms longbow if you are unable to reliably get headshots.

6

To me it feels like it is not even one of those newbie weapons that goes “Here, use this and you´ll be alright, a bit good even, if you get the hang of it”. That´d be longbow out of keri´s ranged weapons for me.

Moonfire? To me Moonbow is instead like “Here, use this and you´ll be doing something at least”.

7

That’s probably true, although I think longbow is the ideal weapon. Decent anyway, absolutely amazing on headshots.

And and I don’t want to make too fine a point of it, but I think having limitless ammo has to count for something.

8

That´s kinda what i find most ironic about the bow, for it is indeed an excellent perk…its just that the bow also gained the quirk of both needing to charge its shots and headshot to deal its damage.

But if you can actually use that bit well then longbow is better.

So its really just a bow that acts as a crutch for people who cant aim well and that´s it, if you got any skill then javs are better, or longbow if you got a good eye and sense. I find this to be a really lackluster identity for a weapon T_T

2 Likes
9

In my experience, it doesn’t feel good. It doesn’t do nearly what the hagbane does in terms of aoe, yet it doesn’t feel like it hits its breakpoints with enough staccato to keep your tempo up in a fight like longbow does so it’s kind of the worst of both worlds. On top of that, the FF penalty is annoying imo for a dot weapon that also kinda stings, i do my best to jump and shoot or to look for nice angles to shoot through but it happens. I never really experienced the “hayday” of the moonfire bow so I don’t really know what it was like pre-nerf, but to me it’s just something that I obtained, and then never used again. There are 2 things i look for in a ranged weapon, its ability to clear waves or its ability to kill elites/specials and the Moonfire bow doesn’t do either. Just my opinion as a dirty Manbow player.

EDIT: I’d also like to add a note about the unlimited ammo because it’s not REAALLY unlimited. Yeah it recharges and you never have to pick up ammo. But you only get like 5 or 6 shots that can’t even clear a wave/elites like a longbow can. And if you’re looking to never need to pick up ammo just use javelin. It’s better in literally every aspect to the Moonfire Bow and then some. Little to no charge time, decent melee bash, unlimited ammo, hits its breakpoints, and doesn’t have any issues clearing mobs.

2 Likes
10

And moonfire bow faster to switch and shoot, because of the missing zoom, which really helps on cata+twitch or cata+deeds. For me it is a very decent weapon for shade and handmaiden. It fits their melee close combat fighting. I am always bit confused when i see shade/handmaiden players with javs and doing 75% of their elite kills with range weapons.

But yeah on sister or waystalker moonfire bow is underperforming, but that is intended by fatshark.

Overall i am glad about the changes, now i play double sword / jav on sister, double dagger / hagbane on waysstalker and on as i said moonfire on shade and handmaiden.
Now we finally use different weapons on different builds/subclasses and not only moonfirebow on every subclass with every build!

11

The Moonfire bow shouldn’t be compared to the Hagbane for two reasons. One it’s a p2p weapon, Hagbane is a default one, so paid for weapons “should” be superior to non paid for ones, because if they’re not, then it’s really just another bow to shoot things with, and the LB is already a great choice and a best bow contender.

2nd, the Moonfire bow is a magic bow, and they’re quite OP in the lore.
So it being both a magical lore bow and you have to pay for it to use it, then it should have some oompf to it. So if it’s competing with the LB or Hagbane, then it should dethrone said bows for those reasons. I’m not advocating for it to be OP, just the superior choice.

That said, the state the Moonfire bow is in, it’s abysmal, I call it the trashbow now. LB, Jav, Hag, they all do it better. Moonfire is only really good for no pick up deeds/cata, but even then if you have Jav, or you’re playing Waystalker with the ammo on ult, you really just don’t need the Moonfire.

1 Like
12

Actually, people did ask for it. Back in the day, the way people complained about the Moonfire bow, you’d think it wasn’t OP but straight up broken. People also loved to complain about the friendly fire that came from the splash damage. The combined complaints resulted in what we have today. So, yeah the community really did ask for it in this case, it’s just one of those cases where you have to be careful what you wish for since it’s safe to say people have buyers remorse after the nerf.

2 Likes
13

I disagree. I like to pay for variety. Keeping the best weapons behind a pay wall doesn’t sit right with me.

3 Likes
14

I understand what you mean but at the same time, there’s only so much you can do with a bow. No matter how original the bow may be, there will always be overlaps with any other bows since their function is relatively the same, unless you go crazy with it.

So with that being said. If I have to “pay” to get a bow then I want it to at least be a superior bow if its function happens to overlap with the other bows. i.e Far as I know range weapons only have 2 functions. CC and sniping. Even now the Moonbow is compared to the LB since their role is the same, sniping. The MB was a hybrid before Fatshark gutted it.

Which brings me to my point. Pre nerf it was said to be the superior Hagbane, post nerf it’s now said to be the poor’s man’s LB. If Fatshark expects me to pay money then the weapon better be original or a superior choice.

15

The Moonfire Bow was nerfed too much, but I don’t for a moment feel remorse for the feedback given. Sad as it is when one weapon hasn’t got its niche, having a single M.E.T.A. overpowered one - which does annoying friendly fire to boot - is much worse.

Should it get a buff in some area? Sure, why not. Many need a balance update. Javelin is a bit too much I think, and some melee weapons (like 1h axe) could get the old fraction of a cleave back.

3 Likes
16

Yeah, I feel the nerf that hit the bow was overdone.

3 Likes
17

Some of the nerf to the moonbow should be undone. It was too much.

7 Likes
18

Yes, people asked for it to be nerfed, but not in the way that Fatshark eventually did. Fatshark should have simply nerfed its charge or charge regen to reduce spamming, and nerfed its friendly fire.

No one asked for it to be made just like the Longbow, but worse. It lost its identity.

3 Likes
19

Removing the AOE blast and making it deal reduced damage on non-headshots and -crits would’ve done enough but oh well, into the nuclear testsite it went.

I’d suggest giving the moonbow it’s old damageprofile back on headshots and crits. Done, fixed it.

20

Totally agree. I think that’s what most people were asking for, but Fatshark has a nasty habit of over correcting.