Best Bow in the game

…because I just started a rogue/ranger/bow character and wanted to know what it is. Apparently it's called Far Song and the only way to obtain it is to get Owen, the blacksmith in Redcliffe to hang himself by telling him you couldn't find his daugther. By doing that a new blacksmith will appear (and if you lie to said blacksmith about being family to Owen you'll even get it for free).

Way to punish good deeds there, Bioware…

Übereil

Seriously……? That's pretty lame.

I thought the strongest bow was 'Spear-Thrower'.

The best bow.

Here's how you get it.

Übereil

I read there and there that Rapid Aim gives 30% increase speed (except that there's a bug and if you go over 60% speed increase the speed increase drop to 0). If you consider only the 30% speed and that it gives 30% damages increase, the best bow is perhaps Falon'Din's Reach, same stats than the bow mentioned which has critical bonuses but not the 30% speed increase that has Falon'Din's Reach. And you get it for free,…too.

Interesting… According to GameBanshee Far Song has the Rapid Aim property but not according to the Wiki. I wonder which one is correct. I hope it's the Wiki, because then I will be getting the best bow in the game.

Übereil

To me, +3% crit chance and 10% critical damage means nothing, as I tend to use the sustained archer form that negates such effects. Can't even recall the name, but it basically increases your rate of fire, but removes normal critical hits (Rapid Fire or something).

In any case, Falon'Din's Reach is more than good enough.

Originally Posted by Ubereil
Interesting… According to GameBanshee Far Song has the Rapid Aim property but not according to the Wiki. I wonder which one is correct. I hope it's the Wiki, because then I will be getting the best bow in the game.

Tell us what the in-game stats read when you get it.

I am wondering which are the best bows as well, especially regarding damage/rapid aim/armor penetration/critical chance values. DAO with 1.02 patch, some notable bows including the following:

Falon' Din's Reach
———————————-
Damage: 9.60
Critical Chance:1.60%
Armor Penetration: 8.80
Range:46
Strength modifier:1.00
+ 2 damage
Rapid Aim

Mage's Eye
———————
Same as above except:
+ 3% ranged critical chance
+ 4 attack

Spear-Thrower
—————————
Damage: 9.0
Critical Chance:1.50%
Armor Penetration: 8.00
Range:44
Strength modifier:1.00
Rapid Aim
+2.5 armor penetration

Originally Posted by JDR13
Tell us what the in-game stats read when you get it.

If I bother trying out getting the bow (I would do it only for checking the bow out) I'll do that.

Übereil

Originally Posted by Ubereil
Interesting… According to GameBanshee Far Song has the Rapid Aim property but not according to the Wiki. I wonder which one is correct. I hope it's the Wiki, because then I will be getting the best bow in the game.

Übereil

Hope? I didn't knew there was pure evil characters wandering here… let call the Chantry!

I could not find anything in the wiki about Rapid Aim. GameBanshee probably does generally more errors than will a popular wiki constantly recheck and challenged. But no idea of the exact description.

About comparison of both bows and importance of critical, about the critical damage increase, Critical Shot and Arrows of Slaying guaranty critical… but the popular Rapid Shot guaranty no critical. It's complicate to compute all of that. Still the impressive numbers related to critical aren't as impressive than they seem but they are not insignificant too.

Originally Posted by Remus
I am wondering which are the best bows as well, especially regarding damage/rapid aim/armor penetration/critical chance values. DAO with 1.02 patch, some notable bows including the following:

Falon' Din's Reach
———————————-
Damage: 9.60
Critical Chance:1.60%
Armor Penetration: 8.80
Range:46
Strength modifier:1.00
+ 2 damage
Rapid Aim

Mage's Eye
———————
Same as above except:
+ 3% ranged critical chance
+ 4 attack

Spear-Thrower
—————————
Damage: 9.0
Critical Chance:1.50%
Armor Penetration: 8.00
Range:44
Strength modifier:1.00
Rapid Aim
+2.5 armor penetration

My 2 cents, I'd say Falon' Din's Reach > Spear-Thrower > Mage's Eye. But if you get one, the others don't worth you "kill your parents" to get them.