I enjoy archery. Me, that is, the guy writing this. I have a longbow in the corner of my living room and a quiver of arrows somewhere downstairs with the rest of the stuff that didn’t get unpacked when we moved. Yet I always play as a mage in RPGs. I guess that given the option, my fantasy is killing people with my mind, rather than the mundane physical tools of warfare that already exist in the real world.
But unlike Oblivion, Skyrim doesn’t have a good magic system, so I play the barbarian. Yet, swordplay in Skyrim is essentially reduced to swing swing smashy smashy, and that gets old, so I figured I’d give archery a try. Unlike Oblivion, Skyrim‘s archery is significantly more effective. As in–it kills things instead of simply turning them into pincushions. So i grabbed a magic bow, smithied it all up nice and shiny, and sought some enemies…which aren’t hard to find.
Despite my efforts, I cannot seem to effectively judge gravity drop. Consistently, I send arrows near enemies, whereupon they cleverly deduce that something is amiss, investigate, and find me. But every now and then I get it right, and the resultant deaths can be quite humorous. For example, I killed someone by accident when I had my bow drawn and he initiated dialog which then triggered the release–he greeted me then screamed as an arrow pierced his chest.
In another scenario, the killcam showed a drawn-out arrow flight to the neck of an unfortunate vampire.
But I find the most satisfying kills to be arrows in the face. It makes me feel like a sniper.
Master swordsman, savior of Skyrim, cannibal, honorary bard, and now: budding archer. I’m a man of many layers.
–Simon