Opinions on 13 Green Bows

I've been shopping around for really great bows. I am kind of surprised to find out that green bows are in most cases cheaper than their component equivalents (i.e. a perfect bow grip of fortitude, or a perfect vampire bowstring could set you back more than many of what the green bows sell for with the same equipment).

There are 13 Green bows available, here is my quick reference on their use:

Boulderbeard's Short Bow
(aka Shocking Shortbow of Fortitude +15^50)
For a ranger the best bows are the "of Fortitude +15^50" and there are four green bows that fit. This is the shortbow of the four, which means it fires fast, reloads fast, and basically does great damage, as long as you are fighting inside the aggro circle.
Negative: "Shocking" is probably the least effective elemental damage in PvE, especially in the higher level zones.

Drago's Flatbow
(aka Sundering Flatbow of Fortitude +15^50)
Another "of Fortitude +15^50", and this one is the most popular bow for the B/P ranger, or any ranger who likes to barrage from as far away as possible.
Negative: The bow itself has none, which is why it sells for 30-40k. The most expensive green bow on the market.

Drago's Vampyric Flatbow
(aka Vampiric Flatbow of Defense +15 stance)
Excellent for barrage farming of ranged creatures (Imps, Gollums, Burrowers, Drakes) as long as you have a way to keep your health up.
Negative: +15 while in a stance. Added defense is nice, but with vampire bows health degen, more health is better.

Elswyth's Longbow
(aka Poisonous Longbow of Fortitude +15^50)
The third "of Fortitude +15^50". If you plan to spread poison (using poison arrow, or apply poison) this is the bow for you. Longbows are also the most versatile bows, and if you are going to carry a longbow, this is a no brainer.
Negative: When not using poison (and there is a huge list of things immune to poison), this is a normal damage bow. I prefer elemental damage on my longbow.

Elswyth's Recurve Bow
(aka Vampiric Recurve of Fortitude +15^50)
The fourth and last "of Fortitude +15^50". If you like to have just one vampiric bow to pull out and do extra damage while they resist the normal damage, this is the bow for you. Recurves have the fastest arrows, making them the best "interrupter" bows.
Negative: I wish there were a longbow or flatbow version.

The Forgerunner
(aka Fiery Longbow of Fortitude +15 stance)
Awesome general purpose bow for hunting in the southern shiverpeaks, where most things hate fire damage.
Negative: +15 stance. R/W or R/Me have more stances, but most rangers only pull out stances (i.e. Whirling Defense, Dodge) when they are trying to get away, rather than attacking.

Gargash's Recurve Bow
(aka Zealous Recurve of Fortitude +15 enchanted)
If you like to use enchantments a lot, and you use Barrage or Dual Shot a lot, this may be a good bow to choose. Barrage may give you the energy to put JI up for example, or if you use with essence bond, you will be building energy coming and going.
Negative: Way too build specific and situational.

Graygore's Short Bow
(aka Vampiric Shortbow of Marksmanship +15^50)
Got plans to do some Minotaur farming, or Ettin, or Griffin? This is definitely the bow for you! In PvE, I like to pull it out for killing things that get too close, faster.
Negative: For farming +15 enchanted might be better. Also, for vampiric bows, Fortitude is always the best grip.

Graygore's Zealous Short Bow
(aka Zealous Shortbow of Defense +15^50)
If you are going to have a zealous bow in your arsenal, short bows are best because of their quick reload. More shots = more energy.
Negative: I'm just not a fan of zealous bows.

Stinger
(aka Poisonous Hornbow of Marksmanship +15 stance)
Best of the green bows for a ranger "spike" build. Hornbows have 10% armor penetration, and while they are slow to reload, they fire interrupts (essential to spike) just as fast as any other. Add Poison and this is one deadly bow, especially in PvP.
Negative: A PvP Spiker will prefer a custom "Sundering Hornbow of Marksmanship +15^50" more, though a perfect stat custom bow will cost about 50 times more. This is probably the most common green bow out there. If you want one, just go to LA1 and say "WTB Stinger 2K" and you'll likely get an offer.

Tarnok's Longbow
(aka Icy Longbow of Warding +15^50)
Take this bow, throw on some Drakescale Armor, and you are the creatures of the Fire Island's worst nightmare.
Negative: Not so good of a bow in the Southern Shiverpeaks, where The Forgerunner is better.

Tarnok's Recurve Bow
(aka Sundering Recurve Bow of Enchanting +15 enchanted)
If you are an R/Mo, this is an excellent bow to keep handy! Healing Breeze, Vigorous Spirit, Protective Bond, Holy Veil, and Judges Insight(!) all last 20% longer when using this bow. Recurve's are ideal for interrupting, and this is the only green recurve that is not vampiric or zealous.
Negative: Not so ideal for non R/Mo's.

Thornbeard's Horned Bow
(aka Shocking Hornbow of Shelter +15 enchanted)
"of shelter" gives you additional protection from physical damage, and the "Shocking" and the 10% armor penetration make this an awesome anti-warrior bow.
Negative: "+15 while enchanted" is one flaw. Of course if you are fighting warriors, hopefully you have some kind of enchantment on. Far from ideal bow against non-warriors.

Any second opinions?

Quote: Originally Posted by ArianeB

Graygore's Zealous Short Bow is the best bow IMO.

People make some dumb arguments against short bows because their range is shorter. Who cares? You're a ranger. You won't be attacked while you've got warrior tanks, etc.

You shoot faster. Thus, doing more DPS.

A correction:

Drago's Flatbow
(aka Sundering Flatbow of Fortitude +15^50)
Another "of Fortitude +15^50", and this one is the most popular bow for the B/P ranger, because having a huge bow makes Rangers feel good, even though Sundering is crap and is effectively like having no prefix. On occasion it's not even customized, as the look alone is good enough for some people.
Negative: It has Sundering and is a huge Recurve Bow, which is why it sells for 30-40k. The most expensive green bow on the market.


A -1 pip from Vamp or Zealous is negligible with weapon-switching, multi-shot attacks, and continually hitting. You want them on a faster-shooting bow though.

Stinger all the way. It's the only green that's ever dropped for me (I don't bother farming them), and I couldn't be any happier. I neglect it for custom weapons when I'm in PvP, but this wins hands-down for PvE for me (I use poison most of the time, especially ettin farming)

The name is also the best out of all of them imo.

The Elswyth's Longbow is my favorite, because i like to use Poison Arrow and be far away from the target.
To me, the green items are like 'fake' Gold items: They are cheap and good and they don't look like a Collector bow, so i prefer Gold stuff.
But if you want a cheap and good bow you should look for the Green items. Rangers really have a bow for nearly all builds.

Quote: Originally Posted by Cyan The Archer

Well, here's how I'd look at it.

Drago's Flatbow, Boulderbeard's Short Bow, Forgerunner, both Tarnok's, and Thornbeard's Horned Bow all suck due to their strings. Sundering is crap, and if a Ranger wants to do elemental damage, they are better off running Kindle Arrows.

Gargash's Recurve is problematic because it is a Zealous with Recurve. It would work OK for a Barrager, but a Hornbow is better for Barrage. Also, most secondaries don't really work well for enchantments,

Elswyth's Recurve has the Vampiric version of Gargash's Zealous issue.

Stinger and Elswyth's Longbow are both good poisoning bows, I'd rather Stinger had a Fort or Defense grip, but it's still not bad. Personally, I'm not a poison Ranger, so I don't run them, but they are good if you do.

That leaves Drago's Vamp Flatbow and the two Greygore Shortbows. I find all three of these are extremely nice as powerful and versatile bows. If you are running Read the Wind or Favorable Winds, Drago's Vamp may be the best bow possible. The two Greygore bows are shortbows, so you don't need the bonus arrow speed of those skills to avoid missing. The first bow I started building shortly after the game's release was going to be identical to Greygore's Zealous (never did get my hands on a perfect defense grip).

(I had read the Greygore Vamp Shortbow was Fort, not Defense. If it's Defense, I'll have to pick one up.)

dragos flat bow is best it doesnt reduce both your life and energy

Quote: Originally Posted by Rajamic

Quote: Originally Posted by olivo69

Quote: Originally Posted by Iskrah

most green bows suck imo... the only one i think that is worth wielding is the Elswyth's Recurve Bow

I like the Tarnok's Recurve, Elswyth's Recurve, the Stinger, and Boulderbeard's Shortbow. They fit my needs, even if most other people seem to not like them much 0_o

Quote: Originally Posted by Valerius

Quote: Originally Posted by Rajamic

I actually have never really found a green bow I have truly liked. I tend to prefer longbows, and occaisionally flatbows when the situation or build is right. I do use other bows as needed. I.e. I use shortbows when I run a practiced stance/choking gas build and sometimes a recurve if I am going to be mainly manually interupting. Horn bows imo just aren't worth wielding except maybe in a PvP spike build, but I haven't done that in a long time.

With this preference on bows, I generally can't find a green bow that fits what I want. The only dmg mod I ever really like is +15%^50 since I only use stances when fleeing or occaisionally when I am taking a lot of dmg and I don't use enchantments unless it is for a certain farm build. With this in mind, there are only a few options for me. To me if I am going to run a barrage build, the best possible option depending on whether favorable winds is down or whether I will be attacking stationary enemies (i.e. solo farming) is the following:

Vampiric Longbow (stormbow) of Fortitude (or maybe defense)
+15%^50
health +30 (or +5 armor)

Vampiric Flatbow of Fortitude (or maybe defense)
+15%^50
health +30 (or +5 armor)

If I am running a practiced stance/choking gas build, I suppose Boulderbeard's Short Bow would work, though I generally use this on Ice Golems where a fire mod would be best and even then, elemental mods are always very situational.

If I want a recurve bow, I would likely want one with a poisoner's string since I could poison and interupt at the same time, and even if I didn't the other options in bow strings would likely not be any better even if poison wasn't used.

The only greenbow that would actually truly fit my needs is an Elswyth's Long Bow for use if I was running a bit more of a balanced ranger build with a poison skill involved. I found this bow actually matches perfectly for a RA build I use, but I already had a gold bow that is modded the exact same, except with a Defense mod instead of a Fortitude mod before Elswyth's Long Bow came out.

Anyways, long story short, for my purposes, green bows generally fall short. =/

I'm not sure why there's all the hate for damage while in stance. I never leave home as a damage ranger without some sort of IAS, and that means offensive stances. Damage while in stance is fantastic when you're using things like Tiger's Fury constantly.

Quote: Originally Posted by OneArmedScissor

I like Graygore's short bow when barraging in PvE, but not PvP. I do use boulderbeards short bow quite a lot, but mainly due to not finding a better Gold one yet. I use a Storm Bow with Poison string and +30 fort, with +15% ^50%. But my bread and butter PvP bow is a gold Recurve that is +15% all the time (-5 energy) 10/10 sundering string, +30 fortitude. Perfect for interupting, and with Druids armor and 13 in Exp, I have no issues with energy management. I do like Elswyth's long bow, though and would use it if I had to.