Arrows and level of use

[Grimstad]

Can't find a wiki on this. At what character level can one use +1, +2, etc arrows?

Also, how are arrows drawn out of quivers? By order from top to bottom, or by level of use? They seem to be arranged in order of when they were gathered from the weapon tab. I recently discovered how to use the arrow buttons in the quiver to rearrange the order of arrows and selectively withdraw or gather arrows.

ps, rookie mistake... I once forgot to Conjure Arrows on my ranger and remove my quiver from the equipment slot in my inventory, and it very quickly drained every single one of my arrows. D'oh!

 

[PurpleSerpent]

Can't find a wiki on this. At what character level can one use +1, +2, etc arrows?

Also, how are arrows drawn out of quivers? By order from top to bottom, or by level of use? They seem to be arranged in order of when they were gathered from the weapon tab. I recently discovered how to use the arrow buttons in the quiver to rearrange the order of arrows and selectively withdraw or gather arrows.

ps, rookie mistake... I once forgot to Conjure Arrows on my ranger and remove my quiver from the equipment slot in my inventory, and it very quickly drained every single one of my arrows. D'oh!

Ah! Well, it appears this is something the wiki didn't have information on initially (I'm just adding it to the relevant pages now), so thank you for pointing this out! Here's what I've been able to work out:

The basic minimum level of an arrow or bolt depends on its enhancement bonus, as follows:

No enhancement bonus: ML 0
+1: ML 0
+2: ML 2
+3: ML 4
+4: ML 6
+5: ML 8

Why did I put ML 0 instead of just saying "no minimum level"? Because this is the minimum use level for ammunition without an extra enchantment. If your arrow or bolt also includes an extra effect, that could raise its minimum level, as shown in the list below:

Does not affect minimum level: Any "material type" enchantment (Cold Iron, Silver and so on)
Increases minimum level by +2: Bane effects, elemental damage effects (Flaming, Frost, Acid, Shock)
Increases minimum level by +4: Alignment damage effects (Holy, Anarchic, Unholy, Axiomatic)
Increases minimum level by +6: Greater Bane effects
Increases minimum level by +8: Slaying effects
Increases minimum level by +10: Greater Slaying effects

So, for example, a player of level 5 would be allowed to equip +2 Shock Arrows or +3 Silver Arrows (both ML 4), but not +1 Arrows of Greater Dragon Bane or +3 Acid Arrows (both ML 6.)

Since I don't use a ranged weapon myself, I'm not entirely sure how the ammunition system works nowadays, but I'm pretty sure you can't get Bane or Slaying (or their Greater counterparts) at any enhancement bonus higher than +1, which would mean level 12 is the minimum level to use all ammunition in the game as that's the level at which you unlock +5 Aligned stuff.

It's worth noting that "unique" ammunition tends to have no minimum level. This includes stuff like the Amethyst Shrieking Arrows from Ruins of Threnal and the Silver Flame arrows sold by Salariin Founts (although notably not the arrows from the Quivering Quiver or items from the Deneith Ammunition Vendor, as these are basically just renamed versions of pre-existing ammunition.)

(Speaking of quivers, the order is top to bottom and thus determined by the order you load the ammunition into the quiver, although obviously the quiver will skip over ammunition stacks if you're not the right level to use them, or if this would result in the quiver trying to load bolts into a bow or arrows into a crossbow.)

 

[Grimstad]

Ah! Well, it appears this is something the wiki didn't have information on initially (I'm just adding it to the relevant pages now), so thank you for pointing this out! Here's what I've been able to work out:

The basic minimum level of an arrow or bolt depends on its enhancement bonus, as follows:

No enhancement bonus: ML 0
+1: ML 0
+2: ML 2
+3: ML 4
+4: ML 6
+5: ML 8

Why did I put ML 0 instead of just saying "no minimum level"? Because this is the minimum use level for ammunition without an extra enchantment. If your arrow or bolt also includes an extra effect, that could raise its minimum level, as shown in the list below:

Does not affect minimum level: Any "material type" enchantment (Cold Iron, Silver and so on)
Increases minimum level by +2: Bane effects, elemental damage effects (Flaming, Frost, Acid, Shock)
Increases minimum level by +4: Alignment damage effects (Holy, Anarchic, Unholy, Axiomatic)
Increases minimum level by +6: Greater Bane effects
Increases minimum level by +8: Slaying effects
Increases minimum level by +10: Greater Slaying effects

So, for example, a player of level 5 would be allowed to equip +2 Shock Arrows or +3 Silver Arrows (both ML 4), but not +1 Arrows of Greater Dragon Bane or +3 Acid Arrows (both ML 6.)

Since I don't use a ranged weapon myself, I'm not entirely sure how the ammunition system works nowadays, but I'm pretty sure you can't get Bane or Slaying (or their Greater counterparts) at any enhancement bonus higher than +1, which would mean level 12 is the minimum level to use all ammunition in the game as that's the level at which you unlock +5 Aligned stuff.

It's worth noting that "unique" ammunition tends to have no minimum level. This includes stuff like the Amethyst Shrieking Arrows from Ruins of Threnal and the Silver Flame arrows sold by Salariin Founts (although notably not the arrows from the Quivering Quiver or items from the Deneith Ammunition Vendor, as these are basically just renamed versions of pre-existing ammunition.)

(Speaking of quivers, the order is top to bottom and thus determined by the order you load the ammunition into the quiver, although obviously the quiver will skip over ammunition stacks if you're not the right level to use them, or if this would result in the quiver trying to load bolts into a bow or arrows into a crossbow.)

Thank you for the detailed info. This is not as simple an answer as I thought it would be. I'll put this into my notes. *Bows

 

[Arsont]

Thank you for the detailed info. This is not as simple an answer as I thought it would be. I'll put this into my notes. *Bows

First off, to expand on the arrow usage selection: By default, you'll use arrows (like any item) from top to bottom, left to right in your inventory. Items in earlier bag tabs will be used before the later ones. If you have a quiver equipped, then you'll use those first, from top to bottom. As you noted, you can change the order within a quiver, and add/remove arrows from a stack. You can also assign quivers to auto-gather, in which case they'll behave like any other collection bag.

Quivers aren't terribly intuitive, but you can purchase and carry around multiple quivers like other storage bags. However, unlike bags, you must have the quiver equipped to pull ammo from it. I haven't checked recently, but I believe the quivers still count the arrows in their weight; a problem if you do carry multiple. Thankfully you can always just load a quiver up with any specific type of arrow and dump it in the bank for later.

Also, last I checked: you can put quivers on a hotbar. Sadly, this doesn't let you equip the quiver, but instead opens it up. That means you can dump the ammo into your inventory; so if you run out of arrows in your current quiver, you'll auto-equip them from your backpack. Situationally useful, but good if you are using a collection of a specific arrow type instead of conjured arrows.

If you have enough House Denith favor, you can buy a Large Thin/Wide quiver, which has more storage than the basic versions you can buy from vendors. Most named/rare quivers have even larger capacity than those. One of the harder ones to get is the Quiver of Alacrity, since it drops from one of the least commonly run raids in the game (Ascension Chamber, or "Abbot"). In the past, it's been an option from the 10th Anniversary token, but I wouldn't be surprised if we saw it pop up again in a similar distribution. Depending on your level, the Dynamistic Quiver (ML 14) would be easier to get and almost certainly better for you long-term.

If you're collecting multiple types of arrows, I'd highly suggest picking up a few extra quivers and turning on auto-collect. It takes a few inventory slots on the front end, but can really help out if you don't take regular breaks to sell loot.

I have a couple of the rare named quivers that I keep stocked up with aligned arrows for those niche uses where I can't otherwise bypass an alignment. Less useful for an Arcane Archer, but comes in handy if you're any other type of archer. I also keep my default Quiver of Alacrity stocked with Sturdy Arrows from House D favor for whenever I TR.

 

[Farlino]

Tip: If you put the quiver that is equipped NOT ON auto-collect and the quivers in inventory ON auto-collect, this will
prevent ammo that can not be used for your weapon to fill up the equipped quiver. You will have to check regularly if you need to reload the equipped quiver (manually) though.
If you make your own ammo (that can not be put in quivers) this will prevent the use of the found ammo instead of the made ammo.

Have fun.

 

[Grimstad]

Tip: If you put the quiver that is equipped NOT ON auto-collect and the quivers in inventory ON auto-collect, this will
prevent ammo that can not be used for your weapon to fill up the equipped quiver. You will have to check regularly if you need to reload the equipped quiver (manually) though.
If you make your own ammo (that can not be put in quivers) this will prevent the use of the found ammo instead of the made ammo.

Have fun.

If I understand this correctly, you load the equipped quiver with desired arrows and leave auto-gather off. Unequipped quivers with auto-gather on will store all other arrows, potentially even ones you want for the equipped quiver, but those can be manually loaded into the equipped quiver as needed. Correct?

 

[Farlino]

If I understand this correctly, you load the equipped quiver with desired arrows and leave auto-gather off. Unequipped quivers with auto-gather on will store all other arrows, potentially even ones you want for the equipped quiver, but those can be manually loaded into the equipped quiver as needed. Correct?

Correct. This way you prevent shooting special ammo you want for special enemies AND loading the wrong type of ammo in your equipped quiver (which makes you run out of usable ammo).

 

[Fauxknight]

Important note that if we're strictly talking the enhancement bonus that the value on an arrow does not stack with the value on your bow/crossbow, only the higher value is used.

 

[l_remmie]

I saved 10 years worth of slaying/bane arrows (and bolts) and then made some toons to shoot them all.
In a select few heroic quests around lvl9 these arrows are great and fun. Sadly that is also the full extend of it.
The rare lootgen arrows are simply not worth your time. It is a fun/flavor thing.

That said, ammo that breaks DR is worth carrying. You can cannith craft holy ammo and buy some others.

 

[RangerOne]

My biggest annoyance with quivers is that since they DO deplete in order running into a stack of bolts will stop the feed. It would be nice if quivers were specific for bolts or arrows.

 

[Shardrena]

On the other hand, anymore I think it's entirely likely that if you're using a bow (or crossbow), you probably have the ability to Conjure arrows/bolts. At which point all a quiver is good for is DR breaking ammo types or gathering up any ammo you loot from chests and crates/barrels. Depending on class and/or which enhancement trees you picked, you may not even need to worry about DR breaking ammo.

 

[dur]

I saved 10 years worth of slaying/bane arrows (and bolts) and then made some toons to shoot them all.

Now if only rangers had a way to slow time to load / shoot spec enemies. Wasted points on way too many quivers, thinking the same thing.

I get mobbed too quick at 11- and 16+ forget it.

 

[l_remmie]

Yea, pretty much exactly that, all that swapping was probably a net-negative for dps. I just wanted to use all that ammo since i had collected it for ever, I couldn't just throw it all away. I'm never picking any up again though.

It does feel good when you see it triggering though. "Poof straight to hell!"