Larian Studios Forums Divine Divinity (English) General A comparative analysis of ranged and melee skills

Divine Divinity provides a definite advantage to a melee fighter over a ranged fighter in their skill system. The purpose of this post is to elucidate these disparities.

1. Broken skills
There are two skills in the game which do not function: True Shot and Crossbow Expertise. Both of these skills are ranged skills. Additionally Evade Arrows might also be a broken skill, and while this is not for the exclusive use of ranged warriors, it is definitely more suitable for ranged warriors.

2. The number of skills dedicated to either ranged or melee fighting

Specialist
2 Ranged
6 Melee
Ranger
6 Ranged
2 Usable by both
Warrior's Lore
0 Ranged
6 Melee
2 Usable by both
Warrior Gods
0 Ranged
4 Melee
4 Usable by both
Totals
8 Ranged
16 Melee
8 Usable by both

Thus we see that there are twice as many skills dedicated to melee fighters. If it is taken into consideration the fact that 2 of the ranged skills are broken the disparity becomes even greater.

3. Integration of specialist expertise with the other skills
All of the specialist expertise skills are passive. That is they should remain in play and exert their effects at all times even when other skills are being utilized. However, in actual fact this is not the case for bow expertise. Bow expertise only decreases the recuperation time when using the standard left click attack. But with the exception of True Shot, which is broken, all of the ranged attack skills require a right click attack. On the other hand all of the melee attack skills are passive and integrate well with the melee weapon expertise of choice and stack with one another as well.

This is my 100th post which now makes me a warrior on the forum and so I thought I would post a topic which has been on my mind and is related to the warrior in the game.

so your saying don't be a ranger? or that the ranger just gets jiped?

Or a ranger could take a greater percentage of the skills available to it...

I'm saying that the skills in the warrior's path are unbalanced in favor of the melee fighter. In fact I have finished the game once--as a Ranger. My original intention was to be a pure warrior, but due to the skill setup I did bow expertise and splitting arrows from the warrior's path and poison weapon from the Survivor as my only combat choices that I wound up using throughout the game.

I never got very far in the game I started as a ranger, but there was a topic in the old forum (no longer online) called 'the way of the sniper'. That poster felt rangers were way overpowered compared to other styles, especially with Splitting Arrows, Explosive Arrows and Poison Weapon. They could hit and kill monsters before they were even seen. This could be a problem with 'friendly' monsters if a cut scene needed to be triggered before they would turn hostile, but paying attention to the mini-map should prevent that.

As you say Raze the archer is powerful. It is interesting that this is the case in spite of getting the short end of the stick/bow in skills.

well I think archers are at a big disatvatage because you can't get a bow for a holy item, and you can get a sword instead <img src="/ubbthreads/images/graemlins/puppyeyes.gif" alt="" /> I'm in the wastelands now been playing archer all through the game but I found the sword of the gods (Didn't know where to even find it lol) and I can two shot everything with it even with no sword skills, though my bow I got from the elves take about 4-5 shots to kill a imp.

Amen. I used a bow I bought from the elf. It cost over 75,000 ing old, but was worth every penny doing a max of 195 dmg per shot. And with the combo of splitting arrows and poison weapon, Josie goes down very quickly indeed.

well to tell you the truth I didn't buy it I got it from a quest the one with bortus the elf's father gave me a bow, and it was the best one that I found.

I just started a archer where si the best place to get a good bow? o ya and what is the sword of the gods i have never herd of it.

At the start of the game there is a bow in George's shop you can steal. For good bows, you can get a bow in the Dark Forest as a quest reward, check with various merchants (particularly the one in the elven village) or wait for random drops.

The Sword of the Gods is not available until fairly late in the game.

heh i also have a 35 warrior so i think i can get the sword just wanted to know where it was

The Sword of the Gods is in the wastelands, after you hit the gong in the council hall and leave Rivellon. More specifically, [color:"#3A495A"]it is in the cupboard of a house south east of the village[/color] (highlight the text to read).