Bow and arrow enhancement limits.

[beerbeard]

Hey folks, I'm having trouble finding the official paizo ruling on arrow enhancement scores.

If a magical bow fires a magical arrow and the total enhancement is more than +10 (say fired from a +5 flaming burst bow and the arrow is +1 holy brilliant.) do i get all possible enhancement or do i have to choose to equal or below the +10 threshold.

If you could link me to the offical paizo ruleing on this I would be grateful. Thanks in advance.

[Kelb_Panthera]

Unless paizo changed it, which I seriously doubt, the actual enhancement bonuses, +5 and +1 in your example, overlap. You only use the better figure, +5 in this case. The named abilities all apply to the arrow, flaming burst, holy, and brilliant in your example.

Therefore the net result in your example would be a +5 flaming burst holy brilliant attack.

[beerbeard]

Hey thanks man. Is there an official ruling saying that?

[Kelb_Panthera]

Hey thanks man. Is there an official ruling saying that?

That's the official rule in 3.5 and I could tell you where to find the rules that govern the interaction. For pathfinder you can almost certainly find it somewhere on http://www.d20pfsrd.com under the rules for stacking magical effects and the specific rules for enhancing projectile weapons.

Like I said, paizo almost certainly didn't change this but there is a paper slim chance that I'm wrong since I don't actually play PF.

[DEMON]

It looks like they did not change it:


Ranged Weapons and Ammunition: The enhancement bonus from a ranged weapon does not stack with the enhancement bonus from ammunition. Only the higher of the two enhancement bonuses applies. Ammunition fired from a projectile weapon with an enhancement bonus of +1 or higher is treated as a magic weapon for the purpose of overcoming damage reduction. Similarly, ammunition fired from a projectile weapon with an alignment gains the alignment of that projectile weapon.

Edit: http://www.d20pfsrd.com/magic-items/magic-weapons

[aeauseth]

What about a +5 Holy Flaming burst Keen longbow. Total bonus of +5 + 2 (holy) + 2 (flaming burst) + 1 (keen) = +10.

Then using +1 arrows of ghost touch. The +1 enhancement bonus of the arrow and +5 enhancement bonus of the bow don't stack, but the special abilities do. So +5 + 2 (holy) + 2 (flaming burst) + 1 (keen) + 2 (ghost touch) = +12. Neither the bow nor the arrows are epic, but the combination of the two exceed +10, which isn't supposed to be possible pre-Epic. Am I missing something here, or did I find a loophole?

[fluke1993]

You are not missing anything.

[Kelb_Panthera]

What about a +5 Holy Flaming burst Keen longbow. Total bonus of +5 + 2 (holy) + 2 (flaming burst) + 1 (keen) = +10.

Then using +1 arrows of ghost touch. The +1 enhancement bonus of the arrow and +5 enhancement bonus of the bow don't stack, but the special abilities do. So +5 + 2 (holy) + 2 (flaming burst) + 1 (keen) + 2 (ghost touch) = +12. Neither the bow nor the arrows are epic, but the combination of the two exceed +10, which isn't supposed to be possible pre-Epic. Am I missing something here, or did I find a loophole?

It's not possible to enhance a single weapon with a total enhancement cost above +10. However, what you've described is -not- a single weapon but two components. That they yield an attack that exceeds the normal limit is balanced by the tradeoff of the arrow being destroyed if it hits and half the time if it misses. The arrow is, in effect, an expendable temporary boost to the weapon.

In short, you've found a potentially useful interaction but I'd hardly call it a loophole. This is one of the few things archery actual has over melee.

At best this can yield up to a total of +23 total by getting a +1 bow with +9 worth of enhancements, casting greater magic weapon on it at cl 16 to boost the +1 to +5, and firing a +1 arrow with +9 worth of different enhancements. The +5 overlaps the two +1's and it and the +18 worth of special abilities.

There are actually a few ways to push it even higher but they require specific class and feat choices.