- for the first ~24 levels the class felt very, very easy, about a 2 out of 10. I've played almost every class in the game to level 20 in the past few months, and the skellie archer is easily the least complicated and most consistently powerful out of all of them. Hit aim, alternate steady shot and the basic shoot command (I didn't even realize that Dual Arrows was worth using until I'd already reached the East) -> dead boss. I never even came close to losing an escort.
I completed the entire West using no other active talents but Aim, Steady Shot, Shoot, Volley of Arrows and Scatter Shot, and about two uses of Relaxed Shot total. Nothing else was necessary.
- The racial shield was so good that there was no pressing need for armour or escape options (although 1 point is disengage was a useful talent for exactly one encounter - the Weirdling Beast in its teleport-proof lair) until I hit the Daikara. From that point onward, I carried two teleport runes until controlled phase door became available. General observation: dual teleport runes are an extremely good escape option for archers in general. Unless you are caught on a very small map - I think the scripted Ambush is the first of those - they'll see you through 99.9% of all encounters. If both runes cannot get you away from an unbeatable pack of enemies, chances are that the map is extremely lethal regardless of your escape options -> see: Dark Crypt
- until about level 20, store bought ammo and weapons were very useful (purely because they let me get the Thaloren ego ASAP), while the things I found in the wilderness were completely unremarkable. Since unique bow egos like the Corpsebow's damage proc are currently completely bugged, there was't a single noteworthy artifact bow or quiver in the entire game.
- the usual speed bump at the Dark Crypt/Dreadfell 9 also slowed my archer down a bit; the damage was slightly too low to compensate for the lack of a decisive answer to enemy spellcasters who could cast their spells before my Scatter Shot projectile could reach them. I nearly died once in the Dark Crypt fighting six blood mages at once; however, I don't think most of my other characters would even have survived that. I'd rate the difficulty for the 24-29 level range at a 3 out of 10.
- the ambush was trivial, even though I had absolutely no intention of beating it when I went in; aim, scatter shot (at talent level 4), volley of arrows (talent level 1), steady shot at the boss, controlled phase door, a few more shots at the lucky survivors, done. I'd only "beaten" the ambush with a save scumming alchemist before, so the ease of this performance was a revelation to me.
The boss dropped the stupendously powerful Ring of the War Master when I had 300 hp left; getting to the ring meant taking an orc arrow in the face and losing a life, but it was worth it. This was the last time I even got close to death.
- Getting from level 30 to 40 was a blur. Having Aim and Steady Shot at 1.60 talent mastery meant that nothing could even come near me, but I doubt it would have been much more difficult without the ring. I usually had 5 or 6 class points in the bank, because I never got a chance to use most of my talents. The Tannen fight was the only encounter that was even remotely challenging, since I put down my Aim right next to the golem and was too stubborn to move when I realized how the fight was meant to be done. I lost two of my three shields before I killed Tannen with AoEs.
- The Prides basically threw physical damage increase items at me; by the time I had finished the last one, I was reliably inflicting 1600 to 2800 damage per shot with 114% crit chance. No boss lived longer than five turns. I spent my two spare cat points just before High Peak, but I shouldn't have bothered; nothing in there even came close to touching me. I used the slowing shot once when I was battle called, but I didn't make much of a difference. The so-called "end bosses" were a joke, and I got the Tactical Master achievement without even realizing that the portals were meant to be a threat. I'd rate the difficulty of lvl 30-50 at 0 out of 10.
Total game time was 25 hours doing virtually everything that class/race combo can do except for farming farportals or engaging Atamathon. I imagine I could cut this down significantly now that I know what the East is like (really easy).
Notes on the ammo mechanics:
- the most valuable bow ego is "Thaloren"; -1 reduction is Steady Shot cooldown means that you can use it every other turn while in aim mode, as opposed to every third turn. In the first twenty levels, when you can only afford to max out one or two direct damage talents, this is incredibly powerful. Later in the east, it is just plain old powerful; 99% of all battles will be over before anybody even manages to get close to you, so an extra use of Steady Shot makes little difference.
- the second most important feature of a bow or quiver is a speed boost; a +200% boost either on the ammo or on the bow was essential to get anything done at all. Going for the full +400% boost by getting matching egos on both bow and quiver served me well in the early game, but became completely unimportant around level 40; the AoEs were enough to finish off anything that had managed to dodge my arrows.
- Leading things with arrows is fun; calculating a flight path and clicking one square behind a target you suspect of retreating adds tactical challenge to the otherwise trivial high level gameplay.
- range and physical damage multiplier of bows increase naturally as you gain access to better tiers. This is what a run-of-the-mill endgame bow looks like:
I don't know what the archer endgame was like before this beta, but having 11 range on your attacks is totally ludicrous. In the endgame I could do over 6000 damage to most melee enemíes before they could even get within rushing distance.
- I really like the reloading mechanic; it felt like a tactical challange for the first few levels, then became practically meaningless when self-reloading quivers came about. The monstrous damage per arrow was also quite helpful. My end-game quiver only had 13 arrows in it, but I never had to reload during the final fight.
I know that Archers were considered stupidly overpowered before b38; this has not changed. Some of the other archer winners hit 1500 damage per attack as early as level 30, which leads me to believe that the damage curve for this class has been slightly flattened; however, I still stomped everything the game threw at me past the Master. I'm not sure if that's a desirable difficulty curve, but it sure was a lot of fun.