Spot on second post in this thread Aneo. Instead of thinking of ways to homogenize classes for "fairness," I'd much rather brainstorm ideas to improve on their uniqueness and to make them more desirable in groups.
1. Assuming a ranger is similar to EQ, they will be able to melee, do ranged damage, and cast spells. The comparison to a mage is apples to oranges as the mage would not be able to do ranged physical or melee damage.
2. Also, I agree that reagents should be required for "some" spells for casters as that would be similar to having 1/3 of a rangers arsenal require arrows. But, as Aneo appropriately stated - casters always have a reagent as mana is finite, whereas arrows could be potentially infinite based off resource collection. But, the reagents would add to the situational gameplay of casters and whether the cost/time is worth the effort.
2. I'd much rather improve what makes a ranger unique - give them bonuses to fletching/tailoring and/or lumberjacking. Similar to how a gnome had tinkering in EQ or a shaman had alchemy, allow a ranger to be able to create arrows or quivers more proficiently than other classes.
3. Tracking could be improved - perhaps through study or knowledge of wildlife/environments, the ranger could track or be at least directed in the area of trees for arrows.
4. Since the focus of much developer discussion has been on situational gameplay, a ranger would be able to provide exactly that - three different forms of gameplay options based off the situation - melee dps, ranged physical dps, or caster dps although not at as high of a level.
As an aside, this is where I personally despise DPS meters, raid cap limits, etc. as it becomes a numbers game of I must take X class that does the best DPS at the expense of Y class. Or, we can only take one of X class because they're garbage. And, most of this equality discussion typically revolves around the raid game of min/maxing and not the journey/group experience in which Pantheon is directed at where a classes's uniqueness/utility can shine. This is where I'd argue that most games fail as the raid game is typically a min/max fest and the utility aspect of classes is marginalized. If all classes are simply different flavors of the other, then it will be a very boring game.
geatz said:Searril said:Lot of people here who apparently never played EQ or didn't understand the order of DPS classes.
If Rangers require ammunition/reagents for DPS then casters should, too. Period. The only exception is if Ranger DPS is clearly better than all casters. Anything else is ridiculously unfair and selfish.
Sounds like you want to make Rangers some sort of Godly, do everything amazing class. Do you even read the posts in this forum? First off, in EQ, Rangers were not a DPS class, they were a hybrid class and there have been multiple posts explaining that mages already have a regeant for casting, it's called mana, rangers don't need mana to shoot their arrows.
I have never played a Ranger in my life and have no desire to, but I've known a lot of them.
I played EQ for many years, and if there is one thing Rangers weren't, it's "godly". The chain they wore was meaningless.
Here's how it works on any mob worth talking about:
(a) If the mob turns and a wizard is targetted, you're dead in one hit. If you get super lucky and the mob misses you on that hit, you die on the second.
(b) If the mob turns and a ranger is targetted, you're dead in one hit. If you get super lucky and the mob misses you on that hit, you die on the second.
Chain armor was meaningless for a ranger for any fight worth talking about.
Tie the ability to shoot arrows to stamina or something like someone said to make it equivalent to casters, but there is absolutely nothing at all fair about making rangers require gathering ammunition while casters can nuke away for free.
(PS The "hybrid" concept of certain classes had nothing to do with them being "godly". All that meant is that the class was based on a subset of the parent classes while not retaining all the core abilities {like survivability} of the classes from which it inherited)
Searril said:geatz said:Searril said:Lot of people here who apparently never played EQ or didn't understand the order of DPS classes.
If Rangers require ammunition/reagents for DPS then casters should, too. Period. The only exception is if Ranger DPS is clearly better than all casters. Anything else is ridiculously unfair and selfish.
Sounds like you want to make Rangers some sort of Godly, do everything amazing class. Do you even read the posts in this forum? First off, in EQ, Rangers were not a DPS class, they were a hybrid class and there have been multiple posts explaining that mages already have a regeant for casting, it's called mana, rangers don't need mana to shoot their arrows.
I have never played a Ranger in my life and have no desire to, but I've known a lot of them.
I played EQ for many years, and if there is one thing Rangers weren't, it's "godly". The chain they wore was meaningless.
Here's how it works on any mob worth talking about:
(a) If the mob turns and a wizard is targetted, you're dead in one hit. If you get super lucky and the mob misses you on that hit, you die on the second.
(b) If the mob turns and a ranger is targetted, you're dead in one hit. If you get super lucky and the mob misses you on that hit, you die on the second.
Chain armor was meaningless for a ranger for any fight worth talking about.
Tie the ability to shoot arrows to stamina or something like someone said to make it equivalent to casters, but there is absolutely nothing at all fair about making rangers require gathering ammunition while casters can nuke away for free.
(PS The "hybrid" concept of certain classes had nothing to do with them being "godly". All that meant is that the class was based on a subset of the parent classes while not retaining all the core abilities {like survivability} of the classes from which it inherited)
So what I hear you saying is that there is also nothing at all fair about a Warrior being able to take more hits than a Ranger, They both use swords and do melee damage so it's only fair the Ranger should be able to wear plate and take more hits as well.
@Searril
Your post is contigent a lot on what expansion your looking at (as rangers changed a lot over the years and with AAs, etc.), what area of the game your looking at (group vs. raid), and the gear of the class. All melee were highly gear dependent in EQ. Rangers were not unique in that aspect. Rangers were hardly dead in one hit on group mobs - your focus on being one-shotted seems to be more raid focused purely. Although, they were never meant to be a main tank, and more of a spot one. Someone that could taunt, pull a mob away, root, and get back to DPS. But, admittedly with EQ, rangers were probably one of the worst classes at launch, but, just because they were bad in early EQ doesn't mean they should be homogenized for future games. I'd argue there were many reasons for them being bad though, and it was more due to bad design than anything - ranged attacks near launch were garbage, their spells were not unique and were shared by druids who if they had already casted their dots, etc. on the mobs, rangers had even less utility as their spells were meaningless. It wasn't till a few expansions later that they started getting unique spells like their group attack buffs and ranged DPS became viable. So, if I were to improve rangers, it would have been to make ranged DPS viable at launch and to have hybrids not share all spell lines with their parent classes.
Back on topic though of ammunition, rangers (or rogues if they used throwing weapons as a form of damage) could receive some bonus to tradeskilling as well to assist with having a finite resource.
So again, I'd argue, don't reinvent the wheel, just fix it.
I usualy like unlimited ammo. But if it would be good for interaction, i could live with ammo crafted, or reags for certain spells. Just if you craft arrows, lets do it in stacks of 100, or its damn boring to craft 1 arrow at once and if there are some high end arrows you should be able to craft them kind of easily once learned. And give a special slot for a quiver or an ammo bag, with alot of slots and make them weight almost nothing. If rogues get to use poisons, let the poison potion last 4 hours or more and reduce the charges it has while its active, so you can stop it at say 2hours 55mins 35 sec and use another type of poison potion at will. So you could carry like 5 different potions, all with lets say 14400 charges = 4 Hours while active it reduces them, so you could activate or deactivate at wish and switch to different ones at wish.
Vandraad said:Ammunition...interesting, but why stop with such a limited scope? Add to that reagents, the 'ammunition' of spells. Some spells should require reagent and depending upon the spell perhaps more than one. Some reagents should be consumed when casting while others can be a 'just have on your person'. Make those reagents span the range from buyable off merchants to looted off mobs to player created.
And not to saddle just the casters with this burden, but have reagents required for some weapon procs. If the proc mimics a spell, make it require the consumption of or at least having the reagent.
I don't agree with spells requiring a regeant it simple just becomes a money sink, and make casting that spell simple not happen. like Symbol spell line in EQ was never casted unless you were raiding, and even then a slight few receieved it due to the fact it became so expensive to do so. just my 2 cents
Raidan said:(or rogues if they used throwing weapons as a form of damage) could receive some bonus to tradeskilling as well to assist with having a finite resource.
This popped out at me, Rogues could be sappers! if they could not backstab. Their throwing could maybe be sling-shots with a class specific craft to improve the slings. This may allow them to sort of be on the front lines in a non-standard, or partially filled group or duo. sling/hide/dodge/maneuver/sling/jump/sling/sling/sling
This is for those who complain about 'earlier' implementations of this (and other) game aspect ....
.... innovate and contemplate a 'better' or 'improved' way!
Example follows :
(i) Bows use ammo (arrows) which are needed to fire it and stored in an 'ammo' slot or container in that slot.
(ii) 'Balance' Whinge : but my ranja has to carry all them arrows and your characters don't!
I think some classes *should* be harder to play, actually! but ...
(a) Basic 'harvesting' skill will allow you to gather 'wooden sticks' from trees/brush ....
... this can be used for crafting (1) Fires/kindling wood (2) 'crude' arrow shafts (3) other stuff
(b) Fletching kit allows you to create 'crude arrow' and 'crude arrow x10'
... they have no point (unless you have heads) or fletching (unless feathers)
... can create 'improvised arrow' if you have at least 1 of these components.
(c) Scavenging skill allows a % of used arrow heads / fletching to be recovered,
... but only within short time span (kept as 'hidden loot' until corpse decays)
(d) Craft / buy decent arrows for 'premium' effect! (extra range / dmg / etc)
(iii) Many spells should use reagents, if possible.
Reagent should depend on 'power' of spell where power = effect x duration
This means it will hit buffs hardest ....
... perhaps allow the reagent to act to 'reduce' mana cost if you must!
... thus allowing the spell to be cast w/out reagent, but at reduced effect or higher mana cost
(iv) If you want, have swords pick up 'nicks' which need a whetstone to remove.
... only minor nicks that act as a v.small -ve to hit or dmg.
(v) Food as a needed commodity...
(a) if you 'hungry' or 'thirsty' you mana/hp regen is lower
... perhaps a (growing) minor penalty to 'focus' or 'concentration'.
(b) applies, perhaps, also to PETS ! (in your face Beastlords etc hehe)
(c) Foraging may allow for berries ....
... scavenging gets meat from dead mobs
... fill up water bottles from (clean?) water sources
... purify spells might be good to stop you getting the trots! hehe
These ideas can be translated for Slings (pebbles/stones), Crossbows (hate them). Javelins/throwing-daggers harder - probably cannot 'improvise'.
Hope this provides some ideas for the 'ammo' brigade! (pro or con).
Zaketh said:Grimix said: Am I the only weird one who liked using ammunition? It's just weird to me to have an endless supply of arrows.....
Again Vanguard did it best with Rangers. Harvest matertials to craft their own arrows or you can buy the normal ones like others. It took so little time to make your own arrows and the self crafted ones were well worth it.
Yup ! ;) VG had it down pretty good
Evoras said:This is for those who complain about 'earlier' implementations of this (and other) game aspect ....
.... innovate and contemplate a 'better' or 'improved' way!
Example follows :
(i) Bows use ammo (arrows) which are needed to fire it and stored in an 'ammo' slot or container in that slot.
(ii) 'Balance' Whinge : but my ranja has to carry all them arrows and your characters don't!
I think some classes *should* be harder to play, actually! but ...
(a) Basic 'harvesting' skill will allow you to gather 'wooden sticks' from trees/brush ....
... this can be used for crafting (1) Fires/kindling wood (2) 'crude' arrow shafts (3) other stuff
(b) Fletching kit allows you to create 'crude arrow' and 'crude arrow x10'
... they have no point (unless you have heads) or fletching (unless feathers)
... can create 'improvised arrow' if you have at least 1 of these components.
(c) Scavenging skill allows a % of used arrow heads / fletching to be recovered,
... but only within short time span (kept as 'hidden loot' until corpse decays)
(d) Craft / buy decent arrows for 'premium' effect! (extra range / dmg / etc)
(iii) Many spells should use reagents, if possible.
Reagent should depend on 'power' of spell where power = effect x duration
This means it will hit buffs hardest ....
... perhaps allow the reagent to act to 'reduce' mana cost if you must!
... thus allowing the spell to be cast w/out reagent, but at reduced effect or higher mana cost
(iv) If you want, have swords pick up 'nicks' which need a whetstone to remove.
... only minor nicks that act as a v.small -ve to hit or dmg.
(v) Food as a needed commodity...
(a) if you 'hungry' or 'thirsty' you mana/hp regen is lower
... perhaps a (growing) minor penalty to 'focus' or 'concentration'.
(b) applies, perhaps, also to PETS ! (in your face Beastlords etc hehe)
(c) Foraging may allow for berries ....
... scavenging gets meat from dead mobs
... fill up water bottles from (clean?) water sources
... purify spells might be good to stop you getting the trots! hehe
These ideas can be translated for Slings (pebbles/stones), Crossbows (hate them). Javelins/throwing-daggers harder - probably cannot 'improvise'.
Hope this provides some ideas for the 'ammo' brigade! (pro or con).
The whole Arrows/Throwing knives/Javelins and everything im fine with when it comes to making your own and have to keep making them to keep throwing/shooting them but if you make it to where you have to buy a regeant to cast a spell, that spell simple won't be cast cept in a raid like situation, people aren't going to throw money into things and stay perma broke due to a spell, it just isn't going to happen, and how knows even how long the spell is going to last or how much that regeant is even going to cost i rem in EQ there symbol spell wasn't a cheap material and basically like half the raid money that was dropped went to the clerics just to repay them for casting it on people, it was kinda annoying, not saying i want some of that money but it could of went to the alcjemist/poisonmakers/ or anyone of the tradeskillers that did something to give the other characters buffs through there tradeskills, instead of a simple spell that required a regeant. And we all know that if spell do require a regeant than the more powerful it becomes in that line the more powerful the regeant it going to require to cast it which even more money, its a endless money sink,and it should be avoided, i just know if i'm in a grp with a cleric and i want all his buffs and know i'm not costing in money to do it, it's not fair to him or me if he decides not to give me that buff simply becuase it costs money. And honestly if i had a spell that costs money at the beginning of the vanilla version of the game gl catching me cast it since i'm sure just like in original EQ, without knowing the some of the hot spots for cash it was a hard time earning money, let alone having to spend half of it on one raid night to buff people.
@RiaHuf22
1. Reagents for spells:
If you look closely at part (iii) line 4+5 (it was well hidden) I suggest spells normally requiring reagents can be cast without them. Either the reagent makes the spell 'stronger' or casting without the reagent makes it 'weaker' or cost more mana. By 'weaker' this might translate to (i) shorter duration and/or (ii) slightly lesser buff/effect. Thus you would start the game using vanilla spells without reagents until or unless you were doing a boss perhaps... as your income grew (or point 2 below started) you might start using the reagent more often.
2. Loot division:
In the same way EQ managed it (organised by the people themselves) drops of reagents generally went to the person who needed it. Thus much of the gems used to go to clerics, pearls/agates to Wizzies/Mages etc. NOTE: it was common for tradeskill items to also be included in 'preferential' splitting. Rogues were usually given any 'poison sacs' etc. This was a way to ensure most players got the 'cash drain' items in lieu of the party [paying them directly for their use.
Hope this clarifies things a bit. I agree raids were costly for reagents, but raids should be expensive, not to mention dangerous, endeavours!
This has been raised and touched on in other questions. My take (as primarily a ranged class player) is:
Limited ranged ammo - fine (I am not a fan of the endless quiver).
Varying ammo range/damage/reload speeds – nice to have (more than just three types too, changing heads, shafts and flights could change the overall effect).
Crafted ammo – definitely
Crafted (expensive and more difficult to carry) utility arrows – yes please (i.e. snare, explosive, freeze, fire, light emitting, etc.).
Storage limits – yes (if there is a way to forage arrows or make then on the fly and if the ranger is effective melee too).
Spell enhanced arrows – sure (promotes role interaction). The effect could be limited to the caster being in the same group as the user (or until their demise).
Environment enhanced arrows – definitely, I know would be difficult (by this I mean arrows flying through something that affects the final impact (fire for instance).
Summoned arrows – same as foraged I guess
Portable fletching kit – Yes, could be used to improve foraged/summoned arrows
Retrievable arrows – yes (from dead bodies. make it a % of how well armoured a target is. The bigger the difference between arrow and armour class, the less arrows will be retrievable).
I would also like to see a ranged player get a small bonus of some sort for crafting their own ammo. The thinking goes: I’m a skilled ranger, I know what my ammo should act like given my style. I would naturally experiment on tweaking the arrows until I find a shaft, weight, flight and arrow head that fitted with my bow skills. So, I think that a ranger using his own arrows would have a slight advantage to an arrow made by another fletcher. Of course, this would be a combined fletching and bowman-ship skill.
As an avid EQ1 and EQ2 player, playing a Druid in EQ1 and ranger in EQ2 I feel at least comfortable talking about Ammo.
Caster: Mana is Ammo and having to Med to gain it back caps DPS over time, grinding levels and is extremely effective as a balance tool as well as making the caster vulnerable while hes medding. That's why everyone was desperate for Clarity (C2/C3) in order to participate effectively at higher levels. I don't see a need to carry regents along with you as a caster in addition to medding. It would gimp the casters too much. The larger the Nuke, the more mana it takes.
For Rangers, it will depend on how Pantheon decides to balance the class. Will rangers be Melee and range dps or weighted more to the bow? limitless arrows is just silly and a horrible idea. Make the ranger buy arrows and carry them giving them a choice as to what their goal is. Make cost and labor ramp to the arrows stats. Perhaps have a foraging ability for basic arrows in a pinch but aside from that, allow for different arrow types to be crafted by players and dropped by mobs. EQ2 had a perfect system for this I feel, despite the eq2 ranger being a poor melee class and weighted a bit much to the ranged.
Thats my take
I like ammo, but it definitely needs to be fair to rangers. No other class would need to stock up massive amounts of ammo-type reagents for combat or stock up on mats to make more mid raid like in EQ1. I also think that a quiver should be an extra slot if required as one more way for rangers to not have a big disadvantage for having ammo and/or stuff like fleeting quiver where the quiver itself gives a bonus.
Still, my preference is ammo, but you only require a type of ammo and not a massive stockpile to be able to play the game.
Evoras said:@RiaHuf22
1. Reagents for spells:
If you look closely at part (iii) line 4+5 (it was well hidden) I suggest spells normally requiring reagents can be cast without them. Either the reagent makes the spell 'stronger' or casting without the reagent makes it 'weaker' or cost more mana. By 'weaker' this might translate to (i) shorter duration and/or (ii) slightly lesser buff/effect. Thus you would start the game using vanilla spells without reagents until or unless you were doing a boss perhaps... as your income grew (or point 2 below started) you might start using the reagent more often.
2. Loot division:
In the same way EQ managed it (organised by the people themselves) drops of reagents generally went to the person who needed it. Thus much of the gems used to go to clerics, pearls/agates to Wizzies/Mages etc. NOTE: it was common for tradeskill items to also be included in 'preferential' splitting. Rogues were usually given any 'poison sacs' etc. This was a way to ensure most players got the 'cash drain' items in lieu of the party [paying them directly for their use.
Hope this clarifies things a bit. I agree raids were costly for reagents, but raids should be expensive, not to mention dangerous, endeavours!
I agree it should cost a little bit of money and thanks for clearing it up, must of missed it, just know for shammies to make shrink pots by them selves cost like 200p a stack, and that to say you didn't die or zone. just trying to make sure the expense of raiding isn't over whelming, but like i said prev you cleared it up and thank you.
tanwedar said:I like ammo, but it definitely needs to be fair to rangers. No other class would need to stock up massive amounts of ammo-type reagents for combat or stock up on mats to make more mid raid like in EQ1. I also think that a quiver should be an extra slot if required as one more way for rangers to not have a big disadvantage for having ammo and/or stuff like fleeting quiver where the quiver itself gives a bonus.
Still, my preference is ammo, but you only require a type of ammo and not a massive stockpile to be able to play the game.
Easiest fix for this is to where you can put a quiver inside your ammo slot, and hopefully if arrows are a huge part of they're class that they can cast a spell or gain a ability to where you can make them barbed for a bleed effect, or like a sleeping poison to tip there arrow in for some minor cc for something like that instead of just makng arrows, would be cool to see they have a choice on what kind of arrows they want to use instad of just chooting arrows and see damage happen.
I hope ranged combat has a place in the game for all classes, at least situationally. I agree that a quiver should be able to go into an ammo slot and not be forced to take up another inventory space.
I think you can minimize the hassle of constantly running out of ammo and having to buy or craft more. Add a skill to the game called "Retrieve Arrows/Ammunition". At lower skill levels when ammo is cheaper, your chance of retrieving your arrows would be low, and increase at higher skill levels. You would never able to retrieve 100% of your arrows. If you wanted to add more depth to the skill, you could add chances to retrieve damaged arrows in various conditions that could be repaired.
Thoughts?
First, I'm glad people like the quiver slot. Makes me feel like I wrote something smart :P
I like the ammo collection idea... mostly... The first problem I see with it is if you're in a raid you might be shooting tons of arrows across multiple wipes/attempts especially if it's a long multi-mob event. This would impact the whole purpose of recovering your arrows and not needing to carry around a bunch of mats. Depending on how many rangers and different types of arrows used (especially if multiple types per player), this could rack up a decent amount of extra "loot" info on the boss. Though I don't think that will be a big issue in the end unless there's a limited item slot number, that arrows affect, on corpses and tons of people shot many types of ammo. Collection would also need to be an ability for the ranger and not collected to the loot window the LM sees of course. Included with that would need to be a mob disappearing based on if all arrows have been collected and/or a normal timer. Arrows that miss (less of an issue later on of course) would need to be unrecoverable too imo.
I would also like to see something similar to Tolan's bracer. Be it a spell/AA/item, I think it's important. This way worst case you can still get some sort of ammo if for example you're deep in a dungeon and run out of arrows/mats or simply don't want to waste high quality/expensive arrows. In a raid you could bum some from another ranger, but deep in a dungeon or something similar you are less likely to be able to.
Last thing: I write arrows, but I mean ammo of any type.
tldr; I like the recover concept if designed well and think something similar to Tolan's is important too. Also, rangers should still die lots.
A lot of people here seem to be trying to push fair or unfair ideals onto other classes while at the same time trying to justify why their class shouldn't be saddled with the same requirements.
To shoot a bow you need arrows. If you want your attacks to be more powerful you craft better arrows.
To cast a spell you need mana. If you want to cast super powerful spells, it isn't to far off to say that maybe you will need some special reagent that could be craftable just like arrows (gem powder or something)
Both caster and melee have a fall back. If a caster runs out of reagents to cast his most powerful spell, then he can always use the slightly less (but still very powerful) spells for just mana cost. That Ranger shooting the bow, if he runs out of arrows he crafted for himself, well then he can melee. The trade off for a caster having to manage mana while a melee doesn;t is the fact that the melee doesn't have the up front burst dps the caster does. Damage is smaller but in longer spurts. The caster will be much more powerful in shorter fights and in burst dps, while a melee will be better at sustained long term dps. Both would have their pros and cons. No one class should be the king of DPS in every situation. As many have said this builds class interdependancy.
As long as "ammunition", be that arrow or spell reagents, do not cost me 1/2 my inventory room and can be placed inside a special container in the "ammo" slot then I would be great with that. I would even go so far as to say I would prefer the requirement of ammunition.
I would like to bring up a point here and ask why only the Ranger could possibly be an archery user? Why couldn't a warrior, who isn't currently being required to tank, swap to a bow and output damage equal to that of a ranger with a bow? Or a rogue or any other melee type for that matter? Why should a person be locked only to specific ways to dps? Sure it would be rough to do close quarter combat as a warrior with a bow in your hands, but fighting should be situational. All this discussion of the ammo thing being tied to the Ranger being a hybrid seems silly. Bows are not exclusively a Ranger weapon.
Further more, Rangers in EQ got a bad rep due to people misunderstanding their roles. A Ranger was not a DPS class. A Ranger was a support class. A Ranger could tank in a pinch, and could often main tank in groups if you soruced the right gear. A Ranger can heal in a pinch, and could main heal in some situations. (I've done it quite often) A Ranger could buff, bringing more dps not only to himself but the rest of the group. A Ranger could perform Croud Control, Snap agro WAS the Ranger. Absolutely no one could build agro like a Ranger in EQ. A Ranger could pull agro from anyone, back a mob away and root park. Its not increadibly easy and takes skill, but its quite doable. A Ranger can DPS, when in a Raid or in a group that has everything covered a Ranger can be a pure DPS. No he wont out DPS that rogue over there, but if something goes wrong and any one of the other group members go down, the ranger can take over where that rogue cannot. That was the hybrid trade off. No you weren't the best at things, but you could do EVERYTHING just well enough to get the job done. That is the reason I have always loved the EQ Ranger.
VR has said many times that they intend hybrids to follow this same formula. I wouldn't have it any other way, but basing your argument on Ranged damage output and ammo requirements on a CLASS rather than a ROLE (dps) is quite slanted. A Bow, throwing dagger, sling, crossbow, dart gun, or whatever isn't tied to the class, but the role. Many people will assume Bow = Ranger. this isn't always true. I do think Rangers would have an affinity for the bow due to their lifestyle (wandering protectors) but that doesn;t mean another class couldn't make good use of the weapon.
I would think that differences in dps ability between the classes would be based more on class specific traits or abilities that could be transfered to several different weapon types, barring maybe a few (how can you backstab with a bow?).
Ranged Physical attacks should require ammo, unless maybe a special magical weapon had that property (bow that summoned arrows as you shoot, or a magical quiver that would never run out of arrows, magical returning throwing dagger / hammer). The suspention of disbalief should be the ammo container and slot allowing you to carry a few thousand arrows when that could never really happen. This again would depend on the container size and stack size of the ammo and such. This extends to reagents as well. No reason not to.
I'd like to see crafted ammo where there was an opportunity to experiment. Griffon feathers and an oak shaft... turns out they are amazing and burst into flame on impact. Griffon feathers and an elm shaft... turns out they warp and fly badly. Ideally the combo's would be different by player (random seed at creation?) so you couldn't just google the right answers.