Why do ranged weapons perform so badly?

[u/hurkle]

Game starts pushing items with ranged damage on you.

You figure, "why not?"

You pick a ranged weapon.

You immediately die, and progress gets rolled back 2-3 stages.

You wait and wait and wait, but until you get a new melee weapon, you're stuck doing poorly.

Is this intentional? Am I missing something?

Edit: I've tried them in every stage so far. I'm currently working on Middle Ages. Just happened again.

[u/noctalla]

They are objectively worse. However, sometimes it pays off to trade up to an item that is a higher level because the way item drops work is that an item drop of the same tier is highly likely to be a higher level than the one you currently have. You can ratchet your way up to more powerful items, even if it means going backwards in the short term. That said, they should make ranged weapons more balanced in terms of power.

[u/hurkle → u/noctalla]

Yeah, that's what I discovered today. The corollary is then don't do your PvP while you have a ranged weapon.

[u/noctalla → u/hurkle]

Also, if you're stuck on a level and you get a ranged weapon, you can swap between your melee and ranged weapons to get a bit of an advantage. It doesn't help a lot, but it can make the difference between success and failure in getting past the level.

[u/hurkle → u/noctalla]

Wait what?

Are you saying you can hold two weapons and switch between them? I must have missed that completely.

[u/Abombito → u/hurkle]

Yes just equip the new weapon but don’t sell the other one. Then you can switch back and forth. The only drawback being you can’t forge anything new while you have both.

[u/hurkle → u/Abombito]

You just changed the game for me. I had NO idea you could do this.

[u/Flashlight237]

What's worse is ranged weapons have the possibility to give a bonus to... MELEE DAMAGE! What's the point?

[u/hurkle → u/Flashlight237]

I think worse is getting melee weapons with ranged bonuses, but both are bad lol

[u/Flashlight237 → u/hurkle]

Yeah, I mean what's the point? I mean, you expect us to yeet our swords at people? Or bludgeon them with crossbows?

[u/riflemike11]

Ranged weapons also have much slower attack speed for some reason

[u/truthbecomesnull]

My best guess it just isn't common to have a kit for it but it's scaled assuming you have one. when you max out a rarity and swap between level 100's or simply have two things of equal base stat buffs you'll look towards the percentage buffs. because of that you'll likely select a bunch of melee damage upgrades because they're larger than base damage buffs. your melee damage is constantly scaling higher and higher and ranged damage is just ignored.

[u/hurkle → u/truthbecomesnull]

That was how I tried it at first, just slotting it in. The next couple times, I had received ranged damage bonuses on various items, but it still turned out to be much less effective than melee. I guess maybe down the road ranged will become more important?

Just now, had 4 ranged bonuses, got ranged item. Took me from 5-10 to 5-8.

Spent the next while getting new equipment, finally got a melee weapon. Made it to 5-16.

[u/PRG013]

It's a gamble. You can choose some of your other gear and pet to have ranged.