Quote:
Let's see here... Split Arrow comes in at L6, so there's a minimum level requirement of 12th to pick this up. At that point you'd have a BAB of +12 and a primary attack stat of at least +6 if not more. Add in Weapon Focus and other sundries, and you're probably looking at a regular archer coming up with a +20-+22 modifier to hit. They spent all their offensive-weaponry cash on a +2 Splitting Longbow, have Rapid Shot (obviously) and Improved Rapid Shot, plus some means of obtaining haste or a similar effect (since they're a volley archer). This gives them five attacks, which count as ten, each dealing 1d8 plus 4-8 depending on Str mod and choice of bow enchantment. The Arcane Archer, using all of the same, can instead spring for a +3 Collision Longbow at the precise same price, and then stacks their +3 Imbue Arrow atop that. An additional +3 to hit and additional +8 to damage on all ten of those arrows. (I suppose you might say my objection here is the potential combination of two class features!) |
So, ultimately you're concerned that, at level 12, an archer is potentially going to get an extra 80 damage on a full attack?
I'd say the real abuse doesn't come in until the capstone ability, where you can basically launch those same 10+ arrows, but with a fireball attached to each and every one of them.
Of course, at that point you're level 16+, so I would hope you could do something epic like that.