IMPORTANT CORRECTION: Lightning Bolt/Lightning Greatbolt does indeed have an explosion outside of water too. The Lightning Greatbolt also flies straighter than the Explosive Greatbolt. For the fixes please check out my next video: kzfaq.info/get/bejne/m754g8Zzss3XmHk.html

Maybe just an useless fact, but the full moon crossbow can be buffed with the magic scorpion talisman, as well as terra magica and the magic tear, and if you "power stance" them, when you shoot both of the bolts and you reload, both crossbows reload almost the same time Edit: sorry that I took my god damn time, it was a typo, they reload really fast, almost at the same time, and they reload smoothly, in comparison to other crossbows

I really wish the perfumer bolts left a trail of explosive powder like the spark aromatics. That'd give some fantastic area denial with the pulley xbow.

Really hope we get some bell bearings in the dlc that let us buy rare consumables, ammo, and crafting materials. Silly that vanilla players are just kinda screwed in this regard unless they want to farm for hours and hours.

I'm fine with crossbows or guns in RPGs not scaling with stats; but their base damage needs to really ramp up with upgrades to make up for it.

I believe the Jar Cannon with lighting bolts has a much longer trajectory than the Hand Ballista. Unless that’s been patched out long ago when I first noticed it. When afk farming was super popular I used to carry both because of the different projectile drops which allowed me to hit spots that would’ve been inaccessible without the other options.

I learned to appreciate the pulley crossbow toward the end of NG+3. Applying scarlet rot so easily on bosses that are easy to hit and have loads of HP like Fire Giant was a huge help for my basic quality build.

Love your content Chrightt! I've been absolutely addicted to randomizers and your videos are a godsend when trying to optimize random builds.

Great guide, I might try a pulley crossbow run. As an aside, Elden Ring has a serious problem with limited quantity consumables across the board. I can't imagine many vanilla players make regular use of perfumer bolts or golem arrows, especially not as frivolously as they're spent in PvP.

This video was right on time for me. As always Crighht, great work. These guides are unparalleled. 🙂

Impeccably high quality video as always

I know I said before steel has the best informative videos before but you are on a whole different level and category ma man. Loves these videos. I learned more than a few things form this, thank you fren. ❤

Crossbow hype

I love crossbows in Soulborne games, and have always preferred them over the regular bows. The reason is simply because they can be held and shot with one hand. It's so much quicker and more convenient to just swap to your a crossbow and shoot, especially in a heat of a battle. Even though they do not scale and become outclassed by the endgame, I still find plenty of uses for them in Elden Ring. You can two hand them and zoom in to snipe and pull one enemy at time, like the regular bows can. You can also quickly swap to them and shoot an enemy with a sliver of health left, to finish them off from a relatively safe distance. And the Pulley Crossbow with either the bleed bolts or the frost bolts is really fun to use.

The lightning ballistea bolts do have an aoe just like the fire ones.

Hope they add some more types of greatbolts in a future dlc. think it would be cool to have a greatbolt that releases a rot cloud upon detonation or a crystal one that has a shotgun like affect.

Something you forgot to mention is that, because its magic damage, you can boost the damage of the full moon crossbow with things like the magic scorpion charm and the magic crystal tear. I personally love having the full moon crossbow as a hard swap in my inventory on my sorcerers, for when Im running low on blue flasks. Put the sacrifical axe in your offhand and the fp per kill talisman and run through mobs with a pretty beefed up crossbow, on account of it being boosted by all the same things as any other source of magic damage. It came in clutch a couple of times.

I kinda wish the ballistae had some more interesting ammo types, bows have already gotten some love by getting running, jumping, and rolling attacks so I think crossbows could get something to spice up their gameplay. Maybe ballistae could get magic bolts that explode into one of those cuckoo glintstone soulmasses, or a holy bolt that could get a lingering AoE litany of proper death style attack, maybe even a gravity bolt that could have a gravitas effect that can pull enemies off cliffs or into hazards. I think it would just be good if there were other ways to play around with these thing than stacking as much damage as possible a mile away.

Your impact on the pvp community is so insane. I've seen so many Xbowx yesterday and was wodnering whats wrong with them... Here we are! Thanks for the nice work!

1:20 I actually love how a lot of crossbows have the kick AoW because it works great in pvp when you run into a great shield

im waiting this for so longgggg

The Ballistae are very powerful in PVP, particularly in the LV80-100 range. Also, the lightning greatbolts too have splash damage, not just the explosive greatbolts.

You can shoot greatbolts out of regular crossbows if you have regular and greatbolts equipped. Jump, press regular bolt slot attack and then greatbolt slot attack immediately after while still in the air

I was wandering fmc's description mentions synergy with holy bolts, is there something to it? Or is it just flavor text?

Quick notes about the ballista: -1 you can craft the bone bolts to have an unlimited amount of ammo -2 just like the claymore isn't a claymore, that ballista is not a ballista but an (unmounted) scorpion.

As someone who rather likes off handing a crossbow, lightning bolts always have an AOE. They deal more damage than explosive bolts too. You don't need to be in water, they just get a bigger AOE in water. As such I feel like they are more of a direct upgrade to explosive bolts and they don't really compare to normal bolts. (He added a pinned comment somewhat after I posted this) In any case. I will add a little extra at the end here. In my own use of crossbows off hand I have found that even if the lightning bolts have a smaller radius. The difference is minimal. I haven't ever missed because of it. The AoE on Lightning bolts is still sizable and very easy to land hits with. As such I find the slight extra damage to be more useful than having a slightly larger AoE. Naturally these opinions mostly relate to PvP. In PvE resistance varies a lot more.

I know this is late, but I just want to put this out as a crossbow enthusiast. There seems to be a bit of a misconception that ballistae are meant to be damage machines, but they aren't. Where they actually shine is in how easy it is to deal damage with them. Because you can use it one-handed, it is FAR easier to quickly use than a bow when swapping from a melee weapon. You can even preemptively load the bolt and put it away, and when you take it back out the bolt will still be loaded. In my eyes, this means there are two builds in it can shine in. When used with a heavier, slower main weapon, it becomes an invaluable finisher for when the enemy is on low health and you don't want to risk a swing, as well as pressuring people at range and forcing them to engage. And on melee status builds, where the crossbow can easily keep up the pressure furing downtime and make sure the status bar doesn't drop too far. I also want to mention that it locking you out of your main hand AOW when left handed isn't that much of an issue. It can be more annoying in pvp where you would want to reactively use both the AOW and crossbow, but in pve you can easily see when a fight will be taken at range, at which point you will want to pull out the crossbow, or if you will be scrapping in melee, at which point you should two hand your main weapon for access to your AOW.

If anyone is interested, on a level 30 build, enchanted shot with dwelling arrows and horned bow chunks a good 1/4th of an players hp if youre doing twink invasions. Its so funny to snipe someone, then vanish with conceiling veil, then pop out of a bush and shoot them from another direction.... also, enchanted shot increases status buildup, so if youre fighting someone whos running a strength build, it will be a one shot sleep proc with trina arrows which can then combo into another one shot frost proc with ghostflame arrows.

pls make a video about.. spells using seals, as alternative to staff sorceries like swift glint, night shard... which is the fastest to cast..

Any differences in projectile speed between the crossbow variants or their bolts? Maybe animation speed? The pulley crossbow can be an unreliable punish, but I wonder if there's better.

Honorable mention should be the One-eyed shield. It functions the same as a ballista except it uses FP instead of ammo and has much shorter range.

Lots of mention about bolt supply being easier on PC: As a PC player, what method is used for this?

Just as a quick question, do you have a general idea of when the Greataxe vid will be?

Used Crepus's Black-Key Crossbow, Axe of Godrick, and Hookclaws on my first run through on a quality build. Good times with such an arsenal.

I'm using Crepus' since it looks cool

Hi Chrightt, I wanted to get your input for stats making a Crucible Knight build for pve/pvp. They are one of my favorite enemies I just need some guidance for a stat allocation. Thank you for your time.

I have been using the Pulley Crossbow on my Knight Gael build and at plus 10 it does decent damage with lord's sworn and perfumer's bolts. When invaded if you time a volley of St Trina arrows you can then one shot the invader with the Marais Executioner's Sword. IIRC Elemental bolts can also be buffed by scorpion talismans.

Also, as far as your book goes, I've waited patiently for what seems over a year now. Do you plan on releasing hard back? I have a thing with touching stuff. Paper and cardboard and soft fluffy stuff drives me batty. I also prefer physical books to ebooks. I'll settle for e if I have to, but I REALLY want hard back.

Is there some bug or something on pc that leads to infinite ammo? Or are you referring to save back ups?

Your ER videos are works of both art and science. This video confirmed what I always suspected: crossbows suck and are more a handicap than a build.

Was the Meteor + Full Moon Crossbow synergy mentioned? The bolts fly straighter

The crossbows of all time!

The only thing people get better at when it comes to crossbows is loading and accuracy were guns gain an additional feature autoloading were they replace the strength needed to draw the bowstring back to ready with target reaquirining and firing rapidly. None of these skills can increase the damage of a crossbow or gun and thus there not scaling damage

I found it easier to just swap to second slot before using the ash. It's still extremely clunky, just slightly better than the default.

What are the best ways to get the bolts/arrows on pc?

Abalest op, the armor pen is good for stagger if you can get a headshot.

3:20 Yes, Lordsworn bolt must be farmed, but just playing through the game normally into NG+ maxed out these damn bolts for me.

..would buffing yourself with golden epitaph make any of these crossbows more or less useful?

can u make a vid about greataxes?

ur legit my fucking hero. was looking for a numbers guide on crossbows few hours ago and found nothing… are you like.. a wizard sir 🧙‍♀️

Use Hand Ballista and lighting great bolts to cheese the duo tree Sentinels from the cliff to the left

Fun fact: black key bolts are not craftable nor farmable and you can get like 40 per playthrough, so the only way to use them in pvp is blessed duping xd

Full Moon Crossbow with Terra Magica?

I heard the ballista reloads faster than jar cannon, also lightning great bolt also has aoe just like explosive so it is strictly better in pvp

I don’t use the Jar Cannon because of the obvious muzzle blast-- if I'm shooting you from a distance, it pays to be sneaky.

The black key crossbow reminds me of Chester's crossbow

They should Scale Xbows, Bows, and Ballista with dex. Higher dex changes the way you actually use the weapons, allowing for specific limb targeting, third person aiming, roll shots, etc., Stat investment i.e., learning to use a weapon should _change how you use the weapon_ and ranged non-magic gameplay in Fromsoftware titles has always been lacking. Armored Core does it fine, so why since Demons Souls have we had _the same_ targeting system even down to the aiming reticle? Even a targeting system as bare bones as AC4: Black Flag would be be better than what we have and a peach to implement.

Old video I know but it's important to mention that you can only get like 90 black-key bolts in a playthrough. I don't know what the accepted standard for modding/cheating in consumables is though.

Ballistae can actually be wielded even when not meeting the two handed strength requirement (dunno about the dex requirement). Extremely weird, but I don't think anyone will complain about that. Makes sniping much more accesible to anyone without resorting to stat bonus item swaps.

That’s it I’m checking out house of hounds. Please don’t make me regret giving this book a try.

I had 5 years of Latin in school, and knowing the regular plural for nouns ending on -a is -ae (of course there are exceptions). :)

this is how i found out that perfumers talisman + arrows sting is no longer bugged

Why can't you jump fire with a crossbow in your left hand but you can with your right?

What level are they best used? Under 150? Under 80?

Crossbows and ballista getting a much larger increase per upgrade means to me that they're meant to be over-upgraded to help you keep your distance from enemies in the early game, or Ballista for sniping generic mobs. Greatbows are actually pretty nice in PvP, Golem stuff for PVP and Radahn's for PvE (Lion greatbow generally gives higher Damage because boosted Radahns arrows, but golem arrows have disjoint windbox) however normal bows? they have such dog doo doo scaling they aren't worth using except for hitting from somewhere the enemy can't reach you and that's not really fun. What irks me is that the Ash of War "Through and Through" exists. The only Greatbow that can equip it has that skill by default so the item is currently useless.

lets GO!

Sad to see crosbows remain a weapon class almost exclusive to twinks

Man i love crossbows in souls games, most playthroughs i run an offhand crossbow, shits cracked

Crossbows not scaling make sense lorewise but as a piece of game design it feels like a holdover from earlier games. Previous games also had weapon upgrade paths that removed scaling but had high base damage, with the idea that they're better for low-level characters or builds that put their stats elsewhere e.g. defense. It never made a LOT of sense but there was some logic to it. It also gave STR and DEX builds some ranged options. This design has pretty much been scrapped in Elden Ring for everything except crossbows, and since the game is balanced around much higher damage numbers crossbows become obsolete very quickly. They're still good in PvP because of fast fire animation (unreactable at close range) but pretty bad in PvE.

ah yes my favorite build, light-roll dual blood/rotbolt pulley crossbows

Oh that's weird! For some reason I thought that the Jar Cannon worked better with Explosive Greatbolts and the Hand Ballista worked better with Lightning Greatbolts.

I love crossbows !

Crossbows are my favorite weapons.

lightning ballista have a greater range potential than the explosive, if you didn't mention this already.

I hope they receive a buff. Fingers are already crossed 🤞🏻.

What level do you think crossbows would hit hard at?

Remember to aim for the head

Not everyone can do that with a gun but the bullets aren't exiting with any extra force because of the guy holding it, he's just more accurate. Just like how hitting a headshot in game does more damage with crossbows. Dexterity increases melee damage because technique matters in keeping the blade straight, moving your body correctly to increase and maintain energy, etc. Dexterity/strength matter with bows because of the amount of technique and muscle it takes to smoothly pull back the string and release accurately. The assumption would be that your character at low stats is firing arrows at the same speed, but without the experience to do that and maintain the same energy Crossbows in the real world were introduced to be easily accessible for the everyman while having less range potential (as far as I know), so the game reflects that in having them not scale at all ( on top of what I already mentioned). I will say that in pve, crossbows can be useful for effectively using no stamina, allowing them to put out more damage in the long run because you don't have to stop and regen stamina. Granted this would be assuming you would have the time to do this (like Radahn getting stuck on a rock). And because they don't use stamina you will be able to roll all over the place after unloading

I wish they didn’t add crafting they should have just added bell bearings for everything woulda been so much better for getting arrows and bolts and other consumables

The problem with cannons and crossbows is the absurd damage on ranged ashes of war. Stormblade does more damage than the cannon, is spammable and can true combo itself after a head shot. All ranged ashes of war need to lose scaling or be otherwise gimped. My flame of the redmanes does not deserve 546 PvP damage lol sacred blade needs a range nerf if it’s gonna be a hyper armor attack with moonveil damage on top of a weapon buff. Flame strike should not be a better and lingering wrath of gold with a weapon buff. Moonveil still needs a 50% dmg nerf.

Oh you are just trying to avoid the big boy axe type are we? I am kidding take your time these are a real gift already. Also fun fact for anyone else reading this. It is making the rounds that the Jar Cannon was based off a real weapon as absurd as it is. And it was, sort of. There are two drawing seeming to depict this sort of weapon but medieval drawings are not a reliable source of information without detailed accounts which these lacked. So there is some doubt to if they existed or not. Further proving this is the Royal Armouries had one reconstructed using medieval techniques as well as having bolt reconstructions made. These bolts were from other early cannons that absolutely existed. They found that while the cannon worked it was less powerful than many bows and crossbows and increasing the charge would destroy the projectile. The other Ballista never existed. Which is funny given it is the more 'normal' design. But no Ballista ever would have had 2 limbs or 2 string. One was plenty.

Jar Cannon is my baby

I’m fine with crossbows not scaling because the force comes from the lever or cord not the user, but yeah ironically they should have at least as much if not more dexterity scaling than bows if that logic was followed to the very end. That said, I would be fine with crossbows not scaling if only they had much higher base AR and/or benefited much much more from upgrades, there’s no reason why that shouldn’t be the case especially since, apparently, their stamina consumption per shot is higher with higher upgrades. As they are, they’re just weaker bows, and for no good reason bows are already pretty darn shit

Crossbows scaling or having high ar would be pretty bad. In general they shoot quick, are one handed, lowish requirements and have decent range, so they are a good offhand weapon in pvp and pve for most builds. If their damage was higher due to scaling or base, then the situations where they are useful would overlap way more with the bows, outclassing them in most. (Like in real life)

i've been seeing more people with a repeating crossbow with sleep darts in the arena, so maybe there's something im missing, (before watching vid)

Crossbrows

Oh this video comes out the morning after i beat the game with only bows/crossbows, neeto

I learned the ballista and ballistae from age of empires two

I'll never understand why miyazaki is so against crossbows having scaling... They could have scaled with strength and to strength what bows are to dex...

The Pulley crossbow is necessary for a Guts build, with GUGS in the main hand

You said that guns take skill but skill is only aim and control. Power will never change unless you’re the main character ….

howdy

I have three hundred hours and a half dozen characters in this game yet I swear to you I’ve never seen the moon bow in my life

I've tested it, and the STR requirments for the ballistae cant be midigated via two handing. It is super weird.

Crossbows have a faster fire rate with shit dmg, shit range, and better mobility (meaning you can charge another bolt and have it on standby before firing, you don't have to two hand, and draw) Bows have a slower fire rate, better dmg, better range, but shit mobility (meaning you have to two hand, draw, and fire while doing this. Your movements are limited) It comes down to the situation at hand or personal preference, but I'll always take a crossbow with me, having the ability to rack another bolt and have it on standby as a pressure instrument is too good.

Just to nitpick, as it‘s latin it should be pronounced "Ballistaaa-eee" :p

ranking the garbage in my trashcan by monetary value

too bad no one uses these apart from shitters with pulley and sleepbone

Explaining no scaling because of realism (like being stronger does not make bolt do more damage) is a bad premise in a fantasy RPG. Why does knowledge of the Arcane make a weapon cause more bleeding? magic.... it is all Fantasy RPG stat stuff. It has very little to do with reality. Sometimes it feels like Elden Ring plays favorites with weapons. Most axes are just worse than the swords and crossbows have limited use in early levels of PVE, etc.... Chrightt has shown the data to prove all this. For hardcore PVP where winning is the only objective, sure... use the most min/max option for the meta. But if you are a PVE'er on NG, use what you find is the most fun. NG can be beaten with *anything* if you are willing to put in the time. The main reason to add scaling to crossbows is just what Chrightt pointed out, NG+ and beyond. If you want to play in NG+, raw damage matters more if you do not enjoy 20 minute boss fights.

I feel like the reason crossbows dont scale with stats is for balancing tbh. Crossbows have the benefit of being fired with one hand at a pretty good range which makes them perfect for an off-hand weapon. Unlike bows which keep you at a safe distance but require both hands to use. I also think the reason bows and crossbows have the lowest damage and scaling in the game is largely because of the benefit of being able to do ranged damage. We trade high damage for high range, mobility and variety of damage type. Crossbows sacrifice scaling entirely probably because of the benefit they get to do damage at high range, dont require two handing to use, increase mobility due to ur access to being a nice distance away from danger and variety damage type based on bolt loadout. Ballista and Greatbow get to do more damage then ur typical crossbow and regular bows probably due to the requirement of needing to be dual wielded and far more heavy and having more mobility restrictions then the lighter bows. Just my observations.