Bow Enchants
Ancient bows are a real damage weapon in Season 2 — arrows now pierce most of a target's armour, so a well-drawn shot actually hurts. Vanilla draw and Power (Bow) scaling still apply (against an unarmoured target nothing changed), and like wands a bow now works on all PvE content. Against players it stays PvE-only, so you can't fire on someone in open-world combat — see PvP Basics.
How bows fire now
- Hold to fire. Hold right-click and the bow streams arrows at its fire rate. Rapid Fire shortens the gap between shots; the base time between shots is 0.3s.
- Every arrow lands once. The old throttling double-hit is gone — one arrow, one hit, no free second tick.
- Arrows fly a little slower by default. Add Velocity (or any +arrow-speed source) to restore the snappy draw, and note that stray arrows force-despawn so the world stays clean.
Holding a bow is a glass-cannon tradeoff: you take +15% damage from all sources while it's in your main hand. That's the same deal wands strike — read Wands, Bows & the Glass-Cannon Tradeoff before you commit to a bow build.
Power (Bow)
Power is the core damage scaler for bows, and it was rebalanced for Season 2. It now grants 5% increased damage per level (up to 25% at L5), down from the old 12%/60%. To compensate, bow base damage was raised ~25%, so a maxed bow lands in a similar place — just with the headroom spread differently.
Power is increased damage, so it sums into one additive pool with your other increased-damage sources rather than multiplying on top of them.
Bow-only enchants
These roll only on bows:
| Enchant | Rarity | What it does |
|---|---|---|
| Piercing Shot | Elite | Arrow passes through +1 extra enemy per level — bosses and ordinary vanilla mobs included, not just shades |
| Rapid Fire | Elite | +12% fire rate per level (shorter gap between shots) |
| Caltrops | Elite | Drops slowing ground spikes where the arrow lands |
| Crippling Shot | Elite | Slows and weakens the enemy you hit |
| Trueshot | Uncommon | Your arrows fly flat — no gravity drop |
| Splinter | Legendary | The arrow shatters for 15% per level around the target |
| Hunter's Mark | Legendary | A marked enemy takes +10% per level from your shots |
| Split Arrow | Legendary | The shot forks into 2 arrows, each at 60% |
| Plague Arrow | Legendary | Leaves a lingering poison cloud |
| Hemorrhage | Legendary | 6% more damage per level against bleeding enemies |
Shared enchants bows can roll
Bows can also pull from a slate of enchants you'll recognise from wands and melee weapons: Ignite, Venom, Shock, Frostbite, Bleed, Catalyst, Combustion, Executioner, Ambush, Long Shot, Surge, Monster Hunter, Soul Eater, Detonate and the Godly Prism, plus the utility trio Velocity, Reduced Cost and Repel. See Sword & Axe Enchants and Wand Enchants for how those behave.
Lucky can be socketed on bows. It boosts the proc rate of the bow's own enchants by 10% per level, up to 40% increased at L4. Cavern Luck, its Calcite upgrade, now applies to bows too.
The conditional damage scalers
Four bow and wand scalers grant more damage rather than increased damage, so each one multiplies with the others instead of summing into one pool. Their per-level numbers came down to match:
| Enchant | Grants |
|---|---|
| Executioner | 8% more damage per level against enemies below 50% health |
| Ambush | 10% more damage per level on an opening hit against a 95%+ health enemy |
| Long Shot | 6% more damage per level at 30 blocks, scaling from nothing up close |
| Hemorrhage | 6% more damage per level against a bleeding enemy |
Shock now scales with its level too: 8% increased damage taken per level, for 24% at L3, where it used to be a flat 25% regardless.
Prism (Godly)
Prism splits your shot into one extra arrow per level, fired in a fan — up to 3 arrows at level 2. Each arrow rolls its own crit and its own ailment procs on whichever enemy it strikes, and Prism arrows are what let a single trigger pull cover a pack.
Volley rules
One trigger pull is one volley — the arrow you loosed, every arrow Prism fanned out, and any Split-Arrow children they spawn. Volleys follow two rules:
- One arrow lands per enemy. A volley deals damage to any given target exactly once. Later arrows still pass through it but deal nothing, so a Prism fan spreads its damage across a pack instead of shotgunning one enemy.
- Fans into a cone. The extra arrows spread out in front of you, so pointing at a crowd is how you use them.
Split Arrow children inherit their parent arrow's crit and proc result, so a forked shot crits and procs as one unit. Prism siblings do not — each rolls for itself.
Ailment and ground-zone limits
- Ignite and Bleed do not stack: a new proc replaces the live one only if it is stronger, and refreshes the timer.
- Venom stacks up to 3 times on a target.
- Caltrops and Plague Arrow place one patch each per player. A fresh proc picks your existing patch up and drops it where the new arrow landed, at full duration, instead of adding another one.
Where bows fit
- Acquire and re-roll bow enchants the same way as the rest of your kit — through Enchants.
- Dress the bow up with Weapon, Wand & Bow Trims and Cosmetics.
- Lean on a bow's piercing draw against tougher PvE like Shades & Wraiths.
Version history
v3.0.0
- Prism now works on bows, splitting your shot into 1 extra arrow per level.
- A bow volley now lands at most 1 arrow on the same enemy. Prism arrows still hit separate enemies, and each rolls its own crit and procs.
- Executioner, Ambush, Long Shot and Hemorrhage now grant more damage instead of increased damage, so each multiplies with the others rather than summing into one pool. Their values were cut to match: 8%, 10%, 6% and 6% per level.
- Shock damage now scales with its level, at 8% increased damage taken per level for 24% at level 3.
- Monster Hunter now works on every enemy that is not a player, and is increased damage rather than a separate multiplier.
- Frostbite no longer makes chilled enemies take increased damage — it is pure control now.
- Caltrops and Plague Arrow now place 1 patch each per player; a new proc moves and refreshes your patch instead of adding another.
- Ignite and Bleed no longer stack, and Venom stacks up to 3 times.
- Repel now knocks enemies back 3.5x less per hit at every level.
- Piercing Shot now passes arrows through bosses and other vanilla mobs, not just shades.
- Fixed bow arrows bouncing off bosses and hanging in the air around them.
- Cavern Luck can now be applied to bows, and Lucky on a bow gives 10% increased proc rate per level (40% at L4).
- Fixed calcite enchant levels showing as a number instead of a roman numeral on bows.
v2.0.0
- Bows reworked into a real weapon — arrows pierce most armour and now land in Skywars with knockback.
- Bows can now be held to fire, and every arrow lands exactly once (base 0.3s between shots).
- Power (Bow) rebalanced down to 5% more per level, with bow base damage raised ~25% to compensate.
- Added bow enchants Piercing Shot, Splinter, Trueshot, Hunter's Mark, Split Arrow, Plague Arrow, Caltrops, Rapid Fire, Hemorrhage and Crippling Shot, and opened a slate of wand/melee enchants to bows.
- Volley shots now crit and proc as one unit, fan into a cone, and can't shotgun a single target; Lucky now works on bows; holding a bow adds +15% damage taken.