Quote Originally Posted by Cieyrin View Post
Haven't played FFXIII-2, wouldn't know. Didn't really care for the extreme railroading of the prequel.

Also, technically, composite bows aren't straight bows, they're recurved bows. Straight bows are a single piece of wood carved and strung to create the curve. Recurved bows are composited with different woods or horn so that you can stretch the bow with more force than a straight bow of the same size could generate. If you just want bows, just say bow or 'proficient with at least one bow (long, short, great or composite version thereof)'.
Okay, sure, I'll go with that.

As for the crossbow thing, that little restriction isn't that great, as they can just be a Lesser Planetouched or Elf. I'm also not seeing where it's supposed to help the "real archers," since they need to at least dip one of those classes so they can even take the feat.
Whoa, gotta stop you right there. Lesser Planetouched do not get free bow proficiency. They aren't Outsiders, they're Humanoids with the (Planetouched) subtype. That's why they don't have LA. And yes, they could just be an elf to get the bow proficiency, but elves are a pretty terrible race to begin with in my opinion. Plus, it's no better than being a human (you trade your free bonus feat for free Martial Weapon Proficiency. You get +2 Dex, which helps you a bit, and give up skill points and lose hit points from the Con hit. It's a pretty even trade, in my opinion).

Yes, real archers need to dip caster classes to use the feat, while casters need to dip fighter classes to use the feat (unless they are elves or they burn another feat slot on MWP). But rangers, duskblades and paladins don't need to dip at all, so they're fine.

For slings and thrown weapons, there's a reason my example was javelins, as they have a 30' range increment, which is far better than daggers and handaxes, as well as slings have a 50' range increment. Not to mention that WotC has no idea how slings are supposed to work, since they're easily as powerful as bows, they just need more training to use properly. That's really the only reason bows won out, is that training time difference, since experienced slingers trained with them from an early age, where as a decent archer takes a much shorter time in comparison, with crossbows and firearms being even shorter still.

I digress, if you just want to provide more bow support, that's fine, bows need cool stuff to keep up with THFers, anyways.
I see your argument for slings. Very well, I guess I'll just open it up to any ranged weapon then. (Are slings ranged weapons or thrown weapons?)