bow

[dracjn]

witch bow is the best bow??

[Siberys]

Gamebanshee has an equipment database for every weapon, armor, ring, or item in general for the game.

Where it says "Banshee network" at the top left of your screen with a drop down box, find Elder Scrolls 4 Oblivion and search through all that information till your hearts content.

[Gobatcha]

You'll make better bows with your own enchantments than you can find in the game.

[Belthan]

Depends. Daedric bows do the most damage, so if you have decent STR, lots of Feather-type magic, or can otherwise afford to carry a ridiculously heavy bow, they're the best way to pack a mighty wallop from a distance. If you need to conserve weight, glass bows hit almost as hard but weigh far less. However, it's rare to find either type at lower levels (silver is pretty sweet until you can find glass or daedric).

I'll second what the other posters suggested about enchantments. Find a non-magical bow with a damage-to-weight ratio that suits you, and enchant it yourself with whatever effect you prefer. That will almost always serve you better than finding a magic bow with some arbitrary enchantment.

And I believe a bow's enchantments stack with the effects from magic arrows, so you can get some really interesting combinations of effects that way.

[UncleScratchy]

Originally Posted by Belthan

Depends. Daedric bows do the most damage, so if you have decent STR, lots of Feather-type magic, or can otherwise afford to carry a ridiculously heavy bow, they're the best way to pack a mighty wallop from a distance. If you need to conserve weight, glass bows hit almost as hard but weigh far less. However, it's rare to find either type at lower levels (silver is pretty sweet until you can find glass or daedric).

I'll second what the other posters suggested about enchantments. Find a non-magical bow with a damage-to-weight ratio that suits you, and enchant it yourself with whatever effect you prefer. That will almost always serve you better than finding a magic bow with some arbitrary enchantment.

And I believe a bow's enchantments stack with the effects from magic arrows, so you can get some really interesting combinations of effects that way.

I enchanted a daedric bow with Weakness to Poison with the hope that it would make my arrows poisoned with potions (damage health, damage strength, burden, etc.) be more effective. Unfortunately I have no way of knowing if it is working. Weakness to fire, frost, shock would probably be good if you could make/find enough of those arrows to go with it. Other than the Thief Den plug-in, does anyone know of a place to buy enchanted arrows, or can they only be scavanged?

[Kyle09]

the best bows are the ones you enchant yourself

[Olorin]

Originally Posted by UncleScratchy

I enchanted a daedric bow with Weakness to Poison with the hope that it would make my arrows poisoned with potions (damage health, damage strength, burden, etc.) be more effective. Unfortunately I have no way of knowing if it is working. Weakness to fire, frost, shock would probably be good if you could make/find enough of those arrows to go with it. Other than the Thief Den plug-in, does anyone know of a place to buy enchanted arrows, or can they only be scavanged?

I do not think that your weakness to poison/poison arrow combo will work on the first shot. Apparently, you can't give them the weakness to something and hit them with that something in the same hit. (Was that unclear? Too many somethings...)
Anyway, if you hit them with the weakness to poison, and it last long enough to get off another shot with a poisoned arrow, that second shot should benefit from the weakness effect.
Sorry if I got off topic, but if you are going to enchant your own bow, it's good to know how the enchantment will play out. I personally just use whatever the strongest bow in my inventory is and make sure to get the shot off while sneaking if at all possible in order to get the damage bonus.

[qizatch]

Originally Posted by UncleScratchy

I enchanted a daedric bow with Weakness to Poison with the hope that it would make my arrows poisoned with potions (damage health, damage strength, burden, etc.) be more effective. Unfortunately I have no way of knowing if it is working. Weakness to fire, frost, shock would probably be good if you could make/find enough of those arrows to go with it. Other than the Thief Den plug-in, does anyone know of a place to buy enchanted arrows, or can they only be scavanged?

You can use alchemy to give some nasty effects to your arrows. Create poison, click poison, click arrow, shoot.

Since weakness must be applied BEFORE the damage to be of any use, you can't do both in one go. As such, it might be better to give your bow some extra elemental damage instead of weakness. Sure, you're next shot won't do increased elemental damage, but since you were sneaking (of course you were) when you fired the first shot, that one will do N times as much damage, where N is dependent on your sneak skill. This multiplier goes not only for normal damage but also other damage types from what I've heard.

If you need to go into battle where you can't go back to sneaking after the first enemy is down, just take along another bow and give that one some weakness enchants, then switch bows after the first shot.