Minecraft Forums

Just like my last two suggestions, this one was originally written in the Minecraft Abnormals Discord server.

Introduction:

Back in the ancient days of Beta, the bow was a pretty different weapon. It quickly fired weak arrows without any need for recharging, much more like a machine gun than any reasonable depiction of a bow. While the current mechanics are actually a major upgrade, that doesn't mean there's no niche for a ranged rapid-fire weapon in the game.

This suggestion, obviously, does just that: it consists of a repeating crossbow (henceforth referred to as just "Repeater") inspired by historical Chinese repeating crossbows that combines the old Beta Bow's mechanics with a brand new one revolving it's integral magazine in order to more adequately balance it for the modern game.

Obtaining:

The Repeater's crafting recipe is simple: it's essentially the Crossbow's recipe, but the iron ingot is replaced by a Wooden Plank. This, in effect, drives the weapon's overall cheap character.

It doesn't use Arrows, but it's own unique ammo. This ammo is the Bunch of Bolts. These bunches are each crafted with two sticks and a flint piece similarly to a "flint shovel". This produces four Bunches. They stack to 64.

Moreover, Fletchers can sell both the Repeater and Bunches of Bolts.

Finally, it's worth noting that Bunches of Bolts can be tipped just like Arrows, though both harming and healing effects are nerfed. Otherwise, this makes the Repeater a much more efficient weapon at inflicting potion effects.

Mechanics:

The Repeater's stats are very similar to those of a Beta Bow: It fires 4 times per second (ideally playing a firing animation), dealing 4 damage per shot, and it has a range of 15 blocks fired parallel to a flat plane. The only change is that it's somewhat less accurate and inflicts less knockback

The Repeater has a durability of 400 shots. Just like the original Beta Bow, it is automatically fired by holding down the right mouse button, but, unlike the original, quickly tapping the mouse button does NOT increase firing speed.

What sets it apart from being a reskinned Beta Bow, however, is the need to actually feed a fixed magazine: Before firing, the Repeating Crossbow must be loaded with a Bunch of Bolts. This takes 2 seconds to do. Each Bunch is worth 8 shots.

Bolts are fragile and break upon hitting a block, so they cannot be reused. Loading a Bunch of Bolts into a Dispenser causes it to quickly fire them in a burst.

Enchantments:

The Repeater has both the universal enchantments, and the following unique ones:

1. Capacity (I-V): Adds 1 extra bolt to the magazine capacity per level. Bunches still top up the magazine.

2. Burst(I): Enemies killed with bolts stuck to them have them shoot out in a radius. Not compatible with Pincushion.

3. Pincusion(I-III): Mobs that have 4 bolts stuck to them in quick sucession take extra damage (1 per level each) as the bolts dig further into them and break (think the Halo needler except it's not an explosion). Bolts deal their damage as separate ticks affected separately by armor. Incompatible with Burst.

Mobs:

The Player isn't the sole user of Repeaters, as mobs can also use them. They're affected by the same mechanics as the player but have infinite Bunches.

The mobs that may wield Repeaters are:

Skeletons have a chance to use them instead of bows. This increases with regional difficulty and are more common in the Deepslate layer.

Piglins sometimes wield them instead of Crossbows.

Pillagers have a chance to spawn with Repeaters instead of crossbows in outposts and patrols, but not raids.

Full support. Would like to add that bolts and repeaters should require fletching tables to produce.
I would prefer to name the new bow type 'quickbow' to not confuse it with redstone repeaters.

Also, the discords in your profile are invalid invites. Jsyk

Thanks for reminding me to get rid of those links.

As for changing the name, I think "Rapid Crossbow" would be better, as that is also the name of a pretty similar item from Minecraft: Dungeons.