Fletching ain’t such a ball ache to raise, grinding the skill ups actually results in useful items. If you’re going to use a trueshot you want a stash of arrows, right?!

The other thing to consider is you have a baseline success chance of 1/20, so 0.5>1-(0.95^14) tells us you are odds on to succeed on at least one combine if you farm enough pieces for 14 combines - even with 0 skill - are you feeling lucky?

I yolo'd mine at 115 skill and got lucky first try. Talked to a mid level ranger with 145 skill and said they have somewhere betwewn 10-15 fails and no bow yet. #justeverquestthings

One thing a lot of people dont realize about it is that trueshot isnt even magical, so it wont do damage to certain mobs. Its only worth getting if:
1. Nostalgia completion
2. You plan to quest Raincaller

If neither of those apply, buy the superior runed oak bow for 100p and call it a day.

For my green ranger, at L40 the Tainted Steel Bastard Sword (20/42) still outdamages Electrum Bladed Wakazashi (7/21) + Orc Impaler (7/23) but it's pretty close now. The TSBS is free if you have some 35+ friends or a half adequate guild, and it is only marginally inferior to the GZ (20/42 +6str vs 19/39) and the GZ sells for 400-ish

On green, for some reason with non-magical arrows and non-magical bows I could still hit wisps. Might not matter.

Have you ever hit for more than 1dmg without magic? Think that's a workaround for some problem or other that allows non-magic range attack to aggro/pull invuln mob.

I’m sure on live the only thing that mattered was whether the arrow was magic. That would turn the whole hit (both bow and arrow dmg) magic.

Yeah there is something odd with it. On live you needed magic arrows or it didn't work. I don't think the bow being magic mattered if I remember correctly. Trueshot will hit wisp and other undead. It's a min dmg it seems like 6. I don't know if that's calculation is based off the arrow damage or what. I'll have to look into that a bit more now that I have a raincaller.

That's my recollection as well. But it's easiest to just go with the p99 flow these days.

Can you clarify this for me?

TSBS 20/42: .476

GZ 18/39: .462

Lamentation Blade 25/54: .463

wouldn't the TSBS be the best option out of the 3?

Yes, 1-50 TSBS is higher dmg potential even without considering the stats. Use (bonus dmg + (wep dmg*2)) / delay once you have melee damage bonuses:

below 29 (assuming no dmg caps)
Tainted Steel Bastard Sword 0 20 42 0.952
Lamentation Blade 0 25 54 0.926
Gigantic Zweihander 0 18 39 0.923

at 34
Tainted Steel Bastard Sword 3 20 42 1.024
Lamentation Blade 3 25 54 0.981
Gigantic Zweihander 3 18 39 1.000

at 49
Tainted Steel Bastard Sword 8 20 42 1.143
Lamentation Blade 8 25 54 1.074
Gigantic Zweihander 8 18 39 1.128