I'm sure someone has figured it out before, but maybe this could be added to the list.

I find this quite useful to kite without the ranger perk since I find it hard to do The Half-Draw.

The Half-Bash

1. Shoot someone until they get within melee.

2. Bash their face.

3. Once the bash connect (the enemy staggered, the bashing hand still extended), don't wait for the bash animation to finish, but directly draw another arrow while backpedalling

Note: Normally you cannot move backward until the bash animation finished, but if you draw another arrow, it will cancel the bash animation allowing you to move backward even though at a reduced pace

4. You will get to shot the one arrow before looping back to step 2, but usually I'm able to do a full draw shot instead of half draw with this technique.

The Reload cancelling trick might be worth mentioning. Its an invaluable technique especially for cross bow users.

@Curse You talking about putting your crossbow away and whippin it out just after firing a shot so you skip the reload animation? @Gwaann That's how I typically kite too mixing in the Double Shot as well. It wouldn't hurt to add some general kiting tips in and that tidbit about canceling your bash animation. Will edit soon. Still haven't updated it since the last few tips.

You're not actually sheathing and redrawing your weapon. As soon as you fire you can skip the entire road animation by tapping the sheath and fire button. Doing that immediately brings your character to the rest position, ready to shoot again. Properly executed, a cross bow can essentially stun lock an enemy.

On yeah, it's already mentioned in the Double Shot tech which is essentially what it is but repeated continually and quite effectively. Surprised nobody has used it in a build yet. It is super OP but really fun too! You play PC right Curse? And you can still get all this stuff to work?

Heya Alastor. First I'd like to thank you for this comprehensive list of tips and tricks as it completely helped the formation of a future build. (Sadly I only has phone and therefore can't really post a build worth anything. Currently I am looking towards getting in a collab to post it which would A: get it posted and B: offer another builder's perspective so it can be refined as they see it might need). Regardless, I wanted to drop a tip I found while building the character. By using necrovamp for power shot and Force Without Effort you can effectively stagger dragons. Yes you read that correctly. Now imagine abusing that mechanic with the double shot technique to stagger-lock the beasties.

Hey, no problem! Glad you're enjoying the techs. I hope to see that build get posted :)

That sounds like some pretty effective staggering. You've tested this yourself and it works 100% of the time or most of the time? I'll have to fiddle with it myself

100% of the time that I have utilized this combo. The only thing is the game still runs off of the 62.5% chance to stagger unless you use crossbow which is closer to 80% chance to stagger. I did not check but it might be possible to use a crossbow to knock smaller creatures flat on their backs with the 30% chance of a dual proc.

That crossbow stagger is dirty! I wanted to make a crossbow-based build a long time ago but never got around to it. Have you tried the double shot with the crossbow? It's too good really

Yes sir, and I have a little gem for you on that one. By using steady hand you can effectively slow time to make double shot with crossbows a breeze as your shot is in fact affected by an inverted axis relative to your hand position when it you finish the button combo. Given you can slow time you can keep those hands where you want em.