With the new update 16.30, the “Unstable Bow” arrived in Fortnite, which will likely cause a lot of damage in the hands of professionals. Well, the weapon will probably do that in the hands of MeinMMO author Max Handwerk too – but unfortunately, it will be on him.
What kind of weapon is this? In the current Fortnite season, bows play a crucial role. Instead of shooting each other with snipers, long-range shooters have to rely on the classic Robin Hood variant. The prehistoric and mechanical variants of the bows can be enhanced through crafting, allowing for the creation of four strong alternative bows.
- You can create a fire bow that quickly burns down wooden walls.
- The stink bow releases a cloud of poison.
- Another type of bow fires small grenades.
- And then there’s the shockwave bow, which throws players around.
With the latest update, the new “Unstable Bow” was introduced, which can be purchased as an exotic weapon from Rebirth Raven for 500 gold bars. This bow has all the mentioned abilities combined and randomly switches modes – every time you shoot.
This means that while the first shot might fire a flaming arrow, the next shot could release a poison arrow. This is also reflected in the weapon description, which says: “This bow fires…something! ¯_(ツ)_/¯”. Yes, including the shrugging colleague at the end.
I’m sure many players in Fortnite will be able to utilize this versatile bow profitably. After all, you can rely on the full arsenal of arrows without cluttering your inventory with bows. As for me, I will just make sure to put a – watch out – bow around the weapon for safety.
New Bow is strong, but also a gamble
This is what makes the new bow strong: The new weapon is really quite powerful. The bow combines the versatile variants of previous options into a single weapon. This means: You can essentially have a fire, bomb, poison, and shockwave bow at the same time without using up four inventory slots.
This brings considerable advantages, especially against builders, as one can deal significant damage with fire and poison. The bomb bow does good damage. And with the shockwave, you can either escape the storm or send the opponent into it. All quite useful. However, the bow has a crucial weakness.
Here’s the catch: You can’t freely choose which of the special arrows the bow fires. The different variants rotate randomly. This significantly diminishes the tactical advantages.
While you’re likely never truly wrong with the bow, no matter which arrow is fired, you shouldn’t fully expect the enemy structure to go up in flames when using the “Unstable Bow” instead of a flame bow.
You can see which arrow will fly next by looking at the arrow when you shoot, and there is also a small display beneath the ammunition. But keeping an eye on that during wild fights is really tricky. This commotion can cost you crucial seconds. And when you get nervous, you might even endanger your own health bar.
That’s my problem: I’m actually a big fan of the bows in Fortnite. I like the versatility and precision of the weapons, which can sometimes be used with the right arrow to bring down enemy structures. This is helpful when you can’t rely on the incredible building skills that some players stroll through the game with.
Because I like the weapons so much, I have already upgraded two or three in my inventory, just to have the various arrows at hand. The unstable bow could even take over this task for me. The downside is: The stress in direct duels gets in my way.
In the heat of the battle, I often find myself grabbing the wrong bow. I wanted to shoot a fire arrow, but ended up firing a grenade arrow instead. That didn’t have the desired effect, leading me to switch weapons. In all the frenzy, I again didn’t grab the fire bow, but the poison bow – and fired so inaccurately that I shot the stink cloud right into my own structure instead of taking out the opponent as planned. With the poison cloud, I then turned my own cover into a deadly zone – that wasn’t the intention.
Therefore, I’d rather not take the unstable bow on the journey to the storm center. Given my luck, I probably won’t shoot the arrow I actually need in 90% of the cases. It’s already becoming clear that in all that chaos, I might once again shoot myself in the knee.
However, I am sure that better players will enjoy the weapon and deal more damage to their opponents than to themselves. Especially players who manage to stay calm under pressure in Fortnite could get an unpredictable weapon here. By the way, there’s another special bow in Fortnite – the Grappler Bow from Lara Croft.
