I'm GMing for a group where everyone (including myself) is entirely new to Pathfinder. We had our session 0 recently followed by a quick practice combat. The thing I noticed from that, plus a little theory crafting of building a low level character myself, is that people using ranged combat felt very underwhelming compared to melee weapon users.
- They couldn't add any modifier to damage
- They had far fewer feats upgrading them (particularly compared to dual wielders)
- They had fewer "third action" options
- Less ability to help out allies with things like flanking
- Can't opportunity attack
Sure, for all that they have the advantage of being safer from getting damaged. But it didn't really feel like a worthwhile trade-off. Does this get better as you level up? Is it just something caused by inexperience? What options can/should you take to make ranged combat feel more interesting and valuable?
For context, my party had a rogue and a ranged fighter as ranged users, as well as a barbarian and a magus in melee, and a druid and sorcerer as casters.
So in the time since writing that question I've been reading and watching everything I can about how this should work. And apparently the official ruling is that you can lean out of cover (like lean around a corner) to shoot as an action, but pop back behind cover for free. That'd be fine if you only want the protection of being behind cover. But if you also want the bonus from them being off-guard, it'd be 3 actions: one to Hide, one to lean out, and one to attack. Pretty steep, but could be worth it in the right circumstances I guess.