There’s been a lot of talk about the ornate bow, and its ability to combo with Contraband, Venturer, and various other ways to turn it into an uzi. Since we’re in chapter 2, it won’t be that simple this time, but I like this weapon… For Rita or Wendy. The other Survivor gun (the Winchester 52) also costs three, but survivors don't have much way to reload it. This, if you have the spare actions, deals with two annoying foes: Three Health enemies and aloof ones. And since we have Daniel Jameson now, the odds of missing with the bow (and causing yourself two actions) are far lower than before.

This is a methodical weapon that rewards evasion. You're going to be laying down the hurt, slowly.

One point I've seen people make in favor of Longbow is that it's "good against Aloof enemies." Not true for most of them. In most cases, when you want to deal with an Aloof enemy, you spend one action to engage it, and one action to bop it with whatever random weapon you have (or even your bare hands, for birds or many random cultist-types). With the Longbow, you spend one action shooting the enemy and one action reloading. Still two actions spent. For most aloof enemies, the "ignores the aloof keyword" text isn't making this good against Aloof enemies, it's making it not a total disaster. Where Longbow is actually good is when it's an Aloof enemy with exactly 3 hp, AND your alternative weapon deals 2 damage - now you're talking about 2 actions for Longbow vs 3 actions otherwise. There are a couple campaigns with a decent number of 3 HP Aloof enemies, but generally Aloof enemies have only 1 or 2 HP, so Longbow isn't actually gaining you any significant value relative to other ways you could be dealing with that enemy.