question about bows in diablo 1

[weakwarrior]

That said, Massive Swift does the most damage PER unit of time, but not the most raw damage overall. Windforce doesn't do the most raw dmg either, contrary to popular belief, a Merciless Burning or Thunder LWB can exceed it (figures are for a level 50 rogue wearing Royal Circlet, perfect stars armor, and perfect zodiac jewelry, bows are all LWB...for a rogue wearing Gotter, add 5 pts dmg at both ends):

Emerald Bow of the Heavens: 125-138
Massive Bow of Swiftness: 118-145
Windforce: 119-158
Merciless Burning: 119-170 (includes the 1-16 fire dmg, which isnt shown on the char screen)
Merciless Thunder: 119-174 (1-20, though Burning actually has a higher dmg potential because of the elemental bug, which is multiplied up to 9 x on Burning bows, only 7 x for Thunder)

Merciless elemental bows are truly lethal, ive killed a lvl 50 warrior with 600 hp (with max resists and full life globe) with ONE arrow before in duels, using my Merc Burning. Pretty rare for this to occur, but its possible.

To nitpick: When comparing a Merciless Burning/Thunder, note that you assume the target has no resistances. This isn't wrong. But if you assume full resists then a Merciless Burning does 118-158 and the Merciless Thunder does 118-159--I just back calculated from your numbers, but I trust your numbers are good. It's only a minor difference, but the comparison with Windforce is slightly affected (Merciless Burning is slightly weaker and Merciless Thunder ties). What does a Savage LWB Heavens do?

Of course, with the elemental bug things are far different.