User blog:Glflegolas/The mod's weapons and their damage per minute

A lot of people have been speculating about the best ranged weapon in the game, and therefore I've been checking the damage and the charging time of various ranged weapons, and here are the results I came up with in hitpoints per minute. For the purposes of these calculations, I used that weapon's average damage per shot. Note that most of these numbers are theoretical; for many throwing weapons, your actual DPM will be limited by how fast you can switch hotbar slots.

Plates & Chestnuts
Both of these weapons do 1 HP per hit. Since you can throw up to 240 of these per minute, this means that your DPM comes to 240.

Slings
Although the sling has low damage per shot, it has a very high RPM, and thus its DPM comes to 360.

Crossbows
Despite their high damage per shot, these weapons have a low RPM of around 16, which means that their DPM isn't nearly as high as you might think:
 * Bronze: 232
 * Iron: 240
 * Uruk: 272
 * Mithril: 296

Spears
Since all spears have a charge time of around 20 ticks (I assume), their RPM comes to around 60.
 * Bronze: 690
 * Iron: 780
 * All spears that deal 5.5 HP of melee damage (Gondorian, Rohirric, Mordor, etc.): 780
 * All spears that deal 6 HP of melee damage (Black Uruk, Uruk, Utumno, High Elven, etc.): 930
 * Utumno: 990
 * Mithril: 1,230

Bows
When it comes to bows, the Free Peoples definitely have the advantage:
 * Black Uruk: 480
 * Mallorn: 540
 * Harad: 600
 * Orc: 630
 * Rohirric: 630
 * Utumno: 720
 * Mirkwood: 771.4
 * Gondorian: 810
 * Galadhrim/High Elven: 1,237.5

Throwing axes
With their high RPM (in theory, up to 240), these weapons feature the greatest DPM of any ranged weapon in the mod.
 * Bronze: 1,320
 * Iron: 1,440
 * Dwarven/Blue Dwarven: 1,680

Conclusion
Judged solely by the theoretical damage dealt per minute, throwing axes are unbeaten. However, it is almost impossible for a player to deal this much damage in a minute as they could never refill their hotbar fast enough to achieve this high DPM. In actual fact, once reloading is taken into account, the best ranged weapons are probably the Galadhrim and High Elven bows, although the Gondorian bow is up there too.

Although crossbows have a fairly low DPM (lower than that of a sling), their advantage is that they can be fired instantly once locked and loaded. Of all the weapons that can be shot instantly, they deal the most damage per shot, and thus are a great way to weaken your opponent before closing in for the kill using other weapons.

This review also proves that plates and conkers (especially conkers, as they can be recovered) can be formidable weapons.

In the end, good combat strategies and adequate supplies of ammunition are the most important factor dictating whether of not you will win a fight.