Battlefield 3 crossbows to have standard, scanner, sniper and explosive bolts

Crossbows are coming to Battlefield 3 in the next expansion, Aftermath. A new post on the Battlefield blog outlines the strengths and weaknesses of the new weapon, which has the power to both kill silently and blow holes in walls thanks to multiple bolts ammo types.

DICE say that the crossbow is designed to be flexible rather than powerful. "The four different bolts and the crossbow become a jack of all trades solution suitable for any class," say DICE While none of the available bolts are as powerful as the standard weapons they mimic (a genuine sniper rifle will always be more powerful than a sniper bolt, for example), the ability to switch bolt types on the fly means any class can adapt to any situation."

If you're a premium member, you can log into Battlelog to see a new two minute video showing all four bolts in action. There's a sequence where the crossbow is used to pepper a chopper with explosive charges, eventually bringing it down. The standard and balanced bolts are almost silent, but will suffer from relatively severe bullet drop. You'll have to reload between every shot, of course.

Aftermath will be with Premium members on December 4 and released to standard players on December 18.

TOPICS

Part of the UK team, Tom was with PC Gamer at the very beginning of the website's launch—first as a news writer, and then as online editor until his departure in 2020. His specialties are strategy games, action RPGs, hack ‘n slash games, digital card games… basically anything that he can fit on a hard drive. His final boss form is Deckard Cain.