Right now I ahve slightly deviated from what I wanted to do origially:

At clvl almost 9 ;) and guildless I sport:

bow 34%,
dex 40 (34 + 1 from handshake +5 Bosper ring) - the 1 point was the diffrence between being and not being ableto pickpocket some folks.

sneaking, stealing, pickpocketing
skinning

In my personal subjective feel there is a difference between bow 10% and bow 34% - I can see it when fighting mobs - better range and accuray.

Hunter Bow equipped - dmg 35, dex required 30.

1H at the base 10% + 5% from a dex based sword and waiting to equip Master Sword.

Combat: a lot of running around ;) and looking for strategic places up high for the bow to do its job.

Sentennza and his other mates were easy - I would provoke them, run to the fieldriders cave and climbed it, reduced mercs' hp bar to a sliver (they are uable to climb apparently) and finish them off with aa sword - one successful hit was enough to do the job. It direct malee fight i did not stand a chance :( But sentenza did take a lot of arrows, approx 60 - 70 ;)

Now I am planing to raise the dex to 64 and proceed with killing all mobs and I can see there is still a hefty amount of exp to gain in Ch1.

The only thing that bothers me is the guild alignment - I might be joining Mercs after all - I like the farm, I like their attitude, I like their armours way better then Paladins...

But otoh Paladins do get some advantage - 10 dex amulet in Ch2 instead later on and I read they get +20 dex from praying to Inos instead of just 10 so.... but fro the lore point of view the Paldins really get on my nerves ;)

Just to remind you - don't forget to use the "learn at X9" trick if you want to train faster.

What you're describing is the second combat path of archer build - trying to fight with bows from the beginning. My experience says that it's a bit harder than going 1H first (because of the "lot of running around and looking for strategic places up high"), but - your choice. :P
In my playthroughs, at lvl9 I would be just about ready to equip the Master Sword (the game gets quite a bit easier after that).

AFAIK, you cannot get more than 10 DEX from praying, from any guild. At least not in G2A.

I usually finish Chapter 1 at lvl ~17-18, so yes, there is still a lot more things to do.

17 - 18 - that's high. Nice.

I just wanted to see if I can pull it off with bow from the very beginning - it is hard but not holpless :p With bow at 34% it became considerably easier as I went from plain 10 to 34 in one go .

I just read about +20 dex for paladins only on the internet. But I wll not see it for myself as most probably I will be joining mercs after all.

And this x9 trick - yes I did remember about it - thanks :) it does save a few LP.

And sad thing - in NotR permanent dex potion gives +3 not +5 :( well, I wll have to live with it.

I just remembered i killed unnamed merc on onars farm. He was just named 'mercenary' . Nobody saw me. Nobody made any comments about it - i advanced a lot since then.

And then i also remembered vatras looked really down on killing innocent people and he would scold you and say something about how bad you are...

So i went to vatras and he didnt scold me neither did he make any comments about it.

Will this killing that merc have any negative repercussion for gameplay - at onar farm all was ok with everybody.

Btw he is the only nonbandit human i killed and nobody saw me killing him.

About Vatras (all of this happens at the soonest in Chapter 5):

If you've killed less than three "normal" people, Vatras doesn't care and doesn't say anything.
If you've killed between three and six NPCs, Vatras will give you a warning.
If you've killed seven and more NPCs, Vatras will scold you. You can either tell him "Bite me" or apologize. If you apologize, he accepts the apology; if not, he gets pissed off (literally, the condition is called VatrasPissedOffForever) and won't talk with you anymore.
If you've apologized and killed someone else since then, he gets pissed off, too.

TL;DR - one NPC doesn't matter.

Cool. Thank you. I shall be more careful.

Brw, where can i buy empty bottle flasks for elixirs?

Canthar, Constantino, Ignaz, Cronos and Sagitta should have 5-10 each in Chapter 1. Technically, Samuel and Lucia have some too, but they're in Jharkendar.

Hmm...I need to check out my inventory one more time as I believe Constantino and Ignaz did not have any - I might have bought them...*scratch head*

What would be the best time to start the NotR add-in world? Ch1? Im clvl 10 atm.

You can't start go to Jharkendar in Chapter 1. Vatras is not going to give you the letter to Saturas before you speak with Hagen, and Saturas won't give you the key to the portal. On the other hand, you won't be able to repair the Eye of Innos at the end of Chapter 3 until you finish the NotR storyline, because Vatras will refuse to leave town until his replacement is back.

Personally, I think that finishing Jharkendar before encountering Seekers in Chapter 3 is easier than the other way round, so I usually go Jharkendar before VoM, but you can do either.

Lvl10 is way too little to finish Chapter 1. If you don't level up to at least lvl15-16 (lvl18 being optimal, but I saw people having even lvl20) before going to Chapter 2, you may end up having quite a bit of trouble later in the game, most notably in Chapter 3 when the Seekers are introduced (even though this is more noticeable for melee-only characters).

Thx for the tips !

Im clvl 12 and still plenty of exp 2 b gained so 15 - 16 looks pretty attainable :)

Yes, I know about that. Well, more precisely, they sometimes can fight back, but their spells will be cast behind you. :D
Inexperienced players in particular tend to make mistakes in this strategy, though, and in that case you always have to be prepared for a hit or two. And that's when your character level can become agonizingly noticeable.

But this topic is mainly about an archer build, so I didn't consider melee tips that important. And even if you manage to find a good strategy for Seekers, you still have to think about orcs in Chapter 4. I read how many people with low levels said "I can't kill them all now, I'm too weak" in Chapter 2, and then had real trouble getting through VoM in Chapter 4, so I decided to put emphasis on good character build early in the game so the player won't have problems later in the game.

Do u happen to know where i can find Tandor in Ch1 to buy the ashbow?

Atm im guildless clvl 15. Bow 34 and dex 60. Master sword + composite bow. 32 LP unspent. What to do with them now?

All dex? Or maybe languages? Or dex potion from Sagitta for 20 lp?

Later i guess 1h to 34% will be easy with 10 bonus from sword.

Tandor is a paladin at the castle in VoM, so you can't (legally).

Do you plan to learn STR at all? I would spend levels 11-21 learning STR and 1H, so if you skip these, you're ~110LP ahead of me. The next stop for me would be languages, some hunting trophies (especially for a mercenary), bows (to ~60-70), alchemy and DEX.

So right now I'd advise 1H (at least to 34%) and languages. It's way too soon for brewing and drinking DEX potions.

Ch2 - ok :( the webpage says its ch1 :( he sells a nice ash bow with dex req of 80. It would be nice in between composite and long bow.

I thought of skilling 1h only without LP - 10% from master sword, 2% from wulfgar + stone tablets. Only with these i can easily reach 30% .

Str - i was thinking of only raising it without LP too.

OR: 2nd option im considering is skilling 1h and str only to the point when it cost 1 lp so up to 34% and THEN bonuses.

I just raised my dex to 64%. I had 14lp left + just got 1lp from daron so i dont know - languages tier 1 & 2 or 1h / str.