Also, this secondary part might not be considered a bug, but you can't fire arrows under any circumstances with the crystal bow. So, having arrows in the offhand might fire them with the crystal bow?

crystal bow does not ammo check at all, it only searches for mana and fires normal arrows.

It should be able to fire normal arrows too, though, since it is a bow.

it intentionally did not check for arrows before and I believe that's by design so it's not changing

for any bow, I mean.

not sure what you're getting at then :P

Even just checking the offhand first would be good since it allows you to load arrows manually, but otherwise fire mana-arrows.

When the crystal bow didn't check, there were no arrows, at all, that mattered, for any bow. So no reason to check.

That's because arrows didn't matter before.

they still don't, the crystal bow fires mana bolts basically

wat are you even saying?

I'm saying that the crystal bow cannot fire normal arrows, and never could :P
It's not a normal bow, it doesn't even have a bowstring.
It shoots "mana bolts" that just happen to look like arrows bc code reuse :P

Now, arrows matter a lot, so there is a reason to implement a minor check.

definitely a bowstring. in the recipe, at least. https://github.com/williewillus/Botania/blob/MC19/src/main/java/vazkii/botania/common/crafting/ModCraftingRecipes.java#L1685-L1690

it can shoot mana bolts, but why not be able to fire other arrows if you 'load them manually' (have them in the offhand) into the bow?

I think he's referring to potion arrows, where it would be rather inconvenient to have a crystal bow for normal arrows and another secondary bow for potion arrows.

exactly. (Also natural pledge adds a custom arrow)

Choosing ammo type could be as easy as putting the arrow into your offhand, since that's a thing in vanilla

The point of the crystal bow is to not carry ammunition around,
I do want to let it fire alternate arrows, but that's going to involve figuring out how to choose ammo type, and also appropriate mana prices for everything

yeah, but it's impossible to make appropriate mana costs for all contingencies.

That still involves having ammo :P

I'll probably let it fire actual arrows..

still would like a way to only need mana for other arrows though

Perhaps craft the bow together with the potion/tipped arrow to set the type, and reset it with a water bottle or plain arrow.

Should probably move this somewhere else too.

or maybe... BREW ARROWS!