One advantage that wooden bolts have over other bolts is the fact that if one sets fire to them and shoots someone, they will cause the affected area to melt, causing heavy bleeding beyond the obvious organ damage and torn skin. I have only managed to do this though by being a magma man and picking up bolts, thereby setting them on fire and shooting them at a naked elf very quickly. They do not, however, cause the corpse to ignite, nor the clothing that the corpse was wearing.
At least, that's what my research showed originally. I've just tried that again and it seems that burning bolts cannot be fired. Well, if the bolt was on fire, that was what would happen. I just tried by throwing the burning bolts but again, I was unsuccessful. I think it has to stick in the wound for it to cause the area around it to melt.
I do not have any data on fire bolt damage...
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To return to the point, even firing wooden bolts against unarmored targets grants You a 20% chance of lodging at most (and almost no chance against armored opponents). Thus, if lodging is a requirement for a wooden fire bolt to cause fire-based damage, then their usefulness is seriously limited.
I tested flaming arrows on elephants in the arena by creating a Fire Man with an iron bow and 100 mangrove (wood) arrows. I dropped the arrow stack and would only walk back to it to pick up 5 arrows at a time, lest they all burn up before being shot. Elephants tend to survive longer under arrow fire, so I found the following:
- Regular arrow hits appear to ignore the flaming state of the arrow.
- Lodged arrow hits will transfer temperature and flaming status to and from the arrow and victim creature.
- If you ignite the victim creature prior to its death, the corpse will be on fire and burn away.
I'd suggest that some sort of minecart shotgun full of unstacked wooden bolts/arrows, which are set on fire during the launch sequence, would be a devastating antipersonnel weapon.
