Hello again im back after fighting with my pc for a while I determined that it was my vcard so Im stuck with the onboard for now. Anyway.
I have been looking all over the place for a tutorial on animateing a bow or even just some advice would help here. Im not strong on animateing but I can do a little. My strong point is the modeling not the animateing but im learning.
Incidentaly I have chosen to atempt a remake of Turok: dinosaur hunter. not the new one as its fantastic but the old one. I have no plans on publishing it as its mostly just to learn to use the engine better and have fun with it.
Thanks in advance for any help possible for this.
This oughta work:
Model the bow, then model the string as a long skinny cylinder. Attach them so they are one object.
Create one bone system (with IK solver) starting at the center of the handle, out to one tip of the bow (where it meets the string) then to the center of the string. Make another bone system going out the other way, like the first. Link the two IK solvers at mid-string together so they move together. When you move them you should see the basic bow action taking place.
Skin them to the bow.
Get them to work with your character like this: Create a dummy helper object, move it to your character’s left hand bone and link it to that bone. Make another one at your character’s right middle finger bone, second from the tip, and link it.
Move your character into shooting position. Link the two bones at the bow’s handle to the left hand dummy, and link the IK solvers to the right middle finger dummy. Animate it and you’re good to go.
wow thats a bit more then i was looking for. this is for a fps so im only really makeing one hand visible. the one holding the handle. its cheep but it works. i was tinkering with it today and i think i may have something to go on. im testing it now to see if its what i want.
what im looking to do is have my players hand holding the bow and you just see the bow curve. in this case i have made it much more simplistic then originaly planed i like your idea though and i may just go for it cause it sounds fun. thank you for your help and when the bow is done ill post some shots up. right now its just basic shape with a few bones.
also another question. beeing as this is an fps and a remake of the original turok you really dont see your player what i was wondering is if i put an arms for things like pistols and what not can i attach things like the pistol and the bow maybe ammo clips and just animate the arms to move how i think they should and attach the weapons to them so they move and rotate with the hand? or would i have to do that in max and just have a whole bunch of differnt arm rigs. and then just attach them to my player that way?
I’m pretty sure you can attach the weapon to the hand inside of Unity, by making it a child with scripting. You can have a different animation for each weapon type. I’m more an artist guy, figuring that stuff out as I go, like you are. 
ok i know bones work with unity but how about biped?
im not really good with bones but i can manage biped abit. i find it more easy to work with.