Certainly the easiest way to do it, although Wulf's comments about firing at a ^10 Gargoyle may have some validity...
As a straightforward mechanic, I don't see why Edges should not apply to loans, - they can make the loan more effective in the same way that an edge on a weapon makes a blow more effective, an edge on a Social skill makes your argument more effective, and an edge on Climb means you get further up the wall for the same effort. You bid, and roll against a score of 3, and if you are succesful, your ^2 comes in to play , your friend gets 5AP, and (if necessary) you loose 3. I suspect that he would also have to loose 5 if you failed, however (you can't turn the edge off...) unless the edge was due to the nature of the opponents...
The problem is that an edge is easier to get than an augmentation, because in a normal contest, it is slightly less useful (or at least slightly more risky - a +1 on the skill generates 1 additional AP, and increases your chance of success on every roll, wheras a ^1 edge only comes in to play when you actually succeed...) - when Lending AP's, however, the Edge would be much more powerful, since you could bid lower for the same effect , and there isn't (generally) an opponent reducing your AP total as well...
>
> I think that you cannot loan APs for the same contest twice. I
> would go so far saying that the character loaning is busy "firing
> arrows" until the melee contest is over. Since HW does not use a
> detailed timescale this would be no problem at all.
Well I certainly think you can continue to lend AP's until your own pool is exhausted, the question is, can you reset your pool if the contest is still continuing at this stage, and if so, how? The "Final Action" suggestion has some merit, but it is hard enough to increasae your AP's when competing against someone, let alone when trying to give them away to someone else (I suppose your mate would have to lend you some back, but that seems like an exercise in futility...)
Although there is no detailed timescale, I would still sort of expect each players activities to take about the same length of time (or at least "Amount of focus") - If only to avoid player boredom. As I said, this is why I like the "Lending AP" model for supporting fire - Your best chance is to loan a small amount of your available points each time for the length of the contest, keeping the archer involved throughout the scene, rather thanmaking a single roll at the start and then either passively watching, or continually interrupting the combat to make unrelated actions ...
> Even if some enemy decides to disturb the firing character while
> the melee still goes on
In this case, I think the Firer would be left defending with whatever AP's he had left at that point, though obviously he could switch to an alternative skill rather than ranged combat (or improvise "Close Combat (smack with bow) attack!)
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