What is the point of Thrower's Bandolier?

Question

Thrower's Bandolier is a new item from Treasure Vault. It solves a set of problem that is in my opinion better solved by a Returning Rune:
You do not want to throw un-runed weapons, but it would be too expensive to put expensive fundamental and property runes on many weapons, as they are lost after 1 attack.

Here are the differences:

• Price
  • Returning: 55 gp
  • Bandolier: 60 gp + the individual price of the mundane items, but contains +1 potency rune (worth 35 gp)
• Actions
  • Returning: 0, as after the attack you have the weapon in your hand again
  • Bandolier: 1, as you have to retreive a new one to be thrown (you can mitigate this by Quick Draw)

So by paying a feat (which for most classes will take a multiclass feat too, through Duelist), you can make a Thrower's Bandolier as good as Returning. Why would I do that?

Answer 1

Thrower's Bandolier can be etched with Runes

Your most-recently drawn weapon from the Bandolier has the runes etched into the Bandolier. This means that you can put Returning (and whatever other Runes you want) on the Bandolier, draw the weapon once, and have the most useful weapon for the encounter. The Bandolier can hold 2 Bulk of weapons, so up to 20 Light or a One Bulk and 10 Light. For that you could have:

• Cold Iron
• Silver
• Adamantine
• Slashing
• Piercing
• Bludgeoning
• Deadly
• Ranged Trip
• Tethered/Grapple
• Disarm
• Nonlethal

And that's if one is a full Bulk weapon. If they're all light, you still have 9 more slots for different permutations of special materials with the other damage types/traits.

This is all in addition to its initial value of giving non-Returning thrown builds an avenue to work.

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Ultimately, the long-term value of having a Thrower's Bandolier is in cost-savings. Instead of having a bunch (or even a couple) of weak but circumstantial weapons, you have one strong weapon that could be whatever you need.

The extra effects the bandolier offers come at a cost of only 25g over their initial weapon runes (plus the Investment slot), and enable you to have Resistance-piercing/Weakness-tapping damage for the price of the precious material weapon itself. It's no longer a question of 'is it worth it to put +2 on this cold iron dagger for fey' and now is just 'guess I'm getting a few less consumables, but I'll be ready for everything'.

Answer 2

Flexibility

Just like Doubling Rings, you can mix what weapons the runes apply to.
You can throw a Trident first for 1d8 damage, then an agile weapon, like Light Hammer. A Bola if you do not want to kill, or when you fight a Skeleton (they are resistant to slashing and piercing).

Ranged Trip

Returning retreives the weapon only after a Strike, which a Trip attempt is not. So if you plan on tripping from a distance, you will need a Thrower's Bandolier.

One more rune

The Thrower's Bandolier + Quick Draw does mostly the same thing (if the enemy has not special weaknesses, like most) as a Returning rune. The first does not cost a rune however. This does not matter much on level 3, because there are no great runes for thrown weapons beside Returning below level 8. Then you could get an elemental damage rune, and you have more feats to affor Quick Draw.

Free Hand

With Thrower's Bandolier and Shurikens or Quick Draw, you can have a hand free. A Returning weapon will come back to your hand, occupying it.
However, other than Thaumaturges it is hard to imagine a throwing builds that cannot afford a hand that is always occupied.

Maneuvers

@Ifusaso raises a good point in the comments, Quick Draw being its own action, it is impossible to do anything but a basic Strike with it.
Most activities like Intimidating Strike and Grab do not work with throwing anyway, but Hunter's Aim or Finishers (with Flying Blade) would. Quick Draw blocks these.

Conclusion

Without Quick Draw, the Thrower's Bandolier is clearly behind in my opinion, unless you have too many actions to burn.

You have to decide if flexibility is worth more than a feat to you. Most likely until level 7 you are better off with Returning, and at level 8¹ you should switch to a Bandolier + Quick Draw (probably easiest from Duelist). Unless you rely on special maneuvers, in which case Returning remains the better option.

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1. Or level 9, you might want to buy a Resilient rune first

Answer 3

Number of property runes weapon can hold is limited by it's potency rune. So, by etching a Returning rune - you expend one of potential slots for other enhancements - and aside from returning weapon into your hand, Returning rune does not contribute to your damage potential.

Bandolier imbues weapons inside with runes etched on it, which allows you to have a number of enchanted throwing weapons.

So, bandolier has less attack speed, but potentially more effects on-hit.