Originally posted by Fluffy Bucketless Pocket Dragon:

My best arrows are iron, it took way too long to be practical, partially because I missed >50% of the time. I am going to need to get better. But I do appreciate the strategies, which I'll try once I get over that embarrassment,

Don't bother making iron arrows like ever, iron is too important of a ressource to produce them, using the ones you find in a chest is ok, i'd recommend you get to the mountains before farming sea serpents, just to mine obsidian to make obsidian arrows or better freeze arrows but you need to farm drakes flying around there and get their freeze glands. Though if you do manage to drag the serpents with a harpoon on land you just need to beat them up with any weapon at hand really.