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Re: Crossbows vs. Longbows
@endoperez and rdonj: Ah I see. Well at least I know I wasn't completely crazy and imagined the whole thing with the cave people.
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All medieval armies canvassed among their healthy citizens for soldiers and martial practice throughout their life was normal for multiple nations and so much of training is "free." This was the advantage of having troops bring their own weapons after all. When you have to start paying them yourself is when the costs rise up. @Kamamura: Crossbows can do that too. Again there is no indirect specialty of the bow. There are helmets recovered from Wisby penetrated by bolts that came down I believe. |
Re: Crossbows vs. Longbows
I think the point Kamamura is trying to make was that wasting crossmen men to simply saturate a field indirectly is pointless. Where the longbow is more easily fielded (think AK-47's), the crossbow due to it's higher cost and greater precision fire seems to be more like a sniper rifle.
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Re: Crossbows vs. Longbows
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And I am somewhat doubtful that an archer would not know how his next shot would behave. That seems unlikely to me. While it is true that back then they didn't have the same kind of quality control that we did I am not so sure that some small imperfections in the crafting of the bow would have such a drastic effect on its accuracy. A bow made by some random peasant who's never made a bow before, sure, I'll agree it's probably not going to come out very well. But a bow made by someone who knows what they're doing, that's a bit different of a story. Besides, having used the bow for hours and hours of practice you would learn if your bow maybe shoots a bit to the left, or a bit high, etc. You would learn how to compensate for any small degree of imperfection. Or you would use the bow for firewood if it just can't shoot straight. Although really, I don't think there's a whole lot that can go terribly wrong in the making of the bow itself... it would seem to me that their biggest problem hundreds of years ago would be in the bowstring. Quote:
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Re: Crossbows vs. Longbows
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I will agree, though, that goods mass produced for the military were likely to be substandard. As noted elsewhere, though, it may well be the case that battlefield longbow use was more about hitting an area reliably than about precision targetting of individuals. In which case the point is more or less moot. Quote:
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Please note: the guy you're quoting specified that the costs he mentioned weren't financial but the availability of trained men and speed of bow manufacture. Quote:
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Re: Crossbows vs. Longbows
heh you ask me we have lost plenty of knowledge from past ages in all aspects of art, construction and science and skill and craftsmanship has gone down.
Mass production has seen to that. Scientific undertanding of a subject does not = practical ability. And there are plenty of things that we cannot match the quality of today. from violins to swords to construction techniques. Architecture is probably the most striking example though. |
Re: Crossbows vs. Longbows
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The "bow" part of the weapon is called a stock. And no, you don't need any particular bowyer skill. I think you have *no* general idea of the level of complexity that societies of the time were capable of generating. For example, looms of the times had up to ***10,000*** moving parts. To think that societies couldn't crank out crossbows with 10-24 parts cheaply is .. simply laughable. The reason looms were successful is the same reason that crossbows were successful. Large amounts of standardized parts could be cranked out, and assembled, quickly and cheaply. And yes, compared to knights, sappers, artillerymen, crossbowmen *were* cheap. Crossbowmen had essentially no need to train. These troops were often raised in mere weeks, vs. the years required to gain excellence with the longbow. Because they had virtually no training - they were easier to raise, deployable from virtually any population. And when killed they were easily replaceable. |
Re: Crossbows vs. Longbows
Considering the people of the medieval and ancient era managed to do stuff as complex as build Hagia Sophia, make Attic pottery and craft intricate jewellery, I think we can expect the average medieval bowyer to be able to make a pretty reliable bow. I suspect a trained archer could also adapt to a new bow of the same basic design pretty quickly.
I saw some program where a modern guy did horse archery and could fairly reliably hit a conventional archery target at 30 yards or so whilst the horse was moving. Also, if you consider an archer has to hit a block of infantry/cavalry however much wide and maybe 4-10 ranks deep, he's got a fair bit of room for inaccuracy. |
Re: Crossbows vs. Longbows
And then imagine that the ancient horse archer were born on horseback with a bow as their first toy, and I say would say accuracy would not be a problem. :)
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Re: Crossbows vs. Longbows
The English longbow did not need the years of training in order to get the archers to hit the target. It needed that to build up the muscles to pull a 120lbs+ longbow - resulting in bone deformities found on medieval skeletons.
And you needed that strength to punch through any armor. As comparison, modern bows are much lighter. Entry-level adult bows are usually around 40 lbs (pound force, 4.54N), the ones used by the average hobbyists are 60-80, be they of whatever type. 40-60lbs bows in the medieval were used by the womenfolk of castles - for hunting and last-ditch defense. And much less effective in combat - shorter range and penetrating power. I was shooting a 40lbs bow and it had hard time penetrate 1" pine from 20 yards or so, FWIW. OTOH. Get a crossbow and an average medieval youth, with strong muscles from physical work. Longbows have to be pulled by upper body, while crossbows are pulled by (stronger) leg muscles or windlass. You get the range and penetrating power (as in 80lbs+) you need without too much of training and could trump the range and power of any long bow with a crossbow strong enough. Granted, you need the resources to field 3 crossbowmen for each longbowmen for the same ROF - but they would need about the same amount of ammunition for comparable effect. Of course, if your king orders archery to be a national pastime for every commoner, and your society is suitable for it - e.g. a peasantry not oppressed as much as the serfs in continental Europe thus less likely to revolt - an island nation should go for longbow. Just my two cents. |
Re: Crossbows vs. Longbows
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And wouldn't you say a bike relies a lot on "mechanical aid?" Such that the level of inputs you put in to get a bike to work is much less than one you need to get a bow to "work." I think you are underestimating the raw fear that a battlefield instills in somebody. A musket is considered an easy to use weapon but there are plenty of instances where weapons have been found with multiple loads in them due to panic. Also you assume that a missed arrow that still hits somebody is the same quality of one that hits an intended target directly. The very nature of how an arrow leaves the bow has a great effect on its character. I think your assumption that the arrow wouldn't vary that much is too optimistic and the implication that an "off" arrow is just as good as a direct arrow is too ambitious as well. The rush and panic to pump out arrows is likely to mean that the archers aren't pulling as far as they need to leading to significant veering and falling short. Quote:
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@Agema and P3D Already addressed above and before as well. |
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