Crossbows vs. Longbows

[cleveland]

On the original question of armor penetration, I think it's really a Terminal Ballistics issue.

Neither the arrow nor bolt would be rotating (like a rifle bullet) so the longer arrow would be more subject to yawing & pitching than the bolt. Therefore, upon impact, the arrow would have a significantly higher chance of striking the target "off-center" with respect to the flightpath.

An off-center strike would cause the missile to deflect and/or shatter, significantly decreasing armor penetration...so a short bolt has a much higher chance of reliably penetrating armor.

But since the arrows & bolts have roughly the same kinetic energy, a proper arrow strike would be expected to penetrate armor, when it (rarely) occurs. This is how English Longbows were deployed, if I recall correctly: overcome the low chance of penetration by blotting out the sun with arrows. Something like a half-million arrows were fired at Crecy.

This seems to be well modeled in Dom3, with the DRN randomness.

I personally think a much more egregious oversight is that the Lance is not AP...this thing is the quintessential kinetic penetrator...

[Horst F. JENS]

Originally Posted by cleveland

On the original question of armor penetration, I think it's really a Terminal Ballistics issue.

Neither the arrow nor bolt would be rotating (like a rifle bullet) so the longer arrow would be more subject to yawing & pitching than the bolt.

Actually, arrows (and bolts) are rotating. That's the reason you put the little feathers on the end of an arrow (usually 3 feathers for an arrow, 2 for an bolt). The feathers are slightly curved to give the projectile a spin in flight. This spin stabilize the flight.


As for armor-penetration, different arrow tips are used even today for different purpose. There exist hunting arrow tips (three or two razor-sharp bladed to cause flesh wounds), "sport" tips (cone) to penetrate (not too much) a target and blunt tips for bird hunting (stun rather then kill).

I have once seen historical special designed "armor-penetrating" arrows... those things had practically a pyramidal-shaped steel needle on it's top. Certainly not cheap or easy to produce.

Possible solution for Dom3 regarding armor-piercing longbowmen:


Create a new unit type "Elite Longbowmen" with armor-piercing longbows. Damage still lower than a crossbow but AP. Good stats, but more resource and gold cost than a "normal" longbowmen.


Off-topic fact:
bowmen used to urinate on the arrows to cause infected wounds.

[Gregstrom]

Originally Posted by Horst F. JENS

I have once seen historical special designed "armor-penetrating" arrows... those things had practically a pyramidal-shaped steel needle on it's top. Certainly not cheap or easy to produce.

You mean bodkin-heads? The cruder examples look a bit like a medieval nail with a socket at the base. I'm hardly an expert, but I'd have thought that the various barbed arrowheads would take more time to make.

[Horst F. JENS]

Originally Posted by Gregstrom

You mean bodkin-heads? The cruder examples look a bit like a medieval nail with a socket at the base. I'm hardly an expert, but I'd have thought that the various barbed arrowheads would take more time to make.

You are right. So bodkin arrows should cost less resource and do less damage than "normal" arrows, but bodkin arrows should be armor-piercing.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bodkin_point