Crossbows vs. Longbows

[Agema]

Originally Posted by MachingunJoeTurbo

[
Incorrect. Guns and crossbows are so alike the conquistadors used them interchangeably in their accounts. The principles in their use are alike in the main ways I already mentioned. The advantages of a held missile weapon as to achieve greater frontage, rotating ranks, improved defensive posture, and so on. Guns in their use are evolution of the crossbows uses. The Maître des Arbalétriers in France eventually evolved to the Maître de l'artillerie for that reason.
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Addressed above.

No. Firearms replaced crossbows where crossbows were prevalent, and replaced bows where bows were prevalent. Early firearm usage more closely relates to the crossbow due to the fire rate and weapon shape, but that does not in any way mean it evolved from crossbows.

And why wouldn't they be as trained as a medieval longbowmen? And just as well disciplined? Are you seriously suggesting that a culture who had the longbow for hundreds and hundreds of years to the sophistication that they could make them from STEEL wouldn't have as good bows? LOL? And how good a bow do you need to penetrate a bright red jacket? And with the numbers they had they should have taken much more than a significant toll especially since at Assaye they had much more artillery and in fact the Indians had superior rocketry technology. But they didn't win. You are still operating on faith that English longbowmen were somehow special compared to EVERYBODY else on the planet.

Discipline, experience, morale and training etc. obviously have nothing to do with how long a culture has had a technology, and there's plenty of evidence the Indian archers of the period did not score highly on most of those counts.

The musket was superior to the longbow or crossbow, equally obviously. No-one's trying to claim bow-armed troops would casually massacre an army 400-500 years more advanced.

(And secondly, you previously said "bow wielding indigenous populations" from which we could infer Native Americans, Dervishes, or whoever else. Now you're just changing your argument to specify Indians.)

They were formed up they had TIME to hammer some stakes down. How prepared do those sorry jokers need to be? LOL! There were lot of archers as usual if the longbow was a rapid shooting crazy machine of awesomeness said cavalry would have been toast. But it didn't happen. Because they weren't as good as you think they are.

I don't think any archers on the planet, ever, could stop a heavy cavalry charge without adequate infantry support, a proper defensive position, or being on a horse themselves to move away. That applies to crossbows or longbows.

I think you are treating everyone arguing with you here as a "longbow fanboy" (in your own words). Your arguments amount to little more than misrepresenting us as if we think a few longbowmen instantly dominate any battlefield. As everyone has gone to great, great pains to state this is not the case, I do not understand why you persist with it. Until you wish to be reasonable, I don't see the point continuing this debate.

[MachingunJoeTurbo]

Originally Posted by Agema

No. Firearms replaced crossbows where crossbows were prevalent, and replaced bows where bows were prevalent. Early firearm usage more closely relates to the crossbow due to the fire rate and weapon shape, but that does not in any way mean it evolved from crossbows.

If you mean purely technology wise yes but in usage and essential principles they are on the same line which is how they could coexist in essentially the same breath until the firearm was refined.

Discipline, experience, morale and training etc. obviously have nothing to do with how long a culture has had a technology, and there's plenty of evidence the Indian archers of the period did not score highly on most of those counts.

This reasoning of yours is dubious and somewhat vague. There's nothing about the English medieval archer that would suggest they would surpass the Indian one on any of these aspects. If anything the Indian army had a more complex way of breaking down the chain of command.

The musket was superior to the longbow or crossbow, equally obviously. No-one's trying to claim bow-armed troops would casually massacre an army 400-500 years more advanced.

And if rate of shooting and the accuracy of those arrows were "good enough" as has been stated before by others this wouldn't be true because speed wise the musket is in the same ballpark as the crossbow and accuracy wise it is in many ways worse. That was what I was getting at.

(And secondly, you previously said "bow wielding indigenous populations" from which we could infer Native Americans, Dervishes, or whoever else. Now you're just changing your argument to specify Indians.)

I'm not changing anything as I've mentioned Indians specifically before.

I don't think any archers on the planet, ever, could stop a heavy cavalry charge without adequate infantry support, a proper defensive position, or being on a horse themselves to move away. That applies to crossbows or longbows.

Perhaps but one is very much more reliant of support and other factors than the other. I'll give you a hint it rhymes with "bong snow."

I think you are treating everyone arguing with you here as a "longbow fanboy" (in your own words). Your arguments amount to little more than misrepresenting us as if we think a few longbowmen instantly dominate any battlefield. As everyone has gone to great, great pains to state this is not the case, I do not understand why you persist with it. Until you wish to be reasonable, I don't see the point continuing this debate.

Even when arguments do not include "instantly dominating" they have cue words that try to wheedle something special out of them. You are all not a hive mind and like I said when I post I try to be comprehensive and remember all that has been said before by other people and not just who I'm quoting at the moment. And if you remember I was speaking of this phenomenon existing elsewhere as well. There have been elements of weirdness, the original post's assertion, the assumptions made by certain individuals about how arrows can behave, three arrows in a bird before it hits the ground and all that. Not all of you are in agreement. If fact the only thing you all agree on is acting like you all agree when talking to me.

[JimMorrison]

Originally Posted by MachingunJoeTurbo

Not all of you are in agreement. If fact the only thing you all agree on is acting like you all agree when talking to me.

Because the one thing that we all seem to agree on - is that you seem to be turning a personal preference into historical fact, and that your approach to expressing such has a tonality that makes people not want to agree with you from the start (re: immediate failure of an argument once the opposition has been called a fanboy, a homosexual, or a nazi).

[Agema]

Originally Posted by MachingunJoeTurbo

I would argue that history is on my side. After all you had "highly trained archers" shooting at European powers during colonialist and imperialist times.

And once more you had Europeans grossly outnumbered by bow wielding indigenous populations. Who won there is quite evident. You are still exaggerating the quality per arrow. There is no slightly. It has to be way way down. There is no other possible way they could literally MISS an UNARMORED dude that many times otherwise despite them being in nicely organized blobs.
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Were they highly trained? Well disciplined? Good morale? I'd suggest overwhelmingly they were not. Many also did not have (as) good bows. Or they did not use massed bowfire. In fact, several times those Indian longbowmen actually took a fair toll on the English in battles.

I continually point to Patay because you had a well rested troop of longbows outnumbering mere French scouts and they even had some stakes set up.

You continually misportray Patay. Firstly, the English were caught unprepared with barely the time to form up, which has doomed many armies. Secondly, what you dismissively call "scouts" were HEAVY CAVALRY. Thirdly, the English (5000) outnumbered the French (1500) as a whole, but in fact there were well under 1000 longbowmen, who had neither got their stakes up properly (which you half-concede), were not supported by melee troops, nor had their flanks secured.

Again I've already mentioned Constance, the Hussite Crusades, Burgundian Wars and so on. "Longbow success" had more to do with French failures than the longbow. Because when they stopped failing they started winning quite handily.

I severely doubt longbowmen were present in the Hussite crusades or Burgundian wars in significant numbers, or that the generals using them would be accustomed to their best usage, if indeed they even could get best usage given the relatively small number of them available.

And the system that works is the crossbow and what "evolved" from it so to speak. That's the military legacy that came to dominate the world, the simple firearm.

That's like saying railways evolved from canals. Firearms did not evolve from the crossbow or the bow.