volleys?

[VAE VICTUS]

ok if they made a total war in 1700-1800,how would they use volleys?
would each side fire at one another,ok im cant figure out how to word this,how would it decide who dies?cause in rtw i can have 120 egyptian archers firing at one phalanx of 80 men,and usually they dont inflict that many casualties.i dunno maybe this is a dumb question.ill post it anyway.
:charge: when all else fails charge

[Uesugi Kenshin]

I would guess that they would lose more men due to their lower armor values and higher attack. It would also probably retain the hit-detection and stat method of calculating hits.

[sharrukin]

ok if they made a total war in 1700-1800,how would they use volleys?
would each side fire at one another,ok im cant figure out how to word this,how would it decide who dies?cause in rtw i can have 120 egyptian archers firing at one phalanx of 80 men,and usually they dont inflict that many casualties.i dunno maybe this is a dumb question.ill post it anyway.
:charge: when all else fails charge

Muskets were not really better than bows. They have a slower rate of fire, a shorter range and are less accurate than bows.

"A late 18th century Prussian experiment, in which a battalion of infantry fired at a target 100 feet long by 6 feet high, representing an enemy unit resulted in 25% hits at 225 yards, 40% hits at 150 yards and 60% hits at 75 yards. Under the stress of battle the proportion of hits would inevitably decline. In 1717 at the battle of Belgrade 2 Imperial battalions held their fire until their turkish opponents were only 30 paces away, but hit only 32 turks when they fired and were promply overwhelmed."

"Prussian studies show that an infantry battalion could fire five shots in volley per minute, at an average rate of about two rounds per man per minute. While this put as much lead into the air as a modern machine gun, it did not mean that the fusillade hit as much, as during another musketry test conducted in 1813, another Prussian test battalion put just 40% of its shots into a target 6 feet high and 100 feet long at a range of 100 yards."

"However, there were no revolutionary improvements in the effectiveness of the firearm from one century to the next. It would be fair to say that, all else being equal, 100 skilled long bowmen from 14th century England could probably defeat 100 skilled British infantrymen using the Brown Bess Musket circa 1815 on open terrain. The longbow men could fire farther, faster and with as much or more accuracy, using an arrow which was every bit as lethal as the musket ball (depending on the range). Why then did the musket prevail over the long bow? It was simply much easier to train soldiers to use muskets effectively and these new weapons could be produced in a reliable quantity more cheaply and more efficiently than the long bow and its ammunition, the arrow."

"year 1712; The weapons made at the Tula aresenal in Russian were rifles rather than smoothbore muskets, and were accurate to about 100 yards. In this case, accuracy meant hitting a target 7 feet in diameter most of the time."

[cunctator]

But a Musket is a far more devastating weapon. The arrow of a good bow has a kinetic energy of only 60Joule compared to more than 3000J of a muskets bullet.

[Oaty]

Now imagine if the coumpound (not composite) bow was invented at the time in the rise guns.

[sharrukin]

But a Musket is a far more devastating weapon. The arrow of a good bow has a kinetic energy of only 60Joule compared to more than 3000J of a muskets bullet.

Well that is not entirely correct as about 1000 joules is closer to what the muskets would have had in the way of kinetic energy. Your point however is still valid. Kinetic energy is often used as the standard for projectile effectiveness, but a baseball (5.12 ounces moving at 50 mph) has 27 foot pounds (36 joules) of kinetic energy. This means it should be a reasonably effective battlefield weapon. An army equipping itself with baseballs based on this theory however would be in for a big shock.

Bear in mind that military changes do not always make sense and military men are just as susceptible to fashion trends as Paris designers. The difference is that idiotic military innovations tend to get straightened out on the battlefield.

Muskets are notoriously inaccurate, especially when compared to rifles, unlike arrows, musket balls have no fletching to keep them going straight, and unlike rifle bullets, they don't have any spin to stabilize them. Most military muskets in the flintlock age were in the range of .65-.75cal (16mm-19mm). At about 30 yards a musket ball will go clean through a man, even at 50 yards it may well pierce both breast & back plate of a pike man, the heavier musket balls were said to penetrate the front plat of a corselet at 100 yards.

Now, round ball ballistics are much worse than conical bullets. This means that the drag value and sectional density reduce the velocity at a much greater rate than a conical bullet or an arrow. A Brown Bess in excellent condition has a normal margin of error of 36" (3 feet) at 100yds. That is as good as it can ever get and is likely to be worse as most muskets would not be in optimal condition. At 500 yards assuming it could reach that far, and thats assuming a lot, the CEP, or circular error of probability would be 15 feet in diameter.

This explains the following quote;
"A soldier's musket, if not exceedingly ill bored, will strike the figure of a man at 80 yards; it may even at 100; but a soldier must be very unfortunate indeed who shall be wounded...at 150 yards, provided his antagonist aims at him; I do maintain...no man was ever killed at 200 yards, by a common soldier's musket by the person who aimed at him."

- British Col. George Hanger, 1814

The Brigade of Foot Guards saw service in the American Colonial Rebellion (AKA The American Revolution) where they used the Long Land Pattern Musket (Long Land Pattern, 1st Model, Brown Bess 1742 version, 46” barrel, .75 caliber firing .69 calibre ball) while most of the army had converted to the Short Land Pattern musket.

A Brown Bess loaded with 80 grains of Fg powder and a .69 caliber ball (494 grain) has a muzzle velocity of 809 fps and a kinetic energy of 718 foot-pounds and at 100 yards it's 680 fps and 507 foot-pounds. This again is with modern powder, modern safety engineering and closer tolerances.

The muzzle loading .58 caliber Springfield rifled musket used in the American civil war had a muzzle energy of a 1,000 foot pounds (1356 joules). The .45 caliber Dixie Percussion Rifle with a light 128 grain lead sphere has 1,100 foot pounds (1491 joules) of muzzle energy. By the time the ball reaches a 100 yd., it was good for slightly more than 300 foot-pounds (406 joules) of energy. At 100 yards a .54 caliber round ball from a Marlin MLS-54 rifled musket with a 28" barrel will deliver over 520 Ft/lbs (705 joules) of energy with a 110 grain powder charge. These are using high quality modern black powders such as Pyrodex RS powder, Goex FFFg, and Pyrodex 60-grain.

Once muskets came along, you could stick a musket in the hands of a recruit with a few months training and tell him to point it at the enemy. Poorly (also quick and cheap) trained troops felt safer no having to close with the enemy, and being far from the enemy were more willing to participate. A musket ball needs far less training behind it to deal some pretty savage wounds. This meant you could raise a force of musketeers much faster than crossbowmen, and longbowmen or composite bows took even longer. Manpower costs would also have been a deciding factor. Less well trained men could use the musket and be disbanded or raised quickly which is not possible with crossbows or bowmen. A standing militia can allow the bowmen to be trained in peacetime but it requires that you trust them not to turn these weapons on your own government and has its own costs as well. Bowmen were required to be physically fit, less so for crossbows while muskets can be fired by physically weaker men.

The volume of fire at close range was more important than accuracy, and muzzle loading smoothbores are much faster loading than rifles were. The maximum useful range of today's more powerful replica muzzle loading rifles is approximately 200 yards and these are manufactured with a quality control that could not hope to be equalled in the 17th and 18th century. Modern muzzle loaders are well made and very strong. Most use superior Pyrodex loose powders rather than replica black powder. Fouling becomes a problem for muskets after firing for more than a few minutes say half a dozen rounds to a dozen rounds. For example the powder used by the Mexican forces in 1836 was inferior to modern powders. The Texans used to superior American produced black powder found the Mexican powder to be of such low quality that many considered it useless. The black powder created a large amount of fouling in the barrel that impeded the loading of subsequent shots, more so with lower quality powder which tends not to burn as completely as better powder does. To compensate for this, Mexican soldiers used an undersized ball of .69 caliber to facilitate loading when the bore got fouled. The point of this of course is that evidence indicates that musket balls in this era were much more undersize than those that are used today, which would affect velocity, range and accuracy.

A bullet fired from a black powder musket could penetrate all but the strongest armor and so a massed cavalry charge would take considerable losses against relatively cheap and replaceable infantry. The noise and smoke produced by muskets was also a useful factor that demoralized the enemy. The smoke did tend to obscure the enemy but given the poor accuracy of the musket and the massed linear formations used for volley fire it was probably not that big of a problem. the poor powder quality of the day, loose fitting musket balls, lack of sights, and poorly trained infantrymen tended to make the musket a very inaccurate weapon. One very good study suggests that volley fire against enemy formations under 200 yards over open ground would average between .5 to 5.5% of the rounds fired actually striking its intended target. That is why some experienced officers had their troops hold their fire until the enemy was as close as 40 yards. With "buck and ball." which was a standard musket ball loaded with at least three buckshot added for pattern spread the musket was dangerous at a 100 yards and lethal at 40.

Kinetic energy is the power as measured in foot-pounds or joules of an object in motion upon impact. When referring to the kinetic energy of archery equipment, the velocity and arrow weight determine foot-pounds of energy. Penetration power is assisted by a heavy weight arrow with a smaller diameter bodkin head which increases the point impact foot-pounds per square inch. The heavier the arrow, the more energy it delivers at any given speed. kinetic energy does not mean penetrative power in and of itself. This is demonstrated by a .45 ACP round (with a 230 grain full metal jacket) fired from a modern Colt handgun at a bucket filled with sand. The .45 ACP round 835fps will not penetrate completely through the bucket. A 550 grain broadhead-tipped arrow at 200 feet per second will. Why? The arrow is what is known as a 'long rod penetrator' and the shape is used in the 120mm APFSDS rounds in the M1 Abrams tank gun used by the American army. The arrow penetrates the sand bucket due to its forward momentum which is enough to overcome the friction cause by the sand.

The bullet has kinetic energy, and lots of it, but it doesn't actually mass much, and when it hits, it immediately dumps most of its energy into the target. It has to do with the fact that energy is much more easily transferred, converted to other forms, and deflected, than mass is. The bullet makes a hole, but it propagates a shock wave that does a great deal of the damage, and loses energy into the shock wave when it does, sort of like a re-entry vehicle dumping speed by converting it to heat and losing it into the atmosphere. The wound cavities caused by such a shockwave tend to stop a target faster than an arrow would.

But an arrow moves slower, and doesn't come apart on impact, and when it hits, the entire mass is in line behind a very small cross section, resulting in a high point load; the energy doesn't get dumped into the target, but stays in the shaft, which just keeps on going, because the energy isn't dispersed into the mass of the target.

If the the total energy stored by a bow is constant then the only way to increase lethality is to increase efficiency. That is how much of the allotted energy is transmitted to the arrow. Such things as bow vibration, proper release, and the bowstring make a big difference.

The formula is: fps squared times weight (in grains) divided by 450240 = foot-pounds in kinetic energy
(Arrow Weight in Grains) X (Velocity) X (Velocity) / 450240= ft/lbs.

So a 400 grain arrow at 240 fps: 240x240x400 / 450240= 51.172708 rounded to 51.2 ft/lbs energy
A 10% increase in arrow speed 240 fps x 1.1 = 264fps becomes 400x264x264 / 450240= 61.919 or 61.9 foot-pounds in kinetic energy
This is almost a 21% increase in kinetic energy for a 10% increase in arrow velocity. Efficiency matters!
Also;
540-grain arrow shot at 220 fps will produce 58.05 ft/lbs.
390-grain arrow shot at 260 fps will produce 58.56 ft/lbs.

A light arrow from a heavy bow, say a sixty-five pound yew bow, travels at an initial velocity of one hundred and fifty feet per second. The striking force of a one-ounce arrow shot from a seventy-five pound bow at ten yards, is twenty-five foot pounds. This test is made by shooting at a cake of paraffin and comparing the penetration with that made by falling weights. Such a striking force is, of course, insignificant when compared with that of a modern bullet, viz., three thousand foot pounds. Yet the damage done by an arrow armed with a sharp steel broad-head is often greater than that done by a bullet.

Interesting passage;
"To test a steel bodkin pointed arrow such as was used at the battle of Cressy, I borrowed a shirt of chain armor from the Museum, a beautiful specimen made in Damascus in the 15th Century. It weighed twenty-five pounds and was in perfect condition. One of the attendants in the Museum offered to put it on and allow me to shoot at him. Fortunately, I declined his proffered services and put it on a wooden box, padded with burlap to represent clothing.

Indoors at a distance of seven yards, I discharged an arrow at it with such force that sparks flew from the links of steel as from a forge.

The bodkin point and shaft went through the thickest portion of the back, penetrated an inch of wood and bulged out the opposite side of the armor shirt. The attendant turned a pale green. An arrow of this type can be shot about two hundred yards, and would be deadly up to the full limit of its flight. "

Studies recommend that an arrow deliver 25 to 39 foot-pounds of energy to kill animals with thin hides and light bones (humans). First, one must realize that a target shot with an arrow will die from blood loss or hemorrhaging as arrows leave behind them a cutting swath. Arrows, unlike bullets, have relatively little kinetic energy on impact rather when an arrow penetrates an animal, the broadhead, or "pointy sharp end" continues to lacerate the inside of the target quite a bit. The result is extreme hemorrhaging which causes blood loss depriving the target creature of oxygen for the brain causing unconsciousness before death.

An 80 lbs compound bow delivers a 660-grain hunting arrow, leaves the string at 245 fps (feet per second), with about 88 foot pounds of kinetic energy. To compare a .270 Winchester, with a 130-grain bullet leaves the muzzle at 3,100 fps with well over 2,500 foot pounds of energy. When you compare 88 foot pounds to 2,500+ foot pounds, it’s easy to see why the impact of a hunting arrow means virtually nothing in terms of knockdown power on a target. A firearm relies on tissue damage and hydrostatic shock created by bullet impact to dispatch an animal. High velocity projectiles such as a bullet impart tremendous energy to a target creating what is called hydrostatic shock. Hydrostatic shock caused by the impact of a musket ball can easily cause a heart attack.

You will notice that in the formula for kinetic energy the velocity is squared, but this is not the case for the momentum formula. Rather equal value is given to both weight and speed and this explain why a heavy arrow will penetrate better than lighter flight arrows. Projectiles with a lower momentum like arrows may have difficulty penetrating barriers which higher momentum projectiles will not.

Momentum = Mass x Velocity.
Weight (grains) divided by 7,000 = pounds divide again by 32 (force of gravity) = 'slugs' X fps (feet per second) = 'slug-feet per second'
So we take our 540-grain arrow shot at 220 fps and our 390-grain arrow shot at 260 fps and plug them into the equation.
540 /7000=0.0771428 and again by /32 = 0.0024107 'slugs' X 220fps = 0.5303571 rounded to .53 slug/fps momentum
390 /7000=0.0557142 and again by /32 =0.001741 'slugs' X 260fps = 0.4526785 rounded to .45 slug/fps momentum
So for exactly or close to exactly the same kinetic energy the heavier arrow will have a significant advantage in penetration. This is without consideration of the type of arrowhead used. Broadheads will cut through an unarmoured target with less resistance than those with a diamond or pyramid points (bodkins). An arrow that is long in relation to its width will penetrate easier than one that is short and stubby (long rod penetrator ).

Another example would be shooting at a suit of armour. If the arrow does not have enough momentum the arrow will simply bounce off. That is it will have zero penetration no matter how much kinetic energy the arrow had. However as velocity helps to determine momentum the greater the kinetic energy the more momentum it is likely to have.

Now we have one other consideration. Our army equipped with baseballs has been told that they have a 1.31 slug-feet/sec of momentum and therefore the armoured knights facing our brave heroes had best be wary. Right? Well no! A baseball volley against armoured knights would, if you have not already guessed it, bounce off. If any of them survive I imagine they might want a word, up close and personal, with the weapons developers.

What we now need to consider is Sectional density. This passage explains it very well;

"I liken it to a woman in heels. Personally, I would MUCH rather have my foot stepped on by a 250lb man in work boots, than a 125lb woman in heels! Assuming the force is distributed evenly across the surface area of each, the "concentration" of this force is SIGNIFICANTLY higher in the high-heel than in the flat workboot (For example: MY size 11 1/2 boots have a heel that is ~4"X4" or 16sqin. My wifes heels are ~1"X1" AT BEST! This would equate to a coeficient of 15.625 for the boots, but 125 or more for the heels!) "

Another example would be a 140lb man falling off a bed would yield about the same amount of kinetic energy as a bullet fired by a handgun.

Sectional Density = Weight /Diameter with Weight being measured in pounds and diameter measured in inches.
Any given projectile striking a smaller will have more of its momentum conserved thus aiding penetration.
All factors being equal a denser projectile will always penetrate more effectively than a lighter one. This is the reason for the use of Depleted Uranium rounds in military forces.
Sectional density is measured in pounds per square inch or psi.

Sectional density is why the arrow passes through the sand bucket while the bullet is stopped by it. The arrow is denser than a bullet, which means the momentum is conserved more efficiently than in the bullet.
The baseball, with its high kinetic energy and momentum, has a sectional density of only .039 lbs/in. The weight is spread out over such a large area that the momentum is easy to stop, meaning there is no penetration.

[Fragony]

ok if they made a total war in 1700-1800,how would they use volleys?
would each side fire at one another,ok im cant figure out how to word this,how would it decide who dies?cause in rtw i can have 120 egyptian archers firing at one phalanx of 80 men,and usually they dont inflict that many casualties.i dunno maybe this is a dumb question.ill post it anyway.
:charge: when all else fails charge

The effectiveness lies in the formation, a line of guns would beat a square because more are able to shoot, but a line is prone for a cavalry charge. It was a different type of warfare.